Audio tapes show former Atlanta Public Schools superintendent bullying state official...

Audio tapes show former superintendent bullying state official...

Just a brief update to let you know that "yes" I am still infatuated with the Atlanta Public Schools cheating scandal and will probably have some very interesting news for you by the end of the semester.

Back to the Question: Is a FEDERAL Department of Education Necessary—notes from academia

From Friedman's assessment (mostly rejected)

Milton Friedman writes of the appropriate federal role in public education in an economics-based article from 1955.[1]  His analysis begins with pointing out the huge role government has assumed in financing and administering education for a nation that believes in individual freedoms, family, and free enterprise.  He gives three plausible ways to justify such heavy government involvement:  creating competition where there would otherwise be a natural monopoly, “neighborhood effects” (or what I am conceptualizing as negative externalities) of which there is no coercive compensation mechanism and a strong form of paternalism over children and the vulnerable.  The article then goes on to differentiate between common education and vocational education.

Snippet from my Personal Statement for law school, (four years ago)

It is quite risky to post what you believe, but at the risk of being vulnerable, here goes.  It's almost 2012 and I have always looked back to what I've done and who I've been to fine tune my future.  Thought I'd share my thoughts from four years ago.

If I fail them, then I fail at life.

My work had become just that serious. I opened my classroom door to the faces of five seven-year-olds waiting for their first glimpse of “teacher,” post-Winter Break. They scrambled in, hung their backpacks on their hooks, got out their materials for the day, and took their seats. Learning to execute just those things had taken us until the end of September to perfect. Amazingly, after a one-month vacation, my students remembered our morning routine and did it flawlessly. Even as the rest staggered in, not a single child went looking for a pencil, forgot his or her holiday “get-smart” homework packet, or asked me to read the directions for the beginning activity. The room was silent. And as they diligently wrote in their journals, I monitored them, doing my best to choke back the tears.

The pride I felt in that moment fueled my commitment to teach for the next eighteen months. My December holiday had been spent analyzing reading unit assessments, math performance projects, and writing samples. The results showed phenomenal growth. My class of predominantly African-American and Latino children had improved an entire grade level in literacy in only five month’s time. These students had transformed into a new group of children now infused with perhaps the greatest source of renewable energy any child has available to him: the motivation to succeed. That January, I knew I had to do everything I could to prepare them for our first high-stakes standardized test in April.

Those first moments still resonate deeply with me. Each day, my students “got smarter” because I taught through their deficiencies and beyond my own self-expectations. We strengthened one another: they worked hard to learn because I worked hard to teach. I saw myself in their little minority faces and knew they needed to see an African-American woman working just as hard for each of them.  By the end of my two years, my two separate classes outperformed projections for their underprivileged socio-economic backgrounds.

How Do We Do More for Juveniles Who Get Less of Both Prevention and Rehabilitation Services?

from my Art of Social Change course facilitated by Betsy Bartholett and Jessica Budniz

       

     During Week 10, Bryan Stevenson, Naoka Carey, and Josh Dohan cautioned of how the criminal justice system had retreated back to treating juveniles as adults though the juvenile justice movement sought an independent system that acknowledges the real differences between child and adult psychological development.  Last session during Week 11, Tim Decker and Edward Dolan added to the weekly discourse of how many children in the United States begin life and enter adulthood with fewer opportunities to be productive, healthy people.  Mr. Decker and Mr. Dolan took what we learned steps farther by explaining that the trade-offs between due process and rehabilitation for juveniles has resulted in children experiencing grotesquely punitive treatment in youth corrections institutions.

Politics as a Barrier to Fairness in Educational Outcomes for Our Children

The following is a response to a course presentation on the Achievement Gap.

Until Dai Ellis spoke up, it seemed that the students and speakers were going to continue to mosey around the big elephant in the room that is responsible for stifling the progress of closing racial achievement gaps for our nation’s most vulnerable children.  Professor Roland Fryer told a narrative of how he’d presented several decisionmakers with his “vaccine” of five “common sense” interventions and how each turned him down, even though they had been initially interested in his achievement gap research because it had potential benefits for their communities.  And Professor Tom Payzant followed Fryer’s presentation by adding that parents and community members ought to be engaged in the process of turning around the lowest performing schools in order for reform efforts to be authentic to the communities with the most to benefit or loose from the interventions.  The former Boston Public Schools Superintendent also cautioned reformers to think about creative ways to replicate charter management organizations without also replicating the bureaucratic ills begotten to many school systems.  But until Mr. Ellis, CEO of Excel Academy “no excuses” charter schools network, advanced his two talking points ((1) “ideology kills” and (2) scaling up charter success is possible), the class conversation seemed mainly about the problem of the achievement gap and proffered solutions coming from research and practice.  The conversation would have never moved to the real takeaway lesson for the evening:  individuals from various backgrounds can become change-agents for the education systems in their communities.  The counterintuitive politics of education reform has made it increasingly difficult to deliver solutions that make our student outcomes more fair.

In the child welfare space, none of us chose this.

None of us chose this for our lives.  As mothers, we don’t choose dysfunction over healthy family units and as children we don’t choose to be orphaned over being nurtured.  None of us look down the barrel and say “Sign me up for the hard life!”  But, it’s true—our choices have consequences and those kinetics run deep and long. When we take toxins into our pregnant bodies we seep destruction into our children.  When we run away from the institutions that simulate normalcy, we claim our autonomy and our vulnerability.  And when we open ourselves up to revolving door of caretakers, we become the bests and worse parts of humanity. What separates those that plead for adoption now and removal yesterday versus those that urge family preservation first and resources soon is not a game of who to blame. But rather, both recognize that none of us chose this for our lives, yet all of us must take care to fix it. Using the babies in the river parable, we are just torn as to whether to concentrate on scooping up the babies we see floating downstream or trekking upstream to search for the baby thrower.  As and much as I would like to strap on my backpack and charge after the evildoer throwing away lives, I cannot contemplate passing by the lives in front of our needing solutions now.

How Can Anyone SERIOUSLY talk of no federal Department of Education?

In a country with such porous state borders, diversity and interconnectedness, how can we seriously be talking about eliminating the federal Department of Education?

What is the comparability loophole?

ESEA Reauthorization is the coming attraction in Congress this fall.  If she were selling tickets, people would be lining up around the block just to see if she will make an appearance.  Some are betting that she will.  Most are skeptical -- at best -- if she will even be permitted to take the stage.  Back in 2007, when she was supposed to star in the blockbuster hit of "Changing No Child Left Behind," she was no where to be found.  Well, correction, she started to get off the ground, maybe even made it to the dressing room to get revised, but never fully showed herself as a finished product.  And now that she has this unrealiable track record, many in Congress (namely House Republicans) insist that they will put together their own show -- in smaller magnitude -- that will carry the same punch.

One of the many, many [read numerous] proposals on what should be included when (if) ESEA reauthorization happens this fall is to fix the "comparability loophole."  The comparability loophole describes the way federal money is delivered to schools serving large amounts (or percentages) of low-income families' children.  Boiled down, this means that in order to get federal funds, a school district must (among other fiscal requirements) spend as much of their own monies (state and local) on schools with high concentrations of low-income students as it does on schools within the same districts that have low concentrations of low-income students.  This is known as the "comparability" fiscal requirement.  It stems from the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA) Title I provision.  (ESEA is the base bill that has been reauthorized several times, most recently known as No Child Left Behind.)

More after the break...

Sign Me Up! (or) Say What?

Another Monday morning where the dirth of good, juicy education policy news is rather annoying.  Being is Washington it seems that the buzz definitely quiets when Congress is on recess.  Meanwhile, the education policy pundits, wonks, and peddlers are gnawing on speculation and media leftovers.  So, thought I'd humor you with my innermost thoughts when it comes to this stuff. 

When it comes to education policy headlines, I find that I am in one of these two camps. 

Either I am willing to immediately jump on board -- no elaboration needed, "sign me up," I'm down --

 or

I put the skids on by seeking much more confirmation -- run that by me again, "say what?"

What are your reactions?  I'm sure you are not nearly as binomial as I.



Image source pages for the cat and baby.

Philadelphia's Arlene Ackerman is Out. But Why?

Booting up my computer this morning, I again saw headlines of the Philadelphia education leader that is no more -- Arlene Ackerman.  Admittedly, I have not followed her administration, the policies, or the press.  I do know, however, that some organizations in the civil rights community welcomed her presences in Philadelphia and were optimistic of what she would do there.  So, I though to ask someone more familiar with Philadelphia about it.  Here's a few lines from my anonymous source:

"Over time, the theatrics surrounding her management style and personality became the story, not what she actually accomplished or attempted to for students.  Due to our schools governance structure, having allies and good relationships is very important.  She didn't seem to do too well with creating the right allies."

So it seems the press clippings jive with what Phillies felt on the ground.  But what about her education policies?  How were those received?

"My sense is that most folks wouldn't quabble with her actual agenda."

Hmm.  So are there any important take-a-ways as Ackerman leaves?

"Seems more like a case for 'if you want to be big city superintendent, you gotta be a politician too.'"

Lesson learned.  Resume the forward-charge.

Click here to read Words from Ackerman