Tag Archives: No Child Left Behind

Masters of Deception

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Actions speak louder than words.

May 2009 Governor Otter and Idaho State School Chief Tom Luna signed a memorandum of agreement with the National Governors Association (NGA) and the Council of Chief State School Officers (CCSSO) agreeing to the Common Core State Standards Initiative (CCSSI) in addition to defining the federal role in education for us.

But they said they did so “with the understanding that these standards are not mandatory.”

August 11, 2010 The Idaho State Board of Education approved Common Core with Mr. Luna in attendance.

Mr. Luna campaigned – not on Common Core and Students Come First laws – but on how good a job he had done and that Idaho was on the “right track.”

November elections Yes, Idaho is one of few states that elect the person to head education (because the politics are so great and politics drives school improvement so well?). Mr. Luna was re-elected.

December 15, 2010: Luna named president-elect of CCSSO with his term beginning in November 2011.

January 2011 – Idaho legislative session begins. Lawmakers and the public heard – for the first time – the introduction of what would come to be hated as the Luna Laws (Students Come First –ha). For our Idaho lawmakers, it began on January 12th with a presentation of The Pillars of Student-Centered Education.

Testimony proceeded with heated debate on both sides of the issues. The pillars – technology-replacing teachers through a one-on-one laptop program with online graduation credits required, pay-for-performance, and limiting collective bargaining.

Among a docket full of rules reviews and hearings on budget items plus the

As our attention was focused on the Luna Laws, the Common Core Standards agreement signed in 2009 was quietly pushed into law. And the Luna Laws held our attention.

As our attention was focused on the Luna Laws, the Common Core Standards agreement signed in 2009 was quietly pushed into law. And the Luna Laws held our attention. Image from Boise Weekly.

unfolding of the details of the Luna Laws, on January 19th mid-afternoon in front of ONLY the senate education committee, Mr. Luna answered questions asked previously of him on a variety of statistics including class size, teacher pay, funding for new assessments, internet conductivity issues in rural areas, laptop issues, outsourcing of IT services, and just a slew of concerns…yawn…. Then, after a short story about how Common Core began with “an impromptu discussion about common achievement standards among states,” Luna’s Chief of Staff, Luci Willits, introduced Rules Governing Thoroughness; Common Core Standards (Docket #08-0203-1003).

Ms. Willits is the same person who explained, “When the grant was put forth, the SDE [State Department of Education] went to the colleges to ensure that any student who passes these standards will be able to go to any college without the need of remedial training.” And she said, “These standards are just that—they are standards.” Hum?

Since when can people read a set of standards on math and language arts and say “passing” them (the tests I assume) will “ensure” student success without remediation? Given the information they had at the time. is that possible?

Anyway, very few but good questions followed this brief presentation to the Senate Education Committee prior to adjournment for the day. Without further discussion and no testimony from the public (who knew – those watching the session were caught up in the Luna Laws debate), on the afternoon of January 24th Senator Winder moved to approve Docket #08-0203-1003. The motion passed with unanimous consent.

Mar.-Apr., 2011: Governor Otter signs Students Come First Legislation (S. 1108, 1110  & 1184). Then, the fight in Idaho to remove those laws kept the public’s attention for two years.

I think this is a great example of Card Stacking that employs all the arts of deception by stacking the cards against the truth. It uses under-emphasis and over-emphasis to dodge issues and evade facts. It uses half-truths.

Cards Stacked ; Game Rigged

Cards Stacked ; Game Rigged

Truth about Common Core? It is built on a foundation of lies and deceit. And it isn’t just standards; it is a package of reforms of which we have only seen the surface. There is much more below the surface if you care to dig. It includes linking the pieces to the reauthorization of No Child Left Behind (CCSSO again!) and training of all our education “workers.”

I’d rather see us stop a moment.

Public education needs to first fix its foundation of trust and base real reform on proven and ethical principles.

STANDARDIZED & PRIVATIZED

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Are Americans sure they want a standardized and privatized system of “public” schools? Does the public understand what is happening?

Dismantling through standardization and privatization. That is what is being done using

Hard to See. That's why they call it Hidden Privatization.

Hard to See. That’s why they call it Hidden Privatization.

the crowbar of outcome-based “reforms.”

Long ago political leaders of both parties began allowing and fostering policies that the arrogant and greedy have used to their advantage and to our detriment. We are allowing a widely recognized destructive and over-reaching federal law —No Child Left Behind (NCLB)—to go unchecked and unchanged. (As of December 2015 the name was changed to the Every Student Succeeds Act – ESSA- but it is still an outcome-based (test-based) federal law.

NCLB celebrated its 12th birthday. It is officially six years overdue for revision—according to its own statute. Why? Is it because Congress can’t get it right, or, is the law doing exactly what it was meant to do?

What we know it did:
1.    Narrowed the curriculum,
2.    Produced cheating scandals,
3.    Gave use data without real results,
4.    Diminished local control and divided communities.

What we know it did NOT do:
1.    Increase accountability for results,
2.    Narrow the achievement gap.

It appears that NCLB also opened the policy door for full standardization and privatization with policies promoted as putting “students first” and the latest new tool for undermining the system — Common Core.

The Idaho task force recommendations* rely heavily on Common Core, the Luna Laws, and outcome-based theory (upon which NCLB was based). R&D – research and development (not Republicans and Democrats) – recommends differently.

*Note: Idaho has its Governor’s “Task Force for Improving Education” putting forth 20 recommendations that the public knows little of in the way of details – but the “preview” is well written. Poised to repeat the mistakes of the past!

*****Double Note for the Nation*****Beware the wolf in sheep’s clothing. Who controls “leadership” and school board “training”? It is in our soon to pass laws – better check yours.

This was originally written for and published in the Idaho Statesman January 30, 2014.

I’m sharing it here because I believe – we must share what we know to be the truth. Also consider, To Privatize or Not to Privatize

And for those brave enough to want to consider the global scale of this, check out Hidden Privatisation. Here’s a one page brief.

Thank you for caring….Now let’s stop this destruction!

2014 and The Governing of Reform

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After reading the Mike Petrilli blog about “universal proficiency by 2014,” it prompted recall of these words that are so central to our success:

“What is absolutely crucial in replication is that the assumptions, conceptions, values, and priorities undergirding what you seek to replicate are clear in your head and you take them seriously; you truly accept and believe them, they are non-negotiable starting points.”  Seymour B. Sarason

The following is an excerpt from The Crucial Voice of the People, Past and Present posted here in an attempt to clarify parts of Dr. Sarason’s statement.

CONCEPTIONS: THE GOVERNING OF REFORM
Like most words, the word “conceptions” has different meanings. When applied to the replication of effective practices in education, both a “formulation of ideas” and the “beginning of some process” (Webster’s, 1976) seem applicable.

The governing of education is legally a state responsibility. The reality is that some states do a better job fulfilling that responsibility than others. Partially, it is because of differences in the way they are governed. For example, as the result of a lawsuit against the state of Massachusetts, a ruling was made that “all children must get an adequate education” and their 1993 Education Reform Act was created. The goals were to equalize funding among districts and improve all student performance.

The state chose to use these instruments for change (as outlined by Minnesota):

  1.  increase state spending on education,
  2.  create curriculum frameworks that set high expectations for student learning,
  3.  create student performance assessments aligned with the curriculum frameworks.

But there was something else very important to Massachusetts’s success, the process. In section 3 of their law, they set up advisory councils in the following areas: early childhood education; life management skills and home economics; educational personnel; fine arts education; gifted and talented education; math and science education; racial imbalance; parent and community education and involvement; special education; bilingual education; technology education; vocational-technical education; global education; and comprehensive interdisciplinary health education and human service pro- grams. And the law specified “a reasonable balance of members,” that they should “be broadly representative of all areas,” and it described specifics for each advisory council.

We must continue to remind ourselves that we cannot take one piece of the equation for educational success or one aspect of a successful “model” without considering all the other factors that contribute to success. Summaries or “briefs” as presented here can never do justice to the bigger picture.

Massachusetts used their available experts and a broad range of interested community members to form councils that established their success factors. It couldn’t have been easy. Democratic processes never are. But “democracy is not attained through osmosis. It works because people recognize their responsibilities in it and put forth the effort to make it work through their actions” (Minzey & LeTarte, 1994, 88). And some states took note, like Minnesota, and followed suit. How their stories end, we can’t know. What we do know is that too many states are making uninformed decisions, are not using researched practices, are not using “experts,” are not adequately funding education, and are not using a democratic decision-making process. Some states fail to meet their responsibility.
*****

We must focus on the problems in order to solve them.

We must focus on the problems in order to solve them.

Today, America as a whole is not yet facing the fact that No Child Left Behind was based on faulty assumptions. We have paid a heavy price — made heavier the longer we ignore the fact that we have not been clear in demanding the best alternative for reauthorization.

Our non-negotiable starting points must guide us if we are to “get it right” (“it” being No Child Left Behind). Do we still value the ideals undergirding President Kennedy’s “twin goals”: “a new standard of excellence in education and the availability of such excellence to all who are willing and able to pursue it”?

The governing of the process by which we set —not standards, but— a standard of excellence matters. State responsibility, yes, but what of “local control”?

The Little Engine That Could

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I think we can.

I think we can.

I think we can; I know we can. The question is, will we?

We can move from test and punishment “reforms” — the No Child Left Behind prescription — to policies and practices that concentrate on helping schools improve.

To do so:

“American education, that great engine of the democracy, does not drive itself. It must be guided, not by one but by many, into a future of incalculable promise.” Francis Keppel, 1966, pg. 163 of The Necessary Revolution in American Education

 

 

The Common Core System

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Connecting “Autonomy,” “Accountability,” & the Common Core National Standards

Here’s how things are going in Idaho. Quick history: In 2011, three laws similar to others in the nation —bust collective bargaining, put in pay-for-performance, and roll out the lap-tops and online “learning” — were passed by lawmakers despite visible and audible protests from Idahoans. But the People in Idaho didn’t roll over. They came back to put them (the Luna Laws) on the ballot in 2012 and defeated all three proposals – SOUNDLY!!! But quietly the foxes have entered the hen house and are going in for the kill. They are doing it through a governor-selected “task force.”

Moving Beyond the Killer B’s: The Role of School Boards in School Accountability and Transformation bases its recommendations on the idea that it is important “to ensure that their [school board] policies and practices align with the pressing need to ensure that all students are provided a high-quality education, enabling them to succeed in college and post-graduation careers.” They express that “the Common Core State Standards [are] aimed at ensuring that all states strive to teach a high level curriculum and administer rigorous assessments.”(page 4) It was expressed that originally Race to the Top had included formal school board evaluations (page 5).

And so it appears that “they” thought of every aspect of The Common Core System.

 The Killer B’s document describes a scheme that in essence promotes the idea of using federal funds to accomplish a wide array of tasks including the establishment of  “technical assistance centers” called “Regional Comprehensive Centers” (RCCs) (page ii, 24).

Moving Beyond the Killer B’s (copyrighted by the Academic Development Institute (ADI)) can be found on The Center for School Turnarounds primarily sponsored by WestEd along with ADI.

WestEd (nonpartisan, nonprofit) regional centers are established in California, Mid-Atlantic, West, Southwest, Central, Northeast, South Central, Great Lakes, Midwest, Pacific, Appalachia, and Texas. And there could be more WestEd Regional Comprehensive Centers that I missed.

WestEd is the Project Management Partner for the Smarter Balanced Assessment Consortium (our Common Core Tests).

Following the lead of Idaho’s State Chief Deputy Superintendent, Rodger Quarles, who was a contributor to the Killer B’s document and a member of the Governor’s Task Force on Improving Education, the Training & Development of School Boards is now on the legislative table (Effective Teachers & Leaders Recommendation #2.5, Task Force doc., Page 37).

And here is where “autonomy” comes into question: Idaho Structural Change Subcommittee’s Strategy 2: Autonomy and Accountability
“…the State should set goals for the public education system, allocate monies, and then hold local leadership accountable for progress against those goals.” (Page 19 Task Force)

When the Common Core National Standards sets the standards, aligns the tests, aligns the curriculum, and, on the advice of the Chief Council of State school Officers (CCSSO) and National Governor’s Association (NGA), aligns the training of teachers, superintendents, and principals, plus the National Parent Teachers Association did their best to train parents to accept Common Core — the only thing left is to train and align the school board members with the help of the School Board Associations and the same non-governmental, non-accountable group that will be “partnering” in the tests —WestEd. Plus, organizations like the Broad Foundation have years of experience training leaders.

With test-driven reforms (they call “outcome-based”), He who controls the tests controls what is learned — especially if all the pieces of the machine are in alignment. Is this the systemic change we want?

Is the American education system to become just one cog in the machine?

Is the American education system to become just one cog in the machine?

“Autonomy”? The Task Force defines it as “people’s need to be empowered to take ownership for results and to have the flexibility to address challenges and local dynamics they face in pursuit of results for our students.” It is not defined here as self-governing and definitely NOT the same as “local control.”

There is nothing of educational significance left to control – goals, standards, tests, training for instruction, curriculum, and governance are all decided and out of our control. All that is left is the hard work of ensuring learning, in some form, occurs – In it, we will have no voice that will be heard by the large conglomerates that will control our schools. Proof ? Do they hear us asking them right now to STOP the CORE? Put the testing on pause. They do in some states but what of the nation?

And those that attended the No Child Left Behind workshop by Gary Ratner and myself at the Save Our Schools conference in D.C. in 2012 heard me ask this question, do we want organizations like the Broad Foundation training our school leaders or do we want it done through public institutions?

The education “reform” laws that Idahoans defeated looked to me to be “models” for the nation. So what is happening now with leadership training in the rest of the nation?

Public Education: Is It Broken?

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Depends on your perspective. If you are a parent or concerned citizen finding your efforts to improve your schools blocked, it is a broken system that allows that to happen. It’s a case of no one being responsible for inaction where and when action is needed.

What's broken?

What’s broken?

When “the system” becomes a barrier to improvement—through unacceptable policies and practices — the system is broken.

That doesn’t mean that all pieces are broken (not all schools, all teachers, all places), but it does mean the system failed to serve, protect, and educate ALL children as well as we can. So this is a place where my perspective differs from Diane Ravitch’s; she continues to say it “is not broken.” Where we do agree is here: “What began as a movement for testing and accountability has turned into a privatization movement.”

The result is unacceptable policies leading to unethical testing, scoring, and reporting practices furthering the already existing inequality of opportunity, segregation, and privatization. I hope people everywhere can agree on this; this is a cycle that is dismantling the system, piece-by-piece, policy-by-policy. Those openly aiming to privatize the public education system are boasting over the strides they have made in transforming the system.

One way the Friedman Foundation measures success is…

“the increase in the percentage of public dollars going to fund private school choice compared to the overall funds going to all K-12 education.”

This is the data they track! Comparing to overall funding!!!! Success is when the public system is fully privatized? Is that what the public has agreed to?

My theory, speaking as a parent with children in the system during the first big take-down (the No Child Left Behind policy), is that privatization never would have gotten this far if policymakers AND the public had been listening to the multitude of people trying to stop the political machine driving the movement and driving our children over the cliff in the process. But we can’t go back and change what happened; we can, however, change policies.

What we can do is move forward determined not to repeat the mistake of ignoring the crucial voices of people wanting to do the right thing for the right reason. We have to sort out those who are offering real, good, practical solutions to existing significant problems—true reformers —and those wishing to transform the system to fit their ideology or to profit the education-industrial complex.

At The Core

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We ask for common sense to be used. We seek common ground. Most of us have a need to be part of a community; we search for commonality with someone.

The word “common” has a softly seductive appeal that brings to mind a sense of belonging as though we are sharing something of value.

Common Core National Standards?

Some of us can’t help but see patterns common to our still-fresh experience with state standards and No Child Left Behind. As standards were demanded as part of an accountability scheme, children were put in harms way in an unprecedented experiment in education reform.

If the child didn’t fit the standards and how they were being implemented, many parents and grandparents opted to teach the children how they knew better fit their needs. I know I did, as did others I know who hired tutors or entered their kids in “programs” to fill the gaps.

The standardized tests can never ferret out the effects of our actions giving the appearance that the standards “worked.”

There is no doubt that the practice of re-teaching or supplementing was done during the first thrusts of the test-based accountability experiment and it is being done again with The Core. As one anonymous parent put it, ” At times my son was very confused by what was going on – so I taught him myself. While the schools probably assume that his level of mastery is due to the teaching and books, the truth is far different. I am sure I am not the only case where parents supplement their kid’s education.” JRM (Huffington Post article Oct. 11)

How can we possible judge a system, a school, or a teacher based on this?

The sell job of outcome-based accountability was in the wording: want “better student outcomes,” “higher achievement,” to “leave no child behind,” like the idea of “accountability, flexibility, and choice”? …yes, yes, yes, yes.

Now, a return of some of what was taken away by Round One — critical thinking and writing through more project-based activities — is the commonsense carrot enticing us to swallow the whole Core National Curriculum.

Billed as “new” and “unique,” The Core is neither. Promising to bring “success” and make students “college and career ready,” it is more certain to sell new curriculum materials, new tests, and new remedial materials and programs when students “fail” the tests…and the pattern continues.

Parents, if you are “supplementing” your child’s education, your child in particular should be opted out of the testing. If this national experiment is to go forward, it should be based on an honest evaluation.

My own opinion — for what it is worth — at The Core of this issue is not our agreed need for some commonality of knowledge; at The Core is conformity.

Narrowing of the curriculum was no little glitch. Unintended in Round One; no doubt foreseeable in Round Two.

Narrowing of the curriculum was no little glitch. Unintended in Round One; no doubt foreseeable in Round Two.

“…conformity is the jailer of freedom and the enemy of growth.” JFK

 

Where We Fail

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As people, we fail when we react to words rather than trying to understand what is meant by them.

Sometimes it is good to start with a blank slate.

Sometimes it is good to start with a blank slate.

Business, political, educational, and civil rights leaders jumped on the idea that outcomes in the form of test scores were the way to go for education reform partially because the words made the idea sound good – “close the achievement gap.”

The idea was sold to the public, and many, many very intelligent people bought it. The end result was the federal testing law called No Child Left Behind.

Achievement, judged by standardized tests, is the basis of the “accountability” mechanism that has yet to hold the system itself accountable for the high cost and little results of the last eleven years—let alone the damage. “Flexibility” disappeared from classrooms whose children most needed it, and “choice” didn’t leave many options for improving all schools.

During this whole fiasco, we failed to keep an open mind that would allow us to accept the evidence and our mistakes. Denial is a human defense mechanism. But it is time for adults to put aside their own stance and do the right thing — admit that testing is not what improves schools.

Our education dollars, time, and efforts will be better spent developing an understanding of school improvement and what it will take to fulfill our obligation to provide equal access to quality education; setting excellence as the norm, understanding change, the importance of school culture in the change process, and how change can lead to improvement and lasting progress.

But who is asking us? Certainly not open-minded people ready to hear and accept solutions.

To all those who were wrong; do the honorable thing, accept your failure, and open your mind.

To all those wanting to help the effort to do the right thing for public school children, share this with someone outside your circle of like-minded associates. Start a conversation.

Crisis and the Groundhogs Day Phenomenon

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Crisis: a turning point in the course of anything; decisive or crucial time; a time of great danger or trouble, whose outcome decides whether possible bad consequences will follow. With the term “crisis” thus defined, has the public education system been in a crisis? Hell yes! And repeatedly!

And for those that have been paying attention to “education reform” for more than a decade or two, you understand why I reference the  “Groundhog Day” phenomenon — the déjà vu feeling of having to wake each day and repeat the same scene over-and-over. Well, the Bill Murray character in the movie was on a cakewalk compared to the real nightmare of decades upon decades of debate about whether or not public education is in a true crisis.

“Whose outcome decides whether possible bad consequences will follow”— please, think about it. How many times have you heard, especially in relationship to No Child Left Behind, that there were unintended consequences?

What Can We Do?

What Can We Do?

In the American Education Reform War, one side defines the crisis as mediocre international test scores while the other side claims there is no crisis at all. Meanwhile, around kitchen tables there are mothers, fathers, grandparents, and students fretting about and struggling with problems related to education. Many times these same people have solutions that can’t be done without the cooperation of the public education system. And without support and help, they know what the consequences will be. These people face a crisis. The system is not responding to them.

Test-Based Goals: Mission Accomplished?

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What do we want? Don’t you generally hear ordinary citizens say, “I want my children to get a good education”? How many of we garden variety citizens say, “I want my kids to graduate from high school ready to score higher on standardized tests”?

If people don’t understand the proper uses of testing and can’t recognize the misuses of standardized achievement tests, then they can’t possibly know that the country has the wrong goal for public education — set in law and in the minds of Americans.

The “achievement gap” is defined by standardized achievement tests. It can serve as one monitor of equal opportunity. It should not be THE goal of the public education system — but IT IS!

“To close the achievement gap” is a test-based goal set by No Child Left Behind. In Idaho, our state school officer, Mr. Luna, points out that “…results not only show a majority of Idaho schools are high-performing, but also that a vast majority of students are performing at or above grade level in reading and mathematics…While I praise these results, I also know the reality behind this data: Though students are performing better than ever in K-12, they continue to struggle after high school.”

Source: Associated Press

Source: Associated Press

His conclusion is that the standards must be higher and the tests better but that is because he fails to see, or won’t admit, the flaw in the outcome-based (test-based) theory — it narrowed curriculum to what was tested and that isn’t good enough. It isn’t good education; it did meet the test-based goals.

Mission accomplished? – test scores up / students unprepared for life because of a narrowed, test-based curriculum!

UPDATE 5/4/15: The marketing of No Child Left Behind deliberately targeted the largest group we have failed to educate well – black Americans. Why would we continue with this failed outcome-based theory of reform? Because we have been told?