Save Oct. 15 for CPS’s Annual Fall Issues Conference

September 8, 2011 by

YOUR Public School Under Attack:
Organizing to Fight Back!

Massachusetts public schools are among the nation’s best, so why are 82% of our schools labeled failures by the federal No Child Left Behind law? Flawed tests are being used to misjudge and label our schools, students and teachers. What are we going to do about it?

On Saturday, Oct. 15, at the Bayside Expo Center in Boston, join parents, teachers, students and concerned citizens to share ideas, strategize and organize to achieve our goal: sensible assessment policies and quality public schools for every child. Click here to register now!

The conference begins with an exciting morning panel of knowledgeable speakers on MCAS Reform, The Struggle to Preserve Boston Schools, Organizing Parents Across America and Exposing “Astroturf” (i.e., not really grass roots) Education Groups.

Stay for morning and afternoon workshops where participants will learn important background information and then strategize on pressing educational issues including high-stakes testing, charter schools, threats to urban public schools, educating the legislature, investing in public higher education, youth organizing and the school-to-prison pipeline, and organizing parents and school committees.   → Read More

Filed Under: Education-Other

“In Honor of Teachers”

September 3, 2011 by

Thanks to Charles Blow’s NY Times oped for a pitch-perfect back-to-school message and tribute to the teacher who turned his life around:

It was the first time that I felt a teacher cared about me, saw me or believed in me. It lit a fire in me. I never got a bad grade again. I figured that Mrs. Thomas would always be able to see me if I always shined. I always wanted to make her as proud of me as she seemed to be that day. And, she always was.

   → Read More
Filed Under: Education-Other

CPS in the News

August 24, 2011 by
CPS Executive Director Marilyn Segal’s letter responding to a Boston Globe Editorial appears today, August 24, 2011.
RULES OF NO CHILD LEFT BEHIND ARE CHALLENGED

Time to get rid of high-stakes standardized tests

August 24, 2011THE GLOBE continues to conflate standardized tests and quality education (“Don’t cut standards for No Child Left Behind,” Editorial, Aug. 22). Researchers such as Diane Ravitch and Richard Rothstein have demonstrated that nine years of No Child Left Behind, with its narrowing of education to teach to the test, have resulted in a slowing of the rate of improvement on the nation’s report card compared with the previous decade.

They understand that poverty is the greatest predictor of poor school performance. Intense pressure to perform on high-stakes tests, closing schools, and denigrating teachers don’t change that unfortunate reality. While a growing number of children in America – now an estimated 25 percent – live in poverty, high-performing countries such as Finland have about a 3 percent child-poverty rate and no standardized testing.

   → Read More
Filed Under: Education-Other

Dear Mr. President

August 4, 2011 by

Former CPS President Ruth Rodriguez prepared to speak at the Save Our Schools rally in Washington but did not have the chance. Her full prepared remarks are here. This is an excerpt:

Mr. President, we want to know, how long will you allow the stubbornly continuation of Mr. Duncan’s failed policy of high-stake testing, school closings, charter conversations and “turnarounds schools” in our nation’s public school system; a failed policy that has become the Secretary’s signature legacy? Arne Duncan’s closing of schools in Chicago to turn them into Charters was a huge failure. Now you are allowing him to take that failure nationwide. You’ve placed yourselves apart from reputable educators as being the leaders of the nation’s public schools whose legacy will be known as the “dismantling of democratic neighborhood public schools” in order to hand them over to the private greedy billionaire white boys club.

   → Read More
Filed Under: Education-Other

CPS Reports from Save Our Schools Conference in DC

August 3, 2011 by

Greetings!

I just returned from the SOS Rally and conference in Washington DC. It was uplifting to join with other progressive education advocates from across the country. The principles of SOS are totally in sync with the CPS agenda:

Guiding Principles

For the future of our children, we demand:

  • Equitable funding for all public school communities
  • Equitable funding across all public schools and school systems
  • Full public funding of family and community support services
  • Full funding for 21st century school and neighborhood libraries
  • An end to economically and racially re-segregated schools
  • An end to high stakes testing used for the purpose of student, teacher, and school evaluation
  • The use of multiple and varied assessments to evaluate students, teachers, and schools
  • An end to pay per test performance for teachers and administrators
  • An end to public school closures based upon test performance
  • Teacher, family and community leadership in forming public education policies
  • Educator and civic community leadership in drafting new ESEA legislation
  • Federal support for local school programs free of punitive and competitive funding
  • An end to political and corporate control of curriculum, instruction and assessment decisions for teachers and administrators
  • Curriculum developed for and by local school communities
  • Support for teacher and student access to a wide-range of instructional programs and technologies
  • Well-rounded education that develops every student’s intellectual, creative, and physical potential
  • Opportunities for multicultural/multilingual curriculum for all students
  • Small class sizes that foster caring, democratic learning communities

Read the Washington Post story on the event here.   → Read More

Filed Under: Education-Other
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