Even the Prichard Committee doesn’t understand The high performing high school First, let’s talk about a very high performing high school in Kentucky’s “Unbridled Learning” school accountability program. This school’s summary of “Accountability Performance” from its 2012-13 school report card (PDF available from menus here) says this school is one of Kentucky’s best performers. In…
The Courier-Journal reports that the Jefferson County Board of Education has thrown in the towel on trying to fix the endemically troubled Myers Middle School. Essentially, Myers is going to be closed. Scheduled incoming sixth grade students this fall instead will enter a number of other schools. Myers current sixth and seventh graders, who will…
Add the Chicago teachers union to the teachers’ union in New York State and the president of the National Education Association who are now calling foul on Common Core State Standards as implemented. A few of the things that irk teachers in President Obama’s home town include: • The purpose of education is to educate…
I’ve been slowly collecting examples of how Kentucky’s Unbridled Learning school accountability program may not be getting the message right. Some of the early indications are found in the Bluegrass Institute’s “Blacks Still Falling Through Gaps, the 2012 Update,” where I point to several schools that got Unbridled Learning’s top award of “School of Distinction”…
The US Department of Education is spending well over $300 million on two competing test programs to assess student performance against the Common Core State Standards. One of those testing programs is being developed by the Smarter Balanced Assessment Consortium (SBAC). The other one is from the Partnership for Assessment of Readiness for College and…
Could inflate Kentucky’s College and Career Ready rates Taking a responsible action, the Kentucky Department of Education has determined that the use of smart calculators on the COMPASS test from the ACT, Inc., could inflate scores and has now outlawed use of those calculators for testing. The findings could impact the state’s reported College and…
While I’m not sure that having a “lackluster” legislative session is the worst thing that could happen to taxpayers, House Minority Leader Jeff Hoover, R-Jamestown, is right in noting that “political fear” dominated this year’s Kentucky General Assembly. Many important issues, including several mentioned by Hoover – telecom reform, right-to-work, prevailing wage, tax reform, the public-partnership…
Huge states’ rights fight looming? Fred Hess at the American Enterprise Institute reports: Showing the taste for power that has led Sen. Lamar Alexander to accuse him of thinking he runs a national school board, Secretary of Education Arne Duncan today yanked Washington State’s “waiver” from the No Child Left Behind Act. In his letter,…
The New York Times reports that the InBloom Student Data Repository created several years ago with $100 million in seed money from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation has run into fierce opposition in places like Louisiana, New York and Colorado from parents and others concerned about student data privacy. Opposition has become so fierce…
Rep. John Will Stacy, D-West Liberty, is one of several lawmakers who have decided not to run for reelection this fall. In a recent interview with “Pure Politics,” Stacy, who has served in the General Assembly since 1993, defended the current practice of Frankfort’s political leadership meeting behind closed doors while “horse trading” (our term,…