Fun with Lyndon, George and Bill – and Audie

Five days on the road and we hoped to make it home Friday night.

"I've got the Presidential Seal / I'm up on the Presidential Podium. / My Mama loves me, she loves me . . ."* Playing around with the podium and teleprompter at the George H. W. Bush Presidential Library and Museum in College Station, Texas.

Air conditioning on the bus failed, and then the vacuum system failed and we lost the ability to close the door, and we started to lose brakes.  Fortunately, we were within sight of Dallas when things really came to smash.

So our Teachers Tour of Presidential Libraries came to an interesting end last night.  More good fortune — the bus stalled out in the parking lot of a gas station with a Dickey’s Barbecue attached.  Ross Perot is right, at least about this:  Dickey’s food is worth the stop.

Other stops along the way provided nutrition for our minds, and for our classroom preparation.  Education experts at the 13 National Archives-related Presidential Libraries work together, and work separately, to create classroom friendly and classroom ready materials.   Beyond the museums, we were looking for history to use in our classes.  We got a lot of pointers to documents our students can use in class to learn history and how to write it.

This is the second year of this particular Teaching American History grant, from the U.S. Department of Education to the Dallas Independent School District.  It’s important that you know that, because Republicans in Congress propose to cut this program out.  This is one of the few programs I think has value way beyond the dollars spent on it.  TAH may become just one more victim of the conservatives’ War on Education.

I hope to post more about what we learned.

We toured the George H. W. Bush Presidential Library and Museum in College Station, Texas, the Lyndon Baines Johnson Presidential Library and Museum in Austin, the Audie Murphy and American Cotton Museum in Greenville, Texas, the William J. Clinton Presidential Library and Museum, and the Little Rock Central High School National Historic Site.

It was a rowdy group of teachers, of course, and we closed down every bookstore we found along the way.  The bus driver hopes never again to hear a single verse of  “99 Student Essays to Grade on the Desk.”

How’s your summer been so far?

_____________

*  Paul Simon, of course.

Case study: How state legislatures and school administrators damage schools, the students they serve, and America

The bruises from my broken nose are fading — two black eyes eventually resulted — but the smarting remains.  Especially I’m smarting because we have been unable to move either of the students to places where they can be helped, and get educated.

But I don’t think that colors my view that this example, from JD 2718, demonstrates how much damage unthinking legislatures and administrators can do to a school, to students who attend the school, and our entire education system, quickly, and probably without recourse.  Nor is there much hope for recovery:

Superintendent threatens principal for offering teacher tenure

A good teacher, one we need to have in the classroom, was offered tenure as promised.

President Reagan’s Commission on Excellence in Education wrote about a “rising tide of mediocrity” in education.  They said that our students’ achievement levels were in trouble, and that it was our own fault.  Had a foreign nation done that damage to U.S. education, they wrote, we might consider it an act of war.

And so it is that the war continues on American education, a war conducted by home grown . . . administrators, and state legislators.

We have met the enemy, Pogo said, and he is us.

War on Education: Is your state short-changing your schools?

CertificationMap.com, the group that tracks what is required to get a teaching certificate in each of the 50 states, also does information graphics from time to time.

Got this one from them today:  A map on how states are spending less on education in 2010 than in 2009.

The map should change dramatically when 2011 is taken into account.  This map shows $15 billion less being spent on schools nationwide.  Texas proposes to cut another $3 billion from spending in Texas alone for 2011.

This is a map of the War on Education in the U.S.  It shows that education, and the U.S., are losing the war.

Brought to you by Teacher Certification Map and MAT@USC | Masters of Education

Click here for larger version of map, "Is Your State Short-Changing Schools?"

For the blog at CertificationMap.com, there is a call for stories about cutting the funds for education:

Are you a teacher, parent or student who has been short-changed by your school? Send us your story at YourStory@CertificationMap.com by Friday, May 13th. In an effort to remind people that the choices we make now will influence our children tomorrow, we’ll be spending Friday the 13th reposting horror stories that illustrate how failing to make education a priority is ultimately failing our own futures.

As with global warming, we now have denialists in education issues, those who deny the rising tide of mediocrity, and a few who cheer the rise.

Really, the Texas Republicans yacht to be tossed out

Texas’s legislative follies win worldwide attention.  From deepest, darkest Minnesota:

I’m just amazed that Texas citizens will elect congresspeople who will do things like this:

In response to the worst state budget crisis since World War II, the Texas House has proposed slashing $27 billion from the budget, including huge cuts to education, nursing homes, and health care for the poor. Yet last Friday, the Texas House Ways and Means Committee approved a tax break for those who want to buy yachts costing $250,000 or more.

I think every unemployed worker, everyone struggling by on minimum wage, every waitress working for less than minimum wage, every teacher watching her support dwindle, every farmer, every working class person ought to be storming the capitol and lining up the fat cats against the wall…but barring that extreme reaction, shouldn’t we at the very least expect those same people to walk into their voting booths and throw the rascals out?

So, Texas parents, when your kid can’t get an AP class next year, when your kid gets stuck in a class with 37 rowdy kids who don’t care that your kid wants to learn enough to get into college, when your aged uncle gets tossed out of his nursing home because it has to close . . . will you vote these clowns out?

And a tip of the old scrub brush to Pharyngula for alerting us.

Texas Lege plans to throw education under the bus

In a desperate attempt to hold on to tax cuts for big oil companies, estate and plantation owners, Republicans in the Texas legislature announced they will steamroll Democrats to throw education under the Texas budget bus.

Seatbelts won’t help the kids in front of the bus.

In a possibly unrelated move, some legislators are re-thinking their plan to allow teachers to carry firearms.

You couldn’t write fiction like this.  Farce with tragic consequences, or pure tragedy?

“Dark day” in Dallas: Republican War on Education creates hundreds of casualties

Texas Gov. Rick Perry’s War on Education created hundreds of casualties today in Dallas Independent School District.  Though the Texas Lege has not approved a final budget, the best case scenario at the moment targets hundreds of jobs in Dallas, and tens of thousands of jobs across Texas.

Dallas ISD Superintendent Michael Hinojosa sent out this message today:

A message from Superintendent of Schools Michael Hinojosa

Earlier today, the district’s administration began the painful process of notifying hundreds of central staff employees that their positions are being eliminated effective immediately. The individuals impacted are good, hard-working people from all departments who have dedicated years of talent and expertise to this school district. They have been colleagues for a long time and they will be missed. While many of them may not have directly worked with children in the classroom, their contributions were nonetheless important in the life of the Dallas Independent School District.

It is highly regrettable that the statewide budget deficit has forced the district to take this drastic course. While many positions are being eliminated, the work is not. Those employees who remain will have an increased burden without extra pay. Please be patient with those who remain on staff in an effort to serve you, parents and the general public.

Today’s action was taken to protect instruction on our campuses as much as possible from the upcoming budget deficit. All totaled, with the layoffs, reassignments, vacancies that will remain unfilled and the number of central staff employees who took the early notification incentive, hundreds of positions have been eliminated from central administration, which will save the district roughly $25 million.

It should be noted that this is the third time in the last four years that Dallas ISD’s central administration staff has been cut. During 2007, 169 central staff positions were eliminated when central services were reorganized. During the fall of 2008, another 160 central staff positions were eliminated because of the district shortfall at the time.

The district is in a financial predicament this time through no fault of our own and we are continuing to work with lawmakers to attempt to minimize cuts to classrooms. At the same time, it appears more likely than ever that Dallas ISD is facing a deficit this next school year of anywhere from $88 million to $126 million. Please continue to press upon state legislators that our work as public school educators is critical to students both now and in the future.

Today is a dark day in our school district and that’s putting it mildly. To those who remain part of Dallas ISD, thank you for your continued hard work on behalf of our students.

Six years ago the Texas Lege cut property taxes, a huge boost to large property owners and those with very expensive tracts of land.  However, the Lege then failed to institute promised new taxes on businesses.  With annual budget shortfalls resulting, contrary to Gov. Perry’s 2010 campaign promises, Texas ended up with a $27 billion deficit in 2011.  Rather than impose new taxes on those who profited from the tax cuts, Rick Perry proposed to fire teachers and close schools.

The Texas budget proposals directly counteract efforts by the Federal Reserve to increase jobs in the nation.

Those firings started today, in Dallas.  Teachers are not included, yet.

Dallas educators still bracing for the budget storm

Here’s the view from Ross Avenue, HQ of the Dallas Independent School District, as of today:

A message from Superintendent of Schools Michael Hinojosa

Today, Proposed Budget Version 3.0 was presented to the Dallas ISD Board of Trustees. This plan considers what a $110 million cut would mean to the district’s budget during the 2011-2012 school year.

From the outset, I want to be clear that we are under no impression at this time that the district will end up facing a $110 million cut. It may end up being larger than that. At the same time, there is a slight possibility that it could be less.

In any event, with only six weeks to go in the Texas legislative session, it is more apparent than ever that school districts throughout the state, including ours, are facing significant cuts because of the state’s budget shortfall. I have worked in public education in Texas for more than 30 years and have never seen anything like this.

The Texas House already has approved HB1, which would require cuts to our budget of anywhere from $130 to $170 million. It would also eliminate significant funding for prekindergarten; reading, math, and science initiatives; and teacher performance pay incentives.

The Senate has yet to vote on HB1, nor has it passed a Senate version, but we are hopeful that it will be an improvement over the current bill. The deficit is so large, however, that it is difficult to get too optimistic.

Proposed Budget Version 3.0 would still eliminate more than 2,400 positions from the district’s payroll. The only positive under this scenario is that, thanks to the 700 contract employees who took the early resignation incentive, the district would not have to further reduce the number of teachers currently employed. While that may be a relief to many, it means that those teachers who remain will be asked to do more.

For instance, under 3.0, the collaborative planning period during the school day for secondary teachers would be eliminated. Middle and high school class-size ratios would be set at 25-1.

The details of Proposed Budget Version 3.0 can be found on the special Web site created to update everyone on our budget: www.dallasisd.org/finoutlook. Bear in mind, however, that as soon as you have a chance to review this plan, our financial staff will have already begun preparing Proposed Budget Version 4.0.

I again want to thank all staff members for your patience throughout this process. I also want to thank those of you who have contacted your lawmakers about your concerns and, especially, to all those who have traveled to Austin to speak out in person. Every little bit helps. Please continue to make your feelings known to lawmakers as they reach the final stretch of their discussions.

When school begins next fall, we will have the same number of students in Dallas ISD, all of whom have dreams for the future. None of them will care about our budget; they will only care about how we are preparing them with the skills to be successful. I know that our dedicated staff will once again rise to the occasion, as it has done so many times before, to meet their needs.

Homework for Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker (and it was due a few days ago . . .)

Eric Brehm teaches in Wisconsin. Now you know the answers to any questions about bias you may have.

It’s been more than three weeks, and Mr. Brehm has gotten no answer from Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker.  It’s not exactly like Walker is a student who hasn’t done his homework, but it’s close enough.

From Brehm’s blog, Bang the Buckets, the letter:

On Saturday, February 19, 2011, I sent the following letter to Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker.  It has since been reposted and blogged a number of times, for which I am grateful.  However, this blog would not be complete unless I included a copy of it here.  And so, here is where it all began:

To the Duly-Elected Governor of Wisconsin, Scott Walker (and anyone else who gives a hoot):

It has only been a week, and I grow weary of the political struggle that your Budget Repair Bill has caused.  I am tired of watching the news, though I have seen many of the faces of those I hold dear as they march on the Capitol.  I am tired of defending myself to those who disagree with me, and even a bit tired of fist-bumping those who do.  I am tired of having to choose a side in this issue, when both sides make a certain degree of sense.  And so I offer you this desultory (aimless or rambling) philippic (angry long-winded speech), because at the end of the day I find that though this issue has been talked to death, there is more that could be said.  And so, without further ado, here are my points and/or questions, in no particular order.

1.  You can have my money, but. . .. Ask any number of my students, who have heard me publicly proclaim that a proper solution to this fiscal crisis is to raise taxes.  I will pay them.  I have the great good fortune to live in a nation where opportunity is nearly limitless, and I am willing to pay for the honor of calling myself an American.  Incidentally, Warren Buffett, the second richest man in the nation (and a Democrat) agrees with me.  Your proposed Budget Repair Bill will cost me just under $3000 per year at my current salary, with the stated goal of saving $30 million this year on the state budget.  I say, take it.  You can have it.  It will hurt me financially, but if it will balance the budget of the state that has been my home since birth, take it with my blessing.  But if I may, before you do, I have some questions.

According to the 2009 estimate for the U.S. Census, 5,654,774 people live in the state of Wisconsin.  Of those, 23.2% are under the age of 18, and presumably are not subject to much in the way of income tax.  That still leaves about 4,342,867 taxpayers in the state of Wisconsin.  If you wished to trim $30 million off of the budget, that works out to about $6.91 per Wisconsin taxpayer.  So I must ask:  Is it fair that you ask $3000 of me, but you fail to ask $6.91 of everyone?  I know that times are tough, but would it not be more equitable to ask that each taxpayer in the state contribute an extra 13 cents a week?

• Would you please, kindly, explain exactly how collective bargaining is a fiscal issue?  I fancy myself to be a fairly intelligent person.  I have heard it reported in the news that unless the collective bargaining portion of this bill is passed, severe amounts of layoffs will occur in the state.  I have heard that figure given as 6,000 jobs.  But then again, you’ve reportedly said it was 10,000 jobs.  But then again, it’s been reported to be as high as 12,000 jobs.  Regardless of the figure, one thing that hasn’t been explained to my satisfaction is exactly how or why allowing a union to bargain collectively will cost so much money or so many jobs.  Am I missing something?  Isn’t collective bargaining essentially sitting in a room and discussing something, collectively?  Is there now a price tag on conversation?  How much does the average conversation cost?  I feel your office has been eager to provide doomsday scenarios regarding lost jobs, but less than willing to provide actual insight as to why that is the case.  I would welcome an explanation.
• Why does your concern over collective bargaining, pensions, and healthcare costs only extend to certain unions, but not all?  Why do snow plow drivers and child care providers and teachers and prison guards find themselves in “bad” unions, but firefighters and state police and local police find themselves in unions that do not need to be effected by your bill?  The left wing news organizations, of course, state that this is because these are unions that supported your election bid, while you seek to punish those unions that did not; I would welcome your response to such a charge.  You have stated that the state and local police are too vital to the state to be affected.  Can I ask how child care, or prison guards, or nurses or teachers are not vital?  Again, I would welcome a response.
• Though you are a state employee, I have seen no provision in your bill to cut your own pension or healthcare costs.  The governor’s salary in Wisconsin was about $137,000 per year, last I checked.  By contrast, I make about $38,000 per year.  Somewhere in that extra $99,000 that you make, are you sure you couldn’t find some money to fund the state recovery which you seem to hold so dear?  As you have been duly elected by the voters of Wisconsin, you will receive that salary as a pension for the rest of your life.  I don’t mean to cut too deeply into your lifestyle, but are you sure you couldn’t live off $128,000 per year so that you could have the same 7% salary reduction you are asking certain other public employees to take?

2.  Regarding teachers being overpaid and underworked. I don’t really have many questions in this regard, but I do have a couple of statements.  If you haven’t already figured it out, I am a teacher, so you may examine my statement for bias as you see fit.  I admit I find it somewhat suspect that teachers are mentioned so prominently in your rhetoric; those protesting at the Capitol are indeed teachers.  But they are also students, and nurses, and prison guards, and plumbers, and firefighters, and a variety of other professions.  If you could go back to “public sector employees,” I would appreciate it.  But as far as being overpaid and underworked . . . I grant you, I have a week’s vacation around Christmas.  I have a week off for Spring Break.  I have about 10 weeks off for summer.  With sick days and personal days and national holidays and the like, I work about 8.5 months out of every year.  So perhaps I am underworked.  But before you take that as a given, a couple of points in my own defense.

• The average full-time worker puts in 40 hours per week, 50 weeks per year, with two weeks’ vacation time.  That makes for a grand total of 2000 hours per year.  Part of the teachers’ arguments regarding their time is that no one sees how many hours they work at home to grade papers, or create lesson plans, or things of that nature.  I am in a rare state, in that I am not one of those teachers.  I work an hour from where I live, and I like to keep my work at work.  I, therefore, do not bring work home with me, but rather stay at school, or come in early, so that I can grade papers or create lesson plans while at school.  So I am more prepared than most to explain the hours it takes to do my job.  I also supervise an extra-curricular activity (as many teachers do), in that I serve as the Drama Coach for my school.  The school year, so far, has lasted for 24 weeks.  I have, in that time, averaged 78 hours per week either going to school, being at school, or coming home from school.  If you remove my commute, of course, I still average 68 hours per week, thus far.  That means I have put in 1,632 hours of work time this year, which works out to over 80% of what your average full time worker does in a calendar year.  If you include my commute, I’m over 90%.  If ikeep going at my current pace, I will work 2,720 hours this school year (or 3,120 hours if you include my commute).  That means I work 136% to 156% as much as your average hourly worker.
• As to underpaid — I’m not sure I am underpaid in general, though I do believe I am underpaid in terms of the educational level expected to do my job.  I have two Bachelor’s Degrees, and will be beginning work toward my Master’s this summer.  By comparison, sir, you never completed college, and yet, as previously stated, you outearn me by almost $100,000 per year.  Perhaps that is an argument that I made the wrong career choice.  But it is perhaps an argument that we need to discuss whether you and others like you are overpaid, and not whether teachers are.

3.  Regarding the notion that teachers that are protesting, or legislators currently in Illinois, are hurting the state. Very briefly, if I may:

• Teachers have been accused of shirking their duties by protesting for what they believe to be their rights instead of being in school.  The argument has been, of course, that no lessons have been taught when classes aren’t in session.  I must submit that lessons in protest, in exercise of the First Amendment right to peaceable assembly, in getting involved as a citizen in political affairs, have been taught these past few days.  The fact that they haven’t been taught in the classroom is irrelevant.  Ultimately a very strong duty of the school system is to help students become citizens — I think that has clearly happened this week.
• As to the legislators, it seems to me as though they feel their constituents deserve to have a length of time to examine the proposed bill on its merits, not vote it straight up or down three days after it was presented.  As the current budget does not expire until June, this seems to me like the only response left them in light of your decision to fast-track the bill without discussion.  Give them another option, and perhaps they will come back.  I can’t say that I agree with their decision, but I can say that I understand it.

4.  Regarding the notion that protestors at the Capitol are rabble-rousers and/or thugs. Such name-calling on the part of conservatives in the state and the conservative media could be severely curtailed if you would speak out against it.  True, most of the people protesting, if not all, are liberals.  Historically, liberals have always tended to think that they have far more support than they actually do.  They also (in my opinion) have a tendency to get extremely organized about three months too late, if at all.  So you can fault them for their decision-making, but I would ask you to speak out against the notion of thuggery.  Again, very briefly:

• So far, 12 arrests have been made.  Estimates say there were about 25,000 people at the Capitol today, and about 20,000 yesterday.  Let’s be conservative (mathematically) and say that 40,000 people protested over two days.  That would mean that officers arrested .0003% of all protestors.  By almost any definition, that is an extremely peaceful demonstration, and of course you are aware that the U.S. Constitution guarantees the right of peaceable assembly for a redress of grievances.  So in the main, these people have done nothing wrong.

5.  If I may provide you with a sense of history. You work in the largest and most magnificiently appointed state capitol in the nation, built by Bob LaFollette (a Republican).  You work in the same building where Phil LaFollette (a Republican) helped guide Wisconsin out of the Great Depression.  You work in the same building where Gaylord Nelson (a Democrat) was the first in the nation to offer rights to unions of state employees, rights that you now seek to overturn.  And you work in the same building where Tommy Thompson (a Republican) provided more state funding to education than any other governor before or since.  Are your current actions truly how you would choose to be remembered?

6.  Finally, Governor, a note of thanks.  Whatever the outcome of the next several days, you deserve a certain degree of credit.  As an educator, I understand how difficult it can be to get young people interested in politics.  You have managed to do this in the space of one week.  A number of Wisconsin’s youth support you.  A number of them do not.  But whatever else can be said of you, you have them paying attention, and thinking about voting, and walking around the Capitol, and turning out to be involved.  You have taught your own lessons this week, Governor, and that has its own value.

Thank you for your time,

Eric Brehm

XXX North XXXXXX Street

Endeavor, WI  53930

While I recognize that the governor has many issues on his plate, I should note that I am still waiting for a response.

Tip of the old scrub brush to Mother Jones, and Positively Persistent Teach.

No, race isn’t the cause of our economic and education woes

Just when you think the conservatives can’t possibly sound any more like fascists of the 1930s . . . I mean, can we just repeal Godwin’s law and call a racist fascist argument, a racist fascist argument?

Paul Krugman, whose Nobel Memorial Prize for economics galls conservatives more than left turns bothered J. Edgar Hoover, noted the other day that Texas is in a series of fixes.  This is important because Texas is what Wisconsin’s governor claims Wisconsin should be:  Shorn of union interference in almost all things, especially in public service sectors including education.  Krugman wrote in his column, “Leaving Children Behind”:

Texas likes to portray itself as a model of small government, and indeed it is. Taxes are low, at least if you’re in the upper part of the income distribution (taxes on the bottom 40 percent of the population are actually above the national average). Government spending is also low. And to be fair, low taxes may be one reason for the state’s rapid population growth, although low housing prices are surely much more important.

But here’s the thing: While low spending may sound good in the abstract, what it amounts to in practice is low spending on children, who account directly or indirectly for a large part of government outlays at the state and local level.

And in low-tax, low-spending Texas, the kids are not all right. The high school graduation rate, at just 61.3 percent, puts Texas 43rd out of 50 in state rankings. Nationally, the state ranks fifth in child poverty; it leads in the percentage of children without health insurance. And only 78 percent of Texas children are in excellent or very good health, significantly below the national average.

But wait — how can graduation rates be so low when Texas had that education miracle back when former President Bush was governor? Well, a couple of years into his presidency the truth about that miracle came out: Texas school administrators achieved low reported dropout rates the old-fashioned way — they, ahem, got the numbers wrong.

It’s not a pretty picture; compassion aside, you have to wonder — and many business people in Texas do — how the state can prosper in the long run with a future work force blighted by childhood poverty, poor health and lack of education.

But things are about to get much worse.

A few months ago another Texas miracle went the way of that education miracle of the 1990s. For months, Gov. Rick Perry had boasted that his “tough conservative decisions” had kept the budget in surplus while allowing the state to weather the recession unscathed. But after Mr. Perry’s re-election, reality intruded — funny how that happens — and the state is now scrambling to close a huge budget gap. (By the way, given the current efforts to blame public-sector unions for state fiscal problems, it’s worth noting that the mess in Texas was achieved with an overwhelmingly nonunion work force.)

Krugman was too easy on Perry.  In his campaign last year, Perry claimed that Texas had plenty of money, a surplus, even.  In debates with Democratic candidate Bill White, Perry pooh-poohed the notion that Texas had a sizable deficit, certainly not the $18 billion deficit White named.

No, the Texas deficit actually is north of $25 billion.  (Linda Chavez-Thompson, the defeated Democratic candidate for Lieutenant Governor, addressed Perry’s denial in a line that very few reporters bothered to report (or report accurately):  “Do you know how many zeroes there are in 18 billion?” Chavez-Thompson said. “11, when you count Perry and Dewhurst.”)

But blogger Iowahawk would hear none of that — no, the issue isn’t bad government and poor fiscal management.  Texas loses out in education because its got more racial minorities, he wrote at some length.

Other bloggers who should know better, or at least should be struck by the repugnance of the claim that race is the problem, spread the claim, including Paul E. Peterson at EducationNext and Mark at Pseudo-Polymath.

Krugman’s original point was untouched by any of these guys.  Texas is in deep trouble, on many, many fronts.  One of the more common comments on Texas education is, “Thank God for Mississippi!”  Mississippi’s having closed down its education system rather than integrate, and continued underfunding and mismanagement since the federal government forced the reopening, keeps Mississippi at the bottom of almost all state rankings regarding children.  That means Texas isn’t dead last.  Texas’s very real problems will affect racial disparities in achievement, but they are in no way caused by racial disparity, or race of the students.

Notice, too, how Iowahawk changed the comparison.  Krugman noted dropout rates.  Unable to muster a direct rebuttal to Krugman’s point, Iowahawk switched to comparing scores in NAEP.  It’s not the same thing by any stretch.

No Texas teacher would say Texas performs better than any other state in stopping dropouts.  While we might brag a bit on how we’ve increased scores on the ACT and SAT, it’s not across the board, and it’s not enough.  (It’s a miracle with the stingy funding, and it will likely stop with the proposed budget cuts — but we’re proud of our ability to make improvement despite obstacles carefully placed by state policy makers.)

Notice, too, that dropouts tend to perform more poorly on standardized tests.  If one wishes to screw around with the statistics for spin, one might note that by forcing students to drop out, Texas raises its scores on NAEP.  I seriously doubt any Texas educator conducts a campaign to get dropouts to boost NAEP scores, but let’s be realistic.  (Which is not to say that there is not a lot of action to mask the dropout problem; a Texas high school is responsible for the academic achievement of kids who drop out, or more accurately, the lack of academic achievement.  Dropouts count against a school’s performance rating, and count hard.  Every school on the cusp of “Exemplary,” or “Recognized,” or “Unacceptable,” has a campaign to track down dropouts to find that they have enrolled in another school to whom blame can be passed, or that they have left the state or the nation, and so don’t count in Texas at all.  One wishes one could school administrators and legislators in Deming’s Red Bead Experiment.)

It’s impossible to claim Wisconsin union teachers are to blame for any Wisconsin woe, when Texas, with it’s strong anti-union stands and ban on unionizing among teachers, performs worse, on average.

Will busting the unions put Wisconsin in the black?  It didn’t work for Texas.

Will busting the unions help Wisconsin schools?  You can’t make that case based on the information from Texas.  In fact, Angus Johnson conducted a more serious analysis of statistics that may provide a better view into the issue, and they tend to show that unionized teachers improve education performance.

Surely these guys understand where their argument ends up.  It is absolutely untrue that Texas’s minorities dragged the state into deficits.

We know where Texas deficits came from.  Several years ago Texas cut property taxes, a key source of education and other funding for the state, promising to make up the difference with corporate tax reforms.  But the corporations blocked significant reform.  Texas has been running on empty for six years, and now the deficits are simply too big to hide.

Unwise tax cuts, made for political gains, that put Texas in the dumper.

It wasn’t unions, and it sure wasn’t the large population of hard-working, tax-paying, union-needing Hispanics and blacks and Native Americans who got Texas in trouble.  They didn’t get the tax cut benefits, for the most part.

Race is not the cause of our education and budget woes, except in this way:  Racists, especially the latent, passive-aggressive sort, will not hesitate to cut programs that they see benefiting minorities.  Those education programs that have done the most to reduce the achievement gaps between the races, boosting minority achievement, are the first to go under the Republican budget meat cleavers.  The proposed cuts are not surgical in any way, to preserve education gains.

Form of child abuse confirmed at Creation Museum

Ken Ham’s organization, Answers in Genesis, tells the sad story of a case of child abuse at his group’s Creation Museum in Kentucky.

I don’t get the idea that Ham is sad about it, though, do you?

Destroying a child’s natural curiosity about science and the world around them damages them for life.  In the U.S., we are fighting trends that show kids in 4th grade are as scientifically adept as the other best students in the world; by 8th grade their affinity for science has begun to fade, and by 12th grade, U.S. students rank far below many other industrialized nations in science achievement.  Ken Ham’s story is one reason why that happens.

Isn’t crushing a child’s intelligence a form of child abuse?

Is this story funny, or tragic?

Update: At Digital Cuttlefish, a story from the other side.  (Thanks, George.)

Another update:  Even more from Digital Cuttlefish, The Rest of the Story.

Tip of the old scrub brush to Unreasonable Faith.

NJ Gov. Christie applauds video/cyber assault on special education teacher

You couldn’t make this stuff up.

Teachers, they hate you out there — some people do, at least.  Who?  Republicans.  The War on Education is getting pretty serious, now with Republican operatives using techniques of public shaming made famous in Moscow in the 1920s and in Mao’s China in the 1970s.  Consider this:

1. Sleazeball political hack James O’Keefe, R-Sodom,  tried to get a New Jersey special education teacher drunk, to hit on her, to get her to dish on her colleagues.
2. Not just any teacher — a special ed teacher commended by President Clinton for risking her life to save the lives of her students.
3. New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie (R) then applauded the resulting video, saying it indicates a problem with teachers.  (Christie has his own anger management issues, it appears.)

Godwin’s law prevents us from making the obvious comparisons.

James O'Keefe, undercover political hoaxster -- teachers, if you see this man and he asks you about education, call the police and your education association that provides your liability insurance, and do not talk to O'Keefe.

Details at The New Republic.

It’s Republicans Gone Wild, with all the depth of analysis and moral backbone such a title implies.

Tip of the old scrub brush to Ed Brayton at Dispatches on the Culture Wars.

We Are Science Probes

Still from “We Are Science Probes.” Full clip of movie below.

In animation, a parable about the dangers of being intentionally ignorant of science. In the not-distant-enough future, a probe from another planet arrives on Earth after the demise of human civilization. Unfortunately, the probes land in Kansas, the land of creationism and woo. The plot thickens.

[My apologies — the version I found did not come with a “pause” button.  It will play automatically when you open this post.  Fortunately, it’s almost perfectly safe-for-work.  If you don’t like the music, turn it off.  There is no spoken dialogue in the cartoon.  If you wish to pause the playing of the cartoon, right click to get to the Adobe Flash Player controls.  To pause the playing click the checkmark next to “play.”]

[Update August 18 — Okay, I give up — 100% of comments I’ve been getting ran against the video without the “start” or “pause” buttons.  You’ll have to go see it at another site — here, for example.]

[Years later, it’s on Youtube!]

Found it at a site called NewGrounds, which includes several other animation pieces.  The piece was created by a group that goes by the handle Billy Blob.

Sure would love this group to turn their creative faculties to hard history — say, the Progressive Movement and Gilded Age.  (Probably less chance of commercialization there, and perhaps less chance of awe-striking art, too.)

Tip of the old scrub brush to P. Z. Myers at Pharyngula.

Stealth creationists aim to mess up biology students

So, God is a platypus?

Appearing to be aware they are losing the battle of the classroom to real science, creationists have taken a sneakier way to undermine science education.  P. Z. Myers explains:

A lot of people have been writing to me about this free webgame, CellCraft. In it, you control a cell and build up all these complex organelles in order to gather resources and fight off viruses; it’s cute, it does throw in a lot of useful jargon, but the few minutes I spent trying it were also a bit odd — there was something off about it all.

Where do you get these organelles? A species of intelligent platypus just poofs them into existence for you when you need them. What is the goal? The cells have a lot of room in their genomes, so the platypuses are going to put platypus DNA in there, so they can launch them off to planet E4R1H to colonize it with more platypuses. Uh-oh. These are Intelligent Design creationist superstitions: that organelles didn’t evolve, but were created for a purpose; that ancient cells were ‘front-loaded’ with the information to produced more complex species; and that there must be a purpose to all that excess DNA other than that it is junk.

Suspicions confirmed. Look in the credits.

Also thanks to Dr. Jed Macosko at Wake Forest University and Dr. David Dewitt at Liberty University for providing lots of support and biological guidance.

Those two are notorious creationists and advocates for intelligent design creationism. Yep. It’s a creationist game. It was intelligently designed, and it’s not bad as a game, but as a tool for teaching anyone about biology, it sucks. It is not an educational game, it is a miseducational game. I hope no one is planning on using it in their classroom. (Dang. Too late. I see in their forums that some teachers are enthusiastic about it — they shouldn’t be).

No such thing as a free lunch.  If it sounds too good to be true, it probably is.  Free software for use in educating kids about biology, sounds too good to be true.

_____________

In comments, Lars Doucet disavows creationist intent.  So the creationist/intelligent design factors were added just to make the game more playable, and not as an attempt to introduce or endorse creationism or intelligent design.

Lots of discussion, much of it rude (some of it delightfully so), at Myers’ joint.

Maybe, if the makers didn’t intend to make a creationist stealth game, they could jigger the thing to make it more accurate?

Top 10 Courses at Glenn Beck’s “University”

Summers for teachers fill up quickly with various training courses — right now, somewhere in America about a thousand teaches gather every morning for a week of AP course training, for example. In larger districts like Dallas, classes convene for teachers in a dozen different locations.

Some teachers scramble to complete courses for advanced degrees, packing a semester or two into a few weeks in the summer.

Our friend Jim Stanley suggested some training we might find out of the catalog of Glenn Beck’s new, for-Glenn-Beck’s-profit school; heck, anyone could profit from these:

The Top Ten Course Offerings at Glenn Beck’s New “University”

10. Chalkboard Management

09. Making Friends with Cocaine

08. How to Weep Like a Televangelist

07. Hatriotism 101: An Overview

06. How to Link Absolutely Anything or Anyone to Marx, Lenin or Hitler

05. Hysterics: Reclaiming An Artform For the Angry, White Male

04. Screw The Bible! (And Turn to Chapter Four of Atlas Shrugged)

03. How to Ban Scientific Darwinism, While Simultaneously Advancing Social Darwinism

02. Alan Keyes: Proof That There Are, Indeed, Some “Good Ones”

And the number one course offering at Glenn Beck University . . .

01. Washed Up Disc Jockeys. Is There Anything They DON’T Know?

Glenn Beck U recruiting poster, from All hat No Cattle

Tip of the old scrub brush to Jim Stanley, with many thanks.

Matriculate your friends:

California legislator would bar Texas social studies changes

California may be down, but it’s not dumb.  According to AP in the San Jose Mercury-News (Silicon Valley edition):

Legislation by Sen. Leland Yee, D-San Francisco, seeks to protect the nation’s largest public school population from the revised social studies curriculum approved in March by the Texas Board of Education. Critics say if the changes are incorporated into textbooks, they will be historically inaccurate and dismissive of the contributions of minorities.

*     *     *     *     *     *

Under Yee’s bill, SB1451, the California Board of Education would be required to look out for any of the Texas content as part of its standard practice of reviewing public school textbooks. The board must then report any findings to both the Legislature and the secretary of education.

The bill describes the Texas curriculum changes as “a sharp departure from widely accepted historical teachings” and “a threat to the apolitical nature of public school governance and academic content standards in California.”

“While some Texas politicians may want to set their educational standards back 50 years, California should not be subject to their backward curriculum changes,” Yee said. “The alterations and fallacies made by these extremist conservatives are offensive to our communities and inaccurate of our nation’s diverse history.”

Bully for California and Rep. Leland Yee.

Tip of the old scrub brush to HeyMash.