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You are here: Home / 2012 / Archives for June 2012

Archives for June 2012

Texas 2012 GOP Platform "Mistakenly" Promotes Shallow Thinking

June 29, 2012 by K12NN Site Admin

From EdWeek, a “mistake” that only confirms the worst biases against Texas, known by many for their highly politicized State Board of Education’s battles over textbook content. The 2012 Texas Republican Party Platform, adopted June 9 at the state convention in Forth Worth, seems to take a stand against, well, the teaching of critical thinking […]

Filed Under: Dallas-Fort Worth, Houston Tagged With: #texasschools, Texas GOP

Parent Trigger = Parent Tricker

June 26, 2012 by K12NN Site Admin

This is a must-read EdWeek article by Diane Ravitch with regard to the trickery behind the “parent trigger” law, and the recent decision by the U.S. Conference of Mayors to endorse a boilerplate bill pushed in four states by a hard-line right-wing group (ALEC). She notes that not one of the charter laws in CA, […]

Filed Under: Chicago, Los Angeles, Parents, Philadelphia Tagged With: ALEC, parent tricker, Trigger, US Conference of Mayors

Culturalist Crutches: The Atlantic's Wrongheaded "The Education System That Pulled China Up May Now Be Holding It Back"

June 25, 2012 by K12NN Site Admin

I think this Atlantic magazine piece, “The Education System That Pulled China Up May Now Be Holding It Back,” has many key aspects all wrong. It’s not enough to recite “culturalist” interpretations of flaws like the emphasis on “rote learning” and “innately imitative” Chinese culture, which are a crutch for frustrated Chinese youth and defensive […]

Filed Under: Cross-Cultural Comparison Tagged With: People's Republic of China, Shanghai

Change.org's Support for Stand For Children Should (And Did) Not Stand: When Liberals Push An ALEC Education Agenda

June 21, 2012 by K12NN Site Admin

Disclosure: I was sought out by and interviewed with Change.org back when they were seeking an education organizer; I like and respect many talented organizers there, and from speaking with him, I believe that Ben Rattray is a reasonable, thoughtful, person committed to social change. I’ve also written for Care2.com and similarly like and respect […]

Filed Under: Big Ed, Budgets, Parents Tagged With: Care2.com, Change.org, DeVos, Gates Foundation, shock doctrine, Stand For Children, Walton Foundation

90% of Chicago Teachers Vote to Strike If Contract Negotiations Break Down

June 18, 2012 by K12NN Site Admin

Via the Washington Post: as of June 11, 2012, ninety percent of the 26,000-plus teachers in the city of Chicago voted to strike if contract negotiations with the city fall apart. At issue are longer school days minus any corresponding increases in pay, and other disputes over class size, restoration of school libraries, art and […]

Filed Under: Chicago, Educators, Parents Tagged With: Stand For Children, teachers strike

Fact Check: FAIL — Romney's Claim That the Federal Government Doesn't Pay for Teachers

June 15, 2012 by K12NN Site Admin

Regarding presidential candidate Mitt Romney’s gaffe: of course state and local governments pay for teachers. No one disputes that. But the federal government does also pay for teachers, whether it’s the local or state education agency that makes that decision, or if it’s indirectly through federally-funded state training and credentialing programs. The Washington Post’s Josh […]

Filed Under: Budgets, Elections, Federal Policy, NCLB Tagged With: Romney

Special Podcast: Weighted Pupil Funding & California's Budget Process, 2012 — Call to Action

June 15, 2012 by K12NN Site Admin

I just spoke with two impassioned and well-informed high school student leaders and a community coordinator at Californians for Justice about an emergency action to support public schools that they’re conducting in the next 18 hours, ending Friday, June 15, 2012. You can listen to the podcast here: Listen to internet radio with MOMocrats on […]

Filed Under: Budgets, Los Angeles, Orange County, Parents, Sacramento, San Francisco, Students Tagged With: CA budget, School Funding

Romney's Education Policies: Eliminate Public Education As We Know It With "Voucherlike" Plan

June 13, 2012 by K12NN Site Admin

Mitt Romney’s latest statements about his vision for America’s public schools can be summed up by his declaration that it’d be best to let families “vote with their feet” and have federal dollars follow children to private/religious, public, charter, or online schools. Reckless, foolish, clueless, or all of the above? Perhaps if someone actually knowledgeable […]

Filed Under: Elections, NCLB Tagged With: Department of Education, Romney

Michelle Rhee Offers Democrats Campaign Money/"Ed Reform" Expertise, They Refuse

June 13, 2012 by K12NN Site Admin

One of the first things Michelle Rhee’s group, StudentsFirstNY, did upon launching in that state was approach Democratic Congressional candidate Hakeem Jeffries (NY-CD8) and offer him a six-figure, unregulated, third party donation to his campaign. They probably thought Jeffries was an easy mark, given the positions he’s taken in the past urging that New York […]

Filed Under: Elections, New York City, Parents Tagged With: Michelle Rhee, StudentsFirst

Florida's Testing Debacle: Just Tweak the Cut Scores (Or, How to Lie With Statistics)

June 12, 2012 by K12NN Site Admin

“Equipercentile equating” is fancy-talk for “don’t like the percentages of failing students? Lower the passing score.” The New York Times recently covered the flap, in which a proficiency grade of 4 on written tests yielded “too many” failures but a grade of 3 magically gave the same results as last year: 81% of students passed. […]

Filed Under: NCLB, Parents, School Districts, The Testing Industry

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Federal Policy

Quick Education Voter’s Guide to the California CD34 Race, April 4, 2017

There are twenty-three candidates running to fill former Congressman Xavier Bacerra’s seat in Congressional District 34 in Southern California. (Bacerra is currently the state’s Attorney General, replacing Kamala Harris, who, after November 8, 2016, became our US Senator.) Election Day is Tuesday, April 4, 2017, 7:00 am to 8:00 pm. You can find your polling […]

Betsy DeVos, #NOTMYSDOE

Take the pledge to #resist and fight for public schools as a public good TODAY. DeVos had to have the assistance of Vice President Mike Pence’s unprecedented tie-breaking vote in order to win her confirmation. Two GOP Senators voted against, all Democratic Senators voted against. Yet all the other GOP Senators who received campaign donations […]

Next #DemDebate MUST Include K-12 Education Policy

The next #DemDebate is scheduled for the important primary state of Iowa on November 14, 2015. It’ll be broadcast by CBS in partnership with the Des Moines Register. Professor Julian Vasquez Heilig is leading the call for the families of 50 million students K-12 across the nation and the communities they live in to have […]

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