Underneath the shouting, a hum about curriculum standards

kicking it upstairs

October 25, 2011

Underneath the shouting, a hum about curriculum standards

by Philissa Cramer, at 10:23 pm

Schools Chancellor Dennis Walcott wasn’t completely wrong when he said tonight’s Panel for Educational Policy meeting had met its goal of promoting conversation about curriculum standards.

The meeting was pushed off course within minutes when protesters aligned with the Occupy movement shouted down Walcott and the standards’ architect, David Coleman. Walcott sped the dissolution into small-group sessions rather than try to talk over the nearly 200 protesters.

Most protesters stayed in the auditorium, but about three dozen parents and teachers followed Walcott and Coleman upstairs for workshops about the new standards, known as the Common Core.

Speaking to close to 20 attendees in a third-floor classroom, Coleman explained that the Common Core, which has been adopted by 25 states since 2009, is meant to “make our kids competitive within this country and outside of it, and to close the gap between high school and college.”

The development of the standards, he said, “was a vast process where thousands of teachers and parents were involved around a shared question of what is the evidence for college and career readiness, and based on that, what are the standards that most determine that.”

Michelle Ciulla Lipkin, whose two children attend Manhattan’s P.S. 199, said she came to the event because she wanted to learn more about how the Common Core would affect her children and was blindsided by the protest.

“I was really surprised because I thought it was going to be a simple, easy discussion about Common Core,” she said. “It took me an hour to get here and I was very afraid I was going to walk out without getting information.”

Rosie Frascella, a 12th-grade English teacher at the International High School at Prospect Heights who participated in the protest, lambasted high-stakes test during her turn at the “people’s mic.”

Later, speaking to reporters, she said she saw promise in the new standards but skipped the sessions about them because she didn’t think they would solve the problems she faces.

“I am very happy to talk about Common Core standards, but before I want to talk about Common Core standards I want a moratorium on the high-stakes testing. You can’t have two types of standards,” Frascella said. “I have to choke my curriculum to do test prep for my students. I would love just to have Common Core standards. That would make me really happy.”

Michael Fiorillo

The Microsoft-Pearson Standards, often mistakenly called the Common Core Standards, are a mask for the testing they are to be appended to.
http://gothamschools.org/author/liza-campbell/ Liza Campbell

Wow! There were HUNDREDS of protesters at an INCREDIBLE action tonight but gotham chooses to title their piece and open by focusing on the 20 folks the DOE got to turn out for their “conversation”… a conversation that is so UNBELIEVABLY meaningless when compared to the issues schools are facing right now. How you could possibly respond to the INCREDIBLE SUCCESS THAT HUNDREDS OF PARENTS AND TEACHERS had tonight by turning this meeting into a true conversation (!!!!) with an article like this one I will never understand.
Anonymous

Coleman’s claims that the ” development of the standards…was a vast process where
thousands of teachers and parents were involved” is not true. I don’t know a single parent who was involved & there is lots of opposition about the way these standards were adopted w/ little public process, through the putsh of Gates money and Race to the Top. Check out the comments of Sandra Stotsky, who helped develop the Massachusetts standards, about how the Common Core was developed by a
taskforce, the majority of whose members work for testing companies, and
how their associated exams are being crafted “behind closed doors.”
Nyhistoryteacher

At what point was this meeting designated “the common core discussion” and not a PEP meeting. Were all the members of the PEP there tonight? It seems like the PEP meeting is the place to protest, not at a parent outreach event.

Protesters are largely defined in the media by the place they protest. Protesting at the parent outreach event doesn’t focus the attention on the PEP. Few news stories will even explain the flawed process of the PEP because of this venue. Protesting at the PEP meeting forces journalists to expose the fraud that is the PEP.
Nyhistoryteacher

At what point was this meeting designated “the common core discussion” and not a PEP meeting. Were all the members of the PEP there tonight? It seems like the PEP meeting is the place to protest, not at a parent outreach event.

Protesters are largely defined in the media by the place they protest. Protesting at the parent outreach event doesn’t focus the attention on the PEP. Few news stories will even explain the flawed process of the PEP because of this venue. Protesting at the PEP meeting forces journalists to expose the fraud that is the PEP.
http://ednotesonline.blogspot.com/ Norm

Was this a fair and balanced “discussion” on common core standards? Were parents given the opportunity to hear the other side from the likes of Leonie and people like Susan Ohanian who has been exposing the sham of the common core for a long time? Were parents even given the right to ask a question other than on an index card?

This meeting was designed so someone like Leonie could not bring up the issues to Coleman”s face as to the distortions in his presentation.

So how do we label this: ”
Underneath the shouting, a hum about curriculum standards”

All I can say is hmmmmmmmm.
Michael M. (parent still)

Still waiting for a “conversation” about annual budget cuts in the face of rising enrollment, increasing school overcrowding, intolerable and illegal class sizes, “demand-based capital plans” that somehow result in 20% CUTS to at least one overcrowded borough, etc., etc. …
http://ednotesonline.blogspot.com/ Norm

Don’t you love these “conversations” Tweed has with people? Sort of like FDR’s fireside chats. I’d like to get the numbers straight. Exactly how many people went upstairs to have a one-way conversation? Was it 20 or 30? While 200 did not go upstairs? I wonder it Coleman told them that the ultimate goal of Common Core is that if it’s Tuesday at 10:15 AM every single teacher in America will be teaching the same lesson and for the same amount of time. Maybe we should install a national gong to indicate “time to go on to the next lesson” for 4 million teachers.
http://ednotesonline.blogspot.com/ Norm

I received this email:

a
parent came late and got shepherded up to the relocated meeting
upstairs on the 3rd Fl. Good thing, too, cause she’s a parent and a
fierce critic of high stakes testing and everything the “core curriculm”
is trying to do. It sounds like there were a
total of about 20 people at this relocated meeting, most of whom were
suits and including David Coleman himself. She thought
there were only about 5 real people there, but she and at least one
other parent there was able to give them a little hell. They weren’t
even safe up on the 3rd Fl!!!!”
Liza

Disqus isn’t letting me log in right now but this is Liza again. To their credit, I was just going to sleep last night and only saw this top article by Gotham which is why I was so upset at the coverage. I didn’t see the two additional pieces below that included other coverage and focused a bit more on the concerns of those who came out for the occupy action… something that would make sense considering there was over ten times as much turn out for the action than for the DOE’s “conversation.” The truth is that people responded to a call to action by community groups and OWS to shut
this meeting down because the DOE has been shutting the community’s voice out of
decisions for so long. We knew the only way our concerns would be heard
is if we used creative action and the people’s mic to make that happen. Such a call brought out hundreds more people than the
DOE’s “conversation” because they aren’t talking about the
real issues facing our schools, and because they aren’t interested in
real dialogue. Real dialogue would mean truly hearing and responding to
the concerns that are commonplace in schools across the city that they
are doing nothing to address.
http://gothamschools.org/author/liza-campbell/ Liza Campbell

When the action was first planned this was called a “Special PEP meeting” that was a conversation with the chancellor about common core and did not mention parents specifically. They changed their definition of the meeting after the action was planned.

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kicking it upstairs

October 25, 2011

Underneath the shouting, a hum about curriculum standards

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