National Day of Action to Support Seattle Teachers' Test Boycott

“We demand quality assessment!”

Wear Red on Wed for Ed!  Scrap the MAP!

*Join the event on Facebook!*

Click here for a list of events

Supporters will hold meetings, press conferences, rallies, take photos, and wear red to show support

Contact: scrapthemap@yahoo.com

For more info, visit:
http://scrapthemap.wordpress.com/

What: Educators, Students, Parents and supporters of Public Education nation-wide will take action in support of Garfield High School teachers and all teachers in Seattle Public Schools refusing to administer the MAP test.

Teachers at Garfield High School and other Seattle Public Schools have gained national attention and support for their stand against the Measure of Academic Progress, for its invalidity, waste of time and resources and its scandalous arrival to Seattle.  We call on supporters of public education nationwide to participate in actions in their locale to show their support for our effort to Scrap the MAP.  Supporters will hold meetings, rallies, take photos, and wear red to show support on February 6^th. 

What You Need to Know About the Seattle Teachers' Rebellion and the Deeply Flawed Test That Inspired It | Alternet

What You Need to Know About the Seattle Teachers' Rebellion and the Deeply Flawed Test That Inspired It | Alternet

School "reformers" have it wrong

The school reform dialogue is frequently centered upon the executive role of Principals. Advocates such as Michelle Rhee assert that Principals and other leaders should be able to select teachers, dismiss teachers, and design instruction through their control of teachers. The Broad Foundation has particularly advanced this viewpoint through their training of business executives as district superintendents.  These self described “reformers” have it wrong.  Their view is fundamentally in error. That may be one of the big reasons it is not working. 

The argument for this extraordinary role for principle leadership comes from two sources, ideological assertions that hide a particular view of learning and a model of the role of  principals based upon models of directions and management  from private industry.  This model is inappropriate for public schools and professional teachers.  The “reformers” have not learned the basic  role and functions of democracy in public education.

In  private industry and commerce a leader is in charge  because the goal of the

Institution is to make profit.   The leader is empowered to make decisions to maximize profit. this is a part of the complete domination of work life in the private sector by authoritarian structures.  Private industry usually  is not a democratic environment.  Workers do not have the right  to decide how to do their work.  They are to follow orders or leave.

School budgets improve, remain lower than 2007.

Important report on the state budget. State spending per K-12 student will rise in the current (2012-13) fiscal year and in 2013-14 due to voter approval of two revenue measures – Proposition 30 and Proposition 39 – last November, according to the Governor’s proposed 2013-14 budget. Yet even with this increase, per student state support for public schools will remain much lower than the 2007-08 level, after adjusting for inflation.

The full report is at

http://californiabudgetbites.org/2013/01/28/key-facts-about-the-governors-proposed-budget-part-3-spending-per-student-rises-due-to-new-revenues-but-still-faces-a-long-climb-back/

Teacher boycott of standardized tests spreads

Teacher boycott of standardized test in Seattle spreads Valerie Strauss January 26, 2013 The Washington Post   A boycott of Washington state’s mandated standardized test by teachers at a Seattle school is spreading to other schools and winning support across the country, including from the two largest teachers’ unions, parents, students, researchers and educators.     , ,     A boycott of Washington state’s mandated standardized test by teachers at a Seattle school is spreading to other schools and winning support across the country, including from the two largest teachers’ unions, parents, students, researchers and educators. The decision by teachers at Garfield High School to boycott the state’s Measures of Academy Progress because, they say, the exams don’t evaluate learning and are a waste of time is fueling a growing debate about the misuse of standardized tests in public education.

Common Core Standards are change - not reform

The Common Core: Educational Redeemer or Rainmaker?

 by Julie L. Pennington ,Kathryn M. Obenchain ,Aimee Papola & Leia Kmitta — October 12, 2012

The Common Core State Standards are poised to guide U.S. educational practice and assessment for the coming years. This commentary examines the framing of the argument for the new standards by the constructors of the CCSS and how the alignment of resources during the implementation phase is tightly ensconced within the organizations who drafted the standards.

Framing education as in need of additional rigor and collective cohesion, the Common Core State Standards (CCSS) are now promoted as a redeemer for educational reform while No Child Left Behind quietly fades into the background.  As states are currently invited to pursue “relief from provisions of …(NCLB)” (http://www.ed.gov/esea/flexibility), the CCSS are poised to preside over a movement to (what are self-described as) more rigorous, more communal and more state-led standards and assessments (http://www.corestandards.org/).

Gov. Brown's view on school improvement

State of the State. Governor Brown. Jan. 24, 2013.

Constantly expanding the coercive power of government by adding each year so many minute prescriptions to our already detailed and turgid legal system overshadows other aspects of public service. Individual creativity and direct leadership must also play a part. We do this, not by commanding thou shalt or thou shalt not through a new law but by tapping into the persuasive power that can inspire and organize people. Lay the Ten Commandments next to the California Education code and you will see how far we have diverged in approach and in content from that which forms the basis of our legal system.

Education

In the right order of things, education—the early fashioning of character and the formation of conscience—comes before legislation. Nothing is more determinative of our future than how we teach our children. If we fail at this, we will sow growing social chaos and inequality that no law can rectify.

In California’s public schools, there are six million students, 300,000 teachers—all subject to tens of thousands of laws and regulations. In addition to the teacher in the classroom, we have a principal in every school, a superintendent and governing board for each school district. Then we have the State Superintendent and the State Board of Education, which makes rules and approves endless waivers—often of laws which you just passed. Then there is the Congress which passes laws like “No Child Left Behind,” and finally the Federal Department of Education, whose rules, audits and fines reach into every classroom in America, where sixty million children study, not six million.

Why does race, ethnicity matter in public schools ?

Start at about 24 minutes into the recording.
Diversity Forum:  Why Race and Culture Still Matter
Keynote Speaker: Dr. Tyrone Howard

December 5, 2012
California State University, Fullerton
Access the Full Video: 
http://distance-ed.fullerton.edu/bbpresentations/Diversity_Forum_12-5-2012/player.html

Why do many reporters miss the story on the realities of school change ?

How the media distorts the issues in the public school debates.  

  Reporters who are not experts on schools too often  rely upon the wisdom of selected “spokespersons” and other elites. 

They have been sold a framework of  a corporate view of accountability. Corporate sponsored networks and think tanks such as the the Thomas B. Fordham Institute, the Broad Foundation,  the Bradley Foundation, the Pacific Research Institute,  and the Olin Foundation provide “experts” prepared to give an opinion on short notice to meet a reporters deadline.  Most reporters assume that these notables are telling the truth when in fact they are promoting a particular propaganda such as in the film “Waiting for Superman”.  Who do they not talk with?  They fail to interview experienced teachers and professionals who have worked for decades to improve the quality of inner city schools.

The Obama Administration’s appointment of Arne Duncan was symptomatic of the problem.  He represents the  kind of corporate/media approach to reform.   So, reporters can go to the corporate funded foundations and provide “balance” by asking the appointees of the government- they get the same story.  In particular recently they have been turning to the Gates and Broad Foundations  or the conservative Democrats for Education Reform and Michelle Rhee.  

 What the foundations and the Billionaires Boy’s Clubs are saying is fundamentally misleading.  They are deliberately distorting the story.  However reporters think that these foundations have smart people so they must know what they are talking about.  See Diane Ravitch.  The Death and Life of the Great American School System: How Testing and Choice Are Undermining Education. 2010.

Teachers support stronger laws to curb gun violence in schools

Educators support stronger laws to prevent gun violence says NEA poll

NEA President: common sense gun safety laws to keep children safe are paramount

WASHINGTON - January 15, 2013 -

Results of a new poll by the National Education Association (NEA) show educators support stronger gun laws to prevent gun violence and keep children safe. The poll comes as the White House is scheduled today to make public the recommendations of a task force led by Vice President Biden. 

The poll of the nation’s teachers, faculty and education support professionals comes one month after the shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Conn., that claimed the lives of 20 children and 6 adults, including educators. NEA polled 800 of its members nationwide during the period of January 9-10, 2013.

“The senseless tragedy in Newtown was a tipping point and galvanization for action,” said NEA President Dennis Van Roekel. “As educators, we have grieved too long and too often—for the children killed, their families and heroic educators. Now more than ever we need to do what is necessary, including enacting stronger laws to prevent gun violence, to make sure every child in our nation’s public schools has a safe and secure learning environment.” 

Key Findings:

◦                Educators overwhelmingly support stronger laws to prevent gun violence.  Nearly two-thirds (64 percent) of NEA members polled feel gun laws in the U.S. should be made stricter, compared to 7 percent who believe they should be less strict.

◦                 NEA members polled support background checks and bans on assault weapons and high capacity magazine clips. 

Cornel West and anti poverty tour.

DSA Chair Cornel West and others speak out strongly against poverty. Cornel at his best.  http://www.c-span.org/Events/Tavis-Smiley-Hosts-Symposium-Vision-for-a-New-America/10737437312-2/

Martin Luther King Jr. and Economic Justice

Martin Luther King, Economic Justice, Workers’ Rights,

and Multiracial Democracy

by Thomas Jackson

In 1968, a united black community in Memphis stepped forward to support 1,300

municipal sanitation workers as they demanded higher wages, union recognition, and respect for

black personhood embodied in the slogan “I Am a Man!” Memphis’s black women organized tenant

and welfare unions, discovering pervasive hunger among the city’s poor and black children. They

demanded rights to food and medical care from a city and medical establishment blind to their

existence. That same month, March 1968, 100 grassroots organizations met in Atlanta to support

Martin Luther King’s dream of a poor people’s march on Washington. They pressed concrete demands for economic justice under the slogan “Jobs or Income Now!” King celebrated the “determination by poor people of all colors” to win their human rights. “Established powers of rich America have deliberately exploited poor people by isolating them in ethnic, nationality, religious and racial groups,” the delegates declared.

So when King came to Memphis to support the strike, a local labor and community struggle became intertwined with his dream of mobilizing a national coalition strong enough to reorient national priorities from imperial war in Vietnam to domestic reconstruction, especially in America’s riot-torn cities. To non-poor Americans, King called for a “revolution of values,” a move from self-seeking to service, from property rights to human rights.

King’s assassination—and the urban revolts that followed—led to a local Memphis settlement that furthered the cause of public employee unionism. The Poor People’s March nonviolently won small concessions in the national food stamp program. But reporters covered the bickering and squalor in the poor people’s tent city, rather than the movement’s detailed demands for waging a real war on poverty. Marchers wanted guaranteed public employment when the private sector failed, a raise in the federal minimum wage, a national income floor for all families, and a national commitment to reconstruct cities blighted by corporate disinvestment and white flight. And they wanted poor people’s representation in urban renewal and social service programs that had customarily benefited only businesses or the middle class. King’s dreams reverberated back in the movements that had risen him up.

School discipline reform - not arming teachers

School Discipline Reform Groups Question Proposals for Armed Security  By Susan Ferriss

 As the White House considers proposals to allocate federal money for armed guards in schools, prominent school-discipline reform groups have issued a report denouncing the idea as a misguided reaction to the Newtown school shooting.

“Placing more police in schools has significant and harmful unintended consequences for young people that must be considered before agreeing to any proposal that would increase the presence of law enforcement in schools,” says an issue brief released Friday by the Advancement Project, Dignity in Schools and other organizations.

If they arm teachers.

If they arm teachers.

Then, teachers  in California deserve Public Safety Officer pay, and Public Safety Officer pensions.  Do you wish to discuss this ?  That would mean a 30 -50% increase in pay and pensions.

Aaron Swartz's Family Condemns MIT and U.S. Government

Internet activist killed himself a month before going
on trial for what family calls 'an alleged crime that
had no victims'

Matt Williams
The Guardian
January 13, 2013
http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2013/jan/13/aaron-swartz-family-mit-government

The family of celebrated internet activist Aaron Swartz
has accused prosecutors and MIT officials of being
complicit in his death, blaming the apparent suicide on
the pursuit of a young man over "an alleged crime that
had no victims".

In a statement released late Saturday, Swartz's parents,
Robert and Susan, siblings Noah and Ben and partner
Taren Stinebrickner-Kauffman said the Redditt builder's
demise was not just a "personal tragedy" but "the
product of a criminal justice system rife with
intimidation and prosecutorial overreach".

It's a New Year, Let's Build New Schools | California Progress Report

It's a New Year, Let's Build New Schools | California Progress Report

Rhee's Student First rates school districts based upon ideology

Laura Clawson. Daily Kos/Labor 

Michelle Rhee continues her descent into parody. You might have thought that teaching students to read would be a good way to evaluate educational performance, but no. Rhee's StudentsFirst organization has released a report card grading states—on their education policies, not their educational results. In fact, not one of the states StudentsFirst ranks in the top five is in the top half of states on the National Assessment of Educational Progress, "the nation's report card," when it comes to eighth grade reading scores, and only one is in the top half when it comes to eighth grade math.

• Louisiana is the top-rated state, according to StudentsFirst. It ranks 49th of 51 on eighth grade reading scores and 47th of 51 on eighth grade math scores.
• Florida is StudentsFirst's second-best state according to ideology. According to educational results, Florida is 35th on reading and 42nd on math.
• StudentsFirst says Indiana is third. The "nation's report card" says it's 30th on reading and 23rd on math.
• The District of Columbia, where Rhee had her way from 2007 to 2010, comes in fourth according to Rhee's ranking system. According to the NAEP? Dead last.
• Rhode Island is fifth in Rhee-land. It's 29th in both reading and math on the NAEP.

By contrast, of the 11 states Rhee rates as having the worst policies for education, three are in the top six for eighth grade reading scores on the NAEP, and four more are in the top 20. Another contrast: The three highest-scoring states on reading are Massachusetts, New Jersey, and Connecticut. Rhee scores them 14th, 21st and 18th.

Multicultural Education Conference for Teaches

Mexican American History Again Left Out

Mexican Americans will be left out – again.  When the  teachers and the profession gets around to writing Common Core Standards in History and Social Studies we can anticipate that they will again fail to include Mexican American history.  How do we know this?

 Major discussions in education circles now focus on Common Core Standards which are an attempt to get some agreements on what level of achievement all states can expect from their students.  Until now, all such standards were in the states.  There was no national common core. ( See ASCD)

Common core standards  have been established in Math and Literacy and are producing major changes in curriculum across the nation.  There are no Common Core standards in History or Social Studies. In these disciplines we continue to have state standards only.

History standards in Texas, Arizona, and California, among others, lack the inclusion of even the most minimal history of Mexican American people.  In California the state standards are based upon the state History/Social Science Framework which was drafted in 1986 and is nearly totally devoid of Mexican American History.  (Campbell ,2012)

https://sites.google.com/site/chicanodigital/home/why-california-students-do-not-know-chicano-history

Mexican American have been left out up to this date (2013), and the history profession has less diversity and less inclusion in their course work than they did in the 1990s.  Ethnic studies and Mexican American history has less influence.  We can therefore predict that when committees get together they will continue the practices of the past- that is exclusion.

  Lets look at California.   California has the largest population of any state, with more than 6,191,000  students  in school in 2009. 

Fiscal Cliff Created by Republican Irresponsibility

This article by Democratic strategist Robert Creamer, author of Stand Up Straight: How Progressives Can Win, is cross-posted from HuffPo:

 If your tax bill goes up $2,200 a year, or you're one of the millions who would stop receiving unemployment benefits, the cause of your economic pain is not some a natural disaster, or a major structural flaw in the economy. The cause is Republican fear of being beaten in a primary by people like Sarah Palin, Sharon Angel or Richard Mourdock - funded by far Right Wing oligarchs like Sheldon Adelson and the Koch Brothers. It's that simple.

Most normal Americans will have very little patience with Republicans as they begin to realize that GOP Members of Congress are willing to risk throwing the country back into a recession because they are worried about being beaten in low turn out primaries by people who do a better job than they do appealing to the extreme right fringe of the American electorate - and to the far Right plutocrats that are all too willing to stoke right wing passion and anger.

Share My Lessons

www.sharemylesson.com Share My Lesson

Singapore's 21st-Century Teaching Strategies (Education Everywhere Series)

NAME Conference for teachers and communities

First Nations - Hunger Strike for justice

Chief Theresa Spence on 14th day of hunger
strike - Craig Brown, staff writer


http://www.commondreams.org/headline/2012/12/24-1

The 'Idle No More' movement, a campaign of grassroots
First Nations protests, has spread like wildfire over
the past week in response to bills passed by the
conservative Canadian government.

First Nations protesters march towards Parliament Hill
during a demonstration as part of the spreading 'Idle
No More' movement in Ottawa, Canada, December 21,
2012. REUTERS/Chris Wattie Anger to the recently
passed C-45, the Harper government omnibus budget
bill, has fueled the growing movement.

Bil C-45 includes changes to the Canadian Indian Act
regarding how reserve lands are managed, making them
easier to develop and be taken away from the First
Nation people.

The bill also removes thousands of lakes and streams
from the list of federally protected bodies of water.

NRA position "irresponsible and dangerous" - Teachers' Union head

Two leading teachers unions came out strongly against a proposal Friday by the National Rifle Association to place armed police officers at the nation's schools.

The suggestion by Wayne LaPierre, the chief lobbyist for the National Rifle Association, came in an eagerly anticipated news conference that broke the organization's week-long silence since the school shooting in Newtown, Conn., that took the lives of 26 people at the school.

"The only thing that stops a bad guy with a gun is a good guy with a gun," LaPierre said, in an appearance that many pundits quickly declared a disaster.

Randi Weingarten, head of the 1.5 million-member American Federation of Teachers, immediately called LaPierre's proposal "irresponsible and dangerous."

What schools need. ( hint. not armed police)

Greg Kaufmann on December 19, 2012 - 11:37 AM ET

A Broader, Bolder Christmas: Top Ten “Gifts” for Under the (Education Policy) Tree

Co-authored with Elaine Weiss

10. A Roof Over Every Student’s Head: Children who lack stable homes are more anxious and less focused than their peers who have adequate housing. They are also at higher risk for poor health and developmental problems, and have lower educational attainment. There is no reason why any child in the United States should not enjoy stable housing. Moreover, we end up paying more for children to sleep in cars or in shelters than we would to provide their families with apartments. It’s time to fund the National Housing Trust Fund that was signed into law by President George W. Bush but never funded.

9. School Breakfast and Lunch for All Eligible Students: Children who are hungry have difficulty concentrating and an impaired learning ability. The recession raised already unacceptable levels of child food insecurity to crisis levels. In Ohio, one in four children was at risk of going hungry in 2012. More than half of surveyed teachers told Share our Strength that they buy food to feed their hungry students. Eating school breakfasts is associated with increased math and reading scores, improved speed and memory in cognitive tests, stronger academic performance, and improved attendance and punctuality.  It’s time for schools to adopt policies like universal breakfast and breakfast in the classroom.

School alternatives to suspension.

New state law as of Jan.1, schools must seek alternatives to suspension.  One alternative is called Restorative Justice.
Teachers, administrators, FYI

What Does AB 1729 Do And How Does It Help Students?

1.     Sets out the legislature’s intent that alternatives to suspension and expulsion should be used and school exclusion should be avoided and recognizes that vulnerable student groups are receiving the brunt of all discipline removals in California!  This is important because it tells school districts who are using harsh and punitive out-of-school discipline and giving more punishments to students of color and others that state law does not support this and that they need to change their practices.  Here are a few things that the legislature said:

—  “The overuse of school suspension and expulsion undermines the public policy of this state and does not result in safer school environments or improved pupil behavior.”

—  “School suspension and expulsion are disproportionately imposed on pupils of color, pupils with disabilities, lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender pupils, and other vulnerable pupil populations.”

—  “Research has found that nonpunitive classroom discipline . . . are more effective and efficient than suspension and expulsion for addressing the majority of pupil misconduct.”

—  “The public policy of this state is to provide effective interventions for pupils . . .  avoid exclusion from school.”

2.     Requires other means of correction be used and FAIL prior to “in-school suspension” in addition to “out-of-school suspension”.  This is important because we want to be sure that schools are working to teach students how to correct their behavior and re-integrate into the school community before they lose valuable instruction time.

The Teachers of Newtown

The Hero Teachers of Newtown

by Diane Ravitch

This much is clear: the teachers and staff at the Sandy Hook
Elementary School reacted with astonishing courage to the
unthinkable, the terrifying intrusion of a man intent on
murdering them and their students. With no thought of
their own safety, they defended their children..

Vicki  Soto.

Everyone of them is a hero, those who died and those who
survived.   Six of them died protecting the children.

We don't know the names of the survivors, but we know who made
the ultimate sacrifice. For their courage and selflessness,
they are heroes of American education.

The principal, Dawn Hochsprung, 47, and the school
psychologist, Mary Sherlach, 52, ran towards the intruder to
try to stop him. They both were killed.

The killer went in search of defenseless babies and teachers.
The teachers heard the gunfire, tried to hide their children,
hid them in closets and cabinets.

Vicki Soto, 27, put herself between the killer and her
children. He killed her. Somehow some of them escaped. Six ran
to a nearby house. They told the surprised homeowner,, "We
can't go back to our school. Our teacher is dead. We don't
have a teacher."

America's Teachers: Heroes or Greedy Moochers ?

America’s Teachers: Heroes or Greedy Moochers at the Public Trough?

by: 

Dave Lindorff

I’ll be brief here. Let’s just note that the heroic teachers who died while courageously trying to protect their kids at the Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, CT, and the others who survived but stayed to protect the kids, were all part of a school system where the employees are members of the American Federation of Teachers.

Let’s just let that sink in for a moment. Those teachers, who are routinely being accused by our politicians of being drones and selfish, incompetent money grubbers worried more about their pensions than about teaching our children (though most, even after 10 years, earn less than $55,000 a year for doing a very difficult job that involves at least 12-14 hours a day of work and prep time counting meetings with parents), stood their ground when confronted with a psychotic assailant armed with semi-automatic pistols and an automatic rifle, and protected their kids. The principal too, a veteran teacher herself, stood her ground, reportedly suicidally charging at the assailant along with the school’s psychologist in a doomed effort to tackle him and stop the carnage.

How many of us would have had to the courage to stand in front of a closet door to keep an armed madman from finding the kids hidden behind it, as one slain young teacher, Vicki Soto, died doing? How many of us would charge at an armed shooter, to almost certain death, in an effort top stop him from further killing? How many would bravely hide in a bathroom with a class of kids when we could have run away and saved ourselves?

And this: How many of the politicians in Washington and in state capitals and how many conservative think-tank “researchers” who attack teachers as leeches and drones would have shown such heroism under fire?

School to Prison Pipeline

Susan Feriss,

The so-called “school to prison pipeline” — which has been the subject of several Center for Public Integrity stories —was the focus of new attention on Capitol Hill Wednesday.  Sen. Dick Durbin presided over the first Congressional hearing on schools suspending students and sending them to juvenile-justice authorities for minor discipline problems.

“For many young people, our schools are increasingly a gateway to the criminal justice system,” Durbin, an Illinois Democrat and assistant majority leader, said in his introductory remarks. “This phenomenon is a consequence of a culture of ‘zero tolerance’ that is widespread in our schools and is depriving many children of their fundamental right to an education.”

Durbin said he hoped the hearing, archived here, would highlight the troubling consequences of sending  kids to court and placing them in the juvenile system for relatively minor reasons. He also called on speakers who testified that it’s possible to keep schools safe – and boost kids’ engagement in school – by cutting referrals to the justice system and instead employing counseling and innovative discipline methods.  

Explaining the Economic Crisis - Ed Asner

Tax the Rich. Ed Asner. 

Compelling description of real school reform

Working Within Constraints to Transform Schools

by Pedro Noguera

Public schools, especially those that serve a disproportionate percentage of low-income students of color, are confronted by a number of constraints that make the job of educating children, well, difficult. These constraints include, but are not limited to:

•                The political—particularly those created by the NCLB related to the inappropriate and excessive reliance on high-stakes assessments to judge students, teachers, and schools. This often leads to a narrowing of the focus of the curriculum, and a narrow focus on achievement without sufficient attention to academic performance and child development;

•                The economic—caused by the shortage of resources (especially in poor communities) that compel schools to do more with less. The financial pressures experienced by low-income families also make it difficult for them to provide the support children need; and

•                The social—which might include everything from concerns about safety, nutrition, health, crime, drugs, and a lack of parental guidance and support.

I describe these as constraints because I reject the "no excuses" position typically offered by the group I called the naïve optimists.

California budget spends less on education

by Laura Rosenhall

California budget spends less than U.S. average on education

Education may be the largest single segment of California's budget, but the state proportionately spends less of its money on elementary and high schools and colleges than the national average, according to a new Census Bureau report.

The statistic is gleaned from the bureau's annual report on state government finances, the latest of which covers 2011.

The report tallies California's "general expenditures" last year at just under $225 billion -- spending from both the state's own taxes and other resources as well as $64.5 billion in federal funds. Education is almost $75 billion of that, according to the report -- or exactly one-third, somewhat below the national average of 35.8 percent.

California's level of education spending in 2011 was fractionally lower than in 2010. Other states ranged from a high of 46.6 percent in Georgia to a low of 24.9 percent in Alaska.

Read more here: http://blogs.sacbee.com/capitolalertlatest/#storylink=cpy

Defending Teachers and Teaching: Standardized Testing Cons | California Progress Report

Defending Teachers and Teaching: Standardized Testing Cons | California Progress Report

WalMart Schools and Kevin Johnson

WalMart schools in Sacramento

A fine by the California Fair Political Practices Committee (FFPC) against Mayor Kevin Johnson revealed that the Mayor has received  $500,000 dollars from the Walton Family – the owners of WalMart- for his advocacy through the organization StandUP. 

The money did not go to the public schools but to advocacy for specific positions. Mayor Johnson has a number of well known positions on “school reform” starting with his initial role in privatizing Sacramento High School as a charter.   He serves as Chair of U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan’s Education Reform Task Force.

Applying the WalMart perspective to schools would privatize  the public institutions.  WalMart is notoriously anti union and exploits its workers for the family’s own gains.  Low wages; pushing wage scales down: few benefits; passing  costs such as  adequate food and health care of workers off to the public programs; and an authoritarian even totalitarian management environment  are mainstays of WalMart stores.  I don’t think they will be able to import the teachers from China, but they will be able to cut wages, benefits, and job security. See http://forrespect.org.

One way you could improve schools would be to adequately fund them, however during the recent vital election to  fund the schools through California Prop. 30, Mayor Johnson and his wife Michelle Rhee were occupied in campaign events in other states. http://choosingdemocracy.blogspot.com/2012/11/what-was-kevin-johnson-doing-during.html

Kevin Johnson’s approach to school change is consistent with the anti teacher  efforts of Democrats for Educational Reform (see prior posts). Also see https://sites.google.com/site/democracyandeducationorg/

Foundations and school reform

One of the things the right wing does is keep organizing.  While we rest and recover from an election such as California Prop. 30, they are off on their next campaign.  They do this by having hundreds of advocates. So that while some recover, others launch their next campaign.

The Foundation for Excellence in Education’s annual conference was held  Nov 26-27   in Washington, D.C. The agenda hits most of the main policies former Gov. Jeb Bush has supported: How to make teachers more effective; school district accountability; charter school accountability; the parent trigger and funding; and what to expect from new Common Core assessments.

The agenda of the agenda of the right and of the Obama administration has focused on Common Core Standards.  To date there has been no evidence that common standards actually change what happens in classrooms.  This is the kind of reform that the well funded foundations like because they can go out and advocate and raise funds without having to get their hands dirty by talking with teachers, students or parents.

Major donors such as the Gates Foundation, the Broad Foundation, and others  are increasingly driving education agendas and that influence just continues to grow. These foundations  have no public accountability, but they  been successful in capturing the policy agenda from local school boards, state legislatures, in the press  and  in Congress  despite their lack of evidence of  success.

BMED Graduate - Principal puts struggling school on new path

dlambert@sacbee.com

PUBLISHED SUNDAY, DEC. 02, 2012

This is the third in an occasional series on principals who are turning around local schools.

Maria Lewis spends much of her day on bent knee. The 44-year-old principal bends down to give direction to bigger kids and to soothe the smallest. But mostly she bends down to listen.

It's clear that kids come first on the T.L. Whitehead Elementary campus in Woodland.

"Every child can learn," Lewis said. "They may be lacking some skills. So what? Let's try to build on prior knowledge."

She must be right. The school's Academic Performance Index has grown from 704 to 793 in the two years since she took the reins of the school. On a scale of 200 to 1,000, the statewide benchmark is 800 for each school.

The increase was enough to make Whitehead Elementary the only traditional school in the four-county region to come out of program improvement this year, a designation Title 1 schools receive if state officials don't think they are improving their scores quickly enough.

"We are really proud" of Whitehead Elementary, Debra Calvin, an associate superintendent at Woodland Unified, told The Bee in October. "It's an incredibly difficult thing to do to pull a school out of Program Improvement."

Mrs. Lewis is a graduate of the Sac State BMED program. Like hundreds of other graduates she has done a great job.  The program has now been terminated.  For details see, The Chicano / Mexican American Digital History project. https://sites.google.com/site/democracyandeducationorg/chicano-mexican-american-digital-history-project/history-of-bilingual-education-dept-at-sac-state

read the entire piece on Mrs. Lewis at the Bee. http://www.sacbee.com/2012/12/02/v-print/5024345/principal-put-struggling-school.html