In This Issue:
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STUDENTS AT STRUGGLING DREW MIDDLE SCHOOL LEARN SKILL THROUGH DEBATE |
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US
DEPT OF ED PROGRAM REVIEW OF COMMON CORE TECHNOLOGY PROJECT & MiSiS
CITES LACK OF LEADERSHIP, STRATEGY, PLANNING, GOALS AND METRICS |
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THE
NEXT SUPERINTENDENT: L.A. Unified must decide on an insider or outsider
as its next chief and whether to embrace aggressive reform |
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STUDY FINDS READING TO CHILDREN OF ALL AGES GROOMS THEM TO READ MORE ON THEIR OWN |
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HIGHLIGHTS, LOWLIGHTS & THE NEWS THAT DOESN'T FIT: The Rest (but
not necessarily the best) of the Stories from Other Sources |
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EVENTS: Coming up next week... |
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What can YOU do? |
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Featured Links:
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Cartoon [kahr-toon] Noun: 1. a sketch or drawing,
usually humorous, as in a newspaper or periodical, symbolizing,
satirizing, or caricaturing some action, subject, or person of popular
interest.
My grandfather was a cartoonist; an artist-illustrator hired by Walt
Disney to do design work on Fantasia, Snow White and Pinocchio. He
designed “Dance of the Hours” and was paid handsomely – but always
figured that the day he took a couple of minutes during the depression
to draw a blue “76” in an orange circle for the Union Oil Co – and then
audaciously charged them $25! – this was his greatest commercial
artistic triumph!
My stepfather was a cartoonist – a Disney animator on Peter Pan and
Cinderella who went on to work for Hanna Barbera and every other shop in
town. He directed the Grinch Who Stole Christmas and Gay Puree …a movie
about straight cats.
My mentor in the film biz was a cartoonist – from Disney – a genius at
combining animation and live action and doing special effects in the
camera. Through all those contacts I knew many other cartoonists – guys+
gals who drew Mickey Mice and princesses and Yogi Bear and Fritz the
Cat and Playboy cartoons. Funny, bright, hard drinking, “Show Biz is
the hardest-way-to-make-an easy buck“ folk to whom nothing was sacred.
Especially Walt. And everything subject to humor, satire, caricature and
ridicule. Especially Walt. “If you can’t make fun of it, it ain’t worth
thinkin’ about”.
Who knew it was a dangerous calling?
"Dictators of the right and the left fear the political cartoonist more than they do the atomic bomb." – Art Buchwald
We love our freedom of speech in this country – political+editorial
cartooning was once of staple of provocative American journalism. Think
Thomas Nast and Mauldin and Herblock and Paul Conrad – who illustrated
Nixon’s downfall from his drawing board on the enemies list.
Sensationalist “Yellow Journalism” is named for a comic character: ‘The
Yellow Kid’. 50’s funny page’s Pogo Possum philosophized about the
McCarthy Era: “We have met the enemy and he is us.” – a portmanteau
philosophy cartoonist Walt Kelly carried over to tree-hugging
environmentalism in the ‘60’s+70’s. Pogo was regularly censored by
newspapers (Kelly often created alternate “bunny strips” with
bowdlerized content: cute rabbits telling safe, insipid jokes. Kelly
told fans that if all they saw in Pogo were fluffy little bunnies, then
their newspaper didn't believe they were capable of thinking for
themselves … or didn't want them to.) These were not the bad old days,
the press still regularly censors
‘Doonesbury’. Publishers and advertisers and readers don’t like feeling
uncomfortable. And editorial cartoonists are an endangered species.
FRANCE IS A WHOLE OTHER PLACE: They don’t poison the garden pests, they cultivate+ eat them!
President de Gaulle complained: "Comment voulez-vous gouverner un pays
qui a deux cent quarante-six variétés de fromage?" ("How can you govern a
country which has two hundred and forty-six varieties of cheese?")
The magazine Charlie Hebdo – (named after Charlie Brown – hapless alter
ego of the most gently provocative+subversive cartoonist) subtitles
itself as 'le journal irresponsable'.The magazine and its cartoons are
intentionally provocative and often offensive–and provocativity
provokes. Subversion subverts. Offensiveness offends. Truth spoken to
power through humor is isn’t always supposed to make you laugh. It’s OK
to be nervious+uncomfortable; it’s OK to share+spread the discomfort.
Comfort is highly overrated. The man-or-woman in the arena/the small
dedicated few who change the world - do not llive in the comfort zone.
We are proud of our American separation of church+state. The French
revolution enforced the separation of the secular from the sacred with
the blade of the guillotine - because the church and the aristocrats
were two faces of the same problem. In America a church wedding is the
‘real ‘wedding; in France the city hall visit is the real ceremony – the
rest is quaint superstitious nonsense. When you have no religion
sacrilege comes easy. Charlie Hebdo is an equal opportunity offender
…regularly offending Christians, Muslims and Jews. The Right and the
Left. And the comfortable Center.
It was Voltaire who said “I detest what you write, but I would give my
life to make it possible for you to continue to write.” This philosophy
comes close to being a French national attitude about free speech. And
Voltaire, lest we forget, was a satirist.
Satire is a powerful thing; it’s a lens through which 4LAKids views
LAUSD. Luckily for me LAUSD isn’t organized religion, so when I mock it
True Believers don’t feel more than a passing urge to rub me out.
Unluckily for the kids LAUSD isn’t organized anything! …though the FBI is working on the ‘(dis)organized crime’ storyline.
If you look at anything too closely it isn’t funny at all. If you are
the coyote vanishing into a dot to the accompaniment of a slide whistle –
and become a puff of desert dust at the bottom of the cliff – that
isn’t funny either.
(Parenthetically wandering off-topic: I suspect that “Pearson” is the “Acme” of this cartoon.)
Humor isn’t funny. It is, like Art-Not-Being-Pretty: Truth.
Truth with a clown nose. And, as the Firesign Theater said: “I think we’re all Bozos on this bus.”
And speaking of the bus:
Ray Cortines is back!
And Caprice Young is back!
Wait! …isn’t this where I got on?
We all were sea-swallow'd, though some cast again,
And by that destiny to perform an act
Whereof what's past is prologue, what to come
In yours and my discharge.
We are all Charlie Hebdo on this bus.
In other news – (there WAS other news):
• Governor Brown gave his state-of-the-state-address on Monday and
pitched his new budget on Friday. In both he promised more money for
education and touted local control of education funding.
• The LA Times business section had an article about how there shouldn’t
be many layoffs upcoming – employment +job security is looking good | http://lat.ms/1y2dhvV
• Superintendent Cortines sent a memo to the board saying just the
opposite. LAUSD has a $321 million (and growing) deficit, he expects
challenges to the District’s local control plan and layoffs are
inevitable: “At the same time the District is investing in the new
programs, there will be cuts. Because there has not been “rightsizing”
or necessary action taken in the past, there will be hundreds of notices
anticipated coming to the Board in February. “ LAUSD, like the State
of California in the LA Times editorial [], needs to move beyond Running
on Half-Empty.
• A Labor Board judge tossed out former Supt. Deasy’s woebegone teacher
evaluation plan. (Actually the judge ruled that back on Dec 24th – we
got to wait until the fifteenth day of Christmas to find it out.)
• President Obama is proposing tuition-free Community College (Save your
bellbottoms: Back in the olden days day when I went to community
college and the first Governor Brown was governor it was tuition-free!)
• Education Secretary Arne Duncan is beginning to advocate for repeal of
No Child Left Behind. Not reauthorization. Not tweaks+waivers. Repeal
…as in Prohibition. (Of course he wants to keep the testing and the
teacher evaluation!)
School starts back on Monday, a new year and a new semester. It's a reset. Let’s be safe+successful out there.
¡Onward/Adelante! - smf
STUDENTS AT STRUGGLING DREW MIDDLE SCHOOL LEARN SKILL THROUGH DEBATE
By Teresa Watanabe, Los Angeles Times | http://lat.ms/17doJcf
January 11, 2015 :: Instead of taking a test, Drew Middle School students learn facts and skills by debating national issues
For years, Charles Drew Middle School in South Los Angeles was so
notorious for poor quality and unruly students that it was tagged "Drew
Zoo."
But don't tell that to the 16 seventh- and eighth-graders who recently
reeled off facts, fiercely presented their views and rebutted opposing
arguments over homelessness and the police shooting in Ferguson, Mo. The
articulate young students were participants in Drew's inaugural
schoolwide debate last month, which Principal NNamdi Uzor launched to
improve research, writing and public speaking skills as encouraged by
national learning standards called Common Core.
Uzor became principal in July, taking over a campus of students who are
predominantly low-income and struggling academically. The school's score
on the Academic Performance Index, a 1,000-point measure of campus
achievement, was just 614 in 2012, among the state's lowest performance
even compared with schools with similar students. In 2013, only 18% of
eighth-graders tested at grade level in English on state standardized
tests, while 33% were proficient in algebra.
"Over the years, scholarly achievement has not been associated with
schools like ours," Uzor said. "But we are changing the culture."
The students said learning through debate was far more exciting than
reading textbooks and taking multiple-choice exams. Several became so
inspired that they organized a trip with parents to skid row in downtown
L.A. to observe the homeless problem firsthand.
Alessandra Salguero, an eighth-grader who initiated the trip, said the
students were particularly moved by the homeless children living under a
bridge with their mothers. "We put ourselves in their shoes," she said.
"Many of us are a paycheck away from being homeless ourselves."
Over the years, scholarly achievement has not been associated with
schools like ours. But we are changing the culture. - Principal NNamdi
Uzor
But she added that the students learned through the debate that they
needed "real evidence and facts" to argue their positions, not just
passionate opinions. Three Drew teachers, Roxanne Martin, Christine
Baccus and Tunisia Haqq-Adams, worked with the students for weeks,
teaching them to formulate pertinent questions, research answers, sift
fact from opinion and articulately present information.
The Common Core standards are emphasizing such skills in an effort to
guide students to think critically and solve problems rather than
memorize and repeat facts on tests. The standards also ask students to
drive more of their own learning. Uzor said the debates have cultivated
all of these skills.
On debate day, the preparation paid off.
As the auditorium filled up, two teams of eight students took their
places onstage for each debate and excitedly peeked into the audience,
searching for their parents. They confessed to battling butterflies.
Then, it was showtime.
The seventh-graders debated whether a police officer's fatal shooting of
Michael Brown in Ferguson was justified, while the eighth-graders took
on the question of whether homelessness is a choice and what the
government should do about the problem.
In their debate, the eighth-graders spun out a dizzying array of data:
1,700 homeless people in downtown L.A. on any given night, 610,000
nationwide; more than $80 billion spent annually on food stamps, with
billions on subsidized housing.
Alejandro Godoy, decked out for the occasion in a black shirt and red
tie, said that services for those who don't get off their "lazy butts"
to find work deprive families of a chunk of their hard-earned paychecks.
Others on his team cited research that homeless people and panhandlers
use much of the money they collect on the street for drugs and alcohol.
"Providing government-funded services to the homeless with no strings
attached only makes it easier for them to continue their bad habits,"
Alejandro argued.
But Michael Lopez countered that a project to build 100,000 homes for
the chronically homeless had saved taxpayers $1.3 billion to date. (That
project was coordinated by the New York-based nonprofit Community
Solutions.) Others on his team argued that many homeless are military
veterans suffering from trauma and substance abuse who should be
supported by the Americans they served.
That, however, led to a rebuttal by Darlene Garcia, who drew on her
father's adage that teaching people self-sufficiency is more effective
than giving them handouts. "If you give them fish, they'll eat for a
day, but if you teach them to fish, they'll eat every day," she said.
In the end, Uzor declined to declare a winner, saying everyone who participated was a champion.
"This is a journey," Uzor said. "We are not close to where we want to be, but we can't be afraid to take steps."
●●smf’s 2¢: There is an article in the national education media about
how the Common Core is promoting digital game play in education: A
quest for a different learning model - Playing games in school | http://bit.ly/1BWa91P.
Playing games and competition has always been instrumental in education,
from the schools of Sparta to Wellington’s playing fields of Eton to
debate and spelling bees.
US DEPT OF ED PROGRAM REVIEW OF COMMON CORE
TECHNOLOGY PROJECT & MiSiS CITES LACK OF LEADERSHIP, STRATEGY,
PLANNING, GOALS AND METRICS
by smf
Sunday, January 11, 2015 :: LAUSD has made public a Dec 16, 2014
external evaluation report of its two principal technology initiatives:
The Common Core Technology Project (1:1 computers) and the MiSiS
student information database. by the Office of Educational Technology
of the US Department of Education.
The main takeaway:
“Among the most significant gaps we identified was the absence of
district--‐wide instructional technology leadership. There is currently
no Chief of Instructional Technology for the district, and instructional
technology support does not exist for any of the schools outside of the
CCTP pilot program. In addition, there is no district educational
technology plan, goals, or metrics for success for how technology will
support learning at the district level.”
The evaluation is kind but critical and should be read in full [http://bit.ly/1IhKhja] – it’s not fair to reduce it to out-of-context quotes and bullet points – but life is not fair so here they are:
I. EDUCATION TECHNOLOGY (CCTP PROJECT)
1. Lack of District-Wide Instructional Technology Strategy
2. All schools should have an Instructional Technology Plans in Place before Receiving Mobile Devices
3. No Metrics for Instructional Success Established and Reported:
4. Instructional Support for Technology not Commensurate with District Need
5. Heavy Dependence on Commercial Learning Resources
6. Sharing Successes and Best Practices:
II. MISIS PROJECT
1. No Clear Product Owner
2. User Support Lagging
3. No Established Effectiveness Metrics
THE NEXT SUPERINTENDENT: L.A. Unified must decide on
an insider or outsider as its next chief and whether to embrace
aggressive reform
by Howard Blume | LA Times | http://lat.ms/1wq03mw
January 7, 2015. 4:00 AM :: As a three-term Colorado governor, Roy
Romer, a Democrat, had to deal with a combative Republican majority in
his state Legislature. He later headed his party's fractious national
committee.
But nothing was as difficult, he said, as running the Los Angeles Unified School District.
"Educating kids in a large urban city is difficult by default," said
Romer, who headed L.A. Unified for six years. "You have a whole lot of
social and economic pressures. … Los Angeles is especially tough because
it's so large, so diverse."
And so political, he said.
In the eight years since Romer left, the school system has changed top
leaders four times, including the October departure of John Deasy, who
left under pressure.
The nation's second-largest school system now finds itself at a
crossroads. Does the system go with a leader from the inside who knows
the system and its players? Or does it go with an outsider who would be
charged with making rapid progress and difficult decisions while working
to understand a byzantine bureaucracy?
For decades, leading L.A. Unified has involved managing factions vying
for leverage, including the teachers union, administrators and civic
leaders. The job has become further complicated by competing visions of
the best way to improve schools — a debate that has raged nationwide.
"I don't know who's going to take Los Angeles," former New York City
schools Chancellor Joel Klein said. "I'm not sure they're going to want
someone who's regarded as an aggressive reformer and people who are
aggressive reformers may be reluctant."
Klein is among the civic and corporate elite who praise leaders such as
Deasy, a veteran superintendent who arrived from a senior post at the
Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation with a "reform" mantra for rapid
change. The former Los Angeles superintendent favored forceful
strategies, including replacing the faculty of schools with persistently
low test results and using students' scores in teacher evaluations.
Some of these superintendents have had limited tenures; most have faced
pushback from employee unions and community activists. Los Angeles
superintendents have been undone for a variety of reasons.
Former Supt. Ruben Zacarias, for example, was pushed out because he was
widely regarded as an insider who was unwilling or unable to challenge
colleagues with whom he spent his entire career. Later, outsider David
Brewer, a retired admiral, pledged to shake things up. But he never
mastered the district's complexities and politics, in the view of senior
district officials and civic leaders.
When Deasy left, former Supt. Ramon C. Cortines, 82, returned. He said
he is willing to remain until a replacement is found; a search is
unlikely to start before the end of the school year.
By then, elections for four of seven board seats will have concluded. A
new board majority will have to agree on whom it wants and what it
wants. That dynamic, however, could change all over again in election
cycles that occur every two years.
"A superintendent is a political appointee. That's all he really is,"
said board member George McKenna, who served as superintendent in
Inglewood Unified for six years. "The board picks him — that is a
political decision and the board uses that person to promote political
agendas."
It follows, he added, that "the demise of the superintendent-board
relationship is the biggest reason superintendents lose their job."
Urban superintendents also face the challenge of dealing with large
numbers of the lowest achieving students — in Los Angeles, many of them
don't speak English fluently. Even so, school chiefs are expected to
show rapid progress.
And yet there's no proof that any big-city district has closed the gap
in achievement that separates poor Latino and black students from white,
Asian and wealthier students, said Russ Whitehurst, director of the
Brown Center on Education Policy at the Washington, D.C.-based Brookings
Institution. He said research also suggests that superintendents have
less effect on test scores than educators closer to the classroom.
Like his recent predecessors, Deasy oversaw student achievement gains.
In addition, student attendance improved and suspensions, especially for
minority boys, dropped sharply. He had backing from philanthropists,
key civic leaders and wealthy out-of-town donors.
Those supporters say the Board of Education needs to look for a leader who will prove just as impatient on behalf of students.
"We need another superintendent to make gains as great and as quickly as
John Deasy," said Bruce Reed, president of the Los Angeles-based Broad
Foundation.
But such superintendents can overreach, said Jeffrey R. Henig, an
education professor at Teachers College of Columbia University.
"Pushing too hard and too fast puts district leaders at risk of backlash
— not just from the recalcitrant and self-interested, but from
potential allies who could be won over with a more incremental and
inclusive approach," Henig said.
An internal candidate would have some advantages, said David Bloomfield,
professor of education leadership at Brooklyn College. "It's less about
national leadership and experience as a superintendent and more about
somebody who really knows the local district and can work with the
leadership on all sides, dozens of sides," he said.
Complicating the picture for the next superintendent is the increasing
assertiveness of United Teachers Los Angeles, a force in school board
elections. The union is calling for more classroom resources and
staffing, along with less reliance on test scores.
To be successful, the next superintendent may need the skills to craft a
"grand bargain" between competing interest groups, provided that these
groups are willing to compromise, said Charles Kerchner, a research
professor at Claremont Graduate University.
Even before the current battles over school reform, urban superintendents have not lasted long.
In 1999, their average tenure was 2.3 years, according to surveys
conducted by the Council of Great City Schools. By 2010, it had risen to
3.6 years, with observers calling for greater stability. It's now 3.2
years.
(Bucking that trend locally is Long Beach Unified, with two
superintendents — Carl Cohn and Christopher J. Steinhauser — over the
last 22 years and a reputation for steady progress and less
confrontational labor-management relations.)
Romer, an outsider, navigated through six challenging years and departed
on his own terms. His successor, Brewer, was forced out after two
years.
In 2008, veteran Supt. Cortines came in, initially to help Brewer, then
to assume the top job for 21/2 years. Behind the scenes, some civic
leaders, including then-Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa, concluded that
Cortines wasn't moving fast enough and nudged him toward retirement.
Deasy was brought in. His policies prompted resistance, but his undoing
was also a product of alienating board members and teachers, as well as
missteps with an effort to provide iPads to all students and a new
student records system.
Romer, 86, said that despite the challenges, he looks back fondly on the experience.
"It was the most joyous job I had, 16 hours a day," he said. "I loved
it, because it's the most important work. There is so much at stake."
STUDY FINDS READING TO CHILDREN OF ALL AGES GROOMS THEM TO READ MORE ON THEIR OWN
ONLY 17 PERCENT OF ALL CHILDREN SURVEYED BY
SCHOLASTIC REPORTED HAVING TIME TO READ A BOOK OF THEIR CHOICE AT SCHOOL
DAILY.
By Motoko Rich | New York Times | http://nyti.ms/1FFNw85
January 8, 2015 :: Cue the hand-wringing about digital distraction:
Fewer children are reading books frequently for fun, according to a new
report released Thursday by Scholastic, the children’s book publisher.
In a 2014 survey of just over 1,000 children ages 6 to 17, only 31
percent said they read a book for fun almost daily, down from 37 percent
four years ago.
There were some consistent patterns among the heavier readers: For the
younger children — ages 6 to 11 — being read aloud to regularly and
having restricted online time were correlated with frequent reading; for
the older children — ages 12 to 17 — one of the largest predictors was
whether they had time to read on their own during the school day.
The finding about reading aloud to children long after toddlerhood may
come as a surprise to some parents who read books to children at bedtime
when they were very young but then tapered off. Last summer, the
American Academy of Pediatrics announced a new policy recommending that
all parents read to their children from birth.
“A lot of parents assume that once kids begin to read independently,
that now that is the best thing for them to do,” said Maggie McGuire,
the vice president for a website for parents operated by Scholastic.
But reading aloud through elementary school seemed to be connected to a
love of reading generally. According to the report, 41 percent of
frequent readers ages 6 to 10 were read aloud to at home, while only 13
percent of infrequent readers were being read to.
Scholastic, which operates book fairs in schools and publishes popular
children’s books including the Harry Potter and Captain Underpants
series, has been commissioning the “Kids and Family Reading Report”
since 2006. For the first time this year, the report, conducted by
YouGov, a market research firm, looked at predictors that children of
different ages would be frequent readers, defined as children who read
books for fun five or more days a week.
Kristen Harmeling, a partner at YouGov who worked on the report, said
that children in the survey frequently cited reading aloud as a special
bonding time with their parents. As children age, “I don’t think that
parents know how important that time and the role that it plays in
children’s lives,” she said.
Of course, children who love to read are generally immersed in
households with lots of books and parents who like to read. So while
parents who read to their children later in elementary school may
encourage those children to become frequent readers on their own, such
behavior can also result from “a whole constellation of other things
that goes on in those families,” said Timothy Shanahan, professor
emeritus of urban education at the University of Illinois at Chicago and
a past president of the International Reading Association.
There is not yet strong research that connects reading aloud at older
ages to improved reading comprehension. But some literacy experts said
that when parents or teachers read aloud to children even after they can
read themselves, the children can hear more complex words or stories
than they might tackle themselves.
“It’s this idea of marinating children in higher-level vocabulary,” said
Pam Allyn, founder of LitWorld.Org, a nonprofit group that works to
increase literacy among young people. “The read-aloud can really lift
the child.”
Other literacy experts say the real value of reading to children is
helping to develop background knowledge in all kinds of topics as well
as exposure to sophisticated language.
“It wouldn’t have to be reading” to accomplish that, said Catherine
Snow, a professor at the Harvard Graduate School of Education. “A
two-minute conversation about something on television or something in a
magazine or something that you’re reading yourself can also have some of
the same positive effects as reading aloud.”
Although the Scholastic report found that teenagers were more likely to
read frequently for fun if they had dedicated independent reading time
in school, only 17 percent of all children surveyed reported having time
to read a book of their choice at school daily. Just 10 percent of 12-
to 14-year-olds and 4 percent of 15- to 17-year-olds reported having
that time in class. Such reading time at school may be particularly
important for low-income children, who reported that they were more
likely to read for fun at school than at home.
While previous studies have shown little connection between independent
reading time at school and better reading habits or comprehension, some
large school districts, including Boston and Chicago, encourage teachers
to include time in the day for students to pick books and read.
Parents also see a connection. Emily Skelding, a mother of four in New
Orleans and a former middle school teacher, said that her eldest son,
Sumner, 15, used to devour books as a child. But now that he has no time
at school to read on his own — or perhaps more significant, to choose
the books he wants to read — “he stopped reading for pleasure,” Ms.
Skelding said.
●● Dr. Stephen Krashen writes to the NY Times: IN-SCHOOL INDEPENDENT READING WORKS
Sent to the New York Times, Jan 8 | http://bit.ly/1xWWdWt
I was astounded to read that studies show that independent reading time
in school has "little connection" to more or better reading ("Study
Finds Reading to Children of All Ages Grooms Them to Read More on Their
Own," January 8).
This claim, announced by the National Reading Panel nearly 15 years ago,
was based on a small, incomplete sample of studies and was replete with
errors in reporting. Study after study [http://bit.ly/1xWWdWt] has confirmed by sustained silent reading works for all ages, first and second language, and in a variety of locations.
►Stephen Krashen is professor emeritus at the University of Southern
California, who moved from the linguistics department to the faculty of
the School of Education in 1994. He is an expert on language
acquisition.
●● smf’s 2¢: Of course reading to+with kids is good. Silent reading is
good and reading out loud is good. Of course independent reading in
school is good. Listening in a circle on the floor, reading in the
library and on a bench in playground and on the bus and under the covers
with a flashlight – all good.
Read Aloud.
All alone -
Or in a crowd.
In a box.
With a fox.
In a house.
With a mouse.
Fiction and non
Poetry and verse
Stories with Wizards
And Hobbits
And worse!
Biography.
Literature.
Fantasy.
Fact.
The story of the digestive tract.
Fairy tales -
Three ninety eight point two
And great white whales
Can happen to you!
Read – or read to
Here or there.
Read – or read to
Anywhere!
I do so like
Green eggs and ham!
Thank you!
Thank you,
Sam-I-am!
HIGHLIGHTS, LOWLIGHTS & THE NEWS THAT DOESN'T
FIT: The Rest (but not necessarily the best) of the Stories from Other
Sources
MiSiS Reset - LAUSD’s PLAN TO SUPPORT THE SECOND
SEMESTER OPENING: Cortines: “…I have asked Microcomputer Support
Assistants and Dawn Patrol Staff to immediately call the central MiSiS
triage room if they see more than 10 students at a school without
schedules after 10 A.M.”| http://bit.ly/1ADgb8e
___________
WILL TEST-BASED TEACHER EVALUATIONS DERAIL THE COMMON CORE? | http://bit.ly/1ICIcP4
Restorative Justice: LOS ANGELES POLICY SHIFT YIELDS DECLINE IN SCHOOL SUSPENSIONS | http://bit.ly/1tXFmmt
LABOR BOARD RULING: LAUSD MUST REPEAL TEACHER EVALUATION SYSTEM | 3 stories + UTLA press release | http://bit.ly/1sjTcyw
Cartoon in questionable taste: “HEY KIDS, DON’T DRAW MOHAMMED!” | http://bit.ly/1A5Rn5Z
Retweet: AN ADMINISTRATIVE LAW JUDGE SIDES WITH L.A. TEACHERS UNION IN
OBJECTIONS TO NEW TEACHER EVALUATION SYSTEM. L.A. Unified responds that
judge sided with district on some key teacher evaluation issues, with
much of system able to go forward | http://ow.ly/H5tUt
She’s back!: CAPRICE YOUNG BROUGHT IN TO HEAD MAGNOLIA CHARTER SCHOOLS | 3 stories+smf’s 2¢” http://bit.ly/1tTXI7R
OBAMA TO PROPOSE TWO FREE YEARS OF COMMUNITY COLLEGE FOR STUDENTS | http://bit.ly/1xZyh3a
ARNE DUNCAN TO CALL FOR REPEAL+REPLACING OF NCLB | http://bit.ly/1ABbxdm
FAFSA: SENATORS ALEXANDER, BENNET WOULD CUT 100-QUESTION STUDENT AID FORM TO 2 QUESTIONS | http://bit.ly/17qeBNj
Retweet from LA Times: FORMER L.A. SCHOOL BOARD PRESIDENT CAPRICE YOUNG WILL HEAD EMBATTLED MAGNOLIA CHARTER SCHOOLS. More soon.
PARENTS, YOU’RE VOLUNTEERED: Charter schools' volunteer demands may discourage needy students + smf’s 2¢ | http://bit.ly/1wyUj9X
BAY STATE SMACKDOWN: DUNCAN:“Mass leads nation in Ed.” OPPONENT: “Who says Common Core advocates don't like fiction?” http://bit.ly/1wZVI8s
#JeSuisCharlie | Cartoon by Michael Shaw, The New Yorker Feb 2006 | http://bit.ly/1A5R5Mh
THE NEXT SUPERINTENDENT: L.A. Unified must decide on nsider or outsider as its next chief ...and on pace of reform | http://bit.ly/1xRo6O3
BAY AREA TEACHERS MAKE PROGRESS ON SALARY/CONTRACT NEGOTIATIONS AMID LAUSD/UTLA STANDSTILL + smf’s 2¢ | http://bit.ly/13XSw6e
DEPT OF ED REVIEW OF LAUSD CCTP iPADS PROJECT & MiSiS CITES LACK OF LEADERSHIP, STRATEGY, PLANNING, GOALS & METRICS http://bit.ly/1IhKhja
THE PLOT TO OVERHAUL NO CHILD LEFT BEHIND: The GOP plan could dramatically roll back the federal role in education | http://bit.ly/1wQBXjE
STUDENTS AT STRUGGLING DREW MIDDLE SCHOOL LEARN SKILL THROUGH DEBATE | http://bit.ly/1ytqLAe
THE HOPES OF TEACHERS IN 2015! | http://bit.ly/17e6l2K
EVENTS: Coming up next week...
TUESDAY 13 JAN
●REGULAR BOARD MEETING - January 13, 2015 - 10:00 a.m. - including Closed Session Items
●REGULAR BOARD MEETING - January 13, 2015 - 1:00 p.m.
THURSDAY 15 JAN
●BUDGET, FACILITIES, AND AUDIT COMMITTEE - January 15, 2015 - 11:00 am
FRIDAY NIGHT 16 JAN: TWO THINGS AT ONCE!
● 1. You are invited to join STATE SUPERINTENDENT OF PUBLIC INSTRUCTION
TOM TORLAKSON at an INAUGURATION RECEPTION on Friday, January 16, from
5:30-7:30 p.m. at the William Turner Gallery, Bergamont Station Arts
Center, 2525 Michigan Avenue, Suite E-1, in Santa Monica.
Please RSVP in you plan to attend! | http://bit.ly/1sdmv5Q
● 2: POLITICS OR PEDAGOGY WITH JOHN CROMSHOW - KPFK 90.7 FM / KPFK.org
6:30-7:30 p . m . | Friday , January 16, 2015 | “Education and the Power of the Media” Call-in : (818) 985-5735
*Dates and times subject to change. ________________________________________
• SCHOOL CONSTRUCTION BOND OVERSIGHT COMMITTEE:
http://www.laschools.org/bond/
Phone: 213-241-5183
____________________________________________________
• LAUSD FACILITIES COMMUNITY OUTREACH CALENDAR:
http://www.laschools.org/happenings/
Phone: 213-241.8700
What can YOU do?
• E-mail, call or write your school board member:
Tamar.Galatzan@lausd.net • 213-241-6386
Monica.Garcia@lausd.net • 213-241-6180
Bennett.Kayser@lausd.net • 213-241-5555
George.McKenna@lausd.net • 213-241-6382
Monica.Ratliff@lausd.net • 213-241-6388
Richard.Vladovic@lausd.net • 213-241-6385
Steve.Zimmer@lausd.net • 213-241-6387
...or your city councilperson, mayor, the governor, member of congress,
senator - or the president. Tell them what you really think! • Find
your state legislator based on your home address. Just go to: http://bit.ly/dqFdq2 • There are 26 mayors and five county supervisors representing jurisdictions within LAUSD, the mayor of LA can be reached at mayor@lacity.org • 213.978.0600
• Call or e-mail Governor Brown: 213-897-0322 e-mail: http://www.govmail.ca.gov/
• Open the dialogue. Write a letter to the editor. Circulate these
thoughts. Talk to the principal and teachers at your local school.
• Speak with your friends, neighbors and coworkers. Stay on top of education issues. Don't take my word for it!
• Get involved at your neighborhood school. Join your PTA. Serve on a School Site Council. Be there for a child.
• If you are eligible to become a citizen, BECOME ONE.
• If you a a citizen, REGISTER TO VOTE.
• If you are registered, VOTE LIKE THE FUTURE DEPENDS ON IT. THEY DO!
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