Obama May Disqualify New York, California From Education Grants

[SoCalDem]

Obama May Disqualify New York, California From Education Grants

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601087&sid=azbmKS2sGeP8#
By Molly Peterson

July 24 (Bloomberg) -- States barring the use of student- achievement data to help set teacher pay would be ineligible for $4.35 billion in education stimulus funds under draft guidelines the Obama administration plans to announce today.

The proposal, e-mailed yesterday by the Education Department, would disqualify states such as California, New York and Wisconsin from applying for the grants unless they change rules excluding student-performance data from evaluations of teachers and principals. President Barack Obama and Education Secretary Arne Duncan, who have long pressed for merit-pay programs that reward teachers for gains in student performance, plan to announce the draft guidelines today. The nation’s largest teachers’ unions oppose linking pay to pupil achievement, saying test scores aren’t an accurate measure of teacher effectiveness.

While the summary didn’t name any states, Duncan said last month that California, New York and Wisconsin are among states with laws that create a “firewall” between student data and teacher evaluations. “To somehow suggest that we should not link student achievement and teacher effectiveness, it’s like suggesting we judge a sports team without looking at the box score,” Duncan said in a June 8 speech in Washington. “I think that’s simply ridiculous.”

snip..

Among the other criteria for the stimulus grants are a commitment to developing common, nationwide academic standards; increasing the number of “highly effective” teachers and principals in high-poverty schools; and creating more “high quality” charter schools, according to the summary. The public has 30 days to comment. The Education Department said it plans to disburse the competitive stimulus funds in two phases, awarding the first round of grants early next year and the second by September 2010. States that fail to win grants in the first phase may reapply for the second phase, the agency said.

[ccharles000]

1. k/r

[foginthemorn]

5. Why are stimulus funds being used for this political project??

This is wrong to use the money this way.

[ColbertWatcher]

2. I'm confused, wasn't that the crap behind NCLB? n/t

[SoCalDem]

3. Sort of.. NCLB, was about CLOSING schools, vouchers AND firing teachers

Apparently this plan is just about firing teachers:shrug::(:

[ColbertWatcher]

11. Well, wouldn't closing schools mean that teachers would get fired? n/t

[SoCalDem]

13. yes, of course, but this "new" approach (in some places)

closes the school, and then "re-hires" the "good" teachers when it re-opens. There was a documentary on this on PBS a while back. It focused on how great the new re-invention of the school was, once all the "bad" teachers were gone, but in one school profiled, only TWO teachers were "re-hired", and in the interim, the school got a face-lift, and a bunch of new "stuff".

The "after" was pretty much what the school had been wanting for YEARS, but only got, once the union was busted, and all but 2 teachers "let-go".

Bush's NCLB, was more aimed at the eventual CLOSING (like in forever) of the "bad" schools, and the use of vouchers to scatter the students into "storefront Jesus schools", to other public schools (with NO transportation provided), or perhaps to homeschooling..

[FrenchieCat]

4. I thought the standardized test penalized students where they couldn't graduate,

and closed down schools who weren't performing as a whole.

Didn't realize those test also singled out teachers for firing. :shrug:

[Vidar]

6. Another fine assault on teachers.

[ProgressiveProfessor]

7. I have been saying for some time that some form of teacher accountability is coming

I had been hoping the NEA etc would get in front of it, but instead they went into denial. Now they and the rank and file teachers are going to be run over. Totally foreseeable.

*sigh*

[TheMadMonk]

8. Two minds here. Properly implemented it would identify those...

...teachers who's performance is sub-par or downright abysmal. It would also identify teachers capable of getting the most out of "problem students" and putting them to work where they can do the most good for both the kids and their communities.

Badly done, as so many fear, it may well become a program for finding whipping boys to be made examples of.

[Wednesdays]

9. K&R

:kick:

[KamaAina]

10. Obama to California: Drop Dead

This is not the time to be holding California's Federal funding hostage!!! :grr: :banghead:

[ColbertWatcher]

12. It's more like: I agree with Arnold! n/t