Money Talks

A bit of recent history for those whose heads are still spinning from trying to figure out where Democratic support for public schools went. It's still there. But it's split. In education policy these days, it's hard to distinguish the left from the right.

This from the Daily Kos:

DFER and Education Policies

In August 2008, many teachers in America and this one in particular were thrilled about Barak Obama’s nomination. Linda Darling-Hammond was a leading spokesperson articulating the Obama campaigns’ education positions. Darling-Hammond had pushed for professional education standards for teachers and had presented data showing the importance of teacher training. Yet, by November Alexander Russo of the Huffington Post was reporting “The possibility of Darling-Hammond being named Secretary has emerged as an especially worrisome possibility among a small but vocal group of younger, reform-minded advocates who supported Obama because he seemed reform-minded on education issues like charter schools, performance pay, and accountability. These reformists seem to perceive Darling-Hammond as a touchy-feely anti-accountability figure who will destroy any chances that Obama will follow through on any of these initiatives.” In December, Obama tapped Chicago’s Arne Duncan as Secretary of Education. Because Duncan had no real education experience it was considered highly likely that Darling-Hammond would be the Deputy Secretary of Education. On February 19, 2009 the New Republic reported, “Darling-Hammond was a key education adviser during the election and chaired Obama's transition education policy team. She has been berated heavily by the education reform community, which views her as favoring the status quo in Democratic education policy for her criticisms of alternative teacher certification programs like Teach for America and her ties with teachers' unions.” They reported that she was going home to California to work on other priorities and would not be a part of the new administration.

    So, what happened and who were those “small but vocal younger, reform minded advocates that supported Obama” but hated Darling-Hammond? In August 2008 a pre-convention Democrats for Education Reform seminar, billed as "Ed Challenge for Change" previewed a coming attack from within the Democratic Party on teachers and especially their unions. David Goldstein of the American Prospect reported:

     “It was sponsored by a coalition of foundations, nonprofits, and businesses supporting the charter-school movement, including Ed in '08, the advocacy group founded by Bill Gates and real-estate mogul Eli Broad. The evening provided a truly unusual spectacle at a convention: A megawatt group of Democrats, including Mayor Cory Booker of Newark, Mayor Adrian Fenty of Washington, D.C., and former Gov. Ray Romer of Colorado, bashed teachers' unions for an hour. Amid the approving audience were Rep. James Clyburn of South Carolina, an icon of the civil-rights movement; Mayor Michael Nutter of Philadelphia, (in)famous as a high-profile African American Hillary Clinton endorser; and Mayor David Cicilline of Providence, the reformer of that once-Mob-ridden New England city. Cicilline took avid notes.” It was from this crowd that Darling-Hammond was receiving her harshest criticism and where the non-traditional (meaning no education background) leader of the Chicago school system, Arne Duncan, was championed as the next Secretary of Education. The loudest voices were those of a new organization calling themselves Democrats for Education reform (DFER), led by young extremely wealthy hedge fund operators from New York City.

        In the May 31, 2007 issue of New York Sun there was a report about one of the first victories of DFER: “A money manager recently sent an e-mail to some partners, congratulating them on an investment of $1 million that yielded an estimated $400 million. The reasoning was that $1 million spent on trying to lift a cap on the number of charter schools in New York State yielded a change in the law that will bring $400 million a year in funding to new charter schools. The money managers who were among the main investors in this law — three Harvard MBAs and a Wharton graduate named Whitney Tilson, Ravenel Boykin Curry IV, Charles Ledley, and John Petry — are moving education-oriented volunteerism beyond championing a single school.

         “They want to shift the political debate by getting the Democratic Party to back innovations such as merit pay for teachers, a longer school day, and charter schools. …  The group — actually two separate political action committees — has raised money for senators Obama, Clinton, and Lieberman; Governor Spitzer; Rep. George Miller; state senators Malcolm Smith and Antoine Thompson; assemblymen Sam Hoyt, Hakeem Jeffries, and Jonathan Bing, and City Council Member Vito Lopez. They count the charter cap lift, signed by Mr. Spitzer in April, as their first major victory.”

        The two political action committees the Sun mentioned are Education Reform Now, a 501c3, and Education Reform Now Advocacy, a 501c4. To lead these committees the hedge fund operators chose Joel Klein, the form chancellor of the New York City schools. It seems likely that Mr. Klein was influential in these young businessmen from elite schools developing the view of education reform they have adopted. Until April of this year, Klein has been the director of Education Reform now. In April he joined his former protégé, Michele Rhee at her advocacy group Students First which is also supported by DFER, the Broad Foundation and the Gates Foundation. When I looked on the DFER web site the first image that popped up was that of a favorite basketball player of mine and the current mayor of Sacramento, California, Kevin Johnson. He also happens to be Michelle Rhee’s husband.

       On the DFER’s official web presence they take at least partial credit for the selection of Arne Duncan instead of Linda Darling-Hammond.

       There is a glaring lack of experience or knowledge about education amongst the leaders of DFER. Michael Hirsch writing for the United Federation of Teachers explains, “What do these folks know about education? With the exception of Williams, who’s the hired help: nothing! Understand that DFER’s endgame has little to do with learning and everything to do with marginalizing public-sector unionized workers and bringing down the cost of taxes for social programs. It’s about creating new business and investment opportunities in areas that are still publicly run and serving as a pre-emptive strike against any hope for private-sector union renewal. Where better to start than with attacking teacher unions, one of the few labor strongholds in this country?” His point is at least in part validated by a cursory look at the present Board of Directors of DFER and the Board of Advisors:

Board of Directors:
Kevin P. Chavous (chair) - Former Washington, DC, City Council member and chair of the Education Committee; Board Chair of Black Alliance for Educational Options (BAEO).
Boykin Curry - Eagle Capital; Co-Founder of Public Prep. Public Prep launched in 2008.
Tony Davis - Co-founder and President of Anchorage Capital Group, LLC; Board Trusteer for Achievement First Brooklyn charter schools. Achievement First has grown into a network that includes 20 academies under ten charters in four cities.
Charles Ledley - Highfields Capital Management; Board Member of the Tobin Project.
Sara Mead - Bellwether Education Partners, Associate Partner; Former Director of Early Education Initiative at the New America Foundation.
John Petry - Columbus Hill Capital Management; Co-founder of Harlem Success Academy Charter School in NYC. Success Academy Charter Schools operate nine public charter schools in NYC.
Whitney Tilson -  Managing Partner, T2 Partners LLC and Tilson Mutual Funds; Board member of KIPP-NYC, and National Alliance for Public Charter Schools.

DFER Board of Advisors:
Steve Barr - Founder and CEO, Green Dot Public Schools.
Cory Booker - Mayor of Newark, N.J.
David Einhorn - Founder of Greenlight Capital, LLC.
Joel Greenblatt - Founder and Managing Partner of Gotham Capital.
Vincent Mai - Chairman of AEA Investors, LP.
Michael Novogratz - President of Fortress Investment Group.
Tom Vander Ark - Partner, Revolution Learning.

    In February another self-appointed expert on education policy from Seattle, Washington, loudly bashed teachers and their unions. An editorialist for the Seattle Times, Lynne K. Varner reported that “Major Democratic funder Nick Hanauer's recent email blasting Democratic lawmakers for failing to buck the teachers union and push for education reforms will go down as the tough-love message heard around the state. ‘It is impossible to escape the painful reality that we Democrats are now on the wrong side of every important education-reform issue,’ wrote Hanauer, a Seattle venture capitalist, to other party faithful. ‘Today, the (teachers union) is literally strangling our public schools to death with an almost infinite number of institutionalized rules that limit change, innovation and excellence.’” In that same editorial Varner said, “Reformers watched in dismay as Democratic leaders blocked key reforms including exchanging an outdated seniority-based layoff policy for one based on performance and overhauling the billion-dollar health-insurance program for school employees.”

    Diane Ravitch famously anointed these modern education reformers, “the billionaire boys club” and has valiantly fought off their benighted positions. They call for the end of seniority rights, lessening of health benefits for teachers, the destruction of the teachers union, privatization of public schools, standards based education, national standards, high stakes testing, no excuses, non-traditional school leadership, imbuing mayors with untrammeled control over schools, trigger laws, lessening the rigor of teacher certification, and value added measures to evaluate educators. Every one of these positions undermines the American public education system which is not failing and never has been failing. There has been a forty year campaign starting with the Reagan administrations falsely premised document “A Nation at Risk” to convince people that our public schools are terrible. Of course any institution can be improved but destroying the greatest education system the world has ever known is not an improvement. Across the United States, schools are staffed with well trained, experienced and dedicated employees and lead by competent administrators. For students who live in poverty zones that are often drug riddled and crime infested, the local school is often the only functional institution in the area. On standardized tests, poor students do not perform as well as students who live in wealthier and safer communities, but these schools still produce students who excel and win their way into some of the world’s most prestigious universities. John Dewey observed in 1916, “education will vary with the quality of life which prevails in a group.” Even as President Obama was cheering the closing of Central Falls High School in Rhode Island, many success stories from that school were following the path out of the poorest neighborhood in the state of Rhode Island opened by their school. These schools are not failing; the communities they are in are failing and schools are being unfairly blamed for it.

    At the DFER web presence is a section called the Brian Bennett Education Warrior Award. Not surprisingly, the awards go to political activists who opened the path for charter schools or who helped close “failing schools” or did some other deed that promoted the DFER agenda in most cases against the will of the local community. When citing previous heroes of education reform, the very first name cited is Alan Bersin. The citation says, “Appointed in 1998 as Superintendent of Public Education of the San Diego Unified School District, Bersin led the eighth largest urban school district in the country. In 2005, Governor Schwarzenegger appointed him as California's Education Secretary. Bersin led the way as one of the nation's first 'non-traditional' big city school leaders, promoting ambitious reform to raise the quality of education and bolster student achievement. Bersin currently serves as the Commissioner of US Customs and Border Protection. Bersin was a founding board member of DFER.” By ‘non-traditional’ they meant he had no education experience or training. I worked one year under Bersin’s leadership. Amongst all teachers and most San Diegan’s the Bersin administration is considered a colossal failure. Today, San Diego Unified School District is bankrupt having just issued a 1000 certificated and a 1000 non-certificated layoff notices and still suffers from the loss of experienced teachers and administrators suffered during Bersin’s tenure.

    It was under Bersin that some of the first DFER style reforms were implemented. It is a fundamental tenet of DFER style reform that there are many failing schools and bad teachers especially in poor communities. DFER Executive Director Joe Williams (“the hired help who has some education experience”) reported about Bersin’s success in changing two “failing schools” into charter schools. He wrote about the valiant fight Bersin put on to defeat the anti-reform teachers union and misguided parents who stood in the road of real reform. In November 2006, Wilson stated, “The conversion of Gompers and Keiller  to charter schools in San Diego suggests that with the right combination of top-down and bottom-up pressure for reform, and with sufficient support for reform efforts from inside and outside of school districts, even the most troubled public schools are able to turn the corner toward educational success. The question is whether education policymakers will act on the lessons that schools like Gompers and Keiller teach us.”  Joe Williams claimed victory for the students and parents who lived in the service areas of Gompers and Keiller, but like most “reform” success it is a complete mirage, because the only thing wrong with the schools was they were in poverty stricken gang infested neighborhoods. The charter school replacements were not a magic bullet that repaired the neighborhood and are likely doing worse than their public school predecessors would have. For a comparison, I picked two public schools that are nearby and have similar populations, Granger middle school and Spring Valley middle school and used the vaunted but often misleading standards based testing data.

API (Academic  Performance Index-California)     AYP (Adequate Yearly Progress-Federal)
Gomper  charter            2011 API 657     2006 API 551     +102     Failed 2011 AYP
Keiler  charter        2011 API 748     2006 API 687    + 61    Failed 2011 AYP
Spring Valley Middle     2011 API 786     2006 API 737    +49    Failed 2011 AYP
Granger Middle             2011 API 817     2006 API 693     +124    Achieved 2011 AYP
Data from California Department of Education.

    Like the supposed miraculous achievements of the Harlem Children’s Zone based on one class in one year or the dramatic improvement in the DC schools based on questionable testing practices, a closer inspection causes great doubt about actual success. The pattern is to claim victory for a reform and berate those who question the wisdom of the reform, but these claimed successes always turns out to be a mirage. The San Diego, New York and DC experiences are being repeated across the nation. Corporate entities are gaining more and more leverage over the education dollar and schools are not being improved! This week in San Diego, the San Diego Unified School district who recently announced the massive teacher layoffs because of budget shortfalls announced they were spending $15 million on i-pads.  The corporate lobbying influence is warping school leadership values to the point where how a corporation like the testing giant Pearson is affected becomes more important than the schools, students or teachers.

    During the 1990’s education reform in America turned in a positive hopeful direction. Throughout America young educators were being introduced to the thinking of Dewey, Piaget, Vygotsky, Gardner, and others. They read case histories of how social constructivism was being introduced in classrooms around the globe. The Soka education revolution in Japan based on the ideas of Makiguchi and the Reggio Emelia preschools of Italy led by Loris Malaguzzi presented young educators with decades of practical application of constructivist theories. In Japan, the concept of lesson study and in America the developments of action research were leading to a model of continuous improvement based on peer reviewed application. Darling-Hammond’s professional teaching standards were codified in California promising a path of growing professionalism for educators in all California public schools. The factory model of education was being replaced by a more humanistic model that engendered a love of learning and engaged children in developing understanding. Then NCLB happened and progress in education was stopped by a mandated return to Edgar Thorndike’s behaviorist model that Dewey had resisted so strongly. All positive education reform and improvement in pedagogy stopped and was replaced with privatization, disrespect of the teaching craft and hubris. Ravitch, Meier and Darling-Hammond were deemed anti-reform and the thinking of Whitney Tilson, Eli Broad and Bill Gates became guidance for good pedagogy. It is as if night were called day. Sadly, educators and union members can no longer count on the Democratic Party – the support of one hedge fund manager drowns out the voices of 100,000 educators.

What You Need To Know About ALEC

This from Diane Ravitch at Bridging Differences:

Since the 2010 elections, when Republicans took control of many states, there has been an explosion of legislation advancing privatization of public schools and stripping teachers of job protections and collective bargaining rights. Even some Democratic governors, seeing the strong rightward drift of our politics, have jumped on the right-wing bandwagon, seeking to remove any protection for academic freedom from public school teachers.

This outburst of anti-public school, anti-teacher legislation is no accident. It is the work of a shadowy group called the American Legislative Exchange Council, or ALEC. Founded in 1973, ALEC is an organization of nearly 2,000 conservative state legislators. Its hallmark is promotion of privatization and corporate interests in every sphere, not only education, but healthcare, the environment, the economy, voting laws, public safety, etc. It drafts model legislation that conservative legislators take back to their states and introduce as their own "reform" ideas. ALEC is the guiding force behind state-level efforts to privatize public education and to turn teachers into at-will employees who may be fired for any reason. The ALEC agenda is today the "reform" agenda for education.

ALEC operated largely in the dark for years, but gained notoriety because of the Trayvon Martin case in Florida. It turns out that ALEC crafted the "Stand Your Ground" legislation that empowered George Zimmerman to kill an unarmed teenager with the defense that he (the shooter) felt threatened. When the bright light of publicity was shone on ALEC, a number of corporate sponsors dropped out, including McDonald's, Kraft, Coca-Cola, Mars, Wendy's, Intuit, Kaplan, and PepsiCo. The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation said that it would not halt its current grant to ALEC, but pledged not to provide new funding. ALEC has some 300 corporate sponsors, including Walmart, the Koch Brothers, and AT&T, so there's still quite a lot of corporate support for its free-market policies. ALEC claimed that it is the victim of a campaign of intimidation.

Groups like Common Cause and colorofchange.org have been putting ALEC's model legislation online and printing the names of its sponsors. They have also published sharp criticism of ALEC's ideas. This is hardly intimidation. It's the democratic process at work. A website called alecexposed.org has published ALEC's policy agenda. Common Cause posted the agenda for the meeting of ALEC on May 11 in Charlotte, N.C. The National Board for Professional Teaching Standards has dropped out of ALEC and also withdrawn from the May 11 conference, where it was originally going to be a presenter.

A recent article in the Newark Star-Ledger showed how closely New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie's "reform" legislation is modeled on ALEC's work in education. Wherever you see states expanding vouchers, charters, and other forms of privatization, wherever you see states lowering standards for entry into the teaching profession, wherever you see states opening up new opportunities for profit-making entities, wherever you see the expansion of for-profit online charter schools, you are likely to find legislation that echoes the ALEC model.

ALEC has been leading the privatization movement for nearly 40 years, but the only thing new is the attention it is getting, and the fact that many of its ideas are now being enacted. Just last week, the Michigan House of Representatives expanded the number of cyber charters that may operate in the state, even though the academic results for such online schools are dismal.

Who is on the education task force of ALEC? The members of the task force as of July 2011 are here.

The ALEC Education Task Force Members from Kentucky include

Sen David Givens

Sen Vernie McGaha

Rep Brad Montell

Rep F L Waide

Sen Ken Winters 

Rep Addia Wuchner

Rep Jill York

H-L reports:
ALEC's state chairmen in Kentucky are
Sen. Tom Buford, R-Nicholasville, and
Rep. Mike Harmon, R-Danville.
Buford said about 32 state senators and 37 House members
 — Republicans and Democrats —
in Kentucky are members of ALEC
and pay $100 membership dues.

ead more here: http://www.kentucky.com/2012/05/01/2171344/kentucky-ethics-group-calls-for.html#storylink=misearch#storylink=cpy

Several members represent for-profit online companies, including the co-chair from Connections Academy; many members come from for-profit higher education corporations. There is someone from Jeb Bush's foundation, as well as right-wing think tank people. There are charter school representatives, as well as Scantron. And the task force includes a long list of state legislators, from Alaska, Arizona, Arkansas, Colorado, Connecticut, Florida, Georgia, Idaho, Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Maine, Maryland, Minnesota, Mississippi, Missouri, Montana, Nebraska, New Hampshire, New Mexico, North Carolina, North Dakota, Ohio, Oklahoma, Pennsylvania, South Carolina, Tennessee, Texas, Utah, Virginia, Washington, West Virginia, Wisconsin, and Wyoming.

Quite a lineup. Common Cause has asked why ALEC is considered a "charity" by the Internal Revenue Service and holds tax-exempt status, when it devotes so much time to lobbying for changes in state laws. Common Cause has filed a "whistleblower" complaint with the IRS about ALEC's status.

The campaign to privatize the schools and to dismantle the teaching profession is in full swing. Where is the leadership to oppose it?

 

Consider the Principal

This from the National Journal:

The principal is your pal. (That's how I learned to spell it, anyway.) That statement may be hard to square with literary characterizations of principals--from the hapless Principal Krupp in the acclaimed kids' book series Captain Underpants to the deliciously evil Principal Rooney in the 1996 John Hughes film Ferris Bueller's Day Off--but it does bear out in real life. A principal's main job is to make sure the kids and teachers in his or her school are taken care of, and that's no small task.

A new report from the Center for Public Education says that a principal's responsibilities have grown beyond administrative duties to include core curriculum and student achievement goals, and many in the profession now feel the job is "undoable."

However, the report also says that principals often are the key ingredient to improving a school's performance, and principals have the most impact at low-achieving schools. Effective principals hire and retain the most effective teachers, and they stick around to make sure that needed changes are carried through. The less effective principals tend to move more frequently to different schools, which adversely impacts the students and teachers.

Principals also are on the hook more than they used to be with the achievement goals of No Child Left Behind and the Education Department's turnaround model for low-performing schools, which mandates new leadership. The Center for Public Education agrees with the administration that the principal is a critical element in turning around a low-performing school, but its report notes that even the best leaders need time before the results of their labors are evident. "It takes a highly effective principal about five years to fully impact a school's performance," the report said...

Student Loan Rates Suddenly Got Sexy

This from the National Journal:

Who knew student loan interest rates could be so provocative? Until last week, only a few members of Congress seemed aware that the current 3.4 percent interest rate for government-subsidized student loans will double by June 30 without congressional action. Now everyone knows, thanks largely to the presumptive Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney, who said last Monday that the lower interest rate should remain in place. President Obama deserves credit, too, for launching the White House college tour to highlight the student loan interest rates. Obama's push no doubt prompted Romney to step up to the plate...

Link between value-added ratings and classroom observations is modest at best, studies show

This from Bill Turque at The Washington Post:

Here’s a statistical postscript to the story of Sarah Wysocki , the MacFarland Middle School teacher fired by DCPS last year after she earned good classroom observation scores on IMPACT’s Teaching and Learning Framework, but low value-added marks on student test results.

Ideally, there would be a healthy statistical link between the value- added and TLF scores. That would provide some solid evidence that following DCPS prescriptives in the classroom leads to higher student achievement on standardized tests.

“Nationally the hope is that there is a strong correlation between a teacher’s score on an instructional rubric and his or her value-added score,” Rachel Curtis, former assistant superintendent in the Boston Public Schools, wrote in her 2011 study of IMPACT for the Aspen Institute. “This would validate the instructional rubric by showing that doing well in instruction produces better student outcomes.”

So far, after two full years under IMPACT, the correlation is modest at best. An analysis of scores by DCPS consultant Mathematica shows that it was 0.34 (+1 indicating the highest possible positive correlation, and 0 indicating no correlation) in 2009-10. Last year it was 0.35.

Jason Kamras, DCPS human capital chief, said two years of data is not enough to draw strong conclusions. The correlation was comparable, and in some cases a little higher, than in other studies. For Cincinnati’s value-added system, which covers the same grades as D.C., a study showed a three-year correlation of 0.35 in reading and 0.33 in math. A study by the Gates Foundation called Measures of Effective Teaching, while less comparable methodologically, found correlations of 0.12 to 0.34 in math and 0.09 to 0.24 in reading.

“Would we like to see it higher? Yes,” Kamras said. “The reality is that these things are complicated and nuanced. They’re not measuring the exact same things. One is a measurement of the practice, the other is the product of that practice.”

Kamras, whose team is working on a series of changes to IMPACT to be announced sometime this summer, said the low correlation “is something we continue to wrestle with and question.”

Good Schools, Bad Schools

 On Report Cards for N Y City Schools

 

Invisible Line Between 'A' and 'F'

This from Michael Winerip at the New York Times:

Yana Paskova for The New York Times

P.S. 30, on East 141st Street in the Bronx, received an A in its last city report card.

Public School 30 and Public School 179 are about as alike as two schools can be. They are two blocks apart in the South Bronx. Both are 98 percent black and Latino. At P.S. 30, 97 percent of the children qualify for subsidized lunches; at P.S. 179, 93 percent.

During city quality reviews - when Education Department officials make on-site inspections - both scored "proficient." The two have received identical grades for "school environment," a rating that includes attendance and a survey of parents', teachers' and students' opinions of a school. 

On the state math test, P.S. 30 did better in 2011, with 41 percent of students scoring proficient - a 3 or 4 - versus 29 percent for P.S. 179. 

But on the state English test, P.S. 179 did better, with 36 percent of its students scoring proficient compared with 32 percent for P.S. 30.

And yet, when the department calculated the most recent progress report grades, P.S. 30 received an A. 

And P.S. 179 received an F.

Is P.S. 30 among the best schools in the city and P.S. 179 among the worst? Very hard to know. How much can the city's report cards be trusted? Also very hard to know...

As universities compete for dwindling state funds, performance matters

This from the Hechinger Report:

When performance funding was first tested in the 1990s, many universities resisted it, “gamed” the numbers or even cheated, research by the Community College Research Center (CCRC) at Teachers College, Columbia University, and others has found.

But tight budgets have prompted dozens of states to try the idea again. And universities are coming around to it.

That’s because performance funding no longer just involves vying for cash bonuses above and beyond universities’ annual budgets. Now universities are competing for their share of dwindling state allocations.

“It’s not the cherry on top anymore,” says Travis Reindl, a higher-education researcher for the National Governors Association. “It’s the base.”

The Obama administration also wants to use money as a motivator. It has proposed a $1 billion competition, modeled after the Race to the Top program, to reward universities for becoming more affordable and raising graduation rates, and to withhold federal financial aid from universities that raise tuition too quickly.

“This has really burst back onto the scene,” said Stan Jones, former Indiana commissioner of higher education and now president of Complete College America, which pushes states to improve graduation rates. Only 55 percent of students at four-year universities graduate within six years, according to the National Center for Education Statistics. And, the United States has fallen to 16th in the world in the proportion of 25- to 34-year-olds with a college or university degree, the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development reports.

The first round of performance funding began in 1979 in Tennessee. Twenty-five more states joined the movement in the 1990s and early 2000s, when healthy tax revenues enabled them to give financial bonuses to universities and colleges for meeting certain goals. But as the money dried up, one state after another abandoned the idea.

A revival began in 2007, led by Washington and Indiana. The portion of public-university budgets tied to performance, or that will eventually be tied to performance, varies from state to state, ranging from 6.5 percent in Indiana to 45 percent for technical colleges in Texas.

“Through performance funding we will show that each dollar we spend on higher education provides a greater return than if the dollar were spent on one of the numerous other competing worthy causes,” the Illinois Board of Higher Education pronounced. “We know we must be able to demonstrate that we can deliver a return on investment.”

State strategies vary. In Indiana, university budgets will be based on four things: the number of students who complete courses (instead of the number who enroll); the time it takes students to earn degrees; the number of degrees awarded; and the number of degrees earned by low-income students.

Ohio’s performance goals for universities include making it easier for students to transfer credits, and limiting the number of credits required to graduate. Tennessee will allocate state money for higher education based on such metrics as the number of students reaching milestones of 24, 48, and 72 credits. Louisiana will tie part of universities’ budgets to successes in improving graduation and job-placement rates, among other measures. And Texas already rewards universities for increasing the number of degrees awarded, and enrolling older, low-income and at-risk students who score below national averages on the SAT or ACT.

Various performance funding strategies are also under way, planned or being considered in Arkansas, Colorado, Connecticut, Maryland, Massachusetts, Missouri, North Dakota, Oregon, South Carolina,  Virginia  and West Virginia.

Rather than continuing to give money to universities based on how many seats they fill, Jones said, “It’s astonishing that, after 60 or 70 years, [states have] finally got around to the point of saying, ‘Okay, did anybody graduate?’ ”

Now some states are also imposing penalties based on performance. When Indiana cut the budgets of its universities and colleges, it made deeper cuts for those with higher per-student costs and lower graduation rates.

Several studies, including two by the CCRC, show that even in its earlier incarnation, performance funding had an impact.

In Ohio, the average time it took to earn a bachelor’s degree fell. Pennsylvania reported fewer dropouts, higher graduation rates, more diversity and higher faculty productivity. Texas saw a 9.3 percent increase in the number of degrees awarded.

Academic strategies also shifted. Tennessee universities increased tutoring and advising. Community colleges in Washington eliminated fees for degrees or certificates, which had prevented some students from graduating. In Florida, community colleges monitored withdrawal rates to weed out and retrain faculty whose courses students most commonly dropped.

At Slippery Rock, the proportion of students who graduate within four years has jumped to almost 38 percent (from below 22 percent), and within six years to nearly 58 percent (from below 52 percent).

“That’s a significant change in the success of our students,” said Williams, the provost. “You have to recalibrate your entire campus to remember that the reason they’re here is for your students to be successful.”

There are plenty of critics of performance funding. If universities get money based on their success rates, critics say, they’re unlikely to admit marginal students who have potential but may have trouble graduating. To keep the money coming in, these critics say, universities might lower standards to make it easier to earn degrees.

In fact, one CCRC study reported that several university branch campuses in Ohio categorized rising juniors as transfer students to meet performance-funding targets. A faculty member at a Florida community college reported being told to push students into more courses than they needed, so the school would get extra performance points. In several states, faculty reported being pressured to avoid giving failing grades, while admissions counselors said they were instructed to reject marginal students.

Education analysts also say that universities with different missions and resources shouldn’t all be forced to meet the same goals.

“What you’re doing is you’re taking a university, which is a very complex enterprise, and you’re attempting to boil it down into a few quantifiable metrics,” Harnisch said...

Reading on Science, Social Studies Teachers' Agendas

To meet the expectations of the common standards,  

Kentucky's science and social studies teachers are  

incorporating language arts into their classes

This from Education Week:

Beth Fahlbush is moving from desk to desk, helping her high school juniors sharpen their essays. They're zeroing in on their lead paragraphs and hunting for the evidence they must marshal to build the bodies of their essays.

"If the evidence does not directly relate to your thesis, cut it out," Ms. Fahlbush tells one girl, who listens as she twists a strand of hair in her fingers. "Remember," the teacher says to a tall boy slouched in a nearby seat, "you are writing an argumentative essay. So you need to defend each of your points."

The teenagers in Room 122 of Scott High School, here in northern Kentucky, are not in English class. They're in U.S. history. And what's happening represents a leading edge of key changes that are taking shape as states and districts put the Common Core State Standards in English/language arts into practice

The seven middle and high schools here in Kenton County are among the first in the country to pilot a new approach to the discipline. It targets the most pivotal ideas in the standards, which demand that students become strong readers not only of fiction but of informational texts, and that they become writers able to wield research, analysis, and argumentation skills as powerful tools. Reflecting the standards themselves, the approach involves teachers of all subjects in teaching literacy skills pertinent to their disciplines.

Variations on those themes are echoing nationwide, since all but four states have adopted the standards and are now starting to grapple with how to turn them into instruction. As the first state to adopt the standards—in February 2010—Kentucky jumped into the work early.

Kenton County's version is guided by a set of teaching tools that were developed by the Literacy Design Collaborative, a loosely knit group of consultants working with the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, which has poured tens of millions in grants into supporting the common standards. More than 3,500 teachers in 50 districts in eight states, including Kentucky, are using the foundation's grants—and guidance—to try out the tools. The foundation is supporting a Mathematics Design Collaborative that is creating teaching tools for the math standards, as well. (The Gates Foundation also provides support for coverage of K-12 business and innovation in Education Week.)

The centerpiece of the English/language arts toolkit is a collection of "template tasks." These short, fill-in-the-blank prompts are designed to open doors to instructional tasks that demand reading, writing, and analysis, and can be customized to each teacher's subject matter. They are structured to address three types of writing—argumentation, explanatory, and narrative—and nine types of cognitive process, such as synthesis, comparison, and evaluation.

The 3 Year Evolution of common Core

This from Education Week:

       

NEA supports resolution to roll back high-stakes testing

Educators urge officials to develop new accountability systems

This from the NEA:

The National Education Association has signed on to a resolution calling on federal and state policymakers to reduce standardized test mandates and base school accountability on multiple forms of measurement. Other initial signers include the NAACP Legal Defense Fund, Parents Across America and the National Center for Fair & Open Testing (FairTest).

“The overuse of standardized tests for high stakes decisions has shortchanged students, teachers and our education system in too many ways for far too long,” said Dennis Van Roekel. “We’ve lost sight of the reason tests were designed—to help gauge students’ comprehension and progress.”

The resolution’s cosigners have joined with public education advocates Diane Ravitch and Deborah Meier to urge state officials to “reexamine school accountability” and develop a system “which does not require extensive standardized testing, more accurately reflects the broad range of student learning, and is used to support students and improve schools.”

NEA has been a strong and vocal advocate of developing new accountability systems. An NEA policy brief issued in 2011 recommends that “assessment systems be developed with the collaboration and agreement of educators and other key stakeholders; should take into account the multiple factors impacting a student’s learning beyond a teacher’s control; and should be designed according to principles that allow their use with students of diverse abilities and diverse cultural and linguistic backgrounds.

The full text of the resolution is online at http://www.timeoutfromtesting.org/nationalresolution.

Everything You Ever Wanted to Know About Common Core

This from Ed Week by way of Politics K-12:

Math, Literacy, & Common Standards

Nearly every state has signed on to use the Common Core State Standards as a framework for teaching English/language arts and mathematics to students. Translating them for the classroom, however, requires schools, teachers, and students to change the way they approach teaching and learning. This report examines the progress some states have made in implementing the standards, what preparations need to be undertaken, and the challenges that policymakers and educators face in achieving the goals of the standards.

---

Download the interactive PDF version of the report, Math, Literacy, & Common Standards.

Advocates Worry Implementation Could Derail Common Core

Whether the standards succeed will depend largely on how well they are translated from expectations to classroom instruction, advocates say.

April 23, 2012 - Education Week

 

Concern Abounds Over Teachers' Preparedness for Standards

Some districts have prepared their teachers on the new instructional approaches for the common core; others have done little.

April 23, 2012 - Education Week

 

Reading on Science, Social Studies Teachers' Agendas

To meet expectations of the common standards, Kentucky’s social studies and science teachers are teaching reading strategies.

April 23, 2012 - Education Week

 

Big Shifts Ahead for Math Instruction

The standards will change the grade levels at which some content is introduced, push aside other topics, and ask students to show their understanding.

April 23, 2012 - Education Week

 

Standards Open the Door for Best Practices From Special Ed.

As schools rewrite curricula, the timing is right for UDL, RTI, according to experts.

April 23, 2012 - Education Week

 

Language Demands to Grow for ELLs Under New Standards

English-Learners will have to go beyond the fundamentals and master 'academic language,' experts say.

April 23, 2012 - Education Week

Father Wires Autistic Son, Publishes Recorded Verbal Abuse from Teachers

This from The Huffington Post:

When Stuart Chaifetz sent his 10-year-old son to New Jersey's Horace Mann Elementary School wearing a hidden audio recorder, he couldn't have predicted what he would uncover.

The move came in reaction to accusations from the school that his son Akian was having "violent outbursts," including hitting his teacher and teacher's aide -- claims that Chaifetz claims are against his son's "sweet and non-violent" nature

Akian, who has Autism, returned with a tape containing hours of apparent verbal and emotional abuse from his classroom aide and teacher -- whom Chaifetz identifies as "Jodi" and "Kelly" -- a recording which his father later published on YouTube.

The Feb. 17 recording started with Akian's aide and the teacher, whom Collingswood Patch provides evidence may be Jodi Sgouros and Kelly Altenburg, respectively, based on a previously published online staff directory.

The two engage in inappropriate conversations, like joking about their alcohol abuse and sex lives in front of their students -- all of whom have behavioral conditions and, according to Chaifetz, communication difficulties that prevent them from relaying the conversations to their parents.

"You would never get away with talking about your alcohol abuse the night before if this was a mainstream class," Chaifetz says in the YouTube video. "And that's the point, isn't it? They knew none of those boys could go home and tell their parents that the person who ran that class was under the influence of alcohol and was throwing up."

As the tape continues, the teacher and teacher's aide's behavior turns from inappropriate to cruel.

"Who are you talking to, nobody?" Kelly asked Akian, who sometimes talks to himself. "Knock it off," Jodi chimed in.

According to the video, Akian became upset, and starting crying.

"Go ahead and scream because guess what? You're going to get nothing until your mouth is shut," the classroom official is heard saying. "Shut your mouth."...

President Endorses Anti-Bullying Legislation

This from Politics K-12:

President Barack Obama today endorsed a pair of bills that would protect students who are bullied at school and in some cases, provide for students or their families to collect damages from school districts that don't act swiftly or strongly enough in students' defense.

In a statement, the White House said "the President and his Administration have taken many steps to address the issue of bullying. He is proud to support the Student Non-Discrimination Act, introduced by Senator [Al] Franken and Congressman [Jared] Polis, and the Safe Schools Improvement Act, introduced by Senator [Robert] Casey and Congresswoman Linda Sanchez. These bills will help ensure that all students are safe and healthy and can learn in environments free from discrimination, bullying and harassment."

Earlier today, the White House hosted a screening of the new documentary "Bully".

The President's endorsement of the bill coincides with the National Day of Silence, a day designated by the Gay Lesbian & Straight Education Network to encourage people to take some form of a vow of silence to draw attention to anti-LGBT name-calling, bullying and harassment in schools.

Obama has shown support for anti-bullying measures several times, including hosting a summit at the White House on bullying last year and speaking before the national broadcast of another bullying documentary that aired recently on the Cartoon Network.

"Today's announcement is a vital show of support to students everywhere of all identities, backgrounds and beliefs who face bullying and harassment in school," GLSEN executive director Eliza Byard said. "By speaking out on GLSEN's Day of Silence in support of these two critical bills, the President has given greater hope to students who often feel that they have nowhere to turn."

From the Nation's Cartoonists

This from Clay Bennett at Slate:

This from Mike Luckovich:

This from Walt Handlesman:

This from Signe Wilkinson:

This from Jim Morin:

This from Marshall Ramsey:

This from Chan Lowe:

This from Signe Wilkinson:

This from Joel Pett:

this from Ben Sargent:

This from Walt Handlesman:

This from Marshall Ramsey:

This from Mike Thompson:

This from Marshall Ramsey:

This from Drew Sheneman:

This from Signe Wilkinson:

This from Chris Britt:

Kentucky Supreme Court justices may favor JCPS in student-assignment suit

This from the Courier Journal:

Kentucky’s Supreme Court appeared willing Wednesday to uphold Jefferson County’s student-assignment plan — with several justices questioning whether state law guarantees students seats in their neighborhood schools.

Although no ruling was issued after more than 45 minutes of arguments, school board officials and advocates such as the Louisville NAACP said the seven justices’ comments have them hoping that they will overturn an appeals court ruling striking down the district’s plan. “You never can tell, but they appeared to be receptive to our arguments,” Jefferson County School Board Chairman Steve Imhoff said. “I feel pretty good.”

From Left, Justice Bill Cunningham, Justice Daniel Venters and Justice Lisabeth Hughes Abramson listen during the case before the Kentucky Supreme Court dealing with busing in Louisville during oral arguments in Frankfort. April 18, 2012

But Louisville attorney Teddy Gordon, who is representing several parents who sued the district after their children didn’t get a spot in their neighborhood schools, said he believes the justices will decide that state law supports his clients. Gordon persuaded the U.S. Supreme Court in 2007 to invalidate JCPS’ old desegregation plan because it looked at individual students’ race when assigning them to schools.



“I hope they’ll side with common sense,” said Chris Fell, one of the parents who sued JCPS and also is running for the school board in an attempt to abolish the diversity plan.



Attorneys do not know how long the justices will take to rule, which will determine if the district can keep a revised assignment policy that considers several factors, including neighborhood socioeconomics, to determine where students can attend school.


The tone of Wednesday’s questioning was much different from last fall, when a divided Kentucky Court of Appeals ruled against the district after harsh questioning, with one judge deriding voluntary integration as a failed “social experiment.”



By contrast, the high court justices hewed more closely to the legal issue at hand Wednesday — the parsing of language in a state statute.


“It’s not up to this court to decide the policy, we just have to (interpret) what the statute says,” Justice Daniel Venters said.

Kentucky law says parents may “enroll” a student at the school closest to their home. Gordon argued that the wording also entitles that student to attend the same school.

Attorneys for both sides agreed that the original law was passed in the 1970s as an attempt to thwart federal desegregation in Jefferson County. It was ruled unconstitutional while a decree was in place, but that decree was lifted in 2000.


Gordon contends the law now applies: “The contemplation (by lawmakers was that) these children go to the school where they enroll.”


But Byron Leet, an attorney for the district, argued that the legislature removed the word “attend” from the statute in 1990 to ensure that districts were allowed to make assignment decisions — not, as Gordon contended, to clean up redundant language.


There is no legislative record detailing the intent of the change.


“This case became a freewheeling political debate about the relative merits of neighborhood schools and desegregation. (But) the real issue is the statutory construction,” Leet said. “The only reasonable conclusion … (is that) when that word was taken out, the statute no longer dictates attendance.”


Venters pressed Leet on the meaning of enroll, citing a higher education case from Mississippi in which enroll meant to attend.


But Justice Lisabeth Hughes Abramson noted that enroll and attend have different dictionary meanings and that other Kentucky statutes distinguish between the two.


Justice Mary Noble asked if it was not a “reasonable inference” to consider the 1990 wording change purposeful, because the legislature at the time was aware that Jefferson County used an assignment system.


And she told Gordon that because JCPS uses clusters of elementary schools as an attendance district, “I don’t think you can argue that attendance district means the school closest to your home.”


Justice Wil Schroder asked if a neighborhood-school system would leave some overcrowded and others half empty, asking, “Isn’t that why we have a school board and elect individuals to decide who goes where?”

Leet also was asked if a right to attend the nearest school would be difficult to implement.

“It would not be difficult, it would be impossible,” Leet said. “Because of where buildings are and populations aren’t, everyone can’t attend the closest school.”


Gordon disagreed, saying the district has already considered the prospect during previous challenges, arguing that a neighborhood schools plan could be “created by the mere push of a button in today’s computer world.”


After the hearing, Gordon said districts should stop spending money to move children among schools, instead making sure all schools provide a better education. He said busing is harming student education, as evidenced by some schools’ low test scores.


Parent Belinda Abernethy, also one of the plaintiffs in the case who watched the arguments, said she isn’t sure how the court will rule. But she said even if the justices overturn the appeals court decision, she believes the lawsuit already has been successful.


“We’ve brought attention to the issue,” she said, noting that the school board recently enacted changes aimed at reducing bus-ride times, partly as a result of parent complaints.


Among the assignment-plan supporters attending Wednesday were Raoul Cunningham, president of the Louisville NAACP, and Georgia Powers, the first African American elected to the state Senate.

Powers said she hopes the high court leaves the plan in place because it helps avoid resegregating schools by race and income. She said she saw the disadvantages of segregated schools growing up.

“We’ve come so far in Jefferson County, and I don’t want to take a step back,” she said.

Techno Trouble

KSN&C had run into some technical trouble recently and some high end anti-virus filters have been kicking the site out. Others reported being redirected to other sites...heaven forbid.

The problem had to do with Google flagging Blogorama as a bad site and apparently sites that contained the Blogorama script were affected.  After getting some help from Blogger I thought I had the problem resolved.

Yesterday, I got two more reports of anti-virus alerts from readers.

I removed more script in hopes of resolving the issue.

Thanks to the folks at KSBA, Bluegrass Institute, and Jefferson County Schools for the alert.

Kentucky Supreme Court Hears JCPS Student Assignment Arguments

This from WFPL:

The Kentucky Supreme Court will hear arguments this Wednesday in Frankfort on a case that could force Jefferson County Public Schools to change its student assignment plan.

An appellate court ruled against JCPS last year, saying Kentucky students have the right to attend the same school where they enroll, or their neighborhood school. But JCPS argues state statute allows the district to transport students to meet certain diversity goals.

If the high court upholds the previous court’s ruling, JCPS may have to redesign its student assignment plan, which the district has already done once this year.


Attorney Byron Leet, who represents the Jefferson County Board of Education, said he has not had any discussions with JCPS officials as to what the district plans to do if the court rules against the district again.

“I think there are still issues yet to be pursued in the event that the Supreme Court agreed with the Court of Appeals, but frankly that’s not something I’m focused on,” said Leet.

Plaintiff attorney Teddy Gordon (pictured with parent Chris Fell, one of the plaintiffs in the case) said the district could request that the U.S. Supreme Court hear the case, but it’s not likely Leet and JCPS would have a case...

Cell video shows five-year-old being bullied by teen

This from WYMT:

A shocking attack on a school bus caught on tape. Tonight a mother says video shows her five-year-old son being picked up and thrown around by a 17-year-old student.

Now the Lee County School District and the Sheriff's Office have started an investigation.
"When I seen and heard that video, I hurt for my boy," said Sabrina Ross.

In the video recorded by a fellow student on a Lee County School bus two-weeks ago, Ross says, the 17-year-old not only kicked her son, but picked him up, carried him over his shoulder and threw him into a seat near the front of the bus.

"There were responsibilities that I feel like the bus driver didn't take," she said. "He should have pulled over, and addressed the situation."

But Ross claims, not only was the incident not reported, the bus driver says he didn't see anything.

"The student grabs my son and walks up to the front of the bus and throws Robert, how did the driver not see that?" Ross questions.

According to Jim Evans, Lee County Schools Superintendent, the investigation was turned over to the Lee County Sheriff's Office. But Evans says, the district is conducting an investigation of its own and disciplinary action against the student and bus driver will be part of that investigation.

"I just don't want any child to go through something like this," Ross explained. "Nobody deserves to be treated like that, especially a little defenseless boy."

Robert who suffers from multiple learning disabilities is also an open heart surgery survivor.

"I took him to the doctor after the attack, and the doctor said one hit the wrong way, could have killed him."

Ross is in the process of pressing charges now.

"I want justice, not just for my son, but for any child who is the victim or could become the victim of bullying."

Professor Bests Iowa Education Official in ACT

This from KCRG: 

A challenge over the ACT college readiness exam ended in stalemate of opinions from a college professor skeptical about standardize testing and the Iowa's top education official who believes it's an important measure.

University of Kentucky professor Scott McLeod in February challenged Gov. Terry Branstad and state lawmakers to take the ACT after the governor called for all Iowa high school juniors to take either the ACT or SAT exams.

He didn't get any takers, but Iowa Department of Education Director Jason Glass said he'd take the ACT, and dared McLeod to do the same.

McLeod, an educational leadership professor, said his goal was to get an up-close look at the ACT. Sixty-one percent of the state's graduating seniors took the test last year.

Glass said they were taking the ACT for fun, but discussion about college and career readiness is real,

The two men sat down on Monday at Roosevelt High School in Des Moines and took the four-hour test. Both finished with scores that mirrored their performance as high school students, The Des Moines Register (http://dmreg.co/IWgb9M ) reported after the results were released.

Glass received a composite score of 27 out of 36, landing him in the 88th percentile of test-takers. McLeod finished in the 99th percentile with a composite score of 34. Iowa's average statewide composite school for students in the Class of 2011 was 22.3. The national average was 21.1.

"I think it was a really good experience, our goal was to learn from this," Glass said. "Having been two decades or more from when we last took an assessment of this form, it's a good experience to get a refresher on what we're asking our students to do."

Glass and McLeod, who both have doctorates, said they found the test challenging. It includes English, reading, science and math tests...

Who is M A Cassidy?

I’ve been writing on deadline recently to complete revisions on an article on M. A. Cassidy with graduate researcher Lindsey DeVries. I was going to call it “Massillon Alexander Cassidy: Progressive Schoolman,” but lately have been leaning more toward “A Southern Progressive: M. A. Cassidy and the Lexington Schools, 1885-1928.” It will appear in the next volume of the American Educational History journal. 

I did my student teaching in 1972 at Cassidy School, under the supervision of my predecessor, some 23 years later, Principal Dorothy Friend. I always thought it was a great school. The kids were treated with respect. When I moved my family to Lexington in 1985, I knew where I wanted my own children to attend school. For almost two decades as the principal of the school that bears his name, I was in possession of a quantity of historical data about Cassidy. I have always wanted to learn more about the numerous progressive initiatives of the hard-working school superintendent. He is arguably the best example of how progressivism manifested itself in Kentucky’s schools. As is frequently the case when reviewing school records retained by the school, I read the good news – as opposed to all of the news.

Previously, I had been principal of two schools whose names came from the communities where they were located; Ryland Heights in Kenton County, and Meadowthorpe in Lexington. Both had the usual local historical memorabilia; neither assembled into any kind of historical account, as I recall. When the building was built, some names of teachers and administrators, and a bunch of photos (perhaps a yearbook), news clippings…was what one found.

But when I became the principal of Cassidy Elementary, I inherited not only the school, but the man. A very large portrait of the man still adorns the first floor hallway as a reminder to all of the wonderful deeds of our namesake. Well, not really.  We weren’t exactly sure of just what those deeds were. But surely he must have been wonderful to have merited such a remembrance. More impressive is his tombstone in the Lexington Cemetery. 

So, who was M. A. Cassidy? When I studied the record, what would I find?

I will confess to a bias in favor of effective school administration and Cassidy was very competent. He led people. I respect that because it’s important work. Folks who do it well are valuable.

Our review of school board records, personal letters, newspaper and scholarly accounts paints a picture of a popular superintendent who transformed the modest schools of Lexington from an undistinguished collection of dilapidated common schools, into to a more efficient system of graded schools, with improved buildings and better trained teachers, while preaching the gospel of literacy and expanding equality of educational opportunity, in a remarkably even-handed fashion for his time, to an increasing number of children. Under his watch, the schools in Lexington grew to enjoy a national reputation for quality. High praise, indeed.

Cassidy was one of a new breed of New South superintendents who maintained the long-standing interest in moral and civic training emblematic of 19^th century schoolmen, but now saw the school as a vehicle to solve social problems and advance national progress.

Upon reviewing the impressive list of Cassidy’s progressive, child-centered initiatives, one might guess that he was dispatched by John Dewey to bring Lexington into the 20^th century. But the data reveals a much more nuanced set of conditions which portray Cassidy as a distinctively southern-style reformer who held conservative and progressive ideals in equal measure.  

Problematic is the proper casting of the ex-Tennessean’s racial politics, which, while clearly racist, were consistent with the vast majority of Lexingtonians early in the 20^th century. Cassidy moved to the north, and found a “southern” state where his racial attitudes were a good fit with the white Democratic majority: at once, progressive and paternalistic; concerned but condescending. 

Conversely, the data present a clear record of Cassidy’s staunch support for black education including cooperation with black leaders, the establishment and improvement of schools for blacks, and the creation of a black teacher association and teacher-training institutes. Cassidy distinguished himself, remarkably, by insisting that schools for black children in Lexington would be up to the same standards as schools for whites. 

In Golden Deeds, his nationally recognized book and character development program, Cassidy shows no reluctance in praising Abraham Lincoln and other heroes who were white, black, men and women. He believed that women should be educated as much as they want, but that their best purpose was in the home. The data illustrate a southern accomodationist’s approach to white supremacy.  

Illustrative of the breadth of miscegenation fears at the time was the U.S. Supreme Court’s acceptance of white supremacy as a matter of “science” in Berea College v Commonwealth (1908). Reasoning that interracial marriage would “destroy the purity of blood and the identity of each [race],” and that prejudice was simply nature’s guard against that unnatural amalgamation, prohibitions against miscegenation went unquestioned by the court. The majority went so far as to argue that it was a credit to America’s civilized society that “the stronger race” did not simply “annihilate the weaker race” and in that way, the law that made it illegal for black and white kids to go to school together, preserved the peace. (See upcoming article in the Journal of Negro Education with Roger Cleveland and June Hyndman).

Cassidy belonged to that class of southern accommodationist progressives who made education their career, utilized the expertise of science and business to efficiently reshape civic life, and who saw themselves as the teachers and guardians of subordinate African Americans in whom they would cultivate some measure of collaboration and consent.

Deadlocked Negotiators Fail to Reach Consensus on Teacher-Prep Rules

This from Teacher Beat:  

Following a three-hour telephone call with negotiators during which consensus seemed frustratingly out of reach on new teacher preparation accountability rules, the U.S. Education Department declined to extend the rulemaking process any further, meaning it will craft the rules on its own.

The final wedge issue on the conference call ended up being a familiar one: student-achievement outcomes.

Several negotiators said they didn't feel that such measures as "value added" were ready to be used to judge program quality.

The breakdown in the process came as an abrupt about-face from last week, when negotiators seemed somewhat closer to an agreement.

But by the beginning of the conference call held this afternoon, the divisions among negotiators seemed to have grown more deep-set, with consensus far from imminent.

The Education Department's proposal would have required states to classify their teacher-preparation programs into four categories, using a mix of measures including student-achievement information. Only those in the top two categories would have qualified to offer TEACH grants for low-income students who commit to teaching in hard-to-staff schools.

The student-achievement piece has been a thorny one from day one. But during the second rulemaking session, the negotiators appeared to have reached a compromise on the matter.
Unexpectedly, the issue raised its head again today....

Sealed Rotenberg Video Finally Played in Court

After Eight Years, Video of Autistic Student Electroshocked by Teachers Finally Goes Public

Graphic video of teen being restrained, shocked played in court: MyFoxBOSTON.com

KSN&C Backstory (2007 here) (2008 here , here, here, here,  here, and here)

This from Jezebel:

For decades, critics have attacked the Rotenberg Center in Boston — which was originally founded to treat severely autistic and mentally disabled children but also accepts kids with ADHD, mental illnesses, and juvie rap sheets — for its use of electric shock therapy. (You may recall Jennifer Gonnerman's 2006 Mother Jones piece, in which she described a 9-year-old with electrodes strapped to his legs so staffers could easily zap him for minor transgressions, and a 15-year-old girl who actually held up a sheet of paper that said "HELP US" as she walked by her classroom.) One mother, Cheryl McCollins, has been trying to sue the school since 2002, after her teenage son Andre received permanent brain damage due to being shocked 31 times in one day for refusing to take off his coat in a new classroom. He's now heavily medicated and state institutionalized, and it doesn't look like he's going to get better anytime soon. This week, she convinced a judge to show a recorded video of Andre's ordeal to not only the jury, but the public as well.

The video's release is a huge victory for the Center's opponents, since the school convinced a judge to seal the video eight years ago and its attorneys tried their best to stop it from going public this week. "These are dramatic tapes, there's no question about that," said one lawyer. "But the treatment plan at the Rotenberg Center, the treatment plan that Andre had in place on October 25, was followed." McCollins disagreed. "I never signed up for him to be tortured, terrorized and abused," she told the jury. "I had no idea, no idea, that they tortured the children in the school." She also testified that she could hear staff members laugh while her son lay catatonic on the floor.

The Rotenberg Center has not publicly commented on the case, but the PR firm that represents it released a statement saying that "JRC educates and treats the most difficult behaviorally involved students in the country and administers the (shocks) to treat severe behavior disorders only after other treatments have failed and a court order is obtained to do so at the request of the student's parents and doctor." But it doesn't look like their excuses will bail them out this time.

This from Fox News:

Disturbing video of teen being shocked played in court

Video of a student restrained and shocked for hours at the Judge Rotenberg Center was played in court on Tuesday after a years-long battle by the center to keep it from the public eye.

The video, which shows former resident Andre McCollins screaming, writhing in pain, and begging for help, was played at the start of McCollins’ trial against the Canton-based Judge Rotenberg Center.

The Rotenberg Center convinced a judge eight years ago to seal the video, and the battle continued up until Tuesday morning when their attorneys asked Superior Court Judge Barbara Dortch-Okara to bar FOX Undercover’s camera from recording the video as it was played.

Dortch-Okara denied the center’s request, clearing the way to give the public the first look at how these controversial electric shocks are used. The video was taken by one of the center’s classroom cameras.

McCollins, then 18 years old, was shocked 31 times that day in 2002. Lawyers for the center and its clinicians say it was part of the treatment he needed to quell his aggressive behavior.

“These are dramatic tapes, there’s no question about that,” said attorney Edward Hinchey, who represents two of the Rotenberg Center’s clinicians. “But the treatment plan at the Rotenberg Center, the treatment plan that Andre had in place on October 25, was followed.”

It was an emotional day for McCollins’ mother, Cheryl, who was in court watching as the beginning of her son’s ordeal was played.

Andre is shown seated at a desk inside a classroom as a staff member asks him several times to remove his coat. He stays still, apparently not responding or removing his coat, until he is given a shock.

He screams and falls to the floor, yelling as he tries to hide under his desk. He was eventually restrained face-down, a helmet on his head, without breaks for food, water or the bathroom.

“I never signed up for him to be tortured, terrorized and abused,” Cheryl McCollins told the jury. “I had no idea, no idea, that they tortured the children in the school.”

She also testified what her son was like when she visited him three days later after the incident. She said she found him in a “catatonic” state.

“I couldn’t turn Andre’s head to the left or the right. He was just staring straight. I took my hands and went like this,” she said, waving them as if in front of his eyes. “He didn't blink.”

McCollins did get Andre to Children's Hospital that day, where he was diagnosed with acute stress response caused by the shocks. The jury also heard her testify about watching the video and hearing staff members laughing while her son was on the floor.

Light Blogging Ahead

Well, not "from now on," but blogging is going to have to take a backseat to scholarship in the near future. I've just had several proposed efforts hit all at once. In the immediate future my attention is going to have to go to

• a local presentation at UK on bullying
• a local presentation at EKU on the legal history of inequity in Kentucky schools
• a national publication (accepted with revisions) on M A Cassidy
• a book chapter (accepted)on Education Reform in Kentucky: Just What the Court Ordered
• an international paper and presentation (accepted)on the legal and political hurdles to late 20th century school reform in Kentucky
• an international presentation on bullying (in the works)
• a handbook for EKU's new 200 hour co-op - part of our expanding clinical pre-service teaching experience 
• a redesign of my course EDF 203: Philosophical and Historical Foundations of Education

So, try not to do anything Earth-shattering until I get back.