Schools

Entering The ‘Brave New World’ Of Corporatized Education

May 15, 2018 Margaret Flowers and Kevin Zeese, Clearing the FOG Radio. Podcast Corporatism, Education reform, Schools, Teachers

First there were charter schools and high stakes testing, and now we are entering a whole new realm of corporate education that treats students as commodities and views schools and teachers as obstacles to profits. Education corporations are pushing computer-based learning on students and crowding out classroom-based instruction, even though studies show online learning is less effective. On top of that, new education tech also monitors students' eye movements, vital signs and emotional state. It is mining data on students from preschool on up that can be sold to marketers and used to determine a student's future. We speak with Morna McDermott, an educator and mom who co-founded the Opt Out Movement and has launched a new campaign, "Classrooms, Not Computers."

Amid School Closures, Puerto Rico’s Teachers Fight Privatization

April 9, 2018 By Emily Wells, Truthdig.com Educate! Class Struggle, Privatization, Puerto Rico, Schools, Teachers

Puerto Rico’s Department of Education announced Thursday it will close 283 schools this summer after a sharp drop in enrollment, thought to be partly a result of displacement of families after Hurricane Maria. However, many teachers in the island’s school system say the issue might be more complicated and believe the system’s recent acceptance of charter schools and voucher programs could be contributing to the deprioritizing of public schools. The Associated Press reports that Puerto Rico is currently operating 1,100 public schools with 319,000 enrolled students. Puerto Rico’s Education Secretary Julia Keleher said of the closings, “We know it’s a difficult and painful process. For this reason, we’ve done it in the most sensible way, taking in consideration all the elements that could impact the daily lives of some families and the school communities in general. …

West Virginia’s Public Schools Closed Due To Teacher Walk-Out Over Pay

February 23, 2018 Staff, Wtvr.com Resist! Labor, Protests, Schools, Teachers, West Virginia, Workers Rights and Jobs

Public schools across West Virginia are closed Thursday as teachers and other school employees hit the picket lines, demanding higher wages and better benefits. According to Dale Lee, president of the West Virginia Education Association, teachers in all of the state’s 55 counties are participating in the planned two-day walk-out, and a group will march Thursday morning to the capitol building in Charleston. Organizers expect thousands of teachers to participate. The work stoppage comes after Gov. Jim Justice signed legislation late Wednesday night granting teachers a 2% pay increase starting in July, followed by 1% pay increases over the next two years. But union officials have said that’s not a sufficient fix. Teachers are also requesting better healthcare and benefits packages. “We need to keep our kids and teachers in the classroom,” Justice said in a statement after signing the pay raise bill.

Statement From DSC, AEJ And J4J On Tragedy At Stoneman Douglas High School

February 17, 2018 Staff, Dignityinschools.org Educate! Mass Shootings, Massacres, Schools, Youth

“A tragedy of this magnitude will be felt in the Parkland community long after the news cameras leave and our attention is drawn elsewhere. It is hard to fathom the pain that students, educators, and families in Parkland are feeling right now, but our communities are familiar with the trauma, pain, and difficulty of navigating the healing processes that are needed to come together after inter-communal violence shakes a community to its core. We know that prioritizing comprehensive social, emotional, and mental health supports, trauma informed care and community building practices are necessary for rebuilding the sense of safety, love, and communal care that should be the foundation of our learning environments and neighborhoods.

Trying To Deliver “Failing” Grade To Betsy Devos, Teachers Locked Out Of Education Dept

February 10, 2018 By Julia Conley, Commondreams.org Resist! Betsy DeVos, Education, Schools

"People are universally appalled, universally aghast by a year of failures." Teachers' groups, parents, and students were barred from entering the Department of Education on Thursday, the anniversary of Betsy DeVos's confirmation as Education Secretary, to present her with a "Failing" report card alongside tens of thousands of comments from teachers who disapprove of her performance leading the nation's public education system. "This is a remarkable moment...this is the first time that I have ever been to this building where we were not let in."—Randi Weingarten, AFT President. After assembling protesters who wanted to express dissatisfaction over DeVos's record on protecting civil rights and supporting funding for low-income schools, American Federation of Teachers President Randi Weingarten and National Education Association head Lily Eskelsen García found the doors to the Department locked.

Cops Rebranded As “School Resource Officers” Can Injure And Criminalize Schoolkids

February 8, 2018 By Thandisizwe Chimurenga, Mintpressnews.com Educate! Criminalization, Police, Schools

SAN DIEGO, CALIFORNIA – Last month a video emerged of a La Mesa police officer violently slamming a 17-year-old student onto the ground at a San Diego charter school. The juvenile, who had complained of feeling ill, was accused by a teacher of being on drugs. When the student consented to a search of her belongings, no drugs were found but some pepper spray was. Since the spray was classified as a weapon, the student was suspended and asked to leave the campus. The student felt the suspension was unfair and refused to leave; that’s when police were called. A statement by La Mesa Police Chief Walt Vasquez says the girl, who had been handcuffed, tried to escape from the officer, who used force to subdue her...

What American High Schools Are Teaching Students About Slavery

February 5, 2018 By Jacob Sugarman, AlterNet.org Educate! Education, History, Propaganda, Schools, Slavery

Just eight percent of American high school seniors can identify the cause of the Civil War; less than a third (32 percent) know which amendment abolished slavery in the U.S.; and fewer than half (46 percent) know that the "Middle Passage" refers to the harrowing voyage across the Atlantic undertaken by Africans kidnapped for the slave trade. These are only a few of the more unnerving findings from the Southern Poverty Law Center’s Teaching Tolerance project, which concludes that in classrooms across the country, the subject of slavery is as mistaught as it is misunderstood. Drawing from online surveys of 1,000 12th-graders and more than 1,700 social studies teachers, along with an exhaustive analysis of the 10 most widely read U.S. history textbooks, the SPLC's latest report attempts to assess how the country understands its original sin. The answer, in a word, is "abysmally."

Military’s Goal Is School Ownership; Communities Push Back

January 2, 2018 By Pat Elder, Nnomy.org Resist! Education, Militarization, Military, Schools

Throughout the country military recruiters are increasingly allowed to casually share lunch in high school cafeterias and interact freely with high school youth in hallways and classrooms. Military recruiters are on campus so frequently in many schools that they get to know kids on a first-name basis. They “chill” in the locker room and hang out in the parking lot and they play one-on-one basketball with kids after school. Meanwhile, college recruiters are typically required to meet with students by appointment in the guidance office. It’s not the “same” access called for in the federal Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA). Forget the old adage that familiarity breeds contempt. With vulnerable 16 and 17 year olds, familiarity breeds trust and trust produces enlistment agreements.

Suspensions Are Down, But Restorative Discipline Not Up

December 16, 2017 Staff, badassteachers.blogspot.com Create! Education, Restorative Justice, Schools

The racism, once long latent in “zero tolerance” school discipline policies, is now manifest to many education stake holders, especially in urban school districts with majority non-white students. White educators everywhere are waking up to the reality that America’s addiction to incarceration is directly tied to school discipline policies that disproportionately push students of color out of the classroom and into the juvenile justice system. In effort to reverse what is called the “school-to-prison pipeline,” many race conscious administrators have called for dramatic reductions in the number of out-of-school suspensions across all student racial demographics.

5,500 U.S. Schools Use Solar Power; Growing As Costs Fall

November 30, 2017 Lyndsey Gilpin, insideclimatenews.org Create! New Economy, Schools, Solar Energy

By Lyndsey Gilpin for Inside Climate News - In a field behind an elementary school in rural Middlesex County, Virginia, near the Chesapeake Bay, an ambitious plan has been taking shape: Schools Superintendent Peter Gretz and other local administrators are preparing to power their school district with solar energy. By next August, Virginia-based solar developer Sun Tribe Solar expects to have an array of solar panels in place in that field that can generate enough electricity to power the county's elementary school and middle school—at a price well below their current electricity costs—while offering students, teachers and the community a way to learn about clean energy. "We felt it was important work for our kids, and we wanted them to see the community leading in a way that was responsible and sustainable, as well as fiscally responsible and efficient," Gretz said. The number of schools powered by solar is growing quickly. About 5 percent of all K-12 U.S. schools are now powered by the sun, and their solar capacity has almost doubled in the last three years, according to a new study by the Solar Energy Industries Association (SEIA), The Solar Foundation, and Generation 180, a clean energy nonprofit. The nearly 5,500 schools using solar power today have a total of 910 megawatts of solar capacity, enough to power 190,000 homes, according to the study. The biggest reason for the surge is the economic benefits of solar energy. Drastic declines in price have made it financially viable for schools. Both public and private schools are reducing their electricity bills with solar, leaving them more money to spend on educational programs, according to the research.

After 16 Years Of Activism, Philadelphia Is Reclaiming Its Public Schools

November 8, 2017 Sarah Jaffe, truth-out.org Create! Activism, Education, Philadelphia, Schools

By Sarah Jaffe for Truthout - Sarah Jaffe: We are talking on Thursday, and the news today is that Philadelphia is taking back control of its public schools. First off, tell us about the news breaking today. What is going on? A.K. Klagsbrun: We just came from city hall, where Mayor Jim Kenney, who was elected on a pro-education platform, just announced that he will be calling on the School Reform Commission (SRC), which is the 16-year-long body that has ruled Philadelphia schools as part of a state takeover, to abolish itself and therefore claim the Philadelphia schools for local control. This is 16 years in the making, since the beginning of the SRC. Our coalition has been calling for this to happen, so we are pretty excited to see it happen this year. It is going to happen on November 16. A.L. Little: This is a great moment, but it is not just a great moment for the people who were part of this process. This is a great moment for the children of Philadelphia -- the students of Philadelphia who have been affected by this failed experiment that last 16 years. Now they have an opportunity to actually receive the same education as their counterparts in many suburban districts. Hopefully, we will be able to see a changeover from the rule of the SRC to now local control here in Philadelphia.

The Public Good: Reports From The Front Lines

October 27, 2017 David Morris, www.ilsr.org Create! Children, Food and Agriculture, health, Schools

By David Morris for ILSR - In 2010, Congress passed the Healthy, Hunger Free Kids Act, a law championed by first lady Michelle Obama. Among other provisions, the law offers universal federally subsidized lunch and breakfasts for schools with a significant proportion of low-income students. Eligible schools must have at least 40 percent of the student body automatically qualify for free lunch because they’re homeless, or in foster care, enrolled in Head Start, or live in households which receive food stamps. About 21.5 million students in the U.S. receive free or reduced-price school lunch on any given school day. About 12.1 million receive free or reduced-price school breakfasts. The new program was created to overcome a significant shortcoming in the existing means-tested program. Many students don’t take advantage of the program because of the social stigma attached. In New York City, for example, 75 percent of public school students are eligible for free or reduced prices but one in three skips lunch. In 2016, Brooklyn high school senior Aminata Abdouramane explained why in Chalkbeat, “The free and reduced-price lunch program creates a social class system that is reinforced daily by the school lunch line. Some students get lunch for free, some get it for a reduced price, and some pay the whole cost. Imagine you’re on the lunch line and another student sees you getting free lunch and takes advantage of this.

Proposed State-Run STEM School Raises Questions, Suspicions

October 17, 2017 Bill Raden, www.capitalandmain.com Educate! California, Education, Schools, Science

By Bill Raden for Capital and Main - A hastily revised bill introduced in Sacramento last month is attempting to address the state’s STEM crisis by adding a single new privatized state STEM school to California’s already contentious K-12 landscape. The plan to create an 800-student “State School for Instruction in Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM)” that would serve grades six through 12, and be located somewhere within Los Angeles County, has met heated resistance from public school advocates. Part of their concern lies in just how much the proposed new breed of state STEM schools resembles charter schools, which are privately managed but taxpayer-funded. School districts have long contended that charters siphon off their higher achieving students while leaving the districts with less money to teach a larger percentage of far-needier kids. Authored by Assemblymember Raul Bocanegra (D-San Fernando), Assembly Bill 1217 stipulates that the new STEM school would operate similarly. It would be managed by a private non-profit corporation and get its funding from the same combination of private philanthropy and the state ADA (average daily attendance) money that would follow its 800 students, probably from Los Angeles Unified School District (LAUSD).

Confederate Statues Down, But Structural Racism Still Stands Tall

June 12, 2017 Ashana Bigard, www.progressive.org Educate! Confederacy, New Orleans, Racism, Schools

By Ashana Bigard for The Progressive - Many New Orleanians celebrated at the removal of confederate monuments around the city in recent weeks. But on the same day that Robert E. Lee’s bronzed image came down from Lee Circle, two black boys (like hundreds of boys throughout the city and state of Louisiana) were not allowed to graduate for arbitrary, punitive, and potentially illegal reasons. The monuments may be gone, but structural racism continues to create barriers for students of color in New Orleans schools. Take the cases of Rahsaan Ison and Rashaad Brown, both enrolled at the New Orleans Center for the Creative Arts. They had requested a tutor in Spanish, and one was provided to them under state and federal law protecting students with disabilities. But the tutor turned out to be so unprofessional that their school claimed he had cheated on a test by answering questions for them, and refused to accept any of their work, making it impossible for them to achieve their graduation requirements. I acted as a student advocate for the boys, and I asked for an accommodation on the 504 plan so they could graduate with the rest of the class.

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