Quote of the Month

“It’s my highest priority.”

Secretary of Education Arne Duncan
(on improving the quality of teachers by measuring, rewarding, or penalizing them based on their performance)

BROWN’S WHO’S WHO IN EDUCATIONAL PUBLISHING CELEBRATES ITS 25TH EDITION

Brown Publishing Network publishes the only annual comprehensive directory of el-hi publishing executives. It’s distributed FREE to all in-house executives listed in the directory (contact me if you’d like a copy: mbrown@brownpubnet.com). For fun, I compared the entries in this year’s edition with the entries in the first edition, published in 1984. Here are some interesting observations:

YOU WON’T BELIEVE THIS – A RUBBER ROOM FOR TEACHERS!

New York City’s contract with its teacher’s union, the United Federation of Teachers, requires that teachers who are accused of misconduct, such as hitting or molesting a student, or—in some cases—of being incompetent, must be kept on the payroll, with full salary and benefits, until the charges are investigated and/or resolved. This process typically takes two to five years.

Meanwhile, during regular school hours these teachers must report to a nondescript room in an office building called a Temporary Reassignment Center, or as it is affectionately called, the Rubber Room. Currently, there are about 600 teachers in seven large Rubber Rooms scattered among the city’s five boroughs. Monitored by two Department of Education city supervisors, these teachers spend the day as they wish—sleeping, playing cards or board games, surfing the Web, etc. And—here’s the shocker—some of these teachers are earning more than $100,000 per year, plus benefits!

HMH — VIRTUAL SAMPLING OF PRODUCTS

Houghton Mifflin Harcourt has launched the virtual sampling of nearly 1,000 of its K–12 products. This digital alternative to traditional printed samples allows teachers and administrators to access product information instantly. Within the next several weeks, more than 7,000 HMH products will be made available for virtual sampling. Ultimately, all of its product offerings will be accessible to sample online.

To learn more, go to: http://hmheducation.com/virtualsampling.

AMERICAN HEROES TO BE EXCLUDED FROM TEXAS SOCIAL STUDIES CURRICULUM?

Texas is currently reviewing early recommendations for new social studies standards. More than 50 people mentioned in their existing textbooks are NOT included in the proposed standards, including Colin Powell, Neil Armstrong, and Nathan Hale. I regret that they have but one social studies curriculum to lose such distinguished Americans as these.

I TOLD YOU SO! PART 2

(see June’s blog for Part 1)

I’ve been tracking the movement toward national standards closely. This month, education representatives from the 48 participating states (Texas and Alaska are the two holdouts) convened and then proposed a set of math and English skills that students should master before high school graduation. The proposal is posted at: http://www.corestandards.org. Discussions and feedback will follow, with the goal of publishing national grade-by-grade standards for K–12 in 2010. Stay tuned.

CURRICULUM SETBACK IN CALIFORNIA

California has not only postponed textbook adoptions for four years, it has also suspended—for the same amount of time—the curriculum commission, which was in the middle of updating the state’s frameworks in science, social studies, and other subject areas. The work done to date would be outdated by 2013–14, when the commission is scheduled to resume, most likely requiring the work to start from scratch at that time. Penny wise and ….

BACK-TO-SCHOOL STATS

Enrollment for 2009 looks like this:

• Nearly 50 million students will attend public schools this fall—up from 47 million a decade ago.

• Approximately 3.8 million Kindergarten students are attending school—up 12% in the past decade. This is an all-time high.

• Pre-K students number 1.1 million—up 40% since 2000.