"A grand jury has indicted Beverly L. Hall, the former superintendent of the Atlanta Public Schools, and 34 other teachers and administrators on racketeering charges connected to one of the largest test-score cheating scandals in the country."
"Scandals over attendance, test scores widen in schools" by Julie Carr Smyth | Associated Press, February 22, 2013
COLUMBUS, Ohio — A former superintendent went to prison in Texas for conspiring to remove low-performing students from classrooms to boost average test scores. Principals in Oklahoma and Missouri are out of their jobs after attendance-related scandals.
In Ohio, a recent state audit uncovered nine districts that withdrew students retroactively or improperly reported they were attending alternative programs. In one instance, auditor Dave Yost said, a district ignored state rules ‘‘because they didn’t like them.’’
It’s all part of a percolating national saga in which grown-ups — not children — are accused of cheating. “Scrubbing,’’ the process of improperly fixing enrollment or attendance data to somehow improve a school’s situation, can include rosier district report cards, added state or federal funding, and employee bonuses.
‘‘I think it is influenced by the high-stakes accountability environment that we’re in right now. It’s raised the stakes,’’ said Gary Crow, a professor of educational leadership at Indiana University. ‘‘It used to be when you take a standardized test and your students did well or didn’t do well, it influenced your teaching, of course but it didn’t get connected directly to your pay, or your job security, or those kinds of things. Well, now, in a lot of places it does.’’
It is also easier to identify such cases in the increasingly data-driven world of education, although they remain isolated....
States’ reactions range from tolerant to tough. Some cite evolving record-keeping technology and reporting requirements. Others pursue prosecutions. That has meant mixed messages for administrators on a staple of the school day: who shows up, and where.
Some educators have fought back, citing the onslaught of tracking questions brought on by school choice as well as rapidly changing state and federal rules....
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Related: Sunday Globe Special: Teacher's Grade
Massachusetts teachers did good!
"Intensified evaluations carry lessons for teachers; Aim is a sharing of best strategies" by James Vaznis | Globe Staff, February 18, 2013
With considerable zeal, Boston teacher Molly Sangalang delved into one of the more difficult math lessons for fifth-graders: multiplying decimals without a calculator.
She demonstrated examples several times on a dry-erase board, repeatedly asked students questions to gauge their understanding. Many were stumped — not the result Sangaland was looking for this particular afternoon, as her supervisor sat in the back of the Blackstone Elementary School classroom, watching her every move.
Across Massachusetts, administrators are increasingly visting classrooms this year and amassing a stockpile of notes, lesson plans, and examples of student work as they carefully judge the effectiveness of more than 68,000 teachers statewide.
The goal of the new ramped-up evaluation systems — developed under hard-fought state regulations — is to build a more skilled teaching force that can help students reach new heights....
The state will up the ante of the new evaluation systems next fall when districts will be required to use student test scores to rate the performance of educators — a practice strongly pushed by President Obama.
The regulations have been a lightning rod among local unions, some of which are unhappy with leaders of the Massachusetts Teachers Association, the state’s largest teachers union, which helped craft the regulations and endorsed using standardized test scores....
I think it is a waste of time to do any more stories about AmeriKa's ejewkhazion and indoctrination centers of inculcation. It's too far gone.
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Meanwhile, the kids can't do math without a calculator, they can't read or write! But they sure can text and tweet!
"State scours Twitter for sharing of MCAS test" by Evan Allen | Globe Correspondent, March 22, 2013
Once, it was enough to warn students not to look at one another’s MCAS exams, or slip an answer to a friend. But now there is the Twitterverse, prompting education officials to launch a new kind of anticheating patrol.
During testing, a staff member scours the popular micro-blogging service for the MCAS hashtag, trolling for students who might be sharing pictures of answer booklets or discussing questions with other test-takers.
“Twitter . . . is something we need to be aware of, to be vigilant about,” said JC Considine, spokesman for the state Department of Elementary and Secondary Education.
The state is on high alert for Twitter cheaters this month....
Do you think as drugged-up and dumbed-down as the kids are that they don't see hypocrisy when it is right in front of them? Have our schools so failed that they are still that stoopid?
Boston high school students met the news that their tweets were being watched with a mix of amusement, outrage, and puzzlement....
I like the middle group best. Good kids. They kNow to whom the Stuff is being is being forwArded.
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I think I'll skip the tests today.
"Too much MCAS reliance, researchers say; Pupils miss out on art, activities" by James Vaznis | Globe Staff, February 20, 2013
More than 130 Massachusetts professors and researchers urged state education officials Tuesday to stop relying on standardized test scores to judge school quality, teacher effectiveness, and eligibility for high school graduation.
In a letter, they said that standardized testing programs, such as the Massachusetts Comprehensive Assessment System, have fostered an “environment of intimidation, fear, anxiety, and stress for both teachers and their students.”
“As educators and researchers from across the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, we strongly oppose our state’s continued overreliance on high-stakes standardized testing to assess student achievement, evaluate teacher effectiveness, and determine school quality,” they wrote in the letter to state education officials....
The professors and researchers are raising their objections as Massachusetts is working with several other states to create a new testing program that could replace the MCAS or be integrated into it.
The letter includes some recommendations, such as ensuring that the state’s new assessment system will go beyond a paper-and-pencil test in judging student performance.
The recommendations also call for halting the use of MCAS results in determining high school graduation and the hiring, firing, or rewarding of teachers.
Mitchell Chester, the state commissioner of elementary and secondary education who is leading the effort to create a new testing system, declined to comment on the letter because he had not seen it.
But he defended the more than decade-old MCAS....
He said the new testing system, which would be taken largely on computers, would include some classroom-like experiences in assessing student knowledge, such as writing essays that require the citing of multiple research....
The professors and researchers said they received inspiration to write their letter from standardized-testing rebellions that have occurred across the country.
In Texas, nearly 900 school boards have adopted a resolution expressing their displeasure about an overemphasis on standardized testing.
In New York State, more than 1,500 principals have signed a letter criticizing a new educator evaluation system for relying too heavily on student test scores.
And in Seattle, some high school teachers garnered national attention last month when they refused to give a district-mandated standardized test....
Did the Globe even cover it? I don't have time to look, and care even less. They ain't makin' the grade with me anymore.
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"Four schools face state takeover after latest MCAS" by James Vaznis | Globe Staff, September 19, 2013
Four underperforming schools, including two in Boston, are facing state takeovers, education officials announced Wednesday as they released the latest round of MCAS scores. But there was also some good news: Scores on 10th-grade exams have hit historic highs.
I'm tired of having poli$hed turds being pre$ented to me by corporate pre$$, sorry. Class dismissed.
The takeovers would mark the first time state education officials have ever seized control of individual schools without putting an entire district into receivership. The move highlights the dire state of education in the four schools....
Yeah, it's just them. It's $y$temic. You can't teach politically-correct propaganda and perversion and then expect to have good, healthy schools. I'm sorry, but that's just the plain old truth from an ejewkhated Amurkn.
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Yeah, I'm sorry about the bitterness. Along with the fart-misting environmentalists, lefty frauds, ma$$ media intelligence operation I call a jewspaper, the other group I feel a great sense of betrayal from is the ejewkhators and the curriculum I was taught at all levels. I'm stunned at the level of Jewish supremacism and elitism in the ma$$ media and their influence along all sectors of cultural society. The infiltration and indoctrination by inculcation is mind-boggling to me. Shows what money and the control of the methods of information can do.
Fortunately, the world is finally throwing off those shackles of imagery and illusion thanks to voices like mine and others you see on the right side of this blog. Sometimes a million whispers can be louder than the loude$t roar.
"7 schools designated as underperforming by state" by James Vaznis | Globe Staff, September 20, 2013
State education officials, citing persistently low MCAS scores, designated seven schools across the state — including two in Boston — as “underperforming” on Friday, while commending 48 others for robust improvement or high achievement on the tests.
The seven schools are the third group to be deemed underperforming under a 2010 state law, bringing the total number to 38, representing 2 percent of all schools statewide. While the designations bring bad publicity, they also enable the schools to take advantage of an array of measures to execute changes, such as replacing all teachers, if need be, and extending the school day.
The officials made the announcement as they released the latest round of MCAS scores for individual schools and districts, a popular barometer of achievement. The announcement came two days after officials released statewide testing results, which showed historic highs on the 10th-grade exams but troubling declines in reading scores in elementary schools.
Schools in affluent suburbs such as Lexington, Newton, and Concord frequently landed in the top five for various grades in English and math, according to a Globe analysis. But some Boston public schools as well as charter schools in Boston, Lawrence, and Marlborough also cracked the top five.
The Globe ranked schools based on the percentage of students who scored “advanced,” the top grade on the exams, administered each spring to grades 3-8 and Grade 10.
Mitchell Chester, the state commissioner of elementary and secondary education, said he was proud of how most schools performed across the state, but expressed concern about having too many low-achieving ones. He said he had designated the seven additional schools as underperforming because of years of chronically low MCAS scores....
Taken together, the developments are threatening to overshadow some of Boston’s success at overhauling struggling schools....
Kids?
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UPDATE: Online exams may replace MCAS tests
Also see: Schools facing takeover reflect on obstacles
The #1 problem:
"Training of US teachers called inadequate" by Philip Elliott | Associated Press, June 19, 2013
WASHINGTON — The nation’s teacher training programs do not adequately prepare would-be educators for the classroom, even as they produce almost triple the number of graduates needed, according to a survey of more than 1,000 programs released Tuesday.
The National Council on Teacher Quality review is a scathing assessment of colleges’ education programs and their admission standards, training, and value. The report urges leaders at teacher-training programs to rethink what skills would-be educators need to be taught to thrive in the classrooms of today and tomorrow.
‘‘Through an exhaustive and unprecedented examination of how these schools operate, the review finds they have become an industry of mediocrity, churning out first-year teachers with classroom management skills and content knowledge inadequate to thrive in classrooms’’ with an ever-increasing diversity of ethnic and socioeconomic students, the report’s authors wrote.
The report could drive debate about which students are prepared to be teachers in the coming decades and how they are prepared.
Don't I always say agenda-pushing paper?
The answer, the council argues, is to make it harder for students to get into teacher preparation programs. And once there, they should be taught the most effective methods to help students.
American Federation of Teachers president Randi Weingarten called the review a ‘‘gimmick.’’ She said she agrees on the need to improve teacher preparation, but ‘‘it would be more productive to focus on developing a consistent, systemic approach to lifting the teaching profession instead of resorting to attention-grabbing consumer alerts based on incomplete standards.’’
She is the president of the teacher's union, huh? I'm not saying she's a bad gal or anything, I know next to nothing about here, but, you know. There it is again.
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And when you are the judge of yourself you always get good grades!
"Boston teachers receive high ratings" by James Vaznis | Globe Staff, May 24, 2013
The Boston public schools has rated 92 percent of all teachers as proficient or exemplary under a new evaluation system, according to a School Department analysis that officials held up as evidence most students are receiving quality instruction.
But in a city where thousands of students struggle immensely and in many cases quit school, the large number of teachers receiving high ratings is raising questions about whether principals and other administrators are judging teachers too lightly....
So it's a softball test, so what? Now crack down on those prescription drug addled kids!
The analysis also confirms a trend spotted last month by the Boston Teachers Union: Black and Hispanic teachers are more likely to be deemed in need of improvement or unsatisfactory than white teachers....
The data also revealed another new trend: Older teachers are more likely to get a negative review....
School officials said they are concerned about the possibility of racial or age discrimination....
And the law$uits that ari$e, but at lea$t that will benefit $omeone.
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The #2 problem:
"Parents are rebelling against standardized tests; Frustration with exams prompts opt-out actions" by Katie Zezima | Associated Press, September 09, 2013
DELAWARE TOWNSHIP, N.J. — A small but growing number of parents nationwide who are ensuring their children do not participate in standardized testing.
They are opposed to the practice for an array of reasons....
The opt-out movement, as it is called, is small but growing. It has been brewing for several years via word of mouth and social media, especially through Facebook. The ‘‘Long Island opt-out info’’ Facebook page has more than 9,200 members, many of them rallying at a Port Jefferson Station, N.Y., high school last month after a group of principals called this year’s state tests — and their low scores — a ‘‘debacle.’’
In Washington, D.C., a group of parents and students protested outside the Department of Education. Students and teachers at a Seattle high school boycotted a standardized test, leading the district superintendent to declare that city high schools have the choice to deem it optional. In Oregon, students organized a campaign persuading their peers to opt out of tests.
A group of students in Providence marched in front of the State House to protest a requirement that students must achieve a minimum score on a state test in order to graduate.
Just don't cro$$ the line like Occupy, kids. The the corporate media will have a much different take on you.
‘‘I’m opposed to these tests because they narrow what education is supposed to be about and they lower kids’ horizons,’’ said Jesse Hagopian, a teacher at the Seattle school. ‘‘I think collaboration, imagination, critical thinking skills are all left off these tests and can’t be assessed by circling in A, B, C, or D.’’
Yeah, I thought that was a litle important when I read that. That is not what AmeriKan ejewkhazion is about anymore, and it certainly isn't the kind of education the banker's mouthpiece want's you to receive.
For many parents and students, there have been few to no consequences to opting out of testing....
And what kind of lesson is that, huh? No consequence for your actions? Who gets away with that other than the Israelis?
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Obama's form of inculcation:
"New education measures face increasing opposition; Critics cite costs, hard testing tied to Common Core" by Motoko Rich | New York Times, August 16, 2013
NEW YORK — The Common Core, a set of standards for kindergarten through high school that has been ardently supported by the Obama administration and many business leaders and state legislatures, is facing growing opposition from both the right and the left even before it has been properly introduced into classrooms....
Say again?
Concerns were underscored last week when New York state, an early adopter of the new standards, released results from reading and math exams showing that less than one-third of students passed.
“I am worried that the Common Core is in jeopardy because of this,” said Randi Weingarten, president of the American Federation of Teachers. “The shock value that has happened has been so traumatic in New York that you have a lot of people all throughout the state saying, ‘Why are you experimenting on my kids?’ ”
Oh, she is worried about common core, huh?
Related: NY standardized test scores drop as expected
Who is shocked, and why is a certain tribe of people always trying to generate fear?
Supporters worry that opposition could start to snowball....
Related(?):
Six Zionist Companies Own 96% of the World's Media
Declassified: Massive Israeli manipulation of US media exposed
I think so.
“The danger here is that you have two kinds of problems going on,” said Kati Haycock, president of the Education Trust, a nonprofit group that works to close achievement gaps. “One is a Tea Party problem, which doesn’t have deep roots but does have lots of political muscle behind it, and then you’ve got a bit of antitest rebellion coming from the left. The question is what’s going to happen if they both get together. That’s the more terrifying prospect.”
Gee, now the "LEFT" is in the same "TERRORIST" boat as the TEA PARTY!
Too bad teachers are the weakest and most cowardly of AmeriKa's public $ervants. Why do you think the ejewcators -- who are still smart people and can see the truth if they look hard enough -- are paid so poorly in comparison with the $ecurity $ervices of police and fire? To $hut 'em up!
One goal of the standards is to reduce high remediation rates at colleges and universities and help students compete for jobs that demand higher levels of skills than in previous generations.
According to some estimates, about 40 percent of students entering college must take remedial courses before they can enroll in credit-bearing classes....
Translation: the school system in Amerika is a TOTAL FAILURE! The rot of politically-correct propaganda and indoctrination has finally come home to roost.
The Obama administration promoted the Common Core by giving priority to states that adopted “college and career ready” standards when it awarded grants under its Race to the Top program. By last summer, 45 states, including Massachusetts, and the District of Columbia had adopted the standards.
That's reason to oppose it right there.
But even many who support them are wary about how they have been adopted.
Well, you know, I don't want to say I told you so, but I to... ah, never mind!!
David Cohen, an English teacher at Palo Alto High School in California who described the standards as “reasonable,” said that among colleagues, “the resistance and the anger and frustration are still coming largely, but not entirely, from the process.”
Do I have to type it at this point?
Secretary of Education Arne Duncan has repeatedly emphasized that states, districts, and teachers have broad flexibility to devise their own curriculums and lesson plans based on the standards. Speaking about the Common Core to the American Society of News Editors in June, Duncan said: “The federal government didn’t write them, didn’t approve them, and doesn’t mandate them. And we never will. Anyone who says otherwise is either misinformed or willfully misleading.”
(Blog editor is astonished that such words come from a government that does exactly that across a whole range of issues, everything in fact. Everything)
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In an interview, Duncan acknowledged that the transition would be difficult.
Just like the healthcare debacle and anything else they roll out, even the foreign policies!
“It’s easier to keep saying everything’s looking great,” he said. “Potemkin village, whitewash the walls. That’s the easy way to do it, but I’m not quite sure that changes kids’ lives or helps our country remain competitive economically.”
See kids? It i$n't about you and your education at all.
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Supporters of the new standards say critics are too impatient....
I've been patient for over seven years here and for a lot longer before then. F*** you!
Massachusetts raised its own standards in the late 1990s and faced a falloff in state test scores before seeing them steadily climb.
Today, Massachusetts leads the country in scores on exams administered by the Department of Education and ranks close to some countries frequently cited as world leaders in academic performance.
Related:
"Many 13-year-old boys may be spending their summer lost in a digital world, building imaginary structures and waging war against zombie pigmen and other fictitious monsters that threaten in cyberspace. But Josh Liberman, about to start eighth grade at Walter S. Parker Middle School in Reading, has spent the past few weeks obsessed with foes of a very different kind. His chief adversaries: the Pythagorean theorem, the distributive law, and linear equations."
Josh can't read? I can sure see clear as s*** and once again it is that select and special tribe dominating my "news" stories. Clear as a $traight line.
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AmeriKan media failed, too.
