Daily postings from the Keystone State Education
Coalition now reach more than 3000 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, 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
Follow us on Twitter at @lfeinberg
The Keystone State Education Coalition is
pleased to be listed among the friends and allies of The Network for Public Education. Are you a member?
SB1085 runs roughshod over the powers of elected school boards and
voters by giving unelected charter school operators the power to spend school
tax dollars without any oversight or controls
“Ultimately,
SB 1085 would gut local control over charter school authorization and growth,
encourage unfettered expansion of even poorly-operated charter schools, take
already underfunded school districts to the brink of financial collapse, and
remove important accountability tools that school districts can use to ensure
that charter schools are performing well and equitably serving all kinds of
students.”
Its harder to do this with nine pairs of
elected eyes watching……
Charter School East: Witness in educator's fraud trial tells how
documents were doctored
MARTHA WOODALL, INQUIRER STAFF WRITER POSTED: November 12, 2013 , 7:31 PM
A teacher who was on the boards of two charter
schools founded by Dorothy June Brown told a federal court jury Tuesday how
statements and actions came to be attributed to her in official meeting minutes
even though she had not attended the sessions.
Lisa Cabungcal, who taught at Laboratory Charter
School in 2000 and left in 2007, was the fourth former employee and phantom
board member to testify in the $6.7 million fraud trial who had purportedly
approved contracts with management companies Brown controlled.
In sometimes tearful testimony, Cabungcal, who was Agora Cyber
Charter School
Although she said she had trouble recalling details,
Cabungcal said she attended some board meetings, but testified that she never
presided over a meeting or voted on any resolutions.
She said she prepared the minutes for the evening
meetings even though she did not attend them because she had to pick up her
children by 5 p.m.
When Assistant U.S. Attorney Frank Costello Jr.
asked Cabungcal how she could take minutes if she had not been at the meetings,
she replied: "I wrote down what Dr. Brown wanted in the minutes."
Why did those minutes include comments and votes
that indicated the Cabungcal had participated, Costello asked.
"I was supposed to be present so I had to put
in my name," she said.
Charter
School West: FBI, Pittsburgh School Dist. Now Involved In Urban
Pathways Investigation
CBS Pittsburgh November 11, 2013
6:21 PM
by
Allegedly, the school’s board has spent tens of
thousands of taxpayer dollars at some of the best restaurants in the city, top
flight catering at ever staff and school meetings and administration and board
retreats to exclusive resorts and spas.
There were also cellphone bills for board members’
spouses and local tax dollars to develop another school out of state. Now the Pittsburgh School District
“The bill runs roughshod
over the powers of elected schools boards and the voters by giving unelected
charter school operators the power to spend school tax dollars without any
oversight or controls. Pennsylvanians who are already seeking legislative
solutions to rising property taxes should rally to stop this bill or risk voter
anger over the roof-raising local tax increases to pay for charter school
growth as a result of this bill.”
SB1085: PA
Charter Bill Bad For Students and School Districts
Public Citizens for Children and Youth PCCY
Newsletter November
8, 2013
The Pennsylvania Senate is poised to pass Senate
Bill 1085 a charter school bill that among its far reaching changes would give
for-profit companies that operate colleges or universities the power to
authorize new charter schools across the state. It’s no secret that the
for-profit higher education sector is rife with fraud and abuse. Yet the
Pennsylvania Senate is about to hand them the reigns of approving new charters
as well as the regular review of their operations.
The for-profit question aside; Senate Bill 1085
permits any college or university to authorize a charter. Since only half of
students who enter college graduate after six years, with poor and minority
students dropping out at jaw-dropping rates, it’s hard to see the wisdom of
this approach.
“now, watch your blood pressure as you
read the list…..”
SB1085:
Killer Weeds
The PA General Assembly is back in session today and
we need to go wading into the policy weeds for a moment. This is where we pay
attention to potentially-lethally-boring policy details around bills such as SB
1085. These are killer weeds all right, but the real threat is to our schools.
I promise you’ll be perfectly safe as you read this message: your blood
pressure might rise, but then you will click “TAKE ACTION” at the bottom of this page, and you will feel much better.
Remember Senate Bill 1085? This is a charter
“reform” bill that will actually hurt school districts. [See “When
Charters Cause Harm”] In a recent analysis of the bill, the Education Law
Center concluded, “Ultimately, SB 1085 would gut local control over charter
school authorization and growth, encourage unfettered expansion of even
poorly-operated charter schools, take already underfunded school districts to
the brink of financial collapse, and remove important accountability tools that
school districts can use to ensure that charter schools are performing well and
equitably serving all kinds of students.” [Education
Law Center SB1085] Those are very strong words coming from our lawyer
friends.
SB1085: Don't
De-regulate Charter Schools
Education Voters PA
The PA Senate is considering a new bill to reform
charter schools, SB1085. This bill is bad for
students, parents, and the community.
We oppose it for the follow reasons:
- SB
1085 will create a statewide authorizer, which would allow designated
entities to authorize charter schools, which takes away the power from
communities to make local decisions. This gives the power to approve
charter schools to high-education institutions – but local tax-payers
would still foot the bill!
- SB
1085 removes enrollment caps, which means communities lost more control
over how these institutions function within their community and over how
public education is delivered – while still being responsible for the
cost.
- SB
1085 will prevent school districts from stopping the expansion of even
poor-performing charter schools. The local school district will not be
capable of checking that a charter school’s performance is up to standard
and that their enrollment process remains equitable. The bill will also
double a charter school’s length from five to ten years, further cutting
accountability for a charter that is performing poorly.
Send an email to your state senator below and let
them know that calling a bill "reform" does not make it good policy.
Tweet from Sen. Dominic Pileggi @SenatorPileggi3m
Here's a
directory of Pennsylvania
Pittsburgh Tribune-Review By Bill
Zlatos Published: Tuesday, Nov. 12, 2013 , 8:18 p.m.
Pittsburgh Public Schools administrators proposed an operating budget of $529.2 million next year and left open an option of raising the real estate tax by .16 mills.
Pittsburgh Public Schools administrators proposed an operating budget of $529.2 million next year and left open an option of raising the real estate tax by .16 mills.
“Financially, everyone can see why that would help,”
said Superintendent Linda Lane
Joseph said next year's budget is driven by flat
state funding and enrollment and increasing costs for retirement, health care,
utilities, transportation and charter schools.
“The major reasons for
the budget increase include $2.7 million in contractual salaries, $3.2 million
in pension obligations and $500,000 in medical premiums, he said.”
Officials say district would have to raise taxes, cut staff and
programs.
By Jacqueline Palochko, Of The Morning Call 10:49
p.m. EST, November 12, 2013
The Easton
Area School
District
“The district has about
300 students attending cyber charter schools and will be reaching out to them
about the new cyber program. Holmes said
later that the district pays about $10,000 for each regular education student
who attends a cyber charter, and $22,000 for a special education student.”
Pending board approval,
students could take computer-based courses in January.
The York
City School
District
The intermediate unit already offers its Virtual
Solutions online program, which allows students to take courses by computer, in
several districts in Lancaster and Lebanon Lancaster City
School District William
Penn Senior
High School
Philadelphia
Schools See Cash in Old Classrooms
New York Times By JON HURDLE Published: November 12, 2013
PHILADELPHIA — The financially troubled school
district here is seeking buyers for more than two dozen school buildings that
it shuttered last summer in one of the country’s biggest school closing
programs. And while one prospective
developer, Municipal Acquisitions, a firm based in Washington ,
has offered $100 million for the entire portfolio, both Drexel and Temple Universities
The school district published details on its
website of 27 buildings, totaling about 3.7 million square feet, and
the land they sit on, in the hope that the properties could be adapted and
reused by buyers, who could provide the district with desperately needed cash.
The public school system laid off 3,800 workers to close a $304 million budget
deficit at the start of the current school year.
Draft
Preschool Bill Follows Obama Proposal, With Some Changes
Education Week Campaign K-12 By Alyson Klein on November
12, 2013 7:47 AM
Last week we told you that Sen. Tom Harkin, D-Iowa,
the chairman of the Senate education committee, and Rep. George Miller,
D-Calif., the top Democrat on the House education committee, plus Rep. Richard
Hanna, R-N.Y., were on the verge of introducing legislation that would dramatically
expand access to prekindergarten programs for 4-year olds, a proposal
that President Barack Obama unveiled in his State of the Union address.
The legislation has not been finalized yet, and
won't be officially introduced until later this week. But a draft of the
legislation that's been widely distributed among education advocates shows that
Harkin and Miller are largely following the president's proposal.
The draft would seek to bolster program quality. To
get the grants, states would have to establish early-learning standards (they
all have them) and promise to start linking preschool data to K-12 (at least 30
states were in a position to do this as of the spring), as well as provide
state-funded kindergarten. And, early-education teachers would have to have
bachelor's degrees. States that don't meet these quality standards could apply
for grants to help them get up to snuff. Additional info here from
the Huffington Post.
“One of the unfortunate effects of our
polarized education climate is that it makes enemies of people who might be
able to add value to each other's work. We force each other into a
defensive crouch, protecting our favorite flavors of schools from attack,
admitting no weakness, and becoming hostile to those who have different ideas
of about how schools should be organized, funded, run and evaluated.
Different and valuable ideas.”
Ed Reform
Needs a Nixon-to-China Moment
Education Week Bridging Differences Blog By Deborah Meier on November
12, 2013 8:31 AM
Today, Robert Pondiscio, the executive
director of CitizenshipFirst, joins Deborah Meier on Bridging Differences. He
will blog with her for the next month or more.
Thanks Deborah, for inviting me to blog with you at
Bridging Differences. I'm grateful to have the opportunity to engage with
you here over the next few weeks.
Let me tell you about two of my friends in
education, Chris Lehmann and Doug Lemov. I admire them both personally
and professionally, although you could hardly imagine two more different
characters. Chris is the son of a labor lawyer who founded the Science Leadership Academy
(SLA), a progressive magnet high school in Philadelphia
“FAHRENHEIT
451″ 60 YEARS LATER: “WHY DO WE NEED THE THINGS IN BOOKS?”
Radical Scholarship Blog by P.L.Thomas
“Sometimes writers write about a world that does not
yet exist,” Neil Gaiman begins
his Introduction to the 60th
Anniversary Edition of Ray Bradbury’s Fahrenheit 451:
This is a book of warning. It is a reminder that what we have is
valuable, and that sometimes we take what we value for granted….
People think—wrongly—that speculative fiction is about predicting the
future, but it isn’t; or if it is, it tends to do a rotten job of it….
What speculative fiction is really good at is not the future but the
present—taking an aspect of it that troubles or is dangerous, and extending and
extrapolating that aspect into something that allows the people of that time to
see what they are doing from a different angle and from a different place. It’s
cautionary.
Fahrenheit 451 is speculative fiction. It’s
an “If this goes on…” story. Ray Bradbury was writing about his present, which
is our past.
Like Margaret Atwood’s In
Other Worlds, Gaiman’s clarification about the purposes of science
fiction/speculative fiction builds a foundation for reading (or
re-reading) Fahrenheit 451 as well as for considering why
Bradbury’s novel on book burning endures.
FairTest Examiner, November 2013
The National
Center
Welcome to the new issue of the FairTest Examiner.
This is an exciting time. Last spring saw the largest upsurge against
standardized testing our country has ever experienced, and this year looks to
be still greater. This issue includes a roundup of protests around the nation.
Meanwhile, new colleges continue to join FairTest’s SAT/ACT-optional list, a
website list that receives 280,000 visitors annually. We highlight six recent
additions to the list.
Resistance to the overuse and misuse of tests is
growing because students, parents and teachers are fed up and proclaiming,
“Enough is enough!” and “Ya Basta!” Our article on “high-stakes horrors”
focuses on some of the worst recent examples of the widespread damage. This
fall’s SAT and ACT scores provide more evidence that test-driven “school
reform” has failed, as do the books and articles we review in this issue.
The Future of
Our Schools: Teachers Unions and Social Justice
Thursday, November 14, 2013 - 4:30pm
See map: Google
Maps
Lois Weiner is a professor of education at New Jersey City University
In her presentation at University of Pennsylvania,
she will analyze how changes being made to public education in Philadelphia,
including school closings, budget shortfalls, and use of standardized testing
to judge student and teacher performance, relate to the global project that is
reshaping education throughout the world. Her presentation will take up ideas
she explores in her most recent book, The Future of Our Schools:
Teachers Unions and Social Justice(Haymarket Press, 2012).
Congratulations! Getting
elected to the school board was the easy part…..
PSBA New
Board Member Training: Great Governance, Great Schools
November 2013-April 2014
November 2013-April 2014
Announcing School Board
Academy ’s New Board Member Training:
Great Governance, Great
Schools
You will need a wealth of information quickly as you
jump out of the starting block and hit the ground running as a newly elected
member of the board of school directors. New board members, as well as veterans
who might like a refresher, will want to make the most of the opportunity to
attend PSBA's New Board Member Training Program: Great Governance, Great Schools
The November 13 episode of EPLC/PCN
"Focus on Education"
will discuss Special Education: Student
Rights and Services.
The hour long program produced by EPLC and PCN is broadcast on PCN
at 9:00 p.m. on the 2nd Wednesday of every month. PCN also typically
repeats the episode at later times each month.
Previous episodes can be viewed online here. Topics we have covered thus far in 2013 are school
violence, student testing, the work of school boards, how schools are funded,
the dropout crisis, parents as advocates, and arts education. To learn more, visit PCN's "Focus on Education" web page. Information
about sponsorships available for the show can be obtained by contacting Ron
Cowell at 717-260-9900 or atcowell@eplc.org.
EPLC is recruiting current undergraduate or graduate students to
serve as part-time interns
EPLC
is recruiting current undergraduate or graduate students to serve as
part-time interns beginning January or May of 2014 in the downtown Harrisburg Pennsylvania School Pennsylvania
Common
Core/Keystone Exams: The PA State Board of Education (Board) has submitted the
final-form regulation entitled “Academic Standards and Assessment."
The Independent Regulatory Review Commission (IRRC) plans to meet
and act on this regulation at our public meeting at 10:00 a.m. on
Thursday, November 21, 2013.
Regulation #6 – 326: Academic Standards
and Assessment
Amends existing regulations to
reflect Pennsylvania
The agenda and any changes to the time or date of
the meeting will be posted on IRRC’s Web site at www.irrc.state.pa.us.
Please note that any comments should be submitted to the Board prior to the
48-hour blackout period, which begins at 10:00 a.m. on Tuesday,November
19, 2013. Please provide IRRC with a copy of any comments submitted, as
well. Please note that all correspondence and documents relating to a
regulation submitted to IRRC are a matter of public record and appear on IRRC’s
Web site.
For a copy of the regulation or if you have any
substantive questions regarding the regulation, please contact the Board
at (717) 787-3787.
You can also download the final-form regulation from IRRC’s Web site using the
following link:
The University
of Pittsburgh School
Pedro A. Noguera, PhD; Friday, November 15, 2013 ;
3:30 – 5:00 p.m.
David
Lawrence Hall, Room 121; 3942
Forbes Avenue , Pittsburgh
The event
is free and open to the public
Join us as we celebrate their accomplishments!
Tuesday,November
19, 2013 5:30 pm
- 8:30 pm WHYY, 150 North 6th Street , Philadelphia
Invitations coming soon!
Tuesday,
Invitations coming soon!
Register: http://tinyurl.com/m8emc4m
Building
One Pennsylvania November
21, 2013 6:00-8:00 PM
IBEW Local 380 3900 Ridge Pike Collegeville, PA
19426
Building One Pennsylvania is an emerging
statewide non-partisan organization of leaders from diverse sectors -
municipal, school, faith, business, labor and civic - who are joining together
to stabilize and revitalize their communities, revitalize local economies and
promote regional opportunity and sustainability. BuildingOnePa.org
The National School Boards Association 74th Annual
Conference & Exposition April 5-7, 2014 New Orleans
The
National School Boards Association 74th Annual Conference &
Exposition will be held at the Ernest N. Morial Convention Center in New Orleans , LA. New Orleans
General Session speakers include education advocates
Thomas L. Friedman, Sir Ken Robinson, as well as education innovators Nikhil
Goyal and Angela Maiers.
We have
more than 200 sessions planned! Colleagues from across the country will present
workshops on key topics with strategies and ideas to help your district. View
our Conference Brochure for highlights on sessions and
focus presentations.
- Register now! – Register for both the conference
and housing using our online system.
- Conference Information– Visit the NSBA conference
website for up-to-date information
- Hotel List and Map - Official NSBA Housing Block
- Exposition Campus – View new products and
services and interactive trade show floor
Questions? Contact NSBA at 800-950-6722 (NSBA) between
the hours of 9:00 a.m. - 5:00 p.m. EST.
Join the National School Boards
Action Center
Participate
in a voluntary network to urge your U.S.
Representatives and Senators to support federal legislation on Capitol Hill
that is critical to providing high quality education to America
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