It’s been a long, hot summer. The Common Core debate has heated up, Congress has sparred over ESEA reauthorization, and the Department of Education decided that it’ll be fun to watch California cope with the fact that its school districts are now operating under two sets of federal rules. Now, with the dog days of August here and Congress safely on the lam, I’m going to take a few weeks respite from blogging. We’ll have three weeks of guest blogs and then return to regularly scheduled programming on September 2.
The week of August 12-16, I’ll turn things over to Jonathan Plucker. Jonathan, a professor at the University of Connecticut, is a whip-smart authority on gifted education. As a longtime professor at Indiana University, he’s going to be sharing his take on the Tony Bennett furor, as well as on market-driven teacher education and how to think about poverty reduction when it comes to edu-reform.
The next two weeks, we’ll touch on two outfits that highlight some of the themes addressed in my new book, Private Enterprise and Public Education. In that volume, Michael Horn and I argue that we’d do well to get over the knee-jerk reaction that often characterizes our discussion of for-profits in schooling. I’m pleased to have two exceptional for-profit entrepreneurs here to talk about all manner of things, and to remind us that the distinctions between for-profits and non-profits are often more subtle than is popularly imagined.
The week of August 19-24, we’ll have Jennifer Medbery. Jennifer is a former math teacher and the founder and the CEO of Kickboard, a small but rapidly growing web-based platform that helps schools with analytics on behavior and academics. She’ll talk about why she’s convinced that teaching should be a team sport and how to foster a collaborative, results-driven culture.
The week of August 26-31, we’ll have Michael Bromley. This is Michael’s second go-round, after a hugely popular stint awhile back. Founder and president of School4Schools.com LLC, a student and teacher support service, and a veteran high school social studies teacher, Michael will discuss the impact of skewed classroom incentives on students and teachers and whether or not there are bad students -- or just bad parents and teachers.
Enjoy, and I’ll see you all after Labor Day!