Setting up teachers and students to fail.

From a teacher/reader representing a thousand Duval classrooms:

I am like a chicken with my head cut off, trying to figure out how to arrange a classroom with twenty-five, 8th grade middle schoolers, Level 1 and 2 readers, who must receive 45 minutes of whole group SRA, after which I am to somehow miraculously convert my classroom into a cozy "group" setting for the 20 to 30 minutes of " differentiated group instruction," making sure that no separate group disturbs the other, while I am sitting (yes, now we are directed to SIT) with my small group ( of 9-10, that the district says must be no greater than 6). After which my room again be magically converted to the "whole group" format for the next class, to be done for two more classes. All of this while coordinating daily with the reading teacher, having no SRA books, being told to apply the concepts of the required  novel to 5-6 other novels approved by the district that are too hard, too boring, and have nothing to do with the theme. 

Needless to say, I am sick of my admin and the district minimizing our challenges. I want someone to model it for me using my 7th period, over-age, 10 ese, and many 504 plan kids because I have spent an entire weekend trying and just cannot find a workable solution. Did I mention that our AP has started Informal Observations under these preposterous conditions? Maybe I can get fired! 

Jason Fischer's grandstanding show where his loyalties lie. Hint it's not with public school kids.

First if you live in Jason Fischer's district you should be completely against vouchers and charter schools. They are both sub-standard, as a group, and bleed resources away from public schools, and yes I know he points to some self-serving studies that say they don't but Vitti and supers throughout the state say they do.

The reason you should be against vouchers and charters is not only does district 7 have some of the best schools in the city but the state itself as well. You should be against anything that might harm them or aren't as good and it is that simple. Well unless you are Fischer.

Does that stop Fischer from promoting vouchers and charter schools? Nope because he is ideology driven, not fact, evidence or even self-interested driven. Even being elected to serve the best interests of his constituents will deter him.

He doesn't care what is best for the families in district 7, he only cares about choice even if the choices are bad ones designed not to benefit children but to hurt public schools and fill the bank accounts of operators.

He has been outraged by a lawsuit against vouchers and attempted to grandstand at the recent school board meeting.

From WJCT

Florida Voices for Choices is the advocacy arm of low-income tax credit scholarship program Step Up for Students. Step Up for Students founder John Kirtley chairs both groups.

The group began rallying against the suit at the Florida Education Association headquarters last week. Duval County was the first of several school board stops throughout the state, said Executive Director Catherine Robinson.

“We all thought this was a good opportunity for some parents to go and voice their support, not only for the program, but for any school board members who might support the program as well,” Robinson said.

The group did receive support from one board member. School Board Member Jason Fischer attempted to add a resolution on the matter to the board agenda, but that motion was rejected by the rest of the board members.

http://news.wjct.org/post/voucher-suit-testing-protested-duval-school-board-meeting

John Kirtley by the way donated to Fischer's campaign and that guy hates public schools I believe because they are staffed by union teachers and has recently threatened to spend his vast wealth to influence school board races all throughout the state. Neither he nor Fischer care about public schools or the states children,

If you aren't yet convinced consider two things. First why aren't Fischer, Kirtley and the rest of the voucher crew fighting to improve public schools? Instead they are fighting to dismantle public schools and filter the children into schools that resist accountability, oh its absolutely necessary for publicly schools but they want to give private schools that take public money a pass.

Next why do the feel they can ignore public school parents and public school supporters so spectacularly. Millions of people have been complaining about a lack of resources, high stakes testing, the school grading system and so much more but they are completely ignored, oh but for the few people that want vouchers they are willing to blow up the whole system and that's because they hate the system

Vouchers are a bad deal and if Fischer cared about the families in 7 he would be fighting against them but hes not and that should tell you all you need to know.

to read more, click the link: http://contextflorida.com/julie-delegal-simple-cure-voucher-school-lawsuits/

What kind of teacher does Jacksonville want in its schools?

By Bradford Hall

When I first learned about the QEA Fund sitting in the auditorium of Andrew Jackson High School, one theme was apparent among teachers in the room: Show me the money! Growing up as a young boy, my teachers would always remind us: "We did not become teachers for the money." Councilwoman Glorious Johnson, who recently presented at a community meeting, informed us that when she became a public school teacher in the 1970s, she earned a less than $10,000-a-year salary and her mother earned even less. It was not the money that motivated them but it was the art of wanting to serve and valuing the development of young people. That is why she and her mother opened their home to children to teach them to read, write and count. Forty years of this has led to doctors, teachers, business professionals, and young people who have grown to become trailblazers. One question I posed to myself after hearing this new discussion surrounding the changing face of public education is: Are educators now motivated by money or are they being pushed in that direction? As we consider the QEA Fund's purpose to expand human capital efforts, I believe this is a very legitimate question. Adding this disclaimer, I want our teachers to have as much opportunity as possible to earn more money but all teachers should have a fair, equitable, and real shot at that opportunity. Investing in people is always a great thing but the district has to take a step back and make sure investing in one group of people does not come at the expense of another group. Here is where Teach For America Jacksonville comes into play. TFA will receive $1.75 million from the QEA Fund. In addition to that, DCPS will also provide TFA another $600k for the next three years. TFA has a significant presence in DTO schools, which is controversial depending on the circle you're standing in at the moment. Foregoing an experienced teacher dedicated to the work for an inexperienced 'might not be here next year' teacher is certainly troubling to me, especially when, concerning secondary schools, the district is positioning these teachers into subject areas that are assessed by the state, which potentially positions these teachers for the $20,000 incentive at a superior rate to non-TFA teachers. You cannot legitimately ask the community to stop classifying teachers as TFA, non-TFA when you have pre-determined what teachers will go where, and you provide one group more development. Back to my question: Are educators now motivated by money? I believe any teacher who took the traditional route to the classroom will tell you money has nothing to do with their choice. However, there are groups who seek to not only change education systems as we know them but these groups seek to change the teaching profession. This 'New Age' teacher has starved for four years of undergrad and now meets TFA recruiters throwing around monetary bonuses; these New Age teachers use that desire for money to lead them to believe they can save the world before going to medical or law school; and sees a great addition to his/her resumé. If you were a recent college grad planning to attend law school or medical school soon, would you pass up an an opportunity to earn over $160,000 in three years? No. 1) Yes. We will always have new teachers entering into the profession but we should ensure that we proportionately distribute those teachers throughout the district. 2) The district must own the teacher recruitment process. We cannot depend on Teach For America because it is not a long-term solution. I know the district has the capacity to build its own recruitment plan to attract quality teachers. The Teacher Residency Program is one example of moving in that direction. 3) The people hired the Board, who in turn hired the Superintendent. While we have talked about QEA, TFA, and whatever acronym one might conceive, we never hired the acronyms. I understand the importance of partnerships but we must be weary about who drives policy. Students are owed loyalty. Parents and taxpayers are owed loyalty. Teachers and principals are owed loyalty. 4) Make the QEA Fund Advisory Board an interactive process by opening the meetings to the public and adding the two School Board members whose schools are impacted. They have a community to answer to. A part of accountability is involvement and communication. Monthly, bi-monthly, quarterly progress reports on these initiatives are also worth it! 5) Stand tall against the education overhaul and do what is right for students no matter what!

Duval's constant churn and burn is holding us back! That is why Duval schools never make progress from one year to the next.

By Greg Sampson

It is perhaps unfortunate that instructional reviews began in Duval County after J.K. Rowling published Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix. We Potterphiles laughed and raged at the antics of Dolores Umbridge as she tore into the faculty of Hogwarts, but then, in a case of life imitating art, several years later instructional reviews began in our schools.

And yes, often it seemed that the spirit of Dolores channeled through the reviewers as they tore schools and the people who work there to shreds.

I won’t quickly forget last year when Fred Heid, then the Chief of Schools, told us that we should really believe that he and his reviewers were on our side, after all, “our contracts are full of bonuses based on student performance, so if your school doesn’t do well [on FCAT tests], it costs us money.”

This year we have a new approach. Of course, this is Duval County we’re talking about, every year we have a new approach. Has it ever occurred to any of the powers-that-be that when you constantly return to the starting line, when you reinvent everything every year, you always start from zero, and that is why Duval schools never make progress from one year to the next? We always start over in August.

The IR (as I will now abbreviate the review) has changed to be student centered. It is not about what the adults are doing; it is supposed to be about what the students are doing and whether they are actually learning. Also, if we think they are learning, how do we know? What data can we cite to prove it?

Furthermore, we are told in preparation that the IR is not a “gotcha.” But they say that every year. Last year, the IR team returned to schools quickly to see if they started doing what they were told to do. The lack of confidence that implied was appalling. It was very much a “gotcha.”

The IR agenda has changed. We don’t start with a presentation by school staff that the District reviewers mostly ignore, preferring to spend their time on their phones texting or on their laptops checking e-mail. (I’m not making this up. That is what they used to do. After forcing school personnel to prepare a presentation, they would ignore the people during the presentation.)

The preliminaries consist of a meeting whereby the District staff will ask questions of the school leadership (administrators, deans, academic coaches) to explain the students’ performance, what worked and what didn’t, and what strategies they will use to move the school to a higher level of achievement.

Then, teams of district and school personnel will visit classrooms for two and a half hours. That is consistent with the past. Afterward, the IR teams meet, discuss their observations, and come up with an Action Plan for the school. The change this year is that the school should not receive a twenty page plan with a plentitude of demanded actions, but the IR team will focus on three to five objectives the school should move on immediately.

The final meeting is between the IR team and school personnel. The objectives are agreed upon and the IR is over.

I will report next week how well the actual visit meets this ideal. They will be at my school Monday, September 8.

I’m somewhat frustrated at this point, though, with the preparations. I am the academic coach for mathematics and I am told that 80% or more of my time should be spent in classrooms working with teachers. But what have I been doing this week?

I spent one whole day in a meeting preparing the powerpoint non-presentation for the review. Today, I spent hours, along with others, setting up the room where the IR team will meet. I moved heavy boxes, straining my back, rather than visiting classrooms and assisting teachers. I am told what to do but they don’t let me do it!

I have had to stay late—two or more hours beyond the contract time—for preparations. (Two out of four workdays. I did not stay tonight because I refused to do it.) I am not an administrator and I am not paid like one. I am a teacher on special assignment. Academic coaches get no extra money for the extra responsibilities and hours. Forcing us to work 11 hour days (or more, I went home but others did not) is --- you supply the word.

School leadership is driven crazy. I swear, if I was a principal, I would jerk my phone out of the wall and ignore my email. I’m sorry, my phone is broken, my computer’s acting funky, somebody stole my cell.

Because District people call and email constantly. Principals are bombarded with hundreds of requests in a given day. OK, I’m on a tangent now, but my principal showed me an exchange yesterday where the District person demanded information immediately, she provided what they asked but since the information was odd, she asked to make sure she understood, and got a reply that at this point they didn’t care—they had moved on.

Back to my point. District demands have gotten so ridiculous that we cannot do the job they tell us to do.

We have been told to be transparent during the IR: admit our challenges, what we struggle to do, and where our school really is at. We have been told that District personnel will be equally transparent. They will own the barriers they have placed at the school by failing to give us the support we need. I will report how that actually turned out.

We have been told that school based personnel will not be attacked by District personnel. If that starts to happen, either the Region Chief, excuse me, they get to be called Superintendents now, the Region Superintendent or the Chief of Academic Services will shut it down. I will report how that actually turned out.

I cannot end this post without discussing food. Last year, we were strictly forbidden to provide a continental breakfast or cater lunch. Although my school’s then Region Chief, no names IW, said she wanted coffee, we were off the hook. This year’s instructions did not mention food. So we go by last year, right?

Oh no, we heard today that we should have juice and coffee in the morning, and since the provided agenda gives the IR team no time to break for lunch, we need to cater that.

Big problem. The superintendent has stripped school budgets beyond the breaking point. We don’t have the money for a free lunch. Whatever discretionary funds we can squeeze out, we would rather spend buying students pencils, paper, and notebooks because their parents can’t afford those necessities.

Well, why aren’t we generous? Why shouldn’t the employees chip in to treat the District?

BECAUSE THEY MAKE THREE TO FIVE TIMES THE SALARY THAT WE GET.

If I began to talk about the conflict of interest, the quid pro quo the free lunch would set up, I would need another post. I’m already over 1000 words. So let me make it simple, you out-of-touch Prudential Drive types: the only people to get a free lunch at our school is our students who live in poverty.

Arne Duncan's big bully federal takeover of education

If I am being honest there isn't much I like about Florida's education system. Charters, vouchers, the terrible way they treat their teachers, I could go on. But what I think is just as bad is the federalization of our school system and that's what has happened with Arme Duncan and the USDOE using of No Child Left behind waivers to force their will upon the states.

Don't want to have blame the teacher evaluations (Washington state), there goes your waiver, Don't want Common Core (Oklahoma) there goes you waiver. Think English as a second language speakers should have two years to learn English before their test scores affect schools and teachers evaluations hardly an unreasonable request (Florida) well you can lose your waiver too, or that's what the most unqualified secretary of education in history is threatening to take away.

I am a big government liberal who is generally satisfied with Obama and I think this is a disaster. Should the federal government have a role to play? Yes but these threats and intimidation tactics are wrong no matter how you slice them.

To read more click the links: http://www.tampabay.com/blogs/gradebook/usdoe-unmoved-by-florida-stance-on-english-learners/2196336

An upcoming article in the Vanderbilt Law Review argues that the administration's waiver program is both illegal and a very, very bad precedent. University of South Carolina law professor Derek W. Black has written articles about the intersection of federal power and school law before, but none quite as feisty as "Federalizing Education By Waiver." And folks have questioned the legality of Duncan's waivers all along, but this takes that game to a whole new level.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/peter-greene/law-professor-declares-ar_b_5749406.html

Miami's Superintendent Carvalho's Thoughts on Florida's System of Educational Accountability and Assesment

By Alberto M. Carvalho

It is not lost to anyone these days that when it comes to educational accountability and more specifically, assessment, public opinion is being influenced by a number of factors and entities that, in some cases, merit consideration, understanding, and acceptance, and, in others, outright rejection. First, we need to recognize that assessment, as a legitimate tool of accountability, exists only to inform and improve the teaching and learning process. Its use beyond that most legitimate purpose lends itself to misinterpretation of results, erroneous conclusions, perversion of the system itself, and potential harm to students, teachers, schools, and communities. These potentially unintended consequences are accentuated further when the accountability system itself is not inclusive of factors that intuitively and scientifically influence student and teacher performance.

Florida is currently one of many states facing educational reform debates, seen by some as driven too far by policy and ideology more imbedded in influenced think-tank pronouncements than in common sense and peer-reviewed research-based findings. Like a pendulum swung too far, the bounce back from that intentional push is now being felt with equal vigor and repercussion. In question here is nothing less than the validity, reliability, and even viability of the state's accountability system.The litany of changes in just a few years with irresponsible and uninformed implementation, devoid of consideration for the multi-stacked impact of so many simultaneous modifications, has left the public confused about the true performance of students. Meanwhile, educators at all levels are concerned, doubtful, and skeptical about both policy and its rollout timeline. The recent disconnect between reports of sinking school-grade performance, alongside improved 

student outcomes, has only added to the confusion and the heartbreak; particularly as it is the result of a simplistic view of student achievement amidst implementation of new standards, scale and cut scores, and end-of-course exams, all either introduced or deliberately modified with predictable consequences.

Some, in an expected defensive position, will say that this is a necessary evolution for the sake of educational and economic competitiveness. Others will even suggest that the push back is driven by special interest, or fear of change. To that, I submit that what is in question is not the need for better and more complex standards or assessments better aligned with the needs and demands of the new economic reality. The debate is not reform, but the form and vehicle of this reform, and even the agents behind it. If there ever was a case of the "ends justifying the means," or better, "by all means necessary," one would find it through an honest observation of the educational policy, standards implementation, and assessment decisions made in Florida over the past few years. Simply put, the “What” has trumped the “How” with dramatic and unfortunately, avoidable consequences. 

So, on the eve of the most dramatic shift since the inception of the FCAT or the transition to FCAT 2.0 in terms of standards and assessment, we ought to pause. We need to take time to honestly reassess previous and recent decisions and their consequences and have the courage to proceed on a path that is student- and teacher-centric. A path that can and must be a both and not an either-or proposition, unlike what the for-hire pundits say. A path that excludes politics, influence, ignorance, and extremism.

How shall we proceed then? Abandon accountability and assessment altogether? Well, for starters, you cannot manage what you cannot measure. Without understanding the cruel reality of achievement gaps, which are often rooted in previously existing conditions known as opportunity gaps, we cannot develop strategic and differentiated solutions to reach and teach all children. Respectful accountability is a data tool of truth that enables and empowers appropriate intervention. Simply relying on an "impression" of achievement is not enough as history has taught us. We cannot go back to the days when majority performance, albeit often mediocre, cloaked entire pockets of underperforming students even in higher performing schools or communities. In education, the loudness of a performing majority cannot drown out the plea of the struggling child whose poverty, disability, linguistic proficiency, or societal disconnect create known school readiness deficits. We cannot return to the days of going along to get along, by eliminating the uncomfortable realities of today's debate, by simply deciding to not examine whether children – ALL children – are learning, and to what level, as a result of our efforts. Do we as parents, not weigh and measure our children as we proudly and lovingly monitor their physical development? Equally, we have a moral responsibility to respectfully and reasonably do the same from an educational perspective to ensure their cognitive development. 

Once again, the issue here is not one of accountability and assessment "all or none." It is one of how, by whom, how often, at what expense, and most importantly, toward what end? We need to recognize that we are not going to assess our way to excellence, but failing to assess altogether is guaranteeing we will never get there. I choose to look at the ongoing debate surrounding this issue as, by and large, healthy and revealing of greater awareness and engagement. We cannot, however, allow the silence of a common sense majority to be hijacked by disconnected and often misinformed or politically influenced voices of dissension.

Nor can we expect that someone other than those who care for and understand the true democratic value of public education will step up and legitimately provide the needed fixes. Maybe the first thing we need to do is recognize that the true regression to reason will not be easy or swift. To devise the right and respectful accountability model that serves our children and teachers well, we must dedicate more time than we have previously before this school year's accountability demands are applied. A prudent course of action relies on following a number of reasonable and sequential steps.

First, we must reassess the impact that an inflexible and flawed federal educational policy is having on our state and nation. Policy that demands, among many other requirements, equal application of egregious consequences on fragile student populations from the English-language learners, who are assessed well before they are able to decode in English, to children with disabilities regardless of severity of the disability itself. To that end, we support the Governor’s and the Commissioner’s efforts to have the ESEA waiver appealed by allowing additional flexibility in regards to these learners. We need to debate the cost/benefit analysis of Florida's much celebrated and recently maligned No Child Left Behind waiver, which is seen by many as having exchanged unreasonable federal policy for arbitrary state rules.

Second, statutory timelines for accountability implementation must be adjusted, not in alignment with arbitrary assessment mandates, but with the readiness/awareness level of standards with educators, parents and communities. In light of what is being decried as a rush to roll out new assessments to comply with statutorily mandated accountability timelines, an additional year of standards implementation should be granted. This will enable sufficient community awareness and understanding as well as optimal statewide professional development of teachers and leaders. 

Third, the state must ensure that as it constructs a new assessment, the private entity contracted to develop it has the experience in educational assessment to do so. The state also must demand that all statistical requirements of validity and reliability, inclusive of field-testing sample questions and the whole exam, be performed in Florida with Florida’s students – not in non-demographically representative states with homogeneous populations dissimilar from our own. The current field-testing done in Utah does not pass the proverbial smell test sensibility, as item bias determination will never be believable. It would make sense, also, to review all statutorily mandated accountability rules that directly or indirectly result in required assessments. Over-assessment is a reality that the state must own and address. Instructional time is too precious to spend it assessing students on duplicative measures. Additionally, assessment of students should serve the strict purpose of informing instruction, not to simply provide a variable into a teacher’s performance evaluation formula, as is the case of the new state-mandated, district-designed end-of-course exams in grades K-12.

Fourth, the state must abandon its plan to use baseline assessment data (data generated by first-ever administration of an exam) as a means of generating school grades. The reason is simple; accountability in Florida relies on an analysis of both performance as well as improvement over time, otherwise known as learning gains. The measure of performance over time demands comparable data preceding the year in question. That will be impossible in 2014-2015 without statistical perversions as baseline assessment data, which by definition, cannot legitimately be compared to previous performance data. Simply put, indefensible or baseless grades are worse than no grade at all. One alternative for this transitional year could be reporting school performance through an objective report card that informs communities of all relevant educational indicators, without having to assign an unreliable school letter grade. Next, the state must not only sustain its earlier and rightful decision of suspending accountability consequences during this transitional year, but also expand it to a second year. The wisdom that justifies this decision, which is rooted in not advancing with consequences during a year of change and inconclusive results, stands as the basis for the previous recommendation. How can results that are potentially inconclusive and not trusted to drive consequences be trusted to produce school grades with all the implications they are known to carry from something as subjective as school prestige to school recognition funding? 

Lastly, the reasonableness of tying inconclusive and statistically unreliable achievement data to teacher evaluation and performance-pay scales based on learning gains or Value-Added Models, when those very same gains that are indispensable to the model are non-existent, is questionable at best, unethical at worst.

Ultimately, what is at stake here is not only the strength and trustworthiness of our state's accountability system, but the system itself. It should be evident that a rush to protect legacy or policy status quo could prove to be not only disingenuous but also potentially disastrous. Simply getting it done cannot be a cheap, expedited substitute for getting it done right. There is a high moral imperative at play here, which if not addressed and reasonably responded to, will define not only who we are, but also what we value, how we tackle challenges when we know better, and how we value our children and those who teach them. Oh yes, and as we, the adults, consider, debate, disagree, argue, and unfortunately sometimes disrespect each otherin this process, we should not ignore the fact that our children are observing us and, as smart as they are, they are learning…or being confused by our confusing ways.

Jason Fischer's appalling voucher defense.

I am appalled, a school board member coming out in favor of vouchers but since Jason Fischer has long advocated for charter schools and even taken money from them I shouldn’t be surprised.

Let me just say, the problem isn’t choice; the problem is the terrible choices that Florida wants to substitute for public schools. Voucher schools and proponents resist accountability. Voucher school proponents say high stakes testing is paramount to evaluate schools and teachers alike, and they say we need STEM and common core for our kids to be competitive but for all those things they give voucher schools a pass.

Let’s forget that vouchers since most go to religious schools obliterate the first amendment but lets think about their cost. Fischer apparently disagrees with the superintendent who has often lamented the loss of resources but since businesses get a tax credit that means Florida’s treasury suffers as well, money that has to be made up by Florida’s citizens.

He then mentions that the Florida school board association, the teacher unions and other organizations trying to kill the program appall him. The other organizations by the way are the NAACP, the League of Women Voters and the PTA among numerous other grassroots organizations. The members of those organizations are appalled too, appalled by vouchers taking away resources and resisting accountability. Appalled by high stakes testing and common core. Appalled by the lack of resources that schools have, but Fischer thinks it is okay to ignore them and their concerns. Why isn’t he speaking for them? Don’t they matter? Or is it because the wealthy republicans that champion vouchers don’t champion them.

Then we should all be appalled how he is trying to obfuscate the facts. In the coming years vouchers won’t be just for kids below poverty but for families making as much as 62,000 dollars and the value of the scholarship will continue to rise. The tests they have been required to take don’t compare to the tests given in public schools. Then unlike Fischer who was just regurgitating every other pro voucher piece out there I have actually talked to the states voucher expert David Figilo and he said there were some great voucher schools but some really bad ones too but instead of weeding but the bad ones and making sure all are high quality, Fischer wants to keep the program expanding.  

Fischer sums up the problem as one of turfism but what it really involves is privatization. Jason Fischer and his voucher friends want to privatize our schools to replace them with charter schools and private schools that take vouchers that despite distinct advantages, being able to pick who they take and keep, under perform when compared to public schools and I can prove it too. 

If Fischer and his ilk truly cared about children they would be fighting to improve public education for all of our children, not trying to outsource their futures to generally substandard options. They would be fighting to make sure our schools had adequate resources, that teachers were well treated and we had proper programs and leadership in place or the exact opposite of what is now occurring.

I mentioned leadership last above because district 7 deserves an education leader who loves and wants to improve public education, not one that wants to replace it.  

The silence of voucher supporters is deafening.

The same groups that support vouchers have remained amazingly quiet while Florida starved its pubic schools of resources, blamed teachers and demonized their representatives and decided it was wise to depend on high stakes testing for just about decision made.  Everything was fine until groups like the League of Women Voters, the NAACP, the PTA and the Florida school board association, hardly kid unfriendly organizations, finally had enough and said no, filing a lawsuit. Since then the people who support vouchers have ratcheted up the hyperbole to new heights

I find it amazing though how they had to twist themselves into knots to do so. These are the same people who often point to the disintegration of the family as a reason we have so many problems, but then say, families know what’s best for their children. Who scream about school accountability and how it is so important teachers and schools are evaluated using high stakes tests and say our kids need common core and STEM to compete internationally. They want all these things for public schools but at the same time want private schools that except vouchers to be exempt. 

We should all support the lawsuit filed by the Florida School Board questioning the validity of Florida’s voucher program which by the way torpedoes the first amendment because society should not be paying for some families’ irrational fear of Gov’Ment schools, hatred of unions or if they want their child to have a religious education. We should not let those people who hate public schools and want to privatize them win. Instead we should be striving to improve our public schools and if people who oppose the lawsuit really cared that is what they would be fighting to do as well.

What has Corey Booker done for Education? Or hey Corey, mind your own %^&ing business.

What has Corey Booker done for Education? Or hey Corey, mind your own %^&ing business.

I get it, he buys his staff hot pockets, he helps old ladies shovel snow and he gives good face time on the Sunday Morning talk shows but if we are being honest what has he done for education.

With great fanfare he took a hundred million dollars form the founder of Facebook and then nothing happened. People were so fed up of the way things were going they went against the status quo candidate and elected somebody who cares about and wants to fix their schools when he left.

Since this is the case I find it incredulous that he thought to weigh in on a lawsuit filed in Florida by the PTA, the NAACP, the State School Board Association and the League of Women voters, you know all those child hating organizations, when they said no more to the states voucher program.

From Booker's Twitter Feed: FL Senate Ed Chair declines school board award after they sue to throw 70,000 poor kids out of schools #dropthesuit http://goo.gl/FXOiXA 

FL school boards asks court 2 end scholarships, remove 70,000 poor kids from schools chosen by parents #dropthesuit http://goo.gl/yzjveY 

He joined Bobby Jindal and numerous other anti-public education republicans in questioning the suit.

Not only does the states Voucher program obliterate the first amendment but it takes hundreds of millions out of our schools and even more out of the states general fund and filters kids into schools that resist accountability, like I resist Ebola. They are a bad deal all around

Where are Booker’s tweets about common core and how it doesn’t address poverty, the shoddy treatment of Florida’s teachers, the hundreds of charter schools that have opened taken public money and closed leaving families and communities in a lurch in Florida and the cognitive dissonance that voucher supporters have? They say our public schools must have common core, STEM, high stakes testing, and evaluations based on tests while private schools that take vouchers are exempt.

Well Corey, where are they?

Nowhere, so Corey unles you are going to get a clue, why don’t you shut the &^%$ up and worry about New Jersey, last I saw you had plenty of problems there. 

Does anybody really believe Gary Chartrand wants to help kids?

Gary Chartrand is the guy who went from running grocery stores to running our schools as the Chair of the State Board of Education, using donations, instead of knowledge and experience to get the position.

He has made my blog a lot recently, supporting candidates who aren’t above misleading people and donating to a PAC that straight up lies.  

Well today’s installment of, Mr. Chartrand please climb back into your hole, you are hurting kids, involves his reaction to a lawsuit filed by the the State School Board Association, FEA, the PTA, the NAACP and the League of Women Voters, the most vile of children hating groups around (sic) according to his rhetoric anyways, that wants to stop Florida’s voucher program.

“I believe in choice and in freedom especially for those children that have limited mobility and limited financial resources. The Florida tax credit scholarships provide this freedom for our most underserved population to choose a school that best serves their needs.  The FSBA “is acting without consideration for this population by filing a law suit against this program. This is surprising and disheartening, and I call on them to rethink their position and withdraw the lawsuit.” –

http://www.redefinedonline.org/#sthash.oTOIuE0Q.dpuf

This from the millionaire who sent his children to exclusive prep schools unlike the schools that he wants to filter Florida’s poorest children into. Now I fully admit there are some great private schools that take vouchers but you must fully admit some are operated out of abandoned strip malls where their teachers with their AA degrees teach creationism as science and everything in between.

The thing is Chartrand doesn’t care because they aren’t public schools staffed by union employees and in his mind that makes them better.

If he really cared about kids then instead of trying to privatize public education he would be striving to improve it but he’s not and that should tell you all you need to know.

Mr. Chartrand it’s time to go away.