Friday, July 29, 2011

Can't Hardly Wait....

@thenerdyteacher claims in this post that everything he learned about education he learned from the epic 90's movie Can't Hardly Wait. This is an awesome and hysterical comparison that has some very sobering parallelisms.

The main points are as follows:

1. Dumping bad reform, like dumping a bad girlfriend, is okay as long as the next one is better.
2. Teachers are being trashed in the name of reform.
3. Teachers need to speak up now and not wait.
4. We should be ourselves, just like we encourage students to do the same.
Link
Who knew the crazy movie's of the 90's could be so wise.

Can't Hardly Wait

Wednesday, July 27, 2011

TED Talks: Always Wear Dark Suits

As teachers we have to be constantly be attentive to burnout. The following video from TED Talks is an interesting new perspective on how burnout works, and the great rewards for burnout prevention in teachers. The main idea of burnout prevention is having graduates come back into the classroom to share with new students and former teachers what they have done since graduation. It's an innovative idea that and if it takes hold, it will change how we "do school."

Always Wear Dark Suits

Monday, July 18, 2011

Our Broken Escalator

linked a post to Nicolas Kristof's article in the New York Times entitled Our Broken Escalator, which discusses the problems with funding education in Afghanistan, and not ensuring funding in our own school systems in the U.S.

The point remains that education is the best way to combat poverty, and while we can focus on doing that in countries across the world poverty is still striking large communities all over the country.

Here is an excerpt from the article

"When I report on poverty in Africa and poverty in America, the differences are vast. But there is a common thread: chipping away at poverty is difficult and uncertain work, but perhaps the anti-poverty program with the very best record is education — and that’s as true in New York as it is in Nigeria.

Granted, budget shortfalls are real, and schools need reforms as well as dollars. Pouring money into a broken system isn’t a solution, and we need more accountability. But it’s also true that blindly slashing budgets is making the problems worse. As Derek Bok, the former Harvard president, once observed, “If you think education is expensive, try ignorance.”"

I can't think of a better way to state how much education in America needs to change.

Friday, July 15, 2011

Health and Education

@ED.gov posted Secretaries Duncan and Sebelius announce awards of $95 million to 278 school-based health center programs.

The link leads to an article in which the Department of Education will be funding 278 school-based health center programs with $95 million which they estimate will be able to help increase the population these centers help by 50%. These centers provide health care to students who would otherwise not receive the health care. Services such as basic health care, including asthma treatments, eye care, and dentist care help students stay in class and become distracted by ailments that can be easily treated.

Of the 278 health centers being funded, nine Chicago centers will receive a total of approx. $9 million dollars.

“Healthy children are better able to learn and succeed in school,” said HRSA Administrator Mary K. Wakefield, Ph.D., R.N. “These grants will improve access to care for children, and help maximize their potential to learn.”

Wednesday, July 6, 2011

Twitter Reply: TED Blog, 100 Websites You Should Know and Use

The TED(Technology, Entertainment, Technology) Blog released this week a list of the Top 100 Websites You should Know and Use. They have broken the list into six categories:

Curiosity and Knowledge
Graphics, Music, and Art
E-Commerce Experience
Searching and Finding
Online Resources
Top Interactive Experience Creators

While TED has listed some fantastic websites for everyday non-educational fun, they have certainly given teachers a fantastic list of resources and real world application sites for teachers everywhere.

Here is one of my favorites, among many

http://www.thinkingwithtype.com/


Play. Learn. Enjoy yourself!

Saturday, July 2, 2011

Tiwtter Reply: ProPublica Education Opportunity Project

@Coolcatteacher shared a post this week on ProPublica's response to the Department of Education's Office on Civil Right new release of data- The Civil Rights Survey. The OCR survey compiles comprehensive data on school districts housing greater than 3,000 students. ProPublica took this data and compiled reports for each school in these districts with stats given in six distinct categories: Free/reduced lunch, % of teachers with less than two years experience, number of AP courses offered in each school, number of students which take at least one AP course, and number of students in an advanced math class. Provided as well are the state and district averages for these categories.

ProPublica took this large compilation of extensive data one step further by creating a app for Facebook that allows you to compare districts, schools, etc and then posts observations and data to your Facebook page.




Overall, I think this is going to be an interesting and insightful tool for the comparison of schools both nationally, within districts and for Chicago specific communities. Hopefully, it begins to ignite some conversations outside of the professional education circle and fuel attitudes for change. This, however, is going to be entirely dependent on their marketing of the app and the resulting success of the app. As we all know, if it doesn't go viral, there is no point.

The only legitimate concern I have with the data that ProPublica's has pulled out for scrutiny, is the category of "Inexperienced Teachers." While I understand that inexperience is going to have an impact on schools; and undoubtedly, there is and issue with teachers being inadequately trained for the urban school setting; I fear the potential impact this data set could have on programs such as AUSL. While inexperience can be detrimental to a classroom setting, I have a difficult time with them giving the impression of all inexperienced teachers having a negative impact.