Found this on the subject too.

Revisionaries

http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/features/2010/1001.blake.html

Here's an excerpt. 

The ultraconservatives argued that they were too light on basics like grammar and too heavy on reading comprehension and critical thinking. “This critical-thinking stuff is gobbledygook,” grumbled David Bradley, an insurance salesman with no college degree, who often acts as the faction’s enforcer.

This should NOT be happening in the United States of America! Actions such as this are more common in China, North Korea, and Nazi Germany. I posted the Huffington Post article, Texas Textbook Massacre on Facebook. Most people were sick about it, though one of my more radical friends said it was about time they made the curriculum more "balanced."  I think HE has been watching too much Fox News. GRRRRR!  The worst part is that all of my grandchildren are educated in Texas. It just makes me sick.

Colbert covered it tonight.

Kelly, have do you know any conservative teachers who had a problem with it? Probably haven't had a chance to have the discussion. Surprised you haven't said anything either, or has  a lot of what you'd say, already been said? (: 

I guess I was avoiding the topic because it makes my blood boil a bit. I agree with most historians in that this move is very unfortunate to say the least.

As most of you know, I am a middle school special education teacher who works directly in the English and Social Studies classrooms. We have a pretty "down the middle" text book for U.S. History but still find ourselves constantly looking for enrichment materials when we cover slavery or civil rights, for example, since the book just does not do such topics justice. The teacher I work with is so creative and open-minded and is not afraid to teach the negative aspects of U.S. history (Trail of Tears, forcing native Americans and immigrants to assimilate, Jim Crow Laws, etc.) We even held a classroom debate over whether Andrew Jackson deserves to be on the $20 bill (he owned slaves, etc.) and for extra credit the students could "elect" and write an essay on someone who could replace him on the bill (MLK was a popular choice.) We tell the kids that teaching such concepts (the good and the bad) is important in understanding how far we've come and what we still can improve upon. In addition to my formal teaching roles, I host an after school Diversity Club in which we celebrate various cultures and discuss racism, tolerance, etc. So this "change" in Texas breaks my heart and really frightens me. 

The article I linked from the Washington Post makes it clear that this will impact other districts since the text book chosen would be cheaper to purchase and a chain reaction could result. My only consolation is that most teacher and parent groups would probably fight hard against such a purchase (well, maybe not in all parts of the country) and I think we are closer to "electronic text books" than we think so the days of big, bulky text books that cost districts lots of money may be over soon. Maybe that's wishful thinking.

I hope this is an isolated case and does not become a trend.

What I can't figure out is why we have parties represented on the Texas Board of Education.  2+2=4 is not an issue that has anything to do with party affiliation.  It infuriates the heck out of me.  Lucky for my kids, they have my husband and me to discuss all the aspects of different concepts even if it isn't encouraged in the classroom.

Well, us Texas women are prob'ly s'posed to be barefoot and pregnant in the kitchen anyway, so what do we need with booklearnin'?  And Sarah Palin almost made it to the vice presidency without knowing any geography or history, 'cause booklearnin' is for them elites.

Democratic candidate for Governor, Bill White, trying to pressure Perry (who does not see this as a problem) to direct a revisiting of this text book decision. We can only hope for Governor White to remedy this awful decision at a future time.

Democratic gubernatorial candidate Bill White on Tuesday said he wants Gov. Rick Perry to ask State Board of Education Chairwoman Gail Lowe to send the controversial social studies curriculum revisions back to the committees where the proposals started.

The board's work on the standards has brought national attention. Critics worry the changes will affect textbooks offered nationwide because of the volume of Texas' purchases.

The 15-member board is set to give final approval to the changes in May. They voted 10-5 to give their preliminary approval earlier this month.

"Individual school board members are no doubt sincere in their beliefs, and some of the changes can be debated by reasonable people. But, under the leadership of another extreme Rick Perry appointee, the amendment process injected politics into our school books and classrooms," White said it a statement. "That is a step in the wrong direction, requiring leadership from our Governor."

Check out the latest polls from Real Clear Politics. Bill White actually has a decent shot. 

Poll	Date	Sample	Perry (R)	White (D)	Spread
RCP Average	2/2 - 3/3	--	46.5	41.0	Perry +5.5
Rasmussen Reports	03/03 - 03/03	500 LV	49	43	Perry +6
Daily Kos/R2000	02/08 - 02/10	600 LV	46	42	Perry +4
Dallas Mng. News	02/02 - 02/10	1508 RV	43	37	Perry +6
PPP (D)	02/04 - 02/07	1200 RV	48	42	Perry +6

 

 

 

Kelly, you're probably not going to like this. Teachers, educators and many others alike are fighting a bill in Florida that is being rushed through by Republicans that would severely impact education standards in the state. What's your opinion? I'm sure there is more to read up on this. Here are 2 links. 

 http://www.floridamortgageblogger.com/2010/03/26/support-floridas-teachers-floridas-congress-stop-sb-6-hb-7189/

 http://www.examiner.com/x-12824-Dade-County-Education-Policy-Examiner~y2010m3d27-Senate-Bill-6--House-Bill-7189-An-Open-Letter-to-Our-Legislature

Republicans don't exactly have a good record to run on when it comes to education. I do understand the need for more teacher accountability and I have known tenured teachers who just should not be teaching, but this system they are talking about is very flawed and will demoralize the good teachers IMO. For example, I teach special education students who have learning and emotional issues. When they come to me in 8th grade at a 4th grade reading level and increase to a Grade 6 level over one year, I am thrilled. But those standardized tests they refer to won't capture that success and will see this kid (and me) as a failure despite the gains. 

I like the some of the ideas of Duncan, Education Secretary. For example, the idea of national standards and tying them to the Race to the Top contests makes sense so all states can aim for the same goals, be on the same page, and get incentives for good programs.

New York State has always been ahead of the game with standards so I feel pretty proud of the educational system in New York State and adhering to the national standards is an easy task. I had a student who came to me from Las Vegas and told me she did not take Social Studies class in Grade 6-it just wasn't offered! Wow! This should not happen!

Duncan wants to recognize major gains in working with at-risk populations or in formerly low-performance schools. Basically, they seem to want us to think outside the box. I will never say a student is "unreachable" but one can't ignore some of the family dysfunction, strikes against some of them before they even walk into school.  If you look at some very effective programs for at-risk students, they are not cheap and they often involve parent training, community outreach. So if these Republican leaders in Florida really cared about student success they'd be looking at this a little differently. Are they willing to reach out to some of these families in tougher neighborhoods, go door to door? I doubt it-they enjoy the comforts of their safe neighborhoods and blame the teachers if they can't reach the tougher kids. This needs to be a community project with all involved if they really want success.

I saw this comment from the one article which was pretty comprehensive and I understand:

 

 

The Huff Po article was pretty harsh. I disagree that the NYS tests are that easy and most kids could guess their way through. Speaking about  the English exam, maybe it's just because I work with special educations students and they really struggle with reading comprehension, listening passages, and written expression-not to mention test anxiety issues-but it is real challenge to get them up to a passing grade. The grades for spec. ed. students have been increasing over the years, but the test is not a piece of cake IMO. I've always been torn on Charter Schools. Public Schools kind of get screwed when Charter Schools take away funding, for sure, but many have been innovative and successful even with tougher students. So I hate to say they have no place. Merit pay sounds nice but it's not always practical and doesn't offer much equity for a teacher who works with special needs students who have a much harder time getting those passing grades, even though they may have improved greatly on other measures. From the article:

So, what is the Obama administration now doing? Its $4.3 billion "Race to the Top" fund will supposedly promote "innovation." But this money will be used to promote privatization of public education and insist that states use these same pathetic tests to decide which teachers are doing a good job. With the lure of all that money hanging out there to the states, the administration is requiring that they remove all restrictions on the number of privately-managed charter schools that receive public dollars and that they use test results to evaluate teachers.

This is not change that teachers can believe in. These are exactly the same reforms that President George W. Bush and his Secretary Margaret Spellings would have promoted if they had had a sympathetic Congress. They too wanted more charter schools, more merit pay, more testing, and more "accountability" for teachers based on those same low-level tests. But Congress would never have allowed them to do it.

Now that President Obama and Secretary Arne Duncan have become the standard-bearer for the privatization and testing agenda, we hear nothing more about ditching NCLB, except perhaps changing its name. The fundamental features of NCLB remain intact regardless of what they call it.

The real winners here are the edu-entrepreneurs who are running President Obama's so-called "Race to the Top" fund and distributing the billions to other edu-entrepreneurs, who will manage the thousands of new charter schools and make mega-bucks selling test-prep programs to the schools.

 

 

Passing of the Florida bill looks like it's just about done and it will need to be signed by Crist, which seems likely. The majority of educators in the state are in a panic and fear that this will be a chain reaction to other states who might do the same. Next might be Alabama.

Plenty of info. I'm following it on the opposition's facebook group. It has a lot of links and a bunch of teachers conversing. 

http://www.facebook.com/pages/STOP-SENATE-BILL-6/387767488775?ref=sgm

The Florida story is not really in the national news so I'm glad you brought it up and it is keeping my interest because of the "chain reaction" implications. My sense is that Florida legislators are using the "Race to the Top" to advance their agenda/cover their butts but I really don't think the intent of that law is to create scenarios like this. I'll keep researching.

Yes, I think Duncan is smart to address this and be clear on what Race to the Top does and does not support/encourage in terms of power moves like this. It is for this very reason that unions sometimes have to be tough and stand up for fairness for teachers (or other professionals.) My experience has been that unions and teachers are very willing to compromise and find common ground and do share the accountability and higher standard goals, but this example and the one in Rhode Island where the Superintendent fired the entire high school staff because test performance was low only serve to demoralize the good teachers and make many wonder why they put in the extra hours and serve on so many committees, etc. when they are met with a slap in the face.

I would have to say that while I support what has gone on with Texas (a biased perspective of course simply because I am a libertarian constitutionalist), its possible that they've gone too far with trying to bring the bias out of education. I think that before this event, we could agree that there definitely was a liberal bias in our schools.

One such comparison that we can draw to this is affirmative action. Is it justified to accept student simply because of their race and thus go to the other extreme. The same is true here. We've had a liberal bias in our textbooks for quite some time, so is it justified to now have a conservative bias? It is surely a controversial issue.

A friend of mine posted something about teacher cuts and lack of teacher appreciation on her Facebook page and this was one guy's response. Ugh! Talk about brainwashed! Losing freedoms? ID cards?

This really worries me than so many take Fox News as the truth. Many people predict that the Dem's may do better in 2010 and Obama will increase his popularity when the economy bounces back, unemployment numbers come down, etc. (which it seems to be on track to do.) But I have to wonder. If Fox News tells people "Unemployment was reported at 8% today, a huge imporvement. BUT there is speculation that Obama is manipulating the employment figures" then boom, he's manipulating the figures. If they say the sky is green, guess what? To Fox viewers, it's green. I almost see us in crisis mode in terms of all these worked up, ignorant people thinking their freedom is gone and hating Obama for things he never did. I hope the White House sees that too and are really working on a plan to combat this "brain mush" movement.