Generalized public, private, and charter school items

[Deacon923]

The unholy trinity.

http://www.theatlantic.com/features/archive/2014/07/why-poor-schools-can-t-win-at-standardized-testing/374287/

This article is not terribly well written in my opinion but it does contain some very telling facts.

1. The textbook manufacturers also make the standardized tests. The answers to the tests, the way the test wants them, are only in that company's textbooks, not their competitors and certainly not the old editions from 5 or 10 years ago. There is a clear link between standardized testing and $$$$ for these companies, who all lobby hard for as much "accountability" as they can get. "Accountability" = $$$ in their pockets.
2. Poor urban schools (or any poor schools) have to do the tests, but can't afford the textbooks. This is called an "unfunded mandate". Or simply, a pile of crap, with poor kids predictably at the bottom.
3. School systems are often mismanaged and have no idea who has what textbooks. This may be due to incompetence or funding/personnel cuts or both. It may also be due to these schools and districts just being too darn big such that they are almost impossible to manage.

Bottom line, everybody's getting paid but kids aren't learning.

 

[PhDeac]

Not a well-written article and it focuses on the wrong side of the problem. The author starts with the fact that the textbook publishers create the standardized tests, thus gaming the system in their favor to send more public education money to private sources. Unfortunately, the story gets lost in a book hunt which effectively "blames the poors" for not being able to get the right books when that's not the real problem to begin with. The real problem is the privatization of public education resources. More and more resources are moving away from the students into private corporations.

 

[Deacon923]

Atlantic article highlights some problems with no-oversight charter schools: http://www.theatlantic.com/education/archive/2014/08/120-american-charter-schools-and-one-secretive-turkish-cleric/375923/

Someone tell the NC GOP that the Mooslums are teaching their kids, that will probably get them more interested in oversight.

 

[bigdoublezero]

I think we might have covered this a while back, maybe in a discussion about the common core, but the sooner we de-emphasize the textbook lobby, whether through technology or standardization, the better IMO.

 

[Deadbolt]

Sometimes I see things like this and think capitalism is killing us...greed is, at the very least.