K-12 Reform While Seattle Sleeps

McGinn may try to take control of SPS

2009-11-13T01:51:00.000-08:00

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Here is a quote from Mike McGinn, Seattle's new mayor as of November 2009:

"As mayor I will refocus our efforts and create working partnerships to improve our school system. And if, after two years, there has been no improvement I will move to have the mayor’s office take direct responsibility for the school district as recommended by Obama’s Education Secretary."

This quote can be found at this URL: http://www.munileague.org/candidate-evaluations/previous-ratings/2009/candidate-questionnaires/McGinnQCEC09.pdf

In this questionaire, Mr. McGinn does not say what he means by "working partnerships." I don't know if anyone knows yet what Mike would consider acceptable improvement. So faced with the possibility of Mike's getting control of the school district, a reasonable person would be wondering whether Mike's having this power is likely to be good or not for SPS teachers, students, and their families.

Since Mike used the word "partnerships" in his statement, I am concerned that he is talking about "public-private partnerships," which in every instance I have seen it used without ambiguity, it signals reform of the perverted, corporatist kind, which is to say, the kind of reform that Maria Goodloe-Johnson is delivering to SPS, with the willing acquiescence of the DeBell-Chow-Carr-Sundquist-Meier-MartinMorris sextet of directors (Director Martin-Morris got big campaign contributions in 2007 from the same big donors as did Carr/Sundquist/Meier - he can afford to give the appearance of being a non-cooperator, since his dissenting votes have no consequence).
What follows is a comment posted to the SPS community blog http://saveseattleschools.blogspot.com/2009/11/public-hearing.html on 11/13/09 at 1:28 AM.

"Are elected school boards equal to the challenges of twenty-first century school governance? Eli Broad, a leading educational philanthropist and founder of the Broad Prize for Urban Education, has argued, “I believe in mayoral control of school boards or having no school board at all. We have seen many children benefit from this type of crisis intervention…You should craft legislation that enables school board members to be appointed by the mayor…[and] limit the authority of school boards.”1 Chester Finn, president of the Thomas B. Fordham Foundation, has written, “School boards are an aberration, an anachronism, an educational sinkhole... Put this dysfunctional arrangement out ofits misery.”2 The most popular alternative is the call to disband elected boards and give their authorities to school boards appointed by the mayor."
I found the above quote in this pdf: http://showmeinstitute.org/docLib/20070411_smi_study_7.pdf
This same article goes on to cite Boston (under Tom Payzant - maybe a familiar name to some blog readers) and New York (with Mayor Bloomberg at the helm) as success stories for mayoral control. "Mayoral control smoothed and sped enactment of Payzant’s reform strategy, including the 1996 adoption of Focus on the Children, a comprehensive five-year reform strategy for the schools (which was renewed in 2001); and efforts to reorganize the bureaucratic structure of the school department, promote technology initiatives, and establish citywide learning standards aligned to state standards.18"
(T-Payzant is a Broad Faculty member, and an advisor to MGJ.)
The report acknowledges that there have been ''...controversy and concerns about the adverse impact of mayoral control. Sol Stern, senior fellow at the Manhattan Institute, has charged that NAEP results show that New York City’s performance did not improve from 2003 to 2005, that barely one in five fourth-graders are proficient in reading according to NAEP (compared to the 60 percent figure reported on the state test), and that “New York education officials – city and state – have indulged in unwarranted self-congratulation about student achievement.”25 Other critics have warned that mayoral control has reduced transparency and made it harder for the community to assess or monitor district activity. Education historian Diane Ravitch and United Federation of Teachers president Randi Weingarten have argued, “The Department of Education now operates in a secretive manner that denies the right of the public to have a say in important decisions or even to know what policy is being considered. Even the once customary practice of announcing contracts at regular public hearings has stopped…It has also now become routine for journalists and other public officials to have to file Freedom of Information demands to obtain the most basic information about the [Wa D.C. city] Department of
Education’s decisions and practices.”26''

The authors go on to say ''For all the optimism that developments in New York City and Boston have generated, there is remarkably little evidence that mayorally appointed boards are more effective [at bringing about the kind of reform that the Broad Foundation favors] than are elected boards. Existing evidence is only modestly illuminating, recommending caution when making strong claims about the merits of appointed boards."

This report does not help us to know whether elected or appointed boards are more effective at bringing about the kind of reform that I personally would favor -- constructive, humane, fair reform that closes the racial gap in authentic measures of student and highschool graduate achievement.

I think I'd rather have an elected board, since otherwise it is up to a succession of mayors as to what kind of reform the board will try to enact.

Furthermore, this report holds up Chicago, Boston, and New York as success stories. I have read some about these school districts, and I certainly wouldn't call these success stories.

Where will unchecked reform of SPS lead to?

2009-11-09T13:15:00.000-08:00

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This is an email exchange on Nov 9, 2009
[Joan writes] In comments I saw tonight on Melissa's blog, I am seeing indications that the purpose of the SAP is in fact to increase the % low-income and %minorities within individual buildings.

This is really alarming to me, because it will surely lead to more school failures than would have occurred if we were to keep the open enrollment scheme. Failures, in turn, lead to "district interventions.

Have any of you read about what "district intervention" means? It is the most harmful thing that can happen to public school children and the teachers that care about them.

I think this is a deliberate policy, because more school failures means more business income opportunities for private tutoring services, and -- if this State should pass charter authorizing legislation (I am told that is very unlikely - but I don't see it as so unlikely)---for charter management organizations

Does this worry you at all?

[S. writes]Yes it does.

Two other thoughts cross my mind on this: the SAP curtails school "choice." This may lead to new parent discontent and demand for other options, and could prime the community to be open to charters

If your prediction plays out, Joan, and many or all SPS schools fail, then yes it could lead to an "intervention." But wouldn't that also look terrible on the resumes of MGJ and the board members? Imagine the headlines -- on MGJ's watch, SPS went from XX % passing/successful schools down to -XX %. Do we think she would be willing to have this on her record

Maybe

IF -- she and the reformites can shift the blame for "failure" entirely onto teachers (though it would still look bad that SPS schools plummeted under her leadership).

Or, and here's a totally Machiavellian theory: If the reformites's goal is to prep SPS for takeover and are paying MGJ enough and padding her nest enough with all these board memberships, affiliations, job security and perqs, is it possible that MGJ is willing to be the saboteur of SPS?

What comes to mind are all the toadies who were willing to give bogus 'data' and testimony and be the fall guys to help Bush/Cheney in their rush to war in Iraq. Are we possibly looking at players and scruples of that order?

I don't know the answers to these questions. I would really like to be wrong about these darker theories....

[Joan writes] I have read tons of stuff about what's happening in other districts, and your description is pretty much my interpretation. The people behind school reform have devised a brilliant strategy, and it is highly successful in serving the true goals of the movement. It has not been successful in serving the ostensible goals of the movement.

The corporatist reformer's plan is not to make all schools fail, but to ensure that some fail (those that serve low-income minority populations), and to make the rest of the non-charter public schools mediocre. Then families who put a high priority on education but can't afford private school will start to demand charters. The New School fits into this as a demonstration project: It shows that charter schools can be better than public schools. A successful program like New School also engenders low-income/minority community support for more of the same, since it primarily serves students from this community.

There will need to be a few charter schools and theme-based non-charter schools to satisfy the voting public. A few good charter school will also serve to deliver public subsidy to wealthy parents who otherwise would send their kids to private school. For those who can afford private school, this is the second best option after vouchers, which very few states permit.

Most charter schools will serve low-income minority populations. This fits in with the privateers' emphasis on closing the achievement gap. The problem is that most of the schools serving these kids will be either military charters or militaristic, highly regimented charters, like Mastery Charter Schools. I have seen recently that the Mastery model is being replicated outside of Pittsburgh, where it started. These are the charter schools that are most profitable, and do not require foundation support.

[A more honest name for MGJ's strategic plan is this: "Industrialized Education for All Non-Charter Public School Students".]

I am certain that it is the profit motive that explains why the reform movement focuses on "closing the achievement gap [artificially defined]." and why the movement seeks secretly to promote school failure. This emphasis also serves the longstanding business community's desire to have the non-elite schools produce submissive, literate work-ready graduates. Remember tha the Mastery School Model requires all students to participate in a non-paid job internship as a graduation requirement. They go to their "job" every Wednesday afternoon during the school year. The elite schools won't go away- these schools will continue to produce well-qualified graduates who are ready to go on to college and then to successful productive careers in science, enginerring, technology, and business.

Even if we don't get charter legislation passed (there is advocacy at the state level to get the legislators to pass a law that paves the way for charters, in order to qualify for the RTT funds -- never mind that the one-time prize [max $0.4 billion] is trivial compared to the annual state spending on K-12 [about $13 billion this year] and the profundity of change that charters will bring to K-12 education for decades to come.)

I do believe that MGJ is a sabatuer. It doesn't matter if her resume looks bad. Any way, interventions are good, from the pro-charter reformist point of view. MGJ can afford taking the risk of getting run out of town by anger parents and teachers, since the Broad Foundataion will make sure that MGJ has future jobs. Look at Arlene Ackerman: I heard she was "run out of S.F.", After that, and until recently she worked on the Broad Faculty, Now she is a superintendent again in Philly or Pittsburgh (don't remember which just now). Another Broad sup that left her job in disgrace was set up with a consultancy, but the Broad arranged for her to become one of the finalists in the search for teh replace in Pomona Calif (the Broad-sponsored sup there was called to D.C. to work for Arne as an Assistand Sec. of Educ.). By the way, Arlene Ackerman, along with Tom Payzant and Mark Roosevelt (Mark was Arlene's predecessor in Pittsburh) were three consultants MGJ listed on her Plan of Entry as her prefered candidates for her Strategic Plan development team.

MGJ's affiliation with the Broad is the biggest conflict of interest. I already have all the documentation to show that the Broad commits to providing on-going career support for their Fellows. This is exactly why the Fellows don't mind antagonizing the public. I believe this is why MGJ is able to sleep at night (remember the quote I am referring to?)

Why does the Broad like African American and Hispanic recruits to their "fellowship" program? I do not doubt that it is because it is harder for people to recognize the racist intent and effects of corporatist reform when the Superintendent does not have white skin.

I browsed the Curriculum Aligment section of the SPS website very recently. I see there evidence of business-people (probably our beloved Broad Residents) having a lot of influence on the curriculum. What I noticed was the economics section of Social Studies is far more developed than the Science Curriculum. The other subjects in Social Studies (civics, geography, history) are also better developed than the Science Curriculum. This is so weird, but understandable: School Reform wants students to be respectful of governent, law, and order, and capitalism. The economics curriculum is very capitalism-center. It starts in KG or 1st grade, with teachers expected to introduce the laws of supply and demand to these youngsters! The twelvth grade Economics Curriculum looks comparable to the introductory macroeconomics course I took in college - way more advanced than I think is needed for a high school graduate.

I think the whole scheme is modified Machiavellian. The ends and the means aren't exactly what the reformist portray to the public. Nor will the ostensible ends lead to success in achieving the ostensible means. The whole scheme is SO perverted.

And its well underway in Seattle. I don't think we will have a better change than this (putting conditions on pro-levy votes) to get Seattle off the perverted reform track, and on to a path of genuine, constructive reform.

Even if my proposal is wildy successful, we still have the problem that Mike McGinn intends to make the School Board directors appointed positions. If he succeeds in this, then all the efforts are moot. We have to figure out how to prevent Mike from succeeding in this. I fear that he may try to bring this about much earlier if he sees that a true grass roots movement is succeeding in averting continued corporatist reform.

[P. writes] Joan, S, et al., we should meet up soon and line out some objectives. We've researched and read ourselves to death on this stuff and we know what's going on. We've seen it all before, haven't we?

We've done a reasonably good job at the lower and middle levels in our community, and praise Meg Diaz for getting the financial scandal onto the TV news, but we need to start getting our concerns out into the community and amongst the politicians.

Perhaps we should write a letter to McGinn, making him aware of our concerns and dissatisfaction with our current crop of talking heads, but making it abundantly clear to him that Mayoral Control or Charters are NOT THE ANSWER, and why. From there, maybe we could meet with him and outflank the Stand For Children/League of Ed Voters/CPPS organizations that will be looking for the first seat at the table. I think the time to act is drawing near. ?

Strong Leadership

2009-11-09T12:14:00.000-08:00

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10/19/09 9:04 AM SolvayGirl1972 said... "...Our school had huge issues with leadership after they pulled our beloved principal to head-up the development of a Montessori program at Bagley. We had NINE principals in SIX years (for a variety of reasons, some beyond district control). For our last two years at the school, we endured one of the District's yo-yo principals (in and out of schools-central office-back to schools).

The response from the District with every principal issue was terrible. And the lesson learned for me was "A school is only as good as its principal, and the District can yank your great principal at any given moment and replace him/her with someone that should have been fired years ago." http://saveseattleschools.blogspot.com/2009/10/candidate-forum-round-up.html

Industrialized Education

2009-11-07T17:37:00.000-08:00

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"Industrialized Education" is a term I coined, as it seems the most appropriate moniker for the the educational strategy preferred in the School Reform movement for non-charter public schools, and military charter schools.   I write more about the aptness of this term in my article Two sides of school reform.

The terms that are associated with Industrialized Education are listed in School Reform Lexicon .

Industrialized Education takes the form it does because it is the most cost-effective way to serve the intent of the Federal legislation No Child Left Behind (NCLB; click here to access the U.S. Department of Education NCLB informational website) student, teacher, and school accountability to be based on norm-referenced high stakes testing. Not incidentally, Industrialized Education provides the best opportunity for private business income profits.

What does Industrialized Education look like?

The curriculum is to be uniform throughout the district and is narrowly-focused on the knowledge and skills that are tested on the high stakes tests

teachers teach to the test

principals (as Instructional Leaders), instructional coaches, and "teacher mentors" conduct "Learning Walks" (google it) to make sure that teachers are adhering to the teaching of core curriculum with utmost fidelity.

Charter schools defined

2009-11-07T17:18:00.000-08:00

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Charter schools are institutions of public education. The authorizing legislation for charter schools is state-level. State legislation exempts charter schools from having to follow most of the state rules governing public schools. As of this writing, there are only ten states that do not allow charter school. Washington state is one of these ten.

The administration of President Obama favors charter schools, merit pay for teachers, and regressive school reform. All of the 2008 Stimulus Funding package for education is designed to promote the school reform agenda.

Charter schools can be operated for profit or as non-profits. Charter Management Organizations (CMO's) can also be organized for profit or as nonprofits. CMOs may operate more than one charter school. Charter schools get the per-capita state funds for K-12 education for each student that enrolls. Typically, enrollment at charter schools is by lottery, unless the demand for seats is less than the number of available seats.

All public schools - both charter and non-charter public schools -- must operate in accordance with the Federal No Child Left Behind (NCLB) legislation. The most significant aspects of this legislation are the definitions given for school failure, annual yearly progress (AYP), and intevention, and the consequences of school failure. The provisions for parent choice and school interventions come in to play when a school is classified as having "failed" under the terms of NCLB.

Seattle has a school that resembles a charter school in many respects. You can read more about this school in the internal article New School - SPS' psuedo charter school.

Newest Articles

2009-11-07T16:17:00.001-08:00

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[See end of this column for list of articles in preparation]

Where will unchecked reform of SPS lead to?

McGinn may try to take control of SPS

Industrialized Education

List of local organizations and wealthy individuals that promote reform of SPS

External Support for Pro-Education (Anti-Reform)

NCLB (see "NCLB has got to go")

SPS has a weak school board as of Nov 2007

Race to the Top Competition: Is this a good deal for Washingon?

Two sides of school reform (What is School Reform?)

Alternative schools instead of charter schools -- go to Charter schools [Index]

High Stakes Testing

Coming Soon:

List of wealthy donors to 2007 SPS school board candidates (coming soon) < Reform of SPS
Pro-reform SPS Board Members and their wealthy campaign donors (coming soon) < Reform of SPS
What has School Reform accomplished in other large urban districts? [coming soon] < School Reform

List of local organizations and wealthy individuals that promote reform of SPS

2009-11-07T16:02:00.000-08:00

Back to Reform of Seattle Public Schools [parent index] | Table of Contents

Alliance for Education http://www.alliance4ed.org/community/ - member of the national reformist "Public Education Network; recipient of Gates Foundation grants for school board training, "community engagement", "teacher quality"

League of Education Voters http://www.educationvoters.org/ has no membership! just a paid staff and board of directors). Started by local Nicholas Hanauer, with his wife, two of the most generous donors to the 2007 slate of reformist candidates (Carr, Maier, Sundquist, Martin-Morris) see SPS has a weak school board as of Nov. 2007 (internal link)
List of wealthy donors to 2007 SPS school board candidates (coming soon)
Pro-reform SPS Board Members and their wealthy campaign donors

External Support for Pro-Education (Anti-Reform)

2009-11-07T15:51:00.000-08:00

Back to Opposition to Reform [Topic index] | Table of Contents

Education and Democracy (San Francisco)

URL: http://educationanddemocracy.org/ [not sure if this site is still active]
Website of researcher/author Dr. Kathy Webster [email link], blogger on Education Justice blog;
"Welcome to our website! Are you interested in promoting democracy? Have you lost influence over educational policy? Need help in fending off the high-stakes testing agenda? This web site provides analysis and curriculum materials that can help community-based movements implement democratic goals in our public schools.

NCLB has go to go

2009-11-06T17:06:00.000-08:00

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On this strand, http://saveseattleschools.blogspot.com/2009/11/proposals-on-table-for-mlk-building-and.html, 11/5/09 5:11 PM seattle citizen said...

I'm just starting to figure out that while teh Supreme Court ruled two years ago (in the Ballard/Kentucky co-case) that schools can't use race as a tiebreaker in assignment, evidently race CAN be used in closing schools: NCLB uses "failing school" designations to target schools, and those are based on race categories.

Likewise, where the district closes a school using WASL scores as one of the deciding factors, it is using race as a means to close the school.

(If the school were then sold to a predominantly white private school then that would be just the icing on the cake, eh?)

NCLB has to go, as does the use of race categories in WASL result grouping. It's, well, racist.

SPS has a weak school board as of Nov. 2007

2009-11-06T16:23:00.000-08:00

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What follows is a paraphrase of comment I submitted Nov. 6 to the Blog Entry titled "School Board Elections" on the SPS community blog -- URL http://saveseattleschools.blogspot.com/2009/11/school-board-elections.html.

Dorothy wrote "I will do my part and let the board know that my decision on the levy vote will be directly related to this issue."

Dorothy's comment has inspired me to suggest the following:

Tell the board that we will organize to raise strong public opposition to the upcoming levy UNLESS the Board agrees to adopt John Carver Policy Governance Model.

The John Carver Policy Governance Model is a brilliant strong-board model. It eliminates micro-manageing by the Board (if it is implemented with high fidelity). and hold the chief executive officer (that would be MGJ in SPS) accountable for upholding Board policy.

I think many of the problems in SPS are related to our having as of Nov 2007 a majority on the Board that favors a weak school board. I include Harium Martin-Morris in the group that favors a weak board. I am happy to explain my reasoning if any one cares to ask. Furthermore, Michael DeBell seems to me to be the strongest advocate for a weak school board. [But see the original post at http://saveseattleschools.blogspot.com/2009/11/audit-and-finance-committee-mtg-11509.html for an account of M.DeBell being very conscientious in interrogating the District about Meg Diaz' report.]

A weak school board does not enforce policy, rubberstamps the Superintendent's actions and decisions, and acts as a buffer between the Superintendent and the Public. In the weak board construct, the main purposes of the Board are to promote the Superintendent's policies, act as the community-engagement intermediary, and take the heat for unpopular actions of the Superintendent.

I talked to Sally Soriano today. I understand from her that prior to 2007 policy was quite important to the Board. That certainly isn't the case now.

•Did you know that as of a policy revision in Jan 2008, the Board no longer requires the Sup. to uphold Board policy?

•Did you know that the Broad Foundation (and Gates,too, no doubt) favors the Superintendent to have more authority than the Board, and to be the chairman of the board? The evidence for this is at http://www.broadprize.org/resources/tools/district/new_york.html. Click on the heading "Setting and Implementing Board Policy," read the brief text there, and then look at just the first several clauses of the downloadable pdf of the NY district bylaws.

•Did you know that The Broad and Gates Foundations have paid for/are paying for our Directors to attend trainings that are designed to get the Board to put more and more weak policies in place, and to teach the Board how better serve the promotional and buffering purposes of a weak school board?

•Did you know that currently there is no limit on the amount that individuals may contribute to school board campaigns, and a few wealthy individuals account for most of the extraordinary funding that Carr, Maier, Martin-Morris, and Sundquist received in 2007?

•Did you know that the Broad Foundation (and Gates,too, no doubt) favors mayoral appointment of school district directors?

•Did you know that Mayoral Candidate Mick McGann favors mayoral appointment of school district directors?

Authentic Assessment

2009-11-04T03:10:00.000-08:00

Go to Table of Contents_19
See also High Stakes Testing

Authentic Assessment and Accountability

Authentic Accountability (external link to FairTest.org) Accountability means informing parents and the public about how well a school is educating its students and about the quality of the social and learning environment. Too often, accountability has been reduced to standardized tests that measure a limited range of academic skills, thereby narrowing curriculum and teaching. This approach has been used to attack rather than help educators, parents and students. FairTest supports authentic accountability systems that provide a rich array of information on academic and social aspects of education to parents and the public, and use that information to improve schools
Empowering Schools and Improving Learning (external link). Initiative released by Forum on Educational Accountability, chaired by FairTest, and signed by 84 national education, civil rights, religious, disability, parent and civic organizations. It calls for a thorough overhaul of NCLB.

District-induced Instability

2009-11-04T02:07:00.000-08:00

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See also Importance of Stability (internal link)

Closures of failing schools leading to charters: "In 2009, Philadelphia schools Superintendent Arlene Ackerman introduced a five-year plan that calls for up to 35 underperforming schools to be shut down and reopened as district authorized charters or privately managed schools. The first 10, which have not been selected, will convert in 2010." http://reason.org/files/annual_privatization_report_2009.pdf (p. 93")

Denver: "The district has also used school closure as an accountability mechanism. In 2007, the school board approved closing eight schools that were under-enrolled and lower-performing. The board projected that moving students from these schools to higherperforming schools would save $3.5 million annually. That money is being used to improve the education of students who will be affected by the school closures, deliver additional resources to underperforming schools and to make money available for new schools and new programs." http://reason.org/files/annual_privatization_report_2009.pdf (p. 94")

NCLB

2009-11-03T23:39:00.000-08:00

Back to School Reform Lexicon (parent link) | Table of Contents

Article: NCLB has go to go! (internal link)
Major elements of NCLB

Assessment and Accountability (internal link)
Highly Qualified Teacher (internal link)
Supplemental Educational Services (SES) (internal link)

Foundation abandonment of charter demonstration projects

2009-11-03T17:31:00.000-08:00

Go to Importance of stability (parent link) | Pillars of Strong Schools and Strong Districts | Table of Contents

Case Study: T.T. Minor K-5, Seattle Public School. (19xx - 2009)

These comments copied from the Seattle Public Schools Community Blog (and then rearranged) (http://saveseattleschools.blogspot.com/2009/10/open-thread_30.html)

10/31/09 uxolo said... The[Sloan] foundation's commitment to T.T. Minor was for eight years and ended in 2006....TT Minor had part of their building's programs operated by funds from the Foundation. It was not a good thing for those who were not provided with their dollars. Where were those dedicated Sloan/New School people once the funding ended? Did they lobby to keep TT Minor open? Did they admit failure? I don't think so....The [Sloan foundation's] commitment to The New School is for ten years and is scheduled to end in 2012." What's the point? Is this foundation trying to prove that if every school has a bunch of outside donors and can get the supt or other political figures to enroll their kids that the school will work and/or be protected from the idiocy of the central district decision making?
11/1/09 1:21 PM adhoc said... So, what happens to New School if the grant isn't extended? How do they fund all of the "extras" without the private dollars? Do they all just go away, and New School becomes just like every other public school? And are parents who enroll aware that this could happen?
11/2/09 9:00 AM Charlie Mas said... There was a reluctant admission of failure at T T Minor, but there was also a lot of blamestorming.The Sloan people blamed the district and the school, the school blamed the district and the Sloan people, the district blamed the Sloan people and the school. None of them ever acknowledged that they did anything wrong. The school was torn apart in every possible way. Then it was isolated from its community. Then enrollment was messed with. Then it was abandoned. Then it was closed.

The Pillars of Strong Schools and Strong Districts

2009-11-03T17:30:00.000-08:00

Go to Table of Contents |

1. Strong School Board: SPS has a weak school board as of Nov 2007

2. Importance of stability (internal link)

Importance of Stability

2009-11-03T17:25:00.002-08:00

Back to The Pillars of Strong Schools and Strong Districts (parent index) | Table of Contents

See also District-Induced Instability

Here, 'stability' refers to several factors:

duration of program consistency
duration of individual student's enrollment in a school
consistent classroom roster over the course of an academic year

[Documentation needed.]

Several studies strongly suggest that typically developing, underachieving students can often make grade level expectations after about three years in a stable strong program.

Conversely, studies show that moving a student from one building to another or changing the program or staffing in a building, whether for family reasons, or due to a district intervention, can set a student back academically. Multiple transfers over several years puts students at increased risk of drop-out or late graduation.

Anecdotes from SPS:

http://saveseattleschools.blogspot.com/2009/10/open-thread_30.html

NYT - New York State tests are too easy

2009-11-03T15:42:00.000-08:00

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U.S. Math Tests Find Scant Gains Across New York

By JENNIFER MEDINA
Published: October 14, 2009

[A version of this article appeared in print on October 15, 2009, on page A1 of the New York edition. Michael Barbaro and Robert Gebeloff contributed reporting.]

New York State’s fourth and eighth graders made no notable progress on federal math exams this year, according to test scores released on Wednesday, sharply contradicting the results of state-administered tests that showed record gains.

In state exams, 80 percent of eighth graders met learning standards in math this year, a jump from 59 percent two years ago. But judged by federal standards, only 34 percent were considered proficient, up from 30 percent in 2007. Fourth-grade students actually performed worse than in 2007.

Across the country, many states posted disappointing results, with fourth-grade students stagnant nationally for the first time in nearly two decades.

The results of the federal exam renewed criticism that the state exams have become too easy. The gulf between the state and federal exams also put Joel I. Klein, the New York City schools chancellor, in a difficult position, because he has staked much on the state exams, tying them to consequences like student, teacher and principal bonuses and the city’s A through F grading system for schools. And the results come at a politically potent time for Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg, who is trying to ride his record on education, and test scores in particular, to a third term.

While the results of New York City’s performance on the federal exams will not be available for several weeks, in previous years they have tracked closely to New York State’s federal results.

There has long been a chasm between what the state tests and the federal tests, called the National Assessment of Educational Progress, deem proficient. But perhaps the most embarrassing aspect of the latest federal results for New York education officials was that they showed little or no improvement during two years in which the state was claiming huge jumps in student achievement.

The state’s Education Department renewed its promise to raise standards and ensure that the state tests include less predictable questions next year.

“It is clear to us that this gap cannot stay,” said Merryl H. Tisch, the chairwoman of the state’s Board of Regents, who added that she considered the national exam the “gold standard” that did a better job of measuring overall student achievement. “We are going to start to address that this year and we are going to make the state tests more transparent and more truthful.”

David Steiner, the state education commissioner, said he was “particularly concerned by the tragically stubborn gaps” between black and Hispanic students and their white and Asian counterparts. According to the federal exam, 50 percent of white fourth graders are proficient in math, compared with 25 percent of Hispanics and 19 percent of blacks, contradicting results from state tests showing a significantly smaller gap.

“What this amounts to is a fraud,” said Diane Ravitch, an education historian who has been one of the most vocal critics of both the state exams and Mr. Klein. “This is a documentation of persistent dumbing down by the State Education Department and lying to the public.”

Christopher Cerf, a former deputy chancellor at the Department of Education, who is now advising the mayor’s campaign and spoke on its behalf, said that when the New York City numbers become public, they could show that city students outperformed their peers in the rest of the state.

“It would be impossible to draw any conclusions about New York City’s progress at this point,” Mr. Cerf said.

The federal exam, which is given every two years, uses what it calls a representative sampling of students. In New York, roughly 4,050 of the state’s fourth graders were tested, while nearly 198,000 students took the state test, which is given every year. In the eighth grade, about 3,800 students were tested on the national test, compared with 209,000 on the state exam. The state also tests grades three, five, six and seven every year.

The federal results for English tests are not expected to be released until the spring.

Critics of the state tests have said that they measure a narrow slice of the curriculum. And under state law, tests from previous years are publicly available, allowing teachers to give students many practice tests and predict what kinds of questions will be asked. The federal exam, on the other hand, does not encourage such preparation, in part because there are no consequences for teachers or schools if students do not perform well.

Mr. Klein said that the city has no choice other than to use the state exam to reward and penalize schools, because it is the only test that measures all city students. And he said that eighth-grade scores on the tests are reliable predictors of whether a student will graduate from high school. “This doesn’t in any way undermine what we’ve accomplished here,” he said.

In 2007, only 34 percent of New York City’s fourth graders and 22 percent of eighth graders were considered proficient on the federal math exam. On the state exam that year, those numbers were 74 percent and 46 percent, respectively.

The city made huge gains on the state math exams in 2009, with 85 percent of fourth graders and 71 percent of eighth graders passing.

“I have said many, many times that we should raise the bar,” Mr. Klein said. “The state’s definition of proficiency needs to be tethered to a more demanding standard.”

But in a show of the politics involving test scores, a spokeswoman for William C. Thompson Jr., the Democratic candidate for mayor, called the Bloomberg administration the “Madoff of the American education system” and a “national disgrace.”

“Bloomberg’s D.O.E. has systemically lied about test scores, graduation rates and dropout rates,” the spokeswoman, Anne Fenton, said in a statement. “Our children deserve a quality education; instead, they have become pawns in Mike Bloomberg’s 200-plus million-dollar public relations campaign to rewrite history.”

Defending the mayor and the city’s school system, Mr. Cerf, the Bloomberg campaign adviser, said that there were important differences in scope and content between the state and federal tests. And he and Mr. Klein noted that the even the federal No Child Left Behind law uses state tests to measure schools’ performance.

Michael Mulgrew, the president of the United Federation of Teachers, the city teachers’ union, said the federal results showed that the state tests were not reliable yardsticks.

“We’ve designed a school system that is just test-taking prep, and we have teachers saying, ‘I know I am not teaching children what they need to learn,’ ” he said.

Race to the Top Competition (2009-2011)

2009-11-03T13:52:00.000-08:00

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See also High Stakes Testing vs. Authentic Assessment (internal link)

Condemnation of the philosophy and strategies underlying US Department of Education's "Race to the Top" (RTT) competition

Board of Testing and Assessment (BOTA) A prestigious panel of national experts convened by the National Academy of Science. Oct 2, 2009 Letter form BOTA to The Honorable Arne Duncan. This letter expresses strong reservations about the use of standardized tests for high stakes decision making.

FairTest says"Race to the Top" funding guidelines need to be thoroughly overhauled, are inconsistent with President Obama positions, and will worsen NCLB testing consequences. http://www.fairtest.org/fairtest-critical-comments-us-education-department

High Stakes Testing vs. Authentic Assessment

2009-11-03T13:18:00.000-08:00

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See also Race to the Top Competition | Authentic Assessment (internal links)

High stakes testing is a fundamental element of School Reform, and is the primary instrument states use to fulfill the NCLB requirement for 'accountability.'

The Case Against High Stakes Testing

Board of Testing and Assessment (BOTA) A prestigious panel of national experts convened by the National Academy of Science. Oct 2, 2009 Letter form BOTA to The Honorable Arne Duncan. This letter expresses strong reservations about the use of standardized tests for high stakes decision making.
http\\ ~The Case Against High Stakes Testing~ (FairTest.org) "The materials selected for this page make the case against relying on test scores to make critical educational decisions about students or schools - or what is called high stakes testing. Common examples include retaining a child in grade or withholding a students high-school diploma solely on the basis their score on a test, or relying on test scores to determine whether a teacher or school should be sanctioned or rewarded. "
The Need for a Moratorium on High-stakes Testing by David C. Berliner on September 14, 2009 http://www.hepg.org/blog/24 "...I hope that the Obama administration learns that there are alternative accountability systems that could work and are cheaper to administer. It is time to admit our nation got it wrong and must start over."
http://www.rand.org/pubs/monographs/2007/RAND_MG589.pdf "Teachers noted ..efforts to align instruction with standards and efforts to improve their own practices... narrowing of curriculum and instruction toward tested topics and even toward certain problem styles or formats. Teachers also reported focusing more on students near the proficient cut score (i.e., “bubble kids”) and expressed concerns about negative effects of the accountability requirements on the learning opportunities given to high-achieving students....[Teachers and principals noted and effect of] declining staff morale.

Headlines

New York Times, 10/15/09 (external link) (internal link) The passage rate of New York students on the state exam is much higher than their passage rate on a national test, suggesting that the state test is inordinately easy. This finding throws into question the significance of a recent report by Hoxby et al. (Sept. 2009). The Hoxby student showed that students at charter schools in New York City outperformed their peers in non-charter public schools. Most of the data in the study pertained to elementary school.

NCLB Supplemental Educational Services

2009-11-03T13:04:00.000-08:00

Back to NCLB (parent link) | School Reform Lexicon | Table of Contents

STATE OF WASHINGTON complete list of SES providers: http://www.k12.wa.us/BulletinsMemos/bulletins2007.aspx Go to B056-07, and click on SES attach C

See comments on http://saveseattleschools.blogspot.com/2009/11/audit-and-finance-committee-mtg-11509.html for discussion of (lack of) efficacy of SES, math coaches, and District-adopted aligned math curriculum.

Description of Supplemental Educational Services (SES)

[This material was copied on 11.03.09 from this URL: http://www.ed.gov/nclb/choice/help/ses/description.html]

Low-income families can enroll their child in supplemental educational services if their child attends a Title I school that has been designated by the state to be in need of improvement for more than one year. The term "supplemental educational services" refers to free extra academic help, such as tutoring or remedial help, that is provided to students in subjects such as reading, language arts, and math. This extra help can be provided before or after school, on weekends, or in the summer.

Each State Education Agency is required to identify organizations that qualify to provide these services. Districts must make a list available to parents of state-approved supplemental educational services providers in the area and must let parents choose the provider that will best meet the educational needs of the child.

Providers of supplemental educational services may include nonprofit entities, for-profit entities, local educational agencies, public schools, public charter schools, private schools, public or private institutions of higher education, and faith-based organizations. Entities that would like to be included on the list of eligible providers must contact their state education agency and meet the criteria established by the state to be considered for the list of eligible providers.

NCLB Assessment and Accountability

2009-11-03T12:16:00.001-08:00

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Source of following quote: http://www.rand.org/pubs/monographs/2007/RAND_MG589.pdf

The standards-based accountability (SBA) provisions of the No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB) of 2001 requires each state to

develop content and achievement standards in several subjects,

administer tests to measure students’ progress toward these standards,

develop targets for performance on these tests, and

impose a series of interventions on schools and districts that do not meet the targets.

Reported Changes at the Classroom Level Included Both Desirable and Undesirable Responses. Teachers noted ..efforts to align instruction with standards and efforts to improve their own practices... narrowing of curriculum and instruction toward tested topics and even toward certain problem styles or formats. Teachers also reported focusing more on students near the proficient cut score (i.e., “bubble kids”) and expressed concerns about negative effects of the accountability requirements on the learning opportunities given to high-achieving students....

Conclusions. This monograph suggests reasons for both optimism and concern...SBA is leading to an emphasis on student achievement...but teacher and administrator responses suggest that a single-minded emphasis on student proficiency on tests has some potentially negative consequences such as a narrowing of curriculum and a decline in staff morale.'

The following articles were found by entering "NCLB" as a search term at this URL: http://www.cse.ucla.edu/products/rsearch.asp. This URL was found as a link on the ed.gov-NCLB website.

Herman, J. (2007), Accountability and Assessment: Is Public Interest in K-12 Education Being Served?, CRESST Report 728 (33 pp.); Summary: The report defines 'public interest' and examines "whether and how accountability assessment influences students’ learning opportunities and the relationship between accountability and learning."
Mintrop, H. and T. Trujillo (2005), Corrective Action in Low-Performing Schools: Lessons for NCLB Implementation from State and District Strategies in First-Generation Accountability Systems, CSE Report 657. Summary: "This paper explores what lessons we can learn from the experiences of [two larger districts (Chicago and Philadelphia) and three smaller and four larger] states that instituted NCLB-like accountability systems prior to 2001...[Our analysis revealed] eight 'lessons': sanctions are not the fallback solution; no single strategy has been universally successful; staging should be handled with flexibility; intensive capacity building is necessary; a comprehensive bundle of strategies is key; relationship-building needs to complement powerful programs; competence reduces conflict; and strong state commitment is needed to create system capacity."
Haertel, E. and J. Herman (2005), A Historical Perspective on Validity Arguments for Accountability Testing, CSE Report 654. Summary: "...Those students and schools that are [failing to meet learning standards] should be held accountable. Of course, the rationales for accountability testing programs are much more complex than that, as are testing's effects, both intended and unintended. In this chapter, we describe various rationales for accountability testing programs over the past century. .. Our goals are first, to illustrate the diversity of mechanisms whereby testing may affect educational practice and learning outcomes; and second, to show that while many of the same ideas have recurred over time in different forms and guises, accountability testing has become more sophisticated."

NCLB Highly Qualified Teacher

2009-11-03T12:07:00.000-08:00

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This material copied on 11.2.09 from http://www.ed.gov/policy/elsec/guid/secletter/051021.html

The law set the important goal that all students be taught by a "highly qualified teacher" (HQT) who holds at least a bachelor's degree, has obtained full State certification, and has demonstrated knowledge in the core academic subjects he or she teaches. In addition, the Individuals with Disabilities Education Improvement Act of 2004 (IDEA) reinforced this goal by aligning the requirements for special education teachers with the NCLB requirements.

The law also requires states will lose Federal education funding if they fail show that they are taking steps and making progress on the goal of ensuring that "highly qualified teachers are distributed equitably among classrooms with students from affluent and disadvantaged families by offering extra training or financial incentives to teach in hard-to-staff schools."

States must have a test in place to assess subject-area knowledge in the key subjects in the standard elementary school curriculum. Further, for new middle and high school teachers, a State must either test content knowledge or require those teachers to have a college major, a major equivalent, or an advanced degree or credential, in each subject taught, in order to be considered highly qualified. If a State has charter schools, teachers who teach in these schools must have bachelor's degrees and must demonstrate subject-area competence in the same manner as other teachers do before they can be considered highly qualified, but certification requirements can be waived, if permitted by State law. For teachers of special education, States must meet the requirements established in Section 602(10) of IDEA.

Complete and accurate reporting of HQT data to the Department is the third requirement. In January 2006, States must submit complete and accurate data to the U.S. Secretary of Education on their implementation of the HQT requirements as part of their Consolidated State Performance Report (CSPR). In addition to reporting the number and percentage of core academic classes being taught by highly qualified teachers in all schools, States must report on the number and percentage of core academic classes being taught in "high-" and "low-poverty" schools.....

The Two Sides of School Reform

2009-11-02T22:19:00.000-08:00

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Note: This article is still a draft. I welcome comments that will help me to make the article clear, concise, complete, and easy to follow.

"School Reform," as I have seen it used, has quite a specific meaning. Before proceding with a definition of this term, it is necesary for the reader to pay attention to the distinction between charter schools [internal link] and non-charter public schools. Both types of schools are institutions of public education, as both types of schools recieve per capita state dollars designated for K-12 education.
School reform comprises the school choice movement, privatization of public education sector, and what I call industrialized education in public schools serving low-income/minority student populations.

School Reform refers, first of all, to an approach for re-making public-financed non-charter education with the goal of increasing the readiness of high-school and community college graduates to be submissive, productive members of the workforce. It also encompasses the School Choice Movement. School Choice calls for per capita state K-12 dollars to follow a child to wherever the family chooses to enroll child, be that a private school, a charter school, or a non-charter public school.

To reduce some confusion that surrounds the use of this term, I urge people to refer to this movement as Corporatist School Reform. ("Militaristic Corporatist Reform Movement" would be more fully descriptive of the school reform movement, but this is too ungainly.) The adjective corporatist captures several features of the movement. Firstly. it characterizes the primary advocates and financial backers of the movement -- this is not a popular grass roots movement, as the noun "movement" connotes. Secondly, it refers to the business creation goal of the movement.

Thirdly, it refers to the belief that bringing systems engineering efficiency, innovation, and competition into the public school realm will lead to cost efficiencies and to a better product, i.e., service-sector job-ready high school graduates. This is not to say that Corporatist School Reform movement discounts the need for a cadre of high school graduates ready for college-level studies in math, sciences, and engineering. It seems, rather, that the movement finds that as long as private schools and a few great public schools are providing opportunities for advantaged children to obtain a superior education, it is cost-effective to have schools serving less advantaged students to focus on providing an education that prepares students for employment in the low-wage sector of the ecomony.

Fourthly, it calls for what I term Industrialized Education in non-public charter schools and in militaristic charter schools. This is the type of education that I am referring to as preferred by "Reformists" in schools that serve lower income communities.

The reader can refer to Industrialized Education for a description.

Industrialized Education takes the form it does because it is the most cost-effective way to serve the intent of the Federal legislation No Child Left Behind (NCLB). NCLB calls for narrowly-defined student, teacher, and school accountability to be based on state-mandated norm-referenced high stakes testing. Not incidentally, Industrialized Education implemented in charter schools provides at present the best opportunity for private business income profits [see articles by Lisa Snell at the Reason Foundation].

The form of back-to-basics eduation seen in the non-charter schools of reformed school districts is ultra-regressive, and is organized around high-stakes standardized, computer-greaded tests.  I feel that "Industrialized Education" is an appropriate name for the School Reform movement's extreme version of traditional education. In the School Reform construct, the ideal non-charter public school is a factory, where teachers are machinery that punches and molds the raw material (the students) in order to imbue the raw material with the desired attributes. The high stakes tests are the primary means of carrying out Quality Assurance. QA provides feedback necessary to improve the percentage of product that meets the product specification, and can be shipped to customers (business that seek submissive, literate, competent, low-wage non-unionized employees for dead-end jobs) .

Some charter schools are also organized rigidly for teaching-to-the-test. These tend to be highly regimented. Military charter schools are of this type. These schools are less expensive to operate than progressive schools, can succeed in meeting their AYP without supplemental support from Foundations. Thus, these kind of charters provide the best opportunity for business income and profit.

Notwithstanding the existence of conservative charter schools, it is a fact that educational innovation is welcomed by reformists, as long as the innovation occurs within charter schools rather than non-charter public schools. Anything goes, as long as schools meet their accountability (AYP) targets. To help them meet their targets, charter schools have more strategies legally available to them than do non-charter public schools. Charters also sometimes have generous financial support from private Foundations, most often one or more of these Foundations will appear on the donor list of a charter school: Gates, Broad, Stuart, and Walton Family. So charter schools have certain advantages over public schools when it comes to the struggle to meet AYP. We also know that sometimes charter schools engage in activities and strategies that enhance the charters school's chance of meeting AYP while a the same time diminising the public school's chance. For example, charter schools are legally allowed to dump their least successful and their more disruptive students back into the non-charter system, and it is known that this does happen.

The term "public-private partnership" is inscribed on both sides of the metaphorical coin. On the Charter School side of the coin, public-private partnerships means generous gifts of money to reduce class size or otherwise pay for extra intructional support, maybe to provide extra psychosocial services, great libraries, etc. One has to wonder if the Foundation support will be perpetual: What will happen to these schools when the Foundations loose interest in supporting the school (this happend to T.T. Minor).

On the Non-charter public school side, public-private partnerships go to the Central District instead to school buildings. The private grants pay for part of the data-driven decision making implementation start-up costs of establishing, refining, expanding the infrastructure for data-creation, data warehousing, and data analysis, and data-driven decision making, instructional leadership training, and enforcement of requirements for teachers to teach-to-the-test.

So now I realize "School Reform" does just mean "regressive education." It can also mean progressive education.

Reformists have a different set of values for charter schools on the one hand, and non-charter public schools on the other. In the case of non-charter public schools, reformists are opposed to innovation and progressive education. Within a charter school system, reformists welcome innovation and competition; they set no limits on pedagogical approach. Non-charter public schools, however, must conform to a strict regime of narrowly focused, district mandated curriculum, and teaching-to-the-test.

Let's Get Real About Innovation in Our Schools

2009-11-02T12:37:00.000-08:00

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Go to Charter schools and such [Index]

Below is the text of a comment I submited to this Edutopia Blog post:

Title: "Let's Get Real About Innovation in Our Schools" By Suzie Boss10/12/09
URL: http://www.edutopia.org/school-innovation-defined

My comment (submitted Nov. 2, 2009):

My impression is that when U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan and school reformists use the term "innovation," they are referring to charter schools. The reformist view, is it not, is that charter schools are the way to introduce innovation into public education? Non-charter public schools, in the reformist view, are supposed to provide strictly regressive, traditional, back-to-basics education:

- The curriculum is to be uniform throughout the district and is narrowly-focused on the knowledge and skills that are tested on the high stakes tests

- teachers teach to the test

- principals (as Instructional Leaders), instructional coaches, and "teacher mentors" conduct "Learning Walks" (google it) to make sure that teachers are adhering to the teaching of core curriculum with utmost fidelity.

In the reformist view, school choice, and innovations are great and highly desirable, as long as these elements of public education are available only through charter schools. Competition is desirable, but not within the non-charter public system. Charter schools compete against non-charter schools, private schools, and among themselves, but non-charter public schools structured so that they do not compete against each-other.

Here in Seattle, the district has withdrawn all support for non-charter Alternative schools, is aligning curriculum uniformly across the district, and is eliminating opportunity for patrons to choose non-charter public schools (all students will be assigned to their neighborhood school, except when there is not enough capacity; a few "option" schools are available to address overflow).

Washington State does not yet permit charter schools, but the Seattle district has allowed a single psuedo-charter to start up. The District gives this school lots of support. Why is innovation good in charter (and psuedo-charter) schools, but unacceptable in non-charter public schools?

In conlusion I doubt very much that any of the DOE funds for innovation will go to expanding and developing WITHIN the non-charter public school systems the GREAT EXAMPLES of innovation that already exist within the non-charter public schools.

We still have some innovative and very successful Alternative schools within SPS, despite the lack of support from the District. Thornton Creek Elementary school, which follows the Expeditionary/Outward bound model, just received last spring the presigious Imag'nation Award from the Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts. Thornton Creek is the first school outside of New York State to receive this award.

Parent activists in Seattle are trying to save the Alternative school system, but it is an uphill battle. Do you have any advice for us?

Alphabetical Index to topics and posts

2009-11-02T11:08:00.000-08:00

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curriculum-alignment-in-sps Filed under Topic: Reform of Seattle Public Schools

Events Index

2009-11-02T10:55:00.000-08:00

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Nov. 18 Wednesday x p.m. - z p.m. School Board meeting

Nov. 11 Scott Oki hosted by CPPS
Meetings Week of Nov 2 - 6

Nov. 4 Wednesday 6 p.m. - 11 p.m. School Board meeting
Nov. 5 School Board Audit and Finance Committee Meeting; This is the meeting where staff answered to the Board about Meg Diaz' report. Blogger notes and comments at this link (saveourschool).

Event 11-10-09 CPPS meeting with Scott Oki - self-proclaimed school reform sage

2009-11-02T10:45:00.000-08:00

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"CPPS Meeting, Tues, Nov 10 with Scott Oki"
Tues, November 10 at 7:00 P.M.
Garfield High School LIBRARY (400 23rd Ave)

Prepare for this event by reading the comments on this SPS community blog post where people compare Alternative schools to charter schools.

Announcement: A Community Conversation with Scott Oki

In his book, "Outrageous Learning: An Education Manifesto," Scott Oki describes the ills facing public schools and applies the same frank, no-nonsense analysis that made him one of the most successful executives at Microsoft and co-founder of the Oki Foundation.

Mr. Oki is meeting with community groups across Washington State in order to offer his common-sense solutions to the challenges facing our schools and solicit input from his audiences. Whether or not you agree with his ideas, please join us in a spirited conversation about ways to improve our schools. To learn more about Scott Oki and read excerpts from the book, including his 11 planks for systemic school reform, visit www.outrageouslearning.org.

posted by Andrew Kwatinetz at 11:48 AM on Oct 27, 2009 on the Seattle Public Schools Community Blog.

https://www.blogger.com/comment.g?blogID=28765366&postID=8454339892994628709

More than 50 comments on this blog post already!

Charter Schools [Index to articles]

2009-11-01T00:42:00.000-07:00

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Article: Charter schools defined

Topic: Alternative schools instead of charter schools

Blog discussion: SPS community blog - Comments on announcement of Scott Oki event Nov 10 2009 . Read the comments to see why people compare Alternative schools and charter schools, and find Alternative schools to be preferable.
Joan's comment on an Edutopia blog post titled "Lets get-real about-innovation in our schools"

Article: Foundation abandonment of charter demonstration projects

Article: Seattle's psuedo-charter school

State law does not permit charter schools; nevertheless, there does exist within SPS a fairly recently established school that resembes a charter school in a number of ways. This school is known as The New School, or "South Shore." It is located in Rainier Valley. There are several ways in which this school resembles a charter school....

Charter Schools: Are they good? Are they Bad?

The general view seems to be that there is zero chance of charter schools coming to this state. The voters have three times rejected charter initiatives. Charters could come to the state through a state legislative action. Arne Duncan is offering a financial bribe to states like ours to pass pro-charter and pro-merit pay (student score conditioned) legislation. It seems unlikely that the legislature would endeavor to qualify for this bribe.
For an excellent communal assessment of charters, go to this link: https://www.blogger.com/comment.g?blogID=28765366&amp. Go to the comments on the essay, and scroll down until you find the first comment by "zb." Starting from this comment, there are number of astute comments about charter schools.
Here is a heartwrenching anecdote that speaks to the problem of parasitical behavior of charter schools, especially when they are co-housed with other schools.
NY Daily News 07.19.09: Charter schools pawn off flunking students, says public school principal (external link) See also the comments and related articles

http://www.rethinkingschools.org/archive/19_04/pare194.shtml By Julie Weosterhoff (of PURE). "District press releases touting the 2010 plan claimed that the CPS charter schools, the model for many Renaissance schools, were outperforming similar regular public schools. This claim is not supported by national evidence on charters. And a recent analysis by the Chicago Teachers Union shows that Chicago charters enroll a smaller proportion of special needs students, a smaller proportion of economically disadvantaged students, and a smaller proportion of limited English proficient students than CPS schools as a whole.

Helpful lessons from charter school experiments:

Hoxby et al., September 2009. Regardless of any flaws and biases that it might have, the Hoxby Study teaches a number of valuable lessons: 1) Stability (freedom from district interference) is important for student and school success - minimum three years worth for each child enrolled and mininum three years for a strong program to succeed in meeting AYP. 2) When student achievement is narrowly defined, significant growth in three-year achievement occurs in the context of a range of pedagogical approaches -- i.e., with pedagogical approach ranging from progressive (hands-on rich engaging student directed curriculum) to regressive (focused worksheet based teaching to the test with scripted lessons). This says that direct instruction is not necessary for significant gains in student achievement.

New School - SPS' psuedo charter school

2009-11-01T00:41:00.000-07:00

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Go to Charter schools [index]

Below find a sequence of comments about the New School copied out of a blog.

State law does not permit charter schools; nevertheless, there does exist within SPS a fairly recently established school that resembes a charter school in a number of ways. I refer to this school as a 'psuedo'- charter school.

This school is known as The New School, or "South Shore." It is located in Rainier Valley. It does not have the freedom from regulations district and state regulations that charter schools do have, but in these ways the school resembles a charter school:

it has enrollment-by-lottery system
it is situated in a part of the city that has higher poverty and higher than average percentage minority school-age children
it has a small class sizes and a rich, progressive curriculum
it has taken over space from an already-established program (though not all charter schools do this--but non-charter schools do NOT do this); it is now trying to take over the whole bldg--but the original program is fighting to stay (SouthShore high school re-entry program).
it receives significant foundation support, as is typical of charter schools that have rich progressive curriculum and small class sizes

What is somewhat unusual is that the program starts at pre-K. I met an African-American parent of a displaced T.T. Minor child who said she has heard good things about the program. So it is quite an attractive school, from what I understand. I suppose for most parents who tour, the progressive curriculum adds to its attractiveness. I bet it has atypically small class sizes, too.

This school is interesting to me because of the dual standard it reveals in the District's priorities. The New School enjoys clear and significant support from the School District. (Rumor has it that the Superintendent's daughter attends preschool at the New School.) Alternative schools, on the other hand, are being phased out. (See "Alternative schools instead of charter schools" on the Charter schools page.) To compare the New School with Alternative schools is appropriate, because like Alternative schools, the New School has a progressive, hands-on curriculum (the PreK-G1 curriculum is called High/Scope--external link).

This next set of comments I copied out of the Seattle Public Schools Community Blog (saveourschools.blogspot.com), and then re-organized for clarity.

10/31/09 11:41 adhoc said... My son graduated from Bryant last year.

He had 30 kids in his 3rd grade class, 31 in his 4th grade class, and 30 in his 5th grade class.

Even at 30/31 the classes are huge. The kids can't walk up and down the aisles in the classroom, and had to turn sideways in some areas. They had to share cubby's. Had 3 lunch shifts. Lost the science lab to form another classroom.

Meanwhile....at New School.......

adhoc said... From the report: "Grant-supported for at least the next 6 years by the New School Foundation. These additional dollars support Pre-K, small class sizes,instructional assistants and staff training"What's the point? Is this foundation trying to prove that if every school has a bunch of outside donors and can get the supt or other political figures to enroll their kids that the school will work and/or be protected from the idiocy of the central district decision making?

adhoc said... So, what happens to New School if the grant isn't extended? How do they fund all of the "extras" without the private dollars? Do they all just go away, and New School becomes just like every other public school? And are parents who enroll aware that this could happen?

SolvayGirl1972 said... [commenting on preceding comment] Isn't that pretty much what happened when the money ran out at TT Minor—another Sloan-funded school? [See internal link - scroll down to "Case Study: T.T. Minor"]

Here is the link to the report: [external link to pdf file]

uxolo said... [commenting on the scheduled end of the grant support]

uxolo said... The New School history is not very pretty. Olchefske let them establish before going to the Board for a Memorandum of Understanding was ever presented. I would not trust the district website regarding the funding cycle. I would trust the New School's site for accuracy.

Robert said... Yeah Gavroche Kay has told me that she is against charters. Send her an email and ask her yourself (I am certain she will respond ;-) electkaysmithblum@gmail.com ).

Melissa Westbrook said... I think the parents at South Shore are aware that their school is greatly helped by the funding from the New School Foundation. Do they all know when it runs out? I doubt it. Will New School continue this experiment? Again, unclear. But if the funding goes away, they will be funded just like every other K-8. I have no idea what would happen to the pre-school; maybe a private operator would take over.

SPSMom said... [commenting on the Superintendent's having enrolled her daughter at New School, says it does NOT bode well for alternative schools], I think it bodes well for charter schools. Two reasons, there is nothing really alternative about the New School and two, it is an example of what a private/public partnership can do. Free tuition and smaal classes, and some enrichment.

Curriculum Alignment in SPS

2009-10-22T13:41:00.000-07:00

Go to table-of-contents.
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May 2009: the District communicated to Roosevelt High School that the Language Arts curriculum would be "aligned." This entailed eliminating popular electives. Read about this at http://saveseattleschools.blogspot.com/2009/05/high-school-la-curriculum.html; see especially Charlie Mas' entry

Oct. 22, 2009: SPS District office has just announced that it will schedule community meetings on District-wide Curriculum Alignment just before and after Thanksgiving

Here are some blog essays on this topic:

Go to reform-of-seattle-public-schools [parent index]
Go to Table-of-contents

Curriculum Alignment in SPS: WHY?

2009-10-22T13:35:00.000-07:00

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Go to curriculum-alignment-in-sps [parent index]

This is a quote from the first entry on this webpage: http://saveseattleschools.blogspot.com/2009/05/high-school-la-curriculum.html

"Basically, the district wants to align the curriculum from school to school for a couple of reasons. One is that there are enough students who transfer from school to school and find completely different things happening. Another is that the district wants to have some continuity about what is happening from school to school. I can see their point somewhat."

Do you want to know why I think the District is keen on Curriculum Alignment?

[If you don't, you can click here to return to the Table of Contents.]

The justifications the District has given don't sound very compelling, do they? Not to me. My guess is that Curriculum Alignment and Elimination of School Choice (SAP) are complementary parts of an agenda to increase the appetite for charter schools.

Notice that SAP cannot be justified unless all the schools are identical in curriculum.

Even so, I would still argue that aligning curriculum isn't enough to justify SAP, Within large urban school districts such as Seattle's, SAP has a huge downside: de facto resegregation. We know that the kids assigned to struggling schools having little supplementary fundraising are not getting as good an education as kids assigned to a school with a predominately white and middle-to-upper class student body.
Familes of kids who under the choice system would have elected to go elsewhere (say, Summit? African American Academy? Tops? - the first two of these programs were closed, remember?) will soon be--under SAP--stuck going to a struggling school they don't want to be in in the first place, and which is academically inferior to the school they would have chosen to go to.

Curriculum alignment, as we can see in the case of Roosevelt High School, can lead to narrowing and dumbing-down of the curriculum. The schools to which the more advantaged children are assigned will become less appealing to families. The familes that can afford to will move their kids to private school.

Looking at these consequences of SAP and Curriculum Alignment, it is easy to see how families of all income levels will likely show a greater appetite for charter schools. Why? Typically

Charter schools are choice schools; if demand for seats exceeds supply, then typically charter school seats are assigned by lottery.
A parallel system of charter schools provides the choice that is to be largely (more probably, completely) eliminated by SAP.
Charter schools are free to cater to a target clientele. Some charter schools specialize in serving low-income minority children. Such charter schools are often punitive and highly regimented. Some charter schools specialize in serving more affluent clientele. So a network of charter schools can provide something for everyone.

We already have a psuedo-charter school in Seattle. It is called the New School. It is also referred to as South Shore. The New School will be the topic of a separate blog essay. I will mention a couple things about it here. ,

The New School uses a PK-K curriculum "High/Scope" that sounds distinctly progressive. "High/Scope sets the stage for active learning: students have direct, hands-on experiences with people, objects, events and ideas. The children’s interests and choices are the heart of High/Scope programs, and a daily plan-do-review sequence provides the structure." It sounds like the Grade 1-3 curriculum is similar in philosophy to the High/Scope curriculum: "The New School Foundation supports strong alignment between its pre-kindergarten experience and the K-3 experiences that follow."
Rumor has it that Maria Goodloe-Johnson is sending her daughter to the pre-school program at the New School.
There is plenty of evidence that MGJ does not support the non-charter public Alternatives schools in SPS, all of which provide progressive education to their students. (See The Sun is Going Down on Board Policy C54 and Alternative Schools .)

Don't these facts taken together tell us the MGJ likes choice and progressive curriculum as long as it is not within the non-charter public school system?

The next logical question that someone would ask is this: Why do Reformists abhor free choice and progressive curriculum when it occurs WITHIN the public school system? The most plausible answer I can think of is this:

$$$$$$$$$

The individuals and organizations that are bankrolling the School Reform advocacy movement are first and foremost business people, whose most fundamental objective is to Make Money for Themselves and/or for Shareholders.

Open enrollment Charter Schools would provide a much better business income opportunity than do open enrollment C54 Alternative schools.

SAP: Is it true that parents want "predicability"?

2009-10-22T12:38:00.000-07:00

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Go to reform-of-seattle-public-schools [parent index]

Links to blog essays on this topic:

http://saveseattleschools.blogspot.com/2009/09/where-to-start.html. In this blog, the author questions whether it is true, as the District claims, that most parents want neighborhood schools and predicatbility: She asks: where is the data to prove this?

SAP Plan to Elimate Choice

2009-10-22T12:26:00.000-07:00

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Go to reform-of-seattle-public-schools [parent index]

Links to blog essays on this topic:

The District says that parents want this. Is this true?
Is this plan disadvantageous to many low-income and minority students?

Curriculum Alignment - Good or Bad?

2009-10-22T12:24:00.000-07:00

Go to table-of-contents
Go to curriculum-alignment-in-sps [parent index]

An exellent report that address this question as the main theme or as a sub-theme:

https://coreknowledge.org/CK/about/research/Report40.pdf. Questions that this report speaks to include the following: Is Curriculum Alignment best practice? [No, since the district doesn't necessarily always pick the best curriculum. Think of SPS' adopted math curricula!] The experience of teachers in a curricularly aligned, data-driven, standardized-test-oriented reformed district.

Whole Language and Phonics

Why do I list "Whole Language and Phonics" as a sup-topic this index? What if the District chooses, of these two approaches, the inferior approach? Public school children will suffer the consequences.
http://www.halcyon.org/wholelan.html Best article so far to give pros and cons of Phonics Wins out. This article indicates that Whole Language curriculum leads to lower levels achievement on broad measures of achievement.
For some interesting blog essays/comments on this topic, search the Core Knowledge site: http://www.coreknowledge.org/CK/search.htm, and use the search string "whole language phonics"
for more interesting articles, search the web: google "whole language versus phonics"

Method challenges some education myths [Commentary]

2009-10-21T14:38:00.000-07:00

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This blog entry is a commentary on the article Method Challenges Some Education Myths By Jason Song and Jason Felch, published October 18, 2009 in LA Times.

I suggest you read the article (click on the link) before reading this essay.

This article purports to summarize research that debunks as myth commonly held beliefs having to do with education. Notice especially that if the assertions of the article are accepted at face value, then we are forced to draw the following conclusion:

"The teachers that command the highest salaries in public schools (due to credentials and years of experience) "add" less value than less-qualified and less-experienced teachers. The less-experienced, less-well credentialed teachers are just as successful, and often more successful, at closing the achievement gap. This is true regardless of class size (smaller class size does not lead to higher achievement)."

Under the following circumstances, the assertions in the news article are very likely to be true:

1. One only looks at schools that have implemented and exhibit high fidelity to a reformist core curriculum and reformist teaching methods.
2. Teachers at the schools constrain the content of their lessons to the core-curriculum, which is to say, all of the teaching is geared to the test.
3. The only measure of individual achievement considered is individual scores on the district- or state-mandated standardized exam.
4. The only measure of teacher success considered is year-over-year aggregate change in achievement of the students in his/her classes for that school year.
5. The only measure of school success considered is the year-over-year aggregate change in achievement of the students enrolled in the school.

Research studies that only look at schools that conform to some or all of these five criteria will likely produce results that support the assertions of the newspaper article. Such research cannot, however be considered as constituting fair and valid tests of the stated hypothesis.

Now lets add another criterion to the five listed above. Let us limit our analysis to inner-city urban high schools, and test whether disadvantaged students at charter schools outperform their peers in public schools. We will mostly find that on narrow measures of achievement, charter schools outperform the public schools. We will also notice, if we are looking, that in violence-ridden neighborhoods, the charter schools are either sponsored by a branch of the U.S. Military, or are highly regimented and punitive.

Consider now asking the same research question, but this time of student performance at schools that have NOT been reformed. Suppose the researchers limited their study to schools that meet these criteria:

1. School located in large urban area, and having very high proportion of low-income and minority students.
2. Teachers do not "teach to the test." Instead, a small proportion of cumulative annual lesson time is devoted to test preparation. This lesson time focuses on test-taking skills, not on test content.
3. The school curriculum and educational philosophy is progressive; that is to say, it is rich and broad in scope, has a strong hands-on/active learning/project-based emphasis, is intellectually-engaging and challenging for students, and students are invited to help determine study themes.
4. The only measure of individual achievement considered is individual scores on the district- or state-mandated standardized exam.

I predict that a high proportion of students at these schools will pass the state standard exams. If the measures of achievement are broadened to include student return rate, first choice rate, drop out rate, college-application rate, college entrance rate, advanced-degree achievement rate, etc., then students at these schools will strongly outperform students at the military and militaristic charter schools, and at non-charter public schools that follow the regressive Reform prescription.

I have found analyses that supports this prediction. In other words, there does exist data that shows that progressive education is more successful at closing the achievement gap than is reform education. The contrast in outcomes is especially stark when achievement is defined by authentic measures.

This blog essay is long enough. I will defer discussion of relevant research for a separate blog essay, to be written on another day.

I am interested to hear what others think of this LA Times article.

Method challenges some education myths

2009-10-21T14:21:00.000-07:00

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Blog note: Please comment on this article and/or go to Joan's commentary on this article.

Related articles:

http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/lanow/2009/10/challenging-classroom-myths.html%20Judging Judging teachers: Much of what you thought you knew is wrong | October 16, 2009 | "A new way of crunching test scores is turning conventional ideas in education on their head. The approach, called value added, has gained momentum in recent months as it has been embraced by the Obama administration and policymakers around the country, though it has generated strong opposition from teachers unions..."
http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-teacher-eval18-2009oct18,0,4471467.story "In Tenn. and N.C., Terry Grier adopted and expanded a statistical method of tracking student progress. Union resistance scuttled more modest efforts in San Diego, mirroring a brewing national debate..."
http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-teacherqanda18-2009oct18,0,5553420.story Commonly asked questions about the 'value-added' approach to teacher assessment
http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-value-added-sources,0,2778110.story?page=2 Times research: Value added sources. In reporting on the value-added approach, The Times interviewed a dozen leading experts and reviewed more than two dozen research and policy papers from proponents and skeptics. [This article provides a] list of some of the papers reviewed by The Times.

Blog note: The last of these related articles lists very few high quality scientific sources. Many of the sources are reformist advocacy organizations. The source lists leaves me with little faith in scientific credibility of the Times assertions in this series of articles.

Here is the article:

Districts and states that use the 'value-added' approach have had some surprising results: Class size, student background and schools' funding appear to be less critical than has long been believed.

By Jason Song and Jason Felch
October 18, 2009

LA Times.

For years, schools and students have been judged on raw standardized test scores. Experts say this approach is flawed because they tend to reflect socioeconomic levels more than learning.

The "value-added" approach attempts to level the playing field by focusing on growth rather than achievement. Using a statistical analysis of test scores, it tracks an individual student's improvement year to year, and uses that progress to estimate the effectiveness of teachers, principals and schools.

Academics have also used the approach to test many assumptions about what matters in schools. Scholars are still puzzling over what makes for a great teacher or school, but their results challenge orthodox assumptions like these:

All teachers are equal. For decades, schools have treated teachers like interchangeable parts. Value-added results suggest there are sharp differences in teachers' effectiveness.

More money, more learning. The highest growth among students is often in poor schools with low achievement scores, according to districts and states that have adopted the value-added approach. Students at affluent schools sometimes have high proficiency scores but make little new progress year to year.

Teachers can't overcome a student's background. Recent research shows that with several effective teachers in a row, students can overcome disadvantages. Some studies suggest minority and poor students make as much progress as other pupils when placed with the same effective teachers.

Class size is key. Modest changes in class size have been shown to have little to no effect on student learning.

Bad teachers tend to teach in poor schools. Several studies suggest that there is more variation among teachers within a school than across schools. Effective instructors are often distributed across rich and poor schools, and they tend to stay at challenging schools longer than at ineffective ones.

Teacher experience matters. Although teachers are generally paid more for years of experience, research suggests that instructors show dramatic improvement in their first few years and then level off. Teachers with 20 years of experience are often no more effective than peers with five.

Teacher education matters. Schools routinely pay higher salaries to teachers with graduate degrees. But several studies have found that educators with advanced degrees do no better than those without, with the possible exception of high school math teachers.

Teacher credentials matter. Most public schools pay teachers more for certifications and advanced credentials. But several studies have shown that non-traditionally prepared instructors -- such as those in the Teach for America program -- have similar or slightly better outcomes than certified ones.

Copyright © 2009, The Los Angeles Times
http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-myths18-2009oct18,0,4278154.story

Please comment on this article and/or Go to Joan's commentary on this article

Teachers, their unions, and the "Human Capital" reform agenda

2009-10-21T00:10:00.000-07:00

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An essay is being prepared for this page. The essay will outline the "Human Capital" strategy of the school reform movement, as it relates to teachers.

The school reform movement calls for teacher assessment, promotion, tenure, compensation decisions to be "driven by data." This is an anti-professional, disrespectful agenda that serves one of the fundamental reformist priorities, this being to reduce the cost of labor.

I am concerned that few teachers in SPS are aware of the efforts that are being made, particularly at the state and federal level, to get legislation passed that supports the anti-teacher agenda.

This lack of awareness may be due to union leadership cooperating with reformist advocates. I will document the nature of this cooperation.

In this article I will attempt to explain what the Human Capital strategy is, and why it is not good for the students of SPS, and why it is not good for teachers and their profession.

Yes! Examples of successful opposition in other districts

2009-10-20T23:34:00.000-07:00

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Back to Opposition to Reform [Topic index]

San Francisco

Education and Democracy URL: http://educationanddemocracy.org/ [not sure if this site is still active] Website of researcher/author Dr. Kathy Webster [email link], blogger on Education Justice blog; "Welcome to our website! Are you interested in promoting democracy? Have you lost influence over educational policy? Need help in fending off the high-stakes testing agenda? This web site provides analysis and curriculum materials that can help community-based movements implement democratic goals in our public schools.

San Diego

Teachers' Unions successfully block reformist Superintendent from implementing a reformist strategy for teacher evaluations | LA Times article

Favorite Links

2009-10-20T16:29:00.000-07:00

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http://educationanddemocracy.org/
Seattle Ed 2010 blog by Dora Taylor and Sue Peters
http://altschoolsseattle.blogspot.com/
http://saveseattleschools.blogspot.com/

More anti-reform blogs and websites

Local blog: seattle_ed.blogspot.com

2009-10-20T15:48:00.000-07:00

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Return to Local anti-reform blogs and websites [Index]

http://seattle-ed.blogspot.com/ ===============

- This blog serves as a warehouse of links to on-line articles, reports, studies, and websites. The owners of this blog (Seattlites Dora Taylor and Sue Peters) have compiled many dozens of articles, and are adding new articles daily. The links are organized by topic.

- The current topics, in order of presentation on the right bar of the seattle-ed blog, are the following:

Regarding Charter Schools and the Privitization of a Public Trust
Charter Schools and Public Funds
Arne Duncan [U.S. Secretary of Education; pro-charter & pro-reformist]
President Obama
The Race to the Top [Federal Dept. of Edu. pro-charter bribes to states that don't yet allow charters; funds to promote school district reform]
The Broad Foundation: "The Underground Department of Education"
About the Gates Foundation and Charter Schools
Mayoral Control of School Districts
Alternative Schools in Seattle
No Child Left Behind
Merit Pay and High Stakes Testing
Kipp Schools [KIPP is a network of charter schools]
Teachers' Unions (e.g., "This is What Happens When You Don't Have a Teachers' Union")
Maria Goodloe-Johnson (Seatte Public Schools Superintendent; documenting that she is reformist, and has very strong connections to the Broad Foundation)
Seattle School Board
School Closures
Food for thought [miscellany]
Ideas on Education
Recomended Sites on Education (locally and nationally)
Don Fisher: Union Buster, Egomaniac, Rube, In His Own Words

TQ Assessment agenda in SPS

2009-10-20T14:53:00.000-07:00

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Article: Teacher Quality Assessment: Open Letter to Patrick D'Amelia, President, Alliance For Education from Joan Sias

Excerpt: "...What are appropriate objectives for any TQA program? Can we conceive of a sensible, cost-effective, meaningful, and respectful TQA system which serves well the intended objectives, and which is likely to be well-received by teachers, principals, Directors, and the public? I suggest that the answer would not look like a Reformist-friendly solution--such as NCTQ (a Reformist advocacy group) might propose--..."
Posted to alliance4education.blogspot.com on October 18, 2009

[Blog note: additional articles to be added from google docs]

Uncategorized essays

2009-10-20T14:46:00.000-07:00

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Consequences of school reform in other large urban districts.html

Commentary on 10/18/09 LA Times article Method Challenges Some Education Myths. According to authors, research suggests that the statement "Smaller class sizes and better qualified teachers generally lead to better student achievement" is a myth. This article is a good example of biased misinformation and constitutes Reformist propoganda.

SAP: Plan to Eliminate Choice Is Especially Disadvantageous to Minority Students

2009-10-20T14:41:00.000-07:00

Go to table-of-contents | reform-of-seattle-public-schools | sap-plan-to-elimate-choice [parent index]

The New Student Assignment Plan (SAP) strikes me as racist.

I have a number of reasons for taking this position.

For the moment, I will only point to the following:
http://ssthing.org/

Click on balloons on this map, and take note especially of

percentage of returning students (this is the percentage of students at end of each year that return to the same school the following year; of course, students leaving the highest grade at the school are not counted in this statistic).
percentage of students at the school for whom this school was their guardians' first choice.

The SAP is a Plan to Eliminate Choice. This data shows that

The best schools are those that have the highest rate of return.
the schools with low-rate of return tend to be the lowest performing schools in the district,
In most cases, the majority of children attending low-performing schools did not get placed into their firstc-choice school.

I infer that children whose neighborhood school is low-performing and has a low-rate of return, very often do not want to attend their neighborhood school.

Once the Plan to Eliminate Choice is implemented, the percentage of children who attend low-performing schools, and for whom the school would have been their first choice (had they been allowed to choose) will decrease. This can be tested by recalculating the "First Choice" statistic for each of the past five years, but under the scenaria that children were assigned to their neighborhood school.

How do parents describe the contrast between north-end and south-end schools?

10/14/09 9:20 AM adhoc said... [http://saveseattleschools.blogspot.com/2009/10/candidate-forum-round-up.html]

Robert it sounds like you live in the North end where most schools are high performing, full of motivated students, and have a very high level of parent involvement. They are full of primarily middle class and upper middle class families put tremendous value on their children's education. Many north end schools have Spectrum, and those that don't will now offer ALO's, making already great schools, even greater. They have strong PTA's and fundraise piles of money to support enrichment, field trips, camping, chess club, and on and on and on.

But have you visited schools outside of the North end? As a parent who lived in the Central area before moving to the north end, I can tell you the disparity in the schools is day and night, or at least it was when my child entered K.

Go check out Aki Kurose, and Cleveland, and some of the other schools where their FRL populations are over 75%, parent involvement is almost nill, fundraising is non existent, many kids are grateful for a school breakfast and lunch, are unmotivated, drop out, fight, join gangs. An ALO, a few honors classes, the SE initiative.....not enough. Not even close to enough to make these schools anything near what north end schools are.

So, yes, I agree, the district is making some moves to equalize and standardize schools (like making every school offer an ALO), but is that really all it takes? Is that enough? If not, then parents who don't have access to great schools will keep on sending their kids to private schools in droves.

By Tracy Record, reporting for West Seattle Blog on Steve Sundquist's community meeting Nov 7 2009:

"Several in the room Saturday afternoon wanted to discuss the concern reported here Friday night - the observation that the newest revision to the West Seattle attendance-areas map seems to draw a sharp line largely following West Seattle’s north-south economic divide, with the feeder-school list for Denny International Middle School and Chief Sealth High School dominated by those with more students from lower-income families, while the feeder-school list for Madison Middle School and West Seattle High School is dominated by those with more students from higher-income families."

http://westseattleblog.com/blog/?p=22224

comment: ...“Swapping” Gatewood [Elem] for WS Elementary on the maps would also considerably change the demographs for Denny/Sealth [middle school/high school] (i.e. less diversity- Sealth loves to say they are 25% each) and bring substantially less district and state funding to Denny/Sealth because of the drastic lowering of F&RL funding that Gatewood would bring (Gatewood with the new elementary boundaries will have only 20% F&RL, whereas WS Elementary will have almost 80%).

My proposal is that West Seattle Elementary, which has historically been a cross-cluster school, that the line dip down at West Seattle Elementary for it to go north, and for Gatewood to go to Denny. … With the current map, Madison winds up being a very white school. I think both (Madison and Denny) would benefit from the diversity of that line switch.”

That suggestion sparked murmurs of support around the room.

A similar point was made by High Point resident Kathleen Voss, who said, “You can’t draw a blind eye to the socioeconomic realities of this map. … If you (have to move another school into the northern section), why wasn’t it West Seattle Elementary?” She talked about that school’s predominance of students from lower-income families, and asked, “what I don’t see in the plan is, what’s the plan to balance the inequity? It’s great that schools are going to teach the same thing, but schools are (filling out) their needs with PTSA funds.”

Sundquist took sharp issue with that, calling the money raised by PTSAs and other such efforts “a tiny tiny sliver of the funding” schools get, while suggesting that perhaps conversations between north and south end PTAs/PTSAs, and involvement with “organizations like the Alliance for Education,” might “realign those monies.”

...As for the rationale behind the proposed line between the Madison/WSHS area and the Denny/Sealth area, Sundquist said a more even north/south geographic split wasn’t feasible, because northern West Seattle has fewer children than southern West Seattle. ... He acknowledged the boundary appears to create economic segregation, ...[but that] ethnic diversity would not change significantly, according to the district’s latest breakdowns (by the way, the book of data that he referred to, dated this past Wednesday, IS available online - for those at the meeting who wondered - it’s available as a three-part “data book” from links on this page).

Susan McLain. “… I would urge you strongly to consider not basing the (West Seattle) boundary line on elementary attendance areas." ..
Sundquist countered that he’s heard other concerns about “income segregation” and has brought it up with the district’s top leaders, regarding the issue of creating “a school that can deliver a high (level) educational program in a high poverty area … they say … it can be done. … We understand that as school leaders we don’t have a lot of legislative tools to deal with the fact that the income is unequally distributed.”

McLain countered, “There IS a legislative tool to deal with ‘redlining’ - one of those tools is to draw the line right, and not in such a way that exacerbates that.” She suggested community support could be mustered in an attempt to support Sundquist if he chose, as she put it, “to make the stand that I think you know you need to make.”

From Blog post at http://saveseattleschools.blogspot.com/2009/11/meeting-on-boundaries-at-roosevelt.html

"There is worry about the high (proportional to the other NE elementaries) F/RL [Free and reduced price lunch-eligible students] number at the new Sand Point. As well the district is going to migrate the ELL [English language learners] program at Bryant over to Sand Point (over the next few years). What will be done to make this program attractive and successful to parents? Superintendent will appoint principals who will start the design teams which will include parents, blah, blah."

Local anti-reform blogs

2009-10-20T14:18:00.000-07:00

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Go to Opposition to reform of SPS [Index]

seattle_ed.blogspot.com This blog serves as a warehouse of links to on-line articles, reports, studies, and websites. The owners of this blog (Seattlites Dora Taylor and Sue Peters) have compiled many dozens of articles, and are adding new articles daily. The links are organized by topic.

The current topics, in order of presentation on the right bar of the seattle-ed blog, are the following:

Regarding Charter Schools and the Privitization of a Public Trust
Charter Schools and Public Funds
Arne Duncan [U.S. Secretary of Education; pro-charter & pro-reformist]
President Obama
The Race to the Top [Federal Dept. of Edu. pro-charter bribes to states that don't yet allow charters; funds to promote school district reform]
The Broad Foundation: "The Underground Department of Education"
About the Gates Foundation and Charter Schools
Mayoral Control of School Districts
Alternative Schools in Seattle
No Child Left Behind
Merit Pay and High Stakes Testing
Kipp Schools [KIPP is a network of charter schools]
Teachers' Unions (e.g., "This is What Happens When You Don't Have a Teachers' Union")
Maria Goodloe-Johnson (Seatte Public Schools Superintendent; documenting that she is reformist, and has very strong connections to the Broad Foundation)
Seattle School Board
School Closures
Food for thought [miscellany]
Ideas on Education
Recomended Sites on Education (locally and nationally)
Don Fisher: Union Buster, Egomaniac, Rube, In His Own Words

Opposition to Reform

2009-10-20T13:18:00.001-07:00

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Media attention

seattleweekly/2009-10-21/seattle-schools-closing-one-day-opening-another/

Opposition to reform in other larger urban districts

Organizing efforts in Seattle and how YOU can help

Opposition at State Level:

dan dempsey said...Perhaps something like the legal action by the ACLU in Florida would get the Board and the Superintendent to take results more seriously.From the ACLU Florida web site: Aho et al. vs. State of Florida et al. was filed in the Circuit Court of the Fifteenth Judicial Circuit in Palm Beach County Florida. Attorneys in the class action lawsuit include Hansen and Vanita Gupta of the ACLU Racial Justice Program, Lewis of the ACLU of Florida, Deborah N. Archer of the New York Law School Racial Justice Project and ACLU Cooperating attorney Ramona Hupp. A copy of the lawsuit is available online at: http://www.aclufl.org/GradComplaint.pdf. This comment appeared at this URL: http://saveseattleschools.blogspot.com/2009/11/audit-and-finance-committee-mtg-11509.html

Organizing Efforts in Seattle

2009-10-20T13:12:00.000-07:00

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Go to Opposition to Reform [Index]

Article: Local anti-reform blogs [Index, with description and links]

Coming soon: Articles on these topics:

Themes:

Organizing against Reform and Charter Schools
Organizing to Bring Authentic Education and Assessment to SPS
Organizing to Save Alternative Schools in SPS

Stakeholders:

Organizing Teachers
Organizing Parents & How You Can Help
Organizing Students & How You Can Help

Anti-Reform/Anti-Charter Organizing in Other Large Urban Districts.

2009-10-20T12:55:00.000-07:00

.

Go to Table of Contents Back to Opposition to Reform [Index]

Please help me find appropriate links!

This is a SHORT list of large urban school districts around the country that have undergone or are undergoing reform.

For each school district, I list websites of community groups that are trying organize opposition to the reform, and news articles that report on successful anti-reform efforts.

Baltimore

Chicago

Los Angeles

New York City

http://ednotesonline.blogspot.com/ Education Notes Online provides information on current issues and on organizing activities around fighting for public education in NYC and beyond. If you are a teacher, help promote Ed Notes to your colleagues. GET INVOLVED IN THE STRUGGLE!
http://www.substancenews.net/

Oakland, CA

Philadelphia

Pittsburgh

San Francisco, CA

San Diego

http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-teacher-eval18-2009oct18,0,4471467.story | "After nearly two years of grinding battles with the union and school board on this and other issues, Grier recently left for Houston, where the district uses value-added results as a basis for teacher bonuses....The opposition in San Diego, Grier said mildly, was "more entrenched than I thought it would be." [Seattle

Consequences of School Reform in Other Districts

2009-10-20T12:51:00.000-07:00

New York City

http://www.substancenews.net/articles.php?page=942§ion=Article: Title: Charter school in New York kicks public schools kids out of their school library... Educators Need to Know More about Libraries: The Case of JHS 126 | Stephen Krashen - October 18, 2009
http://ednotesonline.blogspot.com/2009/10/wonderful-renovation-and-heartbreaking.html [Sunday, October 18, 2009 New Video: The Renovation and Heartbreaking Dismantling of the John Ericsson Middle School 126 Library to make way for a Charter School Teacher Lounge.

Reform of Seattle Public Schools

2009-10-19T11:49:00.001-07:00

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Internal Links:

Where will unchecked reform of SPS lead to?

List of local organizations that promote reform in SPS

SAP: plan-to-elimate-choice Created 10-24-09 | Why? Is it good or bad? Is it racist?

Curriculum Alignment in SPS Created 10-24-09 | Why? Is it good or bad?

Wake up, Seattle. Our district is being reformed. Do you want this? | Created 10-15-09

The Sun is Going Down on Board Policy C54 and Alternative Schools | Created October 15, 2009 "...There are VERY FEW reasons to be encouraged that Alternative Schools will continue to flourish. There are MANY reasons, however, to be discouraged about the future of non-charter Alternative schools within SPS...What can a parent of an Alternative School student do?...

School Reform

2009-10-19T11:16:00.001-07:00

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Articles: School Reform Lexicon | The two sides of School Reform (School Reform defined) | Industrialized Education | NCLB Interventions: District Induced Instability; see also Importance of Stability | What has School Reform accomplished in other large urban districts? [coming soon]

Studies, essays, and op-eds by reform thinker Lisa Snell

Who is Lisa Snell? | Created Oct. 18, 2009
Defining the Education Market: Reconsidering Charter Schools by Lisa Snell 07-01-05
Link: Reason Foundation Website
| Bio and Catalogue of writings by Lisa Snell

Progressive Education

2009-10-19T10:55:00.000-07:00

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Progressive Education: What is it?

Pointers to informative web-articles, book titles, etc.
Created October 18, 2009

Progressive public schools in Seattle

Brief descriptions and links
Created October 18, 2009

See also Topic="Board Policy C54 and Alternative schools in Seattle"

Back to Table of Contents

2009-10-19T10:48:00.001-07:00

Upcoming Events [Index]. Next event: Wednesday Nov. 18

Newest Articles

Favorite Local Links

Article: Introduction [2 articles: October 17; October 19, 2009]

Topic: The Pillars of Strong Schools and Strong Districts [Index to articles]

Topic: Progressive Education [Index to articles]

Topic: School Reform [Index to articles]

Topic: Charter schools [Index to articles]

Topic: Reform of Seattle Public Schools [Index to articles]

Topic: Opposition to Reform in Seattle and elsewhere [Index to sub-topics and articles]

Topic: Reform Efforts at the State and Federal Level [Index]

Topic: Teachers, their unions, and the "Human Capital" agenda of the School Reform movemement [Index to blog essays and articles; coming soon]

Uncategorized essays [Index to essays]

SPS Community blog - Comments on announcement of Scott Oki event Nov 10 2009 . Read the comments to see why people compare Alternative schools and charter schools, and find Alternative schools to be preferable.

Introduction

2009-10-19T10:45:00.001-07:00

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This page contains two entries (posted in reverse-date order):

October 17 2009: Original introduction to blog: When and why I started researching reform of SPS; brief summary of my concerns about reform.
October 20 2009: The two main purposes of my blog: 1) Educate the community; 2) Organize the community.

October 20, 2009====================================

I have two main purposes for this blog.

First Purpose: Educate the Primary Stakeholders

The Primary stakeholders of Seattle Public Schools are the Students, the Teachers, and the Parents. These stakeholders want great public schools provide a intellectually challenging and engaging curriculum, a small achievement gap, and that have low drop-out rates and a respected certificate of graduation.
The Secondary stakeholders of Seattle Public Schools are comprised of the resident community of Seattle. These stakeholders understand that great pulic schools mean a safer, more democratic, wealthier city that is a sought-after place to live.
The Tertiary Stakeholders of Seattle Public Schools are the public and private organizations that will employ the graduates of our schools.

Very few of the primary stakeholders of SPS understand that the District is being "reformed" in a regressive sense.

The first purpose of this blog, then, is to let stakeholders know that this is happening, what reform means, and what the effects of reform will be for our children, teachers, and city.

I presume that most of the well-informed stakeholders

will not want reform and, instead,
do want strong and well-credentialed teachers, and
do want the best schools for all students that public school district can offer.

Second Purpose: Organize the Community

The second purpose of my blog is to help organize the primary stakeholders and pro-authentic eduction tertiary stakeholders

to expell the Broad-sponsored Superintedent and all of her men (the Broad Residents), to prevent the School Board from bringing in another reformist as a replacement, to help identify and recruit a strong progressive Superintendent candidate;
to save the progessive non-charter schools within Seattle Public Schools (the Alternative schools), which clearly are not favored by the Broad-sponsored Superintendent; and
to work to oppose reform advocacy and charter schools (Washington has not yet legalized charter schools) at the state and federal level,

October 17, 2009====================================

At the time that I started this blog, few people in Seattle were aware that the public school district had been enrolled some years ago by the School Board in the School Reform Movement. The term "school reform", when it is used, nearly always refers to a teaching/learning format of a regressive, back-to-basics, traditionalist type coupled with

public-private partnerships;
increased state- and federal-spending within reformed school districts;
core curriculum and curriculum alignment;
high-stakes standardized testing;
data-driven decision making;
performance management systems;
instructional leadership;
performance incentives and bonuses;

Seattlites, do these terms sound familiar?

Within this blog, wherever I use the term "reform" without an adjective, I am referring to reform of the regressive type.

I agree with reformists that K-12 education could and should be much improved, especially for low-income and minority children, but I disagree with reformists as to the best means for achieving this goal.

The research I have seen so far shows that reformist approaches are NOT best practice in K-12 public education, and, where they have been implemented, have mostly failed to produce good outcomes for the children that are most in need of the best that public schools can offer: Minority children from disadvantaged backgrounds.

It so happens that within Seattle Public Schools our non-alternative schools tend to adhere to the back-to-basics, teach-to-the-test, "school reform" paradigm, whereas our Alternative schools take a more progressive approach to education. In a progressive school, teachers do little teaching-to-the-test, and, instead, provide children with an engaging and intellectually-challenging curriculum.

Despite little exposure to teaching-to-the test, Alternative school students tend to do quite well on the very measure that is most treasured by the reformist--the high stakes standardized exam. This is true even for Alternative schools that serve student bodies with a relatively high proportion of minority and disadvantaged students. Here are two examples:

Nova Alternative High School is a testing ground for a progressive curriculum developed by author and thinker Riane Eisler of the Center for Partnership Studies. This is a popular school serving a racially and economically diverse student population. It is considered one of the best high schools in the city.
Thornon Creek K-5 Alternative school curriculum centers around a theme-based model called Expeditionary Learning/Outward Bound. This school won the prestigous Imag'nation Grant from the Lincoln Center of New York City in spring of 2009. Thornton Creek is the first school outside of New York City to receive this award. The percentage of students at Thornton Creek passing the WASL exams is on par with peer traditional schools in the northeast region of Seattle.

Because they provide a standout counter-example to the supposed need for the reform prescription for improving public school education, it is no wonder to me that under Superintendent Dr. Maria-Goodloe Johnson, herself a sponsoree of a powerful pro-reform organization (i.e, the Broad Foundation), there is little support from Seattle Public School executives and Directors for these successful Alternative schools to continue to flourish.

In upcoming blog entries, I will

summarize and refer the reader to research showing what is and is not best practices in K-12 public education, with emphasis on what is best-practice in schools that educate economically-disadvantaged and minority children.
explain how to identify regressive reform agents, advocates, and organizations.
interpret recent and proposed changes at the local (district executive, School Board), state, and federal levels.

Back to Table of Contents

Progressive public schools in Seattle

2009-10-18T19:23:00.000-07:00

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(Blog note: Check back later for brief descriptions and links)

Nova High School
Middle College High Schools
Inter-agency schools (re-entry programs)

AS#1 K-8
Orca K-8

Pathfinder K-8
Salmon Bay K-8

Thornton Creek K-5

School Reform Lexicon

2009-10-18T19:13:00.000-07:00

Back to School Reform [parent index] | Table of Contents

Synonyms for and terms indicative of "School Reform"

Closing the Achievement Gap (i.e., white-black and white-hispanic difference in mean scores on high-stakes tests)
Traditional education
Back-to-Basics
Basic education
Corporatist School Reform
Industrialized education
Charter schools... [Index]
Miltary charter schools
Militaristic or highly regimented charter schools
Top-Down administration
Centralization and elimination of Site-Based Management
Renaissance
Community engagement
Public-private partnerships
Weak school boards
Mayoral appointment of School Board Directors
No Child Left Behind (NCLB) - Federal legislation

Terms Pertaining to No Child Left Behind (NCLB)

Closing the Achievement Gap
Accountability (internal article)
Annual Yearly Progress (AYP)
Highly Qualified teachers (HQT)
Supplemental Educational Services (SES)

Reformist Terms Pertaining to Monitoring and Assessment

High Stakes Tests (internal article)
Teacher Quality Assessment
Instructional Leadership
The Learning Walk
Benchmark tests

Terms Pertaining to Use of Assessment Results

Data-driven decision making (DDDM)
Performance Management System
Failed schoools
Student promotion decisions
Teacher promotion/dismissal/incentives/bonuses; Merit Pay
District interventions: School closure, reconstitution, "Turn-around," interim principals,
Reconstitution of failed schools as charter schools

Reformist Terms Pertaining to Pedagogical Approach

Teaching-to-the-test
Narrowly-focused instruction
Direct instruction and Scripted lessons
Drill-and-skill
Industrialized education

Reformist Terms Pertaining to Curriculum

Core curriculum
Curriculum alignment
Uniform national standards
Unpaid internships in high school
on-line learning
small rewards and punishments

Terms that are identified with the Charter Schools:

Innovation
Competition
School Choice movement
Military
"Bubble kids"
Parent-student-school contracts
Milton Friedman and the Chicago School of Economics (U. Chicago)

Miscellaneous terms that signal a corporatist reform agenda:

The Broad Academy of Superintendents
Superintendent's Plan of Entry
Strategic Plan;
Outside Stakeholders

Major financial supporters of Corporate School Reform and Charter Schools

Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation
The Broad Foundation
The Stuart Foundation
The Walton Family Foundation

Progressive Education: What is it?

2009-10-18T18:49:00.000-07:00

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http://www.edutopia.org/

"Global Achievement Gap" by Tony Wagner. "A fantastic book" suggesting ways to help students become more creative and innovative thinkers

Teacher Quality Assessment: Open letter to Patrick D'Amelio, president of Alliance For Education.

2009-10-18T13:40:00.000-07:00

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Back to Teacher Quality Assessment Agenda in SPS [Topic index]

[Blog note: Alliance For Education.org (A4E, alliance4eduction.org) is a local foundation that is supporting efforts by the School Board and the Superintendent (and other external entities) to reform Seattle Public Schools. Recently, A4E hosted a presentation by the National Council on Teacher Quality (NCTQ), a reform advocacy nonprofit. This comment was submitted October 18, 2009 to alliance4education.blogspot.com, in response to the blog entry entitled: "Final Thought For Friday." http://alliance4ed.blogspot.com/2009/10/final-thought-on-friday.html?]

Joan NE said...

Mr. D'Amelia, please favor me with a reply to the questions and assertions contained herein

(not to mention the numerous thoughtful, relevant--and as yet unanswered--questions and assertions submitted to this blog site).

How is A4E assisting the District in moving toward a TQ assessment system, other than hosting the NCTQ workshop Oct 13, 2009?

Please rebutt the following assertions:

With respect to current efforts within SPS and its (business) Community Stakeholders ("partners" to "public-private partnerships") to design and to PREPARE to put in place a TQ Assessment System, two purposes are

1) to create data-based decision making infrastructure/exostructure [see note at end of comment for definition of term] that anticipates the District's overcoming teachers' union resistance to incentive, merit pay, and ending of seniority-based placement/promotion/retention/etc. policies;

2) to provide another entry point for private business to earn income by providing contract services to the District.

Let's suppose we could suspend, for a moment, the second purpose as a priority.

Now, let's put our creativity, insight, intelligence, and research skills into contemplating this question:

What are appropriate objectives for any TQA program?

Can we conceive of a sensible, cost-effective, meaningful, and respectful TQA system which serves well the intended objectives, and which is likely to be well-received by teachers, principals, Directors, and the public?

I suggest that the answer would not look like a Reformist-friendly solution--such as NCTQ (a Reformist advocacy group) might propose--, because Reformist solutions must satisfy additional objectives, the most obvious being these:

--Provide an opportunity for business income.

--Maximize the potential business income.

I look forward to and welcome a response to my question, and a rebuttal of my assertions.

Sincerely,

Joan Sias ("Joan NE")
Note: I use term "exostructure" to mean the outsourcing to private business entities functions that will be required to support data-driven TAPPPS (Teacher Assessment,Promotion, Pay, Placement System), including technology-based assessments, data archiving, data-analysis, and Instructional Leadership professional development (for training principals to coach and monitor teachers for fidelity to core-curriculum objects).

October 18, 2009 1:25 PM

Eavesdropping: Essays by reform thinker Lisa Snell, written FOR pro-reformers

2009-10-17T13:47:00.001-07:00

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In trying to understand the reform movement, I have found it helpful to make the following assumptions.

1. Reform advocates are very smart. When senior school officials and Directors make decisions that seem crazy, unproductive, counter-productive, self-inconsistent, or just plain stupid or incompetent, I always reject stupidity, incompetence, stubborn attachment to impractical idealogy, and sadism as plausible explanations.

2. Every decision and behavior of reform agents has, at its root, one of the following motivations or purposes:

direct or indirect business-income opportunity;
garnering public support for charter schools (charter schools being desirable, in part, because they are a more productive business income opportunity than is providing services to public schools and public school districts);
training our disadvantaged and non-college bound youth to be submissive, effective, and reliable workers;
winning tax-payer subsidy of private-school tuition
disrupting opposition to and winning increased public support for reform
re-segregation of schools

These are some of the reasons that reform agents give to the public, and which I do not believe:

cost savings necessitated by a budget crisis;
serving equity and predictability;
a genuine, altruistic, non-self-serving desire to Close the Achievement Gap;
to win Federal dollars (e.g., Race the the Top Funds)

Often, but not always, I am able to explain actions, decisions, and preferences of the Superintendent and the Directors of Seattle Public Schools as serving one of these purposes.

Sometimes I am stumped.

I have found articles by Lisa Snell very helpful for showing me the link between otherwise inexplicable behaviors of reform agents and the purposes I list above. In particular, her articles have helped me to understand how recent developments in Seattle Public Schools conform to and support reformist priorities.

Since 1994, Lisa Snell has been the director of education and child welfare at Reason Foundation, "a nonprofit think tank advancing free minds and free markets." Her biographical sketch appears at this URL: http://reason.org/experts/show/lisa-snell.

Lisa has written many essays on the topic of school reform. From reading her essays, it is clear that she is writing for a pro-reform audience. Go to http://reason.org/experts/show/lisa-snell and click on any one of the three tabs at the end of the biographical sketch ("Studies | Blog | Op-eds") to find a complete listing of her essays. Her op-eds date back to 1999. Over the decade spanned by her essays, one can see how the thinking, priorities, and strategies of the reform movement have evolved.

This is the first Lisa Snell essay that I read: Defining the Education Market - Reconsidering Charter Schools; July 1, 2005; http://reason.org/news/show/defining-the-education-market.

This one essay makes it abundantly clear that for people such as Lisa and her intended audience, the foundational motivation for school reform (of the regressive type) is private business access to public-school-directed taxpayer dollars--in short, MONEY.

Questions for and requests to whileseattlesleeps blog readers:

In your opinion, is my list of purposes (above) incomplete and/or off-mark? If so, please provide a specific non-comforming example of an action of decision by a reformist Superintendent or reformist Board of Directors.
Do you disagree that reasons of cost-saving, equity, predictability, etc., are not the genuine motivations for the unpopular actions and decisions of Seattle Superintendent Maria-Goodloe Johnson?
Tell me if you agree (or disagree) with my assessment of this essay by Lisa Snell.
Report back to me and the readers of this blog any insights you are able to glean from her articles.

I am particularly interested in comments and responses that pertain to Seattle Public Schools: where it is, where it has been, and, most importantly, where it is likely headed, which is to say, what quality of education will be provided by Seattle Public Schools in the future if we stay on the reform path.

Good News or Bad News? State Board of Education Strongly Supports Pro-business Education Reform

2009-10-16T13:03:00.000-07:00

These articles copied from the State Board of Education website show that the pro-business reformists have made great progress on their strategy of influencing policy at the state and federal level, in order to force changes at the district level across the state. It is much less costly to influence a single Board of Education (state level) and a single voting body (the State Legislature) than it is to try to influence every large district-level Board of Directors, and every community electorate (the voting public).

This is good news if you believe regressive reform is good for our children.

This is bad news if you do not believe that regressive reform is good for our children.

Oct 14 2009:SBE (State Board of educ) press release, copied from SBE website [http://www.sbe.wa.gov/pressroomarticles.htm] on Oct 16, 2009:

"Recently, a new education reform committee [proabably a reference to " new Quality Education Council [which] has been charged with creating a plan to phase in many education reforms, including "Core-24," and with finding the money to pay for them"] held its first meeting in hopes of one day meeting the state's constitutional requirement of providing basic education to all students in Washington.Whether this state has met that requirement has been hotly debated and is now the focus of two separate lawsuits to determine if basic education is indeed being fully funded." [Are they reformists that have brought these lawsuits? Knowledge and logic leads me to predict that this is true. Here is my reasoning: Reformist bottom line is to extract as much business income (and profit) from taxpayer dollars. Education-business can extract more business income from taxpayer dollars if 1) the reform agenda for accountability/standardized teaching and testing/charters/etc. is fully implemented, and 2) if OSPI and the School Districts have more money. This is a testable predication.]

The Seattle Times article By Donna Gordon Blankinship, Associated Press Writer September 17, 2009, "; copied from http://www.sbe.wa.gov/pressroomarticles.htm on Oct 16 2009

School officials in La Center, Wash., aren't waiting for the state of Washington to finish reforming high school graduation requirements. The small Southwest Washington school district has decided to adopt a version of a 24-credit high school graduation requirement while implementation of State Board of Education's "Core-24" plan is still being discussed by that panel and the state Legislature. Board member Eric Liu said at the board's meeting Thursday that La Center is not alone in its desire to "get ahead of the curve" on education reform. He said school officials around the state are watching the process and figuring out how to adopt the changes that seem inevitable....state Higher Education Coordinating Board says [Core-24 requirements] are needed to get into a four-year university in Washington state...Mary Jean Ryan, chairwoman of the State Board of Education, said she would like to help other districts find the money and the will to move toward the new graduation requirements. She suggested some districts may be able to get a federal grant for innovation to pay for early implementation. Bellingham [did you realize your school district is being reformed to create market opportunity for private business?] is another district working toward early adoption of the new standards... Ryan said she was delighted the project the state board has worked so hard on has such an articulate champion in Mansell [Dr. Mark Mansell, Superintendent, La Center School District ]. Core-24 was adopted by the Legislature earlier this year as part of its education reform bill . The state's new Quality Education Council has been charged with creating a plan to phase in many education reforms, including "Core-24," and with finding the money to pay for them....[TRACKING: vocational, technical, and college-prop] [Under the La Center high school reform plan,] students are given the choice of three different paths to follow in high school: one would prepare them for technical college or on-the-job training, the second would get them ready for college, and the third would prepare them for a more competitive four-year university and graduate school. Mansell [Dr. Mark Mansell, Superintendent, La Center School District ] described the 24 credits as a means to the end [But are you sure, Director, that Core-24 is the RIGHT means and the RIGHT end?]. The real goal of the new diploma is to help kids think about what they want to do with their life and then get the education they need to make their dream happen. Among the other topics on the [SBE] agenda at the State Board of Education meeting that continues Friday were federal government school reform initiatives, online learning and the state's new assessment system.

Wake up, Seattle: Our district is being reformed. Do you want this?

2009-10-15T12:29:00.000-07:00

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Did you know that Seattle Public School system is being "reformed?"

Do you know what "school reform" means?

Until less than one month ago (mid-September 2009) my answer to both questions would have been "No." Motivated by concern that the SPS Superintendent, her staff, and the School Board is no longer supportive of Alternative schools within SPS, I began to do research that would enable me to better communicate to parents at my child's Alternative school the importance of our conveying to the Board our concerns about the future of our beloved school and of SPS Alternative schools in general.

Less than a month after starting this project, I can now answer "Yes" to both questions. I now understand that SPS is being "reformed," and that Alternative Schools as we know them (and as defined by Board Policy C54), are antithetical to the reform philosophy.

And I also know that I dislike nearly every pillar of "school reform", and what the future of Seattle Public Schools is likely to be if the School Board insists on keeping the District on this path.

I foresee that Alternative schools will be phased out within several years.
I foresee purposeful dumbing-down of the SPS curriculum, purportedly serving the goal of "closing the achievement gap."
I foresee that the public school system will not adequately serve the educational needs of my children, who still have nearly about a decade each before they will graduate high school, are highly-motivated, high-achieving, and come from an advantaged background.
I foresee de facto resegregation: Disadvantaged children being further disadvantaged by being concentrated into low-performing neighborhood schools with intellectually unsatisfying, non-engaging "drill-and-kill", "teach-to-the-test" narrowly-focused and aligned core-curriculum, large class sizes, lengthened school days, and increased number of school days per year.
I foresee de facto resegregation: Economically-advantaged children being concentrated into predominately caucasian, high-performing, neighborhood schools with intellectually unsatisfying, "drill-and-kill", "teach-to-the-test" narrowly-focused aligned core curriculum.
I foresee drastic and harmful "district interventions" in "failed" schools, all of which are located without exception in low-income neighborhoods and serving predominately low-income/minority students.
I foresee low- and middle-class parents whose children attend low-achieving schools calling for charter schools.
I foresee parents of all economic classes whose children are high-achieving calling for charter schools.
I foresee charter schools, some of which will be highly punitive and regimented (i.e., those serving disadvantaged students), some of which will be outstanding schools with intellectually-challenging and engaging curriculum (such as my child's Alternative school already offers) and serving students that are predominately white and middle- or upper-class
I foresee a negative feedback of charter schools on the quality of Seattle Public Schools.
I foresee corruption, arising from the striking conflicts of interest inherent in the reform model of public school education.

I am very interested in reform that would lead to closure of the racial gaps on authentic measures of achievement. These include, for example, decreased drop out rates, increased college admission rates, and increased attainment of baccaluareate and advanced degrees. I am convinced that school reform as SPS is now undergoing will not produce authentic success in closing the achievement gap.

In my research, I have noticed that

it is VERY EASY to find evidence that shows that school reform (sometimes referred to as corporatist, traditional, regressive, back-to-basics, or standards-based) has failed to fulfill its low-bar goal;
it is RARE to find evidence that shows that school reform has succeeded to meet its own low-bar goal, much less authentic high-bar goals. Such evidence that does exist is usually limited to individual charter schools, and is rarely peer-reviewed.

In future entries on this blog, I hope to

explain why our Superintendent Maria Goodloe-Johnson was reported as saying, "What you need to know about me is that I don't lose sleep." http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/opinion/2009292186_opina03lynne.html
provide a definition of "school reform;"
explain why the School Board has not wanted the public to know that they put our school district on this path;
answer the question of what is research-based best practice in public education for closing authentic measures of the achievement gap, and for providing quality education for ALL students being served by Seattle Public Schools;
provide a concise history of regressive reform in Seattle;
make predictions as to the probable future of SPS, based on patterns in other reformed and reforming school districts across the nation;
identify who are the stakeholders that are financing and pressing for reform of SPS, their hidden motives and agenda, and their conflicts of interest;
outline the progress of the well-financed school reform movement to take control of the many large urban school districts across the nation, and to bring charters to the ten hold-out states;
show that the goal of providing a quality, authentic education for ALL students in SPS is much more difficult to achieve if charter schools are added to the mix.

My hope is that this blog--and other blogs and websites that I will point readers to--will help Seattle to

wake up from its slumber;
come to understand what school reform means for our children;
instigate a call for an informed public debate as to whether regresssive reform should continue;
inform the public and the School Board as to what kind of reform is most likely to lead to wholesome, humanistic, and authentic fulfilment of the Seattle Public School District's goal of "Excellence for All."

Joan Sias

The Sun is Going Down on Board Policy C54 and Alternative Schools

2009-10-14T23:45:00.000-07:00

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Are Alternative schools in danger?

Background.

Board Policy C54.00 defines "Alternative", and gives Alternative schools curricular autonomy. If C54 is rescinded or adversely revised, then option schools formerly known as Alternative, will be, in principle, academically and philosophically indistinguishable from traditional schools. I suggest you read the page 1 of the policy before you continue reading this blog: (http://www.seattleschools.org/area/policies/c/C54.00.pdf). Notice especially that by definition, Alternative schools possess curricular autonomy, which is to say, they do not have to "earn" their autonomy. This is important to understand when contemplating the denial of the Thornton Creek school application for a math curriculum waiver.

Note: There are a number of assertions here which beg for supporting evidence or logic. I intend to address this in future blog entries.

There are VERY FEW reasons to be encouraged that Alternative Schools will continue to flourish. There are MANY reasons, however, to be discouraged about the future of non-charter Alternative schools within SPS. Here are some of them:

Though few parents realize this, SPS is undergoing "reform" of a specific type. The reform is top-down, traditionalist, regressive, and corporatist, and does NOT easily accomodate the philosophy, curriculum, and pedagogy that makes Thornton Creek Elementary school a sought after school by "those in the know."

As of last check, (October 17 2009), All K-8's are now listed as non-alternative on the SPS schools page-- including Summit, AS1, Pathfinder, Orca. The only elementary school still listed as alternative is Thornton Creek. http://www.seattleschools.org/area/m_schools/index.dxml

The District no longer uses the term "Alternative." Schools formerly known as "Alternative" are now designated as "option" schools. The term "option" as it is being used by the School District has no relationship to the concept of "Alternative" as defined by Board Policy C54.

The District has signaled an end to Thorton Creek Elementary School's independence by denying our request to use math materials in lieu of the District-mandated Everyday Math curriculum.
The Board has shown no interest so far in directing the Superintendent to honor policy C54, even though Board Policy B60 calls for the Superintendent to uphold Board policy.
Board President Michael DeBell believes that the Board has "few tools" to enforce Board Policy, says the Board is having the entire Policy manual rewritten, and is a strong supporter of regressive reform (as already indicated, Alternative schools, as defined by C54, are incompatible with and antithetical to reform priorities for non-charter public schools.). Director DeBell also says that the number of option schools will likely "diminish over time." Reference: http://www.michaeldebell.org/.
The District has eliminated the term alternative. Their use of the term "option" is consistent with the very limited definition that Tracey Libros gave at a recent public meeting: the term “option school” refers to "any school without an attendance area, without regard for philosophy or pedagogy." (Tracy Libros, 10/7/09; verbal communication at a public meeting, as quoted by Melissa Westbrook on saveourschools.blogspot.com.)
Given this definition of "option schools," the schools formerly know as Alternative are, in principal, NOT differentiable from traditional schools only, except in a trivial and limited sense.
With Board support, the Superintendent closed one alternative program this year (Summit), with each justification given being either false or weak.
They have put AS#1 on notice that the school will close if enrollment does not increase sufficiently. We have heard reports that the Enrollment office has been telling parents who enquire about space availability at AS#1 that the school is filled.
All Board members seem to be supporters of regressive reform of SPS, with the Director being highly supportive (see http://www.michaeldebell.org/). (The President of the Board is, along with the Superintendent, a member of the Board of Directors of the Alliance For Education; this is an organization that is dedicated to helping the reform of SPS, in part by making what it calls "investments" in SPS.
The School Board: Director (and President) DeBell, on his blog, says option schools will not disappear but may diminish over time. This statement has us very worried. Will alternative schools be "disappeared" as the number of option schools diminish over time?

What can the a parent of an Alternative School student do?

Continue to refer to Alternative schools as "Alternative."
Ask that alternative schools be listed twice on the District web site's list of schools - once under the grade-levels categories, and again under alternatives.
Remind the Directors that Board Policy B60.0 implies that the superintendent is expected to uphold Board Policy. Reference: http://www.seattleschools.org/area/policies/b/B60.00.pdf.
Ask the Directors to write a memo to the Superintendent, reminding her which schools have autonomy under C54, and reminder her to uphold C54.
Tell directors that it is rumored that the Board is planning to rescind C54, and that you oppose any modification to the policy without buy-in from designated representatives of the stakeholder communities.
Tell the directors that the term "option" as used by the District conveys no meaning other than "lack of attendance area and no direct assignment." Therefore it is an affront to the Alternative School community that the District refuses to call them by that name.
Tell the directors you want schools that are alternative in the sense defined by C54 to be referred to as either "C54 option schools" or "alternative" by the Superintendent and her staff.
Complain to the directors that the Superintended is violating C54 by not allowing alternative schools to choose their own curriculum, and by imposing District-preferred standardized assessments on the schools.
Ask the directors to instruct the Superintendent that she must not interfere with alternative schools' right to exercise the autonomy accorded them by C54,
Remind the directors that the Board has not given the Superintendent unlimited power to obstruct alternative schools from exercising their right to autonomy.
Express the opinion that the Superintendent's limitation on Alternative School autonomy should not be tolerated, unless she can demonstrate that intervention is necessary, and that the proposed intervention is best-practice in education.
Remind the directors that Board policy B60.0 calls for the Superintendent to fulfill Board Policy.
Remind the Board how well you Alternative school's students do on the state standardized exam. The "data" proves that the school are an asset.
Remind the Board that the mission of the district is to serve all of the students, not just those who are compatible with traditional schools. There are students in the school district who would not succeed at a traditional school, but who are succeeding at their alternative school.

http://www.seattleschools.org/area/newassign/faq_schools.html#opt

     "What is an option school? Options schools provide a variety of
     programmatic opportunities for families lookgin for choices in
     addition to their attendance area."

saveourschools.blogspot.com "Notes on Oct 7 Board meeting" article drew many comments. Here are representative comments (quotes and paraphrases) :

"The District needs to clarify what an International School is and provide resources and equity."
Language immersion and Montessori should be treated as option school, but they are not. Does the District have a defensible rationale for this policy?
"Maybe [ the Montessori programs were not made option schools]because there is not enough "programmatic opportunities" in the one Montessori program. ...If it isn't a special pedagogy, what is?"
"...first South Shore was alternative, then regular and now we're back to Option. South Shore WAS created to serve the neighborhood. It has something of an alternative feel (see their website) but frankly, I would call it alternative light. ..."
"...from what I understand, Southshore families do not consider the school to be 'alternative' and did not want it to become an option school."