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Post by Chris_Wendt on Nov 20, 2013 7:33:57 GMT -5
For those too young to remember Babatunde Olatunji, "Jin-Go-Lo-Ba!" was a track from his first hit album, Drums of Passion, which sold over 5 million copies after being released in 1960. Anyhow, the Drums of Passion continue to beat, louder, stronger... ...as passions rise against the Common Core and testing. Quote of the day: "...Ravitch, a former assistant secretary in the U.S. Department of Education, said the (Common Core) curriculum and assessments do not measure student success. They are costly and poorly designed, she said, and set up students to fail." Read the latest, but certainly not the last installment in today's Newsday.com ARTICLE (link).. Personally, I strongly advise against official disobedience on the part of school administrators, meaning, Superintendents and Principals. I especially warn against this sort of unlawful behavior in Wantagh, meaning I don't want to see our professional educators removed by the Commissioner, losing their certificates, and leaving Wantagh Schools effectively leaderless. The school board should not get involved in this civil disobedience, either. Our professional educators and elected Board Trustees need to resist getting dirty in this mess. STAY PROFESSIONAL! On the other hand, I think parents opting-out of having their kids take the assessments, but sending them to school regardless, is the more effective approach for raging against the machine. The state and the central (federal) government want the data from those assessments in the worst way. If your kid does not give them that data, then THEY cannot use that data against you, against your kid, against your kid's teacher or his school, or, against our school district. If they do not get that data from your kid, then they cannot sell that data to any third party. Keep a close eye on Common Core developments in New York. Just wait until the 2013 School Report Cards are published by NYSED! Akiwowo! Chris Wendt
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Post by rr on Nov 20, 2013 10:20:07 GMT -5
Chris - the DISTRICT determines what happens with the data collected as part of this test - not the STATE. I believe I've posted this but below is the link to InBloom FAQ for those seeking factual information posted a corporate website, not a self-interest blog. www.inbloom.org/faqPlease see below for the specifics related to your accusation of their ability to sell data to any 3rd party: -------------------------- Q: What data is collected by inBloom? Participating states and districts decide how much data will be collected and stored in the system, and the states and districts maintain control over that data at all times. Q: Will inBloom sell student data to vendors or anyone? No. inBloom does not and will never sell any student data to anyone. --------------------------- As far as opting out goes - I don't believe in it and I don't believe we should encourage that behavior in our kids. I've said it before - we, the collective 'we parents', whine about how this generation is entitled and expect things just for showing up to things should just work out for them and now we want to step in and 'rescue' them from a test? We want to drag them into this and give them the expectation that if they don't like homework or if they do poorly on a test that it's the fault of the Common Core and since "my parents told me I don't have to take the test I can probably get out of this or that if I complain". Not to mention the fact that our teachers are teaching this curriculum and are administering the tests - do we really want to undercut all their efforts and all the time they've spent training and working to evolve into these new standards? Do we want to take away their authority in the eyes of the children? I say No. Opting Out only serves to drag on and stall the ability to understand if this is working because the data will be incomplete, how can we accurately measure growth if people are having their children opt-out of the test? As a parent in favor of this change I hate the thought of some kid in my son's class refusing to take the test that my son has worked and studied hard for. My son then looks at that kid, looks at his teacher and comes home to me and asks says, uh, wait a minute, why didn't so and so taking this test we've been studying for? What kind of example is that for a kid who's working his tail off to learn and get good grades? Please answer those questions honestly, do you really think it's fair to the teachers and children that are working really hard on this for some parents to just have their children opt-out?
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greda
Junior Member
Posts: 44
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Post by greda on Nov 20, 2013 10:20:10 GMT -5
She is a hack who is part of the system who has changed her mind just to sell books. Her big push now is just to ask for more money, which public education does not need by any stretch of the imagination. There is an op-ed piece in the Post today which lays out exactly how I feel. The pubic education system needs a shock to get it out of its duldrums and dumbed down standards that Mills pushed. Common Core will hopefully do it. nypost.com/2013/11/20/suck-it-up-soccer-moms/
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Post by lilly on Nov 20, 2013 12:12:26 GMT -5
For me, almost anything 'Ravitch' backfires. I hate the way her pov constantly changes. She describes her vacillation as evolving. I think it was when she was with the US dept of ed that she was on the committee and therefore 'pro' national curric standards but now she has 'evolved' once again. She is thought by some to be a union shill (which makes sense of her book signing audience).
I can think of several firsthand fairly recent examples where educational practice/regs have negatively affected or failed children (e.g., 'wait to fail', whole language, math A & B, etc.) and never heard a single outcry from teachers or supers (the Ravitch audience) that it was damaging the kids. But I am hearing the 'for the kids' refrain in support of the anti-CC sentiment. Gee, what element of recent reforms are different with CC? (That is a general, not Wantagh specific comment bc we haven't heard Wantagh's pov on all this yet.)
I'm surprised that the NY Post nailed the dumbing down of the Regents thing.
While I know the testing aspect is very imperfect, kids take their cues from the adults (parents and teachers) in their lives. Opting out wouldn't be an option for my kids - are they going to opt out of SAT's, how seriously will they take future college and career tests if parents tell kids to opt out in elem school? OTOH, my kids have taken tests that have been flawed and/or I feel the results none of their business. There are such things as parental gatekeeping, putting things in perspective for kids and teachable life moments. Those are parent responsibilities, not state ed's or a school district's.
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Post by lilly on Nov 20, 2013 13:00:43 GMT -5
Just a clarification. Ravitch's appearance was not a book signing, it was a breakfast sponsored by the Suffolk Superintendent's Ass'n. Oy vay.
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Post by rr on Nov 20, 2013 13:25:27 GMT -5
good article - it's not easy to look at ourselves in stereotypical terms but I think that article hits it in the head.
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Post by Chris_Wendt on Nov 20, 2013 16:21:09 GMT -5
I think it is funny that there are such staunch positions staked out over the Common Core Curriculum, but virtually ZERO discussion about that CURRICULUM, its content, and the syllabus that flows from the curriculum. The word "rigor" is bandied about as though it were an absolute attribute, rather than a comparative attribute. Rigor compared to what? More rigorous than what, and based on what scale of rigor, what units of measurement for rigor? ...and says who? For low-performing districts, Common Core will certainly be "more rigorous" than whatever curriculum allowed their performance to deteriorate to its present, sad state. CCC, and its comparatively high rigor for those districts will, in my opinion, sink some of those schools and districts, as in, put them on the bottom of the Pacific Ocean, or the East River, or Lake Michigan or Lake Ontario. For middling performance districts, I have no idea whether CCC will be more or less rigorous, or about the same amount of rigor. To any extent that their present or past curricula have hampered their growth, or caused them to languish, academically, at "about average", maybe some will respond positively to the rigors of CCC, and possibly some will react negatively. Neither you nor I can possibly know this, now. For high performing school districts, like Wantagh, I firmly believe CCC can have NO POSITIVE EFFECTS, meaning no better, real educational performance than we have accomplished to date, especially in terms of graduation rate and college attendance rate; however, there is a strong probability that the CCC will, for high-performing districts like Wantagh, be tantamount to a serious dumbing-down of our existing curriculum and the attendant syllabus. Here's why: you cannot take a truly " Common Core" and apply it across tens of thousands of low- middling- and high-performing schools, and expect the entire continuum to magically "level-up" to the highest performance stratum. Please form (and feel free to express) your OWN opinion about this, but I say the CCC will represent a dumbing-down to high-performing schools like Wantagh. We will look better, but YOUR KIDS will not be as smart as yesterday's kids were when they left Wantagh High for college. Arne Duncan, the U.S. Secretary of Education may go down in history for this "clumsy" remark: "'It’s fascinating to me that some of the pushback (about common core testing) is coming from, sort of, white suburban moms who — all of a sudden — their child isn’t as brilliant as they thought they were...'" I have deliberately stayed away from this prejudicial comment until it was raised by Greda who posted the link to McManus' article in the Post. I am a firm believer in never cutting-and-pasting anything that you have not read carefully, or, in reading carefully anything that you quote from another source. McManus' article is brimming with hatred, the word "HATE", directed toward the Common Core from disparate factions now aligned and allied against the Common Core. Where's the D-FENCE? ...and the beat goes on. Chris Wendt
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Post by Chris_Wendt on Nov 20, 2013 16:36:54 GMT -5
in re to rr: "...what happens with the data collected as part of this test...." Believe what you want about in-bloom. My concern is more to what are NYSED and the District doing with all this data, to which I feel they really have no right to extract from children without their parents opting-in, and without some form of monetization (payment, either to the parents, or to the school or district) in return for participation. Without debating a bunch of what if's, I say that, if you don't give the district and the state your kid's data (State assessment scores, item scores, rating, ranking, apparent need for remediation or special or supportive services), then you have no worry about what they will ever do with it. Ask the district about the Data Warehouse, where it is, what's in it who owns and operates it. Ask, too, about longitudinal data. (Oh yeah....) Chris Wendt
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Post by rr on Nov 20, 2013 16:49:06 GMT -5
Hopefully we'll have an informative, fact based CC discussion in Wantagh and if so, I can ask that question. There is no more to fear in passing this data to the district than filling out a credit card application or visiting a website. Data collection, in all forms, is not going away. Do you think your credit card company doesn't 'model' you and your spending behavior and your payment activity? Do you think media companies don't target you based on your online activity? It's been happening, it is happening and it will continue to happen.
Also, Chris, you never answered my question about undercutting the kids and teachers that have worked VERY hard to learn and adopt to this new system and having your children opt-out is in direct conflict with all that work. It's basically a kick in the face to everyone else that is working hard...it's an excuse...and it's wrong.
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Post by lilly on Nov 20, 2013 20:00:29 GMT -5
Without debating a bunch of what if's, I say that, if you don't give the district and the state your kid's data (State assessment scores, item scores, rating, ranking, apparent need for remediation or special or supportive services), then you have no worry about what they will ever do with it. Chris, I think that train already left the station a few years ago well before today's inbloom debate. I'm fuzzy on the details (memory probs) but I think NYS Ed has already been collecting student data so that they can track student as well as cohort data to assist the schools. I remember having convos with Lydia Begley about it. Every kid has a student ID # and it is prob tracked by that. If you want to get really paranoid, find out what IEP Direct reports into the state or if it is just a third party software company with district by district contracts and no state level data sharing. Sounds like IEP Direct is similar to inbloom. But, I'm pretty sure that train has left the station. As for CC curric comments, good observation. Will try and respond to that when I have more time.
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greda
Junior Member
Posts: 44
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Post by greda on Nov 20, 2013 20:48:22 GMT -5
Chris
Did you actually read the article yourself? There was no hatred just someone pointing out the interests of the people who are up in arms. As RR and myself have previously posted, there has been a total dumbing down of curriculum. I have said I have seen it in what is taught between my two kids. Do you have any first hand knowledge of what has been taught over the last five or ten years? And how that compares to what they are looking to do now? I have posted links to show the disgrace public education in NY has become starting with Mills. I have also posted articles outlining the lack of skills our students have in regards to what is needed in the job market. Your response to that has been to refine what is hard and soft data or to bring up something unrelated. Or to quote stats that are based on inflated grades.
I wait with bated breath for the next Chicken Little rant about how the huddled masses are getting ready to storm the Bastille
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Post by Chris_Wendt on Nov 20, 2013 21:29:25 GMT -5
in re to rr: Hopefully we'll have an informative, fact based CC discussion in Wantagh and if so, I can ask that question. I eagerly await that. I think Lilly is working toward opening remarks. Her stuff is always factual. And re: There is no more to fear in passing this data to the district than filling out a credit card application or visiting a website. Data collection, in all forms, is not going away.... It's been happening, it is happening and it will continue to happen. The mere fact that data gathering and data mining is an accepted fact of everyday life does not mean there is nothing to fear from it. M/M Wendt do zero online banking, we pay zero bills online, and we maintain a separate cc account for online purchases not linked to our bank accounts. I had my Yahoo! account hacked via Facebook, and it nearly cost me a ton of money, except I accidentally discovered the situation and was able to stop a serious identity theft before it went too far. Then finally... Also, Chris, you never answered my question about undercutting the kids and teachers that have worked VERY hard to learn and adopt to this new system and having your children opt-out is in direct conflict with all that work. It's basically a kick in the face to everyone else that is working hard...it's an excuse...and it's wrong. Come on. From the top: - The Common Core Concept, under which the curriculum and the assessments exist, is a seriously if not fatally flawed concept; time will prove me correct about this...
- The Common Core Curriculum, as I have stated, ad nauseam, could be the greatest thing since sliced bread, and right here and now we are hopefully preparing to probe and discuss the actual curriculum and its offspring syllabus, maybe even reaching an agreement upon is value or lack thereof...
- The Common Core Assessments, the bogeyman under the kid's bed, released precipitously early (two full years too early) by lone-wolf NY State, have provided a marvelous straw man for any, all, every detractor of the Common Core, the concept, the curriculum. teaching to tests, tests that are 'too hard', states rights and academic freedom activists, educator unions, and paranoiacs who see some Communist Conspiracy afoot, all lining-up against the Common Core, and against King, the poster boy of whatever flavor YOUR cause may be against CC.
Common Core Assessments are not some bargain struck between the Wantagh parents and the Wantagh teachers, not a good-faith bargain against which opting-out becomes a breach of faith or trust. You have a fair point against opting-out, on the morale aspect you raised, which I will keep in mind. I do not want to say too much more about opting out now, waiting for the District Report Card to be published, first, so I have a better idea of the scope of opting-out in Wantagh. It may be a non-issue in the here and now. But even after the Report Card is published, I think I should cool my rhetoric about opting-out and let the whole ball of wax play-out between now and next spring's scheduled assessments. A lot could change in the interim, including the names of the Commissioner of Education and the Chancellor of the Regents. I would like to be able to preserve some of my faith in the power of the people to affect change. Sincerely, Chris Wendt
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Post by rr on Nov 21, 2013 11:37:29 GMT -5
another interesting opinion piece - starting to see more of these...and the really interesting part is that as I scanned the comments I saw that it wasn't all the usual trashing of the Common Core. Maybe as the facts start to become clearer and more and more actual parents of kids going through it are realizing that - it's not so much different or that bad afterall.... www.newsday.com/opinion/editorial-arne-duncan-speaks-the-truth-about-common-core-1.6471262
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Post by Chris_Wendt on Nov 21, 2013 15:18:42 GMT -5
Are we to understand that you agree with Duncan's assessment that our/your kids are not as brilliant we/you had thought? ...that our/your schools are not as good as we all thought?
...and this is because the Common Core is right and good and accurate, and Wantagh's current crop of children are more stupid than we ever knew, and Wantagh's schools, what, suck? I mean, they suck now, whereas, according to the same NY State Department of Education and the same U.S. Education Department, they were officially designated as "U.S. Blue Ribbon Schools of Excellence"? So we should go and change all those signs and plaques to say: "A Mediocre U.S. School" and "A District of Mediocrity"?
Yeah, we suck! I don't think so. But you have inadvertently hit the nail on the head. We don't suck, but it feels as though we do.
Say, they put the Wantagh APPR Plan back on the District Website, and cut it down from 500+ pages to about 64 pages. The big fallacy I see in that plan, and one which any "numbers person" or any "statistics person" or any "performance metrics person" should recoil at, is the preponderance of effectiveness ratings (metrics) being determined by comparison of each teacher and principal, NOT with ANY objective learning standards, but rather WITH THE STATEWIDE MEAN (AVERAGE) PERFORMANCE for those metrics. So, if some teacher sucks, but not as badly as the STATEWIDE AVERAGE TEACHER sucks, then that teacher (who really does suck) will be deemed EFFECTIVE!
That's...laughable. Truly a house of cards.
Chris Wendt
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Post by rr on Nov 21, 2013 16:54:03 GMT -5
Chris - you're reaching now...as you've asked others including myself, please do not put your words in my mouth.
His comments were not well worded and coming from someone in his position are really bad but statistically I think he's probably on target regarding the most vocal opponents.
As I said previously, nobody likes being lumped into a stereotype, but like it or not, stereotypes exist for a reason.
What you're missing with your analysis of the assessments is that we'll, taxpayers and parents, be able to take action against truly ineffective teachers, the outliers. I believe the vast majority of teachers will rate as effective, no real difference from today, but we'll finally be able to get a real glimpse at who is ineffective. They can no longer hide behind tenure or the seniority. To me, that's a benefit, that's actionable and that's accountability.
I guess we should just rest on our laurels and be happy with being designated a blue ribbon school district...great idea - let's just keep living in the past. Lets not look to get better and raise the profile of the schools...afterall, we've been designated a blue ribbon district. Forget about the fact the only time Wantagh schools are in the news is because of lock downs or superintendent issues. When was Wantagh awarded the blue ribbon anyway? And by the way, how do they determine blue ribbon status? Could it be the dreaded statewide and/or national assessments that determine eligibility? Assessments?? Who wants that crap? Oh, wait unless you're going to give us an award, the we like it. Tell us we're underperforming - well then we have a fight on our hands...
Seems a little hypocritical to me, no?
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