NCLB - EDUCATIONAL MALPRACTICE
NCLB is a full-frontal assault on public education. Democratic politicians are bad on public education, Republican politicians are worse. Follow the money. The money is going to test creators like McGraw-Hill (John McGraw of McGraw-Hill was one of the very first overnight guests of the Bush White House), to outside agencies to provide tutoring (doesn't matter if they help kids learn, it just matters that the money ends up in the hands of a person of the private sector), and funneled to select companies for Reading First grants (the scandal of these grants going to "politically" friendly allies of the Bush Education Department is easily documented - just Google it). And about the money, especially in D. C.: the Washington D.C. school district has one of the highest expenditures for administration of the 100 largest school districts in the country, and one of the lowest actual classroom expenditures per student of the 100 largest school districts in the country.
NCLB has absolutely impossible goals. AYP disaggregates test-score data for any group with a pre-determined number of students (30 or 40 is the usual, but unless you have a group of at least 70 you have too small a group for any reliability). EVERY single group must demonstrated AYP in order for a school to stay off the list of "failing schools." That means if a school district has 68 groups, meets AYP in 67, it is considered a failing school, even if that group is identified as "special education" students. But teachers being teachers will attempt the impossible. But when there is failure to have EVERY student demonstrate that they can earn a successful score in a standardized reading, writing, and math test for every grade from 3-10, the creators of NCLB (see the Business Roundtable) will step and say, "See, we told you public education is a failure. Therefore, we must privatize public education." They will then be looking to put as much of the $800 Billion spent on K-12 education in this country into the smallest number of corporate CEO pockets as possible.
If teachers were required to take an oath as doctors are, they would have to decline to implement the tenets of NCLB (particularly District 6 teachers) because they would be violating the first part of the oath: “Do no harm.” NCLB does tremendous harm. It is bad legislation from the top down. It has narrowed curriculum, raised the dropout rate, and done absolutely nothing to encourage students to become active participants in their learning, or able participants in our democratic republic. NCLB is a failure for the United States and its public school students.Labels: EDUCATIONAL MALPRACTICE
TO Jonah Goldberg . . . L. A. columnist
Dear Mr. Goldberg,
"Private, parochial and charter schools get better results." Your words. And you are wrong that charter schools get better results. In Gerald Bracey's book Setting the Record Straight: Responses to Misconceptions About Public Education in the U. S., it is pointed out that charter schools are not getting better results, particularly when you compare demographically similar charter schools and public schools. Perhaps part of your own education should be to read more instead of regurgitating more of the media spin machine anti-public school nonsense.
Seeing that you cite Milton Friedman, I can't help but imagine you are among those who believe that schools should be run like a business. How sad and misguided. Schools exist to educate children and in the United States they exist to create an educated electorate to participate in our democratic republic. Students are not widgets to be manufactured.
One advantage that private, parochial, and charter schools have over public schools is control over their student population. Public schools take all comers. And for some reason, the highest correlative to test scores is the socio-economic status of the students. How about some attempt to close the income gap, then perhaps there would be some close on the achievement gap? However, if it weren't for public schools, the achievement gap would be far greater than the income gap.
For the record, I am a public school teacher in Denver, Colorado. The current political climate makes it difficult to make a difference in the lives of the kids I teach. The pressure to perform on "high-stakes" tests that have no proven value whatsoever is extreme. But the parents of a majority of the kids I teach have faith in me and my colleagues. Too bad the rest of the country, particularly the pundits and politicians don't. Despite teachers being highly-trained professionals, our judgment about students, with whom we spend an extraordinary amount of time, is relegated to the the shelf of insignificance. It seems that too many individuals, especially politicians, think that because they went to school they are experts on education. That just isn't so, and it would be nice if the policy makers and pundits would ask professional educators their opinions once in a while.
Sincerely,
Sean Michael Black, M. A., Ed. S.
Sent to Lou Dobbs in response to his comments about Detroit education:
Dear Lou,
Do you think the public education opportunities are responsible for the economic situation, or are the economic situation responsible for the education opportunities? From this public school teacher, I make the request for YOU ALL in the media to stop bashing public schools, especially for situation for which we have no control. Do you think that those responsible for hiring teachers, especially math and science teachers, look to hire unqualified teachers? There simply is not enough qualified math and science teachers available. And who could blame anyone if they chose to do ANYTHING else than teach. According to much of the mainstream media I read, teachers are to blame for the fall of Western Civilization as we know it. If we teachers are that powerful, how is it that we received NONE of the credit for the largest economic expansion in the history of the United States that occurred in the '90's, but all we hear now is that we teachers are failing to provide an adequate education for our students to compete in the 21st Century. To be honest, I think that our job isn't to prepare students to compete in the 21st Century; our job is to prepare our students to participate in our democratic republic.
Sincerely,
Sean Michael Black, M.A., Ed.S.
