The Delaware Senate Joint Resolution #2 Assessment Inventory Committee, otherwise known as the Achieve Inc. payday, had their fourth meeting tonight. Most of the discussion was around the district inventories and the Smarter Balanced Assessment. Don’t get too excited Delaware! The discussion about Smarter Balanced was by some members of the committee wondering why the Smarter Balanced wasn’t a major part of the discussion and the DOE trying desperately to work around it and misinterpreting the actual legislation that created the committee. Once again, Senator David Sokola, who wrote the bill, didn’t show up. I think he has been at one or two of the four meetings. He hasn’t been to most of the Wilmington Education Improvement Commission meetings either, of which he is a member. But his Legislative Aide did sit in his place, unlike State Rep. Earl Jaques who also championed this legislation last spring as an anti-opt-out bill and didn’t show up nor did he have someone come in his place, but I digress. I do reserve the right to re-digress later though.
Delaware Secretary of Education Dr. Steven Godowsky was there for about the first third of the meeting. State Rep. Sean Matthews asked if any state in the country has received a cut in federal funding due to participation rate. The answer was no. He then asked if any school or district in Delaware has. Michael Watson from the DOE explained there have been Title I reallocations but didn’t specify why (and it wasn’t because of opt-out and we all know it). Colonial Superintendent Dusty Blakey gave a presentation on Colonial’s assessment inventory process. Many wondered right away why Smarter Balanced wasn’t included in their inventory even though most of the other districts and charters who participated did include it. No clear answer was given except further clarification of the legal interpretation of SJR #2. At some point, questions came up about the expectation of the district and the information supplied to them from the Delaware DOE for the process (of which schools and districts did receive grant money). I yelled out “Achieve Inc. created it,” to which I was told public comment was at the end of the meeting. 😉 I can see the two DOE representatives were not happy with my comment and one of them was visibly pissed off. State Rep. Matthews asked what the purpose of the Smarter Balanced is and why we need it. He explained parents are more upset about their children not being able to go to the library to do research since their computer labs are tied up between March and June. Even State Rep. Tim Dukes, a fervent supporter of standardized testing in the past, was questioning what this is all about. He explained how he has been talking to teachers and, in my opinion, he may be walking towards the light in regards to how bad high-stakes testing really is.
Discussion continued around the federal role in Delaware education. State Rep. Matthews asked why the DOE doesn’t push harder against federal mandate. DSEA member Kirstin Dwyer, also on the committee, explained that when teachers pushed very hard for another year off from Smarter Balanced scores tying into their evaluations, they were told prior to this that the feds would never grant it, but they did. A discussion came up about states that do not have to take assessments and were granted waivers. The DOE explained there are seven states involved in something called the Innovation Network, which rang a bell in my head. State Rep. Matthews asked why Delaware can’t try to join this group. A vote was taken to get more information about these kinds of programs before they make their final recommendations. It passed the committee. Talk continued about the federal role, and Susan Haberstroh from the DOE said something to the effect of “Maybe the feds will let us do that”. At this point, the Teacher Leader Effectiveness Unit leader Christopher Ruszkowski, who was sitting in the back, said “No they won’t.” I said “Yes they will.” We both repeated ourselves. But the sad truth is Delaware doesn’t want to have anything to do with the Council of Chief State School Officers Innovation Lab Network. Just ask the many teachers and citizens who are seeing this guinea pig experiment taking place in states like Maine, Colorado and New Hampshire. I actually touch on one of the key parts coming out of these “Innovation Labs” later on in this article. You will know it when you see it! Scary stuff!
Teachers gave public comment about, you know, how bad SBAC is and how the test doesn’t give any useful information. Red Clay Education Association President Mike Matthews complimented the Christina School District for giving a recommendation to dump the Smarter Balanced in their assessment inventory (Capital didn’t give it a ringing endorsement either). He lamented Red Clay didn’t do the same. But he did advise the committee his executive membership unanimously voted on a resolution to have Red Clay change their recommendation about SBAC and he questioned the transparency around Red Clay’s inventory process.
And then came my public comment. To give some background, the meeting was already running late, and public comment was limited to two minutes. One public commenter already went over their time (and continued), which didn’t bother me at all. I knew exactly what I was going to say cause I wrote it out.
In 1992, the CEO of the National Center on Education and the Economy wrote an 18 page letter to Hillary Clinton. Bill was just elected, and the CEO, named Marc Tucker, took it upon himself to write Hillary his ideas for the future of America. Tucker wanted America to become like Germany and Switzerland, where students are “apprentice-trained”. This begins at a very early age. As part of Tucker’s plan, public education must become standardized. As well, career paths are chosen through the tests implemented through these higher standards. This is all part of a much larger plan to merge the US Departments of Education, Labor, and the Immigration division of Homeland Security. By crafting this agenda, children will be tracked and catalogued through massive data systems, tied to state longitudinal data systems. These “pathways to prosperity”, or career tracks for children, are contingent upon data. Data that is provided by every single state to a joint system shared by the US Department of Defense and the US DOE.
In 1996, a company called Achieve Inc. was created by our nation’s governors, corporate leaders, and Tucker’s group. Achieve eventually created the Common Core standards, but gave the illusion it was created by stakeholders. Yes, the very same company that assisted with the assessment inventory in Delaware and gave the matrix for districts to follow. The same company that created the standards is now telling districts how they should utilize their own assessments.
Bill Gates, through his foundation, began funding this over 15 years ago. Delaware allowed this into our state with the Race To The Top grant. Yes, Senator Sokola and Attorney General Matt Denn wrote Senate Bill 79 last year which passed the General Assembly and was signed by the Governor. This bill, supposedly meant to protect student data, was heavily lobbied by companies such as Google, Microsoft, and Amazon. There is a gigantic loophole in this. Eventually, Smarter Balanced will be broken down into chunks through personalized learning. Using a competency-based education model, students will advance based on how they do on these mini-standardized tests. This data will flow freely to the feds which will in turn be shared with employers, non-profits (especially those who really push personalized learning), and corporate interests. What Sokola and Denn allowed into the final bill appears, on the surface, to protect student data. But whether it was intentional or not, the algorithms for personalized learning and state assessments are allowed to be shared. We already see 7-8 Delaware districts using the BRInC Consortium’s “Blended Learning” models. Every single time a student logs in or enters a keystroke, the data recording begins by the companies tracking all of this data. All of the Smarter Balanced Assessment, through the algorithms created by American Institutes for Research, fall into this category as well. Our Governor is one of the very early pioneers of this agenda in Delaware, along with the Rodel Foundation.
So really, who are we kidding with this nonsense? This IS about students: cataloguing them, tracking them, and allowing the government to decide what they should be based on data. But for students with disabilities, they will remain on the bottom of all things concerned with education. Something Delaware fully allows by not granting these students funding in Kindergarten to 3rd grade unless they are so impaired the state doesn’t have a choice. Meanwhile, Governor Markell is getting ready to go down to D.C. to hobnob with yet another education foundation instead of taking care of his own state.
As I mentioned earlier, Senator Sokola did not attend the meeting but his Legislative Aide did. I’ve met him a few times and he is a nice guy. During my public comment, at the second mention of “Sokola”, he picked up his things, had a VERY angry face, and stormed out of the meeting. I certainly hope it wasn’t anything I said, but he looked very troubled. I have talked to Matt Denn about this bill, along with the representative from his office who wrote the legislation, and I don’t know if they are even aware of the “algorithm loophole” that is causing student data to go out like a burst dam. But, and I am only guessing here, it bothered Sokola’s legal aide. I could be wrong and something else was going on that I was not privy to. As well, when I got my two minute flag, I did keep going. I was almost done! As I got into the part about students with disabilities somebody said “Kevin…” like I was saying something bad. Or perhaps it was my angry tone. But I already had to speed through my public comment due to a ridiculous two minute time limit. I’m not a big fan of being cut off over parliamentary rules and procedures (which is why you don’t see me on these committees, task forces, or public office). Or maybe some people didn’t like what I was saying and it cut a little to close to the bone for them. Either way, I got it out. And I have a ton more to say about all that.
Delaware PTA President Dr. Terri Hodges gave public comment about the Smarter Balanced Assessment that echoed many of the opponents of the test throughout the evening. (As an aside, the DOE actually gave out the National PTA’s position statement against parent opt-out to members of the committee and the public). Finally, State Rep. Kim Williams, https://exceptionaldelaware.wordpress.com/2016/02/25/state-rep-kim-williams-slams-state-board-exec-director-donna-johnson-at-weic-meeting-tonight/ again questioned where the parent representative of the assessment inventory committee was. She informed them this parent rep came to the first meeting and not the other three. She was not happy the DOE hasn’t responded to her about this issue and that parents are once again being shut out of the process. With that the meeting adjourned. And I am left with the same conclusion I have always had about the Achieve Inc. Party Assessment Inventory Committee: it will get rid of the good diagnostic district tests that give immediate feedback and allow teachers to help students in lieu of more interim Smarter Balanced Assessments (which will eventually be broken down into mini-tests at the end of units). More data. More tracking. More pre-determined “pathways” for every single student in Delaware. Unless you opt out now. Out of Smarter Balanced AND Personalized Learning. Unless you are okay with your child’s social-emotional, academic, behavioral, and personal data going out to Education Inc. In that case, keep on opting in!
The Season Of Myths 