Daily postings
from the Keystone State Education Coalition now reach more than 1500
Pennsylvania education policymakers – school directors, administrators,
legislators, members of the press and a broad array of education advocacy
organizations via emails, website, Facebook and Twitter.
These daily
emails are archived at http://keystonestateeducationcoalition.org
Follow us
on Twitter at @lfeinberg
Will a PAC Pick Philly’s Next
Mayor?
Students
First PAC is very interested in Philly
City
Phillymag.com by Patrick Kerkstra 07/06/12
The pro-privatization Students First PAC has
been a huge player in state politics from the moment it emerged in 2010 flush
with cash, much of it from three local businessmen who together founded Susquehanna
International Group, a global investment company.
Students First gave State
Sen. Anthony
Williams—a leading Democratic proponent of school vouchers—a staggering
$3.65 million for his failed gubernatorial run. And ever since, the PAC has
showered smaller sums on state representatives and senators receptive to the
organization’s goal of sweeping education reform.
But what’s gone largely unnoticed
is the PAC’s apparent interest in Philadelphia
The contributions are intriguing
for a few reasons.
Students
First PAC’s Jeffrey Yass turns up again in this report….
William Penn Foundation launches a PR offensive against City Paper
report with Inky assist
Posted by Daniel Denvir FRIDAY, JULY 6, 2012
Today's Inquirer includes
two articles (here and here) on the William Penn Foundation, including
the big news that William Penn announced a $15 million grant to the
pro-charter Philadelphia School Partnership―a scoop that we reported yesterday and that William Penn had
refused to confirm.
Indeed, William Penn president Jeremy Nowak gave his Inquirer interview yesterday―after our story broke―making it seem pretty darn obvious William Penn spoke with the Inquirer as part of an effort to push back against a City Paper story they are very unhappy with.
And while the Inquirer cited our article, they did not report or follow up on its three most important scoops:
Indeed, William Penn president Jeremy Nowak gave his Inquirer interview yesterday―after our story broke―making it seem pretty darn obvious William Penn spoke with the Inquirer as part of an effort to push back against a City Paper story they are very unhappy with.
And while the Inquirer cited our article, they did not report or follow up on its three most important scoops:
School
district officials say extra state funding won't bring back furloughed
teachers, cut programs
Published: Friday, July 06, 2012 , 5:00 AM
The
state’s 2012-13 budget that Corbett signed last week after
negotiations with the Legislature restores a $100 million accountability block
grant for public schools.
New
law excludes charter school teachers from revised evaluations
By Amy McConnell Schaarsmith and
Eleanor Chute / Pittsburgh
In 2013-14, public schools across
the state will be required to consider student performance when evaluating
teachers -- except for charter schools.
The General Assembly last week
approved legislation that requires half of a teacher's evaluation to be based
on observation and half on various measures of student performance. Under the
old law, considering student performance is not required in teacher
evaluations.
Ron Cowell, president of the
Education Policy and Leadership Center, a nonprofit based in Harrisburg, said
changing the teacher evaluation process was necessary, but he called excluding
charter school teachers from the requirement a "serious omission."
PRESS RELEASE: PA Department of
Education July
05, 2012
Philadelphia-BasedFrontier Virtual
Charter High
School
Department of Education sought closure of school for its failure to provide core educational programs
Philadelphia-Based
Department of Education sought closure of school for its failure to provide core educational programs
An extensive investigation by the
Department of Education revealed that the school failed to adhere to the
conditions of its charter by not delivering core educational programs to
students.
“Today’s action is in the best
interest of students and provides families sufficient time to make other
arrangements for the upcoming school year,’’ Secretary of Education Ron Tomalis
said today.
“Over the past year, Frontier fell
short in providing its students with the core academic programs parents and
students expect of our public schools,’’ Tomalis said. “These issues were not
just the normal difficulties typically experienced by a first-year
organization, but they go to the heart of Frontier’s ability to provide quality
educational opportunities to students within the confines of its charter, as
well as the Charter School Law.
PSBA:
Key Provisions of New EITC 2.0 Scholarship Program
The
Astonishing Increase in Testing
Schools Matter Blog By Stephen
Krashen Sent to the New York Times, July 6, 2012
There is little reason to celebrate waivers from No Child Left Behind (NCLB) (“No Child’ Law Whittled Down by White House,” July 6).
NCLB’s “obsessive focus on test results” will be much worse under new regulations: The new Common Core Standards calls for an astonishing increase in testing.
NCLB requires standardized tests in math and reading at the end of the school year in grades 3-8 and once in high school. This will be expanded to testing in more subjects (social studies, science and maybe more), and in more grade levels. There will also be interim tests given during the year and there may be pretests in the fall to measure growth through the school year.
This means about a 20-fold increase over NCLB, more testing than has ever been seen on this planet.
There is no evidence that all this testing will improve things. In fact, the evidence we have now strongly suggests that increasing testing does not increase achievement.
http://www.schoolsmatter.info/2012/07/astonishing-increase-in-testing.html
There is little reason to celebrate waivers from No Child Left Behind (NCLB) (“No Child’ Law Whittled Down by White House,” July 6).
NCLB’s “obsessive focus on test results” will be much worse under new regulations: The new Common Core Standards calls for an astonishing increase in testing.
NCLB requires standardized tests in math and reading at the end of the school year in grades 3-8 and once in high school. This will be expanded to testing in more subjects (social studies, science and maybe more), and in more grade levels. There will also be interim tests given during the year and there may be pretests in the fall to measure growth through the school year.
This means about a 20-fold increase over NCLB, more testing than has ever been seen on this planet.
There is no evidence that all this testing will improve things. In fact, the evidence we have now strongly suggests that increasing testing does not increase achievement.
http://www.schoolsmatter.info/2012/07/astonishing-increase-in-testing.html
National Institute for Early
Education Research
State
of Preschool 2011 – Pennsylvania
State
Wait—Freedom
of Religion Is For ALL Religions?
The New
Republic by Amy Sullivan July 5, 2012
A Republican state representative
in Louisiana
"WATSON — Rep. Valarie
Hodges, R-Watson, says she had no idea that Gov. Bobby Jindal’s overhaul of the
state’s educational system might mean taxpayer support of Muslim schools …
'I liked the idea of giving
parents the option of sending their children to a public school or a Christian
school,' Hodges said.
Hodges mistakenly assumed that
'religious' meant 'Christian.'
Thanks
to Susan Ohanian (#susanoha) for tweeting this….
Ignoring Poverty in the U.S.
Ignoring Poverty in the U.S. : The Corporate Takeover of Public Education
examines the divide between a commitment to public education and our cultural
myths and more powerful commitment to consumerism and corporate America
The book addresses poverty in the
context of the following: the historical and conflicting purposes in public
education-how schools became positivistic/behavioral in our quest to produce
workers for industry; the accountability era-how A Nation at Risk through NCLB
have served corporate interest in dismantling public education and dissolving
teachers unions; the media and misinformation about education; charter schools
as political/ corporate compromise masking poverty; demonizing schools and
scapegoating teachers-from misusing the SAT to VAM evaluations of teachers;
rethinking the purpose of schools-shifting from schools as social saviors to
addressing poverty so that public education can fulfill its purpose of
empowering everyone in a democracy; and reframing how we view people living in
poverty-rejecting deficit views of people living in poverty and students
struggling in school under the weight of lives in poverty.
This work is intended to confront
the growing misinformation about the interplay among poverty, public schools,
and what schools can accomplish while political and corporate leadership push
agendas aimed at replacing public education with alternatives such as charter
schools. The audience for the publication includes educators, educational
reformers, politicians, and any member of the wider public interested in public
education
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