I saw this quote mentioned on Forham's Flypaper. I think it does a great job describing where we stand on teacher evaluation.
“The underlying problem for all of this is: We don’t measure this stuff. Think of Major League Baseball where nobody tracked batting averages: ‘Well, I don’t know if [...]
EdWeek had a very interesting story on this Deloitte Report which among its findings identified a significant disconnect between teachers and low-income parents and students over the "most important purpose" of high school.
In a survey of 401 high school educators, 400 low-income parents of high school students and [...]
Tired of the Black Friday rush? Amazon has their Black Friday and Cyber Monday deals all on a single page. Check it out:
[...]I noticed this item from the California GOP web site. Apparently, someone in the House Republic Conference went through Speaker Pelosi's health care bill H.3962, to identify all of the new government boards, bureaucracies, commissions and programs in the bill. The list stands at 111, including the following offices, [...]
Uh-oh. Not a good day if you're a global warming believer. This Wall Street Journal piece, along with a lot of other stories discuss a hacking of the Climate Research Center at University of East Anglia. Apparently some of the stuff that the hackers released casts a shadow on' [...]
Say what you want about the Bush family, but Jeb Bush did some good work in Florida in education reform and even those Jeb is gone, good things are still happening. I found this St. Petersburg Times story to be very interesting.
Out of the blue, the FCAT has a [...]
Last week, I heard KFI's Bryan Suits, an Iraq veteran discussing the possibility that the Fort Hood victims wouldn't receive the Purple Heart because the award is only given to those who are injured as a result of enemy combat. I found that an appalling idea. Suit's point was' [...]
Last Sunday my wife came down with the flu very rapidly. She felt a little bad Saturday night, but by Sunday evening she was miserable. She saw the doctor on Tuesday. The doctor was pretty confident it is H1N1 but submitted the test anyway. She prescribed tamiflu.
By Thursday, I was [...]
I don't really gamble, but I wish I'd bet someone that our state would be short of money before we even got to the January budget proposal. This Sacramento Bee story explains where we stand.
Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger estimated Monday that California's budget will fall out of balance by $5' [...]
I don't think there are many people who believe that our elected officials reflect the people that they're supposed to represent. Here's some data to back up that belief in a Politico.com posting.
Talk about bad timing.
As Washington reels from the news of 10.2 percent unemployment, the Center for Responsive' [...]
I thought this was an interesting Education Week post about a Harvard University study that looked at how cultural prejudices impact grading practices.
Study Shows How Discrimination Creeps Into Grading Practices
A study released this month by Harvard University's Kennedy School of Government uses an innovative experimental design method to' [...]
Greetings, I'm in the middle of a server migration. It is not going quite as nicely as I had hoped. If you experience a little weirdness on the site, please be patient, the part caused by the server migration should disappear soon. The rest of the weirdness is just the' [...]
I was amazed and appalled to see this Chico Enterprise Record story. I realize that Chico Unified is in a dire financial situation, perhaps worse than most other districts. I read a story recently that they were seriously considering asking for a state loan, which would result in a [...]
I thought this story which I saw on this week's EIA Communique was really interesting.
Using data from school districts in Iowa, Indiana and Minnesota, Cornell economist Michael Lovenheim compared district spending trends before and after each district became unionized. He also compared trends between union and non-union districts. [...]
The California Department of Education (CDE) has been singing the praises of the California Longitudinal Pupil Achievement Data System (CALPADS) since 2002. I have no idea of the total cost of the system, but it is millions so far. According to this Sacramento Bee story, apparently they've finally turned' [...]
I thought that the San Diego Union-Tribune did a great job on this editorial titled, "Fix schools? Not us. For the Legislature, it's a race to the bottom, not top".
Including in California. Capitol Weekly reports that many Democrats in Sacramento are flatly opposing making the changes in education laws [...]
Every year I rant about the Academic Performance Index (API) and how terrible it is as a measure of academic performance. I've tried to avoid repeating myself this year. But after several stories came out in the last couple days praising schools for their API performance, I couldn't help myself. [...]
I've commented on several op eds from Walt Gardner, retired LAUSD teacher and if I recall retired CSU Pomona professor. Walt and I typically end up on the opposite ends of the issue discussed in his op eds and this Los Angeles Times piece is no exception. Walt argues' [...]
I know that my friends whose politics fall to the left of my own, which is probably everyone I know, are going to find this post irritating. To them, I apologize for the irritation. I couldn't help but see the irony in this Huffington Post piece by Josh Silver.' [...]
Secretary Duncan was in Sacramento yesterday to, among other things, encourage the California legislature to embrace the Governor's education reforms including the elimination of the student/teacher data firewall. This Sacramento Bee story described some of the visit. As I read it, this part stood out:
Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger called a [...]
The Sacramento Bee published this op ed teachers David B. Cohen and Alex Kajitani. They suggest that looking at test scores is a "poor tool for teacher evaluation."
The link between test scores and teacher performance may seem obvious to the casual observer, but this is a case where appearances [...]
This Atlanta Journal Constitution opinion piece by Maureen Downey provides a good recap of Secretary Duncan's reform plans. Near the end of the article, there is a response from Dr. John Trotter of the Metro Association of Classroom Educators, which from what I can understand from their web site [...]
Some of the columns I read from the San Diego Union-Tribune's Ruben Navarrette make me want to scream, but it seems that almost every time he writes about education, his views are much closer to my own. This latest column about the Federal Race to the Top (RTTT) program [...]
The Governor just appeared at a press conference to announce that he was calling a special session of the legislature to "ensure California is eligible to compete for billions in recovery funding for education." This is apparently to address the comments from both President Obama and Secretary Duncan suggesting that [...]
Alternative teacher certification programs make it easier for people who had other careers to join the teaching profession. Programs like Teach for America and the New Teacher Project that work at bringing college graduates quickly into the profession have some data to suggest their teachers can do better at raising [...]
I thought this Sacramento Bee story was pretty positive about the new Sacramento City School Superintendent Jonathan Raymond. There were several things in the story that I though were really positive. As I read the story, I came to a couple really troubling paragraphs:
Raymond pledged to visit each of [...]
Although I've been talking about it a lot with friends and coworkers, in reviewing my last few posts, I realized I haven't said anything about the biggest issue in California public education right now, whether California's law preventing student performance data to be used in teacher evaluations should be repealed. [...]
I find it mind boggling that the President's administration ridicules conservatives for believing in "conspiracy theories" on one hand and then on the other hand, they ask Americans to report "fishy" emails and web postings on the Internet.
On the White House blog, Macon Phillips posted this post about the [...]
I thought that this response from Don Boudreaux over at cafehayek.com to the local teacher's union insistence that merit pay for teachers won't work because teachers aren't motivated by money was awesome. His point was that if teacher's aren't motivated by money, wouldn't it be good public policy [...]
I'm really starting to like this new weekly feature from the Thomas B. Fordham Institute. Here is last week's edition where they contrast the United States education spending vs. the Gross National Product of other nations. Take a look.
Fun Fact Friday! - US education expenditure and other countries' GDP [...]
There is always a lot of furor over where California falls when compared against the other states in education spending. Supporters of increased education funding frequently cite NEA's determination that we're 47th out of 48 states. The latest United States Census data (see figure 4) puts California 23rd out' [...]
Today, I received an email from the California School Boards Association that drove me a little crazy. I could be misinterpreting an unfortunate choice of words, but let me share it with you and see if you agree with my assessment. Here's an excerpt from the email:
Earlier this month, [...]
During the last Presidential campaign my liberal sister Michelle tried to find some issue where Barack and I would agree. She had me read the chapter on education from his book and as I told her at the time, I didn't find anything in it that was out of line' [...]
Here's the third "Fun Fact Friday" from the Fordham Institute. These simple visual representations of education facts are really starting to grow on me.
Fun Fact Friday! - Per Pupil Spending and NAEP Test Scores from Education Gadfly on Vimeo.
Read the rest of this post!
I often wonder about the lack of parental outrage over the poor academic performance of many of our state's public schools. When I saw this Los Angeles Times piece by Steve Lopez, it gave me some hope that parents in Los Angeles Unified are starting to feel a sense [...]
I'm not sure why I'm on a run of political postings lately, but this item from HotAir.com just cracked me up. This announcement from the FedBizOpps.gov web site is just loaded with irony.
Humor In The Workplace
Solicitation Number: RFI-BPD-09-0028
Agency: Department of the Treasury
Office: Bureau of the [...]
I couldn't help but think of that famous Jedi Master Yoda's response to the whiney Luke's "I can't believe it", when I read this Sacramento Bee opinion piece by Assembly Budget Chair Noreen Evans. Apparently, Ms. Evans doesn't believe that it is possible for the state to live within' [...]
In this Los Angeles Times story about LAUSD delaying a vote on a policy that "would have allowed charter operators and other outside groups to bid for control of 50 new schools scheduled to open over the next four years" there were a couple great quotes:
"It's criminal what's happening" [...]
I saw this video on RedState.com which presented the Federal debt as a car road trip. I thought it was a great way to clarify how rapidly our nation's debt has grown, particularly under the last couple administrations.
Read the rest of this post!
The Fordham Institute has a started a new video piece called "Fun Fact Friday" where each week they're going to present "an interesting education fact in a fun visual format." The first one is the relationship between class size and student achievement. Take a look.
I knew something bothered me about Congress ending the private school voucher program in Washington D.C., but I didn't give it much thought until today. This Washington Post editorial reminded me how much it bothered me.
Seven council members -- including those who represent the poorest sections of the city' [...]
When No Child Left Behind (NCLB), the bipartisan reauthorization of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act, was new, everyone was talking about the "Texas Miracle." Texas it seemed had seen large improvement in their system of public education through strong accountability and high expectations for all students. When I saw [...]
I thought that this Sacramento Bee editorial pretty accurately describes the current status of education funding in our state. I don't totally agree with their per student numbers, since that omits a pretty big portion of Federal funding, but the year to year comparisons are accurate.
Sometimes California's Capitol is' [...]
Some people get really upset about the "outrageous" comments from people like Glenn Beck and Rush Limbaugh, but I'd be willing to bet a $1 that there won't be similar outrage about the former Vice-President's contention that the battle against climate change is similar to the struggle against Nazi [...]
Even with my experience with how public education works, this Contra Costa County Times story amazed me.
Allison Moore says she and her 15-year-old daughter complained for months about the chaotic environment in a Clayton Valley High School math class.
"The students weren't behaving," Moore said of the third period Introduction' [...]
Stories about this going on in New York City have been out for a while. This VoiceofSanDiego.org post is the first that I've seen mentioning the issue in our state.
Lynne Holyoke knew her principal wanted to fire her. The retired art teacher said the two had often sparred over' [...]
With the exception of perhaps some teacher union leaders, I don't think anyone believes teacher evaluation systems work well. The recent report from The New Teacher Project called the Widget Effect clearly described just how dysfunctional these systems are.
Today, I read this Washington Post story describes how' [...]
After a 17-day road trip that included Nevada, Idaho, Montana, Wyoming, Washington and Oregon, we're safely back home in California. It has been many years since I took that long a trip/vacation. We had a great time.
Now comes the unpacking and getting back into the swing of our normal life.' [...]
Yesterday, we spent our day at Riot Zone Family Fun Park. We arrived when it opened at 11am and other than quick trips home for lunch and dinner, we were there until midnight when it closed.
The kids spent the bulk of the day on go karts but various [...]
