PSU students challenge Gist to debate
With public school teachers organizing to Dump Gist (they meet today at 4:30 at Cranston West High School) as her continued employment is debated later this week, students from Providence are applying some pressure as well. Following up on the Providence Student Union‘s high-profile action in which adults took the NECAP test, they now want [...]
What are we racing to the top of?
With all the fuss about high stakes testing, the biggest shame is that the Department of Education is telling us that the measure is the answer. A ruler never helped anyone grow an inch. Something other than the test needs to be looked at when 64 percent of the Hispanic or Latino population will not [...]
Dump Deborah Gist
Deborah Gist is nothing if not polarizing. Nearly 90 percent of local teachers want a new leader. But the Chamber of Commerce supports her. She backed the firing of Central Falls teachers, but she has the backing of the East Greenwich School Committee. Tom Sgouros and the Providence Student Union have twisted her in knots [...]
Our schools and the truth about policy
The commissioner of education has an op-ed in the Providence Journal this morning. Entitled “Our Schools and the Truth about Testing” it painted a rosy picture of what high performance in schools means: “Every high-performing school I have ever visited has been a vibrant, rich educational environment where learning is fun and well-rounded, and where [...]
More illogic from RIDE
In a reply to my post about sneaky changes in the NECAP documentation, the RI Department of Education spokesman wrote this: “The NECAP assessment is designed to measure whether students have attained the knowledge and skills expected at each grade level, that is, whether students have met grade-level standards.” This, of course, is the heart [...]
Sneaky changes in NECAP documentation
The NECAP-as-graduation-test has occupied a lot of my attention recently. As I have written before, the NECAP test is a fundamentally different kind of test than one you would use as a graduation test. The questions you’d put on a graduation test are exactly the ones that the test designers consider a waste of time [...]
How RIDE Undermines Their Own NECAP Test
If I had to pick one thing to complain about with the high-stakes NECAP testing regime it wouldn’t be the pressure on the students, the deformation of the curriculum, or any of that. If it was just one thing, it wouldn’t even be the misguided policy to use NECAP as a graduation test. It would [...]
Students Statewide Should Boycott NECAP
It is a bright autumn day in early to mid October. Students from all over the state are sitting quietly in rows. On their desks are booklets and number 2 pencils. It’s NECAP time. Soon the teacher gives the O.K. to begin and in unison kids take out a book and begin reading instead. Thus [...]
The Beatings Will Continue Until Morale Improves
It’s been said in jest that ‘the beatings will continue until morale improves.’ But to some this seems increasingly to be the Rhode Island’s guiding principle as it tries to improve its struggling public education system. One of the most salient concerns has to do with importance of standardized tests. Recently we learned that almost [...]
Chafee Takes Economic Center Stage Tonight
While Senate President Teresa Paiva Weed may have tried to focus some of the attention away from marriage equality with a press conference on the economy yesterday, the real news will happen tonight when Gov. Linc Chafee gives the annual State of the State speech. In it, he will outline his proposal for next year’s [...]
Why High Stakes Tests Shouldn’t Grade Students
A broad coalition of education activists and defenders of the less fortunate will attend the Board of Regents meeting tonight to ask the public education oversight committee to reconsider a new rule that would require high school students to pass a standardized test – traditionally used for grading school performance, not student – in order [...]
Protest RIDE’s High-Stakes Testing Policy Thursday
Next Thursday youth, parents, and other advocates will be heading to the Board of Regents meeting to protest against the new high-stakes testing graduation requirements that Commission Gist and the Regents passed last year. This discriminatory policy, which is scheduled to be implemented in Rhode Island schools this October, is an absolute disaster. It uses [...]
Budget Would Create One State Board of Education
Perhaps the biggest policy proposal in the draft budget is the idea to merge to board of regents, which currently oversees elementary and secondary public schools, and the board of governors, which oversees public higher education, into one board of education. The nine member board would be appointed by the governor and would employ a [...]
RI Progress Report: Marijuana Decriminalization, Brien Defends ALEC, Doherty Distances Self From Norquist
Two legislative committees last night passed a bill that would make possession of less than an ounce of marijuana punishable by a ticket rather than potential jail time. The bills now head the floors of the Senate and the House. Decriminalization of marijuana makes a lot of sense as it would save taxpayers money and [...]
Citing Legality, Town Might Scrap Tuition Plan
Barrington will likely not move forward with its controversial idea to let a limited number of students from outside the community pay tuition to attend its high-achieving local public schools, said Barrington School Committee President Patrick Guida, who is also a member of the state Board of Regents. “There’s a good chance we won’t move [...]
EG Wants iPads, CF Wants Enough Textbooks
It’s another sign of the increasing education disparity between Rhode Island’s affluent suburban towns and its economically challenged inner cities: the East Greenwich School Committee is considering getting every student at the high school an iPad, while in Central Falls, Pawtucket and Woonsocket students sometimes share textbooks, taking turns getting to take them home for [...]
ACLU Questions Legality of Barrington Tuition Idea
The Barrington School Committee finally has a legal opinion on its idea to allow a small number of out-of-town students to to pay tuition to attend its high-performing public schools. It’s from the RI ACLU. “The Barrington School Department has no obligation to establish a special program to accept students from out-of-town, but once it [...]
Legal, Moral, Fiscal Issues for Barrington Tuition Idea
There are, at least, three major conundrums that need to be addressed before Barrington can move forward with its proposal to offer out-of-district students to attend the high-performing school district if they can afford to pay tuition. The most obvious are the legal issues, and we detailed them yesterday. The public school system will need [...]
Barrington Tuition Idea Might Be Discriminatory
Not so fast, the state Department of Education tells a member of the Barrington School Committee after learning this morning that the district is considering allowing a limited number of students to attend the town’s high-performing schools if they can pay tuition to the public school system. “They’d be smart to get a legal opinion [...]
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