Education
A whopping 300 union teachers and organizers showed up for a weekend event at URI’s Ryan Center to back the opinion stated, as follows, by National Education Association Rhode Island President Larry Purtill: In Rhode Island, he said, many teachers distrust state Education Commissioner Deborah A. Gist and her aggressive approach to changes that echoes…
The Providence School Board elected to close 5 schools last night. Parents were angry. Kids were used as props. I’ve seen it before. Similar circumstances occurred in Warwick a couple years ago, where a total of 4 schools were closed in two years (and everyone survived, believe it or not). My thoughts from 2009 are…
There are (legitimate) concerns that student testing requirements will result in a “narrowing” of school curriculum. All math and ELA (and now a Science) and not much room for the humanities or arts. As Mark Schneider explains, the National Center for Education Statistics has released their High School Transcript Study and found that isn’t happening.…
Rhode Island Association of School Committees Executive Director Tim Duffy commented as follows to the post in which I suggested that pension problems are a self-inflicted wound among governments, especially local governments: The wound is not a locally self-inflicted one. School committees are not responsible for pension debt. We do not negotiate these benefits with…
There is a white paper at AEI arguing that the it’s time for a paradigm shift. Instead of school choice–which accepts the current whole school, institution (or “bricks and mortar”) -based educational structure–reformers should look to educational choice as the true next-generation model: By supporting reforms to increase choice only among schools, choice advocates are…
Another interesting aspect of the article on Education Commissioner Deborah Gist’s new regulations that Marc mentioned yesterday is the way in which one of the objections is answered in a separate article on the same page: “If they gut collective bargaining, they are heading down a road to destroy public education,” said Larry Purtill, executive…
As reported by the ProJo this morning, the new Dep’t of Education Basic Education Program attempts to implement a new way of doing business. It strengthens management rights, implements evaluations, defines a “code of responsibility” and removes seniority as the primary qualifier for job retention. All done to, as Commisioner Deborah Gist explains, to make…
My Patch column, this week, notes that school administrators in Tiverton appear to analyze differences between their approach and that of one of the most successful districts in Rhode Island (neighboring town, Portsmouth) only to the degree that they can formulate excuses why their own students and community in general are to blame for the…
Predictably, teacher-legislator James Sheehan (D., North Kingstown) is vocally opposed to Providence Schools’ attempt to save the necessary money while causing the least amount of harm to students. At bottom, Providence’s approach is an attempt to keep the teachers who offer the most value per dollar, which will also allow it to keep more teachers,…
Just to make you think (h/t): Now, it’s a gross simplification, to be sure. I’d add a column labeled “Reading”, for instance, and how much of the “classes” and “homework” laid the groundwork necessary for “perl”. But the point being made is this: the basics of education are necessary, but it is often what kids…