February 2014 – Page 2

February 21, 2014

EXXON CEO joins in an anti-fracking lawsuit

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Chickens coming home to roost? EXXON CEO Rex Tillerson, trying to hide behind his Bar RR Ranches name, is suing a fracking company in his backyard. He is joined by anti-environmental ex-Republican majority leader Dick Armey.

Seems the two tycoons don’t like the odd looking water tower- which provides the huge volume of water needed for fracking- blocking their view of nothing in particular and say the trucks are a nuisance.

Though the suit “cites the side effects of fracking” in the complaint, a lawyer representing the Exxon CEO said he hadn’t complained about such disturbances.

Rex’s “philosophy” is a matter of public record- “if I can drill and make money, that’s what I do.”

This is essentially the argument the fracking company that he is suing is making; so part of the case hinges on whether Tillerson, who has made much of his money off Fracking, can sue to have an inconvenient ordinance enforced, when EXXON is constantly arguing against ORDINANCE ENFORCEMENT.

Seems like Rex wants one set of laws just for himself.

————-

from Wall Street Journal Morning Addition today, by Danny Gilbert

BARTONVILLE, Texas—One evening last November, a tall, white-haired man turned up at a Town Council meeting to protest construction of a water tower near his home in this wealthy community outside Dallas.

The man was Rex Tillerson , chairman and chief executive of Exxon Mobil.

He and his neighbors had filed suit to block the tower, saying it is illegal and would create “a noise nuisance and traffic hazards,” in part because it would provide water for use in hydraulic fracturing. Fracking, which requires heavy trucks to haul and pump massive amounts of water, unlocks oil and gas from dense rock and has helped touch off a surge in U.S. energy output.

It also is a core part of Exxon’s business.

While the lawsuit Mr. Tillerson joined cites the side effects of fracking, a lawyer representing the Exxon CEO said he hadn’t complained about such disturbances. “I have other clients who were concerned about the potential for noise and traffic problems, but he’s never expressed that to me or anyone else,” said Michael Whitten , who runs a small law practice in Denton, Texas. Mr. Whitten said Mr. Tillerson’s primary concern is that his property value would be harmed.

An Exxon spokesman said Mr. Tillerson declined to comment. The company “has no involvement in the legal matter” and its directors weren’t told of Mr. Tillerson’s participation, the spokesman said.

The dispute over the 160-foot water tower goes beyond possible nuisances related to fracking. Among the issues raised: whether a water utility has to obey local zoning ordinances and what are the rights of residents who relied on such laws in making multi-million-dollar property investments. The latter point was the focus of Mr. Tillerson’s comments at the November council meeting.

The tower would be almost 15 stories tall, adjacent to the 83-acre horse ranch Mr. Tillerson and his wife own and a short distance from their 18-acre homestead. Mr. Tillerson sat for a three-hour deposition in the lawsuit last May, attended an all-day mediation session in September and has spoken out against the tower during at least two Town Council meetings, according to public records and people involved with the case.

The Exxon chief isn’t the most vocal or well-known opponent of the tower. He and his wife are suing under the name of their horse ranch, Bar RR Ranches LLC, along with three other couples. The lead plaintiffs are former U.S. House Majority Leader Dick Armey and his wife, who have become fixtures at Town Council meetings.

Mr. Whitten, who also represents the Armeys, said they declined to comment.

February 21, 2014February 21, 2014

Four years later: Student achivement and Central Falls’ transformation

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As we approach the four year anniversary of the tumultuous firing of the the teachers at Central Falls High School (CFHS), regarded nationally as a watershed event in the Obama administration’s school reform efforts, we must once again consider the success or failure of what followed (and preceded).

Progressives and ed reform skeptics are somewhat hamstrung in this process, as we tend to discount the validity of reformers’ goals and metrics. It often seems like wiser strategy to not accept their premises. Yet, if we ignore this data, we risk unilaterally disarming our own arguments or simply lessening our own understanding of the situation.

With that preamble, consider some charts tracking Central Falls High School 11th grade NECAP proficiency rates, compared to the statewide 11th grade proficiency rate to provide perspective on overall trends. 2007 through 2013 covers all the years the 11th grade NECAP has been administered statewide, all data from RIDE’s website.

In all these charts, CFHS is in red, RI public schools statewide in blue, where applicable, CFHS transformation plan goals in yellow and RI statewide Race to the Top goals in green.

RIDE triggered the crisis in Central Falls following the application of the 2009 NECAP, either immediately before or after RIDE received the 2009 scores (it is hard to say which would be more irresponsible). As you can clearly see above, CFHS was named “persistently low-performing” after two consecutive years of double digit growth in reading proficiency, with a higher proficiency rate and lower achievement gap compared to the rest of the state than they have achieved since the transformation.

CFHS’s transformation plan hoped to “to sustain the rate of growth experienced in the past few years” while focusing their attention on math and other issues. This clearly did not work, and it has taken the school four years to approach the status quo ante in NECAP reading proficiency.

We all still pay to administer the NECAP writing assessment, but since it was not used for No Child Left Behind accountability, it has mostly been ignored by RIDE. Despite the lip service they may give to “multiple measures,” they cannot even be bothered to consider all the tests they administer. Regardless, as a relatively low-stakes, straightforward and authentic ELA test, it helps to corroborate trends in reading scores.

While both CFHS and RI writing proficiency jumped in 2013, the gap between the two is still 8% greater than it was pre-transformation.

Increasing math proficiency was the academic focus of the transformation plan.

While the authors of the plan stated “we are confident that our targets are reasonable” after consideration of “historical CFHS NECAP data… the proportion of students on the cusp of proficiency levels, and… statewide NECAP averages,” in retrospect, that was wishful thinking (or a politically necessary exaggeration). In reality, getting CFHS up to 14% proficiency is a substantial improvement based on a tremendous amount of hard work by students and teachers. But it is not what reformers projected after repeatedly citing CFHS’s 7% proficiency rate in 2009 as a justification for firing all the teachers.

For the NECAP science exam, I shifted the year label back a year to match with the fall test cadres above, and included the goals from RIDE’s strategic plan. The results are depressingly similar to the math test.

Taking a longer perspective on the CFHS data, a few things seem clear:

The school’s academic performance prior to the transformation was not as bad as reformers thought or presented it.
Rushing the process did not “save” the students in the school. The test scores of the student cohorts in the school during the process clearly suffered. They were worse off in reading and writing achievement according to the NECAP scores.
In the four years since RIDE named CFHS “persistently low performing,” the gap between CFHS and RI state proficiency rates has increased on all four NECAP tests.

CFHS has had success improving their graduation rate, but it is important to note that while the four year graduation rate jumped 20% between the classes of 2010 and 2013, when most students in those cohorts took the NECAP in the junior year, the class of 2010 outperformed 2013 in NECAP reading and writing (in fall 2008 and fall 2011, respectively). The class of 2013 did outperform the class of 2010 by 3% in math and science, but there is no evidence that the 20% improvement in graduation rate was driven by increased student learning as measured by NECAP.

In short, dramatic changes have not created dramatically different results on RIDE’s NECAP assessment. It does not mean that nothing can improve urban high schools in Rhode Island, in fact, our recent track record includes some notable successes, including some all too fleetingly implemented at CFHS in the past twenty years, should we choose to re-examine them. But the “fire ’em all” Central Falls transformation has not worked, on its own terms, by its own standards.

February 20, 2014

What do teachers think: Susan Weigand

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Susan Weigand, 2nd grade teacher at Hugh Cole Elementary School in Bristol-Warren, punctuates nearly every sentence with “I could go-on about my students all day.” Her dedication to her young students was evident throughout her sit down with RI Future.

“Where is the safety net for the children that come to kindergarten ill prepared for what they have to do,” she said. (Read the first part of this three-part series here on Jen Saarinen)

But there was a stark contrast between her excitement for her students recent policy changes. She said that changes in policy and budget have affected her teaching style and her students.

“Work I’m asking students to do is significantly more challenging,” she said. “In that comes the question of whether or not it’s developmentally appropriate. There are several situations where it’s not, I’m being told to ask my students things beyond what they’re capable of doing.”

Weigand said that budgets for teachers aren’t what they once were either. There was a time where teachers could buy supplies that weren’t provided for them by the district. Those times are long gone.

“We don’t really get a budget,” Weigand said. “The district provides us with certain supplies but there’s no discretionary fund for teachers to buy things for their classroom. When I was first hired in this district 16 or 17 years ago, we had a budget to go purchasing for our classroom.”

Budget cuts affect those on the elementary school level differently than others. Weigand explained the uniqueness of the situation. “The difference is we teach everything and we teach multiple levels, so if I’m doing science activity about states of matter I have to have different levels of books because each of my kids are at different levels –well my district doesn’t provide that.”

During her time as a teacher, Weigand has noticed major changes within her field. The greatest change she has seen is the shift away from viewing students as young adults.

“We have somehow forgotten that these are small children sitting in our rooms,” she said. “I think we have forgotten these are little people – 6, 7, 8 – we very much have forgotten these are little kids and we treat them like tiny adults. Where does that creative thinking of being able to come up with the answers themselves come into play?”

February 20, 2014February 21, 2014

For Lilia Abbatematteo, foreclosure crisis is still an issue

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What follows is Lilia Abbatematteo’s story about her foreclosure in her own words.

Back in December, I attended a Fannie Mae event hosted at the Rhode Island Coalition for the Homeless. I attended this event because on September 6th 2013 my house was foreclosed on and Fannie Mae became the owner of the home I have lived in for over 40 years.

On the date of my auction, my friends and supporters from Direct Action for Rights & Equality (DARE) and the Tenant and Homeowner Association (THA) helped me protest the auction, and we informed all three potential investors who showed up that day that it would be a bad idea to buy the property because it would mean displacing residents (my family) who want to stay and get the home back. On the day of the protest, this felt like a victory, but since then, things have been really hard.

I have received letters saying that I could be evicted. The Fannie Mae event was supposed to be for people who have not yet been foreclosed on, but I decided to go anyway, to see if anyone would help me. Ever since the day of the foreclosure auction I have been worrying. What am I going to do? How can I buy my house back? What will my children be left with if we don’t have this house?
My husband and I live at 129 Chapin Avenue with our four grown children, plus our three grandchildren.

This is a house I inherited from my parents, Portuguese immigrants who came to this country and worked hard for years. My mom always worked two jobs and my father worked 12 hour days. In fact, the house was completely paid off by 1984. In 2002 I co-signed a second mortgage with my mother and her then live-in partner, to help out a troubled family member. Through the years the mortgage was transferred between various banks. It ended up with Chase Bank for a while, but my name was no longer on the loan. This was traumatizing and made it impossible to get a modification after my mother’s death. I’ve tried to resolve the issue through phone call after phone call after phone call. I’ve even paid a law firm to get help. But the bank always refused to work with me.

I’ve worked my whole life, and even when we fell behind on the mortgage, I was working. In 2008 my son-in-law decided to self-deport back to Guatemala. He made this decision because the constant stress and fear of worrying that Immigrations and Customs Enforcement (ICE) was going to come and take him away was too much. For this reason, my daughter and her kids moved back in with us. At the same time, in 2008 I took at 7% pay cut at work, and have not seen a pay raise in seven years. These changes combined really started to strain our budget and that’s why we fell behind on our mortgage.

My next-door neighbor (also a member of DARE and the THA) came along with me to the Fannie Mae event last week for support. We drove to Pawtucket and found a parking spot. I brought with me a letter I wrote asking that Fannie Mae look into the possibility of selling the home back to me. We walked into the brick building and went to the second floor where Fannie Mae apparently has an office – I had no idea!

It seemed like we were the first ones there, at 9 am on the dot. Someone asked us to fill out some initial paperwork, and told us someone would be with us shortly. A woman named Kate, from Fannie Mae came out and talked to us. She asked if I had ever received a “Know Your Options” package from Fannie Mae in the mail. I had not. I told her a bit of the complicated story of my house, and she said in order for Fannie Mae to investigate my case, I needed to write a narrative of all my communication with Fannie Mae and about the house, with a date, a name, and the topic of conversation when we’d talked. The trouble with this request is that I haven’t kept detailed records of all the people I’ve talked to over the past few years, especially not over the phone! I’ve made so many phone calls! In the end, I felt like Kate was trying her best to be nice to me, but I’m worried that she won’t be able to help me. When my neighbor and I left the event an hour later – we saw only one other person there!

I told my neighbor that I think the reason more people weren’t at the event is because once people think their home is up for foreclosure, it’s like the Berlin Wall goes up. It’s the end of the road. It can feel like there is no hope. Still, even though I’m skeptical that this narrative will help, I’ve done my best to write out a very detailed narrative that tells the story of my house and what’s going on with it – to the best of my ability.

Sometimes I feel like there’s no hope. My dream is that Fannie Mae will come to the table and offer me the possibility of setting up a rent-to-own scheme. My children were raised here and my grandchildren are being raised here. My granddaughter says, “I don’t want to move.” This is heart-wrenching. I like my neighborhood. From the diversity of ethnicities, to the fruit trees and grape vines planted by my father in our backyard, this home is my world. If Fannie Mae evicts us, where will we go?

February 20, 2014

Colorado pot economy producing new revenue, new research and new residents

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Colorado expects to make $133 million in new revenue this year because of legalized marijuana. This is twice what the state anticipated when it became, along with Washington, the first state in the nation to tax and regulate the giant underground pot economy. Between legal and medicinal marijuana, Colorado expects more than $800 million in sales alone this year.

For comparison, Rhode Island faces a similar-sized budget deficit this year ($149 million) as Colorado expects to reap in new revenue, and the state legislature here is considering legislation that would make us the third state to profit from pot. Rep. Edith Ajello and Senator Josh Miller are sponsoring the bill and they wrote an op/ed about why here.

News of how the marijuana industry is proving to have a very positive effect on Colorado’s economy is starting to sweep the nation. Earlier this week, the Associated Press reported on a 5-year-old who stopped having hundreds of seizures a week when she experimented with a tincture made from marijuana plants grown specifically to prevent seizures.

From the AP, which says the science is still unproven but “more than 100 families have relocated” to Colorado to try the special strand of marijuana grown to accentuate the chemical naturally found in the plant that reduces seizures:

The doctors were out of ideas to help 5-year-old Charlotte Figi.

Suffering from a rare genetic disorder, she had as many as 300 grand mal seizures a week, used a wheelchair, went into repeated cardiac arrest and could barely speak. As a last resort, her mother began calling medical marijuana shops.

Two years later, Charlotte is largely seizure-free and able to walk, talk and feed herself after taking oil infused with a special pot strain. Her recovery has inspired both a name for the strain of marijuana she takes that is bred not to make users high — Charlotte’s Web — and an influx of families with seizure-stricken children to Colorado from states that ban the drug.

The New Hampshire state legislature is also considering legalizing marijuana and the Oregon legislature is debating putting the question to the voters as a ballot initiative.

February 20, 2014

Tonight: ‘Inequality for All’ at URI

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‘Inequality for All’ is coming to the University of Rhode Island tonight.

Well, just the blockbuster Robert Reich movie about the phenomenon on rampant income inequality in America. The phenomenon itself has been here for some time now, says Danielle Dirroco, the executive director of URI’s grad school labor union, host of the tonight’s event.

“Wealth inequality is the issue of our time, and we know this all too well here at URI,” she said. “As tuition creeps higher and higher, the opportunity for Rhode Islanders to gain access to a higher education is compromised and our capacity to creatively address our economic woes is undermined. To make any positive change, we have to begin by educating ourselves. Graduate Assistants United is thrilled to put the University of Rhode Island on the map for this nationwide campus event.”

The event starts at 6pm and there will be a special live webcast with Reich in which we can ask him a bunch of Rhode Island-specific questions. Here’s the Facebook event and below is the full press release from the URI Grad School Union:

Graduate Assistants United, URI’s Graduate Employee Labor Union, will be providing its community with the opportunity to view and discuss this award-winning documentary about income inequality in our nation and the way it has shaped our economy and democracy. This event is held in conjunction with a national campus-based event that will include over 150 universities across the country. The University of Rhode Island will be the only university participating in this exciting event in state of Rhode Island.

Co-Sponsors include the URI Graduate Student Association, NewportFILM, the URI Department of Campus Equity and Diversity and SE Greenhouse. Refreshments generously provided by Starbucks Coffee Company.

The event will be held at the College of Biotechnology and Life Sciences Ryan Family Auditorium (CBLS 100). RSVP to Graduate Assistants United: uri.gau@gmail.com.

The American economy is in crisis. Enter Robert Reich: Secretary of Labor under Clinton, revered professor, charismatic pundit and author of thirteen books. “Bob” as he’s referred to in the film, is our hero and guide, shining a light on the urgency of this issue. Economic imbalances are now at near historically unprecedented levels. In fact, the two years of widest economic inequality of the last century were 1928 and 2007 – the two years just before the greatest economic crashes of modern times. What is the link between high inequality and economic crashes? What happened to the Middle Class?

As Americans, we’ve been taught that there is a basic bargain at the heart of our society: work hard, play by the rules and you can make a better life for yourself. But over the last 35 years, this bargain has been broken. Middle class incomes have stagnated or dropped over the same period during which the American economy has more than doubled. So where did all that money go? The facts are clear – it went to the top earners. In 1970 the top 1% of earners took home 9% of the nation’s income. Today they take in approximately 23%. The top 1% holds more than 35% of the nation’s overall wealth, while the bottom 50% controls a meager 2.5%. The last time wealth was this concentrated was in 1928, on the eve of the Great Depression.

What’s the big deal, you may ask? Didn’t the wealthy earn it? INEQUALITY FOR ALL is happy to acknowledge that. There is no vilifying of the rich here. The problem is that wide income divisions threaten the health of both our economy and our democracy.

When middle class consumers have to tighten their belts, the whole economy suffers. We saw this in the years before the Great Depression just as we see it today. The middle class represents 70% of spending and is the great stabilizer of our economy. No increase in spending by the rich can make up for it.

This is the moment in history in which we find ourselves: unprecedented income divisions, a wildly fluctuating and unstable economy, and average Americans increasingly frustrated and disillusioned. The debate about income inequality has become part of the national discussion, and this is a good thing. INEQUALITY FOR ALL connects the dots for viewers, showing why dealing with the widening gap between the rich and everyone else isn’t just about moral fairness.

The issues addressed in this film are arguably the most pressing issue of our times. The film alternates between intimate, approachable sequences and intellectually rigorous arguments helping people with no economic background or education better understand the issues at stake. INEQUALITY FOR ALL allows viewers to start with little or no understanding of what it means for the U.S. to be economically imbalanced, and walk away with a comprehensive and significantly deeper sense of the issue and what can be done about it.

For more information about INEQUALITY FOR ALL and to view the trailer, please visit InequalityForAll.com

This event is free to the public. Please RSVP via email to Graduate Assistants United at uri.gau@gmail.com

February 20, 2014

Rhode Island is not yet the solar power state

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The number of jobs in the bustling solar power industry grew by 62 percent last year in Rhode Island – an increase of 130 jobs from 2012. But as Progressive Charlestown points out, we’re still lagging far behind every other state in the northeast in this regard and we were one of the worst state’s in the nation when it comes to adding jobs in the solar power sector of the economy.

Rhode Island ranked 45th in the nation for new jobs in the solar industry, according to a new report by the Solar Foundation. Only Alaska, Wyoming, Mississippi, Nebraska and North and South Dakota ranked worse than Rhode Island.

And Rhode Island did even worse when compared to our Northeast neighbors (though per capita, we ranked higher than both New York and Connecticut).

Why our other northeastern states doing so much better at growing the solar sector of their economies? Here’s what Abel Collins, program director for the local chapter of the Sierra Club, wrote on this blog last week:

Rhode Island solar installers have been forced to look for work in Connecticut and Massachusetts where strong renewable incentive programs have stayed in place. For the sake of the environment and our struggling economy, it’s time to rectify this situation. The good news is that there are already a couple of new programs in place that should help, and there a couple of renewable energy legislative initiatives that could become law this session.

Click here to read about some of the new programs Rhode Island has in place and some of the new legislation that could help even further.

And earlier this week the Providence Journal reported that a Colorado-based company won approval to locate a new solar farm at the Quonset business park. So maybe the solar industry outlook is looking brighter for Rhode Island.

February 19, 2014February 20, 2014

Cranston residents suing because prison ‘residents’ dilute political power

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Today marks the announcement that Cranston residents are filing suit because their voting rights are being violated. Cranston! You might be wondering: “Where do these lawsuits come from?” It turns out, good ol’ RIFuture played a part.

About eight years ago I saw Prison Policy Initiative (PPI) founder Peter Wagner give a presentation on “Prison Based Gerrymandering” in New York State. He illustrated how taking thousands of men from, typically, New York City and sending them to live in cages Upstate shifted political power to those Upstate areas. They did this by counting the prisoners as “residents” who are then represented by politicians at the same rate as the free residents. Naturally, the politicians do not cater to the interests of the prison residents; in fact, the politicians interest is in getting more prisoners, to inflate their power. A tiny little district with a big warehouse full of cages will get the same vote in Albany as a place with twice as many people living in it.

About five years ago I did an analysis of Rhode Island, posted it on RIFuture (archive unavailable), and Peter Wagner took note. It turns out that Cranston, with its consolidated Adult Correctional Institutions, is one of the most impacted areas of the country. A small coalition formed on this esoteric elections issue, including Direct Action for Rights & Equality, PPI, ACLU, and Common Cause. Senator Harold Metts sponsored a bill to make this change, targeting the 2010 Census, but the bill was not passed before redistricting time.

“The Residence of Those in Government Custody Act,” introduced as S 2286 by Senators Metts, Crowley, Pichardo, and Jabour on February 4, 2014, and as H 7263 by Representatives Williams, Tanzi, Slater, Diaz, and Palangio, on January 30, 2014.

Now the issue has gotten down to the personal level, as residents of Cranston who don’t have the blessing of living next to the prison are challenging why they have less political power. For example, six people who live near the prison will fight for their politician’s ear for every 10 people who live on the other side of town. Multiply that out. There is a reason that districts should be of similar population size, and its about ten people’s voices being the equivalent of ten people’s voices when making large decisions. Unless those people locked up in the ACI start getting their voice in the discussion, they are being used to puff up the district.

Some states have already passed laws that eliminate this problem. Of course, if Rhode Island did so, the lawsuit would be moot.

February 19, 2014

The post-rational conversation on climate change

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It all started when I watched a rare show of interest on global warming this weekend on all the talk shows. HuffPo ran this article with a meme with the quote:  Sorry, Congresswoman, I Just Have To Interrupt You

Host David Gregory had a bit of a hard time staying out of the climate change debate between scientist Bill Nye and Rep. Marsha Blackburn (R-Tenn.) on “Meet the Press” Sunday. Though Gregory said repeatedly there is no doubt.

I posted this along with this comment: “This video would blow Gregory’s mind.” ‪

This started an exchange with an old friend of mine who is a conservative “not usually into politics.” However, what transpired isn’t even conservative, it is reactionary, and he is an intelligent guy. What follows is what used to be a discussion and now is conversational gridlock. We can’t blame everything on the political system if it is just a reflection of us. However the points he raises reflexively are instructional.

He first wrote “Well, it IS the DAVID GREGORY show, after all so why shouldn’t he interrupt a guest who is in the middle of making a point? ” He said referring to the HuffPo meme, and what Nye called Blackburn’s filibuster. to which I replied:

“That isn’t the criticism off Gregory, he is a journalist and it is his show. If you read the HufPo blog, what is remarkable is that he even broached the subject confidently after a decade of letting an opinion held by less than 10% of climate scientists get 90% of the air time without a peep of criticism. I like the old style television interviewers that hold guests accountable to the facts as opposed pandering to the privileged Beltway brats.”

Conservative: “I get that, but I am more with the 10%. Climate does change, that I agree with.”

Me: “So you admit the odds are you are wrong? The issue is what we can do to address the rapid advance of the climate change, Climate disruption. Are you confusing climate with weather?”

C: “It’s too political, I frankly think there is too much behind money the scenes in the anti-carbon faction [of course there already is tons of money in oil but that system is established].”

Me: “Established oil interest are OK but the pittance that environmentalists can raise to advocate on behalf off people and nature is bad? There is too much money in politics for sure, that is another thing I would like to see change. This is covered in the video and blog too.”

C: “But tech just isn’t there yet to do it right. I don’t want an electric car [that most likely gets its “clean” power from coal anyway] that will only get me 40 or 50 miles down the road and then take 12 hours to charge a battery that is more toxic than Hydraulic Fracturing fluid. I would rather use a bike or a horse. Sorry I am a mean spirited ignorant bastard.”

Me: “Well I like the bike and the horse. I am glad you see the risk of Fracking (which is happening under your feet). But you have been bamboozled on global warming my friend. There are a lot of solutions that are scalable if we were really trying- which we aren’t because of the power of fossil fuel money and the quarterly profit mentality. The Fossil Fuel Companies have funded the disinformation programs. The US is the only country in the world that doesn’t understand that global warming is real and man made, partly because the media gives equal time to the vast minority doubters. Just watch a BBC broadcast on their month long flood. It’s a simple formula really- the more green house gasses the more the planet is warmed. By the way, I wrote less than 10%, the comparative studies have found as many as 97% of climate scientists agree when avoiding the word “cause” which has a high threshold and using words like ‘primary drivers.’

Denier disinformation campaigns have done their best to use the skepticism of science against itself to distort the findings for political purposes. Most of the surface earth is water, so water temperature and ice pack conditions are a better measures than surface temperature. If you think changes in transportation are inconvenient, it’s nothing compared to the costs of the havoc global warming will cause. Even if we stopped burning fossil fuels today, there is enough CO2 in the air to raise the temperature another degree.

As to your nature, maybe that’s what you say you have become but I am not so sure, but thanks for summing up this mentality. Maybe you are having a cranky life day but there is more to you. Why anyone would buy into the mean, arrogant lie that that is our nature is beyond me. Any time there is a disaster most people turn out to be pretty helpful.”

C: “So why be an alarmist?”

Me: “What is happening is cause for alarm so this is not alarmism- but the point isn’t to panic but to address the problems. While you are right that it is the politics of who will benefit form the change economically and politically that has the works glued up, but it doesn’t change the physics of nature. The stupid thing is this presents the opportunity for a whole new technological advance that is good for economics and provide us with a cleaner and healthier place to live. Of coarse the rub is it challenges the establishment of both parties which is rooted in wars for fossil fuels and geopolitical corporate advantage.

This problem- that putting all the crap into the air in industrialism was spoiling the environment – has been suspected since the turn of the century, and the health problems were well manifested early on. Unfortunately the conservatives after the ’70’s have opposed and dismantled the Clean Air Act and Clean Water Act so politically it is hard for them to change course.

So moving forward requires a change in the structure of power and neither party wants that. (This is covered in the Chomsky video.)”

C: “If you really want to do something talk to the Chinese.”

Me: “Now on the Chinese, they are a mixed bag actually. Sure their filthy coal plants aren’t helping, but America isn’t leading either (watch the video for more on this.) The Chinese are outpacing us on solar & wind development and on more efficient mass transit. Also they have made such a pigsty of their rivers and air so quickly that the Chinese people are rising up. Obama isn’t helping with his “all of the above” energy policy which helps sell coal to them and, if he approves the Key Stone Pipeline to refine fitly tar sands, will be helping to refine oil for them. If the US decided to become the world leader in a new sustainable energy economy we would put China to shame, but now they can just say they are doing it to be competitive (just like) with the US.”

C: “It’s a religion and I am an agnostic.”

Me: “In the group I work with on the state level here there are geologists, physicists, engineers, biologists and climate scientists- the rate of erosion is massive in RI and the soil is inundated with water. These are facts. Some are politically conservative, some are liberal, but no one doubts that this is a rapidly advancing problem spurred on by burning fossil fuels. Some of these people advise REIMA & FEMA on how to prepare to deal this this. It is an ongoing, very real problem, and it is nationwide in it’s scope- global actually. If there is any doubt they want to be prepared and err on the safe side.These are a lot of brass tacks type and they are not “Moonies in a cult.” Sure some politicians want to cut the best deal for their funders (Campaign donors) and not for you and me, let alone defenseless nature. But some want to help.

However, politics aside, nature is not going to negotiate. It’s not being idealistic to say that raising the CO2 level to 400 ppm with take 80 years to absorb and will result in 1-2 degrees in have temp rise and sea level rise- it is as close to fact as we have. The truth is that these are the optimistic projections, according to the newest UN IPCC reports, and they have a politically sensitive situation in thatchy have to deal with the powers that be, namely the US who has blown up the UN Climate Change talks repeatedly and refused to commit to global carbon reduction standards.

Three years ago I heard the NASA scientist James Hansen speak. He is the expert who testified in front of congress when GHW Bush was president and conservatives were still rational. He described the physics of the biosphere and then presented several examples of the extreme weather patterns that could occur once “feedback loops” started. These are cycles that create exponential growth in the rate of change. They sounded a lot like what was happening and I asked him at dinner why he didn’t say that this was what it looked like was happening. He paused and simply said ” I have grandchildren.” I knew by the look in his eyes that this was very serious.

C: “Okay but I just cannot make it my cause célèbre.”

Me: “You don’t need to make it your cause. Just be aware of the realities and do what you can.”

___________________

Reflecting on this is is interesting that we seem to agree that there is too much money in politics though he seems to be willing to let it go for the established fossil fuel interests. This is reactionary and suggests that a rule by money, what Chomsky calls in the video a Plutocracy, is OK as long as they are the established Aristocratic interests. However, while it doesn’t square with his complaint that there is too much money in politics, It does explain why the RNC is challenging the FEC in the McCutcheon case, and inadvertently makes Chomsky’s point that conservatives like him today are irrational.It is interesting that when it comes to Fracking which is happening where he lives he can see the risks- here is another place we agree so the discussion revealed common ground here.

Also, this reveals for someone supposedly not political he was pretty able to rattle off the usual denier foils. But he never read the blog posts or watched the video, so he had already made up his mind, but seemed to back off in the end when there were too many facts to refute. No I am sure that he has returned to his Fox News echo chamber and has more stock complaints but I know it got him thinking.

Have you had conversations like this?   Thanks for the honest exchange and considering my thoughts.

February 19, 2014February 19, 2014

RI economy improved for 1%, but it got worse for 99%

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Rhode Island’s economy is recovering. But not for the 99 percent it isn’t.

A new report by the Economic Analysis and Research Network shows that between 2009 and 2011, the 99 percent – those Rhode Island’s who make on average $41,958 a year – saw an average decline of 4.1 percent in their earnings.

On the other hand, the one percent in Rhode Island – those who make at least $287,311 a year – did quite well in the same two years. Their earnings increased by 17.3 percent from 2009 to 2011.

“Rhode Island has not escaped the disturbing trend of growing inequality over the past decades,” said Kate Brewster, executive director of The Economic Progress Institute. “Today, the average income of the top one percent is 20.3 times the average income of the bottom 99 percent. We call on leaders in Washington and here at home to put in place policies that increase income for the majority and help close the income gap.”

Only in four other states – North Dakota, Massachusetts, Texas and Colorado – did the one percent fare better from 2009 to 2011. And only the 99 percent in Nevada fared worse than the 99 percent in Rhode Island did from 2009 to 2011.

Conversely, there was less income disparity between the one percent and the 99 percent in Rhode Island from 1979 and 2007, and Rhode Island had less income disparity than the national average. The richest one percent of Rhode Islanders income grew by 170.3 percent from 1979 to 2007 compared to 40.4 percent for the poorest 99 percent of Rhode Islanders. Nationally during that same time frame, the richest one percent increased their earnings by 200.5 percent and the poorest 99 percent increased by only 18.9 percent.

The change in income distribution coincided with not only the economic collapse but also broad income tax cuts for the top tax bracket in Rhode Island proposed by former Governor Don Carcieri, a tea party Republican, and approved by the General Assembly, which took a hard turn to the right on economic policy during and after the Carcieri era.

From 2005 to 2011, the highest income tax rate in Rhode Island dropped from 9.9 percent to 5.99 percent. And during that same time frame that taxes were lowered on Rhode Island’s richest residents and they simultaneously started to earn a higher percentage of the state’s overall income, the unemployment rate creeped up to among the highest in the nation, further eroding the talking point from the far right and conservative Democrats that tax cuts help create new jobs.

The new report released today does not breaks down the data only into the one percent versus the 99 percent. You can read the full report here. Or check out the online version here. Here’s the Rhode Island-specific data.

In 2007, the one percent in Rhode Island accounted for 18.1 percent of all income. That was up from 1979, when the one percent only accounted for 10.3 percent. In 1928, the one percent in Rhode Island were responsible for 23.6 percent of all income.

February 19, 2014

What do teachers think: Jen Saarinen of Warren

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Jen Saarinen was thrust into a changing, tumultuous profession when she started teaching ten years ago.

“When I graduated from college, No Child Left Behind was just getting underway,” she said.

Saarinen is a math teacher at Kickemuit Middle School in Warren, and she spoke to RI Future about the many changes that she and her students have been inundated with over the past ten years.

“The major changes that have resulted in the classroom as a result of the state standardized tests have been more testing situations that our students are forced to go through,” she said. “We now track our students three times per year using NWEA for progress in addition to completing a “Common Assessment” per core subject at the end of each quarter.”

She voiced her concern by saying “The number of days that are spent on these tests, not to mention NECAP soon to be PARCC, we don’t truly have a full year to instruct the students to make this progress!”

While she does has her qualms about the proliferation of testing, Saarinen believes that some policy changes are a step in the right direction. One of these was the implementation of an evaluation model for teachers. “I do believe that there was a need to have an evaluation model for educators, however I do not feel that the one that Rhode Island is using is the most effective evaluation model,” said Saarinen. She went onto say, “Compound the demands of the educator evaluation and the assessments, many teachers are no longer in love with their profession.”

Some teachers have fallen out of love with their profession, and Saarinen has noticed a similar phenomenon in students. “I feel that my students don’t have the love of learning that they once had. I can’t imagine that the amount of testing/pre-testing/re-testing plays into this. Teachers have made jokes about their school name being changed to a ‘testing center.'”

February 19, 2014March 17, 2014

Hilton and Renaissance hotel workers fight to unionize

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Over a hundred people organized a picket line in the cold and slush outside the Hilton Hotel in downtown Providence Tuesday evening to demand that The Procaccianti Group begin treating their employees properly, pay fair wages, and not interfere in the worker’s right to form a union.

Originally announced as a a “civil disobedience” action at the Renaissance Hotel by the State House, the focus of the picket was changed when 70% of the employees at the Hilton signed a petition, declaring their intent to unionize. The Procaccianti Group manages both hotels.

The Federal Government has cited the Renaissance Hotel twice: First, OSHA cited the Renaissance for workplace hazards and the Hotel settled, agreeing to pay $8,000 in fines. Second, the General Counsel of the National Labor Relations Board has issued an Unfair Labor Practice complaint against the Renaissance and its parent, The Procaccianti Group. After an eight-month investigation, the NLRB Complaint named thirteen different hotel managers and alleged multiple acts of interfering with, restraining and coercing employee organizing rights at the Renaissance, including interrogation. A trial is set for March 31 in Boston.

At the Hilton Hotel, I watched as a group of hotel employees attempted to deliver the petition to the hotel management, only to be barred entry by members of the Providence Police Department. At least one police officer had zip tie handcuffs hanging off his belt, perhaps in anticipation of any civil disobedience that might crop up. However, the action was completely peaceful and well mannered, if loud and boisterous.

Several speakers took turns at the megaphone. A woman named Krystle talked about having been terminated because she advocated for her right to form a union. She also talked about the terrible treatment pregnant women receive at the hands of hotel management. In her written statement she said, “I was working in the restaurant then as a busser. Management would pressure me to work faster. They never offered to help me lift the heavy bins of dirty dishes. I went into pre-mature labor twice. I was treated like a machine, not a human being. It was outrageous.”

Speakers included Providence City Councilpersons Carmen Castillo and Luis Aponte. Aponte talked about the tax breaks the Hilton receives from the city. “You’ve done well in this city,” said Aponte, “Do good by your workers.” Castillo, in addition to being on the Providence City Council, is a worker in the hotel industry, at the Omni Hotel. She was at the protest to lend her support to the Hilton and Renaissance Hotel workers.

As much as the speeches by the politicians in support of the workers were welcome, it was the voice of the workers, speaking for themselves, that really invigorated the crowd. As the speakers spoke in English or Spanish, their words were translated, but even if you didn’t speak the language, you knew what they were saying. These are decent, hard working people who want to be treated properly, paid fairly, respected on the job, and live their lives with dignity and purpose. They are not simply replaceable cogs in The Procaccianti Group machine, they are human beings and they deserve, and on Tuesday night they demanded, to be treated as such.

February 18, 2014

Is ‘anti-gay therapist’ Dr. Cretella a therapist or not?

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The recent cancellation of anti-LGBTQ activist Michelle Cretella’s talk at Providence College by Dr. Matthew Cuddeback has taken a new turn.

Cuddeback initially invited Cretella, a founding member of NOM-RI (dedicated to preventing marriage equality in our state), a board member of NARTH (dedicated to “curing” homosexuality) and vice president of the American College of Pediatrics (a group that broke away from the American Academy of Pediatrics because of its support of adoption by gay and lesbian couples) not to discuss any of that work, apparently, but to “describe her journey to navigate the controversial issue of homosexuality as a physician and a Catholic.”

Cuddeback defended inviting an Cretella because she “is not a therapist, and had no intent to speak as one. Her intent was to speak of her journey, as a physician, from rejecter to appreciator of the Catholic and natural law traditions concerning homosexuality.”

If Cretella is not a therapist, and had no intention to speak as one, how does one explain a piece she wrote on LifeSiteNews yesterday in which she said,

No therapy is free from harm. Regarding all forms of psychotherapy for any given condition a surprisingly high 14-24 percent of children deteriorate during psychotherapy.

This sounds like something a therapist might say, especially one who signs her piece as Michelle Cretella, MD and chairs the American College of Pediatricians’ Committee on Adolescent Sexuality. She certainly wants us to accept that her credentials somehow add gravitas to her opinions. Note also that this piece was to appear in the same week that Cretella was scheduled to speak at PC.

The piece she wrote yesterday never once mentions “natural law” or Catholicism. Instead, Cretella lays out her case as a lawyer might, filling her piece with footnotes and links to studies. To some her piece might look like a case made by a scientist or a doctor, but it is not. It is pure religious advocacy, dressed up as science to present an opinion, not fact. Cretella wrote the piece to argue against laws that prevent so-called therapists from attempting to “cure” those under the age of eighteen of homosexuality.

Cretella never mentions what some of these therapies entail. Cures advanced over the years for treating homosexuality have included Prozac, playing sports, hypnosis and gaining weight. One extreme example is aversion therapy, in which victims are shown pornography and their genitals are electrocuted when they react improperly. Ruined lives and suicides are often the tragic result of these techniques, but Cretella, who is not a therapist, is silent. Perhaps because, not being a therapist, she is not qualified to speak on these topics?

Cuddeback, in canceling the talk, said, “Because I sense that Dr. Cretella may be the object of animus were she to present at PC next week, I have advised her that we shall postpone her presentation.”

Cuddeback is being disingenuous. Cretella has earned every inch of animus aimed her way.

February 18, 2014February 19, 2014

Congressman Langevin’s statewide food tour asks: can RI be ‘Silicon Valley of food’?

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Next to our beautiful beaches, Rhode Island is best-known nationally for our left-leaning congressional delegation and the amazing food we have here.

And all week long, Congressman Jim Langevin is bringing these two reputation-boosting attributes together as he visits some of the most innovative, entrepreneurial, economy-boosting and just plain delicious businesses in the Ocean State.

Langevin will visit one of the largest distributors of organic produce in the nation as well as one of the biggest distributors of frozen fish. He sample world-renowned cured meats and shop at an upstart local grocery chain that’s causing its bigger national competitors to rethink their business models. He’ll eat at some of the best restaurants in New England and visit some of the the hippest markets and most beautiful farms found anywhere.

All without ever leaving Rhode Island.

He kicked off his week-long food tour yesterday at Daniele, Inc in Northern Rhode Island. The average Rhode Islander may not know this Burrillville-based business, but purveyors of the finest prosciutto worldwide know the brand well (as should anyone who enjoys a high-quality, authentic Italian Grinder).

And Daniele owner Davide Dukcevich, who was Langevin’s guest at the State of the Union this year, may have given the congressman an idea that could prove to be the key to fixing Rhode Island’s economy.

Dukcevich, Langevin said, approached him, “about the possibility of branding Rhode Island as the ‘Silicon Valley of food.'”

“That concept resonated with me,” Langevin continued, “and I believe that the business savvy, enthusiasm and determination of individuals like Davide can make that idea a reality.”

Betasprings founder Allan Tear agreed.

“Rhode Island has all the right ingredients to be the center of culinary innovation in the U.S.,” he said. “New food and beverage startups are joining our existing packaged food businesses in bringing their products to New England, the US, and the world. These food innovators create the kind of jobs that matter for Rhode Island.”

You can follow Langevin’s food tour of Rhode Island on Twitter or Instagram with the hashtag: #RIFoodWeek.

Or you can let us follow it for you on this Storify we’ll update throughout the week:

February 18, 2014

Why legislators think we should tax and regulate marijuana

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Senator Josh Miller, of Cranston, and Rep. Edith Ajello, of the East Side of Providence, double bi-lined this op/ed on why Rhode Island should become the third state in the nation to legalize marijuana.

Check it their op/ed below the video. And here’s Rep. Ajello from three years ago explaining how tax and regulate would work:

A Sensible Marijuana Policy for Rhode Island
By Rep. Edith H. Ajello and Sen. Joshua Miller

Marijuana policy reform is a hot topic these days in Rhode Island and across the country. Over the last three years, we’ve been discussing the issue with constituents, colleagues, opinion leaders and activists on both sides of the issue. Our conversations have led us to two points of agreement:

Our current marijuana policy has failed. For instance, studies indicate an increase in youth marijuana use and that it is easy for them to get it.

Most Rhode Islanders are ready for change.

A survey conducted last month by Public Policy Polling reinforced our conclusions, finding that a solid majority of Rhode Island voters support taxing and regulating marijuana like alcohol, allowing adults over the age of 21 to use it. These results are right in line with several national polls that indicate a rapidly growing majority of Americans agree it is time to make marijuana legal.

Marijuana prohibition has been a failure of tragic proportions. It has failed to prevent use or abuse. It has been a distraction for law enforcement officials who should be focusing elsewhere. Marijuana prohibition has resulted in criminal records for thousands of otherwise law-abiding adults and limited the ability of too many of our young people to access financial aid for higher education. Insidiously, this prohibition has forced marijuana sales into an underground market where more dangerous products such as heroin and cocaine are also offered. Ironically, prohibition ensures that the state has no control over the product. Criminals fight over the profits and our state and municipalities forego millions of dollars of tax revenue.

It is for these reasons that we support regulating and taxing marijuana as we regulate and tax alcohol, and approaching marijuana as a public health matter rather than a criminal justice problem. We can mandate that marijuana be properly tested and labeled so that consumers know what they are getting. We can restrict sales to minors and ensure that those who sell marijuana are asking for proof of age. We can collect tens of millions of dollars in much-needed tax revenue and foster the creation of new businesses and jobs in an emerging industry.

Importantly, we can redirect our drug prevention and treatment resources toward addressing the abuse of more harmful drugs such as methamphetamine, heroin and prescription narcotics. We can urge teens to stay away from marijuana until their brains are fully developed.

Those who wish to maintain our current prohibition laws often claim marijuana is a “gateway drug” that will inevitably lead to the use of other drugs, but studies suggest otherwise. According to a 1999 study commissioned by the White House and performed by the Institute of Medicine, marijuana “does not appear to be a gateway drug to the extent that it is the cause or even that it is the most significant predictor of serious drug abuse.”

Marijuana’s illegal status creates the gateway. By forcing marijuana consumers into the underground market, we dramatically increase the possibility that they will be exposed to more dangerous substances. Separating marijuana from the illicit drug markets while reducing exposure to more addictive and dangerous substances cannot help but reduce any gateway effect associated with marijuana use. Customers buying a bottle of wine for dinner are not, after all, offered heroin.

Regulating marijuana will take the product out of the hands of criminal enterprises and place it behind counters of legitimate businesses that safely and responsibly sell marijuana – and marijuana only – to adults 21 and older.

Under marijuana prohibition, illicit profits are used to fund violent gangs, illegal gun markets, human trafficking, and other violent trades. Regulating marijuana will allow us to redirect marijuana sales revenue away from the violent criminal market and toward a meaningful solution. A large portion of tax revenue derived from wholesale transactions will fund programs preventing and treating the abuse of alcohol and other substances. According to federal government data, nearly 2.5 percent of Rhode Islanders needed treatment for hard drugs in 2012 but did not receive it. The recent spike in drug overdose deaths is a stark reminder of the need for treatment and education.

Most people recognize that marijuana prohibition’s days are numbered. The question is now “when should we end it?” not “should we?” Like most Rhode Islanders, we believe now is the time and regulating and taxing marijuana like alcohol is the answer.

February 18, 2014February 18, 2014

Hotel workers resort to civil disobedience today

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Workers at the Renaissance Hotel in downtown Providence have held rallies, marches and protests in calling attention to the poor conditions they have to endure at the Procaccanti Group-owned hotel. Today they will try civil disobedience.

An action outside the hotel is planned for 5pm, right across the street from the State House.

“After months of picketings, numerous federal government citations against Renaissance management for mistreatment of its workers, and refusal from The Procaccianti Group to address the workers demands, workers have planned an escalation of their struggle with a civil disobedience in front of the Renaissance Hotel,” said this Facebook event post. “Come support the workers in their struggle for justice! Come join the picket to support those partaking in the civil disobedience! Come tell the community at-large to honor the workers’ boycott of the Renaissance Hotel until justice is won! Come tell The Procaccianti Group to respect its workers demands!”

For almost a year, Renaissance Hotel workers have been fighting for better working conditions.

“Workers say the Hotel has always treated them poorly, but that conditions further deteriorated since the Procaccianti Group, a national hotel management company, took over the hotel in December 2012,” according to a press release from last year. “The Hotel’s top management remains the same. Employees say they have had enough. They are demanding a voice on the job.”

In January, the National Labor Relations Board issued a complaint against the hotel and scheduled a fact finding hearing in March.

“The NLRB Complaint alleges multiple acts of interfering with, restraining and coercing employee organizing rights, including interrogation and illegal promises of benefits to induce workers to abandon union organizing,” according to the Joey Quits website earlier this year. “The NLRB Complaint cites The Procaccianti Group’s TPG Hospitality affiliate for maintaining illegal work rules nationwide, including rules restricting communications and prohibiting employees from speaking to the media and the public about their jobs.

February 14, 2014February 14, 2014

10 Wingmen: RI led the nation on pension cuts, but is backing away from leading on the law

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Rapp, Katz and I get an early start on the pension debate this week on NBC 10’s web-only Wingmen segment. I argue the pension case should go to court mostly because I think it’s horrendously unfair that Rhode Island boast about leading the nation when it comes to slashing benefits but loses the stomach for the real fight when it comes to figuring out whether it was legal to do so. (That’s not reform, that’s cuts)

News, Weather and Classifieds for Southern New England

February 14, 2014February 14, 2014

The NECAP math test is wrong

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Recent remarks in the Journal by the Commissioner of Education point a finger away from the NECAP and toward math education in this state, “Gist said that math is the problem, not the NECAP. ‘This is not about testing,’ she said. ‘It’s about math. It’s about reading.” (Jan. 31, 2014).

A statement like this puts everyone on notice. It tells our students they had better try harder; it tells our teachers they need to stay on track and get better results; and it tells our schools they need to raise their test scores. The subtext of the statement is that there is a big crises and just about everyone in the school system is to blame.

And just behind this subtext is the further ominous and obvious subtext that everyone in the schools needs to be held accountable until we get out of this mess.

But what kind of a mess are we in? What if our low math scores are the result of how we measure math instead of how we teach math? If that is the case, there is much less of a crises and the argument for holding everyone to high stakes accountablity–students don’t graduate, teachers get fired, schools get taken over–

has much less traction.

Since a lot rides on the answer to this question—is it the way we teach math or is it the way we measure math?—it’s worthwhile trying to answer it.

One way to go about this is to compare the performance standards set by different tests. A performance standard is sometimes expressed as a grade level, as in, “the proficiency level of the grade 11 NECAP is set at a ninth grade level”. In this case, a student demonstrating proficiency would show us that he or she has mastered the expectations of a student completing ninth grade. That is, the student would get most of the questions with ninth grade content and ninth grade difficulty right, but would get many fewer questions set at higher levels of difficulty or questions covering topics not usually taught until tenth grade or later.

The way this would show up on a test would be in the average score of the students taking the test—a test set at ninth grade proficieny would have a higher average score than a test set at the eleventh grade proficiency level if they are taken by the same group of students. That makes sense–the eleventh grade standard for proficiency is harder than the ninth grade level because students have covered more content and developed stronger skills.

Back to the basic question—is it the way we teach math or the way we measure math? If we look at the way the NECAP measures reading, we can see that in the two states that take the test in grade 11, New Hampshire and Rhode Island, about 80% of students achieve proficiency. If we say 80% achieving proficiency indicates the test is at an eleventh grade level, then we have to wonder about the NAEP results students in these states achieve because less than half achieve proficiency.

We then have to ask ourselves, what performance standard is NECAP using? Whatever it is, it is much lower than the performance standard NAEP uses because a much higher percentage of students pass. In fact. over 80% more students pass NECAP than pass NAEP, so you can think of the NECAP performace standard as almost twice as easy as the NAEP performance standard. The tests are using different performance standards.

$math necap chart$

If you look at math, the results are startlingly different—here the percentages passing NECAP and NAEP as very comparable, meaning both tests use the same performance standard. And if you look at the NAEP reading and math performance standards, they are pretty comparable, with reading a little higher than math.

It looks like NAEP, the national measuring stick, uses about the same performance standard for reading and math while the NECAP does not.

Now, you can argue that NECAP has set the math performance standard right and has used a reading standard that is too easy. Then, of course, we would have a reading and a math problem instead of just a math problem.

But either admitting the math standard is too hard or the reading standard is too easy would mean admitting that something is wrong with the way NECAP standards have been set, something the Department of Education and the Commissioner have steadfastly denied.

I think that, at heart, they have denied such an obvious fact because it is too costly to their policy agenda to admit that anything could be wrong with the tests.

To do so would be to cast doubt on the expertise of the test designers who are the ultimate source of authority in the accountability debate. If test designers are wrong and tests are fallible, then how we measure students, teachers and schools is up for grabs. RIDE loses its top down leverage.

In the same article, Gist said, “Now is not the time to rethink our strategy.”

“Holding students accountable is really important,” she said. “We cannot reduce expectations.” The Chairman of the Board of Education, Eva Mancuso echoed the thought, “We are on the right course.” This sounds like a comment from the bridge of the Titanic.

February 14, 2014February 14, 2014

RI political pundits: chained to a cave and shouting at shadows

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My second year writing (occasionally) for RI Future has probably made a cynic out of me.

The problem with politics is that it necessarily has to make an emotional appeal out of rational arguments. And that’s not to castigate that, that’s simply reality. You can trot out facts, figures, well-reasoned logic, and a thousand points of data; but without that gut punch, you can’t win. Anger, or fear, are often the most effective.

Combine that with righteousness and you have a heady mixture. A politician must always be righteous, right up until the moment they must be penitent; but that only happens when some undeniable wrongdoing has been brought to light. There is no room for mulling things over, for admitting mistakes while you’re still assailable. The nature of politics (to some extent driven by media) treats measured consideration as weakness.

In the Iliad, my favorite character is always Odysseus. Odysseus is the character who collects all his thoughts and then gives an answer when questioned. This is in stark contrast to his fellow leaders Agamemnon and Achilles, who are constantly feuding. We have a surplus of Agamemnons and Achilleses, but precious few Odysseuses.

In contemporary Rhode Island politics, there is precious little space for nuance. Thus as we race for the governor’s office, we ask who has The Plan for reinvigorating our economy? Do we expect four budgets to somehow turn back the tide in this extended downturn? Or to erase our manufacturing collapse? The Governor is not some sort of ambivalent god who can protect our economy when we demand it. For that matter, neither is the General Assembly

We’re too focused on get-rich-quick schemes; and when we’re not proposing those, we’re claiming something that takes a lot of work can be done easily. We want to have all the positive indicators of other places; low employment, low crime, healthy people, clean and responsive government; but we don’t want to put in the time and money it takes to build those things. We want it cheap, and preferably we want to do it with as little change as possible.

Rhode Island’s pundits, like myself, are perhaps the worst. In the Sanskrit word it comes from, it’s supposed to mean “learned.” But I think of us as like the people in Plato’s Cave; watching shadows dancing upon the wall and proclaiming our interpretations as reality. But the pronouncements I read daily from opinionated people of all stripes rarely match the place I grew up in. A place of diversity and yet a true melting pot in the old sense; a single culture forged from many others. A place of decrepit and failing brick and concrete; yet with sinews of marble and cobblestone. I think of Rhode Islanders who have grimly read and heard of our doom for half a century or so, and wonder what they must think. Is there relief from it all? Or do we just grimace, ignore it, and keep going?

But when we cast everyone into heroes and villains, we must always be the hero striving to keep the villain from damning us all. That’s a terrible thing in politics. There aren’t fairy tales where the villain and hero reached a reasonable compromise and all parties walked away feeling decent about what they got. It’s easier, far easier, to think of the other person as evil. But the desire to do evil is rarely in anyone. Most of us are far more invested in our own righteousness.

There are a lot of would-be heroes out there now, heading towards the campaign season. Some of them are would-be Jeremiahs, convinced they’re speaking The Truth to the masses who just refuse to listen. Others are without a doubt egoists, who just want to be seen and accumulate as much power and influence as possible. Some might be over-inflated, convinced they have a ton of influence without really having much of anything. They’ll plot out plans and platforms, explain why they’re the force of good and their opponents are fighting to make us fail. And eventually one of them will get elected, and then eventually the economy will turn around, and they’ll declare victory without having done too much.

I often have heard it said that native Rhode Islanders are the most pessimistic about our state. But I find that hard to believe. If they truly are, then they must be mad for insisting on remaining here. The economy’s poor, and the weather sucks. I don’t think a bunch of outsiders who have decided to rest up here for awhile are going to save our state for us. It’s going to be the people who remain here through hurricanes and blizzards, economic downturns and mass layoffs and pension cuts.

What makes a Rhode Islander to me? A Rhode Islander can spend all day castigating the state and still love it deeply as they go to sleep. It doesn’t matter why they love it, it’s that they do. That’s what counts.

February 13, 2014February 14, 2014

Providence: the Groningen of the United States

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Two talking points in our conversation have to change.

1. We need to stop looking at successful places as somehow inherently different than Rhode Island, and acting as though we can’t repeat the exact same steps they made for success here to produce the same results.

2. We need to stop acting as though change takes years and years in cases where the actual data shows that it does not. Providence in particular is not doing what it needs to do to be a biking city, and the city and state need to take a hard look at priorities in the budget in order to make that change. Biking infrastructure is cheap and easy to create.

I made a post on my blog about Groningen, in the Netherlands, which is the undisputed leader in biking in the world. It so happens that Groningen has a lot in common with Providence. We can follow the same steps that places like Groningen did, and have the same results.

Comments appreciated.

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