Carlos, our Research & Evaluation guy at Breakthrough, is guest-posting today.
Enjoy!
——–
Being from Texas, I have always appreciated the satire of the Fox television show King of the Hill and life as it relates to a simple family from a simple Texas town. In a recent episode, Mike Judge (yes, THAT Mike Judge creator of Beavis and Butthead), tackles student achievement tests and what the pressure can lead school boards, administrators and students to do.
The entire episode is quite hilarious and available for view at Hulu.com, but this clip is a good place to start: Principal Moss, burdened by the pressure of his students performing well, has found a unique way to work around the testing, and takes it just a bit beyond the edge.
First of all, way to go young people! Showing up is how you get your issues addressed. Ever notice that the 60+ folks get pretty much whatever they want from the government? It’s because they always vote. Now it’s your turn at the table.
Now that we’ve made a choice, let’s think about what this means for education policy (again, I know, but it’s good to see this from a variety of sources), from the good folks at ontheissues.org.
Last night, EdWeek.org hosted a debate on education policy in the new administration. Ed advisors to the Obama and McCain campaigns met at Teachers College to answer questions about NCLB, student achievement, and teachers.
Despite that, I found the debate really interesting and worth the watch. The candidates are too busy to put in more than a minute or two toward education, and they avoid specifics on any policy so as to stay out of the weeds. These advisors, however, are living in the details of proposals and plans. So, while the debate didn’t reframe what we already knew about the candidates’ general attitudes, we did get a bit more into their thinking, philosophy, and a picture of what might actually happen in an administration. Video should be up at edweek.org this afternoon.
UPDATE: The video’s up, but it’s behind a registration wall. EdWeek is good folks, though, and worth a registration to watch the debate. Click here.
I couldn’t believe it actually happened. Those of you who made it to the end of the debate were rewarded with 10 1/2 minutes of education policy, teachers, and parental responsibility. Here’s what we learned:
Does poor performance in schools pose a threat to national security?
Should the Federal government play a larger role in education?
Rhee’s plan would place teachers on two tracks. The first track would remain the same – teachers can opt to maintain tenure and the traditional salary structure. The second track, which would be completely voluntary, would provide bonuses for those teachers who opted out of tenure. In other words, they would have a strong incentive to improve student performance.
Posted by Carlos Alvarado
Posted by Bobby Cupp
Posted by Bobby Cupp
