If Washington D.C. is the capital of America, than Delaware is the capital of corporate education reform. Over the past week, many of us who are resisting the privatization of public education have been talking about The Ledger. Peter Greene broke the news for the world to see, which Diane Ravitch quickly picked up on. …
As Capital joins the BRINC initiative in Delaware, they are moving forward with their Strategic Plans which will benefit corporations more than students. It is like they copied the playbook of the Delaware Dept. of Education, Rodel, and Governor Markell and called it a plan. At their April board meeting, the Capital School District unanimously…
The Christina School District Board of Education had an action item on their agenda to enter into a contract with the BRINC Consortium and a company called Modern Teacher. I wrote a bit about it a few days ago. With a third referendum attempt facing the district and a huge loss of students this year…
For a school district that laid off 99 teachers over the summer to enter into the BRINC Consortium and sign contracts with companies like Modern Teacher prior to going to a referendum is not the smartest of ideas. With that being said, this is exactly what Acting Superintendent Bob Andrzejewski is looking to do. The…
I’ve been meaning to write about this consortium for a while now, but other matters kept pushing it to the side. BrINC stands for Brandywine, Indian River, New Castle County Vo-Tech and Colonial, the four school districts that are part of the BrINC Consortium. What is BrINC? It is a massive personalized learning initiative. And…
The Rodel Foundation of Delaware has a new name. They are now called Rodel. This landmark rebranding effort comes to you from Rodel. It is the 20th Anniversary since the Budingers sold their business to Germany and decided to launch an education reform non-profit company destined to jack up Delaware education for all time. In…
In the near future, Sony and IBM plan on putting all education eggs in one basket: the Blockchain Ledger. This is very, very bad. Especially when Sony wants artificial intelligence to analyze the information for the classroom. Beyond making it easier to share information, Sony said also that the stored data sets could potentially be analyzed…
I should have been paying closer attention. Delaware Senator Bryan Townsend introduced a bill on May 5th. It cleared the Elections and Government Affairs Committee on May 17th. Now it is up for a Senate vote today. Let me be very clear: for all intents and purposes, this legislation will eventually destroy public education.
Delaware Governor John Carney and Delaware Secretary of Education Dr. Susan Bunting will talk to educators, parents, and citizens tonight about education funding and the state budget tonight at 7:45pm. To be included on the call, you had to sign up yesterday by 2pm. I signed up on Tuesday. I will be reporting live from…
Today, the Rodel Teacher Council gave a presentation to the Delaware State Board of Education with policy recommendations for their Personalized Learning Blueprint. I’ve written about them before and actually received a bit of heat from a few of their membership. These aren’t bad people or bad teachers. I truly believe they have been brainwashed…
Happy St. Patrick’s Day! As the Irish eyes are smiling, I thought I would give an update on what articles are in the top 17 of all time on here along with some other Top 17 lists! TOP ARTICLES FROM JUNE 13th, 2014 UNTIL MARCH 17th, 2017 Delaware Public Schools: You Have Until Thursday To…
Capital School District sure has changed in just two years. Back in 2014, their board was railing against the Smarter Balanced Assessment and fully supporting a parent’s right to opt their child out of the test. Flash forward to now, and their board will be discussing something called a “Balanced Scorecard.” This balanced scorecard is…
Last Friday, the Commission on Evidence-Based Policymaking held a hearing for the handling of data in America’s future. Make no mistake: this would allow student data to flow out of schools more than it already is. FERPA would become more of a joke than it already is. The written statements are now available. And we…
Just in case anyone was wondering why “equity” is such a big word these days… The term is being hijacked by the US DOE and corporate education reformers with the Every Student Succeeds Act… Everyone is talking about equity these days… But what it is supposed to mean and what the corporate education reformers want…
Newark Charter School and Sussex Academy, along with Dover Air Force Base Middle School, were the only public schools to win the designation of 2016 National Blue Ribbon Schools. Two private schools, religiously based, Christ The Teacher Catholic School and St. John the Beloved School also won. So what made these schools get the prize…
Where are decisions made that affect every single person in America, as well as the rest of the world? The Aspen Institute seems like a good place to look. I first came across the Aspen Institute when I was researching the Rodel Foundation of Delaware two years ago. It seemed like an odd outfit. Since…
Standards-Based report cards are here. Three schools in the Delaware Red Clay Consolidated School District, Cooke, Forest Oak, and Richey are beginning a pilot program this year for 2nd and 3rd Grade. The plan is to have standards-based report cards for all elementary grades, K-5, by 2019. Modeled after the Smarter Balanced “scores”, the goal…
Personalized Learning, as a concept, has been around since the 1960’s. In its original form, it was an effort to personalize learning between a teacher and a student. Students don’t always learn at the same pace. The term has been bastardized by corporate education reformers over the past five years. Their idea is to launch a technology boom…
For years, I’ve been telling Delaware parents they should choose to opt out of the Smarter Balanced Assessment. I was wrong. Here is why… We are entering a new era in education. The promised era of digital personalized learning is here. It is on the cusp of coming into every single public school in the…
Indian River has NO monthly financial statements, budgets, nothing showing ANY money whatsoever on their website. Way to be transparent! Hard to look for your yearly budgets with no information. What are you hiding? How much money did Miller mess with in the finances? Is the state going to have to bail you guys out? Why…
The Season Of Myths 