(From GothamSchools, May 15th, 2013)

It was already slim odds that education would get much action from Gov. Andrew Cuomo and the legislature this session after they increased school aid, funded several education grants, and amended the teacher evaluation law during budget negotiations in March.

But in the aftermath of a federal corruption dragnet that has brought down several lawmakers, any glimmer of hope that education could get some attention seems to have vanished.

“With this legislative session, with all the corruption, I would be surprised if anything gets passed,” said Mona Davids, who runs the New York City Parents Union, a parent advocacy group. State Sen. Velmanette Montgomery, of Brooklyn, sponsored a bill to end mayoral control that Davids lobbied for. The bill’s long odds grew even longer after Montgomery’s named surfaced last week as one of seven lawmakers recorded in the home of former Senator Shirley Huntley, who was cooperating with investigators to reduce a prison sentence. Huntley was sentenced to a year and a day in prison for embezzling funds from a charity she ran.

Davids said she believed Montgomery, who has not been charged, has done nothing wrong. Still, she said she doubted the bill could proceed before the session ends on June 30. “It’s May, but it’s over,” Davids said.

Read the full post here.

(From Ed News Colorado, May 15th, 2013)

The State Board of Education Wednesday unanimously adopted guidelines for high school graduation requirements, but that doesn’t mean current high school students will have to change their class schedules to order to get their diplomas.

The guidelines have a long implementation timeline, and the document is expected to be changed more than once over the next two years. That makes its impact on future students hard to predict.

The overall goal of the guidelines is to make high school diplomas represent what students actually know and can do - “competency” in education jargon. Most district graduation requirements now are based on completion of a certain number of classes over a certain number of years. (Education jargon for that is “seat time.”)

The document is “an intentional statement that we are moving from seat time … to proof of competency,” said Scott Stump, a community college system administrator who was a member of the 19-person committee that developed the guidelines for SBE.

Read the full post here.

By Andrew Ujifusa

(From Education Week, May 14th, 2013)

Supporters of the Common Core State Standards are moving to confront increasingly high-profile opposition to the standards at the state and national levels by rallying the private sector and initiating coordinated public relations and advertising campaigns as schools continue implementation.

In states such as Michigan and Tennessee, where common-core opponents feel momentum is with them, state education officials, the business community, and allied advocacy groups are ramping up efforts to define and buttress support for the standards—and to counter what they say is misinformation.

Supporters assert that the common core remains on track in the bulk of the states that have adopted it, all but four at last count.

But the pressure is on for common-core champions to make sure their message gets through. U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan told the U.S. Chamber of Commerce in Washington last month that the private sector had to snap out of what he portrayed as its lethargy and to prevent states from reverting to inferior standards, as he contended states did a decade ago under the No Child Left Behind Act.

"I don't understand why the business community is so passive when these kinds of things happen," he said.

Read the full post here.

MCT ILLUSTRATION

(From OC Register, May 6th, 2013)

By Gloria Romero  

California on May 8 observes the Day of the Teacher. Created 31 years ago at the behest of then-Sen. Joseph Montoya (a Democrat who, a few years later, was convicted of seven felony counts of racketeering, extortion and money laundering) the largely ceremonial event was intended to honor the teaching profession.

This year's festivities afford Californians an opportunity to reimagine the teaching profession's future. Bipartisan political reform has swept the nation in recent years, giving rise to an unprecedented focus on student achievement, teacher quality and parental choice in public education.

These efforts have galvanized a new civil-rights movement in education, with more elected officials - particularly Democrats - willing to break with their traditional allies, the teachers unions that have long dominated the education debate. Simultaneously, public opinion has sharply shifted, reflecting continued support for teachers while decrying the obstructionist role of teacher union regressive tactics and policies.

Wednesday's commemoration carries particular significance, given the recent filing of key lawsuits seeking reforms through the courts that have been blocked in both the electoral and legislative routes. Vergara vs. California seeks to have declared unconstitutional five state statutes, which for decades have impeded access to quality teachers for too many of California's 6.3 million students. Both the California Teachers Association and the smaller California Federation of Teachers were granted permission to join the case as defendants. In other words, they are taking this lawsuit extremely seriously. Vergara would shake the very foundation of the education bureaucracy, including overturning seniority rules and demanding a rigorous teacher evaluation process.

The second lawsuit was just filed in federal court in Santa Ana by 10 California teachers who resigned their union membership to challenge compulsory dues payments. "Forcing educators to financially support causes that run contrary to their political and policy beliefs violates their First Amendment rights to free expression and association," stated their lawyer.

The lawsuit follows November's defeat of Proposition 32, which would have curbed the political influence of campaign money from both corporations and unions, and the Supreme Court resolution of the Knox v. SEIU case, resulting in victory for individual union members against their unions' taking additional "special" dues from their paychecks without permission.

We are at a crossroads over the essence, quality and future of the teaching profession. Undoubtedly, the resolutions of these lawsuits will shape how California envisions and transforms the profession and how courageously it seeks changes desperately needed to close student achievement gaps and prepare an educated workforce for tomorrow's economy.

This cannot happen too soon! The most recent reports of the highly respected National Council on Teacher Quality provide a sobering assessment of how broken the profession is in California. It assigns a failing grade - D - to how well California prepares and delivers teachers. Grades of F were given to how well California even identifies effective teachers and removes ineffective ones. These grades are nothing less than shameful.

It is appropriate that we honor and celebrate teachers and their profession. But let's commit ourselves to going beyond mere ceremony. Let's commit ourselves to become proactively involved in determining the future of the teaching profession itself, as these cases wind through the courts. After all, we can't have a great state without great schools. And we certainly can't have great schools without great teachers.

(New York Times, May 4th, 2013)

Contrary to what Mr. Greene argues, Teach for America is right to develop leaders as well as teachers. Many corps members recognize the need for systemic change and leave the classroom to pursue better outcomes for students through other means. Difficulties with unwieldy school districts, outdated legislation and poorly allocated resources will persist even if better teachers are brought into classrooms.

Indeed, innovative former corps members like Mike Feinberg and Dave Levin, founders of the KIPP charter network, promote just the “creative, independent, spontaneous, practical and rule-bending” leadership that Mr. Greene advocates for inside the classroom. Students attending KIPP middle schools are certainly better off for the leadership of these former corps members.

Teach for America should continue to balance leadership with instruction; it is only by working in the classroom as well as at the local, state and national level that we can provide all students with the education they deserve.

By Gloria Romero

(From OC Register, April 30th, 2013)

Education-reform advocates throughout the country recently convened to commemorate the 30th anniversary of the landmark 1983 report, "A Nation at Risk," from the National Commission on Excellence in Education. Intended as a wakeup call, the report declared that "the educational foundations of our society are presently being eroded by a rising tide of mediocrity that threatens our very future as a nation and a people."

One of its most foreboding lines warned, "If an unfriendly foreign power had attempted to impose on America the mediocre educational performance that exists today, we might well have viewed it as an act of war."

While the report, indeed, jump-started a national dialogue on reform efforts, very few of the commission's recommendations were ever implemented.

We remain a nation at risk. And, in today's global economy and with demand for international competitiveness that has pressurized and irrevocably transformed the need for a more-rigorously educated workforce, we face heightened risks.

The report's warnings and call to action continue to reverberate. Today, 1 in 4 American students fail to earn a high school degree on time. We trail other nations in the percentage of students who complete college. The achievement gap between too many minority students and many of their white counterparts continues to exact demands for constitutional relief in our state and national judicial systems. Education has become an issue of national defense, economic prosperity and civil rights.

The members of the commission, drawn from government, business and the education arena, concluded that American schools were failing to produce a competitive workforce. They identified key themes needing addressing - themes that sound all too familiar today, including low test scores and weak teacher preparation programs. They recommended taking steps to improve teacher quality, dedicating more classroom time to the new basics, increasing academic rigor and raising standards for college admission.

Ironically, during the 30th anniversary commemorations of the report, the California Teachers Association led the charge in Sacramento to defeat legislation authored by Democratic Sen. Ron Calderon of Montebello, which would have increased rigor and accountability in how California teachers are evaluated. The bill had strong support from education reformers.

Are our schools better off now than they were 30 years ago? Today, 29 percent of Americans surveyed by Gallup responded that they have confidence in K-12 schools - a low mark since Gallup commenced asking education questions. Despite the nation spending twice as much on education than was spent 30 years ago, our international rankings on math and science remain anemic. We've seen reading scores rise only one point from 1980-2008 among 17-year-olds about to graduate high school.

Our nation is still at risk. What needs to be done? More studies and commissions? Absolutely not.

On the 25th anniversary of "A Nation at Risk," the same handwringing over what to do was best addressed by the nonpartisan group Strong American Schools: "Now is not the time for more educational research or reports or commissions. We have enough commonsense ideas, backed by decades of research, to significantly improve American schools.

"The missing ingredient isn't even educational at all. It's political. Too often, state and local leaders have tried to enact reforms of the kind recommended in 'A Nation at Risk,' only to be stymied by organized special interests and political inertia. Without vigorous national leadership to improve education, states and local school systems simply cannot overcome the obstacles to making the big changes necessary to significantly improve our nation's K-12 schools."

How many more anniversaries will we "commemorate" before our students, and nation itself, are no longer at risk?

(From Union Watch, April 23rd, 2013)

CTA sponsors a resolution demonizing what it perceives to be faux Democrats.

At last week’s California Democratic Party convention in Sacramento, the California Teachers Association went into attack mode, sponsoring a resolution suggesting that two organizations run by prominent Democrats are backed by dastardly corporate Republican types.

WHEREAS, the so-called “reform” initiatives of Students First, rely on destructive anti-educator policies that do nothing for students but blame educators and their unions for the ills of society, make testing the goal of education, shatter communities by closing their public schools, and see public schools as potential profit centers and children as measureable commodities; and

WHEREAS, the political action committee, entitled Democrats for Education Reform is funded by corporations, Republican operatives and wealthy individuals dedicated to privatization and anti-educator initiatives, and not grassroots democrats or classroom educators; and

WHEREAS, the billionaires funding Students First and Democrats for Education Reform are supporting candidates and local programs that would dismantle a free public education for every student in California and replace it with company run charter schools, non-credentialed teachers and unproven untested so-called “reforms”;

While not named in the resolution, two outspoken leaders of the reform movement - Michelle Rhee (StudentsFirst) and Gloria Romero (California director of Democrats for Education Reform) - were clearly targeted as heretics.

Rhee’s “sin” is that she actually puts the needs and interests of school children before adults. Romero, as a state senator, authored the nation’s first “Parent Trigger” law and is a strong proponent of school choice.

Read the full post here.

(From The Hill, April 18th, 2013)

The ”Gang of Eight” had the right idea in supporting efforts to increase STEM (science, technology, engineering, and mathematics) education in the United States as part of the immigration reform package they unveiled Wednesday. But it’s hard to imagine that the “Border Security, Economic Opportunity, and Immigration Modernization Act,” which raises the cap on the H1B visas that allow companies to employ foreigners in U.S. STEM-based jobs, will lead to any meaningful improvement in STEM education for U.S. students or in American workers’ ability to compete for these jobs in the future.

One of the major obstacles negotiators faced in crafting the immigration reform package was the issue of foreign workers and U.S. jobs. The deal on whether and how foreign workers may take lower-skill U.S. jobs was forged only after intense negotiations between business and labor unions. So far, however, no one with comparable political heft is fighting hard for the interests of tomorrow’s workers - today’s U.S. students.

In a typical year more than 100,000 workers obtain H1B visas that allow companies to employ them in high-skill U.S. jobs. In order to obtain such visas, companies must demonstrate that they cannot find qualified candidates among U.S. citizens. The extent to which H1B visas will be needed in the future depends on how successful the U.S. education system is at providing today’s students with the STEM training needed to fill these high-skill jobs. Each U.S. student who is not provided with an adequate education in the areas of STEM represents a future adult at risk of becoming chronically low paid and under-employed because of his or her competitive disadvantage compared to a foreign student.

Read the full post here.

(From OC Register, April 16th, 2013)

In, "Les Miserables," Victor Hugo's classic novel, a man is sentenced to prison for five years for stealing a loaf of bread to feed his family.

Today, in Montgomery County, Pa., a couple is facing up to seven years imprisonment for "stealing" an education for their child.

As incredible as it seems, is this a modern-day, American "Les Miserables"?

Prosecution and defense lawyers were in court last week in what has become the most-watched education-related trial in the nation. It figures to affect parents across the nation.

Could something similar happen in California?

Hamlet and Olesia Garcia were arrested and charged with "theft of education services" for having enrolled their 5-year-old daughter, Fiorella, in a school outside their approved local education-agency boundary. The Garcias had temporarily separated, with Mrs. Garcia taking the child to live with her and her father in Montgomery County - not far from the Garcias' Philadelphia-area home. The couple soon reconciled, but decided to keep their child in the Montgomery County school until the end of the term in June so as to not further disrupt her life.

The Pennsylvania Penal Code contains a "theft of services" statute. Legal experts, however, said the statute is intended to prosecute such offenses as stealing cable boxes or utility services.

"I have never seen anything like this," commented the Garcias' attorney, Ricardo Corona. "Anybody that would try to bring charges against a father here using the guise of a statute more designed to stop cable piracy would probably be laughed out of court. The statute doesn't fit."

Read the full post here.

(From The Seattle Times, April 16th, 2013)

The third guest in our occasional “Education Conversations” video series is Lisa MacFarlane, Washington state director of Democrats for Education Reform.

MacFarlane recently sat down with editorial writer Lynne K. Varner to discuss three questions:

• What does education mean to you?
• What does an ideal education system look like?
• What’s one reform Washington needs now?

In the interview, MacFarlane — most well-known for changing Seattle levy campaign requirements to a simple majority and for reversing her former opposition to charter schools — argues for “uniformly high” academic standards for all high school graduates so that they are better-prepared for the work force.

Watch the video below:

By Seema Mehta

SACRAMENTO — California Democrats on Sunday condemned efforts led by members of their own party to overhaul the nation's schools, arguing that groups such as StudentsFirst and Democrats for Education Reform are fronts for Republicans and corporate interests.

Before delegates overwhelmingly passed a resolution excoriating the groups on the final day of the party's annual convention here, speakers urged them to focus on protecting students and teachers.

"People can call themselves Democrats for Education Reform — it's a free country — but if your agenda is to shut teachers and school employees out of the political process and not lift a finger to prevent cuts in education, in my book you're not a reformer, you're not helping education, and you're sure not much of a Democrat," said state Supt. of Public Instruction Tom Torlakson, a registered Democrat whose office is nonpartisan.

The advocacy groups are calling for increasing parental choice, tying student performance to teacher evaluations and changing how teachers are hired and fired. President Obama, Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa and Newark, N.J., Mayor Cory Booker are among the elected Democrats who support the groups' efforts.

But such moves are anathema to teachers unions. California Teachers Assn. President Dean Vogel argued that the organizations are working to eliminate workers' rights and "hellbent on turning students into test-taking machines."

"I'll tell you right now, they want to do that, they have to come through us," Vogel said.

"Let's be perfectly clear," he added. "These organizations are backed by moneyed interests, Republican operatives and out-of-state Wall Street billionaires dedicated to school privatization and trampling on teacher and worker rights."

Gloria Romero, a former Democratic majority leader in the state Senate who leads the California chapter of Democrats for Education Reform, called the Sunday resolution "stupid."

"They drank some Kool-Aid that has been fresh squeezed for them by the most powerful political interest in California, the California Teachers Assn.," she said, adding that improving schools for minorities and the poor should be a priority for the party.

Read the full post here.

Make schools transparent

By Gloria Romero

I want the next mayor to be an education mayor, but not by simply operating his or her own network of schools. I'd like the mayor to create an Office of City Schools to provide a one-stop informational shop for families. This office would provide detailed information on each school's academic "dashboards" to parents and residents: the academic performance level of each school (including charters, magnets, private); graduation rates; their eligibility to be transformed under the state "parent trigger" or the federal No Child Left Behind laws. Information on parental choice organizations and laws, including open-enrollment data and transfer eligibility, would be available, enabling parents to make informed decisions. Because housing and schools are closely linked, the office would provide data on real estate sales, transit routes and crime rates. Information for each school on staffing, salaries and ongoing major litigation would also be made transparent and accessible.

Read the full post here.

(From Telegram, April 11th, 2013)

The contract for the local teachers' union, the Educational Association of Worcester, expires at the end of August. Negotiations haven't started yet, but state and national-level education experts and advocates say changes to contracts like Worcester's could help students learn more.

In most cases, Worcester's students do need to learn more. Fewer than half of the city's students can do grade-level math, barely more than half do grade-level English language arts work, and more than a third of students do not speak English proficiently, meaning teachers must address their language needs while teaching them core subjects, too.

Commissioner of Elementary and Secondary Education Mitchell D. Chester challenged Worcester and other districts to look at their teachers' contracts during a local appearance in January. Although the typical teacher salary schedule rewards years on the job and advanced college credits, those factors have only a "limited" relationship to how good a teacher someone is, he said.

Read the full post here.

(From The Daily Cardinal, April 10th, 2013)

Perhaps there is no bigger civil rights issue of our time than education reform. The achievement gap between high and low-income children born in 2001 is 40 percent higher than it was in 1976, according to a Stanford report.

The Alliance for Excellent Education states Wisconsin is home to 13 (eight more teeter on the edge) of the nation’s almost 1,600 drop out factories, schools which the graduating class is comprised of less than 60 percent of the students who entered freshman year. More than one-in-ten schools in the nation can be categorized as “drop-out factories.” Each lost diploma translates in $8,100 earned per individual or $1.8 billion in lost revenue per year for Wisconsinites alone.

One thousand six hundred dropout factories is 1,600 too many. That is why Democrats for Education Reform (DFER) is so vital to improving our education system. The countries that out-educate us today will outdo us tomorrow. DFER comes with the expectation that we, as a nation, can do better to educate our children.

DFER recognizes that the status quo for many schools is working and we should not change that. However, for the schools that the status quo is failing, DFER demands that we improve schools to ensure American primary and secondary schools are the best in the world because it is the right and moral action.

Read the full post here.

(From City Journal, April 2013)

Saving California’s schools will take more than a tax hike.

On Election Day, Californians voted on Proposition 30, an initiative that would save the state’s education system (according to the governor, state legislators, and teachers’ unions) by giving it an influx of at least $6 billion. If the proposition failed at the polls, its proponents warned, various school services would have to be cut, and schools would have to shave up to 15 days from the school year. Nonsense, said the proposition’s detractors; the state could find the money elsewhere if the initiative didn’t pass. And if it did pass, they added, the new money would probably never see the inside of a classroom; instead, it would be used to shore up (temporarily) the state’s hugely underfunded teacher-retirement system. Prop. 30 did pass. As a result, Californians now have the highest state sales tax in the country—7.75 percent, up from 7.25 percent. And the state’s top marginal income-tax rate has leaped from 10.55 percent (Number Three in the nation) to 13.3 percent (Number One).

Even if the extra money reaches the classroom, it’s not clear that it will do any good. The tired mantra from teachers’ unions, school boards, and education bureaucrats is that money spent on education is an “investment” that will pay off in greater student achievement. As the data show, that claim is fallacious. The Cato Institute’s Andrew Coulson notes that over the last 40 years, the country’s education spending has almost tripled, while its scores on the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) have remained flat.

In California, education spending has doubled over the last 40 years. The state’s teachers are the fourth-highest-paid in the country, with an average salary of $67,871, not counting their generous pensions. What do we have to show for it? On the most recent NAEP, California’s fourth-graders ranked 45th in the nation in mathematics; in science, they ranked second to last, topping only Mississippi. Over the same 40-year span, California’s average SAT scores have dropped about 5 percent.

Read the full post here.