By John Thompson. When lost in the woods, the first rule is “hug a tree.” In other words, slow down, confront your fears, regain your calm and think prudently about getting back on track. When trapped in the urban crises of today, we should first hug each other, converse with each other, and then hug the …
By John Thompson. The Education Post is a school reform site that claims to seek a “better conversation, better education.” It supposedly wants to elevate the voices of teachers and others as an antidote to the “politicized debate that pushes people to the extremes.” However, many or …
By Anthony Cody. (Originally posted here, July 23, 2012. This essay is also included in my book, The Educator and the Oligarch, a Teacher Challenges the Gates Foundation.) In the summer of 2012 I traveled to Seattle and spent most of the day meeting with leaders of the Gates Foundation, discussing their work …
By Vincent Marsala. Many people think that applying business principles and making educators compete via stack ranking and merit pay will make education better. Even former National Education Association President Dennis Van Roekel said it might work, “The first thing you have to decide on is what you …
By Joseph Ray Lavine. A co-founder of the Network for Public Education addressed the ineffectiveness of current U.S. standardized testing and teacher evaluation standards in a speech at the University Chapel, at the University of Georgia, in Athens, Georgia, last Wednesday. Anthony Cody, who also writes the …
By Anthony Cody. Researchers Sarah Reckhow and Megan Tompkins-Stange have released a paper titled “Singing from the Same Hymnbook”: Education Policy Advocacy at Gates and Broad. The paper was shared last Thursday at a fascinating event hosted by the American Enterprise Institute. The event was a forum, …
By Elizabeth Hanson M. Ed. And David Spring M. Ed. In this report, we will explain why Washington State legislators should protect fair evaluations of our teachers and principals by opposing the use of unreliable student test scores to make decisions about teachers and principals. We therefore should oppose Senate …
By Renee Carlson, Janet Foster, Enid Hutchinson, Ed Kitlowski, Amanda Koonlaba, Nancy Kunsman, Justin McGehee, Lynn Otaguro, Joy Peters, Wendi Pillars, Rachel Rich, Petra Schmid-Riggins, Jim Strickland, Rebecca Gillespie, Jamyle Kathy Acevedo and Josh Thompson – members of the Viva/NEA 360° writing …
By John Thompson. The University of Pennsylvania’s Matthew Steinberg and Lauren Sartain of the Consortium on Chicago School Research (CCSR) find that better classroom observations contribute to improved student performance. This study is doubly important because it is consistent with the CCSR’s finding …
By Anthony Cody. When the history of modern education reform is written one of the most shameful chapters will be the continued embrace of various forms of “Value Added Models” for purposes of measuring the effectiveness of teachers in raising test scores. This month, the Department of Education is asking for …
