Daily
postings from the Keystone State Education Coalition now reach more than 1900
Pennsylvania education policymakers – school directors, administrators,
legislators, legislative and congressional staffers, PTO/PTA officers, parent
advocates, teacher leaders, education professors, members of the press and a
broad array of P-16 regulatory agencies, professional associations and education
advocacy organizations via emails, website, Facebook and Twitter.
The Keystone State Education Coalition is
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These daily
emails are archived at http://keystonestateeducationcoalition.org
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A few more on the McCommon Core……..
NAACP 2013
Conference on the State of Education in Pennsylvania
A Call for Equitable and
Adequate Funding for Pennsylvania
Media Area Branch NAACP Saturday, May 11, 2013 9:00 am – 2:30
pm (8:30 am registration)
Marcus Foster Student
Union 2nd floor, Cheyney University of PA, Delaware County Campus
Information and
registration at: http://www.naacpmediabranch.org/2013_conference.html
Here’s our weekend
posting in case you missed it…..
Pennsylvania April 20, 2013 :
IDEA:
It’s the law, but nobody wants to fund it…….
Are
high-stakes tests counterproductive?
Extensive RAND research shows it all depends
on how they are used
Post-Gazette Opinion By Laura
Hamilton and Gabriella C. Gonzalez April 21, 2013 12:02 am
Laura Hamilton is a senior behavioral scientist and Gabriella C.
Gonzalez is a social scientist at the nonprofit, nonpartisan RAND Corp.
A group of parents across the country are rejecting the idea of high-stakes testing as a means of judging both schools and educators, choosing to have their children opt out of standardized high-stakes tests like the PSSAs that public school children inPennsylvania
A group of parents across the country are rejecting the idea of high-stakes testing as a means of judging both schools and educators, choosing to have their children opt out of standardized high-stakes tests like the PSSAs that public school children in
Under the No Child Left Behind
Act, these tests became a means for states to assess educational performance.
The opt-out movement argues that such high-stakes testing can narrow
curriculum, saddle both teachers and students with excessive stress and
threaten the jobs of educators.
While the opt-out movement's
concerns are valid and have sparked an important conversation, the use of
high-stakes tests is a complex issue. A decade of research on testing and
accountability conducted at RAND indicates
that these tests can have both positive and negative consequences depending on
how policymakers, school districts and teachers use and implement them.
By Eleanor Chute / Pittsburgh April 22, 2013 12:02 am
The Pittsburgh Promise
scholarship program is stepping up its fundraising efforts, setting a goal of
raising an additional $90 million in two years instead of taking until 2018 as
planned.
Martin McGuinn, retired
chairman and CEO of Mellon Financial Corp., said the campaign will build on the
momentum of the Promise, which began offering scholarships to city public
school students beginning with the high school graduation class of 2008.
WHYY Newsworks By Mary
Wilson, @marywilson April
21, 2013
A proposal intended to provide
more transparency to campaign finance data has passed in the Pennsylvania
Senate. Candidates for statewide office
and the General Assembly would have to file their campaign finance reports
electronically under the plan. Candidates,
as well as political action committees, also could trigger more frequent filing
deadlines if they raise $10,000 or more in a month.
Senators to Arne Duncan: Stop Flat-Funding
Key K-12 Programs
Education Week Politics K-12
Blog By Alyson Klein on April
17, 2013 1:35 PM
The Obama administration has been
a big fan of using competitive grants to drive its agenda on everything from
teacher quality to standards to "personalized learning,"much
to the chagrin of some advocates for school districts. So far, Republicans in the U.S. House of
Representatives have resisted that strategy. But
Democrats in the U.S. Senate have continued to finance the administration's
favorite competitive-grant programs, such as Race to the Top, although not
always at the level the administration has sought.
Meanwhile, formula grants that
go out to just about every school district—Title I grants to districts and
special education—have been virtually flat-funded in Senate appropriations
bills.
Insiders
continue to believe that ESEA reauthorization will not take place until after
January 2015.
Whiteboard Advisors April 2013
When asked “about when do you
believe that a final ESEA bill will be singed into law?” 77% responded “after
January 2015” according to an April 2013 Whiteboard Advisors poll
The basic business principles school
reformers ignore
…..But that is precisely what
we are doing with the new Common Core State Standards, high-stakes tests, and
teacher evaluation systems being rolled out around the country. We’ve had 10
years of failed mandatory state standards, high-stakes tests, and evaluations
of educators based on test scores, of an accountability policy that has turned
our K-12 schools into test prep factories. In schools across the nation, now, a
third of each school year is spent doing test prep, taking practice tests, and
taking high-stakes tests. That’s failed. It has clearly, utterly failed. And so
we’ve decided to do a lot more of that.
Moving
Ahead With Common Core
New York Times Editorial By THE EDITORIAL BOARD Published:
April 20, 2013
Some Ask: What’s the Value of Common Core
State
KQED By
Claudio Sanchez, NPR April 15, 2013 | 10:35 AM | By MindShift
At 2 p.m., it’s crunchtime for
students who write for the Harbinger Online, the
award-winning, student news site at Shawnee Mission East High just outside Kansas City , Kan.
“The development of common standards and shared assessments radically
alters the market for innovation in curriculum development, professional
development, and formative assessments. Previously, these markets operated on a
state-by-state basis, and often on a district-by-district basis. But the
adoption of common standards and shared assessments means that education
entrepreneurs will enjoy national markets where the best products can be taken
to scale.”
Time for Teacher Unions to Hop Off the
Common Core Train
Education Week Living in
Dialogue Blog By Anthony Cody on April
22, 2013 12:35 AM
The two largest teacher unions
in the US
Wikipedia on Common
Core State
From Wikipedia, the free
encyclopedia
The Common
Core State Standards Initiative is a U.S.
Common Core State Standards Initiative Website
Anthony Cody tweeted a link to a
column he penned in July 2009…..
Have you
heard that Common Core was a grassroots project w/teachers involved: Take a
look at reality:
“So who makes up the two Work
Groups? Of the 25 individuals on the two teams, (four people are on both) six
are associated with the test-makers from the College Board, five are
with fellow test-publishers ACT, and
four are with Achieve. Zero
teachers are on either Work Group. The Feedback Groups have 35 participants,
almost all of whom are university professors. There appears to be exactly one classroom
teacher involved in the entire process, on one of the Feedback Groups.”
The Secret Sixty Prepare to Write Standards
for 50 Million
Education Week Living in
Dialogue Blog By Anthony Cody on July
6, 2009 12:13 PM | 26
Comments
Sixty individuals, ONE teacher
among them, will write national education standards in the next five months, in
a secret process that excludes effective input from students, parents or
teachers.
As teachers we spend a lot of time thinking about what we teach our students, and how to engage them in learning. When the National Governor’s Association (NGA) called for national education standards a few months back, some educators optimistically believed that we might be consulted in the process. After all, didn’t the entire No Child Left Behind fiasco teach us what happens when policies are enacted without the active engagement of the professionals expected to carry them out? However, I had a sinking feeling history might repeat itself, when I wrote this entry a few weeks back. Now the other shoe has dropped. On Wednesday, the NGA and the Council of Chief State School Officers (CCSSO) released their plan for developing national standards for Mathematics and English.
As teachers we spend a lot of time thinking about what we teach our students, and how to engage them in learning. When the National Governor’s Association (NGA) called for national education standards a few months back, some educators optimistically believed that we might be consulted in the process. After all, didn’t the entire No Child Left Behind fiasco teach us what happens when policies are enacted without the active engagement of the professionals expected to carry them out? However, I had a sinking feeling history might repeat itself, when I wrote this entry a few weeks back. Now the other shoe has dropped. On Wednesday, the NGA and the Council of Chief State School Officers (CCSSO) released their plan for developing national standards for Mathematics and English.
“Testing companies are in the
business of making a profit, but let’s not confuse their mission — their
mission is to create as many tests as they can and then grade them at as little
cost as possible,”
Seeking to Pare
Standardized Tests, Legislators Take Aim at Testing Firm
New
York Times/Texas Tribune By MORGAN SMITH
APRIL
20, 2013
As the Texas Legislature moves
to uproot the state’s standardized testing program amid an outcry from parents
and school leaders, state lawmakers have focused their criticism on Pearson, the publishing and
testing company that develops the tests.
Pearson holds a five-year, $468 million contract through 2015 to provide
the state assessment tests that students begin taking in third grade. While
policies that led to the contract won unanimous approval four years ago, some
lawmakers now say Pearson exerted excessive influence in the policy-making
process.
“Testing companies are in the
business of making a profit, but let’s not confuse their mission — their
mission is to create as many tests as they can and then grade them at as little
cost as possible,” the chairman of the Senate Education Committee, Dan Patrick,
Republican of Houston, said Tuesday at a hearing on a comprehensive education
bill that would reduce the number of high-stakes tests students must pass to
graduate.
The First
Race to the Top
New
York Times Opinion By WILLIAM J. REESE
APRIL
20, 2013
FOR the nearly 50 million
students enrolled in America Atlanta
But we should also be
wondering, where did all this begin? It turns out that the race to the top has
a lot of history behind it.
Members of the Boston School
Committee fired the first shots in the testing wars in the summer of 1845.
Is This Why National PTA Showed “Superman”
at Its National Convention?
Diane Ravitch’s Blog By dianerav April
21, 2013 //
A reader sends this
information:
SEATTLE (AP) – December 1, 2009
(WPVI) — The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation is giving the National PTA $1
million to teach parents about education reform. [Common Core]
ALEXANDRIA, VA, Feb 15, 2013
(MARKETWIRE via COMTEX) — National PTA announced today that it received a
one-year $240,000 grant from the GE Foundation [General Electric] to further
its efforts on the Common Core State Standards.
Superintendents, Business Managers, School
Board Members, Union Leaders, Any Others interested in PSERS and wanting to learn
more about Pension Reform . . .
Tuesday, May 14, 2013 Registration:
6:30 p.m. Presentation: 7:00 p.m.
Allegheny Intermediate Unit 475 East Waterfront Drive Homestead , PA 15120
Jeffery B. Clay, Executive
Director for the Pennsylvania Schools Employees’ Retirement System (PSERS)
will present on the topic of pension reform. Mr. Clay’s presentation will
review the increases in retirement contributions and the Governor’s proposal on
pension reform. As one concerned about public education, we are sure that
you will find this meeting enlightening and a valuable investment of your time.
In order to accommodate those
attending and prepare the necessary materials for the meeting, please
register using the following link: http://www.eventbrite.com/event/6252177431 by May 7, 2013 .
If you have any questions
regarding the registration process, please contact Janet Galaski at 412.394.5753 or janet.galaski@aiu3.net.
Sign Up
Today for PILCOP Special Ed CLE Trainings
Spots are filling up for the
final three trainings in our 2012-2013 Know Your Child’s Rights series with
seminars on ADAAA, Pro Se Parents and Settlement Agreements.
For seminar details and
registration: http://pilcop.org/sign-up-today-for-special-ed-cle-trainings/
PA Charter Schools: $4 billion taxpayer dollars with no real
oversight
Charter schools - public funding without public scrutiny; Proposed
statewide authorization and direct payment would further diminish
accountability and oversight for public tax dollars
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