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By placing a Teach for America hobbyist on the state board of education, Rick Scott thumbed his nose at all the hard working men and women who sacrifice so much for the state’s children. Teach for America in case you have been living under a rock takes non education majors, puts them through a five week access course and then puts them in our neediest classrooms or the exact opposite of what people call best practices.     In case you were wavering because of the pennies he recently threw the states teachers please also remember that under his watch the state stole 3 percent of teacher’s pay to balance the books, and a draconian and nonsensical teacher evaluation system was enacted.   This also continues the state's policy of not putting educators or experienced applicants in charge of education and then we wonder why we are in trouble. Shameful.

Sorry I just threw up in my mouth a little bit. Oh where was I, oh yeah, Rick Scott appoints 32 year old TFA alumnus Rebecca Fishman Lipsey to the state board of education. Sorry I think I need to throw up again. First there wasn’t one teacher in the whole state qualified? How about a native of Florida or somebody who has been here longer than 5 years as Mrs. Fishman Lipsey arrived, to work for TFA, in Miami Dade from New York, just in 2008. “With an exceptional career in education, Rebecca is committed to student success and accountability, and it is clear she will be a tremendous advocate for all Florida students," Scott wrote in a statement. http://miamiherald.typepad.com/nakedpolitics/2013/09/rebecca-fishman-lipsey-named-to-state-education-board.html#storylink=cpy Um career? She spent two years in a classroom and what 7 or 8 years tops in education, though I hesitate to use Teach for America and education in the same sentence? Heck in some districts that lack of experience wou

The battle to regain control of public education from corporate interests took a turn for the worse as several supposed friends attacked public education. First is director M. Night Shyamalan who penned the book: I got schooled, 5 Keys to Unlocking Quality Education. I can’t compete with the excellent Edshyster who has already written about it but I feel comfortable saying shouldn’t he be more concerned with 5 keys to quality filmmaking? Come on friends, we can all agree the Sixth Sense was great but what has he done since then? Even Signs and Invincible are now found lacking now as we realize we were still caught up in the Sixth Sense after glow. http://edushyster.com/?p=3269 MSNBC however must have thought his book was groundbreaking as they invited him to speak at Education Nation with all the teachers, err a couple teachers, what no teachers have been invited?!? Seriously WTF it’s called education nation, not how to profit off of education, nation. That’s right friends the Educatio

Rich and powerful policy makers often attack smaller classes as a waste of resources despite the fact no teacher ever said, I wish my class had 10 more kids because that would make me a better teacher. Jeb Bush has often attacked the class size amendment in Florida which was a citizen driven initiative that passed in 2002 and withstood a recall in 2010. He routinely attacks the class size amendment despite the fact he sent his children to the exclusive prep schools Bolles and Gulliver Prep who use their small class sizes as a selling point. Gary Chartrand the chair of the state board of education has also attacked the class size amendment. He recently said in multiple papers, “In my opinion we are wasting money to the tune of half-a-billion dollars a year, limiting the number of students in a class doesn’t help kids achieve but rather is just “wasteful spending,” he said. Ironically enough Mr. Chartrand also sent his children to the Bolles schools and his protégé, Duval County school b

The same Jeb Bush whose family, friends and supporters have benefitted financially from his so called education reforms may have some explaining to do about his business dealings with Miami businessman Claudio Osorio who was sentenced to 12 years in prison the other day. Apparently Jeb served on the board of a company that Osorio used to bilk investors. From the Miami Herald: Innovida had a manufacturing facility in North Miami-Dade, and prominent board members including former Gov. Jeb Bush and Miami condo king Jorge Perez, the company never gained traction. Osorio was convicted of using Innovida, which claimed to produce high-tech building panels, to deceive investors and line his pockets. Osorio, represented by attorney Humberto Dominguez, pleaded guilty before U.S. District Judge William Dimitrouleas in Fort Lauderdale federal court in February. As part of his plea, the U.S. attorney’s office agreed to drop 19 other charges. http://www.miamiherald.com/2013/09/17/3632865_p2/miami-bu

The administration of federal student aid is a highly complex and bureaucratic job thanks to a great deal of program complexity and regulation. Financial aid offices are often overwhelmed with the tasks involved in that administrative process, with staff finding that little time for anything else remains at the end of the day. Unfortunately, simply following the rules and norms associated with financial aid administration is demonstrably insufficient when it comes to meeting the needs of today's students.  With a far greater number of students entering higher education without the support of college-educated parents, and facing more significant financial constraints (and higher college costs), an effective financial aid office must do more than distribute financial aid and apply rules and regulations.  To ensure that the aid dollars are spent in a cost-effective manner, aid offices must also be part of a cross-campus effort focused on student retention . Everyone who works on the c

While watching the annual Gates Postsecondary Education Convening from afar via twitter, I am struck by the apparent absence of discussion about several core underlying issues keeping more students from succeeding in earning college degrees. We cannot increase the success of undergraduates from disadvantaged backgrounds without ensuring that they are safe, healthy, and ready to learn. Food insecurity is a growing problem in higher education, as revealed by institutional surveys, and hopefully soon tracked by national data (I'm working on it). Idea #1:  Institute a free/reduced price breakfast and lunch program at all public colleges and universities where at least 1 in 3 students receives a Pell Grant.  Far too many of today's faculty are ill-equipped to teach the students of tomorrow.  The focus on research has trumped the emphasis on high-quality teaching even at institutions with no research mission. Idea #2: Make teaching a priority in public higher education.  a. Require t

Let’s go over a few of Jeb Bush’s biggest hits. Poor kids should have vouchers to go to private schools, just not the private schools his children went to. Educating children should be like shopping for milk. Florida’s state colleges of education should be blown up, Taliban style. Okay I added those last two words. The class size amendment is a failure and who cares if its initiation corresponds with the modest improvements in Florida schools. Experience and education for teachers doesn’t matter, that’s right education doesn’t matter in education. We need to rescue education from the tyranny of unions. You know those all powerful unions assuring teacher’s opulent lifestyles. We need to be student centered. Um, I don’t know any student who wanted to be tested to death, put in a one track fits all curriculum and not be able to go to any classes they might actually enjoy. You know what happened in Florida because of him.   His latest man crush is for common core. Now I have some problems

Accountability, accountability, accountability it is one of the words that education reformers scream to the high heavens. The thing is they are talking about accountability for teachers and public schools not about them. Instead they want you to ignore the man behind the curtain. Look at charter schools, in Ohio and Florida and all around the country which have become cash cows for hedge fund managers and supporters of the republican party, then there is vouchers in Louisiana and Florida that send children to schools that teach intelligent design or that have teachers without degrees, and what about all the odious teacher evaluation bills that use the value added formulas that can be wildly inaccurate or have teachers evaluated based on students who they never even taught, yeah that one was Florida too.   Then don’t get me started about Teach for America which does the exact opposite of what we know to be best practices and assures our most vulnerable classrooms will have an ever revo

Here is a hint; it’s not students, parents, teachers, or even Rick Scott and the Florida legislature. Nope it answers to a higher Power, dramatic pause, Jeb Bush.   Kathleen Shanahan, Jeb Bush’s former chief of staff asked incoming commissioner Pam Stewart who she reported to.   From the Palm beach Post:   Kathleen Shanahan, another state board member who also once worked for Bush, wanted assurances that Stewart "understands with full clarity who she reports to." http://www.theledger.com/article/20130917/NEWS/130919156/1005/NEWS02?p=2&tc=pg Stewart acknowledged that she did know. Jeb Bush, love him or hate him, and I am in the latter camp, is still incredibly influential in Florida’s education system and it’s him the board and commissioner answer to.  

The headline in the Times Union was, First Coast educators elated Stewart is new state commissioner. Two superintendents, Vitti from Jacksonville and Joyner from St. Johns were quoted saying nice things about her too. Unfortunately for the Times Union they don’t speak for the majority of educators in Northeast Florida. Why would we want more of the same leadership that has done its best to tear the teaching profession down and who answers solely to Jeb “I think all of the colleges of education should be blown up, larger classes are fine, teachers don’t need job protections and advanced degrees don’t matter, I put my children in exclusive prep schools with well rounded curriculums and small classes where they weren’t tested to death, the opposite of what I want for your kids” Bush. No we are not elated. We are disappointed and sadly we are used to it.   Read more at Jacksonville.com: http://jacksonville.com/news/metro/2013-09-17/story/first-coast-educators-elated-stewart-new-state-commi

From a reader: "Know your enemy" He went to the charter school conference to see the enemy of the institution he represents. He wanted to hear their argument, and see their plans while meeting the elected officials who receive large sums of campaign capital from these organizations. I believe he knows he is, Charter Money could quash his hire as Superintendent. So he played his cards low until the summer. Then the first move was increasing student responsibility with the end of Grade Recovery as we knew it. He eliminated the use of the Virtual School as a means of grade recovery. He knew the lack of controls which could verify hat students taking the exams were in fact those students taking the course and that the student received no assistance while taking the exams. He began to move more resources toward elementary schools, not in so much in academics rather in Art Music and P.E. He cut costs by eliminating administrate positions, and ended or greatly curtailed the expendit

Today in the Times Union superintendent Vitti talked about bring kids back form charter schools to public schools. Now this is the Vitit I have been waiting for and is drastically different from the one who went to an attract charter schools symposium a few months back. http://jaxkidsmatter.blogspot.com/2013/06/superintendent-vitti-uses-district.html I think he has a laudable and achievable goal. He is off to a fast start too what with the return of the arts and discipline to our schools but that’s just a start. I think the next step is just to inform the public how charter schools are doing when compared to their public school counterparts and where there are a few good ones for the most part they don’t perform as well as their public school neighbors. That’s a message that the district needs to beat like a drum.     But what chutzpah our super has, he’s either talking out of both sides of his mouth see paragraph one or he’s saying charter schools are both inferior and not public sch