Note to Cami: 100 excellent ways to create 100 excellent schools

UPDATE:

As promised, I bring you more ways to create excellent schools. Still looking for more, so add your suggestions in the comments and I'll update in a few days. Thanks to all who sent in suggestions. Keep 'em coming.

1. Melissa T: Realize that schools need to play a vital role in the community as a provider and supporter of wrap around services. Schools are supposed to involve and support the communities, not alienate them.
2. Patti Grunther: Do NOT hire administrative staff that is unnecessary (e.g. assistant superintendents in a school district where many schools are in disrepair or without basic supplies??) at high salaries, give them enormous raises and then lay off teachers due to a deficit you yourself created.
3. Jeff Grossman: Limit classroom size.  Study after study has shown that this is a proven method for improving student performance.
4. Jeff Grossman: Have a safety net in place to help students who fall below grade level.  Having children reading several years below their grade level for example is unacceptable, when a child falls below grade level, treat it like a crisis.  Have a robust remediation staff in place and do whatever is required to ensure that students receive services in a timely manner.
5. Jeff Grossman: Create an environment of collaboration. For example, assign mentor teachers to work with novices.  Create teacher cohorts and are give ample common planning time. Ensure that all teachers take part in a peer evaluation system and have an opportunity to observe, and learn from other teachers that are teaching the same grade and/or subject as they are.
6. Treat English language learners as an asset, not a liability. They are doing something you probably never succeeded at: becoming bilingual.
7. Tamar Wyschogrod: Poverty alleviation creates excellent schools. Affordable housing creates excellent schools. After school programs create excellent schools. Jobs for parents create excellent schools. Health care creates excellent schools. Safe streets create excellent schools. Good nutrition creates excellent schools. Racial and socioeconomic integration create excellent schools. Oh, and reducing class sizes. That's a good start.
8. Create a community of support and shared ideas between schools. Start by visiting this very excellent school and see how a caring principal and staff work together with parents and administrators to make a safe, fun, engaging learning environment for all the students.
9. Stop, collaborate and listen. As the great philosopher, Vanilla Ice, once said. But seriously. Do that. It's pretty solid advice.

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Jersey Jazzman delivered yet another blistering critique of Cami Anderson's disastrous One Newark plan calling it "illogical, innumerate, secretive, and ill-conceived". Sir Duke once again fills his post with charts, graphs, data, links to studies—you know, actual proof—that this will probably go down as the biggest public policy boondoggle in NJ history. He pointed out that Cami likes to blame the backlash on the 'political season'. (Hmmm... sorta like Christmas? Is there a Black Friday where I get coupons for showing up early and complaining louder and longer?) Then ends with a link to a Bob Braun post which calls out many players on the opposite side of the issue for not taking more aggressive action sooner:

It is now June and no organization—not the Newark Teachers Union,  not the New Jersey Education Association, not the Education Law Center, not the American Civil Liberties Union, no one—has taken aggressive court action to seek a temporary restraining order to stop this flawed plan that will cause real and irreparable damage to children in the city. Soon, within a matter of days, it will be too late to do anything.  And Anderson, despite the optimistic hopes of some in the city, now has repeatedly said she will not resign and she will continue to bury the city under the weight of her “One Newark” plan. 

Hey, guys—get real:  Cami is gaming you and you don’t even know it. Despite what The Star-Ledger editorial board says about her, she is not politically naïve nor tone-deaf.  She knows precisely what she is doing and she is winning.

Read Bob's entire post. He raises some excellent points. Stealing from JJ here, One Newark has all the makings of...

Hat tip to Jersey Jazzman

While the parents and students of Newark are fighting the good fight, they can't do it alone. It's time the major players in this fight started making some real noise. 

In the meantime, I thought I'd offer a little advice to the beleaguered superintendent. Unlike Anderson and her 'Broadie Cronies' who have little to no actual teaching experience, I have a masters in teaching and 13 years experience, so I think I know a thing or two about my profession. The following is a partial list—in no particular order—of 100 ways to create 100 excellent schools. These are the first 20. I will add more as I think of them. Please add yours in the comments section and let's get to 100. 

100 excellent ways to create 100 excellent schools

1. Don't close them. Closing schools disrupts families, destabilizes neighborhoods and makes people very, very angry—especially when their neighborhood school is doing a good job.
2. Define 'poor performance'. Test scores are not the sole arbiter of excellence. Statistics don't tell the whole story of why X-number of students in a particular school are 'not succeeding'. Where are the successes? Do the students feel engaged and excited about learning? Are they happy to be there? Are they putting forth a good effort? Are the parents engaged and supportive? These are all signs that a school is on the right track even if their test scores are low. 
3. Engage parents and community. You can't have excellent schools without them.
4. Get as much money into the classrooms as possible. A teacher can't teach without adequate supplies.
5. Don't fire teachers. Mass firings of teachers erodes morale, arouses suspicion among staff, students and parents, and does not work.
6. Provide meaningful professional development for educators. PD should be research based (that would be vetted research) and address the specific needs and concerns of the student population. 
7. Hire experienced educators to lead schools. Most Broadies have little to no classroom experience. Struggling corporations don't hire teachers to lead and fix them so why should schools hire business people to run them?
8. Invest in infrastructure. Students cannot learn and educators cannot teach in buildings that are unsafe, vermin infested and lack basic sanitary systems. If you build clean, well lit, safe and inviting buildings, drop out rates will drop.
9. Listen to the experts. Hundreds of professional educators around the country—many right here in NJ—have offered research based solutions to what ails schools in high poverty districts.
10. Leave ideology at the door. You may desperately want to implement a reform because you believe it will work, but unless you can back it up with real vetted research, best to leave it out.
11. Listen to teachers. They—not billionaires or business people—are your best source for how to help struggling students.
12. Broaden your definition of 'excellence'. An excellent school does not have every student performing at a proficient level, but it believes every student can get there. There's a difference between believing in children and believing in an unproven ideology. The first one can succeed; the second one is DOA.
13. Build on successes. Set 1 or 2 reasonable goals a year. Too much change too quickly overwhelms, stresses and angers everyone.
14. Slow down. Rome wasn't built in a day. Real education progress takes time. Developmental milestones happen for a reason. They can't be rushed or forced. When you push too hard against children, they push back, and that ain't pretty—or fair.
15. Build a working relationship with your teachers association. Signing a contract then trying to renege on it builds distrust and animosity. Unions did not cause the issues many students in Newark face, but unions have many good solutions for helping students succeed. We've been doing it all across New Jersey for decades.
16. Communicate, communicate, communicate with staff, parents and the community. You simply must attend BOE meetings and listen to everyone whether you agree with them or not.
17. Be compassionate even with those who disagree with you. Education is a nurturing environment. If you don't bring a healthy dose of compassion with you every day, you're in the wrong profession.
18. Listen to students. It's their education, not yours. When students feel connected and valued they will engage in their learning. Right now they're not happy.
19. Don't believe in miracles. Yes, I did just say that. Miracles don't happen every day, that's why they are miraculous. Quick education miracles only happen on TV. The Texas and DC 'miracles' have both been debunked.
20. Every school should accept and retain every child who walks through its doors. Charter cheerleaders love to say that their schools are public schools. That's a myth. Unless a child does something truly horrendous, a public school can't expel them. The attrition rates among Newark's charter schools are unacceptable. Charters must be held to the same standards as public schools. Anything less in a public school system is discriminatory. 

Readers... I'm looking for 80 more suggestions. Leave yours in the comments below and I'll update this in chunks of 5 or 10.

My open letter to Gov. Christie

In the spirit of fellow educator, and journalist, Melissa Harris Perry, I bring you my version of her open letters to leaders:

Dear Governor Christie,

It's me, Marie. I heard you recently gave your staff huge raises. That's fantastic! I'm sure they worked very hard to help get you re-elected, and are very deserving. And now that they are back on the public payroll, you can reward them on the taxpayers' dime. Just curious... who did their job when they were on hiatus, and how much were they paid?

Believe me, I completely agree with you that, "People who take on more responsibility deserve more pay." With the new evaluation system and standardized testing regime now in place, educators across the state are completely overwhelmed with all the additional work but, unlike your staff, our take home pay is shrinking. 

I even congratulate you for actually shrinking your overall payroll because after all, why should taxpayers pay exorbitant salaries of—as you call some of us—"greedy" and "selfish" public employees (even though what you said in this video is factually wrong in so many ways)? But here's my problem: you did an excellent job of laying off tens of thousands of tax payers—educators, police officers, firefighters, first responders, office workers and others—who help keep the state running, all in the name of 'shared sacrifice', but I'm having a wee bit of difficulty understanding why your staff got such huge raises. I mean, while tens of thousands of taxpayers are seeing their take home pay shrink and their workload dramatically increase, six of your staff got raises over 40%, one of whom got a 50% raise! How is that 'shared sacrifice'? How could you excoriate public employees for their alleged largess when your staff is getting the biggest raises of any state workers—by a huge margin? And at least for public educators, the average salary increase for contracts settled since January 2011 is less than 2.2%.


Are you starting to see how some people have a problem with this?

So, while you're busy giving huge tax breaks to big corporations to lure their business to New Jersey because it's such a great place to live and work, remember that part of the reason is that tax-paying public employees make it that way. 

Oh, and next time you point your finger at someone, remember there are always three pointing back at you.

Love,
Marie

Rigor: The death of public education (no really)

Wish I could take credit for this bit of Photoshop

What's worse than education 'reform'? Educators who drink the reformy Kool-Aid.

As a product of 12 years of Catholic education in New Jersey the 60s and 70s I learned a thing or two about the roots of the English language. While I didn't have any art, music, science, PE or health classes until high school, I learned a great deal about phonics and diagramming sentences, and just enough about Latin to allow me to pass in freshman year.

I didn't want to take Latin, but Principal Sr. Anne Williams, told me that since I was smart enough to take French, I was smart enough to take Latin, too. Wait... what?!?! I didn't sign up for two languages! I signed up for French l and Intro to Physical Science, the basic freshman science class. I did not want to take Latin! I needed that science class! I didn't care that my sister—God bless her— was president of the Latin Club for four years; I was not looking to be a legacy! And besides, what kind of cockamamie logic says that a person is any smarter because of the language they choose to study? But that was a time when educators were respected. One did not argue with teachers or principals even if they were wrong, especially habit-wearing ones with a man's name. I guess enrollment numbers in Latin class were down and they needed to keep Sr. James Eileen busy.

Latin is a clumsy language. It doesn't roll off the tongue like Spanish, French or Italian. Because I was forced to take it, I hated it. I dug my heels in and did just enough to pass the class. I was not going to put one extra ounce of effort into something I didn't want to study. And I did not want to sing the Latin Declension Song! 

Ohhhhhh... are we having a 'Slowly I turned/Niagara Falls' moment? Yeeees... you remember the Declension song, don't you? That snappy little ditty invented to help Latin learners remember verb tenses and such. Are your eyes glazing over? On a whim I Googled it and found not only the lyrics, but a link to a You Tube video! Cue the fanfare! Here is The Latin Declension Song in all its glory!



This is a terrible rendition. A classroom full of 15 year-old girls sang it much more fluidly and melodically. But the author of the blog goes on to write a touching post about his Latin teacher, Sr. Anna Roberts:

How extraordinary that a quarter of a century after my last Latin class with Sister Anna I reflect not on how excruciating the study of an ancient tongue could be, but on how exciting; not on how pointless, but on how many times a week I still point to things I learned from her; not on the deadness of the language, but on the magnificence of the life that one amazing teacher could breathe into it. 

What a difference a great teacher can make! Maybe if she taught me Latin, I'd have taken more of an interest. Aside from most of the lyrics and Sr. James Eileen's very sledge hammer-like pronunciations, I don't remember much else. But the one thing I did learn was how to decode many words in many languages, a skill I still use and value to this day. And it did help boost my verbal score on the SAT. So in the end, it wasn't a total waste. Nothing really is if we learn the lesson from it. (I'll save my story about junior year chemistry class for another day.) 

So when ed 'reformers' started spewing 'rigor' as a cure-all for 'failing schools', my Latin radar kicked into high gear. Webster's Dictionary defines the roots of rigor as: 

Middle English rigour, from Anglo-French, from Latin rigor, literally, stiffness, from rigēre to be stiff. First Known Use: 14th century.

The full definition is even worse:

1

a (1) :  harsh inflexibility in opinion, temper, or judgment : severity (2) :  the quality of being unyielding or inflexible : strictness (3) :  severity of life :  austerity

b :  an act or instance of strictness, severity, or cruelty

2

:  a tremor caused by a chill

3

:  a condition that makes life difficult, challenging, or uncomfortable; especially :  extremity of cold

4

:  strict precision :  exactness <logical rigor>

5

a obsolete :  rigidity, stiffness

b :  rigidness or torpor of organs or tissue that prevents response to stimuli

c :  rigor mortis

Rigor mortis is what happens to dead bodies. I do not want my child nor my students exposed to this type of teaching. And I am very concerned when I see well-meaning, career educators with years of experience and boatloads of degrees drinking the Kool-Aid, nodding in agreement about the need to make public education more rigorous when they don't seem to realize it means 'dead'—like my freshman year Latin class and education in China! Education should never be those things. It should involve hard work, but that hard work should be inspiring, challenging and creative like Sr. Anna Roberts' Latin class, not Sr. James Eileen's. School isn't always fun, but we should never make it so dead as to rob children of the joy of learning. If we do, then we need to close up shop and find another profession. We sabotage our profession when we blindly go along instead of stepping out of our comfort zone and fighting back. 

If an educator harms a student and is found guilty, they will lose their job and could go to jail. Yet we are expected to dramatically change the way we teach, to implement methods that have never been proven to work, that could have lasting ill effects on our students' ability to learn because business people have convinced great swaths of the country that we are the problem, that we must be held accountable. And yet, when these reforms fail—and they will—who will be held accountable? 

Would Miss Crabtree do this?

   

I leave you with this quote from Diane Ravitch posted to Facebook by another of my education heroes, Chicago Teachers Union President, Karen Lewis, while I was drafting this post:

Can teachers successfully educate children to think for themselves if teachers are not treated as professionals who think for themselves? 

In honor of retiring educators everywhere

The function of education is to teach one to think intensively and to think critically. Intelligence plus character – that is the goal of true education.

~ Martin Luther King, Jr.

I was a little quiet on Facebook and Twitter the past couple of weeks because I was busy planning and hosting the Hunterdon County Education Association annual retirement dinner, which took place on May 22nd. Retirement dinners are bittersweet because while we celebrate and honor decades of service and professional excellence, we also say goodbye to many years of experience that, given the current education 'reform' climate, may never be replaced.

Children must be taught how to think, not what to think.

~ Margaret Mead

Within the first 6 months of Christie's first term the number of public school employees who filed for retirement almost doubled that of the previous year. While I don't have statistics on the past 4 years, I have personally spoken to many retiring educators who are simply fed up. A special education teacher with whom I had the honor to work for 10 years, who worked miracles with our most challenging children for over 20 years, told me that while she didn't want to retire, she could no longer subject her students to education 'reform'. Another is taking an early retirement, sacrificing part of her pension, because she just can't take it anymore. This is how we 'attract and retain the best teachers'? This is how we make a great public education system better? We make educators' jobs so unbearable that they leave rather than inflict damaging policies on their students?

A teacher is a compass that activates the magnets of curiosity, knowledge and wisdom in pupils.

~ Ever Garrison

For the table decor and program I searched the Internet for quotes about education—not necessarily about teachers because not everyone who works in education is a certified teacher, but all of us who work in schools every day—whether administrative assistant, library clerk, custodian, cafeteria aide, maintenance worker, bus driver or teaching assistant—teach them in some way, shape or form.

If you are planning for a year, sow rice; if you are planning for a decade, plant a tree; if you are planning for a lifetime, educate people.

~ Chinese Proverb

Some of the quotes brought tears to my eyes because of the author's profound understanding of what education, learning and knowledge really are. Their words are diametrically opposed to ed 'reform' speak. Rest assured, Socrates didn't care about 'accountability'; Jean Piaget knew 'churn' was something one only did to make butter; and William Arthur Ward knew the real definition of 'rigor' means 'strictness, severity, rigidity, or harshness, as in dealing with people'—not something one would want in a school. And as for 'transformational change'? Well, I'm sure John Dewey's definition was very different than Bill Gates'.

Education is not preparation for life; education is life itself.

~ John Dewey

This is who we are. This is what we do. Never forget it.

The following is my introduction speech. The quotes I put on the tables and in the program are interspersed throughout this post. Remember them when you are at your wit’s end, when you’re struggling with VAMs or SGOs or SGPs or test prep or evaluations. Print them out and hang them in your classroom, your faculty room, by the copier—heck—on the front door of your school! Mail them to elected officials and board of education members. That other stuff that disrespects students and educators is not why we became educators. This is why:

The secret in education lies in respecting the student.

~ Ralph Waldo Emerson

Here is my speech:

"Good evening everyone and welcome to the Hunterdon County Education Association 2014 Retirement Dinner. Tonight we celebrate a combined total of over 500 years of education excellence in Hunterdon County. Let that number sink in… 500 years. That’s half a millennium of experience we are losing. A little over 500 years ago one of the greatest artists who ever lived, Michelangelo, was at the height of his creativity carving the David, the Pieta and all his other great works. He would look at each block of marble and see the sculpture trapped inside.

In every block of marble I see a statue as plain as though it stood before me, shaped and perfect in attitude and action. I have only to hew away the rough walls that imprison the lovely apparition to reveal it to the other eyes as mine see it.

"I’m sure writer Joseph Addison was thinking of him when he said,

What sculpture is to a block of marble, education is to a human soul.

"Tonight’s honorees, whether an Extra Special Person (ESP) or classroom teacher, are like Michelangelo in that you unlock the work of art that is every child you encounter.

"That ability is a gift. It cannot be manufactured. It can’t be tested or ranked or corporatized. The ability to work with children, to inspire, to motivate, to teach is a calling. It is an art, like any other and yet it is like no other because while Michelangelo created some of the greatest works of art mankind has ever known, we create the future.

I cannot teach anybody anything; I can only make them think.

~ Socrates

"How will the future judge us? 500 years from now, how will America look back on this dark moment in history? Well, if history does indeed repeat itself, then my friends, we are on the brink of another Renaissance. As the Middle Ages gave way to the likes of Michelangelo, da Vinci, Shakespeare, Galileo, Copernicus, Columbus and Magellen, we are on the brink of a resurrection of our profession.

Every child deserves a champion—an adult who will never give up on them, who understands the power of connection and insists that they become the best that they can possibly be.

~ Jean Piaget

"It must happen; it will happen because we will make it happen! The quotes you see on your tables tonight are why. Next to being a parent, education is the second most important job there is. If you Google quotes about venture capitalism or politics or oh, I don’t know—dog groomers—you won’t find any by Socrates, Martin Luther King, Jr. or Albert Einstein because what we do really does change the world!

"So sit back and enjoy the evening. You truly have earned it!

Teaching is more than imparting knowledge; it is inspiring change. Learning is more than absorbing facts; it is acquiring understanding.

~ William Arthur Ward

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The human mind is the greatest example of infinity on this very finite planet. It cannot be confined to box forever; it cannot have an endless stream of stuff shoved into it without a creative output or push-back. Eventually it—we—will break free. We will succeed in ending this ed ‘reform’ madness because it is diametrically opposed to what our profession is all about, and our students will consciously and unconsciously demand an end to it—they already are here in NJ. Teaching is an art, and no one understood that better than one of my heroes—one of the greatest artists and teachers who ever lived:

Logic will get you from A to B. Imagination will take you everywhere.

~ Albert Einstein

Teacher Appreciation Week Followup: The good, the bad and the ugly

Although Teacher Appreciation Week is officially behind us, I did promise you a Part 2 of my NJ BOE post—the testimony. But some other stuff happened after Part 1, and as a mom and teacher with only 5 weeks left of school, there's only so much I can fit into one day. I promise I'll get to it this weekend. 

In the meantime, here's what happened in the past week or so...

The good: Newark has a new mayor: educator Ras J. Baraka! Blogger Mother Crusader reported on the millions spent on independent expenditures by education 'reform' special interest groups and individuals for his opponent, Shavar Jeffries, but all that money couldn't silence the voices of the people who've had just about enough of other people telling them what's good for their children—then not delivering it. Baraka not only understands public education and the challenges inner city school districts face, but he lives, eats, breathes and sleeps it as principal of Central High School. He turned that school around the old fashioned way, through building a dedicated staff, providing meaningful professional development, and investing time and effort in students—not tests! I was honored to be asked to help spread the word about his campaign. I wish him much luck. All education eyes on both sides of the debate, and from all corners of the Garden State (and Wall St. and beyond) will be watching Newark under a microscope to see how he can steer that ship back into the hands of parents and community members and their public schools.

Great news out of Trenton! The Assembly Education Committee unanimously passed the bipartisan bill A3081. According to NJEA:

A-3081 calls for a variety of measures to ensure that any implementation of new standards, testing, and teacher evaluation is carried out thoughtfully. This bill includes:

• An Education Reform Review Task Force to look at how the CCSS are being implemented, use of PARCC assessments, and the implementation and potential effects of the teacher evaluation system. NJEA would be represented on this task force. 

• Student growth percentiles (SGPs) to not be included in the annual summative ratings of teachers for at least two years.

• Giving districts the option to administer the PARCC assessment online or by pencil and paper, or a combination of both during the two-year period after passage of the bill. 

• Stops the New Jersey Department of Education from using the PARCC assessment for student or school accountability purposes for at least two years after passage of the bill. 

So, a bipartisan bill that will allow meaningful input from educators who have been largely left out of the conversation, and will give districts the option of pencil and paper tests for two years because many simply aren't technologically ready, and won't be any time soon with an $800 million state budget gap? Could the tide actually be turning? I don't care who you are, any reasonable, responsible parent in this state doesn't want to see their children tested to death—especially when the tests are set up for them to fail.

Education committee member, Assemblywoman Mila Jasey had this to say: 

This move will give us more time to assess what's going on statewide in terms of implementation and evaluation capabilities. Two major concerns from administrators, teachers and parents alike are all the time being spent preparing for testing and the lack of hardware capacity to conduct both the testing and evaluations. (emphasis mine)

Sponsors of the bill are: Assembly members Mila Jasey, D-Essex; Patrick Diegnan, D-Middlesex; Sheila Oliver, D-Essex; Bonnie Watson Coleman, D-Mercer; Benjie Wimberly, D-Passaic; and Charles Mainor, D-Hudson.

Co-sponsors so far include: Assembly members Chris Brown, R-Atlantic; Ralph Caputo, D-Essex; Angel Fuentes, D-Camden; Gordon Johnson; D-Bergen; Sean Kean, R-Monmouth; Alison Littell McHose, R-Sussex; John McKeon, D-Morris; David Rible, R-Monmouth; Holly Schepisi, R-Bergen; Parker Space, R-Sussex; Linda Stender, D-Union; Shavonda Sumter, D-Passaic; and Cleopatra Tucker, D-Essex.

With this much bipartisan support, how can Gov. Christie, who touts his ability to work across the aisle, not sign it? 

Thank you to everyone who called, wrote or emailed the members of the Assembly Education Committee. They heard our concerns. Feel free to let them know how much you appreciate their efforts. I'd like to personally thank them, too. Here they are:

Assemblyman Patrick Diegnan, Chair  908-757-1677
Assemblywoman Bonnie Watson-Coleman 609-292-0500
Assemblyman Ralph Caputo 973-450-0484
Assemblyman Angel Fuentes  856-547-4800
Assemblywoman Mila Jasey 973-762-1886
Assemblywoman Angelica Jimenez 201-223-4247
Assemblyman David Rible 732-974-0400
Assemblywoman Donna Simon  908-968-3304
Assemblyman Troy Singleton 856-234-2790
Assemblyman Dave Wolfe  732-840-9028

The bad: Social media lit up this week with this story in The New Yorker about the rise and fall of public education and education 'reform' in Newark, including the fact that Mark Zuckerberg's $100 million was largely wasted on more bloated bureaucracy including $1000/day consultants. The money's gone and Cami & Co. have nothing to show for it other than a lot of really angry parents and students.

On September 24, 2010, the team [Zuckerberg, then Mayor Cory Booker and Gov. Chris Christie] described their plan for Newark on “Oprah.” “So, Mr. Zuckerberg,” Oprah asked, “what role are you playing in all of this?” He replied, “I’ve committed to starting the Startup:Education Foundation, whose first project will be a one-hundred-million-dollar challenge grant.” Winfrey interrupted: “One. Hundred. Million. Dollars?” The audience delivered a standing ovation. When Winfrey asked Zuckerberg why he’d chosen Newark, he gestured toward Booker and Christie and said, “Newark is really just because I believe in these guys. . . . We’re setting up a one-hundred-million-dollar challenge grant so that Mayor Booker and Governor Christie can have the flexibility they need to . . . turn Newark into a symbol of educational excellence for the whole nation.” This was the first that Newark parents and teachers had heard about the revolution coming to their schools. (emphasis mine)

We all know how this story ends. Which leads me to...

The ugly: Newark Superintendent Cami Anderson continues to reach new heights of incompetence as her deeply flawed One Newark plan rolls out. Bob Braun wrote an excellent piece describing the destruction, disruption and all out disenfranchisement of Newark's neighborhoods. It's not an easy read. One Newark is nothing short of abuse. Any elected official, starting with Sen. Booker and going right on down through the state legislature to the Newark City Council who is not outraged over this, who does not take immediate action to stop this madness and downright cruel treatment of children does not deserve to represent the people:

Only 63 percent of families were matched with a school somewhere in the top five selected by families. Anderson does not tell us how many received their first or even their second choice. The form parents had to fill out required them to list eight schools in preferential order.

Remember—we are talking about elementary and secondary children here, most of whom attend neighborhood schools. These are not college kids applying to their “reach” and “safety” schools. These are families with young children who do not know—and probably won’t know for months yet—where their kids will go to school. 

Parents and teachers have been sending in reactions. One teacher wrote this about an eighth-grader who was rejected by EVERY school to which he applied—every public high school:

“You can imagine how sad it is when one of my 8th graders tells me that no one wants them in their high school . They have been on this earth only 13 or 14 years. Wonderful for their self image. It’s heartbreaking.”

No one wants the kid. Hey, thanks, Cami. Made that child’s day. Year. Maybe life. 

Other parents reported siblings assigned to different schools or to schools to which they had not applied. At least one parent has three children going to three different schools–way to go, Cami! You apparently forgot you were on the ballot Tuesday and, well, you lost. 

“My son was matched to a school we did NOT choose. He DID use all 8 options and we applied early in January,” wrote one mother. To Cami, that’s school choice. 

Another said she was denied any choices because “I received a letter stating they did not match my child because I didn’t select enough schools!!! There aren’t 8 schools I want my son to attend!!!” 

So the school choice program, it turns out, is not parental choice—but choices exercised by  bureaucrats at 2 Cedar Street. Parents in Montclair, where Cami  now lives, can choose to send their children to neighborhood schools—but people in Newark simply aren’t as rich as people in Montclair.

Empowerment in Newark means empowerment for $300,000-a-year Anderson and her many $175,000-a-year tools. For Newark parents-not so much. 

I've said it before and I'll say it again: everyone in New Jersey needs to be concerned about what's going on in Newark. The treatment of its citizens by someone who is so completely out of touch with their wants and needs—and who does not want to listen when they complain— is nothing short of criminal. I'll bet that if Oprah knew what's happening, she wouldn't be too thrilled. Thank God Ras Baraka won! I hope and pray that he will be able to stop this insanity. 

NJ Ed Truth Squad Call to Action Part 2: When bad things happen to good schools

UPDATE! I have it from a reliable source in Newark that closing Hawthorne or turning it over to a 'charter launch' is a violation of the NCLB waiver process for priority schools, so Cami had to back down on that. However, it appears that Hawthorne's progress, which qualified it as a K-8 school on the move, may have helped her earn a merit pay bonus. So, she wanted to close a school that helped line her pockets. 

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In Part 1 I wrote about the recent Congressional vote on a charter school bill. Part 2 is about Newark Superintendent Cami Anderson's plans to convert Hawthorne Avenue School, a successful and beloved neighborhood public school, into a charter.

A Newark teacher sent me this heartfelt post written in April by Hawthorne Ave PTSO President Grace Sergio about the successes this school has had under Principal H. Grady James. You may remember that along with three other principals, James was briefly suspended earlier this year for speaking at a parent/community forum (something Anderson no longer does) on the fate of their school in light of her One Newark plan. Read Bob Braun's excellent coverage of this here. 

Originally under One Newark this school was destined to be converted to a charter, but I guess after reviewing the school's data here and here, she had no choice but to back down—sorta.

See, the school is improving under James' leadership. Even though 94% of its students are free and reduced lunch eligible, and 89% are African American (both numbers higher than the district average), many of its numbers are heading in the right direction: 

True, their language arts proficiency trend numbers are a little erratic, but I defer to Jersey Jazzman and Dr. Bruce Baker for explanations. They are the numbers guys.

Despite all these obstacles, and the fact that the building quality is rated as 'Very Poor' (something that's far too common in our urban school districts), Hawthorne's numbers are going up and the parents and community support it. Maybe that's why Cami wanted to co-opt it—so she could somehow prove that a charter school serving a mostly minority, low-income population really could outperform a traditional public school. #SMH!

I guess the public outcry got to her because a report this week in NJ Spotlight had this to say:

Anderson has since backed off on some of the details, instead saying Hawthorne Avenue would remain a district school, just under outside management.

Either way, a third of its students are to be moved elsewhere, and with enrollment decisions due to be announced within the week, the change for the school continues to blow back on Anderson in increasingly public ways.

Yesterday, the extra attention came by way of the Randi Weingarten, the national president of the American Federation of Teachers, visiting the school to voice her support for it remaining as it is.

Identifying Anderson as part of a nationwide reform movement of “privatizers” and “profiteers,” Weingarten said Hawthorne was an example of the superintendent’s plans gone awry.

“They don’t want schools doing well the old-fashioned way,” she said. “They are so craven here that instead of celebrating the success, and instead of seeing what is growing and nurturing that, why would you stop that?”

According to the district's and state's own beloved data, Hawthorne Avenue School is headed in the right direction. If anything, it needs to be supported, nurtured, studied and replicated—not dismantled! What the heck is 'outside management' anyway? And why does this school need it? Why can't the Newark School District continue to manage it? As we've seen time and again with all things ed 'reform', all roads lead to one place: the bank. My guess is there's some sort of profit to be made by somebody, somewhere. 

So, #NJEdTruthSquad, here's what we need to do: Contact Rep. Donald Payne, Jr., who wrote a letter to Cami demanding answers about One Newark. I wrote about that letter in a previous post, but interestingly the link is no longer available. Odd technical glitch? Or could it be because he has endorsed Shavar Jeffries in the Newark Mayoral race? Not sure.

But in any event, click on the Congressional delegation contact info link on the right side of this page and send Rep. Payne an email or call and leave a message telling him to help stop the dismantling of Hawthorne Avenue School, and demand that he push Anderson for proof her 'reforms' really are in the best interests of the children of Newark.