Letting Literacy Slip --

Editorial from the Atlantic Journal-Constitution, Published on: 12/30/05

Finally, someone is getting the point! (The emphasis is mine.)

At every level of education, Americans are faltering in their ability to grasp a newspaper story or a passage in a book.

This skill is known as prose literacy, and it's declining even among well-educated Americans. The latest sampling of adult literacy by the National Center for Education Statistics found a 10 percentage point drop in graduate students who tested proficient in prose literacy in 2003 compared to the last time it was measured in 1992.

There was also a marked slip among college students testing proficient; 40 percent in 1992 and 31 percent in 2003.

The National Assessment of Adult Literacy gauges Americans' fluency in reading text and documents such as maps and labels. It also looks at quantitative literacy, a person's ability to understand tax forms, tables or bank statements.

To be ranked proficient, an adult has to be able to read and extract information from complex materials, such as legal documents. "No group, not even those with the highest levels of formal education, had an average in the proficient level on any of the scales," says National Center for Education Statistics commissioner Mark Schneider.

The sampling found that 13 percent of adults demonstrated "below basic prose literacy." According to Schneider, that translates to 30 million Americans who "could not do much more than sign a form or search a simple document to find out what they are allowed to drink before a medical test."

What's hard to understand is how literacy is falling at the same time that schools are making reading their top priority.

The poor showing on the national literacy assessment even among college grads ought to generate discussion at both state and federal levels about whether test-driven reform is creating better test-takers rather than better readers. As schools concentrate more resources on teaching kids how to bubble in the correct answers on standardized tests, less time is available to develop critical thinking skills...

Yep, that's it I'd say. You might ask yourself, Why would the powers that be want a nation that can fill in bubbles might not think critically? Hmmm...
anti nclb

The New Educational Privatization: Educational Contracting and High Stakes Accountability --

Another from Susan O'hanian's site. This one a study of school privatization. The introduction reads:

The institutional landscape of K-12 educational contracting is fundamentally changing. Based on industry and district data, this study identifies three distinct shifts in the content and structure of interactions between suppliers of instructional goods and local school systems. These shifts include i) elevation of test-related services and products, ii) increasing emphases on technology-based solutions. and iii) an expanding role for the state in spurring market activity. Drawing on a case study of district practice, the study provides evidence of how broader changes are influencing local contracting activities, and the dilemmas and responses generated by these pressures. The study suggests the need for new conceptual approaches to studying educational privatization that draw on the institutional analysis of organizations and also identifies critical questions for future research.

I refer to this research, first published in the Teachers College Record so that I might publish a letter in respnse, also from O'hanian.

Comment by Dick Schutz

Burch’s inquiry and analysis are breaths of fresh air rising above the data-free, tis-taint polemics that have heretofore comprised the “privatization/voucher/charter/reform/etc.” literature. Her inferences are grounded on the simplest of descriptive statistics and direct observation, but they shed more light on what has been and is now going on than all the randomized-control experiments, hierarchical linear analyses, and such bundled together. “Midvale,” N=1, is prototypical of every school district in the country. (School districts, like individuals, are each different; but at the same time they share many commonalities)

What Burch doesn’t note are the fatal technical flaws in federal educational legislation and its implementation over the time period that she considers. Zooming in on these gives sharper focus to the “lens of the organizational field.” Here are five for starters:

· El-hi educational standards are not performance standards; they’re content standards. The “standards” are largely rhetorical, formulated by logrolling committees 5-15 years ago and never revised since their initial proclamation.

· The Item Response Theory that undergirds the mandated standardized tests inherently yields relative, ungrounded scales. The terms “proficient” “below proficient” and such are fictions, based on nothing more than arbitrary segmentations of normalized distributions. Linking the tests to the content standards does not fix the flaw. The same test item formats are sliced differently, but it’s the same baloney any way you cut it. As the Midvale experience indicates, local efforts to fix the flaw have been stifled by federal mandates; and teachers who need “good data” the most are now the least likely to have such.

· The “New Science of Reading” proclaimed by NCLB is empty. Bottom line, each individual teacher is left with the responsibility of integrating the elements of the “Stone Soup science.”

· “Annual Yearly Progress,” which is to get us to “No Child Left Behind by 2014, is a statistically impossible enterprise.

· Recent efforts to introduce “flexibility” in meeting AYP requirements open the door for a whole new set of tests for kids with “specific disabilities”—that is, kids who don’t pass the current tests. By rotating carefully selected kids who are “near the bubble” into SpEd, everybody “wins.” The kids are not harried as much. Teachers get rid of their “worst” kids. Schools and districts make AYP. And the Education/War President can declare that the “Plan for Victory” is working in Education as well as in War. The arrangement gives a whole new meaning to the term, “flexibility,” but I can’t think of anyone who might object, other than maybe the kids and teachers on whom the “cruel, inhuman, and degrading” treatment is being inflicted.

Dick Schutz
3RsPlus@usinter.net
— Dick Schutz
Teacher College Review online discussion
2005-12-17
anti nclb

First-Ever National Private School Voucher Program Sent to President’s Desk --

They have done it! A national school voucher program. where the hell is the media on this?

This from People for the American Way:

Legislation diverts money from public schools, allows for religious discrimination in hiring, and fails to keep federal funds from being used for religious indoctrination

WASHINGTON—On the same day the Senate passed legislation that cuts public education funding for the first time in a decade, it also voted to establish the first-ever national private school voucher program, as part of the final appropriations measure for the Department of Defense. With final approval in the House today, Congress has signed off on this dangerous measure, under the guise of one-time relief for students affected by this year’s hurricanes. People For the American Way President Ralph G. Neas voiced strong opposition to the voucher program, which, in addition to diverting funds from public schools, allows federally funded private schools to discriminate on the basis of religion while hiring teachers, and fails to protect against the use of federal funds for the religious indoctrination of students. “The promise of a quality public education for every child is a cornerstone of our democracy, but private school vouchers divert money from public schools and undermine that promise. Most Americans oppose such voucher programs, which might be why this one was attached to a must-pass defense appropriations bill,” Neas said. “This program throws open the door to using taxpayer dollars to fund private schools. It also allows for government funding of religion and religious discrimination. We deeply regret its passage.”

anti nclb

Agents' visit chills UMass Dartmouth senior ==

By AARON NICODEMUS, Standard-Times staff writer.

This has nothing to do with NCLB, but a lot to do with what is happenning in our country right now. I quote in full:

NEW BEDFORD -- A senior at UMass Dartmouth was visited by federal agents two months ago, after he requested a copy of Mao Tse-Tung's tome on Communism called "The Little Red Book."
Two history professors at UMass Dartmouth, Brian Glyn Williams and Robert Pontbriand, said the student told them he requested the book through the UMass Dartmouth library's interlibrary loan program.
The student, who was completing a research paper on Communism for Professor Pontbriand's class on fascism and totalitarianism, filled out a form for the request, leaving his name, address, phone number and Social Security number. He was later visited at his parents' home in New Bedford by two agents of the Department of Homeland Security, the professors said.
The professors said the student was told by the agents that the book is on a "watch list," and that his background, which included significant time abroad, triggered them to investigate the student further.
"I tell my students to go to the direct source, and so he asked for the official Peking version of the book," Professor Pontbriand said. "Apparently, the Department of Homeland Security is monitoring inter-library loans, because that's what triggered the visit, as I understand it."
Although The Standard-Times knows the name of the student, he is not coming forward because he fears repercussions should his name become public. He has not spoken to The Standard-Times.
The professors had been asked to comment on a report that President Bush had authorized the National Security Agency to spy on as many as 500 people at any given time since 2002 in this country.
The eavesdropping was apparently done without warrants.
The Little Red Book, is a collection of quotations and speech excerpts from Chinese leader Mao Tse-Tung.
In the 1950s and '60s, during the Cultural Revolution in China, it was required reading. Although there are abridged versions available, the student asked for a version translated directly from the original book.
The student told Professor Pontbriand and Dr. Williams that the Homeland Security agents told him the book was on a "watch list." They brought the book with them, but did not leave it with the student, the professors said.
Dr. Williams said in his research, he regularly contacts people in Afghanistan, Chechnya and other Muslim hot spots, and suspects that some of his calls are monitored.
"My instinct is that there is a lot more monitoring than we think," he said.
Dr. Williams said he had been planning to offer a course on terrorism next semester, but is reconsidering, because it might put his students at risk.
"I shudder to think of all the students I've had monitoring al-Qaeda Web sites, what the government must think of that," he said. "Mao Tse-Tung is completely harmless."

Contact Aaron Nicodemus at anicodemus@s-t.com
anti nclb

'Straight-cut ditch' schools widen gap in education --

Marion Brady | Special to the Orlando Sentinel

First, the New Advocate is out. If you have not read it yet do it now!

I started out just planning a few quotes, but this guy is so right on I ended up quoting nearly the whole thing:

Brent Staples writes about education. His opinions appear in the New York Times. I write about education. My opinions appear in the Orlando Sentinel.

Staples thinks No Child Left Behind is improving education in America. I think it's hammering nails into education's coffin...

...The long-range consequences of NCLB will be bad for all students, but they'll be devastating for the very students NCLB's advocates and apologists most want to help.

I begin my argument by asking not what's bad for students, but what's good for them. Hands down, the most popular answer to that question is, "The basics! The 3 Rs are the foundation of everything else!" The power of this assumption is demonstrated daily in the school nearest you as all else is put on a back burner in an effort to raise reading and math standardized test scores.

But as is often the case, the popular answer is superficial. The basics are mere means to an end. What we most want for our kids is an education which helps them realize their potential. Obviously, highly developed basic skills are important tools in a kid's pursuit of her or his potential, but it's easy to win the "basics" battle and lose the "developing individual potential" war. And that's where NCLB is taking us.

Henry David Thoreau can help explain where I'm coming from. "What does education often do?" he asked. "It makes a straight-cut ditch of a free, meandering brook."

No Child Left Behind is a strategy for making straight-cut ditches. In contrast, developing individual potential doesn't just leave brooks free to meander, it aims to clear away debris and make meandering easier.

I'll hear from those who resist this idea. They'll tell me kids have to learn to live in the real world. They'll say that NCLB's emphasis on standardized tests is a good thing because "everybody has to take tests." They'll maintain that schools dedicated to developing individual student potential will be "soft," that such an education might be OK for a few talented kids, but as a general policy it's an invitation to anarchy, or at least to social decline.

Ironically, while America chases Japanese "straight-cut ditch"standardized test scores, the Japanese come to America to find out about our "meandering brook" students. Asked by Dr. Joseph Renzulli at the University of Connecticut about their interest in American education, visiting Japanese educators recently said, "We have no Nobel Prize Winners. Your schools have produced a continuous flow of inventors, designers, entrepreneurs, and innovative leaders. We can make anything you invent faster, cheaper, and, in most cases, better. But we want to learn what role this 'creative productivity' focus plays in the production of creative and inventive people."

NCLB's push for "straight-cut ditches" is bad policy, but exactly why it's often particularly devastating for blacks, other minorities, and the long-time poor may not yet be obvious.

The main problem? Those high-stakes tests NCLB demands.

There are many kinds of "smarts" -- linguistic, spatial, musical, kinesthetic, naturalist, interpersonal, and so on -- many paths to the development of individual potential. Never mind, says NCLB. It focuses on just one -- symbol manipulation skills -- and ignores the rest. Worse, the emphasis isn't even on symbol manipulation skills in the broadest sense, but just on those most valued by those hired to write test questions.

Well, it will be argued, those skills are the key to good jobs, so they're the ones every kid needs.

Maybe. But the big test isn't seen either by the kids who take them or by the general public as just a test of ability to manipulate symbols. It's seen as a general intelligence test -- a measure, across the board, of smarts, of brains, of innate ability. That one score on that one ability then becomes, both to the kid and the larger society, the whole, denigrating story.

If you have any doubts about the effects of thinking you're not smart, in a society that thinks you're not smart, Google "self-fulfilling prophecies."

Marion Brady, a longtime educator, lives in Cocoa. He can be reached at mbrady22@cfl.rr.com. He wrote this commentary for the Orlando Sentinel.
anti nclb

D’s AND F’s FOR ‘NO CHILD LEFT BEHIND --

From the Black voice news. This article uses the recent NAEP results to say that NCLB is not working. This a lot you have had before here but what Marian Wright Edelman has to say is important:

“Our children have been hijacked and shackled by bad policy and bad politics,” says Marian Wright Elderman, president of the Children’s Defense Fund. Elderman who has accused the administration of stealing her successful child achievement concept, is both worried and angry.

“This nation has squandered away four years and billions of dollars in education funding. Our children have been tested to death, forced to regurgitate and at the end of the day they haven’t learned to do basic reading and math or much less learned to think. It’s a national shame,” said Elderman.

And it is.
anti nclb

Superintendents blast 'No Child Left Behind'' --

Another item from the Chicago area:

Area school superintendents met in a recent town-hall meeting with lawmakers and community members to discuss academic and financial performance.

Two common themes were voiced: Schools need more money and the No Child Left Behind Act isn't working.

...
"No child left behind. That sounds great, but, in fact, there are so many children who are going to be left behind as a result of this legislation,"

...
the process by which schools are taken over after they fail to meet standards for five consecutive years is ambiguous and potentially harmful.

...
...state funding has been primarily aimed at failing schools...

"There is funding for Watch List schools," Jordan said. "Fortunately, we can say it today, 'We aren't on the Watch List.' (But that also means) we can't get any funding."

...

Willie Mack, superintendent of District 88, said that while NCLB, which was created in 2001, isn't working, the political discussion as it pertains to education has always been the same.

"Get rid of some of those unfunded mandates on teachers, if we're serious," Mack advised. "(In Springfield,) What they were saying in the 1970s, they're still saying today."

Mack also assailed politics at the local level for interfering with education, calling it a "fight."

"Fight indicates some sort of contest," Mack said. "I know some people would like peace and harmony and that would be nice, but we are up against forces who do not have children foremost on their minds."

...

"Don't go into the board room looking for peace," he warned. "Go in there looking for justice for the children."

...

"I really think that No Child Left Behind was a wake-up call for us because what we were doing wasn't working," Cole said. "I think it's been used to expose what we need to focus on."

Davis disagreed with Cole.

"It's a wake-up. But a wake-up to what?" he asked. "And with what consequences?"...

Exactly.
anti nclb

Can Policymakers Improve Teacher Quality? --

From ASCD. There's a lot here, but what catches my eye:

Department of Education Stalls Teacher-Quality Requirements

U.S. Secretary of Education Margaret Spellings announced a one-year delay in enforcing penalties on states that have not yet met the teacher-quality requirements of NCLB. To escape penalties this year, states have to show evidence of a "good faith effort" toward meeting the following criteria:

1. Establishing a state definition of a highly qualified teacher.
2. Implementing a system for reporting to parents and the public on classes taught by highly qualified teachers.
3. Ensuring the completeness and accuracy of data on highly qualified teachers reported to the U.S. Department of Education.
4. Taking steps to ensure that experienced and qualified teachers are equitably distributed among classrooms with poor and minority children and those with their peers.

States that satisfy these expectations will be able to negotiate a delay in meeting the full requirements until the 2006–07 school year.

...
And then there's:

Senate Bill Seeks Increased NCLB Flexibility

Senators Olympia J. Snowe (R-ME) and Susan Collins (R-ME) have introduced the NCLB Flexibility and Improvement Act to give states, school districts, and schools greater control in meeting the requirements of NCLB. The bill addresses several aspects of teacher quality, such as giving more flexibility for middle and high school teachers who teach multiple subjects. In addition to teacher quality, it also addresses accountability, funding, and provisions for assessing special education and limited-English-proficient students. More information on this bill is available in the ASCD Action Center.

Pretty sure this bill will get nowhere for now, but might be worth watching.
anti nclb

The New Advocate is Out --

Check it out! Great reading as usual.

This morning as I was checking out the Advocate and just generally reviewing recent posts in the blogosphere, two from Educational Equity, Politics & Policy in Texas caught my eye.

The first one is a must read. The author argues that more religion not less is needed in government, and I am inclined to agree with him. The second story is about a boy in a Texas High School who got suspended for speaking Spanish in school. I am horrified that this kind of thing can still happen. Those school officials should read the first post.
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Deadline Looms for School Aides, Hundreds Must Get Certification by June

By V. Dion Haynes,Washington Post Staff Writer, Thursday December 8, 2005; Page DZ03

Here's an up and coming problem that we have not been hearing much about, paraprofessionals in the schools that must meet strict education requirements soon. These are people, as the article notes, that often have only a high school education. What the article does not say is that many of these people are part time workers, working at entry level wages, with few or no benefits. The article does state that little or no money has been put up for ther required education. And, if these people lose there jobs who will replace them? Go here for a list of what the law requires of these people and, of course, some right on comments from Susan Ohanian.

Officials in a union representing teacher's aides in the D.C. public schools say they fear that more than half of about 700 members could lose their jobs in June for failing to meet a provision of a federal law that requires them to be certified.

The No Child Left Behind law mandates that the country's 750,000 teacher's aides who are part of Title I programs for impoverished students be certified as "highly qualified" by June. The certification requires that they either have an associate's degree or two years of higher education or pass a test verifying their knowledge.

In recent years, teacher's aides have been playing a larger role in the classroom, offering tutoring and individual instruction for academically deficient students and translating lessons for students who are learning English. Most aides have been required to have only a high school diploma...

On the more encouraging side of things in New Hampshire, Most elementary school teachers with more than three years of experience will no longer need to take the Praxis II exams to be considered "highly qualified" under the federal No Child Left Behind Act.
...
"This is an exciting new development that the federal Department of Education recognizes New Hampshire's rigorous certification and training process for elementary school teachers," said former teacher Sen. Iris Estabrook in a statement. "This eliminates any need for legislation at the state level on this matter, and assures teachers that they can be considered highly qualified without additional burdensome tests to the certification process."
...
We can only hope that this encouraging development will spread to other states. To say that passing a test or having a certain amount of education makes one highly qualified is absurd.
anti nclb

The New Advocate is Out and NCLB Resistance Appears to be Growing ---

Welcome back Joe. Glad to see you are up and at it again! Checkout the New Advocate. Great reading as always including a another must read for this blog. The second part of this post has to do with these four articles: Lakewood Board of Education Takes a Stand; School administrators bash No Child at town hall meeting; School laws blasted; Change 'No Child Left Behind' law, panelists say. Two are from the Chicago area and two are from Ohio. School administrators, superintendents, school boards, educators, parents and students are speaking out against NCLB. All in a two day period. There will be more and more of these, just you wait and see.

From the last article about the panelists come these:

Teaching "to the test" gets in the way of creative instruction and impedes learning.

Struggling schools need more resources, both through federal funding and from business and community organizations.

Greater weight should be given to individual student progress.

High-stakes testing should be replaced by diagnostic tests that show students' strengths and weaknesses.

School administrators should make schools more inviting to parents, to better meet the parental involvement section of NCLB.

Students and parents themselves should be held accountable for their work and actions, rather than placing all responsibility on schools and districts.

Standards should remain high, but more help should be given to help students meet standards.

Funding should be available to increase early literacy.

It would be a good start.
anti nclb

Highly Qualified Teachers and Alternate Universes

Another great post from Jim Horn over at Schools Matter. Sunday, December 04, 2005

One of the core lies undergirding NCLB is the claim that the Law will provide “highly-qualified” teachers in every classroom in America. But just as the “Clear Skies” initiative offers more latitude to the polluters and the “Healthy Forests” initiative gives great swaths of virgin timber to the logging companies, the “highly-qualified teacher” initiative inside NCLB disguises a policy designed to accomplish the exact opposite of its claim.

What the neo-cons at ED have done in terms of teacher quality since the signing of NCLB in 2002 is to, in fact, denigrate teacher education programs (or threaten to blow them up) and undercut professional accreditation efforts by NBPTS to offer a rigorous licensing procedure for teachers that has national legitimacy. ED prefers, instead, to offer to schools non-teachers with subject area degrees whose only exposure to the art and science of teaching (pedagogy) will have been through brief self-induced tutorials to conditioning techniques that are central to Ed’s preferred straight- jacketed model of teaching, Direct Instruction...

Now go read the whole thing. Jim's right on as usual.
anti nclb

Oakland schools in need of real reform --

This from Inside Bay Area, Article Last Updated: 12/01/2005

If anyone has any doubts about the designs the Broad Foundation and corporate America have on our public education system this commentary should go a long way to convincing you (emphasis is mine):

THIS month's $24 million question: When should you reject a gift?

Answer: When that "gift" is a poison pill.

When the state picked Randolph Ward, from the pro-charter school Broad Foundation, to take over Oakland schools in 2003, some smelled a corporate coup.

If the onslaught of school closings and charter openings under Ward has left any doubt, he's finally made his goal clear: to privatize Oakland schools.

In a nakedly aggressive public gesture, representatives of some of the world's richest men and corporations — including Bill Gates, Eli Broad, Clorox, Kaiser, Dell and Dreyer's/Nestle — joined Ward on Nov. 14 to unveil their "investment" in district "redesign."

Executives congratulated themselves for throwing crumbs to a project allegedly for education. But, as the Tribune reported, the $24 million "will not bring in any new pencils, books, teachers or school buses."

Instead, it buys technology and training solely to transform the district into a private business network. The investors say the district's new central office will become a "business service," and new small schools will "act as customers" who "invest in services."

Donors revealed that corporate executives will now call the shots in the district. The head of the East Bay Community Foundation said his private organization will disburse funds and "communicate the bottom line" to educators.

...

The Oakland Education Association proposes a different educational vision: 15 students per class; the best facilities, materials and technology for teaching and learning; enough support staff for students' academic and extracurricular needs; and much more.

OEA's vision focuses on what students need each day and is based on extensive research, experience and commitment.

The district's corporate investors disregard this vision, because authentic reform costs many times more than what they currently pay in taxes or token "gifts."

Each year Clorox gives its CEO 32 times more than what it will give to 41,000 students. Kaiser called its million-dollar donation "a big deal," but its 18 to 24 percent planned rate increase over two years will cost the district several times that amount.

...

It's time to say no to phony reform, no to handing our children over to big business; but yes to real change and excellent schools for all.

A movement of educators, students and parents can achieve this goal by demanding that Oakland's major corporations: (1) pay off the district's debt to restore democratic control to Oakland citizens and (2) commit to substantial, mandatory and ongoing contributions for genuine reforms that will dramatically improve learning conditions for all students.

Craig Gordon has taught in Oakland public schools for 15 years. He is taking a leave this year to write about educational issues.

Did you catch bottom line stuff. I am aghast. How could anyone in their right minds think that these corporate yahoos are what will fix the American public education system? I tell you these guys are out to really screw things up, and you just watch, they will.

anti nclb

Susan Gets Responses to Previous Article --

Again from Ohanian's site. These are all worth a read but this one got me (Emphasis is mine):

Susan Ohanian's masterful summation in your August issue of what is really going on today in public education serves as a powerful rebuttal to the absurd charges made by business leaders.

The outrageousness begins with the blatant accountability double standard. It seems that in corporate America nothing succeeds like failure. Those at or near the top walk away with more money in one year of driving a corporation into the ground than 100 teachers make in a lifetime of demonstrated success with their students.

So what is the risk for them? Maybe their egos get bruised a bit when they are asked to resign. But in the short time they're at the help calling the shots, they take home perks and cash beyond the wildest imagination of most teachers.

The no-longer-so-hidden agenda, of course, is to create a two-tier society, reminiscent of Latin America. By scapegoating and eventually destroying public education, the goal becomes easier to achieve. The evidence abounds. The middle class is becoming an anachronism, as both parents work full time and still can't support their familes. Three-quarters of personal bankruptcies are the result of medical bills that individuals can't pay because they don't have health insurance. Unions are being emasculated by court decision and hostile lawmakers. And the hits just keep on coming.

When the American people finally wake up to what is happening, it will be too late. It's a frightening scenario.

WALT GARDNER
Retired Teacher,
Los Angeles Unifified School District,
Los Angeles, Calif.

That last part is on the same theme as this editorial in The Nation about Delphi Corporation seeking chapter 11 status:

posted November 9, 2005 (November 28, 2005 issue)

...

Delphi's move could have been predicted from its recent hire of Steve Miller as CEO. He has made a long career, going back to the Chrysler bailout of a generation ago, of using government handouts and corporate welfare in the form of bankruptcy to restructure firms while looting workers' assets. Just before he joined Delphi, Miller was CEO of Bethlehem Steel and a board member at United Airlines (UAL). Before selling off Bethlehem he eliminated health insurance for 95,000 retirees and offloaded the firm's underfunded pension obligations to the government's Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation. And he offloaded UAL's even larger underfunded pension to the PBGC, itself now underfunded. At the time, Forbes announced that this spectacular disappearance of worker savings foretold "the end of pensions"--not just for UAL but the country. It has since been imitated by Delta and Northwest. Miller took the job at Delphi because he thought it offered a "pivotal position to impact the restructuring of America's auto industry," meaning more of the same.

Miller's plan for Delphi is cynical and wildly greedy. The bankruptcy is targeted only at Delphi's 51,000 US-based workers, less than a third of its worldwide labor force. It is well financed, with Delphi holding $1.6 billion in cash and a new credit line for as much as $4.5 billion in low-interest debt from Citigroup Global Markets Inc. and JP Morgan Chase. Nothing in US bankruptcy law--recently tightened for individuals but not for corporations--says a company actually has to be broke to enjoy its protections. And Delphi is not broke; of its forty-five US plants, only eleven are in a separate holding group of financially troubled enterprises.

As the price of not canceling the workers' contract and liquidating their pension, Miller is demanding a drop in average wages from $27 to $10 an hour, concessions that would total more than $2 billion a year. This is about 25 percent more than Delphi's current losses, counting the money-losing plants, and will be pure profit once those are eliminated...

...Whatever wage cuts Miller gets at Delphi will be a marker in the full Big Three contract negotiations in 2007, when current contracts expire...

And whatever the out come it scares me as much as NCLB does.
anti nclb

Refrains of the School Critics

Publication Date: 2005-08-03, By Susan Ohanian

I somehow missed this in the summer but O'hanian elightens as usual. The emphasis is mine.

Behind the rhetoric lies a contempt for the work of public school educators.
This article is from the August 2005 School Administrator, published by the American Association of School Administrators

George Packer, a New Yorker staff writer, points to the danger of clarity, observing that seemingly simple and tough-minded words blow out as much smoke as the jargon of the Pentagon of decades past.

Nowhere is this smoke thicker and trickier than in the lingo the corporate-politico-media squad uses when talking about public schools. At first glance, their talk seems plain and to the point: failing schools, caring about education and education as war. In contrast, education progressives befuddle the public with authentic means of assessment,decision-making processes and triangulated learning.

But the simplicity is deceptive. The expression failing public schools has a lot in common with war on terror. After the media parrot these phrases often enough, we find ourselves at war and in the morass of radical public school deformation. Familiarity breeds acceptance. We need to unpack the knee-jerk, smoky phrases to examine the purposes behind the rhetoric we are in danger of taking for granted.

What follows are refrains about schools plucked from the news--not always unique statements but phrases repeated so often they have become jingles framed around a common theme: Make sure the public can’t think about public schools without thinking about failure.

The structure below is designed to encourage people to look closely at the rhetoric used to describe schools. Readers are invited to unpack popular phrases, to think about what is revealed and what is hidden. In so doing, we can keep our own discourse free of the corporate catchphrases.

The refrains are these: Schools are failing; Caring about education; Education as war; The knowledge supply chain; Failing schools, failing teachers; The private-sector fix;

and my two favorites:

Refrain: Preparing all students for the 21st century

Example: “Today, more than ever, we live in a global economy where competition and technology are changing the workplace and impacting economic success for all Americans. U. S. schools must change if they are to prepare all students for the challenges and opportunities of the 21st century. This is not a partisan issue.”

Speaker: Edward B. Rust Jr., chairman and CEO, State Farm Insurance Co.; former chair, The Business Roundtable’s Education Initiative; and member National Commission on Mathematics and Science Teaching for the 21st Century. (Testimony before House Subcommittee on Education Reform, March 8, 2001)

What It Means: Rust is right that this isn’t a partisan issue. Republicans and Democrats alike embrace the corporate agenda. When working people can’t find living-wage jobs and their children don’t pass the high-stakes test for a high school diploma, blame the schools. When 50-year-old high tech workers find their jobs shipped to India, blame the schools.

What It Hides: The global economy is a cutthroat slaughterhouse for which corporate America assumes only profits, not responsibility. Despite all the hype, algebra cannot ensure a living-wage job for tomorrow’s workers. As Gerald Bracey and Richard Rothstein have pointed out in their essays, technology often lowers the skills needed for jobs. Moreover, even a casual glance at the Bureau of Labor Statistics’Occupational Outlook Handbook, ( www.bls.gov/oco)reveals that retail sales positions account for almost as many jobs as the top 10 fastest-growing occupations combined.

In case you missed it: Sandy Kress, education adviser to President George W. Bush and prime architect of No Child Left Behind, pointed out in his keynote address to the EduState Summit in June 2004: "The Business Roundtable has been at the forefront of the effort to craft, pass and implement the No Child Left Behind Act."

and finally (because I am a kindergarten teacher after all:

Refrain: Beefed-up kindergarten academics

Example: Nap time needs to go away. We need to get rid of all the baby school stuff they used to do. (“Time May Be Up for Naps in Pre-K Class,” The Washington Post, March 15, 2004)

Speaker: André J. Hornsby, former superintendent, Prince George’s County, Md., Public Schools

What It Means: In hyper-academic frenzy, kindergartners get DIBELS-tested on their speed parroting of nonsense syllables--instead of singing, dancing, finger painting, block building and hanging from the monkey bars.

What It Hides: Developmentally appropriate practices are abandoned in favor of giving the appearance of high standards. Suddenly, 5-year-olds worry they aren’t good enough to measure up to the demands of the global economy. Battling this tide, the admissions office at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology asked seniors who applied: "Tell us about something you do for the pleasure of it."
anti nclb

Read all of the NCC's ten “moral concerns” here --

Which is Jim Horn's School's Matter or get them as a PDF here. They are worth a read. These guys are right on!

National Council of Churches Public Education Committee: 'No Child Left Behind' Act is leaving too many children behind

Another from Susan Ohanian. Emphasis is mine:

A National Council of Churches committee has
warned that the "No Child Left Behind Act" is leaving more children behind
than it is saving, especially children of color and poor children.

Instead of treating children "as unique human beings to be nurtured and
educated," the statement says, the act has encouraged school districts to
regard children as "products to be tested and managed."

Declaring that "Christian faith demands, as a matter of justice and
compassion, that we be concerned about our public schools," the NCC Committee
for Public Education has issued ten "moral concerns" about the implementation
of the act.

The ten critiques examine the effects of the law on students, teachers,
schools and their communities..

Today's statement decries the business-management assumptions that are the
foundation of many of the law's purported reforms.

"The No Child Left Behind Act approaches the education of America's children
through an inside-the-school management strategy of increased productivity
rather than providing resources and support for the individuals who will
shape children's lives," the statement declares.

"As people of faith we do not view our children as products to be tested and
managed but instead as unique human beings to be nurtured and educated. We
call on our political leaders to invest in developing the capacity of all
schools."

The statement criticizes the federal education law in the context of a 1999
NCC General Assembly policy statement that affirmed: "... criticism of the
public schools often ignores an essential truth: we cannot believe that we
can improve the public schools by concentrating on the schools alone."

...

Among 65 national organizations the NCC has endorsed a "Joint Organizational
Statement on the No Child Left Behind Act."

"Overall," the statement says, "the law's emphasis needs to shift from
applying sanctions for failing to raise test scores to holding states and
localities accountable for making the systemic changes that improve student
achievement."

...Contact: Jan Resseger, Committee Chair (216-736-3711), (216-308-9611),
ressegerj@ucc.org

NCC News: Philip E. Jenks, 212-870-2252, pjenks@ncccusa.org; Leslie Tune,
202-544-2350, ltune@ncccusa.org — National Council of Churches Public Education Committee
NCC News
2005-11-28

"...we do not view our children as products to be tested and
managed but instead as unique human beings to be nurtured and educated." That's the way most teachers I know treat students too.
anti nclb

My Turn to Vent --

I guess it all started with the Folkbum's rant. Then I discovered this post from the conservative blog Beyond the Beltway. I really do not want to make more traffic for this guy but read what he says and then, because this appears to be a very popular blog look at the rest of the posts as well. This is some of it:

...Of course, I see this as a reason to reduce the governments role in education (of course he does) not expand... The reason is that I don't see how to avoid this problem and not spend buckets of cash. The No Child Left Behind has resulted in massive increases in federal education spending...and at the same time we have either no improvement in actual proficiency or possible even a decline. To get the improvement my guess is we'd probably have to spend even more. (Heaven forbid!)...

...I say get the government out of education. Set up a voucher system. Set it up so that parents have to fork over part of the tuition. Once parents start having to cough up the dough every month so their kid can get an education I bet more parents would be interested that they are "getting their money's worth".

The Folkbum rants:

So what do I want..? It's simple: Shut up and let us do our jobs... If Quindlen is right that the American people should be our biggest advocates, then those same people ought to recognize that it was the teachers who reached them--not the meddling anti-tax forces, the know-it-all politicians, or the privateers who currently run the Department of Education--who deserve the praise and rewards. It was the teachers who helped them "levitate" who created conditions for success, not vouchers or Intelligent Design or corporate America.

Think back for just a second about your favorite school teacher, one who really did help you levitate, and ask yourself this: Would I meddle now in how that teacher does her job? Would that teacher have been as effective with me then if he'd had to prepare me for a standardized test? Would that teacher agree with me if I'd said to her face that she had an easy job--summers off and weekends free?

You know what the answers are. You know what the solution is: Stop perpetuating myths and start respecting and supporting what we teachers do. Then work on your family, friends, neighbors, and legislators to do the same.

If you have read me at all you know what side of the issue I stand on. Thinking about these two posts I start, as I always do, knowing that there are big time forces out there that truly do want to do away with public education. They want to privatize it and let the parents "get their money's worth." Then I begin thinking about the excuse that these people use, that the education system in this country is broken. That there are inequities in the system that we seem incapable of fixing. Then I think of all those yearly reports that I have read that say most people think their local schools are doing a great job. But I know the inequities are there. I know that you can tell who will do well in school and who will fail by looking at the parents' bank balance. I know that in my own school system most of the native kids fail to graduate high school. But I know deep down in my soul privatized is not the way.

This is where I almost agree with the Folkbum and who basically says, what we really need to do is all pull together, which I believe is true, but come on! This simplistic answer has yet to work. We have not done it. So what then? I don't have the answer. I do think it starts with work at the community level. In fact my time might be better spent organizing locally that writing here, but it also begins with getting the word out, spreading the word about the planned destruction of public education in America. It begins with finding better people to run for office and supporting them. It takes a lot of hard work, but it does also take money, no matter what they say.

It will take money to support famlies in becoming places where literacy and learning are important. It will take money to bring good paying jobs to those that need it most. It will take money to turn around school ,systems that have floundered for years. Money spent on our children.

As near as I can tell the conservatives do not want to spend money on other peoples' children. They do not want to spend money on anybody, corporations and the mechanisms of warfare not being bodies. It's every man, literally, for themselves. That is where I believe that we on the other side of the political spectrum, no matter what you call us, differ. We are all in this together. As simplistic and/or idealistic as it sounds we need to help each other.

We especially need to help each other now. Healthcare costs and all others costs are rising, no matter what they say. We are losing our economic base, no matter what they say. 30, 000 good paying jobs at GM gone. And just yesterday 7,000 more at Merck, gone. Our American Dream is being outsourced and they tell us it is good for us. They take away our ability to earn a living, to make a living wage and now they want us to pay for educating our children. Look down the road. Their children will be educated and what about ours. Sometimes, especially at this time of year I hear those words in my head over and over, "We have prisons don't we." I fear we are moving backward. Pulling together is the only thing I can think of that might reverse the slide.
anti nclb

Join Bracey in Calling for Staples to Stand Down --

Here Jim Horn posts Bracey's rather long and detailed letter to the NY Times. It's worth a read, not that I think it will do any good. people like staples have been reporting falsehoods like this for far to long to get me to believe that they will stop now.

Also, here is O'hanian's take on that article by Sam Dillon on the NAEP, also in the NYT. This includes a comment by Bracey, and Jim Horn's take on exactly who was quoted in that article.
anti nclb

The New Advocate is Out --

Good reading as always. Speaking of the Advocates there are two posts to take particular note of. The Super's Blog reprints a letter from Gerald Bracey to the NY Times responding to the NAEP article mentioned below. Bracey's right on as usual. Also, the Folkbum rants about teacher wages and the need to more fully support public education and teachers, and not just financially.
Anti NCLB

Maggie--You're doing a heckuva job!

As noted previously, this has been a slow weekend for NCLB news. Most of it is like this article from the NY Times which bemoans students' high state test scores as compared to the same students low scores on the NAEP. Even though it is generally accepted that NAEP is flawed. There also seems to be a lot of pro NCLB propaganda out there now as well. Then there is this little gem from Schools Matter.

The spirit (and management) of Brownie's FEMA lives on at ED. Here is a piece sent by Nancy Patterson that offers the perfect example of ED rhetoric vs. ED reality.

One of the latest pushes under NCLB is secondary literacy, and to address that the U.S. Department of Ed sent out a September request for grant proposals. The grant proposal for "Striving Readers" had to be submitted by school districts and had to be 60 pages long. Those districts interested in this funding were required to get an external evaluation of the reading program that was to be funded. So, school districts hoping to receive money from this grant (between 1 and 5 million dollars) had to produce 60 pages, including a large section of "scientifically rigorous" evaluation, develop a program that would be funded, and seek outside evaluators before the November 14 deadline. Ok. Not fun, but not impossible. However, the grant proposal had to be submitted electronically by 4:30 on November 14.

Unfortunately, it looks like the DOE could not handle the electronic submissions and schools trying to upload their proposals found that the submit button disappeared before the 4:30 deadline. And districts trying to get further information about the grant in the weeks prior to the deadline could not get help from the DOE. Individuals calling the DOE to ask about the Striving Readers Grant got a voice mail message saying that the voice mail was full...

...Announcements about the Striving Readers grant recipients should be coming out in a few weeks. I wonder how many districts should be on that list but won't be because of DOE foul-ups...

Exposure of the incompetence, hypocrisy, collusion, and corruption at ED, the corporate media, and the "think tanks" (why do I think of the septic systems my dad used to install?) is one of the weapons we have to fight back the ed privatizers and the corporate socialists intent upon control of the American education system.

If you have documented stories that fit any of the above criteria, send them along to Schools Matter at the email address shown here .

Jim Horn is doing a great job over there at Schools Matter. Go Jim!
anti nclb

The First of two must read blogs --

Things are slow news wise right now but two recent posts have caught my eye. This first one is from Jim Horn over at Schools Matter. This post is not from Jim however but from graduate student Judy Rabin and it comments on the biggest news in the NCLB world these days, the "recent ruling by a federal judge in Michigan who dismissed legal challenges to NCLB on grounds that Congress has the right to impose mandates on the states..." Her premise is that this "...should be a clear signal for opponents of NCLB to change strategy."

Her main point, "It is becoming increasingly clear this battle has got to be fought on the grounds that NCLB is a violation of the most basic and fundamental human rights to freedom and is a clear violation of the Constitutional right of due process as stated in the Fourteenth Amendment: "No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws..."

She uses Chief Justice Warren’s opinion in Brown v the Board to make her point. "...With its embedded stigma of failure associated with standardized tests, what is NCLB doing to the motivation and ability of a child to learn? In effectively negating Plessy, Warren stated, "Separate educational facilities are inherently unequal." In 2005, we need to ask if the type of education a child receives also be inherently unequal. The evidence is piling up and has been clearly documented that NCLB, with its punitive consequences, sanctions and emphasis on testing and failure is not only leading to further segregation but is causing intellectual and emotional harm to children. Like segregation itself, it is inherently unjust and causes damage that can never be undone. Increasingly, the most vulnerable and under-funded schools are being turned over to private, for-profit management organizations with scripted, mind-numbing narrow curriculum.

The Brown decision established the doctrine of sociological jurisprudence in education by invoking the Fourteenth Amendment. It's time to revisit Brown and create new frameworks for legal challenges to NCLB on the grounds that it is an inherently unequal and unjust law..."

It is an argument worth pondering.

Post number two comes from Teacherken. In BLUEBERRIES: our wrong national education policy, Ken discusses educational reform and his view:

"...I ask people to remember this: we have a shortage of qualified teachers currently in our classrooms, we want to improve our public education, and if we are going to attempt to do so, we must acknowledge that reality. We must also recognize, as the first Cuban quote I offered makes evident, that we cannot successfully change our schools without the cooperation of the millions of us already dedicated to the future of our children. That suggests that the voices of educators needs to have more predominant places in our public dialog, and that our role should not merely to be the punching bags for politicians and others looking to score points. We have a responsibility to work cooperatively, but it is unrealistic to expect enthusiasm from those who receive the bulk of the criticism and yet have little opportunity to offer our experience.

And when you listen to our voices, your attitude may well change."

Read the original post if only for the blueberry story that is the title, but for me Ken hits when he states "...Far too much of the rhetoric surrounding the arguments about educational policy seems premised on the idea that those of us working in the schools do not have the best interests of children at heart. It often has a tinge to it that leads one to believe its advocates think that by using punitive measures and relying on rhetoric that denigrates those already committed to our children that somehow magically the schools can become a place that solves all the national problems of the day..."

When you work in schools with teachers you realize these people are dedicated to children. It is with teachers that reform must start and I believe that the best thing that has come out of the current reform blitz is that teachers and their institutions have become focussed on the best ways of reaching all kids. That said, NCLB still is a terrible law that must go.
anti nclb

Warning flags are flying over America’s public schools --

From Susan Ohanian.org. This is important stuff so I reprint it in it's entirety.

Since graduating from the University of Florida in 1982 Paul has taught social studies at Carol City High School in Miami. He coached the girls' basketball team at the same school for 17 seasons, retiring from coaching when he was elected to the Executive Board of the United Teachers of Dade (AFL-CIO, AFT-NEA) as one of three Vice Presidents for High Schools. He is an active member of the Florida Coalition for Assessment Reform (FCAR).

The approaching storm is a creation of this nation’s wealthiest and most powerful corporate leaders. They are lead by men who first mapped out their strategy at the Business Roundtable’s education summit in Charlottesville, Virginia in 1989. They came down from the summit as the newly formed Business Coalition for Education Reform and sent out a message—evacuate the public schools!

The ensuing New Orleans-style exodus has since transformed the public schools into America’s Superdome. Huddled inside of neglected and crumbling public school buildings now are the mostly Black and Latino children of poor and working-class parents. It is these children’s broken bodies and spirits that will lie amid the wreckage after the storm has passed.

The bringers of the storm have a dream and a game plan for making it real. They are men unsated by billions in profits plying young people with X-Boxes, iPods, Big Macs, Air Jordans, cellphones, Sprite, MTV, and B.E.T. They want their cake and they fully intend to eat it too! Their vision of the future includes the transfer of billions of dollars in annual public school funding into their own pockets. Their goal is a downsized and exclusive for-profit school system to train and educate only the children created in their own image and likeness.

But the American people’s reverence for equal opportunity stands between the corporate nightriders and their mission. Our history recalls public education as a partner of the abolition of slavery in a grand post-Civil War experiment in democracy. For that reason their designs must be concealed behind the façade of education reform and the smokescreen of school choice. The corporate agents of public school destruction can be difficult to ferret out but look and listen for their rhetoric and there you will find them.

Their game plan is being executed when you hear the men and women—parents, and the children they are raising—students, described as “stakeholders” along with the teachers and administrators. So completely enthralled are they with the business model of school management, the human beings involved are reduced to nothing more than isolated owners of a speck of a giant corporation. Public schools will be run like ExxonMobile, Microsoft, Wal-Mart, or Enron.

Their game plan is advanced when a crushing tedium and a spiritless boredom is inflicted on public school children under the guise of “rigor”. Testing is for public schools. Start testing the pre-teen child in the third grade. Keep testing every year until the schools become testing factories and then testing sweatshops where children labor to no useful end. The music, art, dance, theater, physical education and vocational classes are for private schools. Recess and field trips are for rich kids!

Their game plan is advanced when teachers are mired in endless, mind-numbing, irrational record keeping requirements because education must be “data driven” to be effective and efficient. They count on the weight of this mountain of meaningless paperwork to contribute to the disillusionment and physical collapse of teachers before the deathblows are struck.

Their game plan counts heavily on racism. While they fully intend to leave behind African-American, Latino, Native American and immigrant children, they will wring their hands in public over the “achievement gap” because it helps obscure other gaps in the nation’s social fabric. America’s household assets gap, the average white family owns 14 times the average Black family, is never factored into test score analysis. Nor the infant mortality gap, more than twice the rate for Black mothers, the life expectancy gap, the health care gap, nutrition gap, the employment gap…

They are forced to buy influence in the Black community. It is enemy territory and snake oil salesmen like Armstrong Williams and charlatans like Rod Paige must front their message. The US Department of Education had to pass thirty pieces of silver to Williams for his No Child Left Behind promotion. Paige put a blackface on the phrase “the soft bigotry of low expectations” and was able to call the biggest education fraud in history “the Houston Miracle” with a straight face. He was rewarded with a spot in George Bush’s cabinet.

Their game day slogan is “No Excuses” because it helps excuse away certain damning realities. Historically low levels of federal education spending and lower state funding of public schools, “No Excuses”. The perfect correlation of poverty and low standardized test scores, “No Excuses”. The re-segregation of America’s schools, “No Excuses”. Excuses are reserved for corporate downsizing, the outsourcing of jobs, escaping from pension and health care plans through bankruptcy filings, corrupt accounting practices and insider trading, offshore tax avoidance schemes, and obscene profit making.

Then there is the most potent rhetorical weapon in the CEO’s arsenal. They shout it in the faces of 9-year-old children. They bludgeon parents, teachers, administrators, elected school boards and whole school districts with it. Failed! Failure! Failing! F! When the time is right they will condemn the whole idea of educating all of America’s children—a noble but failed experiment. On the ashes they would build their Brave New World.

Unless! Maybe we are not mere stakeholders? Maybe it’s not the children who are failing? Maybe, millions strong and indivisible, we are the real power? Maybe they are just a handful of rich men who can be defeated by all of us together?

Miami, FL
anti nclb

Misspellings clarifies NCLB "leeway" remarks

From The Super's Blog
More on the Spellings PR splurge. Warning: This is satire.

PRESS RELEASE:

The Bush administration today clarified what it means by granting more "leeway" for schools trying to make adequate yearly progress (AYP) under the No Child Left Behind (NCLB) laws.

According to Bush's top education advisor, Margaret Misspellings, the new revised law will be called All Schools Still Pretty Much Left Behind (ASSPMLB).

Misspellings was careful to clarify reports in The Washington Post about granting leeway to schools under NCLB. She stated,"We are excited about granting schools more leeway. But the purpose is to hold firm in our surreal requirement that 100% of all students in every disaggregated subpopulation in 100% of America's schools score at the proficient level on their state standardized assessment or they FAIL. While blindly holding firm in this unreasonable and irrational standard, we hope to provide additional flexibility in the myriad of ways in which schools can work hard and still fail."

Misspellings added, "It is only by labeling all of America's schools failures and developing alternative methods of failure that we can increase the number of private schools who are not held to these same irrational standards."

She added, "I hope this clarifies what we mean in the reports stating that we are giving more schools leeway."
anti nclb

Coalitions of the Unwilling

From Jim Horn of School's Matter. (Essential reading always.) Jim's comments on the below spelling anouncement are right on.

A good deal of misleading press coverage has resulted from Spellings’ announcement for some kind of experiment in growth models to be used in 10 states chosen during the next year through an application process. For instance, this Washington Post piece almost seems giddy in its praise and appraisal of how this bold move will beat back the cascades of criticism of NCLB...

...And then a couple of graphs down comes this, which negates all the rosy PR that this move was intended to engender:

Spellings said she would not compromise on essential principles. Foremost, she said, is ensuring that all students are tested in reading and mathematics from grades 3 through 8, and once in high school, with results reported separately for racial and ethnic minorities, disabled students and other groups. The law's twin goals are to close achievement gaps and ensure that all students reach proficiency by 2014. "A growth model is not a way around accountability standards," Spellings said Friday in Richmond.

Now who will the ten states be? We learned from this Friday's post that the ten states chosen for the experiment must have in place the kind of longitudinal data gathering apparatus that was called for on November 17 (one day before Spellings’ announcement) by the Data Quality Campaign, led by Achieve, Inc., Bill and Melinda, the Alliance for Excellent Education, Council of Chief State School Officers, The Education Trust, National Center for Educational Accountability, National Center for Higher Education Management Systems, National Governors Association Center for Best Practices, Schools Interoperability Framework Association, Standard & Poor’s School Evaluation Services, and State Higher Education Executive Officers...

...eSchool News Online reported November 21 that ED’s Institute of Education Science (IES) has just announced the shovelling of $52.8 million to 14 states to begin the implementation the kind of databases that the corporate technocrats and the ed industry are screaming for:

States receiving the grants are Alaska ($3.5 million), Arkansas ($3.3 million), California ($3.3 million), Connecticut ($1.5 million), Florida ($1.6 million), Kentucky ($5.8 million), Maryland ($5.7 million), Michigan ($3 million), Minnesota ($3.3 million), Ohio ($5.7 million), Pennsylvania ($4 million), South Carolina ($5.8 million), Tennessee ($3.2 million), and Wisconsin ($3.1 million).

The grants were made under the Educational Technical Assistance Act of 2002, Title II of the statute that created IES. All 50 states, five territories, and the District of Columbia were eligible to apply, and IES received 45 applications.

The winnings states reportedly were chosen in a competition based on the merit of their proposals. Proposals were assessed based on aspects such as the need for the project, the quality of the project's design, and the quality of the management plan, ED said.

Can we assume that the ten states will be chosen from the fourteen listed above? I think so...

Read the original to become more fully enlightend.
anti nclb

Bush Administration Grants Leeway on 'No Child' Rules --

By Nick AndersonTuesday, November 22, 2005; Page A01, Washington Post Staff Writer

The Bush administration has begun to ease some key rules for the controversial No Child Left Behind law, opening the door to a new way to rate schools, granting a few urban systems permission to provide federally subsidized tutoring and allowing certain states more time to meet teacher-quality requirements...

That is the article in a nutshell. We will now wait to see how this PR announcement translates to idividual states. It could be good news or more smoke and mirrors from the admin istartion that brought us the Clear Skies Initiative.

anti nclb

Poverty and educational opportunity --

Tuesday, November 15, 2005 - Bangor Daily News

Historically, most Americans have worshipped the free market. If poverty becomes widespread, liberals blame poorly funded schools. They reason that as long as children have access to good public schools, anyone who works can succeed. Conservatives fault the moral character of the poor. Or, like President Bush, they suggest that lazy and permissive public school teachers and unions tolerate and encourage bad habits among children of the poor. Both perspectives unfairly scapegoat public schools and the children of the poor...

...close studies of test results show that the United States does well even in comparison with nations where only elites take the tests...When treated as a separate nation, U.S. white children are number one on some tests...

American education is failing primarily in the sense that it badly serves poor and minority children...As one critic has quipped, ZIP codes would do just fine. Punishing these schools won't provide the teacher training, smaller classes, and quality preschool programs that have been shown to improve the performance of such schools...

...Can good schools compensate for deficiencies in children's lives outside of school? In a recent Teacher's College Record, Arizona State University Professor David Berliner reminds us that over the course of a school year, children spend about five times as many waking hours with family and neighborhood friends as they do in school.

...The poor you may always have with you, but a recent UNICEF study puts the childhood poverty rates in the Scandinavian countries at fewer than 5 percent of the population ..

...Historically some conservatives have argued that school can't make up for bad genes, which are viewed as the real cause of poor school performance and poverty. Berliner replies by reminding us of the hideous example of children brought up in a closet, whose capacity for physical growth, language acquisition, and intellectual functioning could not be developed. He then cites Harvard evolutionary biologist Richard Lewontin's thought experiment: Plant two batches of seed corn, one in good soil with sufficient water and sun, the other in soil lacking exposure to sun and suitable nutrients. The seeds planted in good conditions will do on the whole much better. They will also show more differences among themselves than those planted in poor conditions, none of which will thrive. There are genetic differences among individual seeds, but for those in poor conditions, the full genetic capacity cannot be expressed...

More recently, work in the social sciences on mothers of mono and dizygotic twins shows analogous results. At the lowest socio-economic class, environment is a very strong predictor of measured IQ. In other words, though there are differences in various capacities among all human beings, our poorest citizens have very little chance to develop the full range of their capacities.

The good news is that modest improvements in the environment of the poorest children can bring large gains in academic performance...

..Goldberg points out that allocations for child care under the 1997 welfare "reform" have fallen far short of real need. Sen. Snowe has advocated a $6 billion increase over the next five years. These would be positive steps. Yet they would be inadequate without job training and minimum wage enhancements to increase the probability that jobs can meet minimal needs. Without such reforms, equality of opportunity even for our children - let alone George Bush's ownership society - will remain a dream. Our schools will continue taking the blame for problems beyond their reach.

John Buell is a political economist who lives in Southwest Harbor.

Readers wishing to contact him may

e-mail messages to jbuell@acadia.net.

But no, blame the teachers, blame the schools, blame the districts, and punish everyone, except of course those wishing to make a profit off of public education.
anti nclb

Legal, Education Experts Say NCLB Needs Changes, Flexibility --

From the New London CT DAY, By DAN PEARSON, Day Staff Writer, Education Reporter
Published on 11/16/2005
Hartford — A panel of legal and educational experts said Tuesday the No Child Left Behind law was designed with good intentions but has proved to be “intrusive,” “overly prescribed,” and particularly “inappropriate” for special education students.

The Connecticut Public Interest Law Journal at the University of Connecticut School of Law hosted the symposium on NCLB and its impact on the state and its schools in advance of Congress' five-year reauthorization of the law in January,

The law is poised for examination because it is entering its “mid-life,” said Mark Stapleton, the state education department's chief of legal affairs. He said the new era will have to take into account declining federal funding; the fact that far more schools than originally envisioned are considered “failing;” and the transfer, or “school choice,” option is creating an even greater concentration of low-performing students in urban areas.

Panelists said complying with NCLB prevents cities and towns from paying for preschool, child healthcare, technology, literacy training for parents, security and other programs that would benefit students more than the additional testing required by the law.

“Give parents and students what they really need,” said State Education Commissioner Betty J. Sternberg, a panelist. “Don't just measure more with more testing...”

...Attorney General Richard Blumenthal, who participated in Tuesday's symposium, said he filed suit because NCLB violates state law and a provision within NCLB that prevents the state from expending its own funds to comply with the law. He said the suit was filed as a “last resort” after the U.S. Department of Education refused to grant Connecticut flexibility under the law.

Blumenthal said the U.S. Department of Education was supposed to respond to the suit in October, but was granted an extension. He expects the department to ask to dismiss the suit this month...

...Panel members were particularly critical of NCLB's requirement to test special education students at their grade level instead of “out of level” — at their ability level — saying it provided no worthwhile data for teachers. They also said the impersonality of NCLB clashes with the long-established Individual Education Plan, a learning plan designed for special education students through meetings among parents, teachers and administrators.

Glenn McCrath, who oversees special education in West Hartford schools, said NCLB is having a “tremendously negative impact from a psychological standpoint” on special education students. Patrice McCarthy, a legal counsel for the Connecticut Association of Boards of Education, said the testing mandates are “destroying motivation” by setting “unreachable standards.”

Ann-Marie DeGraffenreidt, the director of the TeamChild Project, a center for disadvantaged children, said low-performing students are being encouraged in some troubled high schools to drop out and go to Adult Education to keep the school's overall standardized tests scores from dropping lower.

Yep, it is indeed true, all of it. And by the way, I'm back.
anti nclb

Inspector General to Conduct Broad Audits of Reading First --

From Education Week, by Kathleen Kennedy Manzo, Published: November 9, 2005

A federal investigation into Reading First will include several broad audits of the policies and procedures involved in implementing the $1 billion-a-year program, according to the U.S. Department of Education’s inspector general’s office schedule of reviews for 2006.

The inquiry will scrutinize the contracts awarded for technical assistance to states, how reviews of state and local grant applications were conducted, and whether federal consultants followed conflict-of-interest guidelines and gave appropriate guidance to grantees, says the schedule, made public last month.

The inspector general’s office undertook the inquiry after a series of complaints this past summer from educators and members of Congress alleging that federal officials and their agents may have steered contracts to favored publishers and consultants, and complaints that the program has not adhered to the principles of scientific evidence outlined in the No Child Left Behind Act.

The Government Accountability Office, the investigative arm of Congress, is conducting a separate probe at the request of a bipartisan group of senators.

Another Round of Letters

As a result of the ongoing complaints, Education Department officials sent letters last month to state education officials and federal contractors to clarify the requirements of the program and reiterate, as in several previous letters, that no particular commercial reading programs or products are mandated under Reading First.

A letter from Christopher J. Doherty, the program’s director, to the Portsmouth, N.H.-based RMC Research Corp., which has been awarded contracts of more than $40 million to provide technical assistance for states, says that “it is essential that the [National Reading First Technical Assistance Center] avoid all conflicts of interest among employees, subcontractors, and consultants who may have connections to particular instructional programs or materials used under Reading First.”

Such perceived conflicts have prompted criticism that has dogged Reading First since its inception in 2002. The program promotes research-based reading instruction as a means of raising achievement in the nation’s most disadvantaged schools, a goal of the No Child Left Behind law, which authorized the initiative.

A number of state officials, for example, have complained that they were pressured to adopt specific textbooks and tests devised by key consultants to Reading First. ("States Pressed to Refashion Reading First Grant Designs," Sept. 7, 2005.)

RMC Research sent consultants to work with states in drafting their grant proposals and, through the three Reading First Technical Assistance Centers, provides ongoing help in carrying out each state’s approved plan. Both the RMC consultants and panelists convened by the Education Department to review state grant applications have been criticized for allegedly overstepping their authority in advising states on the commercial products they should require participating schools and districts to use.

Formal complaints filed with the inspector general by several publishers charge that Reading First reviewers and consultants essentially fixed the competition to exclude their products. ("GAO to Probe Federal Plan for Reading," Oct. 12, 2005.)

The Education Department letters sent last month, while welcome, are inadequate, according to publishers, their representatives, and at least one former federal official.

“Certainly it’s nice to reiterate that [policy] and talk about the conflict of interest, but it’s a bit like shutting the barn door after the horses are out,” said Stephen D. Driesler, the executive director of the Washington-based school division of the Association of American Publishers. “We’ve been raising these concerns for years now, and unfortunately, a lot of the damage has already been done.”

‘Urban Legends’?

Mr. Driesler said the Education Department has endorsed certain programs by virtue of the reviews conducted by researchers associated with the technical- assistance centers. Moreover, he said, hope is scant that publishers who were unsuccessful early in the grant process will be able to break into the market midway through the six-year program.

Reading expert Susan B. Neuman, who oversaw the rollout of Reading First as the department’s assistant secretary for elementary and secondary education during President Bush’s first term, said federal officials should do more to convince educators that they are pushing evidence-based instruction.

“Usually, where there is smoke there’s fire. Even the perception of a problem is a problem,” she said. “Perhaps reiterating the same message again and again [that there is no list of approved programs] is not as efficacious as putting in place very active processes to help people understand that it’s about … using what we know about the science of reading.

“It’s not just about selecting the status quo basal textbook [that has all] the critical ingredients, almost like baking a cake.”

The inspector general has already begun interviewing federal consultants and complainants. Both that investigation and the one by the GAO are expected to last through early next year...

Little steps.

See y'all in a few. I'm taking a brief vaction. Be back by Tuesday or Wednesday.
anti nclb