foxnews--2019-04-24--Warrens 125T education plan sweeping giveaway to the wealthy at expense of the poor WaPo edito

Warren's $1.25T education plan 'sweeping' giveaway to the wealthy at expense of the poor, WaPo editorial board says

Democrat Elizabeth Warren’s $1.25 trillion plan to cancel existing student loan debt and make college free has been slammed as a “sweeping bailout for the middle class” and a regressive giveaway to the wealthy at the expense of the poor.  “Her latest big idea — to eliminate vast quantities of student debt and make public universities tuition-free — is not a sound idea,” wrote the Washington Post’ editorial board on Tuesday.  WARREN'S MASSIVE $640 BILLION STUDENT LOAN CANCELLATION QUESTIONED OVER FAIRNESS TO STUDENTS WHO PAID OFF THEIR DEBTS  Warren unveiled the far-reaching plan on Monday, pledging to cancel almost all student loan debt for 42 million Americans and introducing tuition-free college, with a total price tag of about $1.25 trillion over 10 years, including a one-off cost of $640 billion to cancel the debts.  Under the proposal, each person’s student debt would get a relief of $50,000 if household income is up to $100,000. Higher incomes would also be entitled to massive debt reductions, while only those households with earnings of over $250,000 would get no student debt reduction.  But as the editorial notes, spending over $640 billion to provide relief to graduates, who are defaulting on their student debts at a lower rate than before, comes at the expense of people who didn’t go to college at all and other priorities that would benefit the country better.  “What might be unfair is debt relief to the exclusion of other priorities with wider benefits, including to people who did not go to college at all,” the board wrote. “Ms. Warren proposes a wealth tax to cover the cost, the proceeds of which would then not be available for alternative, possibly more progressive uses.”  The tuition-free college, meanwhile, was lambasted by the newspaper as solely for the benefit of “the upper reaches” of income in the country as the children of rich parents will now be able to finish university debt-free even though their parents “are perfectly capable of helping defray the cost” of a for-profit school.  The board went on to praise Sen. Amy Klobuchar, another 2020 contender who’s viewed as a more moderate candidate, for saying during an event in New Hampshire that she can’t match Warren’s plan because it’s unrealistic.  “For us, though, policy priority is the essential concern. Student-loan defaults are concentrated among students who attended for-profit institutions, or who accumulated low loan balances but then dropped out and were stuck paying the money back out of lower-than-anticipated earnings,” the board wrote.  CLICK HERE TO GET THE FOX NEWS APP  “Such issues are hardest for students and families of color, as Ms. Warren correctly emphasized. This calls for a targeted approach that relieves the worst financial stress of those least able to handle it, not a sweeping bailout for the middle class and above.”


foxnews--2019-05-29--Bidens education plan pledges to defeat the NRA support assault weapons ban

Biden's education plan pledges to 'defeat' the NRA, support assault weapons ban

Former Vice President Joe Biden pledged on Tuesday to "defeat the National Rifle Association" as part of his 2020 campaign promise to fight for school safety.  "As President, he will secure passage of gun legislation to make our students safer, and he knows he can do it because he’s defeated the National Rifle Association twice before," Biden's plan, released on Tuesday, read.  It stated part of the plan to "defeat" the NRA included supporting legislation that banned "assault weapons" and high-capacity magazines.  His plan came after a slew of school shootings that prompted Democrats to call for gun control laws. Biden's planned seemed more moderate than other 2020 candidates' -- specifically Sens. Cory Booker, D-N.J., and Kamala Harris, D-Calif., -- in that he focused on working through Congress rather than substantially expanding executive authority in the ways others proposed doing.  Biden's proposal also took aim at the NRA's push to arm teachers, saying it "isn't the answer." "Parents shouldn’t have to worry about whether their kids will come home from school, and students shouldn’t have to sacrifice themselves for their friends days before graduation," he said.  "We cannot let gun violence become an acceptable part of American life. Biden knows that arming teachers isn’t the answer; instead, we need rational gun laws."  The NRA did not immediately respond to Fox News' request for comment. Biden and the NRA, however, found common ground in a 1986 law that, overturned multiple gun regulations. Biden supported the law which, according to the NRA, was "the law that saved gun rights" in the U.S.  The NRA has become a major target in the periods following school shootings -- that included during the 2020 election cycle. While New York fought to pressure banks into severing ties with the organization, 2020 Democrats said they would take on the gun rights organization.  Booker, in particular, vowed to “bring a fight to the NRA like they have never ever seen before.” His gun control plan endorsed progressive measures like universal background checks but caught special attention for pushing a requirement that gun owners obtain licenses from the federal government.  Harris, in April, threatened to sign a series of executive orders -- including universal background checks -- if Congress didn't address the issue in her first 100 days as president.  CLICK HERE TO GET THE FOX NEWS APP  Amid criticism of the NRA, Trump decried New York state's "siege" on the organization. "The NRA is under siege by Cuomo and the New York State A.G., who are illegally using the State’s legal apparatus to take down and destroy this very important organization, & others," he said.  "It must get its act together quickly, stop the internal fighting, & get back to GREATNESS - FAST!"


france24--2019-01-20--Taking universal out of university Why foreign student fees challenge Frances education model

Taking universal out of university: Why foreign student fees challenge France’s education model

France’s decision to hike tuition fees for international students more than tenfold has triggered a standoff with universities and revived a debate about the role of state-funded higher education and its responsibility to the French-speaking world.  When Abdalah Faye looked beyond his native Senegal for a place to pursue his university studies, there was only ever one destination on his mind: France, the former colonial power and traditional destination for expatriate students from the West African country.  “France and Senegal share a common language, a common history, our education system is copied on the French, we value French diplomas more than our own, and France is home to many of my fellow countrymen,” said the 27-year-old politics student, listing the reasons that brought him to France.  And then there’s the money issue. Higher education in France has long been much cheaper than in other Western countries – in fact almost free, for foreigners and French nationals alike.  “France is the country that gives everyone an equal chance,” said Faye, who is pursuing a master’s degree at the University of Versailles Saint-Quentin-en-Yvelines (UVSQ), west of Paris. “That includes the children of farmers from the remotest corners of Senegal, who couldn’t possibly think of studying in America, Canada or elsewhere.”  Home to centuries-old universities such as the Sorbonne in Paris, as well as leading business schools, France is the world's top non-English-speaking destination for students, though it ranks well behind the United States and Britain, and is now trailing Australia too. The number of foreign students at French universities fell by 8.5 percent between 2011 and 2016 and the country has seen increased competition from Germany, Russia, Canada and China.  In order to address the “shifting balance of power” in global education, France’s government has unveiled a plan, dubbed “Welcome to France”, to lure more international students. Measures include simplifying student visa regulations, offering more English-language courses and improving accommodation, in an effort to increase the number of foreign students from roughly 300,000 today to more than half a million by 2027.  But the revamped “welcome” will come at a cost for international students, who have so far enjoyed near-free higher education, just like French and EU nationals. When the new academic year begins in September, non-EU students will see their annual fees for a bachelor degree jump from €170 ($195) to €2,770, while the cost of a master’s or doctoral degree will go from the current €243 per year to €3,770 – a 1,600% increase.  Announcing the measures back in November, Prime Minister Edouard Philippe stressed that France would still “subsidise two thirds of the cost of studies" – averaging at just over €10,000 per year for each student. "And the fees will remain well below the €8,000 to €13,000 charged by the Dutch or the tens of thousands of pounds paid in Britain," he added.  But that is small comfort for the likes of Faye, who already struggles to make ends meet while working the maximum 20 hours per week authorised for foreign students.  “I never took a cent from my family back home,” Faye told FRANCE 24. “I already have to skip classes to work so that I can afford my food and rent. There is no way I can afford the fees as well.”  The decision to massively increase tuition fees has been described as a “paradigm shift” by France’s Conference of University Presidents, an umbrella organisation representing the heads of France’s 75 universities. The conference has been cautious in its response, welcoming many of the government’s measures while warning that top students from abroad should not be priced out of the system.  The body also warned that the prospect of increased income from fees should not be used as a pretext for a decline in state funding – a persistent concern in a country attached to the principle of publicly-funded education.  The response from individual university presidents has been more critical, with several openly defying the government. By mid-January, seven universities had announced they would not charge international students higher fees in the forthcoming academic year, prompting a rebuke from the higher education minister, Frédérique Vidal, who stressed their “duty of obedience and loyalty” as civil servants.  French universities are allowed to waive fees for up to 10 percent of their students, meaning they will have some leeway to refuse to apply the increased fees without actually flouting the law.  Some university heads pointed to a lack the information and consultation surrounding the reform, noting that the government’s top-down approach contradicted its stated aim to strengthen universities’ autonomy in what remains a highly centralised system.  “There was no discussion with the academic world,” lamented Nathalie Dompnier, president of Lyon 2 University. “We discovered the figures in November and received no explanation for the increase in fees and how it was calculated. […] We don’t know what financial support measures will be put in place, so we will not implement the fee increase.”  Others decried a measure that “discriminates” against foreign students and introduces a form of “selection by money”.  “France honours itself by showing it can welcome students from poor backgrounds, we must not turn back on this principle,” said Nadia Dupont, an administrator in charge of training at the University of Rennes-II, in western France.  Supporters of the hiked fees say there is a principled case for ensuring foreigners contribute to funding a costly education system.  “In so far as state higher education in France is essentially financed through public funds and thus by taxpayers, it is appears logical to ask for a contribution from the students (and parents) who do not pay taxes,” writes Professor Jérôme Caby of the Sorbonne Business School in Paris.  However, a study commissioned in 2014 by Campus France, a government body in charge of promoting French universities abroad, has shown that foreign students have a beneficial impact on the local economy: while the state spends €3 billion each year on their education, they contribute €4.65 billion to the French economy.  As Daniela Susanibar Rosas, a law student at Paris-1 University, told the FRANCE 24 Debate show: “We work here, we pay rent, we move the economy – there are small cities in France that work only because they are student cities.”  Jean-Claude Lewandowski, an education specialist, said the fees hike will only be successful if the reform meets three conditions: a huge expansion in bursaries and loans, a sweeping cut in administrative obstacles (notably visa restrictions and access to housing), and better integration of newcomers.  “Aside from the issue of tuition fees, foreign students are often poorly welcomed in France,” Lewandowski wrote on his blog, citing expensive accommodation, run-down campuses and a lack of communication with local students and staff members. In this respect, he added, the prime minister’s promises to ease visa restrictions, expand scholarships, and offer newcomers more French-language classes signal a positive step.  Critics of the hiked fees have been less than impressed with the prime minister’s suggestion that foreigners regarded free education as being cheap in quality – and that the top students would therefore look elsewhere.  “Philippe thinks that introducing higher fees will make France more attractive because international students associate price with value,” writes education expert Juliette Torabian in the Times’ Higher Education Supplement. Whereas “research suggests that international recruitment is most sensitive to perceived quality of teaching and institutional reputations. While universities in some countries charge higher international fees, they also provide students with a high return via their good reputations with employers and the quality of their facilities, accommodation and pastoral and academic support.”  Analysts at the OECD say raising tuition fees can be a “double-edged sword”, sometimes leading to a steep decline in the number of international applicants. While New Zealand was able to offset higher fees with a generous scholarship policy and expanded working rights for foreign students, a dramatic increase in fees for foreigners in Sweden in 2011 coincided with an 80% slump in applications from abroad.  “A reduction in the number of international students can potentially harm a tertiary education system, as international students do not only bring their financial contribution, but also a diversity of perspectives and cultures that improves the educational experience of all students,” write OECD analysts Daniel Sanchez-Serra and Gabriele Marconi.  “Discrimination by nationality can also harm the student experience by creating divides between students,” they add.  In some cases, attempts to discriminate between national and foreign students have actually brought the two closer together – in protest.  Last year Belgian students successfully rallied against plans to charge higher fees for international students, forcing the government to back down. Similarly, since Philippe’s announcement in November, French students have staged a number of protests – the largest drawing crowds of several hundred – to denounce an “unfair and discriminatory measure” and express their “fraternity” with foreign students.  Much of the criticism levelled at the government’s plan revolves around the universal mission that education is invested with under France’s republican tradition, a mission that underpins the extensive network of French schools scattered across the globe. In this case, it is coupled with an element of post-colonial responsibility, or guilt, towards former dominions.  In a Le Monde op-ed signed by more than 60 professors and lecturers, French academics said the fees would inevitably lead to a decline in the number of African students – who currently account for 45% France’s of international students – enrolling in the country’s universities, noting that the vast majority would no longer be able to afford higher education in France.  By denying African students “a dignified welcome, France gives up on its privileged relationship with the African intellectuals, engineers and executives of tomorrow,” the authors wrote, lamenting a measure that will accelerate “France’s loss of credibility on the continent”.  Already Africa’s brightest minds are being lured to China, India and Middle Eastern countries where “Islamist ideologies hold sway”, they said, adding: “France’s decision to turn its back on African youth signals the abandonment of the universalist […] message carried by French social sciences on the African continent.”  According to researchers Lama Kabbanji and Sorana Toma, of the Institute for Development Research and the University of Paris-Saclay respectively, the introduction of tuition fees is in line with a decade-old policy of “chosen immigration”, which has resulted in a relative decline in the number of immigrants from poorer countries and students from Africa.  Lawmaker M’jid El Guerrab, who represents French nationals in West and North Africa, including Senegal and Morocco, said such measures would only increase the “Francophobic” sentiment witnessed among youths in his vast constituency, and the sense that “they are unwanted” in France.  “For some Moroccan families, the fees announced by Edouard Philippe are the equivalent of a year’s salary,” El Guerrab told Jeune Afrique, noting that less than 1% of Moroccan students in France currently benefit from scholarships. “French universities will therefore become the exclusive preserve of the wealthy, and this selection by money is not in line with our republican tradition.”  For Faye, the Senegalese student, the new government policy reflects changing attitudes in France, and a hardening stance on immigration in particular.  “France no longer wants to give privileged access to people from its former colonies, it wants wealthier students,” he said, adding: “But the wealthy don’t come to France – they go to America.”


france24--2019-05-14--Controversial education reform bill goes before French Senate

Chrisophe Archambault, AFP | A banner reads, 'No to the reform Blaquer (referring to the French Education Minister)' as teachers demonstrate during a nationwide strike in Paris on November 12, 2018.  Education Minister Jean-Michel Blanquer’s school reform bill, nicknamed the law for "putting trust back into schools", will be put to a vote in the French Senate on Tuesday. But school unions say they are concerned by aspects of the sweeping bill.  Blanquer’s “trust back into schools” bill was passed by the National Assembly in February and goes before senators on Tuesday.  However, many teachers and parents are voicing serious concerns about key elements of the draft bill. The main primary school unions – SNUipp and FSU, UNSA and Sud – are calling on teachers, parents and local elected officials to demonstrate against it on May 18.  Compulsory education from the age of 3 years, teachers’ duty to set an example, teacher training – the Blanquer bill covers many aspects of national education.  “This bill focuses on administration rather than education,” said Francette Popineau, co-secretary general of the SNUipp-FSU union in an interview with FRANCE 24.  “The bill does not resolve the problem of social inequality and exclusion. In fact, it’s creating new ones.”  One of the key points of the Blanquer bill is compulsory school attendance from the age of 3 years. Currently, children in France only have to attend school from the age of 6, when primary school (École élémentaire) begins. However, most children already attend nursery school (maternelle) from the age of 3.  While unions are happy with this change, they are unconvinced that there are the financial means to implement it. The FSU union views it as “a gift to private schools”. “If kindergarten becomes compulsory, private schools will automatically receive funding from local authorities, but public schools will not receive as much funding,” said Popineau.  When the bill was first drawn up, the most contentious issue was the possible abolishment of the role of school principal – which unions feared was a crafty way to reduce the number of civil servants. Blanquer responded to the criticism with a column in French daily Le Parisien, where he said the bill did not “threaten the situation between schools and their principals” and that this measure would not be imposed throughout France.  “Far from it,” said Blanquer in the piece in late March. “If this measure were imposed everywhere in France, I would completely understand the outcry, but that is not the case at all. It will probably involve just a few dozen schools.”  Article 1 of the draft law also stipulates that teachers have a duty to be "exemplary" role models for their pupils. But unions see this as a challenge to freedom of expression.  “Teachers should keep their opinions to themselves – that's normal,” said Popineau.  “But a teacher should also be able to speak out about problems in the system without fear of reprisals. Some teachers could feel intimated by this new measure.” However, the government responded to this criticism by saying that this measure only applies within the context of a current law that guarantees civil servants freedom of expression.  One very divisive point is teacher training. The new law will allow students hesitating to continue long-term studies for financial reasons to become trainee teachers through a so-called pre-professionnalisation scheme. These students will be recruited during their studies and would spend two half-days every week in a college or school.  Unions fear that these education assistants would be “used to replace absent or missing staff”.  “It’s like asking an apprentice to take control of an aircraft after just watching what the pilot does a few times. Would you be willing to board his plane? The same is true for schools,” said Popineau.


france24--2019-05-31--Students teachers across Brazil protest Bolsonaros education cuts

Students, teachers across Brazil protest Bolsonaro’s education cuts

Miguel Schincariol, AFP | Demonstrators protesting education budget cuts take to the streets of Sao Paulo, Brazil, May 30, 2019.  Thousands of protesters took to the streets in dozens of cities in Brazil Thursday for a second nationwide demonstration in as many weeks over the government's plan to slash education spending.  Far-right President Jair Bolsonaro's government has provoked outrage among students and teachers over its proposal to freeze 30 percent of discretionary spending for public universities in the second half of this year.  A suspension of post-graduate scholarships for students in science and the humanities has also fueled anger.  Protests began in the capital Brasilia in the morning and have since spread across the country to more than 80 cities, local media reported.  "The main message is that a 30 percent cut to education is absurd and makes it impossible for higher education in this country," said Lina Vilela, a teacher at the Brasilia rally where protesters held posters with messages such as "Our books and pencils are our weapons."  Karina Afonseca said she was protesting against "the intellectual setback" Bolsonaro's actions would cause in Brazil.  "I'm here for those who are poor and deserve the right to quality public education," social services student Kaio Duarte said.  "I'm worried that the next generation won't have all of the rights to education that I have had."  In Rio de Janeiro, protesters carried signs describing Bolsonaro as "the enemy of education."  "We can't simply pretend everything is OK -- it is not OK," said university student Isadora Duarte, 24.  Tens of thousands protested across Brazil on May 15 -- the first nationwide demonstration since Bolsonaro took power in January, which underscored growing opposition to the embattled president.  Bolsonaro, who has railed against socialism as he seeks to promote his ultraconservative ideas, described the May 15 protesters as "useful idiots" and accused leftist militants of stoking the rallies.  But Thursday's turnout could be lower after the government said it would free up 1.59 billion reais in funding (about $400 million) for the sector.  Thursday's demonstrations come after thousands of pro-Bolsonaro protesters marched in cities across Brazil on Sunday in a show of support for the leader, who has seen his popularity plummet in his first five months in office.  Among their demands was for Congress to speed up approval of the government's stalled pension overhaul, seen as key to unlocking other much-needed reforms that are crucial to kick-starting economic growth.


freebeacon--2019-11-12--Education Unions Report Sharp Declines in Membership, Revenue

Teachers' unions are experiencing sharp declines in membership and revenue in former union strongholds Oregon and Washington, according to new annual reports.  Two Oregon teachers' unions—the state's American Federation of Teachers (AFT) chapter and the Oregon School Employees Association (OSEA)—reported drops in paying members of 35 percent and 36 percent, respectively. Both unions lost nearly $1 million in revenue as a result, with the OSEA closing three field offices and accepting a $400,000 bailout from its parent organization to help make ends meet. In Washington, the Federation of State Employees disclosed a 27 percent decline in financial supporters since June 2018.  The membership declines reflect the waning power of unions in the United States. Just 10.5 percent of American workers were members of unions in 2018, the lowest percentage in the past century. Hillary Clinton won union voters in 2016 by the narrowest margin of any Democrat since 1984, despite the fact that nearly every major union endorsed her campaign against President Trump.  A major turning point came in 2018 when the Supreme Court declared forced dues schemes for government workers unconstitutional in Janus v. American Federation of State, County, and Municipal Employees. Unions nationwide hemorrhaged revenue, as agency fee payers resigned. The loss of those partial dues payers caused AFT's national office to lose 4.3 percent of its total financial supporters even as it added thousands of new members.  Aaron Withe, national director of the pro-free market Freedom Foundation, said the effects of the ruling have been especially pronounced in traditional union strongholds Oregon and Washington because of outreach efforts. The foundation launched an information campaign targeted at agency fee payers and union members to advise them of their right to stop paying labor groups.  "The fallout that the unions are experiencing in Oregon and Washington are a direct result of our full-scale outreach campaign," Withe said. "We've spoken to tens of thousands of public employees at their homes and offices, and what we've found is that when they learn their rights under Janus, they opt out in droves."  Neither Oregon nor Washington labor officials responded to requests for comment.  In response, union leaders have launched a Janus counterattack, introducing hundreds of bills in state legislatures across the country to advance pro-union policies. Many of these bills unionize new workers without their knowledge or consent and provide nonmember fee workarounds in states such as Oregon.  The National Right to Work Foundation, which successfully argued the Janus case before the Supreme Court, is now fighting several legal battles to close loopholes that labor unions use to prevent workers from ending their payments. Many local and state unions have attempted to install "withdrawal windows," refusing to honor resignation requests that do not meet certain deadlines. Foundation spokesman Patrick Semmens said such policies directly reflect labor unions' fears over their waning influence.  "When you see a significant drop in membership like this when union support is finally voluntary it demonstrates just how much union bosses rely on coercion to corral workers into their ranks," he said. "Hundreds of thousands of teachers and other public employees across the country remain trapped in dues payments because of union policies that block workers from exercising their First Amendment rights."  Withe said the Freedom Foundation plans on expanding its operations to other states, including those in the Rust Belt, to bring its education campaigns in Oregon and Washington to larger audiences.  "We expect to see these results continue in the larger states that we operate in as we continue and expand this campaign," Withe said.  The success of those information campaigns could have major effects in the political landscape. Labor unions contributed more than $1.6 billion to left-wing political advocacy groups between 2016 and 2018, and top Democratic presidential candidates have gone to great lengths to secure these substantial financial and political resources. Former vice president Joe Biden and Sens. Bernie Sanders (I., Vt.) and Elizabeth Warren (D., Mass.) have released plans to bolster union membership and the size of union war chests in the future.


freebeacon--2019-12-09--American Education’s Great Stagnation

American Education’s Great Stagnation

American schoolchildren's educational attainment has stagnated in the 21st century, according to data from two recently updated assessments of reading, math, and science skills.  Results from the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP), released in November, and from the Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA), released Tuesday, indicate that American kids have seen minimal improvement in their academic abilities since the early to mid-2000s.  "For all of these ambitious efforts we've seen unfold, they don't seem to be making much difference, at least when it comes to measured student performance in reading and math," Rick Hess, an education policy expert at the conservative American Enterprise Institute, told the Washington Free Beacon.  Experts who spoke with the Free Beacon agreed that the causes of this stagnation are unclear—as one put it, "it's always kind of a guessing game as to what's behind these numbers." At the same time, this flatlining suggests that the education experiments of the past decade, and in particular of the Obama administration, have had minimal benefits on student achievement and may even have hindered the most disadvantaged students.  The NAEP, commonly referred to as the nation's report card, is an assessment of academic proficiency taken by a sample of 4th, 8th, and 12th graders across the country. The test covers a number of subjects, but the most closely watched indicators of academic improvement are the fourth- and eighth-grade reading and math evaluations.  Through the 1990s and early 2000s, achievement, particularly in mathematics, rose steadily, but then began to flatten out. As a report from the Brookings Institution notes, "for both fourth grade and eighth grade, the average [math] scores from 2017 were identical to the average scores from 2009." Fourth-grade reading scores have been more or less flat since the 2007 assessment; eighth-grade scores have seen improvement, but not on par with the early growth in math scores.  This flatlining obscures an underlying trend: Over the past decade or so, NAEP scores among African-American students, particularly boys and particularly in major cities, have actually declined. That means that the much-bemoaned "achievement gap" between black and white students—which much of education policy is focused on closing—may be widening.  "You saw substantial gains by black children relative to white children from the mid-'70s to the '90s, and you saw some of that in the early years after [No Child Left Behind]," Hess said. "One of the striking things has been that you have actually seen a worsening on some of these fronts, both in terms of low-income children and also black children."  A similar overall trend is apparent in the PISA, a triennial assessment of 15-year-olds in nations around the world. The United States outperforms the OECD average, but that performance is not a product of improving test scores—in fact, PISA scores have been more or less flat since 2000.  The 2018 PISA, released last week, does show at least one bright spot: The share of Americans performing at the top levels in reading increased by about 4 percentage points between 2009 and 2018. But even those gains may not be cause for celebration, as there was no similar improvement among low-achieving students.  The flatlining of test scores has taken place even as national spending on education has risen steadily. Through most of the 1990s, when NAEP scores tended to rise, per-pupil spending in primary and secondary schools was below $10,000. Today, spending has easily cleared $12,000 per pupil with little improvement in performance.  The underlying cause of this stagnation is unclear. Experts the Free Beacon spoke to did not quite agree when it began—most agreed that there was a bump after the implementation of No Child Left Behind, but disagreed about when that increase slackened off. Michael Petrilli, president of the Thomas B. Fordham Institute, a leading education think tank, linked the flattening to the Great Recession.  The recession "likely had a huge negative impact on kids, especially poor kids from the most disadvantaged families," Petrilli told the Free Beacon. "When you're looking at some of these latest results, these are kids who were sort of born into the latest recession or were quite small during the worst years of unemployment."  School spending also declined in the wake of the recession, Petrilli noted, although at no point did it fall below pre-Great Recession levels. It's a plausible story—even post-recovery, the recession appears to have fundamentally altered the spending, job-seeking, and even childbearing practices of young adults, so why not also their children's educational outcomes? This, Petrilli argued, means that we may not see more NAEP growth until the Great Recession cohort ages out of school.  Max Eden, an education expert at the Manhattan Institute, is not so sure. While offering the caveat that it is hard to draw many conclusions from the data, he suggested that the Obama administration's Common Core did not deliver on its promises to increase achievement and may have actually harmed socioeconomically disadvantaged students. Eden also pointed to Obama administration efforts to reduce school punishments and suspensions—policies it perceived as racially inequitable. One recent study conducted by the nonpartisan RAND corporation found that "restorative practices" in punishment actually worsened educational outcomes in grades six through eight.  "I'm very much inclined to believe that this push towards discipline reform, to try to lower suspensions and expulsions … will do more harm than good," Eden said. "I don't think policy can do nothing at all, but I think that the policies we have implemented have done more harm than good."  The bad news is not limited to the United States. Eden noted that just as NAEP scores are a blow to Common Core, so too is the rapid decline of PISA scores from Finland, once heralded as a model for education policy.  "The people who had been the central opinion makers of education policy were just pretty fundamentally wrong," Eden said. "About 15 years ago Finland was the top-scoring country, pretty near the top in the world, and if you Google for ‘Finland education,' you'll find just hundreds and hundreds of articles written about how the Finland model works.… But just about no country has fallen farther, faster over the past few years than Finland."  Hess agreed with Eden's skeptical view of what the education establishment has pitched during the stagnation and emphasized that policy can only go so far in changing outcomes.  "The idea that policy can do little to shape education in the short term is always correct," Hess said. "That's been true for a half century plus. Folks have been trying to use federal policy to change school outcomes. All policymakers can really do is move crude levers.… For those things to actually change what happens in schools is at best a multiyear process."


freedombunker--2019-01-04--Honoring the Emancipation Proclamation with Educational Freedom

New Year’s Day marked the 156th anniversary of the Emancipation Proclamation, which guaranteed:  On this day, Booker T. Washington serves as a shining example of the importance of freedom and education. As Pepperdine University Economics Professor Gary M. Galles explained in a recent Foundation for Economic Education article:  Booker T. Washington...sought ‘the most complete freedom compatible with the freedom of others,’...born a slave, [Washington] was seven when the Emancipation Proclamation was announced. At 11, he got his first book and taught himself to read. He thought to ‘get into a schoolhouse and study...would be about the same as getting into paradise.’ At 16, he went 500 miles to the Hampton Institute, where he attended classes by day and worked nights to earn his room and board. After graduation, Hampton made him an instructor. In 1881, he founded the Tuskegee Institute. ...Washington recognized that for blacks’ advancement, starting from the legacy of government-enforced slavery, coercion of others was not the answer.  Today, a majority of African-Americans, as well as Americans in general, embrace Washington’s legacy of liberty as opposed to coercion regarding the education of their children.  Assigned public schooling has been on the decline since 1999 for students overall, but the decline is twice as high for African-American students compared to the general student population, down by 10 percentage points versus 5 percentage points.  Yet the proportion of African-Americans reporting that their children’s school was their first choice has remained stuck at around 10 percentage points below the overall population since 2012, the earliest year available from the U.S. Department of Education (here and here).  Not surprisingly, African-Americans want more educational options that better meet their children’s needs.  According to the most recent EdChoice national survey, a majority of African-Americans believe American K-12 education is on the wrong track, 55 percent, the same percentage as the general population (p. 63). However, support for a variety of parental choice programs is noticeably higher among African-Americans compared to the general population:  These results mirror findings from several other surveys, including those conducted by Education Next, Beck Research for the American Federation for Children, the Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research, Gallup, the Black Alliance for Educational Options, and even PDK’s annual survey of Americans’ attitudes toward public schools (in spite of their pollsters’ dubious framing of educational choice-related questions. See here, here, here, and here.)  “The most complete development of each human being,” according to Washington, “can come only through his being permitted to exercise the most complete freedom compatible with the freedom of others.”  Full and unfettered parental control over the education and upbringing of their children is the ultimate exercise of freedom and perhaps the best way to fulfill the promise of the Emancipation Proclamation that “all persons held as slaves...shall be then, thenceforward, and forever free.”  [This post originally appeared on The Independent Women’s Forum blog here.]


freedombunker--2019-01-09--Corruption is Inherent in the Government Education System

Violent criminals have always been Jerry Brown’s favorite candidates for pardons but on his way out the door, the recurring governor saw fit to pardon Bill Honig, once the subject of a gushing profile in People magazine. The former state education boss was convicted on felony conflict-of-interest charges during the 1990s, but in 2011 Brown picked Honig for the state Board of Education. The convicted felon withdrew his name, but there’s more to the story.  Bill Honig knew government education was a bust, complaining that dumbed-down textbooks were “all horrors,” but he still defended the system. The alleged partisan of “quality education” would not allow parents in Compton and other inner-city areas to choose the schools their children attend. He said school choice would create “elite academies for the few and second-rate schools for the many” and authored “Why Privatizing Public Education Is a Bad Idea,” in The Brookings Review. Honig opposed the 1993 Proposition 174, the last measure for school choice that came before the voters. So did his successor Delaine Eastin, another close ally of the California Teachers Association.  On Eastin’s watch, the California Department of Education gave away more than $20 million to an interlocking directorate of ineligible “community-based organizations.” When auditors uncovered this massive fraud, Eastin fired the whistleblowers and kept the money flowing. Both whistleblowers sued to get their jobs back and a jury awarded one $4.5 million and held Eastin liable for $1.4 million in non-economic damages and $150,000 in punitive damages because she had “acted with malice.” The rewards were subsequently reduced and punitive damages dropped, so Eastin did not need a pardon from the governor, the office she sought last year.  California taxpayers should also consider Eastin’s pal John Mockler, who wrote Proposition 98 as an “antidote” to Proposition 13. Mockler formed a lobbying firm to represent publishers and education bureaucrats. These connections came in handy when he served as state secretary of education and executive director of the State Board of Education under governor Gray Davis. Mockler became a rich man working both sides of the table but his conflict of interest never drew charges. As Mockler, Eastin and Honig confirm, corruption is inherent in the government monopoly education system. That is unlikely to change under new governor Gavin Newsom, who wants to expand the system with universal pre-school and spend $1.8 billion on a range of early education programs.  K. Lloyd Billingsley is a Policy Fellow at the Independent Institute and a columnist at The Daily Caller.


freedombunker--2019-01-09--Is Education a Commodity

Is Education a Commodity?

I have argued for school choice long enough that I’ve heard (and read) this objection many times. I’ve tried to have sympathy for it, too, but to no avail. I generally ask the person what they mean by “commodity” and why they believe education does not qualify. As best I can tell, the problem is that the term “commodity” has at least two definitions in the public consciousness. Whether or not education is or should be a commodity might just depend on the definition we are using.  According to the Merriam-Webster dictionary, there are no fewer than five definitions of the word “commodity.” When we debate whether education is a commodity, I think two of these definitions are usually at play. One definition (number 5), suggests that a commodity is a good “that is subject to ready exchange or exploitation within a market.” Education clearly qualifies as a commodity. By this definition, anything that can be traded on a market—from the food I buy to counseling services—is a commodity.  This is the definition defenders of school choice like myself use. And by this definition, education—or at least formal schooling—clearly qualifies as a commodity. It can be, and in fact is, bought and sold in the same way counseling services might be bought and sold. A school has a service to provide and is willing to provide it in return for payment. In fact, if the critics were right that school isn’t a commodity—at least by this definition—the school choice debate would be a non-issue. Schooling couldn’t be bought or sold. Yet, clearly, it can.  Some folks who say education isn’t a commodity might mean that education should not be bought or sold, even though it technically can. If that is what they mean, I’d simply ask them to be clearer in their language. They do not mean that education is not a commodity, but that it should not be bought or sold. It seems like a nit-pick, but the change in phrasing is important because it is quite literally a different debate. Rather than a debate over whether education is like other services we buy or sell, the new question becomes whether or not we ought to sell it even if it is like those other services.  I’ve had a good many discussions with people with deep moral objections to the buying and selling of education; even if it can be bought and sold, they say, it should not be. Perhaps because I do not have much sympathy for that view, I like to ask why they say that education should not be bought and sold. Their answers are usually about how good educations can’t be standardized because students aren’t widgets.  Commodities might invoke images of raw products that are standardized in quality.  This gets us to the second possible definition of “commodity,” the one I think is most common in the minds of school choice detractors. Merriam-Webster suggests that a “commodity” can refer to “a mass-produced unspecified product.” Investopedia seconds that definition by pointing out that the “quality of a given commodity may differ slightly, but it is essentially uniform across producers.” If we are thinking of commodities in this way, commodities might invoke images of raw products that are standardized in quality, from corn to copper.  If this type of standardized thing is what we mean by “commodity,” I can understand why folks don’t want education to be a commodity. As long as students are different, they might argue, education shouldn’t be “one size fits all.” I agree! Then again, that’s why I am for school choice.  If we want to avoid “commodification,” the worst thing we can do is leave schools in the hands of governments.  When someone objects to school choice because it “commodifies” education, I like to remind them of two things. First, if crass standardization is what they are worried about, governments and their public school systems do a wonderful job of standardizing! I’d argue that the worst thing we can do if we want to avoid “commodification” is to leave schools in the hands of governments. Conversely, the best thing we can do is to open up avenues for competing providers and school choice.  Secondly, I like to remind those who object to the “commodification” of education that they are probably using a different definition of the word than I am. When they hear “commodity,” they are probably imagining some standardized thing like widgets. When I hear “commodity,” I am simply imagining a service that can be bought and sold in a market. Some things in markets—a lot of items in my grocery store, for instance—are standardized because people want standardization. (I certainly want to know that the cheese I buy today will taste the same as the cheese I bought last week.)  Other things we buy in markets—think counseling or interior design services—are not at all standardized because consumers don’t want standardization. In fact, markets will produce goods and services that are as standardized (or not) as customers seem to want. Some families might want a standardized approach to education because they believe X model is effective and want their children educated in that model with fidelity. Other families will prefer schools that are not standardized, that are flexible enough to educate different students differently.  “Commodity” is a tricky word with several possible definitions. It can refer to anything that can be traded in a market, or more specifically, to a standardized and interchangeable product. When school choice opponents object that “education is not a commodity,” it probably behooves us to ask what they mean by “commodity” and what their precise objection actually is.


freedombunker--2019-01-23--Private Schools Provide Educational ChoiceFor Now New at Reason

Private Schools Provide Educational Choice—For Now: New at Reason

For families uninterested in whatever education public schools may provide, the most established alternatives continue to be independent schools run by private groups, religious organizations, and businesses. They recruit students by offering strong academics, religious and moral instruction, and different approaches ranging from firmer discipline to student-guided education.  That such schoos continue to attract families that (usually) must pay tuition on top of the taxes they're forced to cough up to support government institutions is a testament to their success in satisfying customers, suggests J.D. Tuccille. But that success has long stuck in the craws of some critics, including government officials. They've launched attacks including efforts a century ago to outright ban private schooling in Oregon and modern New York's scheme to strip such schools of anything more than a façade of autonomy.


pravadareport--2019-11-08--America’s education system: Teaching the price of everything and the value of nothing

America’s education system: Teaching the price of everything and the value of nothing  "Ask students to read for more than a couple of sentences and many will protest that they can't do it. The most frequent complaint that teachers hear that it's boring. It is not so much the content of the written material that is at issues here; it is the act of reading itself that is deemed to be boring. What we are facing here is not just time-honored teenage torpor, but the mismatch between a post-literate New Flesh that is too wired to concentrate and the confining concentrational logics of decaying disciplinary systems. To be bored means simply to be removed from the communicative sensation-stimulus matrix of texting, You Tube and fast food; to be denied, for a moment, the constant flow of sugary gratification on demand. Some students want Nietzsche in the same way they want a hamburger; the fail to grasp-and the logic of the consumer system encourages this misapprehension-the indigestibility, the difficult is Nietzsche." Mark Fisher, Capitalist Realism: Is There No Alternative?  I am a substitute teacher (grades K-12) in a public school system located in Virginia, a state on the eastern seaboard of the United States. For many years prior to becoming a substitute teacher, I also taught at a private school in Virginia. Tuition and fees at the private school are approximately $42,000 (USD), the public schools are, of course, tuition free.  To be sure, there are highly motivated students in both educational settings that call into question Mark Fisher's observation above. But in the main, both organization's struggle with figuring out if they are working with their subjects as students or as consumers of services provided by teachers and administrators.  From what I have observed in the tiny microcosm in which I've worked, adults have not figured out how to teach Generation Z. It is as if K-12 students are; well, lab rats, in a messy experiment that reflects adult confusion about how to facilitate learning in an era when all the "book learning" education seeks to impart is largely available on the World Wide Web (WWW). Reality hits video screens before adults can interpret it for their children; that is, assuming the adults are up to the task. Twitter, a modern day ticker-tape, dumbs down the American populace. Attention spans for students and adults are measured in 10 minute increments, if that.  Teachers are little more than circuits in America's educational network and, as such, transmit surface information to the students and little more. The kids know a lot, for sure, but they, like the adults that school them and lead them, have no intellectual depth, something required for critical thinking. It is fitting, I suppose, that in these times when the United States is a polarized nation of cynics who believe in nothing, it's not surprising that its educators teach the young to be cynics. But as Oscar Wilde noted through one of his characters, a cynic is "one who knows the price of everything but the value of nothing."  And yet the very adults (academics, corporate leaders, politicians) that created this cynical, digitized short attention span world whine about students not being able to read and write, think critically or master math. There is a reason for that: They are not being taught effectively to do those things. All of which reaffirms something I wrote in 2013: The American Education System is creating Ignorant Adults.  The leaders of Boeing and Lockheed Martin worry out loud about the absence of US school aged students who can excel at science, technology, engineering and math disciplines (STEM). But they have no problem funding initiatives for Chinese students and aviation professionals in China.  Back in the USA, school classrooms are a mishmash of technology, new wave/repackaged learning techniques and revisionist history. Apple I-Pads and Smart Boards are located in each classroom for student/teacher use. They are all connected to software that provides music, cartoons and learning platforms like Canvas for most grade levels. The latest teaching fads like Maker Learning with its "Digital Promise" backed by Google and Pixar, among others, competes with concepts like the Flipped Classroom, Blended Learning and other pedagogies that come in and out of vogue. And yet, along side all the technology are crayons, magic markers, pencils, paper and cardboard for writing and drawing.  It's no stretch to say that iPhones, Android and other hand held devices may cause epigenetic changes. Students, teachers/coaches and administrators are constantly staring head down at their computing-communications devices. It is tough to get a face-to-face conversation going with most anyone in these groups as their eyes and heads are in the down position while sitting, walking or standing. Even if you are having a meatspace meeting, participants will incessantly dart their eyes to the handheld safely nearby the hand, in the hand, or on the lap (looking down again).  America's past, woeful in many respects, is being revised again by adults to suit the agenda of those who seek to promote a narrative that seeks to change the political/cultural narrative of US society and its history, and it is aimed at young students in particular. The New York Times (NYT) 1619 Project is an example of this. According to the World Socialist Website, "The 1619 Project, launched by the Times in August, presents American history in a purely racial lens and blames all white people for the enslavement of 4 million black people as chattel property. "  The NYT has provided teaching materials that are being used by colleges, universities and high schools across the United States. Who is willing or capable of debating the claims of the New York Times; or should we say, who is willing to be labeled a racist for disagreeing with The revisionist authors of the 1619 Project? At the collegiate level, at least, there may be debate on the matter but at the high school level, what teacher is going to argue against using 1619 teaching materials. After all it is the New York Times.  What is very troubling about the NYT revisionism is that it makes the preposterous claim that racism is part of the DNA of all white people. The World Socialist Website claims that: "This is dangerous politics, and very bad history...[it] mixes anti-historical metaphors pertaining to biological determinism (that racism is printed in a "national DNA") and to religious obscurantism (that slavery is the uniquely American "original sin"). But whether ordained by God or genetic code, racism by whites against blacks serves, for the 1619 Project, as history's deus ex machina. There is no need to consider questions long placed at the center of historical inquiry: cause and effect, contingency and conflict, human agency and change over time. History is simply a morality tale written backwards from 2019."  I have often winced at some of the practices I observed in classrooms. On a typical day as a substitute, I arrive at a school, pick up instructions left by the teacher who is absent (or has a meeting), and head to the classroom. Substitute teachers, or Subs, are a lower class of species, members of the gig economy, and treated as such by the "real" teachers and students. I remember one teacher I subbed for was headed off to a meeting and as she left said, "Sharpen my pencils for me." I dutifully did. A majority of the teachers and administrators don't ask for your name, you're just known as "The Sub."  Once students complete their work (if they even choose to do it), which for most does not take much class time, they are free to play video games, stick ear buds in and listen to music or hang out with friends via the handheld device. One of the popular video games with male 6th to 12th graders is Krunker, a first person shooter game. Is US society really that concerned about active shooters in schools?  The State and corporations can be found in some form in the public school system. One elementary school has Lockheed Martin as a sponsor of a science program. In another elementary school, a class is learning about Virginia's geography: The students print and video work product will ultimately be used by a tourism association in the State.  In both institutions learning is calibrated to the SAT, ACT and various Advanced Placement tests. Student test scores serve as one metric for teacher performance reviews along with standards set by school boards, the State, or independent audits in the private school case.  Students are not required to stand or even pay attention to the United States Pledge of Allegiance that is carried via intercom into the classrooms each morning. Some schools don't even bother with it. Yet, during sporting events like American contact football, students/athletes and fans are required, or let's say by the pressure of custom are compelled, to stand for the playing of the United States' National Anthem. American flags are stitched into football jerseys and prior to games one football player is selected to run the American flag onto the field amidst the adrenaline fueled shouts and growls of fellow teammates following close behind. A color guard from a high school's junior reserve officer training corps (JROTC) sometimes is present. They present in strict marching formation the American flag along with the flags of the US Navy, Marine Corps and Air Force.  To stand and recite the Pledge of Allegiance in a classroom takes one minute. To be upright for the National Anthem takes, perhaps, five minutes. The school band normally plays the latter and on occasion high school Madrigals will sing the National Anthem.  Yes, the militarization of US society and the deification of military personnel, even if they are accountants in uniform working at the Pentagon, is something to be concerned about. But saying the Pledge, and standing for the National Anthem, should be a requirement for students. There has to be some measure or display of loyalty to one's country and the young must learn that. Still many want to wipe away any sense of citizenship, patriotism. Well, they are doing a fine job of that.  Students at both institutions are the beneficiaries of some serious force protection measures normally associated with protecting military personnel stationed at installations around the globe. The public schools in which I worked have armed police officers on site with a phalanx of civilian security/disciplinarians roaming the halls. Security cameras are everywhere indoors (hallways) and outside (entry and exit) recording movements. Public school buses are also outfitted with cameras and tracking systems.  The private school where I was once employed uses a less blunt force approach opting for a more subtle presence: security personnel are a bit less obvious and do not carry firearms. The school does employ a corporate style full-time director of security and safety with some serious emergency management credentials.  It is the same security scene at public and private schools across the United States which raises an interesting question: Are students really captive minds in minimum security enclosures subjected daily to social, emotional learning techniques or socialization/habilitation for entry into society? Or are they "free" learners allowed to be creative and explore beyond the confines of the pedagogy that seeks to "standardize" them.  There is a functioning big data brother at work tracking students as they make their way through K-12 known as the Common Core of Data (CCD). CCD is described by Marc Gardner in a presentation for the US National Center for Education Statistics (NCES)as "the annual collection of the universe of United States public elementary, secondary education agencies and schools. Data include enrollment by grade, race/ethnicity and sex, special education, english learners, school lunch programs, teachers, dropouts and completers." The CCD also gathers information from state justice, health and labor departments. The NCES also collects data from private schools.  It doesn't end there. Colleges and universities are tracking high school seniors as they begin their searches for schools they'd like to attend. The Washington Post recently reported that many colleges and universities have hired data capture firms to track prospective students as they explore websites. "Records and interviews show that colleges are building vast repositories of data on prospective students - scanning test scores, zip codes, high school transcripts, academic interests, web browsing histories, ethnic backgrounds and household incomes..."  The owner of Canvas, referenced above, is Instructure. Their mission, according to their investor website is to "grow [the young] from the first day of school to the last day of work [retirement]." One of the capabilities that Instructure provides its clients is Canvas Folio Management. According to the investor webpage, it "delivers an institutional homepage and deep, real-time analytics on student engagement, skills and competencies, network connections, and interactions across various cohorts. Allows institutions to generate custom reports tied directly to student success initiatives and export accreditation-ready reports on learning outcomes at the student, cohort, course, program, or institutional level."  Ah, yes, the thrill of being hunted for a life time by big data brother. Anyway, there is no escape.  Don't try this in a Classroom  "Learning is an active process, not simply a matter of banking information in a recipient passive mind. Teaching therefore has to be a transactional process rather than just the transmission of information. The transactional aspect is essential to enabling students to challenge their situations in life, which they must learn to do if they are to play their parts as active citizens of a better world...teaching must be approached as an intellectually disruptive and subversive activity if it is to instill inquiry skills in learners and encourage them to think for themselves rather than mindlessly accept received ideas. We believe it is more important in the digital age than ever before." (Ingenious: The Unintended Consequences of Human Innovation by Peter Gluckman and Mark Hanson, Harvard, 2019).


sottnet--2019-12-14--Scientists warn against errors in digitisation of education

Some experts believe that the rapid digitisation of the world economy has several controversial social and cultural implications that require careful analysis.A research group at the Federal Institute of Educational Development of the Russian Presidential Academy of the National Economy and Public Administration (FIRO RANEPA) has studied the risks and prospects of digital trends in education.Researchers from the RANEPA Federal Institute of Educational Development have presented a project, "Didactics Concept of Digital Vocational Education and Training", which outlines ways of organising a personalised digital educational process based on a field of educational theory - Digital Didactics.The authors of the study note that today the digital economy is the main "customer" for vocational education and training. The analysis of promising markets shows that within the next 3-5 years, graduates of various fields will need to master digital production technology.The study stresses that given the dynamically changing technological and socio-economic realities of modern society, educational requirements facing university graduates are also constantly being updated. In this regard, educational models that would successfully function under conditions of "floating" didactic purposes are required.Against this backdrop, RANEPA researchers have pointed to a high risk of digital over-optimism, which could lead to the dehumanisation of education as a social institution. They believe this can be most acutely demonstrated by substituting the digitisation of education with ineffective "digitising".The authors of the study believe that building a digital educational process requires the development of a new field of educational research - Digital Didactics.The key factors determining the formation of new approaches to learning, according to the authors, are three phenomena of the 21st century: the digital generation, which has special socio-psychological characteristics, new technologies that form the digital environment, and, finally, the digital economy and its requirements for human resources.Illustrating the problem of the unsuccessful digitisation of education , researchers analyse several cases, including the events at the Brooklyn's Secondary School for Journalism, where in November 2018, high school students held a protest against the online learning platform Summit Learning.According to frustrated students, the network project, which covers 380 schools and 55,000 schoolchildren in the United States,As the protesters stated,These and other examples, researchers believe, demonstrate that the success of professional and personal self-determination and social adaptation of young people requires a flexible combination of digital, material and pedagogical technologies. Creating a digital educational process using web-based didactics will allow us to overcome the current transitional period, they say.The major condition for the emergence of next-generation education, according to scientists, is the development of teaching techniques.First of all, it concerns the implementation of distance learning, complex case studies, blended learning, flipped learning, and project method. Simulators and augmented reality tools should also be used to develop professional and advanced capabilities.It is noted that the use of the game environment, the ability to cater to the individual pace and rhythm of workers, as well as various interactive features, such as the student's choice of the starting difficulty level of tasks, would help to improve, in the near future, the effectiveness of learning using educational materials.The authors of the study paid special attention to the problem of digital and pedagogical assessment technologies, which would ensure the objectivity and transparency of tests while maintaining stable educational motivation.The experts prompted their audience to abandon the traditional assessment, including due to its "repressive functions", and paid attention to the inclusive assessment systems that imply instantaneous feedback between the teacher and the students through the use of IT-tools.According to research team leader Vladimir Blinov, head of the Research Centre for Vocational Education and Qualifications Systems of FIRO RANEPA, Big Data technologies allow educators to carry out a personalised monitoring of the educational process, tracking the dynamics of changes and conducting a comparative analysis. The teacher, equipped with operational information on the quality of the tasks, will be able to more effectively direct the movement along the educational route.Other ways of assessing learning performance, such as personal digital footprint management or multi-layered monitoring of learning progress based on cumulative assessment technologies (e.g., ranking or portfolio), can also help to make learning even more exciting.The study concludes with a glossary of the key concepts of the new digital social reality.


talkingpointsmemo--2019-08-27--Obama Unveils New Education Campaign On Redistricting Issues

Former President Barack Obama put his name on yet another redistricting reform effort ahead of the 2021 map-drawing cycle.  Obama on Monday announced “Redistricting U,” an education campaign being led by the group All On the Line. All On the Line’s parent organization is affiliated with the National Democratic Redistricting Committee, the Eric Holder-led effort that Obama has also endorsed.  “For Redistricting U, All On The Line is sending dedicated trainers to cities across the country to train volunteers, give them the skills and tools they need to impact the redistricting process, empower them as leaders in the movement for fair maps, and hear their ideas about approaches that will work best in their communities,” Obama said in a fundraising email announcing the new campaign.  Saumya Narechania, All On The Line’s campaign manager and advocacy director, told TPM  that his group was organizing multiple waves of training sessions to mobilize grassroots activists around the issue.  The first wave of trainings — in-person, half-day sessions — will take place this fall in roughly two dozen locations, Narechania said.  There are 10 states in particular the group is targeting — most of them purple states or red states Democrats hope to turn purple. Narechania said participants will learn the basics of the redistricting process and the ins-and-outs of how it works in their state. The trainings will also discuss messaging around redistricting issues and how to develop action plans in the specific communities.  Those activists may go on to offer public comments in the redistricting process, specifically in states with independent commissions, or pressure their state legislators to adopt or reject certain maps.  The campaign is one of several new initiatives that redistricting reform advocates have launched ahead of the next round of map-drawing, which will occur after the 2020 census. Republicans dominated the last round of redistricting and in several states, like North Carolina and Wisconsin, locked in maps that gave them overwhelming majorities in the legislatures even as the statewide vote was much closer.  Rather than seek equivalent Democratic gerrymanders (which, to be fair, do exist in states like Maryland), the National Democratic Redistricting Committee says it’s supporting candidates who have pledged to make map-drawing fairer.  Republicans meanwhile have put up their own group, the Scott Walker-led National Republican Redistricting Trust, that has sought to block reform efforts and protect GOP-tilted maps.  Walker’s statement appeared to allude to reporting suggesting that Obama, as an Illinois state legislator, redrew his district to include the donor base that helped propel his 2004 U.S. Senate run  “He’s the only President in the past 40 years to gerrymander his way to the Presidency,” Walker said. “America’s only modern gerrymanderer-in-chief is now trying to convince the American people that he’s against his own redistricting practices.”


tass--2019-04-04--Stoltenbergs comparison of Stalin Hitler IS shows lack of education says Moscow

Stoltenberg’s comparison of Stalin, Hitler, IS shows lack of education, says Moscow

© AP Photo/Francisco Seco  MOSCOW, April 4. /TASS/. NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg’s statement comparing Soviet leader Joseph Stalin, Adolf Hitler and the IS terrorist group (outlawed in Russia) shows his lack of education, Russian Foreign Ministry Spokeswoman Maria Zakharova stated during Thursday’s briefing.  "This statement is more stupid than inappropriate," she stated. "Many Western politicians are notorious for their absurd and stupid statements that have no relation to facts. They are simply ignorant."  "I think that the quality of Western education is a big myth. In my opinion, this all comes down to a lack of education," the diplomat concluded.  Earlier, NATO Secretary General has explained the increase of the organization’s defense budget due to threats from the outside world. He claimed that neither Hitler, Stalin, nor the IS would have been defeated by means of peaceful protests or dialogue.  In other media


telesurtv--2019-06-25--Cuba To Help Nicaragua Improve Its Education System

Cuba’s government has signed cooperation agreements with Nicaragua, which the Sandinista government hopes will help strengthen its education system.  There will be "exchanges" whereby Cuba will visit and share their experiences building a world-class school system.  > _**RELATED:**_  >  > [_**Nicaragua Creates 2,000 ‘Reconciliation Commissions’ for Peace**_](https://www.telesurenglish.net/news/Nicaragua-Creates-2000 -Reconciliation-Commissions-for-Peace-20190618-0007.html)  Nicaragua’s Vice President Rosario Murillo announced Tuesday that Cuba’s Education Minister Ana Elsa Velazquez is visiting the country. The visit comes as the two countries sign accords relating to cooperation in various areas of education, and on the training of Nicaragua’s teaching staff.  State media has reported details of what Cuba’s minister has planned during her visit. She will speak in the towns of Esteli and Matagalpa to conferences of primary school teachers, where she will explain how Cuba has built a quality education system, including the use of "mobile teachers" that are deployed to homes where children are unable to attend their local institution.  Vice President Murillo celebrated the visit, saying; “Cuba is a wonderful country of solidarity, and with a high level of development in quality education, and with a long-standing commitment to solidarity and revolutionary fraternity.”  The achievements of Cuba’s education system have been praised internationally. These include the elimination of illiteracy in just one year at the beginning of the revolution.  The teaching methods and programs used to achieve this, known as  ‘Yo Si Puedo’ (Yes I Can) have been deployed in Venezuela and Bolivia to eliminate illiteracy in the respective countries. According to World Bank figures, as a proportion of its GDP, Cuba[ spends more](https://cuba- solidarity.org.uk/information/facts/) than any other country in the world on its public education system, which is free at all levels for its citizens.


telesurtv--2019-06-26--Costa Rican Teachers Protest Education Reforms

Teachers affiliated with the Association of Secondary School Teachers [APSE](https://apse.cr/) marched Tuesday in the capital toward the National Assembly, protesting against the neoliberal policies affecting the public sector that will criminalize strikes.  > **RELATED:   >  [Activists, Right Groups Demand Justice for Slain Costa Rican Indigenous Leader](https://www.telesurenglish.net/news/Activists-Right-Groups-Demand- Justice-for-Slain-Costa-Rican-Indigenous-Leader-20190320-0023.html)**  "The protest aims to show the public that the government and most legislators are attempting to criminalize protestors and dissolve unions, as well as reducing wages of public servants, especially in the education sector," APSE President Melida Cedeño told reporters Tuesday.  Demonstrators have been on a work stoppage for five days showing their ire against the Essential Services bill, the Dual Education bill and the Public Employment bill.      Cedeño emphasized the strike had received support from across all regions of the country and condemned the education proposals that would declare education fundamental and all strikes by education workers illegal.  Teachers reject the bills named "Dual Education and Dual Technical Training," arguing it is an attempt to put education at the service of the private sector, creating a low-cost labor force.  In addition to the teacher protests, a group of demonstrators, small-fisherman among them, allegedly stormed the president's palace in San Jose and threw an explosive towards the head of state's residence.  According to AFP, the demonstrators launched a low-impact explosive along with stones at the palace.      The artesenal fishermen want the government to not implement a value-added tax set to go into force July 1.  President Carlos Alvarado says his administration is open to dialogue with the fishing sector that is a major source of income for the Central American nation, but that violence isn't acceptable.  "This won't be done with violence, repression, knocking down gates, damaging public infrastructure with stones or dynamite, which can harm many people ," Alvarado said. "That is not the Costa Rican way.  W will not accept this," added the president. One demonstrator was reportedly beaten over the head.


theamericanconservative--2019-05-13--How Massachusetts Showed the Way on Education Reform

We are now nearly four decades beyond the publication of A Nation at Risk, a federal report that indicted the “rising tide of mediocrity” and initiated a well-deserved period of hand-wringing about K-12 public education in the United States. Massachusetts was the only state to respond to the call to create a school system that would be among the best in the world. Sadly, now even the Bay State is retreating from the policies that delivered its historic success.  The landmark Massachusetts Education Reform Act of 1993, which was entirely state-led, pushed academic content and high standards over the Bush I and Clinton administrations’ agenda of K-12 education as merely workforce development training. Today, however, Beltway-driven initiatives like the Obama administration’s Common Core State Standards, together with a new generation of state leaders who seem to have forgotten the importance of tying new money to high standards, accountability and enhanced school choice, threaten to undermine the reforms that made the Bay State the nation’s unquestioned educational leader.  The Education Reform Act required the state to draft liberal arts-rich “curriculum frameworks” to help schools choose curricula by specifying the content students should be able to master. Developed after years of public debate and with input from teachers and experts, the English, writing, math, science, and history frameworks were internationally benchmarked, with an eye toward authentic college readiness.  Classic literature, like the works of Charles Dickens, Jules Verne, Mark Twain, and Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, made up about 80 to 90 percent of the English content. In math, students were required to start studying algebra in the eighth grade, years before the National Mathematics Advisory Panel made the same recommendation. A wide range of voices—including the Thomas B. Fordham Institute, noted standards expert E. D. Hirsch, Jr., educational historian Diane Ravitch, Achieve, Inc., and the American Federation of Teachers—hailed the Massachusetts frameworks as national models.  Passing Massachusetts Comprehensive Assessment System (MCAS) tests based on the frameworks became a high school graduation requirement early in the current century. The tests also earned accolades and applied pressure to school systems to develop rigorous curricula. If they didn’t, their students’ scores would show it.  Another state test was developed for new teachers, who had to demonstrate communication and literacy skills and the knowledge to teach this material within the frameworks.  The results of the reform were better than even the law’s authors had hoped.  Beginning in 1993, Massachusetts’ SAT scores rose for 13 consecutive years. The state’s scores on the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) shot up, too. By 2005, Massachusetts students became the first to score best in the nation in all four major NAEP categories (fourth- and eighth-grade reading and math). Since then, they have repeated the feat on every subsequent administration of NAEP except one.  While American students as a whole lag behind their international peers, the 2007 and 2011 Trends in International Mathematics and Science Study results showed that Massachusetts students were competitive with their counterparts in places like Japan, Korea, and Singapore. In 2007, the Bay State’s eighth graders even tied for first place internationally in science.  In addition to across-the-board improvements, race- and class-based achievement gaps narrowed. E.D. Hirsch found that Massachusetts was one of three states that made the most progress at reducing achievement gaps between 1998 and 2005. Between 2002 and 2009, the NAEP scores of African Americans and Hispanics on both fourth- and eighth-grade reading tests improved more rapidly than those of white students. Low-income students made gains as well.  With this record, Massachusetts should be the model for other states to follow. But the Bay State has chosen to retreat from its own success. In 2008, Massachusetts turned its back on accountability when an independent agency that conducted comprehensive audits of school districts was eliminated.  When the Obama administration kicked off its push to federalize public education by making adoption of Common Core English and math standards a condition of receiving federal grant money, Massachusetts acquiesced. It adopted the standards in 2010.  Common Core cut the amount of classic literature, drama, and poetry that Massachusetts students study by 60 percent. The math standards, which Stanford University mathematics professor emeritus R. James Milgram called “shopping cart math,” no longer get students to algebra by eighth grade.  Subsequent revisions also dumbed down the Bay State’s science and U.S. history standards. In 2009, then-governor Deval Patrick’s administration brushed aside the state law that required history to join English, math, and science as a high-stakes test. Instead he pushed new age fads, including educating the “whole child” and vacuous “21st-century skills.”  The Education Reform Act had also created the nation’s best charter schools. A Stanford University study found that Boston charters were doing more to close achievement gaps than any other group of public schools in the country. But after the failure of repeated legislative attempts to loosen restrictions on the number of charters that could operate, supporters chose to make the issue the subject of a statewide referendum in 2016. Opponents prevailed, claiming charters “drain money” from traditional public schools, even though Massachusetts is the only state to provide full and partial reimbursements to school districts that lose students to charters.  Results from the dismantling of education reform have been swift and predictable. While Massachusetts still ranks first on NAEP, from 2011 to 2017, state scores either stagnated or declined in both English and math. In the Common Core era, the Bay State was among those that saw the biggest declines in math.  By 2013, the percentage of students scoring “Proficient” on MCAS fourth-grade reading tests had fallen by 10 points. SAT scores have also dropped significantly, especially in writing.  More than a quarter-century after education reform, the state’s K-12 funding formula is no longer keeping up with rising health insurance and special education costs. Rather than tie new money to reforms, the foundation of the historic 1993 law, it appears lawmakers plan to simply increase spending with no strings attached.  If your children ever grouse about why they have to learn history, you might want to direct them to the story of public education in Massachusetts. Here, state leaders have forgotten what led to the nation’s most successful reforms and appear determined to return to the barren landscape that existed before they were enacted.  Massachusetts has demonstrated what works in public education. Why are the state’s leaders running away from it?  Charles Chieppo is a senior fellow at and Jamie Gass directs the Center for School Reform at Pioneer Institute, a Boston-based think tank.


theatlantic--2019-07-05--Higher Education Has Become a Partisan Issue

Over the past 25 years, since Newt Gingrich helped Republicans reclaim the gavel in the House of Representatives, Americans have become more politically polarized. Not only do members of one party view the other party as wrong, but they more frequently view them as a “threat to the nation’s well-being.” Americans don’t trust the other side, and more and more they mistrust institutions too, including the media and higher education.  Polls have shown that confidence in higher education, overall, has decreased in the past few years. A Pew Research Center survey found that 61 percent of Americans are worried about the path America’s colleges and universities are on. Democrats think that the cost of tuition is too high and, to a much lesser extent, that students are not getting the skills they need for the workplace. But Republicans overwhelmingly hold negative views of the sector; 73 percent  thought higher education was going in the wrong direction, as opposed to 52 percent of Democrats. A 2018 Gallup poll found that only 39 percent of Republicans expressed a “great deal” or “quite a lot” of confidence in the sector, down 17 percentage points from 2015.  For many Republicans, mistrust of Democrats and mistrust of institutions collide when it comes to higher education, because they see colleges and universities as having a liberal bent. They point to surveys showing that college leadership leans liberal, and that liberal professors outnumber conservative ones on campuses.  The latest corroboration for some conservatives was Harvard’s decision to rescind admission to Kyle Kashuv, a Parkland survivor and conservative activist, because of racist messages he sent via Google Docs while in high school. For some, this drove home the message that liberals, and universities, practice selective forgiveness, allowing for the former sins of liberal institutions and people (see: Harvard University’s own past) but not doing the same for conservatives.  Read: Kyle Kashuv becomes a symbol to conservatives who say the left can’t forgive  It’s been an open question for some time whether this partisan mistrust would translate into tangible, monetary penalties for higher education. One answer came last fall, when voters in Montana took to the polls to decide whether they would continue to tax themselves to support higher education. The tax, known as the six-mill levy, has been voted on once every decade since 1948, and this vote was seen as a bellwether for public sentiment on higher education. Though the measure had been passing narrowly in preceding years, voters in 2018 again decided to continue taxing themselves to support their state universities. The support was likely the result of an interesting phenomenon that occurs when the conversation is not about “higher education” as a monolith but about people’s local colleges. Even though people may feel dubious about higher education more broadly, they can see the good that their local schools do and often feel favorably toward them as a result.


theblaze--2019-08-20--The public education system should teach kids how to obtain a job not how to be PC


thedailyexpress--2019-12-06--Nicola Sturgeon admits disappointments in education survey

The First Minister continued to insist that this week’s Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) report for 2018 showed “stable” scores in both areas, despite hitting record lows. It came as her general election campaign was hit by a survey suggesting Scots are losing faith in her government’s ability to manage the NHS, justice and education. The poll found that 50 percent of the electorate think the health service has got worse in the past five years, while only seven percent think it has got better.  It came as Ms Sturgeon launched a battle bus tour of Scotland for the final week of the general election campaign, ditching the private helicopter dubbed “Ayr Force One”. Addressing a crowd of around 30 supporters in South Queensferry, the First Minister repeated calls for voters “to stop Brexit” and “lock Boris Johnson out of power”. First stop for the battle bus – a Volvo converted to run on biofuel – was the Christmas Village shop at Crieff Visitors Centre in Perthshire. Earlier, Ms Sturgeon told MSPs that maths and science performance was not up to scratch and insisted her government’s reforms would deliver an improvement similar to “that which we have already delivered in reading”. But Scottish Tory acting leader Jackson Carlaw accused her of being in “denial”, warning this was “a little like people celebrating the fact that they have just had their kitchen redecorated when the front two rooms in the house are on fire”. He disclosed that only one of the 40 developed countries assessed in the survey has experienced a larger drop in science performance since 2006, the year before the SNP came to power.  Mr Carlaw said Scotland has also experienced the fifth largest decline in maths over this period and argued that SNP ministers’ response was “almost as alarming as the results themselves”. Professor Lindsay Paterson, an education expert at the University of Edinburgh, has said the results “would make any parent wince with shame” but “even worse is the disgraceful political spin which the Scottish Government has struggled to impose”. Although Scottish pupils’ reading skills improved by 11 points, this only brought Scotland’s score back close to its 2012 level. Ms Sturgeon also repeated her claim the PISA survey showed a closing of the attainment gap between rich and poor children, despite the report stating it was very similar to the 2012 and 2015 results. Speaking after First Minister’s Questions, Mr Carlaw said: “Our young people are deprived of the kind of education children in other countries are receiving. “The SNP promised to have an ‘unwavering focus’ on improving standards in schools. But instead, Nicola Sturgeon’s only unwavering performance has been on trying to force through another unwanted and divisive (independence) referendum.” He disclosed that Scotland’s performance in science has dipped by 25 points since the 2006 PISA survey, with only Finland falling by more over that period.  Over the same time, the decline in maths results has only been eclipsed by Finland, Australia, New Zealand and South Korea. Ms Sturgeon said the most recent Scottish Household Survey showed 86 percent of people with experience of the education system expressed satisfaction. She added: “I do not think that that is job done, but it is an indication of the focus and the progress that we are making and will continue to deliver.” Meanwhile, a YouGov poll for The Times found that 52 percent believe the health service is being handled badly by SNP ministers, while 40 percent think it is being managed well. On education, almost half (48 percent) said they thought the issue was being handled poorly, while only 40 percent thought the reverse. For justice, the figures were 44 percent to 38 percent. The results mean each issue now has net negative ratings, with health on -12, education on -8 and justice on -6. When the questions were last asked in April, positive ratings were returned for all.


thedailymirror--2019-01-14--Education spending falls by more than 7 billion since the Tories came to power

Education spending falls by more than £7 billion since the Tories came to power

Education spending has fallen by more than £7 billion since the Tories came to power.  The Mirror has exposed how parents across the country are being sent begging letters to help cover the cost of paper, pens and even toilet roll.  Now analysis by the House of Commons Library, reveals how real terms spending on schools and colleges fell from £95.5 billion in 2011-12 to £87.8 billion in 2017-18 - a fall of £7.7 billion in annual spending.  Labour ’s Angela Rayner, who commissioned the research, said it would come as no surprise to “teachers who are having to make do with less and parents who are receiving begging letters from schools to cover basic supplies”.  As a share of GDP, education spending fell from 5.69% to 4.27%, a decline of 25% in only seven years.  It comes days after it was revealed that the number of secondary schools in deficit hit 30.3% last year, up from 8.1% in 2014.  The Education Policy Institute said the average debt is £483,569 - and one in 10 have deficits of over 10% of their income.  The Prime Minister has said that spending on schools is at a record high this year, and Tory Ministers have repeatedly said that education spending is increasing.  But Labour has accused the Tories of misleading the country over education spending and the Statistics Authority has repeatedly written to the Education Secretary to rebuke him for his use of statistics.  In a letter published in October, the UKSA raised “serious concerns about the Department for Education’s presentation and use of statistics.”  Ms Rayner added: “Despite misleading statements made by the Prime Minister and her Ministers, the Government’s own data shows that they have been slashing education funding throughout their time in office.  “It will be a generation of children and adult learners who will pay the price for Tory austerity and the Tories’ failure to invest in our education system.  “The next Labour government will end Tory cuts to our schools and increase education spending by £25 billion as part of a National Education Service that works for the many, not the few.”  A Department for Education spokesperson said:  "Since 2017, we have given every local authority more money for every pupil in every school.  "And the overall 5-16 schools budget was one of two budgets protected in 2010, despite the necessary savings that had to be made due to the deficit.  "The core schools and high needs budget is rising from almost £41bn in 2017-18 to a record £43.5bn by 2019-20, but the Education Secretary has been clear that he recognises the pressure schools feel on their budgets.  "That is why he has set out his determination to work with the sector to help schools reduce the £10 billion they spend on non-staffing costs.  "But let's also look at what's happening in our schools: standards are rising, with 163,000 more six-year-olds now on track to be fluent readers than in 2012, a more rigorous curriculum and qualifications, 1.9 million more children in good or outstanding schools – 86% of schools are now judged to this standard, compared to 68% in 2010 – and a shrinking attainment gap.”