Betsy DeVos tries to shame teachers on Twitter, gets taken to school instead.

Does this look familiar? Students lined up in rows. A teacher in front of a blackboard. Sit down; don’t talk; eyes up front. Wait for the bell. Walk to the next class. Everything about our lives has moved beyond the industrial era. But American education largely hasn’t. #SXSWEDU pic.twitter.com/kyy2r7bTud

— Betsy DeVos (@BetsyDeVosED) March 6, 2018

Okay now those images look exactly like the classrooms that I sat in while I attended elementary school way back in the 1960's.

However I also fairly recently worked in public schools and I know something that apparently Betsy DeVos, the actual Secretary of Education, does not.

Here let some real teachers do a little educating.

Don’t you know that stock photos aren’t real? How many classrooms have you visited in the past year? Classrooms don’t look like that anymore. Students don’t work like that anymore. I would think that as Sec of Edu you would be celebrating us, not putting us down. #Bye pic.twitter.com/GPDr1aS7vp

— Teresa Hurtado (@MissHurtad0KISD) March 6, 2018

Ok, first of all, give Stock Photo teacher some credit, she has the whole class eager to share. (Her biggest problem, tbh, is the lack of decorations. Put a poster up on your stock photo walls!) Secondly, this is a real, public school classroom right here: pic.twitter.com/sU8hYnn7SY

— PostMalonialism (@Mr_Orlopp) March 7, 2018

No. It doesn't look familiar. THIS is what public school looks like. pic.twitter.com/OYYrXvIRq2

— LPG (@puckettgarcia) March 7, 2018

Damn teachers do not play when you insult the progress they have made in their teaching methods and classroom atmospheres.

But this last tweet really put the nail in Miss Betsy's coffin.

Meanwhile at the DeVos funded West Michigan Aviation School... pic.twitter.com/8Dutpd43iZ

— Kristen Famiano (@kfam) March 6, 2018

Now THAT is the kind of burn which leaves a lasting mark right there.

So it appears that Trump's Education Secretary not only got school by the Parkland students, but our amazing public school teachers as well.

Good choice there Donnie!

Florida public school teacher had secret life as an online white supremacist provocateur.

Courtesy of HuffPo: 

Dayanna Volitich, a 25-year-old social studies teacher at Crystal River Middle School in Florida, has been secretly hosting the white nationalist podcast “Unapologetic” under the pseudonym “Tiana Dalichov” and bragging about teaching her views in a public school, HuffPost has discovered. 

In her most recent podcast on Feb. 26, a guest railed against diversity in schools, dismissing the idea that “a kid from Nigeria and a kid who came from Sweden are supposed to learn exactly the same” and have the “same IQ.” Volitich enthusiastically agreed with the guest, and went on to argue that “science” has proven that certain races are smarter than others. 

In the same episode, Volitich boasted about bringing her white nationalist beliefs into the classroom and hiding her ideology from administrators. She said that when parents complained to the school’s principal about how she is injecting political bias into the classroom, Volitich lied to the principal and said it was not true. 

“She believed me and backed off,” she said. 

Volitich also agreed with her guest’s assertion that more white supremacists need to infiltrate public schools and become teachers. “They don’t have to be vocal about their views, but get in there!” her guest said. “Be more covert and just start taking over those places.” 

“Right,” Volitich said. “I’m absolutely one of them.” 

Huffington Post did a pretty admirable job of linking this "Tiana Dalichov" character to public school teacher Dayanna Volitich.

Heavy.com also found where Volitich, as "Tiana Dalichov," criticized the victims of the Florida school shooting, and even confronted them online.

They also featured part of her podcast which leaves no doubt that these two people are one and the same.

Thankfully, partly due to their efforts, she has now been removed from the classroom where she can no longer poison the minds of her students:

“The teacher has been removed from the classroom and the investigation is ongoing. Pursuant to Florida Statute an open investigation and materials related to it are exempt from public record and cannot be discussed until the investigation is complete,” the statement from Citrus County schools said.

Remember how we talked about the election of Donald Trump empowering these cowards and making them feel bold enough to come out of the woodwork?

Well this is yet another example of that very thing.

At least one shot fired today as high school teacher held off police for over 30 minutes after barricading himself in a classroom.

Randal Davidson

Courtesy of Time: 

A teacher barricaded himself inside a locked classroom at a Georgia high school on Wednesday and apparently fired a single shot from a handgun, authorities said. 

No students were in the classroom at the time, and the only injury reported was a student who hurt their ankle running when Dalton High School was evacuated. 

The teacher was identified by the Dalton Police Department as 53-year-old Jesse Randall Davidson, a social studies teacher and play-by-play voice of the Dalton football team. 

Police spokesman Bruce Frazier said the teacher was taken into custody after a 30- to 45-minute standoff with officers.

VIDEO: Dalton High students running to safety after reports of shots fired. @DaltonPD says the suspect is believed to be a teacher. Suspect is in custody. Video credit Dalton HS Student @wesleycaceres5. @wsbtv pic.twitter.com/pFyoBVbtFc

— Chris Jose (@ChrisJoseWSB) February 28, 2018

Here is more from the Atlantic Journal-Constitution:  

The incident at Dalton High School, about 91 miles northwest of downtown Atlanta, sent panicked students running through hallways and alarmed parents already on edge in the wake of a mass shooting earlier this month at a Florida high school.

About 11:30 a.m., some students tried to get into Randal Davidson’s classroom and he would not let them in, Dalton police spokesman Bruce Frazier said. 

They alerted the principal. When the principal came to the door and used his key to try to open it, Davidson forcibly closed it on him, Frazier said. 

At that point, the principal heard a gunshot. Police have not said what type of gun was used, only that it was a handgun. 

"We had officers inside the building quickly,” Frazier said. Officers evacuated a hallway and secured the area first. 

During the evacuation, a female student was hurt, police said. That student is being treated by emergency officials for an ankle injury.

As the incident was unfolding at least one Dalton High student made the obvious observation.

@nra my favorite teacher at Dalton high school just blockaded his door and proceeded to shoot. We had to run out The back of the school in the rain. Students were being trampled and screaming. I dare you to tell me arming teachers will make us safe.

— Chondi🌙 (@_omg_chondi_) February 28, 2018

You do not know if a person is a "bad guy with a gun" until they do something bad with that gun.

Until then they are just a person with a gun.

And people, even good people, have very bad days.

Having access to a firearm can make that very bad day, a deadly day for them, and for those around them. 

In short sending armed, overworked teachers into American classrooms is fucking stupid!

During the school massacre in Florida there was an armed sheriff's deputy on scene. He hid until the shooting stopped.

Courtesy of the New York Times:

The only armed sheriff’s deputy at a Florida high school where 17 people were killed took cover outside rather than charging into the building when the massacre began, the Broward County sheriff said on Thursday. The sheriff also acknowledged that his office received 23 calls related to the suspect going back a decade, including one last year that said he was collecting knives and guns, but may not have adequately followed up. 

The deputy, Scot Peterson, resigned on Thursday after being suspended without pay after Sheriff Scott Israel reviewed surveillance video. 

“He never went in,” Sheriff Israel said in a news conference. He said the video showed Deputy Peterson doing “nothing.” 

“There are no words,” said Sheriff Israel, who described himself as “devastated, sick to my stomach.” 

So roll that around in your mind a little, here was a trained law enforcement agent who panicked when the bullets started flying, and Donald Trump expects regular classroom teachers to walk into a hail of gunfire and kill an armed intruder?

By the way this is how a number of teachers responded to the idea of carrying weapons to school.

Guys, I’m a college professor.

I’ve also been shooting guns my entire life and own multiple guns now.

I don’t trust myself to be able to capably defend a classroom against a shooter, and I’m a good shot.

Why would we expect teachers everywhere to bear this responsibility?

— Josh Grubbs (@JoshuaGrubbsPhD) February 21, 2018

#CNNTownHall As a teacher, I’m letting you know I’m not carrying a gun to work. I’m not bringing guns around my children. I am not a police officer or in the army for a reason, I teach kids — I don’t go to war every day. My job is to educate children.

— skye l. (@skyelorenn) February 22, 2018

I’m a teacher. Don’t give me a gun. Give me the supplies I need, the salary I deserve, and the common-sense gun laws to protect my kids.

— Jocelyn ✡️ (@jocelyndorf) February 20, 2018

And your solution is to arm teachers??? Are you fucking insane?? I'm a teacher, I teach children. I've been in the army, I've made the choice to no longer be a soldier, but a teacher!

— Lucien (@LucienOldenb) February 22, 2018

This is idea is ridiculous and no serious person should even consider it as a solution to school shootings.

Mother Jones also took a look at the NRA's idea for "hardening our schools" and they are chilling.

Some of the ideas include putting up prison yard style fencing, getting rid of trees, getting rid of parking lots (Well that will be super convenient for parents and staff.), installing thicker, heavier doors, vastly reducing the number of windows, and for the windows they do keep, making sure they are made of “ballistic protective glass.”

This is not an environment in which to learn, this is an environment in which to serve time AFTER you have killed somebody with a gun.

It is where a school shooter ends up, not the children that he wanted to target.

School teachers report from the front lines about what they are seeing in Trump's America.

Courtesy of NPR: 

Previous surveys we've reported on, including one from the Southern Poverty Law Center, also found increases in school bullying related to overheated political rhetoric. 

The UCLA survey, unlike those, relies on a nationally representative sample: 1,535 teachers at schools whose demographics reflect those of U.S. schools as a whole, rather than pulling from self-selecting volunteers. Also, the survey was conducted after President Trump took office. Along with the survey, researchers at the UCLA Institute for Democracy, Education and Access conducted 35 follow-up interviews by phone. 

Here are some of the key findings: 

• 79 percent of teachers reported that students have expressed concerns for their well-being or the well-being of their families because of what is in the news. Most commonly mentioned was immigration, but the list also included the much-publicized travel ban, restrictions on LGBTQ rights, threats to the Affordable Care Act and threats to the environment. 
• 51 percent of teachers reported more students experiencing "high levels of stress and anxiety." 
• 44 percent of teachers reported that students' concerns were affecting learning. In interviews, they spoke about students who seemed stressed, distracted and who were contributing less to class discussion for fear of drawing attention to themselves. 
• 41 percent of teachers reported that students were more likely than in previous years to introduce unfounded claims in class discussions, such as from Facebook or talk radio. 
• 27 percent of teachers reported an increase in students making derogatory remarks about other groups during class discussions. This included sexist as well as racist and anti-Muslim comments. 
• 20 percent of teachers reported heightened polarization on campus and incivility in their classrooms. 

These last two figures were higher for teachers at predominantly white schools, says John Rogers, lead author of the report and a professor at UCLA's graduate school of education. He noted that teachers in eight states used the word "emboldened" to describe some white students' increasingly racist and offensive behavior. 

The report is not comprehensive, and there's no easy way to compare its results with those during any previous administration. But it speaks to an ongoing national discussion about civil discourse and civic engagement inside and outside the classroom.

When I say in the headline that teachers are on the "front line" I mean that literally as they are often the ones who first recognize shifts in how young people respond to the mood of a country, or how attitudes are evolving concerning racism, sexism, or tolerance of "the other."

During the Obama Administration it seemed that the country was moving rapidly toward more progressive attitudes, hope for the future, and acceptance of others.

But now with Trump in the White House it appears that we returned to intolerance and divisiveness almost overnight.

Oklahoma teacher takes to panhandling to raise money for school supplies and public awareness as well.

Courtesy of Fox 23 News: 

A Tulsa teacher is making a bold statement about the state of education as she pleads for money at a local intersection in order to pay for classroom supplies. 

Teresa Danks is a third grade teacher in the Tulsa Public Schools systems.

As a result of serious education budget cuts, Danks says she is now spending between $2,000 and $3,000 of her $35,000 salary on supplies for her students. 

Oklahoma ranks nearly last in teacher pay when compared to other states across the U.S.

There is nothing unusual about that by the way, a LOT of teachers are forced to spend their own money to make sure that their students have the materials that they need to learn in the classroom. 

And good for this teacher to bring attention to that fact, and to hopefully shame some of the politicians in her area to start adequately funding public education.

Perhaps the greatest picture that will ever be taken in the Oval Office while Trump is president.

Courtesy of Yahoo News:

Presidential photo ops are normally a staid affair, but Rhode Island teacher Nikos Giannopoulos brought some unique flair to the Oval Office when he met with President Donald Trump. 

Giannopoulos carried a black lace fan that he unfurled alongside Trump at the Resolute desk in order to, as he put it in a Facebook post, “celebrate the joy and freedom of gender nonconformity.” Giannopoulos met Trump with a group of other teachers on April 26, but he only received a copy of his picture with the president this week. Since he posted the photo on Facebook on Thursday, it has gained widespread attention and, as of this writing, was shared over 2,600 times. 

“I walked into the Oval Office, I was probably like the fourth person to walk in,” Giannopoulos told Yahoo News in a Friday phone interview. “I kind of popped open my fan just to be kind of a little bit sassy, as I am prone to being.” 

According to Giannpoulos, Trump immediately took notice of the fashion accessory. 

“I started fanning myself and he complimented the fan actually, so that was his first sentence to me. It was basically, ‘Oh, I like the fan.’ And then he also told me that I was very stylish,” Giannopoulos said.

Giannopoulos teaches special ed students in Rhode Island so he is undoubtedly used to dealing with individuals with Trump's intellectual limitations. 

I think this should be a new thing when getting your picture taken with Trump.

Just try to do something that will be both eye catching and ultimately embarrassing to him personally, and every inbred redneck who voted for him.

Palin picks up on her daughter's ghostwritten post about mean liberal teachers and makes it even dumber.

Courtesy of Palin's the Grizzled Mama's Facebook page: 

Teachers Unhinged 

Piper's endurance of incidents like this is admirable. The problem is when a teacher seeks to hurt a child who may not be as resilient as Piper has had to learn to be, that teacher will have scarred another child while never being held accountable. 

Funniest thing after this incident with the local Drama teacher was Piper's comment, "And of course, Mom, he drives a Prius." 

- Sarah Palin

"Unhinged teachers?"

There's some obvious projection for you.

Of course as I pointed out when this story first appeared two days ago over at Bristol's ghostwritten blog, it is VERY unlikely that anything like this happened, or that it happened in the way the Palin family ghostwriters describe it.

It is just another opportunity to garner sympathy by hiding behind the kids, and they are so dedicated to this methodology that they even decided to use it twice.

As Donald Trump would say, Sad. 

By the way, and just a little off topic, it appears that Dakota just bought Piper a car.

Okay just how much do former Medal of Honor recipients get paid? 

Because right now I have no idea what he actually does for a living.

Anchorage School board passes budget that dramatically cuts back on classroom teachers and support staff.

Courtesy of ADN:

The Anchorage School Board on Tuesday unanimously passed a budget for next school year that cuts dozens of classroom teaching positions to partially close a $15.3 million budget gap. 

The seven-member board voted on the budget after about 30 minutes of discussion at its evening meeting, leaving the document crafted by the district administration largely unchanged. 

Assuming the state Legislature doesn't decrease or increase per-pupil state funding, the $563.6 million general fund budget for the 2017-18 school year results in the net loss of about 123 "full-time equivalent" positions, including 99 teachers, to save about $7.2 million total. 

"This budget document is not as rosy as I would like it to be, but it's the circumstances that we are in — when you have flat revenue and increasing expenditures," said Anchorage School Board member Kathleen Plunkett. "We're not going to be able to do everything that I know we would all love to do."

As I think I have made abundantly clear over the years I am a huge advocate for spending on public education, so I find this very troubling. 

When I graduated from high school, Alaska's schools were some of the best in the nation.

Since that time I have watched our schools suffer from budget deficits, diminishing support for our teachers, and of course the implementation of NCLB.

These budget cuts leave already overworked teachers with less support and even less of the time and resources they need to do their jobs effectively.

Ultimately all of this hurts the kids.

Trust me if these people REALLY believed that children were our future, public school teachers would be the LAST jobs they would look to cut from the budget.

You mark my words, the state income tax is coming.

It has been 37 years since Governor Hammond signed that bill back in 1980 to eliminate our state income tax but I think with the oil revenue drying up that the writing is on the wall.

And I have to say that if it helps to keep teachers on the job, I would have no problem paying a little more in taxes. 

Bristol Palin's ghostwritten blog tells a story about her sister being targeted by a liberal teacher. Moose poop doesn't really smell, but this does.

The first part of the poorly written post deals with an incident in New York, and then extrapolates to include, as always, a member of the Palin family.

In this case poor put upon little Piper Palin: 

Recently, my 10th grade sister actually just had something awkward happen to her at school. A liberal teacher, someone who has always hated my mom, went on a rant about President Donald Trump. This alone should be disturbing, but you can see it happens all over the nation to unsuspecting kids all the time. Of course, this teacher’s political rant turned into and (sic) anti-Sarah Palin rant. (Because why wouldn’t it?) 

Then, the teacher told the kids in his class that they should tell Piper what he said and how they feel about my mom’s politics! 

I couldn’t believe it. 

A few days later, after the teacher was sent to the principal’s office – literally – and interviewed by the principal, the teacher apologized to my dad. 

But what about the damage done to the kids in that class? What about the fact that teachers across America feel perfectly fine teaching kids THEIR version of American politics… what happens when people are spewing their political beliefs and the politician’s kid ISN’T in the class? 

I hope teachers start suffering some consequences (Yeah. I'll bet you do.)– but you know that probably won’t happen!

Okay first off we should remember that before Donald Trump was busy lying everyday to the American people, Sarah Palin and her family were doing that already. 

Secondly this supposedly happened in a Wasilla school, in one of the reddest parts of the state.

Do we really believe that in that atmosphere a teacher would let their liberal flag fly?

The word you are looking for here is "unlikely."

My take is that, at Sarah's urging, Bristol's ghostwriter took a completely unrelated incident and worked to somehow make it about the poor downtrodden Palins being victimized once again by some heartless liberal. 

We have seen this play out time and time again. (Remember Joe McGinniss supposedly peeking through Piper's bedroom window?)

I will say this, comparing Bristol's ghostwritten blog to her mother's click bait saturated ghostwritten "website," certainly makes Bristol's look ten times better.

I mean at least there is sometimes actual content there, whereas Palin's is empty and devoid of any personality at all.

Teachers take on the herculean task of teaching their students the difference between fake news and real journalism.

Courtesy of AP: 

Teachers from elementary school through college are telling students how to distinguish between factual and fictional news — and why they should care that there's a difference. 

As Facebook works with The Associated Press, FactCheck.org and other organizations to curb the spread of fake and misleading news on its influential network, teachers say classroom instruction can play a role in deflating the kind of "Pope endorses Trump " headlines that muddied the waters during the 2016 presidential campaign. 

"I think only education can solve this problem," said Pat Winters Lauro, a professor at Kean University in New Jersey who began teaching a course on news literacy this semester. 

Like others, Lauro has found discussions of fake news can lead to politically sensitive territory. Some critics believe fake stories targeting Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton helped Donald Trump overcome a large deficit in public opinion polls, and President Trump himself has attached the label to various media outlets and unfavorable reports and polls in the first weeks of his presidency. 

"It hasn't been a difficult topic to teach in terms of material because there's so much going on out there," Lauro said, "but it's difficult in terms of politics because we have such a divided country and the students are divided, too, on their beliefs. I'm afraid sometimes that they think I'm being political when really I'm just talking about journalistic standards for facts and verification, and they look at it like 'Oh, you're anti-this or -that.'"

Leave it to our heroic public school teachers to take on yet another almost impossible responsibility that the children's parents are ill equipped or simply unwilling to take on themselves.

Fortunately for the teachers there is also some help coming from both Google and Facebook who promise to do their part in identifying and rejecting fake news sites and making it harder for impressionable young minds to stumble upon them.

Would have been nice to have all of this happen before the 2016 election put that shitgibbon in the White House, but I guess it's better late than never.

As it turns out Donald Trump did offer Jerry Falwell Jr. the Secretary of Education cabinet position and he turned him down.

Courtesy of Yahoo News: 

Liberty University President Jerry Falwell Jr. says President elect-Donald Trump offered him the job of education secretary, but that he turned it down for personal reasons. 

Falwell tells The Associated Press that Trump offered him the job last week during a meeting in New York. He says Trump wanted a four- to six-year commitment, but that he couldn't leave Liberty for more than two years. 

Falwell says he couldn't afford to work at a Cabinet-level job for longer than that and didn't want to move his family, especially his 16-year-old daughter.

Holy shitballs!

The fact that Trump offered this position to Falwell suggests to me that he really determined to gut out education system in this country.

And as much as I would be terrified with Falwell in such an important position I am not at all sure that Betsy DeVos is really any better.

The NCLB program that Bush introduced was devastating to the teachers and students in this country, but whatever Trump has in mind could be infinitely worse.

Meet Betsy DeVos, Donald Trump's choice as Secretary of Education.

And here I thought that Jerry Falwell Jr. would be the worst possible choice.

This is going to be a VERY bad four years for public education in this country. Let's hope it survives until the next presidency/

Teachers continue to report on the "Trump effect."

Courtesy of Peoples World:

Classroom teachers report that during this political campaign season an alarming number of students have been mirroring Donald Trump’s bullying, disrespectful behavior. They also report a rising level of fear and anxiety among children whose races, religions or nationalities have been Trump targets. 

The teachers are calling it the “Trump effect,” National Education Association (NEA) President Lily Eskelsen García said in a media call yesterday. “The harm the Trump effect is doing to our students is bigger than politics,” she stressed. 

“I was heartbroken when a 14 year old girl in my class sobbed that if Trump is elected she’ll be sent back to Peru,” Joy Bock, an Ohio middle school social studies teacher, said during the media call. “She was born in this country, but her parents had said that if Trump is elected the family wouldn’t be safe.” 

Several months ago in Iowa, white students rooting for their high school basketball team held up pictures of Trump and yelled “build the wall” to taunt Latino students playing on the opposing team. The same thing happened in Indiana. 

Muslim children across the nation as young as eight or nine years old are being called “terrorists” by other kids. At several schools, bullies are pulling hajibs off the heads of Muslim girls and yelling “Trump! Trump!” 

These are not isolated cases of bigotry. The Southern Poverty Law Center has published a survey of approximately 2,000 K-12 teachers called The Trump Effect: The Impact of the Presidential Campaign on Our Nation’s Schools. Among the teachers asked, more than one-third have observed an increase in anti-Muslim or anti-immigrant sentiment and more than half said they’ve seen an increase in uncivil political discourse.

Gee usually Republican politicians have to actually be elected before they start screwing up the country. 

However Donald Trump is a menace whose negativity will not be restrained nor contained by a mere election.

He must be stopped, period.

By the way you may remember that Hillary Clinton pointed all of this out almost two months ago.

Teachers are abandoning Kansas by the boatload.

Courtesy of KCUR:  

The number of teachers leaving Kansas or simply quitting the profession has dramatically increased over the last four years. 

The annual Licensed Personnel Report was released Tuesday by the Kansas Department of Education. While it was provided to the Board of Education meeting in Topeka Tuesday, the report was buried in board documents and not addressed by either staff or the board. 

The report shows that 1,075 teachers left the profession last year, up from 669 four years ago. That's a 61 percent increase. 

The number of teachers who left the state doubled in the last four years, from 413 in 2012 school year to 831 in the last school year. 

“When you’re under attack almost continually and called lazy and overpaid and incompetent of course you’re going to leave the first chance you get,” says Mark Desetti, the top lobbyist for the Kansas National Education Association (KNEA). “It’s just shocking to me.”

This literally drives me nuts.

The Republicans may think that undermining education in this country is a good idea in the short run, because you know uneducated people are more likely to vote for them, but in the long run it is damaging our ability to make technological advances, utilize problem solving skills, and compete in a global job market.

Suggesting that children are our most important resource is not just a campaign slogan, it is a fact.

Diane Ravitch explains exactly why education is in crisis here in America.

Courtesy of HuffPo: 

It has become conventional wisdom that “education is in crisis.” I have been asked about this question by many interviewers. They say something like: “Do you think American education is in crisis? What is the cause of the crisis?” And I answer, “Yes, there is a crisis, but it is not the one you have read about. The crisis in education today is an existential threat to the survival of public education. The threat comes from those who unfairly blame the school for social conditions, and then create a false narrative of failure. The real threat is privatization and the loss of a fundamental democratic institution.” 

As we have seen again and again, the corporate education industry is eager to break into U.S. public education and turn it into a free marketplace, where they can monetize the schools and be assured of government subsidization. On the whole, these privatized institutions do not produce higher test scores than regular public schools, except for those that cherry-pick their students and exclude the neediest and lowest performing students. The promotion of privatization by philanthropies, by the U.S. Department of Education, by right-wing governors (and a few Democratic governors like Cuomo of New York and Malloy of Connecticut), by the hedge fund industry, and by a burgeoning education equities industry poses a danger to our democracy. In some communities, public schools verge on bankruptcy as charters drain their resources and their best students. Nationwide, charter schools have paved the way for vouchers by making “school choice” non-controversial. 

Yes, education is in crisis. The profession of teaching is threatened by the financial powerhouse Teach for America, which sells the bizarre idea that amateurs are more successful than experienced teachers. TFA — and the belief in amateurism — has also facilitated the passage of legislation to strip teachers of basic rights to due process and of salaries tied to experience and credentials. 

Education is in crisis because of the explosion of testing and the embrace by government of test scores as both the means and the end of education. The scores are treated as a measure of teacher effectiveness and school effectiveness, when they are in fact a measure of the family income of the students enrolled in the school. The worst consequence of the romance with standardized testing is that children are ranked, sorted, and assigned a value based on scores that are not necessarily scientific or objective. Children thus become instruments, tools, objects, rather than unique human beings, each with his or her own potential. 

Education is in crisis because of the calculated effort to turn it into a business with a bottom line. Schools are closed and opened as though they were chain stores, not community institutions. Teachers are fired based on flawed measures. Disruption is considered a strategy rather than misguided and inhumane policy. Children and educators alike are simply data points, to be manipulated by economists, statisticians, entrepreneurs, and dabblers in policy. Education has lost its way, lost its purpose, lost its definition. Where once it was about enlightening and empowering young minds with knowledge, exploring new worlds, learning about science and history, and unleashing the imagination of each child, it has become a scripted process of producing test scores that can supply data. 

Education is in crisis. And we must organize to resist, to push back, to fight the mechanization of learning, and the standardization of children.

Typically blogging etiquette suggests that I simply sample a portion of what somebody has written, link to the source, and then add my own thoughts and possibly other links as I feel necessary.

However as I read through Diane Ravitch's post I found that all of her points were important to share, and that I could really not add anything more relevant than what she had already written.

Therefore I share this post in its entirety, and if Diane Ravitch takes offense I will reluctantly take it down.

However considering her passion for getting this information out I doubt that will happen.

Organization trains Christian teachers to sneak their religion into public schools.

Courtesy of the Washington Post:  

Finn Laursen believes millions of American children are no longer learning right from wrong, in part because public schools have been stripped of religion. To repair that frayed moral fabric, Laursen and his colleagues want to bring the light of Jesus Christ into public school classrooms across the country — and they are training teachers to do just that. 

The Christian Educators Association International, an organization that sees the nation’s public schools as “the largest single mission field in America,” aims to show Christian teachers how to live their faith — and evangelize in public schools — without running afoul of the Constitution’s prohibition on the government establishing or promoting any particular religion. 

“We’re not talking about proselytizing. That would be illegal,” said Laursen, the group’s executive director. “But we’re saying you can do a lot of things. . . . It’s a mission field that you fish in differently.” 

“They appear to be encouraging teachers to cross the line,” said Daniel Mach of the American Civil Liberties Union, which fought the Christian Educators Association in a 2009 court case over Florida teachers’ religious expression at school. “Decisions about the religious upbringing of children should be left in the hands of parents and families, not public school officials.” 

Others say that there would be outrage if teachers of any other faith were being encouraged to express their beliefs in the classroom, legally or otherwise — particularly at a time when anti- Muslim sentiment is on the rise and some parents have complained that academic lessons about Islam can amount to religious indoctrination.

And that's really the crux of the issue.

These Christian educators believe that THEY are being discriminated against for their religious beliefs, when if there were another religious group using the same devious tactics they would be justifiably horrified.

THAT is why we have the separation of church and state, to protect children from proselytizing from ANY religious group or denomination.

You would think that educators might actually know that.

How much does your state support public education? Not as much as you would hope.

Courtesy of the Washington Post:

The report card is being issued Tuesday by the Network for Public Education (NPE), a nonprofit group co-founded several years ago by education historian and activist Diane Ravitch to advocate for America’s public school system. The authors evaluated states on criteria they see as promoting a professional teaching force, equitable and sufficient funding and equal opportunities for all students to succeed — all critical to the health of public schools. 

Specifically, the reports looks at how states approach high-stakes standardized testing and school finance as well as how much they promote teachers as professionals and resist privatizing public education. How states spend taxpayer money is another criterion, as is whether states promote policies that affect the income, living conditions and governmental support for students to give them all a chance to succeed in school. Some states earned A’s in a category or two but none earned higher than an overall C. 

I am both pleased to see that my state of Alaska is one of only thirteen states to achieve a grade of C, while also being horrified that C is the highest grade ANY state had achieved.

Public education is one of my sore points, and in my opinion NO state should feel satisfied with any ranking below an A, or an A- with extenuating circumstances.

However these days public education, and our teachers, are undermined, underfunded, and under empowered, and the result is dumber children, moronic adults, and voters who cannot find their asses with both hands and a road map.

Which by the way is really the driving force behind the conservative attacks on public education.

I mean come on, would an intelligent, well educated person vote for a Ted Cruz or Donald Trump?

Washington Supreme Court rules that charter schools are unconstitutional.

Courtesy of The Seattle Times:  

After nearly a year of deliberation, the state Supreme Court ruled 6-3 late Friday afternoon that charter schools are unconstitutional. 

The ruling — believed to be one of the first of its kind in the country — overturns the law voters narrowly approved in 2012 allowing publicly funded, but privately operated, schools.

In the ruling, Chief Justice Barbara Madsen wrote that charter schools aren’t “common schools” because they’re governed by appointed rather than elected boards. 

Therefore, “money that is dedicated to common schools is unconstitutionally diverted to charter schools,” Madsen wrote.

Education policy analyst and public school advocate Diane Ravitch had this to say about the ruling:  

This is a big win for parents and public schools.

I would agree and further state that I hope this is the first of many such decisions that put a stop to charter school programs that drain money and resources from the public schools while resisting any oversight from the same public whose tax money they are taking.

Listen I understand that there are some poorly run public schools in this country, and that parents really want alternatives.

But I also understand that there is a very determined anti-public education movement that uses charter schools and homeschooling as a way to undermine public schools, and their motives have far more to do with their religious faiths and ideology than they do with improving educational opportunities.

Make no mistake, public education and public school teachers are under constant fire in America and charter schools are the Trojan horse the opponents are using to get past our defenses.

(H/T Common Dreams)

The dearth of teachers is no longer confined to red states.

Courtesy of NPR:  

There are serious shortages of teachers from California to Oklahoma and Kentucky and places in between. 

A big factor: Far fewer college students are enrolling in teacher training programs, as we reported this spring, exacerbating a long-standing shortage of special education, science and English-language-learner instructors. In California, enrollment in teaching programs is down more than 50 percent over the past five years. Enrollment is down sharply in Texas, North Carolina, New York and elsewhere. 

Add to the mix stagnant pay, attrition, retirements, an improving economy as well as politicized fights over tenure and just about every other education issue and you've got the makings of a genuine problem — in some regions. 

"All of those things together are creating a serious challenge for us," Oakland Unified School District spokesman Troy Flint tells NPR Ed. "The teacher shortage we're facing in Oakland is significantly more dire than in previous years. We just don't have as many teachers in the pipeline." 

Heading into the new school year Aug. 24th, Oakland has some 50 classroom vacancies. "The biggest challenge this year has come from the nationwide teacher shortage impacting all education employers, especially California public schools," Superintendent Antwan Wilson wrote this week in an email to staff and parents. 

California has more than 21 thousand teaching positions to fill. Districts laid off or eliminated some 80,000 teaching jobs between 2008 and 2012 during the Great Recession. And as the economy rebounds more young people have more options. 

The shortage areas tend to be worse in districts with budget woes, a concentration of high-poverty areas and systems that are experiencing strong population growth.

For decades the conservatives have wanted to destroy public education in this country, and now it looks as if they are finally succeeding. 

The problem is that the lack of teachers does not only impact public schools, but also the private schools and charter schools that the conservatives want to replace them with.

And the part that is so upsetting is that this was an easily predictable outcome that in their zeal to vilify educators the conservatives simply did not want to see. 

I weep for our future.