How do school districts bypass special education services and get away with it? One way, is to make it look like special education services are being restored, but due to a teacher shortage, the district must rely on teachers without classroom experience. Special education, all teaching really, but special education, especially, demands teaching qualifications. To […]
The Ridiculous Ways Adults Ruin Recess
Recess for children is such a simple concept that some adults don’t know how to deal with it. Edutopia is talking about a “right way” to do recess in order to “optimize” it. This stems from a report that is supposed to “help” with recess. They want to manipulate how children play and how we […]
Gates’s Blunders Destroy Teachers and Public Schools!
In a democracy, all powerful institutions that affect our lives need vigilant oversight. ~David Callahan, The Givers: Wealth, Power, and Philanthropy in a New Gilded Age (p. 304) As grills get fired-up for the 4th of July, dark clouds hang over the country. Here’s one. We learned through a RAND report, that the Bill & […]
Betsy DeVos Conquers the World: The Global Education Reform Movement (GERM)
Education in almost every country in the world is subject to the grip of education ‘reform’ which is diminishing public schooling, promoting privatisation and destroying teacher professionalism. It aims to produce a narrowly educated workforce, which can read instructions and advertisements but is discouraged from thinking critically about the world. ~UK’s National Education Union Betsy […]
Schools, and a Country’s Children: Remembering a Gentler (Not Perfect) Past
This is our land. These are our children. We’re all in it together. ~Brochure for the Van Buren Intermediate School District, Project NOMAD (Needs and Objectives for Migrant Advancement and Development), 1972 and 1973. In the early seventies, as a young college student, I became an aide for two summers, in the Michigan Migrant Education […]
Why Merging DOE with DOL is Wrong! Education is for Children, NOT Corporations
Moms and Dads, when you looked into your newborn’s eyes for the first time, did you think, I wonder what job our government will steer our baby into? A merger of the Department of Education (DOE) with the Department of Labor (DOL) is about just that. Here’s a quote from this administration’s manual called “Delivering […]
For Dads Who Care and Protect Children
There can be no keener revelation of a society’s soul than the way in which it treats its children. ~Nelson Mandela, Former President of South Africa Fathers who are protectors of children. Today is your day. Today, I am thinking about fathers who help their sons and daughters in school, and fathers who flee a […]
School Transformation Double Talk Threatens Students and Teachers
It’s easy to be confused by what is said about schools today. We are told one thing, when quite the opposite is taking place. We are told that with the Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA), education will involve local decision making. Simultaneously, the Bill & Melinda Gates foundation is giving $44 million to affect state […]
Alternative Routes vs. Growth Mindset: Shouldn’t School Be Like a Map?
Maybe you are planning a trip over the summer. Are you going to tackle the Grand Canyon? Perhaps you’re going overseas to Italy, or some exotic place that has always been on your bucket list. Maybe you will stay home and enjoy relaxing in the backyard. Why don’t we tell children that school is like […]
All the State Chiefs of Education in a Nutshell
I’ve compiled the list of state school superintendents, commissioners, officers, leaders, CEOs, whatever you want to call them, who are running schools in each state. They’re powerful and responsible for initiating school reform. This includes Common Core State Standards, high-stakes testing, teacher evaluations, and the digital transformation of public schools. Currently, they’re determining how the […]