On Course

Does it Matter that Trump’s Pick for Education Secretary is a Big Donor to Republican Senators?

desrocheswnpr — Mon, 09 Jan 2017 08:55:48 -0500

Money in politics is nothing new. But where that money comes from can be an important factor in determining the legitimacy of the democratic process. That’s why we have campaign finance laws and a long history of trying to make sure big money doesn’t influence decision-making (too much).

Enter President-elect Donald Trump’s pick for education secretary, billionaire Betsy Devos. According to the Washington Post, Devos and her family gave over $800,000 to Republican senators – many who are tasked with vetting her for the job. From the Post:

During the 2014 and 2016 election cycles, DeVos and her relatives gave at least $818,000 to 20 current Republican senators, including more than $250,000 to five members of the Committee on Health, Education, Labor and Pensions (HELP), according to a Washington Post analysis of Federal Election Commission records. …
To money-in-politics watchdogs, the DeVos family’s contributions create a conflict of interest for senators now charged with judging Betsy DeVos’s fitness to helm the Education Department.
“She’s acknowledged that her family gives, and gives a lot, because it’s aiming to buy influence,” said Robert Weissman of Public Citizen, who said the scale of the DeVos family’s political donations is unusual for a prospective Cabinet member. “Against that backdrop, how are the senators supposed to evaluate her nomination in an unbiased way? They can’t.”

Watchdog groups are calling for these senators to recuse themselves from the confirmation hearings. But this is not a new issue. The Post notes that President Obama’s pick for commerce secretary, Penny Pritzker, donated about $20,000 to Democratic senators who then voted on her confirmation four years later.

DeVos also has quite a different vision for public education than the current administration – one that would likely include more public money for school vouchers (which could include religious schools) and charter schools. This then begs the question – are these watchdog groups asking for the senators to recuse themselves because they took money, or because the confirmation involves a person who’s opinion is different from theirs?

Partisanship takes many faces. If we’re going to shed light on only one dark corner, that leaves less light in the other. The whole room should be lit up.

(Photo via PublicDomainPictures.net)

Wow... Check Out This New Tech That Helps Kids With Dyslexia to Read

desrocheswnpr — Thu, 15 Dec 2016 11:01:42 -0500

This is cool. It’s a device that you scan over text and it reads it to you. I’ve never used it, and I can’t endorse it, and I can’t even say that this is anything much different from technology that’s already out there. (Smart phones will read text, for example).

But I love that two people with dyslexia are out there trying to innovate, trying to do something different, trying to change people’s perceptions of what it means to have dyslexia. The founders are husband and wife team, Jamee and Payden Miller.

Side note: The company behind the Read ‘n Style pen, Hidden Abilities, recently won an Award for Entrepreneurship by the co-founder of Apple, Steve Wozniak.

Here’s a little explainer from the Hidden Abilities website:

The idea for the Read ‘n Style pen began when Jamee was in elementary school. Like many others, she struggled with reading. When Jamee had homework, she went to her mom for help, and the two of them would sit at the kitchen table taking turns reading. Jamee would read a page out loud and her mom read the next to her. They would repeat this process back and forth until they were finished. When it was her mom’s turn to read, Jamee would follow along with her, reading the words on the page as her mom pronounced them out loud. Seeing the words, then listening to them pronounced helped Jamee understand what she was reading, improved her spelling, and built her vocabulary.

How Many Prisoners Have Dyslexia? We Don’t Know, But It’s Probably A Lot

desrocheswnpr — Tue, 13 Dec 2016 10:57:33 -0500

Roughly one-third of prison inmates are functionally illiterate.

That’s according to a new survey conducted by the National Center for Education Statistics.

That’s one out of every three people behind bars has trouble reading, or grasping concepts presented in what they read. Compare that with the general population, which is roughly one out of four.

The results are even worse for math skills – over half of all prisoners can’t do basic things with numbers.

But what’s most fascinating is the absence of key data. There’s not a single mention of the word “dyslexia” – even though it’s likely the reason why a large portion of prisoners can’t read well enough to get or maintain a job.

Dr. Sally Shaywitz works at the Yale Center for Dyslexia and Creativity. She estimates that about 20 percent of the general population has dyslexia. Others guess between 10 and 15 percent. It’s not really known because there’s no consistency behind diagnostic procedures, and there’s no universally recognized definition of dyslexia (though there have been efforts to change that), which is a condition where people have trouble connecting sounds with letters and words on a page.

So if 20 percent of the general population is functionally illiterate, according to the NCES report; and by Shaywitz’s estimate, 20 percent of people have dyslexia, it would not be a huge leap to connect this illiteracy to this condition.

By comparison, if more people in prison can’t read, it’s highly likely that more people in prison have dyslexia, which also comes with a unique set of strengths, such problem solving ability, spatial awareness, and out-of-the-box thinking.

In fact, there are many successful entrepreneurs who have the condition. Some say it’s because of dyslexia that they’ve found success.

This means that our failure to understand dyslexia, and the failure of school systems to try to understand it on their own, has undoubtedly caused many students to fall into a life of antisocial behavior. It’s a large, and completely undiscussed, contributor to the rampant school-to-prison pipeline.

Maybe one day there will be data to support this. And when that happens, you can bet I’ll be one of the first to report on it.

Ninth grade

desrocheswnpr — Fri, 09 Dec 2016 10:00:51 -0500

beeps-bravely-through-her-fear:

Ninth graders will tell off-topic lunatic stories with such intensity and passion that you can’t help but get caught up in their nonsense.

They are silly and scared.

Ninth graders will wait to whisper-ask if they can use the bathroom. They will also fart with abandon while giggling. They are afraid to say the word “sex” but gleefully discuss Melanthius’s mangled genitals in The Odyssey.

Ninth graders will leave cough drops on your desk when you are not feeling well. They get nervous if you’re absent, even if you tell them the day before “I am going to be absent tomorrow.”

Ninth graders are slowly understanding the world around them. “If they’re lying about the buggers in Ender’s Game,” they say, “does that mean all governments lie to keep their people under control?” You are quiet. They put their head down.

You are going to break their hearts this year.

Ninth graders blush when talking to you. They might be a little in love, in a removed, chaste way. You are an aunt, a wise cousin, a mysterious neighbor. They will crimp their hair and draw on their wrists. They like that you’re a nerd. They imagine meeting your dog. They want to perform for you.

Ninth graders cry when Tom Robinson is killed. They get so angry at Capulet and Tybalt. They hate Napoleon and wish for Snowball to come back to run the farm. They think Telemachus whines too much and that no one should be handicapped like in Harrison Bergeron. They believe George and Lennie could’ve run.

“But this was written a while ago,” they reason. “Things are different now.”

That one kid picks his head up. “Not that different.”

Ninth graders will one day be older. Please, please. You need to save this world. I am counting on you to save this world.

Great look into a freshman class!

npr: Student parent. Ever heard that term? It’s used for a...

desrocheswnpr — Thu, 08 Dec 2016 10:00:50 -0500

npr:

Student parent.

Ever heard that term? It’s used for a student who is also a parent, and there are nearly five million of them in colleges around the country. That’s over a quarter of the undergraduate population, and that number has gone up by around a million since 2011.

It can be really, really expensive to be a student parent, especially if you need to pay for child care while you’re in class.

In some states, child care for an infant can be as much as $17,062 a year, according to a report by Child Care Aware of America. Add that on to the ever-rising cost of college tuition — both private and public — and the financial strain of getting a college education becomes a huge burden for low-income parents. So much so that only a third of student parents get a degree within six years, often citing mounting debt as a reason for dropping out.

For College Students With Kids, Getting Cheap Child Care Is A Challenge

Illustration: Maria Fabrizio for NPR

general-anxiety: ladyflowdi: thefingerfuckingfemalefury: blackp...

desrocheswnpr — Wed, 07 Dec 2016 10:00:42 -0500

general-anxiety:

ladyflowdi:

thefingerfuckingfemalefury:

blackphoenix1977:

pleatedjeans:

Three cheers for these guys [x]

This is how to be a good ally.

Using their Bro-ness for good, not evil

So a tiny story: on Black Friday a few weeks ago I went to Gamestop to buy my brother a game for Christmas, and I noticed this older man was watching me like a hawk. He was loitering around the front of the store without really buying anything, and every time I glanced at him out of the corner of my eye he was looking at me. I went to look at the PS4 games, and he was looking at something right behind me. I checked out the Nintendo games, and he was looking at them too. I was the only woman in the store, by the way.

By the time I got in line to pay he was loitering at the front of the store again, and I just had that feeling that he was going to try and take the game I just bought, or steal my purse, as soon as I left the store. OR, he was going to try and follow me home. And I know I don’t have to explain that terror to any woman reading this, but all I could think was that I’m in this Gamestop alone with at least twenty other men and something is about to happen. I’m beginning to freak out, to the point where I’ve just pulled my pepper spray out of my purse and into the pocket of my coat.

So there I am, next in line to pay, and there is this GIGANTIC dudebro right behind me, and I say gigantic as a 6 foot tall woman. He says, “Ma’am? Don’t be offended, but would it be alright if I walked you to your car?” and I was like “Are you serious?” and he was like “There are some weird guys in here right now. Have you noticed that guy watching you?” and then I showed the dudebro the pepper spray in my pocket and he was like “Right on. Would you still let me walk you to your car?” and I said yes.

So I paid, and waited while HE paid, and he walked me to my car. And just as I was getting in, the weird guy who’d been loitering came out of the store, saw me and my dudebro, and turned around and walked away in the opposite direction.

In short: men who recognize that women are unsafe in dark alleys, college campuses, grocery stores, gas stations and retail stores and do something about it are the kind of quality men that this world needs more of.

Oh god, this made me tear up. Take care of each other out there.

Against All Odds, This Afghan Girl Finishes Her Education Despite Child Marriage

desrocheswnpr — Tue, 06 Dec 2016 10:00:49 -0500

Against All Odds, This Afghan Girl Finishes Her Education Despite Child Marriage:

givology:

Meet Yalda, an inspiring young girl who graduated high school early and is now preparing for college! She was inspired by soldiers to learn English and further her education. Yalda is proof that one can achieve their dreams despite any obstacles!

Study Suggests Listening Skills Can Predict a Child’s Ability to Read

desrocheswnpr — Mon, 05 Dec 2016 12:19:25 -0500

Researchers from Northwestern’s Auditory Neuroscience Laboratory found that a 30-minute listening test given to three-year-olds is a strong predictor of how well that child will learn to read. It can also help figure out if the child will develop a learning disability.

Nina Kraus, director of the lab, says this is a big step forward toward better understanding the complex mechanisms associated with reading and listening to sounds.

Kraus told KQED that this discovery could help schools and parents figure out how to allocate resources early on.

“There are excellent interventions we can give to struggling readers during crucial pre-school years, but the earlier the better,” said Kraus, a professor of communication sciences, neurobiology and physiology in the School of Communication. “The challenge has been to identify which children are candidates for these interventions, and now we have discovered a way.”

Kraus suggests parents and teachers can create spaces that would help some vulnerable children overcome any literacy challenges they might face. Here are some things you can do, according to KQED:

1. Reduce noise
2. Read aloud
3. Encourage children to play a musical instrument
4. Listen to audiobooks and podcasts
5. Support learning a second language
6. Avoid white noise machines
7. Use the spread of technology to your advantage

Here’s Kraus giving a speech called “Breaking the Wall to Neuro-education: How the neuroscience of sound, language and music shapes human communication.”:

(Photo via HearingReview.com)

How Are Kids Learning in a ‘Post-Truth’ World?

desrocheswnpr — Fri, 02 Dec 2016 09:44:19 -0500

It’s official – Oxford Dictionaries have named “post-truth” as the word of the year for 2016. It’s an adjective, meaning: “relating to or denoting circumstances in which objective facts are less influential in shaping public opinion than appeals to emotion and personal belief.”

From the Oxford University Press:

The concept of post-truth has been in existence for the past decade, but Oxford Dictionaries has seen a spike in frequency this year in the context of the EU referendum in the United Kingdom and the presidential election in the United States. It has also become associated with a particular noun, in the phrase post-truth politics.

Here’s a graphic that explains it a little:

Soooo, what the heck does that mean for schools? Canadian teacher Andrew Campbell wrote an insightful piece about this very idea. Here’s a snippet:

There’s considerable evidence that, contrary to conventional wisdom, people do not naturally seek truth. Rather than gathering facts and forming opinions based on evidence, most people form opinions and then accept or reject facts based on whether they confirm their beliefs. …
A second factor is the existence of filter bubbles. Eli Pariser first explained how search algorithms use personal information (e.g. location, past click behaviour, search history, etc.) to shape what information is provided to users. This means that a search is likely to provide results that confirm what you already believe, even if what you believe is wrong. …
Currently, most educators seem to be walking their students into a Post-Truth future. Schools embrace the role of filter bubbles and the democratization of expertise, teaching students that using Google is an essential 21st Century Competency and encouraging the use of social media as a trusted source of information.
If, however, we believe truth is important, we must formally and explicitly begin to teach students about the digital world they are entering. All citizens need to be aware about the role algorithms play in what they read on their screens, and there’s no better group to start this with than students…
We also need to start helping students understand the value of a free and independent media. … Students must become thoughtful activists of Internet content. Algorithms are built on user behaviour, so if we change our behaviour we can change what we see.

This is a real thing that’s happening. Emotional reaction has replaced informed decision-making. That’s always been a problem, but it’s exacerbated by an over-saturation of information that preys on stereotypes and fears. Schools are ground zero for mitigating this dangerous trend, and teaching students how to think critically, and for themselves, is step one in this process.

Check Out This Ad for a Special Education Director in Las Vegas

desrocheswnpr — Mon, 07 Nov 2016 10:31:49 -0500

You can’t make this stuff up. One of the hardest jobs in the education world, and the demands are three short sentences long. I hope this charter school finds much more than they’re looking for.

Check out the ad for yourself.

npr: Elections officials in one Idaho county have found a...

desrocheswnpr — Fri, 04 Nov 2016 10:00:47 -0400

npr:

Elections officials in one Idaho county have found a delicious new way to get out the vote: by bringing “food truck voting” straight to the people.

OK, so it’s not a real food truck. You can’t get a meal there.

The Ada County mobile voting booth is actually a converted cargo trailer, complete with walk-up windows and a giant “I voted” sticker painted on the side. As the most populous county in Idaho (the capital of Boise is the county seat and most urban city in the mostly rural state), Chief Deputy Clerk Phil McGrane says the mobile trailer adds a fifth option to early voting locations in Ada County.

So, where did food truck design come from? Believe it or not, McGrane says he was inspired by his love of Kansas City barbecue.

“One of my hobbies on the side is competitive barbecue,” says the elections official. “And if you were to go see me set up, you’d see pop-up tents and a trailer, and so it’s taking some of those ideas and just flipping it for voting.”

How ‘Food Truck Voting’ Is Catching On In One Idaho County

Photo: Frankie Barnhill/Boise State Public Radio

Come to Connecticut!

austinkleon: “Les Voleurs,” a manifesto by William Burroughs...

desrocheswnpr — Thu, 03 Nov 2016 10:00:46 -0400

austinkleon:

“Les Voleurs,” a manifesto by William Burroughs and Brion Gysin, printed in The Adding Machine

Earlier in the essay:

Writers work with words and voices just as painters work with colors; and where do these words and voices come from? Many sources: conversations heard and overheard, movies, and radio broadcasts, newspapers, magazines, yes, and other writers… So let’s come out in the open with it and steal freely.

Filed under: steal like an artist

The crossroads of ethics, the law and flattery. Lots to ponder!

npr: Just about every day, genetic counselor Shawn Fayer heads...

desrocheswnpr — Wed, 02 Nov 2016 10:00:38 -0400

npr:

Just about every day, genetic counselor Shawn Fayer heads to the maternity ward at Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston and tries to convince new parents to give him a blood sample.

Fayer is offering gene sequencing for newborns. It gives parents a tantalizing look at their baby’s genetic information.

New parents Lauren and Ian Patrick, from Marion, Mass., were excited when they were first approached earlier this month.

“My initial reaction — why wouldn’t someone do this? Why wouldn’t they want the information?” Ian Patrick says as he cradles his newborn son, Finn. “For me, more information is better, even if it’s not always good.”

If his parents sign him up, Finn would join the BabySeq project, an NIH-funded study led by Dr. Robert Green, a medical geneticist at Brigham and Women’s Hospital. With genetic testing getting cheaper and cheaper, Green wants to figure out what happens when parents know their child’s genetic blueprint from day one.

Would You Want To Know The Secrets Hidden In Your Baby’s Genes?

Illustration: Scott Bakal for NPR

Study Says a Good School Climate Can Narrow Achievement Gap; But Common Definitions Needed

desrocheswnpr — Tue, 01 Nov 2016 11:17:44 -0400

It turns out that if you feel safe and welcome at school, there’s a good chance you’ll get better grades than if you go to a school where you feel unwelcome.

That’s the suggested result of an analysis of some 78 studies over the last 15 years that focused on the relationship between school or classroom climate, academic achievement, and socioeconomic status.

Researchers from the University of Southern California and Rami Benbenishty of Bar-Ilan University in Israel published their findings in Review of Educational Research.

“Our analysis of more than 15 years’ worth of research shows that schools do matter and can do much to improve academic outcomes,” study co-author Ron Avi Astor, a professor of social work and education at the USC, said in a press release. “Our findings suggest that by promoting a positive climate, schools can allow greater equality in educational opportunities, decrease socioeconomic inequalities, and enable more social mobility.”

But they also found there’s an inconsistency with how things are defined. Astor said the U.S. Department of Education has a definition of “school climate” and related terms, but it “is only somewhat aligned with the research and the scholars producing it.”

“There is a tangible, immediate need to construct a common definition and reliable climate measurements that can be translated into practice and policy guidelines,” Astor said. “In the absence of a clear and uniform definition and measurement of school climate, the ability of researchers and stakeholders to evaluate school climate growth over time is restricted.”

The Every Students Succeeds Act was passed earlier this year, and included lots of emphasis on school climate and social and emotional learning. But, according to the authors of this study, the new law doesn’t use the definitions that researchers use. So that means it will be probably be hard to A)prove compliance, B)use data to make improvements, and C)compare what works with what doesn’t.

Hopefully DOE officials take note of this discrepancy and work with researchers and school districts to make sure everyone’s on the same page.

(Photo via ExcellEducationInnovations.com)

Breathe.

desrocheswnpr — Tue, 25 Oct 2016 09:50:10 -0400

general-anxiety:

hisnamewasbeanni:

offbeatteacher:

Teachers, if you are anything like me, you may be feeling worn out, over-worked, stressed, and flooded. Remember to take small moments to breathe, stretch, drink water, and remember why we got into teaching in the first place.

Note: don’t do this if you have the flu.

No flu, just a bad cold, but stretching made my back hurt worse…why do things we love hurt us?

mathhombre: manacontemporary: “In my remembrance of the...

desrocheswnpr — Fri, 16 Sep 2016 10:00:40 -0400

‘Invocation’ "The Golden Rule" (Seed 1)

‘Invocation’ "The Golden Rule" (Seed 1), (detail)

Sinews, (detail)

mathhombre:

manacontemporary:

“In my remembrance of the compassionate (rahma) spirit, and as a woman of nomadic heritage, I try to reclaim the womb (rahim) and my connectedness to a nourishing power that is always with me wheresoever I wander. Water and its circumbulative connection to the Divine breath are primordial symbols inherent to the vitality of my journey.”—Artist Amina Ahmed.

Ahmed keeps a studio at Mana Contemporary.

#mathart

Beautiful!

general-anxiety: mrskcreads: I was also the kid to bring...

desrocheswnpr — Thu, 15 Sep 2016 09:58:29 -0400

general-anxiety:

mrskcreads:

I was also the kid to bring multiple books during testing! You never know when you’ll finish one!

I finished all my work quickly so that I could read. I wanted my work fine (correctly) so that they’d all leave me alone lol

Yup!

Where Have All the Teachers Gone? Or Are They Everywhere?

desrocheswnpr — Thu, 15 Sep 2016 09:54:33 -0400

60,000.

That’s the number of teachers the United States is short on, according to a recent report by the Learning Policy Institute.

As noted by the Chicago Tribune, this is the largest reported teacher shortage since the 1990s.

The shortfall is a result of increased demand for teachers as schools reinstate classes and programs axed during the Great Recession. It has been compounded by a dramatic decrease in the supply of new teachers entering the profession. Enrollment in teacher preparation programs dropped from 691,000 in 2009 to 451,000 in 2014, a 35 percent decline, according to the study, “A Coming Crisis in Teaching? Teacher Supply, Demand and Shortages in the U.S.”
“Our analysis estimates that U.S. classrooms were short approximately 60,000 teachers last year,” Leib Sutcher, the study’s co-author, told reporters Tuesday ahead of the study’s release. “Unless we can shift these trends, annual teacher shortages could increase to over 100,000 teachers by 2018 and remain close to that level thereafter.”
The impact of the teacher shortage on students, according to the study’s authors, will be schools having to cancel courses, increase class sizes and teacher-pupil ratios, or hire underprepared teachers.

But as perennial teacher union critic Mike Antonucci points out (multi-perenially): “It appears there is – and probably has always been – an oversupply of elementary education teacher candidates and a shortage of those in math, science and special education.”

He also says these claims of shortages are always overblown, as these figures always seem to be released just around the time school starts. Which is to say the release is more political than data-driven.

What do you think? Is this a ploy to pump more money into schools without foresight, or is this a real need that has real consequences?

(Photo via PublicDomainPictures.net)

Dr. Seuss Invented the Word ‘Nerd’. Coolest Nerd Ever!

desrocheswnpr — Wed, 14 Sep 2016 16:21:26 -0400

From Dictionary.com:

The slang term nerd means an intelligent but single-minded person, obsessed with a certain hobby or pursuit, e.g. a computer nerd. But the word that has been the bane of so many elementary schooler’s existence was actually invented by their king: none other than Dr. Seuss himself!
The word first appeared in print in Seuss’s 1950 picture book, If I Ran the Zoo, though Seuss’s ‘nerd’ is a small animal from the land of Ka-Troo, not a pale kid with glasses taped together.

But how did the word go from how Dr. Seuss used it to its modern day connotation? Well Wikipedia has a few theories. The one I like is how oral legend at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute holds that the word “nerd” is “derived from “knurd” (“drunk” spelled backward), which was used to describe people who studied rather than partied.”

Neologisms. Where would English be without them?

Kindergarten in the wild! Kids with knives and saws playing...

desrocheswnpr — Tue, 23 Aug 2016 10:10:27 -0400

Kindergarten in the wild! Kids with knives and saws playing outside. Now that’s wild.