Daily postings from the Keystone State Education Coalition now
reach more than 3250 Pennsylvania education policymakers – school directors,
administrators, legislators, legislative and congressional staffers,
Governor's staff, current/former PA Secretaries of Education, PTO/PTA
officers, parent advocates, teacher leaders, business 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
These daily emails are archived and searchable at http://keystonestateeducationcoalition.org
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Keystone State Education Coalition
Grassroots Non-Partisan
Public Education Advocacy
PA Ed Policy Roundup for
August 14, 2014:
Education Secretary Arne
Duncan kicks off preschool grant competition in Pittsburgh
To inform state
policymaking, Pew provides research on the fiscal challenges state and cities
face as a result of their pension and retiree health promises.”
The
Pew Charitable Trusts
Education Secretary Arne
Duncan kicks off preschool grant competition in Pittsburgh
By Eleanor Chute / Pittsburgh Post-Gazette August 13, 2014
11:43 PM
In the wake of U.S. Education Secretary Arne Duncan’s
announcement that Pennsylvania can compete for up to $20 million in federal
money for early childhood education, the Pittsburgh community is gearing up to
seek money to expand quality early childhood education here.
Mr. Duncan on Wednesday visited the Hug Me Tight Child Life
Center in the Hill District, where he kicked off a $250 million preschool
development federal grant competition, of which Pennsylvania could win as much
as $20 million for one year. Mr. Duncan hopes such a grant would be renewable
for four years, but the additional funding has yet to be allocated.
PA-Gov: Dates of
Gubernatorial Debates Announced
PoliticsPA Written by
Jill Harkins, Contributing Writer August 13th, 2014
According to theAssociated
Press, the campaigns of Republican Governor Tom Corbett and Democratic
nominee Tom Wolf have decided on the places and days of their three fall
gubernatorial debates. The first
debate, as
suspected, will be held in the Harrisburg media market on September 22 in
Hershey, PA at the 30th Annual Pennsylvania
Chamber of Commerce dinner.
The second debate will be held on October 1 at KYW-TV studios
in Philadelphia.
The final debate will be held on October 8 at at the WTAE-TV
studios in Wilkinsburg and will be shown in the Pittsburgh media market.
All of the debates will take place in the evening, though exact
times have not been announced.
Beyond the commercials, watch
the real gubernatorial debates between Gov. Tom Corbett and Democrat Tom Wolf
By Christina
Kauffman | ckauffman@pennlive.com on August 13, 2014 at 5:41 PM
Anyone who's seen a television recently might feel as
though the debates between Gov. Tom Corbett and
Democratic nominee Tom Wolf have
already started. But aside from the
dueling commercials, three formatted debates have been scheduled between
Sept. 22 and Oct. 8.
Debates will be held in the Harrisburg, Philadelphia, and
Pittsburgh media markets, starting in the midstate with the Pennsylvania
Chamber of Business and Industry's 30th Annual Chamber
Dinner, Monday, Sept. 22 at Hershey Lodge.
Ron Tomalis probe demands
continue
Bill Schackner and Mary Niederberger / Pittsburgh Post-Gazette August
14, 2014 12:00 AM
A day after the resignation of Ron Tomalis, special adviser to
the governor on higher education, calls continued Wednesday for investigations
into whether he was a “ghost employee” and into the state Department of
Education’s email retention policy. Officials
of Fresh Start PA, a political action coalition that supports the candidacy of
Democrat Tom Wolf for governor, called Tuesday for various state agencies to investigate
whether Mr. Tomalis was a “ghost employee” who did little or no work for his
$139,542 salary and to examine the email retention practices of the education
department. On Wednesday, Fresh Start
chairwoman Katie McGinty continued to push Republican Gov. Tom Corbett for
those investigations and for the firing of acting Secretary of Education
Carolyn Dumaresq over public statements she made claiming education department
employees delete and cleanse their emails each day.
In addition, state Rep. Brandon Neuman, D-Washington County,
issued a news release also calling for investigations by state Attorney General
Kathleen Kane into Mr. Tomalis’ job performance and the education department’s
email purging practices. “In the interest of good government and transparency,
I think it’s the right thing to do,” Mr. Neuman said.
In response, Jay Pagni, a spokesman for Mr. Corbett, said
Wednesday evening that the governor “has full confidence in acting secretary
Dumaresq.”
Our Opinion: Going too far in
scoring our schools
Wilkes-Barre Times Leader Last updated: August 12. 2014 4:25PM
Call it the curious case of Corbett’s cash catch.
Call it the curious case of Corbett’s cash catch.
When Gov. Tom Corbett released his proposed 2014-15 budget in
February, it included $340 million in “Ready to Learn” education block grants.
He wanted to tie this money to a school district’s “School Performance Profile”
score, a new method of gauging public school achievement that gives each school
a score from 0 to 107 based on a wide range of data, primarily standardized
test results. Corbett proposed creating
four tiers of districts based on SPP scores: below 60, 60 to 69, 70 to 79 and
80 or above. The higher the tier, the more flexibility in spending the cash.
The catch? District-level SPP scores didn’t exist.
Bethlehem school
superintendent tweets 'good riddance' to Tomalis
Joseph Roy says former education secretary damaged relationship
between state and school districts.
By Adam Clark,
Of The Morning Call 2:38 p.m. EDT, August 13, 2014
Twitter is a place where Bethlehem Area School District
Superintendent Joseph Roy can make announcements about snow days, answer
questions from students and, as of Tuesday night, wish "good
riddance" to state officials on their way out the door. Upon reading about Ron Tomalis' resignation
as Gov. Tom Corbett's special adviser on higher education, Roy
took to the social networking site to offer the former secretary of education a
farewell.
"Good riddance, though the damage is done. Ron Tomalis resigns
under pressure as Tom Corbett's education adviser," Roy tweeted, along
with a link to The Morning Call's coverage.
“Since meeting with parents, teachers,
and advocates when the School District entered full-blown fiscal crisis last
spring, City Council has explored education models that are seeing positive
results in districts demographically similar to ours. Thursday, Council's
Committee on Education is scheduled to hear expert testimony on School-Based
Family Services (SBFS) Centers, which revolve around the health and wellness of
the child along with academic performance.
This comprehensive approach acknowledges
that poverty is Philadelphia's No. 1 problem. We cannot fix our schools without
addressing what ails our children at home.”
Fight for students, schools
Philly.com Opinion by Darrell L. Clarke Thursday, August 14,
2014, 1:08 AM
Darrell L. Clarke is
president of Philadelphia City Council
Uncertainty is the dominant mode at the School District of Philadelphia these days. The latest development, a delay in General Assembly action to allow Philadelphia to enact a cigarette tax funding stream that City Council unanimously approved in June 2013, is just one in a seemingly neverending series of devastating setbacks.
Uncertainty is the dominant mode at the School District of Philadelphia these days. The latest development, a delay in General Assembly action to allow Philadelphia to enact a cigarette tax funding stream that City Council unanimously approved in June 2013, is just one in a seemingly neverending series of devastating setbacks.
It could be tempting to find excuses to give up on our schools.
Indeed, that might even be the point of what appears to be a coordinated,
nationwide attack on public institutions. However, there also are those who
believe the School District of Philadelphia can succeed if given appropriate
resources, but who see no point in taking action until Election Day on Nov. 4
because of the current political climate in Pennsylvania.
With all due respect, this is ill-advised. To have any chance
of securing what is right and fair for our students, we cannot agree to delays,
and we can never give up on fighting for them.
Can we trust the Philly
cigarette tax revenue projections? A look inside the numbers
WHYY Newsworks BY KEVIN
MCCORRY AUGUST 13, 2014
You can hear them calling in the street.
They lean on corners, squat on milkcrates, rest on folding
chairs – angling for a buck.
At the bustling intersection where Erie and Germantown Avenues
slice through North Broad street, they occupy every corner, calling to
passersby: "Loosie! Loosie!"
They're the city's black market cigarette hawks.
Chester County lawmaker
pushing to hike Pa. cigarette tax
WHYY Newsworks BY MARY
WILSON AUGUST 14, 2014
For months, Pennsylvania lawmakers have been wrestling with a
plan to let Philadelphia levy a cigarette tax to help pay for its schools. One Republican has a proposal to take that
tax statewide. Rep. John Lawrence of
Chester County figures that if lawmakers can pass a cigarette tax for Philadelphia
schools, they can pass a statewide cigarette levy to help with higher school
property taxes. His proposed
80-cents-a-pack tax would go straight into a property tax relief program for
seniors.
120 American Charter Schools
and One Secretive Turkish Cleric
The Atlantic by SCOTT BEAUCHAMP AUG 12
2014, 11:25 AM
The FBI is investigating a group of educators who are followers
of a mysterious Islamic movement. But the problems seem less related to faith
than to the oversight of charter schools.
It reads like something out of a John Le Carre novel: The
charismatic Sunni imam Fethullah Gülen, leader of a politically powerful
Turkish religious movement likened
by The Guardian to an “Islamic Opus Dei,” occasionally
webcasts sermons from self-imposed exile in the Poconos while his organization
quickly grows to head the largest chain of charter schools in America. It might
sound quite foreboding—and it should, but not for the reasons you might think.
“The biggest problem in education today,
she said, is the obsession many school reformers — including Education
Secretary Arne Duncan — have with standardized tests and using student scores
to make high-stakes decisions on whether students move to the next grade
or graduate high school, how much teachers get paid and whether they can keep
their jobs, and even if schools are reconstituted or closed. “I will go down to
my last breath telling people that the most corrupting influence in public
influence today is a high-stakes consequence for not hitting the cut score on a
standardized test,” she said.”
New NEA leader to nation’s
educators: Revolt, ignore ‘stupid’ reforms
Washington Post Answer Sheet Blog By Valerie Strauss August
11
To call the woman who is about to take the helm of the National
Education Association “outspoken” would be something of an understatement. Lily
Eskelsen García, who will take over next month as president of the largest
teachers union in the country (and, for that matter, the largest union of any
kind in the country), is nauseatingly sick of what she calls “factory school
reform” and she doesn’t mind telling everybody about it in clear, challenging
words. “Stop doing stupid,” she says. That’s
not all. Acknowledging that sometimes it is hard for her to be diplomatic,
García says she wants to shake things up: “The revolution I want is ‘proceed
until apprehended.’” Translation: Teachers, administrators and everybody else
involved should ignore bad school reform policy and do “the right thing” for
kids. “Don’t you dare,” she said, ” let someone tell you not to do that
Shakespeare play because it’s not on the achievement tests. Whether they
[reformers] have sinister motives or misguided honest motives, we should say,
‘We are not going to listen to you anymore. We are going to do what’s right.’”
Districts' Budgets Swell to
Accommodate a Surge in Non-Teaching Staff
Education Week District Dossier Blog By Denisa R.
Superville on August 13, 2014 10:26 AM
Between 1970 and 2010, the number of employees in the nation's
schools grew by a whopping 84 percent. At the same time, the number of
non-teaching staff members expanded by 130 percent to more than 3 million —or
about half of public school districts' staff.
But who is counted among the "non-teaching" staff?
What do they do? And what has led to the exponential surge in this
staffing category at a rate that has outpaced even the growth of teachers and
students?
Ex-Head
of Washington Schools Steps Down at Advocacy Group
New York Times By MOTOKO RICH AUG. 13, 2014
Michelle A. Rhee, the
divisive former schools chancellor in Washington and one of the most public
faces of a campaign to change public education, is stepping down as chief
executive of StudentsFirst, the advocacy group she founded four years ago. In a blog poston the group’s website on Wednesday, Ms.
Rhee said that it was “time for my next step in life” and that she would focus
on her family and support her husband, Mayor Kevin Johnson of Sacramento, as
“he continues to move forward with his career.” She also has two children with
her ex-husband, Kevin Huffman, the commissioner of education in Tennessee. Ms.
Rhee, who raised millions of dollars from donors including the Walton Family
Foundation and the Broad Foundation, pursued an aggressive agenda involving changes
in state laws regarding teacher tenure, performance evaluations and testing. In
her statement, she said: “While I remain 100 percent committed to the success
of StudentsFirst, it’s time for a shift in the day-to-day management of the
team and our advocacy work.”
TAKING ADVANTAGE OF THE
AUGUST CONGRESSIONAL RECESS: BACKGROUND & TALKING POINTS
National School Boards
Action Center August 06, 2014 by Staff
Members of Congress return to their hometowns to meet with
constituents locally and on September 8 they return to Washington, D.C.
As a public education advocate, you can help to influence their decisions and
votes on legislation affecting your local public schools by reaching out to your
members of Congress. They will be especially interested in your concerns
as this is an election year for the entire U.S. House of Representatives and
one third of the Senate.
Read the latest on federal education issues on Capitol
Hill in the NSBAC
August Congressional Recess Talking Points and then contact
your members of Congress during the August recess. You can
call your members’ offices using the Capitol switchboard at 202.224.3121 or use
the National School Boards Association’s legislative action center at
nsba.org/advocacy. Consider becoming a Friend of Public Education to connect
with National School Boards Action Center’s advocacy efforts and stay active
year round.
Save the Date 2014 PAESSP
State Conference October 19-21, 2014
Please join us for the 2014 PAESSP State Conference, “PRINCIPAL
EFFECTIVENESS: Leading Schools in a New Age of Accountability,” to be
held October 19-21 at the Sheraton Station Square Hotel, Pittsburgh,
Pa.
Featuring Keynote Speakers: Alan November, Michael Fullan &
Dr. Ray Jorgensen
This year’s conference will provided PIL Act 45 hours,
numerous workshops, exhibits, multiple resources and an opportunity to network
with fellow principals from across the state.
TOWN MEETING ON LOCAL CONTROL
OF PHILLY SCHOOLS
THURSDAY, AUGUST 14TH 6:30 P.M. MONUMENTAL BAPTIST CHURCH
4948 LOCUST ST.
Philadelphia Coalition Advocating for Public Schools Posted
on August 4, 2014by wearepcaps
Forty Thousand Philadelphia registered voters signed a petition
this Spring to put the question of returning our schools to local control and
abolishing the School Reform Commission on the ballot in the form of a
non-binding referendum. But before this can happen City Council and the Mayor
and have to approve. Come to the town meeting to find out how returning our
schools to local control can improve education and how can bring pressure on
our elected officials to let the people vote on this important question.
PASA-PSBA School Leadership
Conference registration forms now available online
PSBA Website
PSBA Website
Make plans today to attend the most talked about education
conference of the year. This year's PASA-PSBA School Leadership Conference promises to be
one of the best with new ideas, innovations, networking opportunities and
dynamic speakers. More details are being added every day. Online
registration will be available in the next few weeks. If you just can't
wait, registration forms are available online now. Other
important links are available with more details on:
·
Hotel registration (reservation deadline extended
to Sept. 26)
·
Educational Publications Contest (deadline Aug.
6)
·
Student Celebration Showcase (deadline Sept. 19)
·
Poster and Essay Contest (deadline Sept. 19)
Slate of candidates for PSBA
offices now available online -- bios/videos now live
PSBA Website August 5, 2014
PSBA Website August 5, 2014
The slate of candidates for 2015 PSBA officer and at-large
representatives is now available online. Photos, bios and videos also have been
posted for each candidate. According to recent PSBA Bylaws changes, each
member school entity casts one vote per office. Voting will again take place
online through a secure, third-party website -- Simply Voting. Voting will
openSept. 9 and closes Oct. 6. One person from the school entity
(usually the board secretary) is authorized to cast the vote on behalf of the
member school entity and each board will need to put on its agenda discussion
and voting at one of its meetings in September. Each person authorized to
cast the school entity's votes will be receiving an email in the coming weeks
to verify the email address and confirm they are the person to cast the vote on
behalf of their school entity.
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