This past week, one of our local newspaper’s editorial boards posted yet another editorial about how horrible it is for parents to be opting out of our state’s Smarter Balanced Assessment (SBAC) because opting out is really harming our low income communities. The editorial praises a superintendent of a district which is home to high percentage of low income families and English language learners for saying that there is room for improvement and that the district will work towards student growth. I’m sorry, but that is a giant, “DUH!” There is always room for improvement and we are always working towards student growth. The editorial complimented him for “No drama. No tears.” Personally, I am disappointed that this superintendent, and other superintendents around our state, are not stepping up and pointing out that the emperor has no clothes. The test and punish system is harming every student, and most particularly students like those in this superintendent's district.
The editorial goes on to insist that without this shiny new test, we can’t possibly know where to find our underserved student populations nor figure out how to help them, and that people who don't like the testing are just not being adults. It insinuated that only privileged crybabies are opting out and in doing so, are harming low income schools that must depend on the largesse of the federal government. Thus, we should all bow down (or bend over) and take it because "this is what adults do". Below is what I posted in the comments section of the editorial.
So this is about "helping" low income students? Do we not already know, after 15 years of these policies under NCLB, that our low income and EL students need more support? Come on now. You really can't be that obtuse.
Around the country, in areas that have been using this test score focused evaluation of schools and teachers for a few years more than we have, it has been about closing the schools of low income families and students of color and placing them in privatized systems supported by tax dollars, systems that perform no better than the public schools they replaced and which offer the parents little recourse when they are dissatisfied.
New Orleans Recovery District is now 100% privatized. Some parents have not even been able to get all their children into the same elementary school with the district's "OneApp" process of enrollment. Schools close in the middle of the year and it's tough luck. When a restaurant closes, you can just go eat somewhere else. When your child's school closes in the middle of the year, that's a little bigger problem. But since there is no democratic process at a private school, it's just tough luck for them. That's the way the market based cookie crumbles.
http://www.nolaedequity.org
And speaking of food, right now in Chicago, people are starving themselves to death over the closure of their school, one of over 50 public schools that have been closed in that city in recent years and then replaced by the same kind of private charters we see in NOLA. And not in affluent areas, but in areas of concentrated poverty that are largely home to black and brown families.
http://cloakinginequity.com/2015/09/09/parents-risk-dying-for-dyett-and-neighborhood-public-schools-fightfordyett-wesupportdyett12/
Chicago, home of Arne Duncan (who was the head of Chicago Public Schools prior to his current position as US Secretary of Education) and Barack Obama. Where Obama's former Chief of Staff, Rahm Emanuel, is continuing the same policies Duncan brought to DC. That is the model that has been set up for the nation. Duncan said that "The best thing that happened to the education system in New Orleans was Katrina". That is only true if by "best" he means "best for the privatization of our public schools".
By the way, neither Obama nor Duncan nor Emanuel's children attend or attended public schools in Chicago. All of their children were enrolled in the private Chicago Lab School, where they are subject to none of the policies that they, and the Oregonian editorial staff, advocate for.
Our state education "leaders" need to wake up and start leading. This isn't about Lake Oswego ruining it for all the poor kids. Give me a break. People in Lake Oswego are apparently not only well educated and affluent, they must also read and analyze national news and see that this is not only not good for their kids, who waste hours taking a test that removes them from their instructional program where parents already know how they are doing, but that it harms all students and our education system in general.
Meanwhile, down at the testing and evaluation companies, the cash register rings and the bank accounts of their share holders grow even fatter.
As for the Oregonian editorial board, there is obviously no hope. You are all either ignorant of what the national agenda is or in the pocket of moneyed interests intent on privatizing public education.
Drink up.
The editorial goes on to insist that without this shiny new test, we can’t possibly know where to find our underserved student populations nor figure out how to help them, and that people who don't like the testing are just not being adults. It insinuated that only privileged crybabies are opting out and in doing so, are harming low income schools that must depend on the largesse of the federal government. Thus, we should all bow down (or bend over) and take it because "this is what adults do". Below is what I posted in the comments section of the editorial.
So this is about "helping" low income students? Do we not already know, after 15 years of these policies under NCLB, that our low income and EL students need more support? Come on now. You really can't be that obtuse.
Around the country, in areas that have been using this test score focused evaluation of schools and teachers for a few years more than we have, it has been about closing the schools of low income families and students of color and placing them in privatized systems supported by tax dollars, systems that perform no better than the public schools they replaced and which offer the parents little recourse when they are dissatisfied.
New Orleans Recovery District is now 100% privatized. Some parents have not even been able to get all their children into the same elementary school with the district's "OneApp" process of enrollment. Schools close in the middle of the year and it's tough luck. When a restaurant closes, you can just go eat somewhere else. When your child's school closes in the middle of the year, that's a little bigger problem. But since there is no democratic process at a private school, it's just tough luck for them. That's the way the market based cookie crumbles.
http://www.nolaedequity.org
And speaking of food, right now in Chicago, people are starving themselves to death over the closure of their school, one of over 50 public schools that have been closed in that city in recent years and then replaced by the same kind of private charters we see in NOLA. And not in affluent areas, but in areas of concentrated poverty that are largely home to black and brown families.
http://cloakinginequity.com/2015/09/09/parents-risk-dying-for-dyett-and-neighborhood-public-schools-fightfordyett-wesupportdyett12/
Chicago, home of Arne Duncan (who was the head of Chicago Public Schools prior to his current position as US Secretary of Education) and Barack Obama. Where Obama's former Chief of Staff, Rahm Emanuel, is continuing the same policies Duncan brought to DC. That is the model that has been set up for the nation. Duncan said that "The best thing that happened to the education system in New Orleans was Katrina". That is only true if by "best" he means "best for the privatization of our public schools".
By the way, neither Obama nor Duncan nor Emanuel's children attend or attended public schools in Chicago. All of their children were enrolled in the private Chicago Lab School, where they are subject to none of the policies that they, and the Oregonian editorial staff, advocate for.
Our state education "leaders" need to wake up and start leading. This isn't about Lake Oswego ruining it for all the poor kids. Give me a break. People in Lake Oswego are apparently not only well educated and affluent, they must also read and analyze national news and see that this is not only not good for their kids, who waste hours taking a test that removes them from their instructional program where parents already know how they are doing, but that it harms all students and our education system in general.
Meanwhile, down at the testing and evaluation companies, the cash register rings and the bank accounts of their share holders grow even fatter.
As for the Oregonian editorial board, there is obviously no hope. You are all either ignorant of what the national agenda is or in the pocket of moneyed interests intent on privatizing public education.
Drink up.
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