eduwonkette
Through the lens of social science, eduwonkette took a serious, if sometimes irreverent, look at some of the most contentious education policy debates in this opinion blog. Find eduwonkette’s complete archives prior to Jan. 6, 2008 here. This blog is no longer being updated.
Teaching Profession
Opinion
In Which Mike Petrilli and I Play Debbie and Diane
Mike Petrilli and I have a friendly off-blog scuffle at least once a week, and here's our latest quarrel. Over at Flypaper,
Student Achievement
Opinion
How Much Would Paying Kids for Test Scores Cost?
In the midst of this budget debacle, along comes an estimate of the cost of NYC's student incentive program at full scale - i.e. if all students in grades 4-7 were eligible to receive up to $500 per year. Even a 50% success rate would cost a cool $90 million dollars - not far off from the $99 million dollars in budget cuts that will be distributed to New York City schools unless the city ponies up.
Education
Opinion
All Purpose Equity!
Everyone loves equity - the US Department of Education, the New York City Department of Education, insert your hometown Department of Education here. If you've got a shaky initiative in mind, best to back it up with the equity line.
Education
Opinion
Welcome These New Edubloggers Aboard!
Here are two new blogs worth checking out:
* AccessAbility: Written by a special education writer, this blog hopes to encourage discussion on research-based special education interventions.
* AccessAbility: Written by a special education writer, this blog hopes to encourage discussion on research-based special education interventions.
Equity & Diversity
Opinion
Cool People You Should Know: Mica Pollock
Mica Pollock is an anthropologist who teaches at Harvard's Graduate School of Education, and studies how youth and adults struggle daily to discuss and address issues of racial difference, discrimination, and fairness in school and community settings. She has two new books coming out this summer: Everyday Antiracism: Getting Real about Race in School and Because of Race: How Americans Debate Harm and Opportunity in Our Schools. Her first book, Colormute: Race Talk Dilemmas in an American School, won AERA's 2005 book award. You can find an excerpt from Colormute below:
School & District Management
Opinion
Culture, Gender, and Math
Larry Summers' fatal gaffe, in which he suggested that innate differences between men and women may explain why fewer women succeed in math and science careers, set of the latest round of the gender math wars. Though many are in a tizzy over a "boy crisis" in education, as early as the fall of kindergarten, boys outperform girls in math at the top of the distribution (i.e. if we compare girls at the 95th percentile with boys at the 95th percentile). By the end of third grade, boys outperform girls in math not just at the top, but throughout the entire distribution. These early differences persist through high school.
Teaching Profession
Opinion
Mike Petrilli and the Fat Police
Every April 1, the Education Gadfly releases its very funny April Fools issue, a collection of mock education-news stories that generates double-takes in readers’ offices around the country. Apparently April Fools Day falls a little late this year.
Equity & Diversity
Opinion
Educating a New Majority: The Condition of Education 2008
The National Center for Education Statistics released the 2008 Condition of Education report this morning. If you need any basic stats on education – early childhood through post-secondary – this 300+ page report is for you.
Teaching Profession
Opinion
Kopp Out
Last week, Robert Pondiscio put forth an ingenious proposal to leverage the service of recent college grads who teach for two years through Teach for America:
Education
Opinion
New Verbs to Describe City Council Hearings: Hissing, Spanking, Chasing
Here's a round-up of yesterday's budget hearings: Chancellor Talks of Cuts for Schools, Amid Hissing (NYT), City Council Spanks Chancellor Klein Over School Aid Cuts (Daily News), School Budget Showdown (Gotham Gazette), and Rollback Set in Schooling of the Gifted (NY Sun). (Sidenote on City Council hearings: one Columbia Law School reader reports that the footage of The Great Liebman Chase of 2007 made rounds in his Criminal Law course.)
Education
Opinion
In NYC, Tis the Season for Sacrifice
A few weeks ago, a solemn President Bush revealed that he honors our soldiers' sacrifice by abstaining from golf. "I think playing golf during a war just sends the wrong signal," he explained.
Teaching Profession
Opinion
skoolboy wonders: Could a Parrot Pass the New York State ELA Exam?
A few days ago, A Voice in the Wilderness broke the story that the retest for the New York State English Language Arts exam had a task that required students to write a position paper arguing that inexperienced people can provide leadership, after listening to a speech by Wendy Kopp, founder of Teach For America. Some were appalled by the one-sided nature of the task, likening it to propaganda. eduwonkette’s take was that the task would be more defensible if students were given information on both sides and then asked to choose a side to argue.
School & District Management
Opinion
Sol Stern and the SUTVA Shenanigans
Sol Stern's new article on the Reading First study shenanigans offers a window into the central challenge of randomized experiments in education. That challenge is the violation of the Stable Unit Treatment Value Assumption (SUTVA) required for clean causal inference in randomized experiments. As articulated by ninja statistician Don Rubin, the most common violation of SUTVA involves "interference between units."
Curriculum
Opinion
Suggestions for a Summer Reading List?
It's about that time, folks - what are you planning to read this summer? I've just started this book by Dan Koretz, Measuring Up: What Educational Testing Really Tells Us, and I highly recommend it. Also on my list for the summer are: