What Works and Vouchers sections added to website/Update on Corbett Education team/WP - Do international test comparisons make sense?/NYT - Teacher Ratings Get New Look, Pushed by a Rich Watcher

We’ve added new sections to the website for What Works   and for Vouchers

If you have suggestions for links to websites, articles or reports that describe best practices for improving student learning/achievement please send them along.

Likewise for background and unfolding coverage of the voucher issue.

Updating the record on the Corbett Education Transition team:

Carolyn Dumaresq, Partner, Dumaresq Consulting is a team member who has experience in public education.

In addition to being a Board Member at PA Partnerships for Children, she was the former Executive Director for PSEA and a former Superintendent at the Steelton-Highspire School District.

Washington Post Answer Sheet Blog

Posted at 5:00 AM ET, 12/ 6/2010

Do international test comparisons make sense?

By Valerie Strauss

Tomorrow we will learn the latest results from the Program for International Student Assessment, known as PISA and promoted as the most comprehensive study to test and compare student performance internationally.

http://voices.washingtonpost.com/answer-sheet/standardized-tests/so-what-if-the-us-is-not-no-1.html

Do you continue to be concerned about the lack of achievement of our failing billionaires as they struggle to re-form public education? 

Here’s what our favorite one is up to now……

Teacher Ratings Get New Look, Pushed by a Rich Watcher

By SAM DILLON Published: December 3, 2010

PRINCETON, N.J. — In most American schools, teachers are evaluated by principals or other administrators who drop in for occasional classroom visits and fill out forms to rate their performance.

The result? More than 9 out of 10 teachers get top marks, according to a prominent study last year by the New Teacher Project, a nonprofit group focusing on improving teacher quality.

Now Bill Gates, who in recent years has turned his attention and considerable fortune to improving American education, is investing $335 million through his foundation to overhaul the personnel departments of several big school systems. A big chunk of that money is financing research by dozens of social scientists and thousands of teachers to develop a better system for evaluating classroom instruction.

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/12/04/education/04teacher.html?ref=education

Happy Board Reorganization Day!

LAF