teacherken's musings on everything

I officially reported back two weeks ago, on Monday August 15. In this entry I wall offer a description and a reflection of the two week’s since. While I will not universalize my own experience, since there are aspects of both my schedule and my approach which are sui generis it is nevertheless my hope that this piece will help belie those statements which describe a teacher’s life as not particularly demanding, statements which claim that we only work 7.5 hours a day, 10 months a year, which numerous days off during the school year.

I will offer my experience of the first two weeks. I will present, you will read, and then (with a very slight acknowledgment to a certain conservative news organization) you will decide. I invite your comments and responses.

While officially the 155 teachers in our building reported back on Monday August 15, many of us were in the building the prior week, in my case for two reasons. First, I was helping the athletic director with checking in the many students coming out for fall athletics - we had to ascertain eligibility by grades and residence, ensure all permissions and medical clearances had been attended, and that they were not too old. And because I would already be in soccer practice as of the 15th, I needed to at least make a start on setting up my room.

On That first Monday, teachers began to arrive shortly before 8. We greeted one another and other staff, picked up our mail, and went to the cafeteria, where until shortly after 9 we were able to have a continental breakfast courtesy of the school, pick up our keys, receive various pieces of paper, and the like. We were supposed to in the auditorium at 9 AM for our opening official meeting, but the man who operates the audiovisual equipment and sets up the auditorium had gone to the hospital the night before (the first time since I arrive at the school in 1998 that he has been absent) and there was delay finding someone with a key. We then had our opening staff meeting -- remarks by the principal, by several key administrators and other leaders, and outline of the schedule for the week, and the introduction of the 21 new teachers (all of their pictures would be posted near our mailboxes by the end of the week so we could get to know them).

During that first day we largely worked on getting our rooms set up - decorating walls and bulletin boards, making lists of broken or missing items such as desks, light fixtures and the like (our building is used extensively outside of school hours - it was the main high school summer school for a system of 138,000 students, and the prior week had been used for training of teachers new to the system). We had had 5 additional temporary buildings added during the summer (for a total of 21), and we had to help new people find their rooms.

In my case by 3 PM I had to be outside for soccer practice. I had prepared tentative roster lists by grade of the students who had already submitted their paperwork, and had held slots for several I expected would be returning. We spent 3 hours on the field (I am the JV coach and assist with the boys varsity). We had additional students joining us during that practice, and from them I had to collect their paperwork, write down their information. We had surprisingly few freshmen this year, so it did not take time to learn all the names. At our peak we had two coaches watching around 60 teenagers practice. At times that first week only one of us would be out there because of off-site meetings or other activities requiring our presence - we are both teachers in the building. We had scrimmages set for that first Saturday, so we had to do some quick evaluations. By the second afternoon we were dismissing some players, some who were not in condition were leaving on their own. Each day we adults were practicing the kids until 6 PM, then talking between us, then I would go back to my room for about another hour to catch up on things I could not do during practice. During the rest of the week I would leave home before 6:30 and not arrive back until sometime around 8 PM.

In my role as teacher, there were multiple meetings and required training sessions. We are required to annually be retrained in sexual harassment, dealing with homeless students, and similar policies. We also had two departmental meetings. We have until shortly after labor day to turn in our updated professional goals for the year and our emergency lesson plans. In the case of goals, since I keep a copy on my home computer I was able to arrive with those already done. But as I am teaching AP government for the first time, I still as of now have that to work on. We had to get the books we needed to our rooms. In my case I had to get some National Honor Students to come in and help process books -- all of our AP Government books arrived that Monday (August 15), and had to be counted, bar coded, stamped with the school name and address and numbered. We had around 150 of those to process. For our other social studies courses we had well over a thousand new books to be processed. And then books had to be moved to the appropriate rooms. Remember that I am in an outside classroom, and without the help of the students the task would have been impossible. We also had to sign out our computer equipment, hook it up and make sure it was working, obtain our video equipment and our overhead projectors. For some of us, we were already scheduling our time in computers labs and the library for the first month or so. Finally on Thursday we we received our class lists, prepared on a central school system computer, but with that information not as yet (even as of this last Friday) downloaded to the in school system, so for those of us using a computerized grade book we had to type the information in by Monday, and for those still pen and paper, copy the information into whatever book was being used. Meanwhile there was an additional all staff meeting to prepare for the first week of students. Officially we were off on Friday the 19th, but almost 120 of the teachers showed up to continue preparation -- it is the County’s way of getting work for which it does not have to pay. For most of us we also set up seating charts. As I teach 6 classes, and I don’t want the computer (which could) do do this automatically, I had to to take into consideration what I knew about the students (most were 10th graders, and I taught 9th last year - of my 155 students I had previously taught or coached about 40)

And on that Thursday we had almost all of our freshmen ride the bus to school, obtain a copy of their schedules, and then walk their schedules. With 2,900 students in a sprawling building, if we did not do this, many would be wandering the building lost on the first day of school.

Oh yes, and during this time many of us were working on plans, copying handouts, and the like. The copying is critical - we have only two xerox machines for our 155 faculty. The lines can get extensive, especially when the machines are consistently jamming, as they were that first week. One cannot risk arriving and attempted to copy before school the day one wants to use something - the lines might be too long, or possibly both machines will be down.

AP Government is a college-level course. The other teacher and I who have sections did some more joint planning (we had done some on our own during the summer), then we each had to make up a syllabus for the year, and get that copied. The county has not yet obtained the supplemental readers that are an essential part of our materials, so I was setting up links on a web page for those items we would used in the first unit. That is, for those items available online. And since these would be entire documents of which we wanted only selections, I had either to obtain versions that had internal hyperlinks, or else set up detailed descriptions of how to find the passages we wanted read. For other items, we actually had to make copies for the students to use - this is tricky with respect to copyright. We were not copying entire articles, but even so the students will have to return the material to us and we will destroy it after we are finished.

For most teachers they had their Saturday “free” in that they could not get into the school building (although the custodial staff was working very hard) - some would come in on Sunday, since the building is used by a Church group. Many teachers continued to prepare at home. In my case I met the soccer teams at a high school in Montgomery County for a set of preseason scrimmages. The host school had not wanted to pay for referees for 4 games (boys and girls, varsity and jv). For several years in the 1970’s I had refereed high school and college games in Pennsylvania, so I agreed to help. I coached my own boys’ jv, with a varsity boys player serving in my stead on the field. I refereed the other 3 games, two of 90 minutes and one of 70 minutes. Despite sun block I did get burned, and i pulled a hamstring and was doing a bit of hobbling around by the end. Since this was the first scrimmage for both schools and since both sides had players whom they were trying to evaluate, i felt it important that there be some control on the field so that no one got hurt.

Believe it or not, I took Sunday the 21st off, doing nothing for school. That will be my last non-school day until Thanksgiving.

Monday August 22. The students arrived, went to a room by name to receive their official schedules, and then waited until until most of the buses arrived. They were then dismissed to their first periods. Periods were a bit shortened this first day. During the 35 minutes I have each class, I got students to their assigned seats, handed out a blizzard of paperwork, explained class procedures, assigned textbooks, and answered questions. Soccer practice now did not begin until 3:30. But meanwhile those students who were assigned to the jv had to put their gear in my room - only freshmen had as yet been assigned lockers, and those were not big enough to include all their soccer gear. They would come in the back before school or during the first period, and would have to retrieve their things at the end of school. I would have therefore about 10 minutes between the end of the school day and when I had to be on the soccer field to get into the building to a bathroom and to relax.

One of the thin gs my students do the first day is fill out and information sheet. On it I have information about their parents and information about them. I used the latter for some brief remarks the second day that helps me to begin to learn about the students. it is not just learning their names. I may be bale to talk about what they want to do later in life, activities they do now, where they want to go to college. It serves as a way for me to reassure them that I care about them as individuals, that I value parts of the lives that don’t necessarily connect directly with my class. Also on that 2nd day they learn - if they do not already know by reputation or because I have taught an older sibling government in the past (last year as we changed sequence, I did not teach government) how crazy I can be. I ask them to write down what they think justice is, then tell them i have to do a quick errand. i step outside, put on a peruke (white wig) and black robe, then throw open the door while loudly declaiming “Oyez, oyez, all you having business before this honorable court, draw near, Kenneth J. Bernstein Presiding, Order in the Court” and slam my hand down on the desk. “The question before this tribunal is what is justice.” I ask someone to offer a definition. l Often I get something like “punishing those who break the law.” In that case I am likely to respond “so Harriet Tubman should have been punished for running away and for returning to help others run away.” The class for the next 20 minutes or so becomes an exercise in Socratic dialog. We will quickly look at Plato’s Republic, The Declaration (“deriving their just powers form the consent of the governed”), the Preamble (“establish justice”), Hobbes (including “and the life of man, solitary, poor, nasty, brutish and short.”) and Locke (excerpts from the 2nd Treatise). Besides letting them know how crazy I am - and I truly am -- there are several purposes to this exercise. First, I organize the course - including the AP course - around the two themes of the nature and definition of justice and the nature of the social contract. Second, I KNOW they are going to talk about this class when they go home. It helps make a connection with the parents.

And starting this 2nd night, when I return from soccer I begin to call every single parent and guardian. I have on the first day sent home two copies of a letter which explains the course and my procedures and expectation, gives my email and the address of the web page on which parents can track assignments. One copy is to be signed and returned, the other kept for reference. not all students bring the papers home, and in the reams that do come home on the first day some parents do not realize that they need to keep the 2nd copy. I want to be sure that they know how to reach me and how to monitor what is going on in my class. Second, they may have questions, especially after that “what is justice lesson.” The call enables me to assure them that I know what I am doing. Third, I ask if there is anything I should know about the child to make his/her time in my class successful, any concerns or issues. There students legally entitled to modification, such as a 504 Plan or an IEP. The student often does not tell me, and it can be several weeks before the Special Ed department gets me the paperwork. This way I will know as quickly as possible if a child needs instructions repeated, extra time on tests, preferential seating, or anything like that. I also learn if parents have just separated, a grandparent just died, struggles with certain kinds of exercises.

I often have to say as I introduce myself something like “don’t worry, André is not in trouble, I am just calling to introduce myself.” Some parents have come to fear when the teacher calls. having called when there isn’t a problem, I am far more likely to get parental cooperation if I do have to call with a problem, because that is not the only time I call.

Also, by the time I am calling, my AP students have already had their first heavy assignment - 17 pages of Hobbes. By now some of them are panicking that they have bitten off too much. These calls let me assuage some of those fears, assure the parents that the student will be able to make it through the course, that I will offer some extra help, and to point out that this is excellent preparation for attending a rigorous college.

The rest of the first week goes by fairly quickly. We begin to get into the academic rhythm. There are interruptions - mandatory assemblies to cover the code of conduct. Additional students arriving, some being withdrawn because they don’t live in our attendance district (parents cheat to get their kids into our school because it is so good. Some get caught as a result of my phone calls - the phone number has changed to one in another jurisdiction, for example). The days remain long, but at least they begin to have some shape. I am simultaneously teaching my students content and technique -- how to read, how to study, how to take notes - as well as inculcating into them a set of expectations that for many are quite challenging. I begin to make some cuts to my jv to make the numbers more manageable, even as i get still more players. And I continue with the parental phone calls. By Saturday afternoon I have contact all those parents of students I have not taught who have working legitimate phone numbers, and have begun to contact those parents of previous students (a process I will complete this week). Since this weekend we did not have a scrimmage, I was actually able to take Saturday morning (and this morning) off and only do school related work for about 6 - 7 hours.

Does it get any less intensive? Not really. So far I am not collecting homework, but merely going over it in class. This next week I will begin to haven papers turned in. I turn all ordinary assignments back the next school day. Even using my lunch and planning periods efficiently, that often means 3-4 hours of additional work on a school night. I am also one of the two freshman class sponsors, so I begin to pick up some responsibilities with that as well. My average workday for the next 10 months will be 12 hours - when the coaching finishes, i get more duties as a sponsor, and then I also run tutoring sessions to help those students who are struggling.

If you have read this far, you will now have a better sense of how intense and demanding my work as a teacher is. I have not talked about the other reading that I must do during the school year - I do not count that as part of my school work, even though things like reading the papers and news magazines really is preparation. I do not have children of my own, so I am able to be as insane as I am in how much I give to my students and my school . I teach the children of two outstanding science teachers in our building, and both think I do too much. I do not know how to do it any other way.

I accept that I do more than many teachers. But there are others in our building who in their own way do as much as do I. They may not call all the parents, but the amount of time they give to overseeing research practica in science, or helping with science projects, is astounding. 2/3 of those who sponsor activities do so without financial compensation. When some students asked me about sponsoring a philosophy club, I steered them to a math teacher who is writing his dissertation on philosophy even as he teaches 6 sections of high school math.

So what do you think? Please be kind and offer some kind of response, so that I know my effort in writing this was not wasted.

Tomorrow I officially report back for the year, with students reporting the following Monday. And yet I have been hard at work for the past week. I was at school four days last week, missing only the day I had my colonoscopy. I was helping clear athletes for participation, assisting our athletic director (he was paid for his time, I was not for mine), and I began the laborious process of setting up my classroom - I am in an outside temporary and almost everything has to be removed and locked up at the end of each year.

I thought I’d offer a few vignettes - and memories - so that those of you who do not teach can have some idea why when people talk about how teachers only work 7 hours a day 10 months a year are very wrong. And perhaps you can thereby come to appreciate the dedication of so many who teach the children of this nation.


I have today been working on paperwork. I have had to update my professional goals for the year. Every year I am required to put together a document which states clearly what my expectations - for each class I teach, for each additional professional responsibility I have, and for more life as an educational professional general. At the end of the year I am required to go back and examine how I did in achieving my goals, and analyze why I did not meet any that were unfulfilled. This is an entirely separate process from the formal professional development plan which I am required to have on file and update annually. That document ensures that I maintain all qualifications for certification. I am currently on an Advanced Professional Certificate II, now entering my 11th year of teaching. My ongoing professional development can be fulfilled in a variety of ways, and much of mine personal requirements will be met by running workshops to train other teachers and in mentoring as I have the past two years student teachers.

I have prepared tentative rosters of all male soccer players - varsity and JV - who have submitted the necessary paperwork (physicals, insurance, permissions, checking GPA for eligibility, etc.) or whom we know will be submitting in the next few days. We are required to be able to show that a student has practiced at least 10 days before he competes in interscholastic competition, and no one can even dress for a practice who is not cleared.

I have set up weekly progress reports so that we can monitor the academic progress of our soccer players - especially important for our freshmen.

I have rewritten the letters that go home on the first day explaining my expectations in each class, how parents can check assignments, when they can expect grade sheets, how they can contact me. I have to have a copy signed by parent and student in order to enforce my expectations, because students are entitled to due process, and if we cannot prove that the parent was notified we can legally have trouble enforcing rules.

I will have 3 sections of AP Government. We do not have a supplementary reader. I have spent hours scouring for materials in the public domain or available by link on the internet. I have put together a page of links for those we will need for the first 5-6 weeks - we are hoping we can persuade the County to buy a supplementary reader so I don’t have to keep doing this. I am about to go off and set up handouts of publicly available material that is not online. Some of this copying will be done at my own expense.

Which reminds me - I began teaching in a December, when I took over a class where the teacher had lost his certification ( had not taken the courses necessary to maintain his certificate, and refuse to teach on a per diem basis until he made up the missing credits). I started on a Friday. On Monday I came in with a batch of stuff I had put together, and to be ready first thing (that school started at 7:30), make copies at a Kinko’s. A student in my home room saw the Kinko’s box, and asked if I had paid for the copying myself. When I responded that I had, she told another student, “See, I told you he was a real teacher.” I don’t know what it says that an 8th grade student decides that I am a real teacher because I pay for photocopying out of my own pocket. In that regard, there is an interesting relevant article in today’s Washington Post [Teachers Spend Big to Supply What Schools Don’t http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/08/13/AR2005081301237.html]


I have also been spending about 5 hours each day (including weekends) this week working on my AP syllabus for the year, preparing lesson plans for the first three weeks or so of school. That is because once I receive my class lists of students (probably on Thursday) I will begin the process of calling every single parent I have, so that by the end of the 2nd week of classes I will have talked with everyone. That ensures that they know how to reach me, and lets me know about any specific concerns for their child they wish to offer me.

But remember - officially I don’t start until 8:00 AM tomorrow. I will, however, be at school at 7 so that I can get some of the xeroxing for which I will not pay done before the lines build up - we have two copying machines for over 150 teachers.

I am not that unusual in the time, energy and out of pocket money that go into my being a teacher. Just remember that the next time you hear someone say that teachers have it easy, or suggest that they only work 10 month’s a year, or only 7-8 hours a day.

This question is particularly relevant to me, both as a teacher and as a human being.  But it is insufficient.  In its complete form, it should be, “did I make a POSITIVE difference?”

I am, since May 23, in my 60th year, one in which I will periodically look back, reflect, and ask and perhaps answer questions such as that in the title.

Today’s reflection is about my growing awareness during the early part of  my life of injustice, and how it shaped me.  I do not assert that my insights or experiences are profound.  They are mine, and I share them as an explanation in part of who I am and why I react and write as I do.


I cannot claim that I was the perfect child.  At times I was not even all that good of a child.  I might have been different, except for an incident in First Grade.  We were in in the art room, working on clay.  The class was particularly ill-behaved that day, and after a while the art teacher blurted out that everyone had been misbehaving except Kenny.  Our classroom teacher, Mrs. Richardson, then announced that we were going back to our room, and everyone would be held after school except for me.  I felt the angry stares of my classmates.  As it happened, since we didn’t have bells at Murray Avenue, Mrs. Richardson actually let me out about 8 minutes early, and everyone else almost on time.  When I walked outside I saw all the cars lined up to pick up the school children.  I felt very alone, the only child outside, not willing to find the car from our local carpool, not wanting to explain what had happened.  

That was near the ned of First Grade.  I had learned that lesson well.  In 2nd grade I was one of the worst behaved in my class.  I was in 2D, with Mrs. Ploughman.  Her solution ot misbehavior was to send students next door to 2C.  The embarrassment was supposed to make us alter our behavior.  But I quickly realized that students from 2D were sent to 2C for the same reason.  It couldn’t be that harsh a punishment.  So I misbehaved in 2C as well.  In desperation, Mrs. Ploughman tried sending me back to my first grade teacher, knowing that I had been very close to her, and that I had had no record of class disruption the previous year (note the aforementioned incident).  When I disrupted that class, I was for the first time in my life sent to the principal, Miss Loretta Hirschbeck, all 6’1” before she put on her heels.

My family was very close to Miss Hirschbeck.  I had a sister 3 grades ahead of me, and she had helped my mother get a string instrument program started in the school.  By now I was playing cello.  It was April.  Miss Hirschbeck knew how to handle me.  I had sent her a Valentine.  She asked if I remembered it.  I nodded my head silently.  She asked if I knew what all the Xs I had placed before singing meant.  I nodded again.  She then told me that if I didn’t behave myself, she would collect all of the Xs in front of the whole school at the next assembly.  My eyes became very wide, and for the rest of elementary school, until after several weeks in 6th grade I finally skipped, I appeared to behave.  Note the way I expressed it.  I did enough improper things not to stick out from my peers, but I became damn sure I didn’t get caught.  It also meant that I was determined not to be a tattletale.  And I did not speak up when I saw things that were wrong.

The first time I truly became aware of injustice was when I was around 10.  It was during an extended family trip to Miami Beach when I was in 5th grade.  This would be December of 1956.  I remember getting off the plane and going into the terminal at Miami and seeing signs on bathrooms that said they were only for whites, and seeing signs pointing outside for the “colored restrooms.”  I asked my parents about this, and my mother told me that in the South Negroes were largely kept separate from whites, that it was called segregation.  For the first time in my life I was aware of people being treated differently for what they were.

Surprisingly, I had not encountered this growing up.  Our neighborhood was all white, to be sure.  Most of the Blacks we saw were delivery people or domestic servants.  We had had maids who were both white and black in our household, so the fact that most Blacks were working in lesser jobs had not registered on me.  And although we were Jewish, our neighborhood and our school were both quite mixed at least on religion.  About the only difference I had noticed is when Billy van Heusen, who later played several years in the NFL, came over to our house to play, and when we went ot the bathroom I noticed a physical difference.  When I asked my parents about that, I was told about circumcision, and how Jewish boys all were but many Christian boys were not.  And since religion did not make a difference in my playmates, and because it was still relatively shortly after WWII, we did not, even in Jewish Sunday school, really talk about the Holocaust.  Out textbooks would talk about how Jackie Robinson was a credit to his race, and the model example of an African American was likely to be Booker T. Washington.  Although Rosa Parks had already created history in Montgomery, I have no memory of our talking about it, or of seeing anything about it on our old black and white television.

When I looked around the hotel in Miami, I realized very quickly that not only were there no black guests, just about all the guests were Jewish.  My sister made a close friendship with a young lady from Scranton Penna, who that summer would join us at national Music Camp in Interlochen Michigan, and who would later be at Bryn Mawr while I was first at Haverford.  I was beginning to notice segregation and discrimination, whether enforced by law or by custom.  And it troubled me.

It is written of the Buddha that his father tried to shield him from all unpleasantness, surrounding him with beauty and tranquility.  Thus when he firsts encountered a beggar it was a shattering experience, one which caused him to embark on his spiritual quest that eventually, years later, led to his enlightenment under the Bodhi Tree.  Although the encounter with segregation presented me with an awareness I had previously lacked, it did not cause as yet any major changes in my life, but the seeds had been planted.  

My elementary school was all white - I do not remember a single Black in my entire grade, nor when I skipped into junior high school after 6 weeks in the Fall of 1957, although there were blacks in my grade, I was in one of the two “gifted” classes in 7th grade, and we had no blacks.  But they were in gym class, so I first got to know blacks of my own age. When I had returned to Interlochen in the summer of 1957, I looked around at a group of junior campers that was also all black.  This was my 4th year, and I would have 4 more after this.  There were so few blacks, even at the high school level, that they stood out, and stuck in my memory:  I most remember the superb violinist Darwin Apple, later concertmaster of a second tier orchestra, and who had an adequate solo career in smaller venues.  

That Fall of 1957 was important for another reason, and that was Central High School in Little Rock.  This time I watched the events on television, we talked about them at home, and at school.  I read a great deal in our various daily papers, which in our house meant at least 4 during the week - the local Mamaroneck Daily Times, the NY Times, the Herald Tribune, and the World Telegram (which my mother read on the train on the way home from her law office in downtown Manhattan).  From 1957 on I was paying close attention to the Civil Rights movement.  I looked to see signs of discrimination in the North, and it was not too hard to find them.  My parents tried to explain the difference between de jure and de facto segregation, but when I asked how it was any different to the Negro who could not get the job or buy the house, my parents had no answers.  I remember sitting down and writing an imaginary story, where all the power was controlled by Negroes, and how they were denying rights to Whites.  I was trying to show people how it might feel were the roles reversed.  I was not a skilled writer, even for an 11 year old.  Still, it marked another step on my path to opposing discrimination.

I will not detail all of the events of my secondary school years that relate to this topic.  There are too many.  I cannot say I was pure.  I remember getting angry a a Saturday basketball game and calling another kid whom I did not know “you dirty Nigger.”  The shock on his face brought me to my senses.  But what shocked me more was that not one of my teammates, nor my coach -- all white  -- corrected my behavior.  That night, I wondered why the rules should be so different, that I as a white boy could be so nasty in my language and not be chastised, but I knew had he said something similarly derogatory towards me he probably would have been jumped by my teammates.  His teammates had not defended him.

Of course, there was one Black in those basketball games no one would ever “diss” like that.  Chris Brice as a 6th grader was far superior to all the 7th graders .. he would later be an All-County player in a county (Westchester, NY) of well over half a million people with something like 40 different high schools. So because of his gifts he was treated better than were most other blacks.  I so this, and filed it away.

I knew only a few blacks well in high school.  I Knew Nancy Goode because she played violin in the orchestra (where I played cello).  I ran cross-country for two years with Sammy Shelton, our star.  By high school it was not so unusual in at least some of my classes to have black students.  I do not ever remember any of them being a guest in my home nor I in theirs.  My circle of acquaintances (because I really did not have close friends) was largely limited to people who overlapped in my classes, or whom I knew from Larchmont Temple, either the Youth Group or the dancing classes taught by a couple named Barry.  I also had a few friends from drama and music.  There were both jews and Christians, and my parents raised no objections on the few occasions when  I dated non-Jewish girls -- perhaps because I dated so infrequently they were just pleased to see me going out, and besides, they didn’t think anything would be serious.

The real diversity in my acquintanceships during this time was working class whites.  I became ‘friendly” with a number of people for whom college was never considered a possibility.  A guy named Roy a year ahead of me, he was going into the Air Force to work on jet engines.  His (single) mother was a seamstress.  And I was amazed to realize that there were people for whom college was not something they could consider.  In the early 1960’s the community college route was not all that available, certainly not where we were.  And if one were not in college, then at 1i8 one had to confront the reality one might as a male well be drafted.  So iI began to perceive a very different world than that in which I was raised.

When I was considering colleges, and for a while expressed an interest in the Naval Academy (for which I would not have qualified), my mother strongly insisted that the Navy was no place for a Jew.  When I then pointed at Admiral Rickover, she explained how much of an exception he was.  Thus I did not tell my parents when I filed for Naval ROTC until after I had done.  They reluctantly allowed me to apply to the requisite six universities and to take the exam, on which I did superbly.  The issue of ROTC became moot when I took my physical because I was immediately washed out because of my eyes.  I then was in the strange position of applying to 6 universities with NROTC, and little Quaker Haverford College.  

One application was rejected because of my developing social conscience.  The application for Indiana University in Bloomington required one to file for housing at the same time as one applied for admissions.  I did not opt for a fraternity, already having something of a bias against such things  -  by high school I was already seeing things like Demolay (the junior Masons), that there were clubs in our town to which my family could not belong because we were Jewish, and so on.  There had been an incident in nearby Scarsdale, which had a substantial and influential Jewish community, where someone had been barred as coming as an escort to a dance because he was Jewish.  When the young minister of one of the local churches preached out against this he was summarily dismissed from this pulpit.  I started to feel some level of solidarity with anyone against whom discrimination and prejudice were applied.  And I had begun to learn far more about the Holocaust, sometimes from the parents of acquaintances, because my own family did not openly talk about it.

One question on the Housing application was “race.”  I decided then and there I had only one answer I would give  -- I did not check any boxes, but wrote in “human.”  As I remember, the application was not accepted because it was considered incomplete.  I refused to change it, and eliminated IU from my list of possibles.  

When I visited Haverford in october of 1962 for my interview, while I was in the waiting room I read an article about a program that Haverford’s admissions guy, Archibald MacIntosh was doing with an admissions guy from Harvard (whom I vaguely remember was named John  Miles, but don’t hold me to that after 43 years).  They were seeking out students from the black community in the South and trying to help them get to integrated private colleges in the North.  I devoured the article, and found a way to raise the issue during the interview.  I think that helped get me in ..  I really should not have been admitted, despite sky high boards, because I was not in the top 1/3 of my high school class.  But that conversation caught Mac’s attention, and helped the College decide to take a chance on me.  It probably didn’t hurt that I had brought down my early AP US History papers.  Mac borrowed them and I later found out they were used to interview Roger Lane, now retired and who won the Bancroft Prize in History.  It also didn’t hurt that I won a National Merit.  But that conservation showed that I was concerned about people beyond myself, and at a Quaker institution like Haverford, that made a difference.

The summer I graduated from high school, 1963, I started to participate in Civil Rights demonstrations.  I began with the White Castle hamburger chain, which refused to hire blacks.  I also sat in at the private office Governor Nelson Rockefellar maintained in NYC, being replaced at that event about 5 minutes before the State Police arrested everyone for trespassing.  Thus I narrowly avoided a criminal record.  And from this participation, on August 28 of that summer I got on a bus and traveled to Washington DC.  I was one of only 5 whites on a bus full of people from the Bronx Chapter of the Congress of Racial Equality (CORE)>  My closest friend there was Willie, a Black about 3 years older than me who was quite bright and lived in Harlem.  Several times I had stayed in his small apartment.  And he and I together had met our hero while picketing, the head then of CORE, James Farmer.  

The participation in the ‘63 March was a in important watershed for me.  I met people from the Mississippi Delta who knew of no Civil Rights groups except NAACP.  The were amazed that a white kid from the suburbs of New York City would care about what happened to them.  I heard the speeches, I ran into people i had known years before.  And I saw Wilt Chamberlain, who had come without fanfare and as a private citizen, walking quietly and holding a sign saying something like End Discrimination Now.

By the time I entered Haverford in the Fall of 1963, I had grown from being a kid from a comfortable, upper-middle class Jewish background in the NY suburbs, to someone who saw discrimination, began slowly to understand how it affected people, and who was coming to a point where he felt that he could not remain silent about such wrongs when he encountered them.

Okay, it doesn't sound sexy like the Motorcycle diaries, and I sincerely doubt it will be turned into a movie, especially as I am not as appealing as a young Che Guevara.  Since I go by the name of Teacherken, I am expected (and often do) post on issues of education, here, at dailykos, and elsehwere. .  Periodically I provide a cumulative diary like this at dailykos, which will enable newcomers and/or interested parties to see all of what I have post in one annotated list.  Thus readers will have one link on which they can click to find anything I have written in diary form at dailykos about education since December 22, 2004.   Some of these diaries got lots of traffic, others did not.  You can decided on your own what if any value THIS diary offers you.   NOTE:  some of the imbedded links to publications may have expired.


HERE'S THE LIST.

what was your favorite subject in school reached #2 on the recommended list on Saturday July 30.  The primary focus is an article from the St. Petersburg (FL) Times (one of the great papers in the nation) about how electives are being eliminated or cut back in order to provide more time to prepare for mandatory tests in reading.  I offer a fair amount of commentary of my own.  The thread is mixed, with a lot of poster limiting themselves to the question in the title, but many choosing to explore the implications for them had they not had access to electives, and still more talking about the various policy implications caused by the testing requirements of NCLB and the need to ensure that all students can read.  There are 152 comments, many extended and thoughtful.

NCLB problems not solutions was a diary on July 26 that flew by with little comment or notice.  As I wrote at the time

First I will discuss the problem of high qualified teachers, a requirement under the Law.  Next I will refer to a somewhat related column about teacher compensation that appeared on the front page of the metro section of the July 26 Washington Post.  Finally I will discuss the issue of supplementary services (tutoring), focusing in particular on an article in the July 25 Baltimore Sun.  Throughout I will offer my own analysis and commentary.  

Some thoughts on testing and education is a July 21 piece on three different items about the topics in the title of the diary, two from Seattle and one a column by Bob Herbert of the NY Times.  As usual, I provide some selections from each of the pieces (while I encourage you to read the entire piece) and provide some additional commentary of my own.

Slashing Fed Support 4 Gifted Education, posted July 19, works off a story in the Washington Post on the slashing of funding for  the Javits Center for Gifted Education.  It is an example of the shortsightedness of this administration's approach to the funding of education, and something of the hypocrisy of NCLB.

Rothstein (NOT Rove) on Educational Equity was posted July 15, It focuses on a conversation with Richard Rothstein, who was for a number of years the educational columnist for the NY Times.  The conversation appeared in The Evaluation Exchange, a publication of the Harvard Family Research Project.

The Campaign for Educational Equity is a diary about a new approach being taken by Teachers College in NYC, led by its president Arthur Levine.  The diary focuses on a piece first published in Teachers College Record back in May.  The diary was posted on July 14.  I happen to think it was deserving of more attention than the five comments it received.  Take a look, and decide for yourself.

A Political Issue - Teacher Pay was the first of my pieces ever to be front-paged (on July 3 by Armando).  It uses an article that appeared in the Long Beach (CA) Journal (and apparently elsewhere) as the starting point for a discussion of the educational implications of teacher pay and an exploration of the political issues involved.  The diary parked a fascinating discussion of 255 comments.

HOW NCLB ENRICHES BUSH CRONIES AND OTHERS has a self-explanatory title.  It is based on a report written by Gerald bracey and put out by the school of education at Arizona State University.  It gives specifics of individuals and companies that are benefiting rom NCLB while showing their contacts with the Bush family and the President. I provide a link to download (PDF) the entire report.



BILL MOYERS:  "A MORAL TRANSACTION" is about Public television.  This is related since public tv started as educational tv -- our local station in DC is WETA, founded as  (Greater) Washington Educational Television  Association.  Moyers paid himself for a two page spread in the Washington Post to present his defense of the purposes of public education.  He was involved with the founding of public broadcasting, and has been a powerful advocate for its independence.



SOMETHING GOOD & EXCITING IN PHILADELPHIA is about a new charter high school  opening this Fall and dedicated to peace studies and conflict resolution.  It includes the organizers request for mentors for each of the students.  I wanted people aware of what good things could be done under charter school legislation, and to let those people close enough to get involved about the opportunity to participate.



Three Things TO THINK ABOUT put together information from three emails I had received from different lists in which I participate.   The first two items were clearly about education.  The first was about an article entitled "A Teacher Falls In Love, Over and over" and the second was about the "opt out" provision for parents to prevent the military recruiters from having personal information about their children.



AN EDUCATION LEADER ON NCLB will connect you with an interesting piece entitled "Zen and the Art of Bill's Philosophy" from District Administration, a professional journal for superintendents and the like.  It focuses on a many who has been regional superintendent in Vermont for 23 years.



GEORGE LUCAS -EDUCATION NOT STAR WARS introduces readers to Edutopia and the work of the George Lucas Educational Foundation (for which Edutopia is the primary informational outlet).  It  includes an extract from the latest issue to whet your appetites.  If you don't know about GLEF, this is your chance to find out and sign up for free.



What's wrong with Education??? is the text of a post to the Assessment reform network by George Sheridan, who gave me permission to post it on dailykos.   George is a teacher in California, and a union rep, who is quite articulate about the problems teachers and schools really face.

HIGH STANDARDS from Virginia was posted May 4.  It is also the result of a post on the Assessment reform network, this from a woman who is a former Virginia teacher of the year, but is posting in her capacity as parent of a middle school student.  it is well worth the read, even if I say so.

If you truly care about education was my attempt to provide a brief annotated list of some online resources about education.  Anyone with a serious interest in education policy should know these sites.

Responsibility, posted May 11, is my reaction to a posting on an educational listserv about the issue of affixing blame and responsibility.  I explain within the piece, which was my response back on list, why it is relevant to issues of education and of testing.

Testing Insanity gets even worse? is largely the text and background of a press release on a really absurd situation that occurred in Washington State.  Perhaps one can respond with a sardonic laugh or comment, but it is illustrative of what we doing destructively to our schools and our students.

Education -- You won't believe  -- or will you ?? has selections from four articles on education, the first from Texas about Sandy Kress, a major influence on Bush and the creation of No Child Left Behind, the other three being from a variety of Virginia publications.   All four articles are worth the read, and the diary will give you a sense of each.  You may have seen this one, since it made the recommended list.NOTED link has been corrected

being a teacher - some end of year good and bad are my personal reflections as I approached the end of this school year.  You may or may not find it relevant, but it will give you a sense of how I operate, and what matters to me.

And now ... reflections & questions is another personal reflection.  I drafted it as I begin this my 60th year, and posted it in the early hours of May 23, my 59th birthday.   Since my vocation is as a teacher, personal reflections are inevitably connected with my life at school.  THis piece is very personal.

Need a Tutor?  Call India was also posted on May 23.  It is about a phenomenon of outsourcing in education.  The implications are scary, given that one part of NCLB is the transfer of federal education funds to provide tutoring for students in schools that fail to meet Annual Yearly Progress.  This one is not all that long, and it is an issue about which we should be watchful.

PEN Public Education Network provided some selections from the weekly email from the Public Education Network, which is an invaluable source for anyone interested in education, providing not only links for news articles, but also things like sources of funding for teachers and schools, etc.  Take a look, and if you have any interest, I point you at how you too can sign up for this weekly Newsblast.

Finally, Memorable teacher(s) - whom do you remember?.  This was inspired by a visit yesterday to my alma mater, Haverford College, for a glee club reunion, where we were conducted by the long time 928 years) choral director at the College, Bill Reese, now 95 years old.  I give my memories of four teachers, one high school and three at Haverford, who had a huge influence on me, and I encourage others to offer their memories in the comments.   Some of those, such as that by Plutonium Page, are by themselves worth the read.  This was on the recommended list for several hours, and has over 90 comments, most of which I promise are not by me.



If you care about education, posted on April 16, gives an explanation of the Public Education Network, with some samples from that week's electronic newsletter.   This is a good resources for those that want an easy way of following major issues in educational policy.



Some education resources, posted April 18, contains some selections without comment from the newsletter of the Coalition for Essential Schools, and organization based on the work of Ted Sizer.



warning about a new "report" on teachers  was posted on April 19.  This is the diary in this group most likely to have been read, as it was on the recommended list for about 24 hours.  It addressed a report issued by the Progressive Policy Institute with which I found a number of problems, but which since it was getting some publicity was important to discuss.  I will note that for this diary the discussion in the comments is worth taking the time to read perhaps in its entirety.  WARNING  -- there are over 300 comments, and the thread stayed active for several days.



commercializing all of education? explores the decision of the US Department of Education to defund the work of the Eisenhower  National Clearing House for Mathematics and Science Education.  It is based on an email bulletin from Eschool News online  -  another valuable resource on educational issues, and was posted on April 20th.  This is a diary you may well not have seen.



Teachers and the law was also posted on April 20, and similarly scrolled by without much action.  It contains information from the Reach Every Child website of Alan Haskvitz, and contains information that may prove useful to some on this list



Don't let my critics in explores a conflict at George Mason University.  Posted on April 27, it includes selections from the online column the day before by Jay Mathews, principal education writer for the Washington Post.  It shows how even in education people on the right (in this case Checker Finn) are unwilling to have meetings where those who oppose their views (in this case Jerry Bracey) are even allowed to attend.



What does it mean to be a teacher? A reflection on what life as a teacher is like, from my perspective as a high school social studies teacher.  Posted March 20. As I note in the intro,

The least of the problems is a response on the issue of cheating on tests required by the Federal "No Child Left Behind" (NCLB) law.  It was an extended version of something I began as a comment on another thread, and includes a quotation from Walt Haney's magnificent analysis of how the so-called Texas Miracle in education was actually the result of cooking the books in other ways.  I believe this diary provides a good summary of some of the issues confronting public education, and I asked people what they were doing to help save public education.



Do you REALLY want to read THIS diary?, posted March 31, was my reflection on the process of National Board certification for teachers, written just after I had completed my last part, the Assessment Center Testing.  Like many of my diaries, it is very much of a personal reflection and analysis, but perhaps may give some insight into the process.



Saving Public Education - Saving Democracy largely consists of a statement posted with permission by five researchers in education, E. Wayne Ross, Kathleen Kesson, David Gabbard, Sandra Mathison, & Kevin D. Vinson.  I felt it was very much on point as to what is really at stake in some of the battles currently going on in the field of public education policy.



Education and "The Mighty Wurlitzer"  is the title I place on a piece by well known education writer Gerald Bracey, who gave me permission to post a piece he had written on how the right manipulates public discourse on education.



F for Assessment - today's education diary was posted on April 3.  It contains selections and analysis by me of an article by Jim Popham, noted expert and former president of AERA, on how our current program of assessment is badly flawed.



Cheapskate Conservatives Cheat Students, posted April 4, takes you through a few selections of an article by that title written by Richard Rothstein, who used to write the education column in the NY Times.



Teacher quality and NBPTS certification posted April 5, takes the reader through an article by Andy Rotherham originally published in Education Week .  As one who had been undergoing the NBPTS process, I thought it worthwhile to consider his points and offer a brief response of my own.



More than an exit exam? offers selections from a report strongly recommending the use of multiple measures to determine high school graduation, with as usual a few personal comments by me.  The piece itself comes from the School Reform network based at Stanford, and the best-known of the authors is Linda Darling-Hammond.



The loss of hope? , written on April 10 as I sat in a Starbucks with my wife, is only partially about education.  It is an explanation of why I keep teaching even as I can hold out little hope that anything I do will make any kind of difference on big picture issues. Perhaps as much as anything, it is a self-exploration shared with the community.



Fed Educ Law Causes Cheating? discusses a new report done by Nichols and Berliner on behalf of the Great Lakes Center.  Includes executive summary of report.



Bush Proposed Education Cuts relying  on an analysis originally prepared by National School Boards Association, the information passed on by Fairtest provides a detailed look at what Bush's budget would do to Federal support of education



Among School Children, Class Size Does Matter an op ed I wrote a number of years ago that appeared in a now-defunct chain of suburban DC papers, in their Montgomery and PG editions.  This piece was also picked up by a number of email services.  it represents my musings on how the issue of class size can be explained.



A Teacher's View - the Real Battleground This includes some musings on my own teaching, which serves as the basis for my concern that the kind of teaching I can do now is under real threat, and ultimately challenges readers  -- what will they do to support public education?  This diary stayed on the recommended list for the better part of 24 hours.



EDUCATION: If you oppose NCLB, read this is based on an item enclosed in a email I received from an educational listserv.  I had the author's permission to post the email, which describes a forum of progressive educators that "agenda of promoting a progressive, democratic vision of public education that supports the good work many schools are doing while pushing the public policy agenda in a direction counter to the current prevailing wisdom."   The organization is funded in part by Soros.  I encourage people to explore it.



So who knows what something means? starts with a tale about how the author of a piece used in a standardized test who discusses real problems with the questions used  and the answers accepted.  I then go into an extended set of remarks of my own about the problems with the kinds of testing we are now doing.



What is a good teacher? offers for your reading the text of a piece of that title by Alan Haskvitz, an award-winning teacher (his cv blew me away) .  I was glad to see that many of the traits he discusses others find in me.



IMPORTANT - 3 Articles on Education  describes 3 important commentary pieces, by Nel Noddings, Ronald S. Byrnes, and John Merrow, that appeared in a single issue of Education Week .  I provide extracts from each article, a wee bit of my own commentary and background on the authors, and encourage others to go read the pieces.



But is it SCIENTIFIC? discusses in detail a symposium on educational research,  that were available on line,  from Teachers College Record .  The symposium was framed around a set of questions, which I provided in a blockquote in the diary, and which I do so here:





.  This was actually my second diary on the same subject, because the first one, an important TCR for educational issues, scrolled by so quickly.  



on the finances of public school education was actually originally written as a comment way down on another diary.  I offer some details about systems I know here in Washington, and invited others to participate in a dialog, which ultimately got 23 comments.



How the Right will kill Public Education used a story in the Charlotte Observer about the possibility of granting tuition tax credits for attendance at public schools.   This diary provoked a lengthy discussion, with 233 comments.



Thoughts on a teacher's week was cross-posted from my own blog because I wanted some feedback, and I don't get many comments on my own blog.  It uses some of the events from a week in my classroom to talk about teaching, but also about more.



so how many kossacks are teachers? included a poll, and got a number of us to offer some information about our own roles in the world of education



I hope this diary has been of use to at least some readers.

Okay, it doesn't sound sexy like the Motorcycle diaries, and I sincerely doubt it will be turned into a movie, especially as I am not as appealing as a young Che Guevara.  Since I go by the name of Teacherken, I am expected (and often do) post on issues of education.  Periodically I provide a cumulative diary like this on Dailykos, which will enable newcomers and/or interested parties to see all of what I have post in one annotated list.  Thus readers will have one link on which they can click to find anything I have written in diary form at Dailykos about education since December 22, 2004.   Some of these diaries got lots of traffic, others did not.  You can decided on your own what if any value THIS diary offers you.  



NOTE:  some of the imbedded links to publications may have expired.<br.<br>

ALSO NOTE: some of these diaries were also posted here, but for convenience sake all links are to the versions at Dailykos.




HERE'S THE LIST.



what was your favorite subject in school reached #2 on the recommended list on Saturday July 30. The primary focus is an article from the St. Petersburg (FL) Times (one of the great papers in the nation) about how electives are being eliminated or cut back in order to provide more time to prepare for mandatory tests in reading. I offer a fair amount of commentary of my own. The thread is mixed, with a lot of poster limiting themselves to the question in the title, but many choosing to explore the implications for them had they not had access to electives, and still more talking about the various policy implications caused by the testing requirements of NCLB and the need to ensure that all students can read. There are 152 comments, many extended and thoughtful.



NCLB problems not solutions was a diary on July 26 that flew by with little comment or notice. As I wrote at the time

First I will discuss the problem of high qualified teachers, a requirement under the Law.  Next I will refer to a somewhat related column about teacher compensation that appeared on the front page of the metro section of the July 26 Washington Post.  Finally I will discuss the issue of supplementary services (tutoring), focusing in particular on an article in the July 25 Baltimore Sun.  Throughout I will offer my own analysis and commentary.

Some thoughts on testing and education is a July 21 piece on three different items about the topics in the title of the diary, two from Seattle and one a column by Bob Herbert of the NY Times. As usual, I provide some selections from each of the pieces (while I encourage you to read the entire piece) and provide some additional commentary of my own.



Slashing Fed Support 4 Gifted Education, posted July 19, works off a story in the Washington Post on the slashing of funding for the Javits Center for Gifted Education. It is an example of the shortsightedness of this administration’s approach to the funding of education, and something of the hypocrisy of NCLB.



Rothstein (NOT Rove) on Educational Equity was posted July 15, It focuses on a conversation with Richard Rothstein, who was for a number of years the educational columnist for the NY Times. The conversation appeared in The Evaluation Exchange, a publication of the Harvard Family Research Project.



The Campaign for Educational Equity is a diary about a new approach being taken by Teachers College in NYC, led by its president Arthur Levine. The diary focuses on a piece first published in Teachers College Record back in May. The diary was posted on July 14. I happen to think it was deserving of more attention than the five comments it received. Take a look, and decide for yourself.



A Political Issue - Teacher Pay was the first of my pieces ever to be front-paged (on July 3 by Armando). It uses an article that appeared in the Long Beach (CA) Journal (and apparently elsewhere) as the starting point for a discussion of the educational implications of teacher pay and an exploration of the political issues involved. The diary parked a fascinating discussion of 255 comments.




HOW NCLB ENRICHES BUSH CRONIES AND OTHERS has a self-explanatory title.  It is based on a report written by Gerald bracey and put out by the school of education at Arizona State University.  It gives specifics of individuals and companies that are benefiting rom NCLB while showing their contacts with the Bush family and the President. I provide a link to download (PDF) the entire report.


BILL MOYERS:  "A MORAL TRANSACTION" is about Public television.  This is related since public tv started as educational tv -- our local station in DC is WETA, founded as  (Greater) Washington Educational Television  Association.  Moyers paid himself for a two page spread in the Washington Post to present his defense of the purposes of public education.  He was involved with the founding of public broadcasting, and has been a powerful advocate for its independence.


SOMETHING GOOD & EXCITING IN PHILADELPHIA is about a new charter high school  opening this Fall and dedicated to peace studies and conflict resolution.  It includes the organizers request for mentors for each of the students.  I wanted people aware of what good things could be done under charter school legislation, and to let those people close enough to get involved about the opportunity to participate.


Three Things TO THINK ABOUT put together information from three emails I had received from different lists in which I participate.   The first two items were clearly about education.  The first was about an article entitled "A Teacher Falls In Love, Over and over" and the second was about the "opt out" provision for parents to prevent the military recruiters from having personal information about their children.


AN EDUCATION LEADER ON NCLB will connect you with an interesting piece entitled "Zen and the Art of Bill's Philosophy" from District Administration, a professional journal for superintendents and the like.  It focuses on a many who has been regional superintendent in Vermont for 23 years.


GEORGE LUCAS -EDUCATION NOT STAR WARS introduces readers to Edutopia and the work of the George Lucas Educational Foundation (for which Edutopia is the primary informational outlet).  It  includes an extract from the latest issue to whet your appetites.  If you don't know about GLEF, this is your chance to find out and sign up for free.


What's wrong with Education??? is the text of a post to the Assessment reform network by George Sheridan, who gave me permission to post it on dailykos.   George is a teacher in California, and a union rep, who is quite articulate about the problems teachers and schools really face.

HIGH STANDARDS from Virginia was posted May 4.  It is also the result of a post on the Assessment reform network, this from a woman who is a former Virginia teacher of the year, but is posting in her capacity as parent of a middle school student.  it is well worth the read, even if I say so.

If you truly care about education was my attempt to provide a brief annotated list of some online resources about education.  Anyone with a serious interest in education policy should know these sites.

Responsibility, posted May 11, is my reaction to a posting on an educational listserv about the issue of affixing blame and responsibility.  I explain within the piece, which was my response back on list, why it is relevant to issues of education and of testing.

Testing Insanity gets even worse? is largely the text and background of a press release on a really absurd situation that occurred in Washington State.  Perhaps one can respond with a sardonic laugh or comment, but it is illustrative of what we doing destructively to our schools and our students.

Education -- You won't believe  -- or will you ?? has selections from four articles on education, the first from Texas about Sandy Kress, a major influence on Bush and the creation of No Child Left Behind, the other three being from a variety of Virginia publications.   All four articles are worth the read, and the diary will give you a sense of each.  You may have seen this one, since it made the recommended list.NOTED link has been corrected

being a teacher - some end of year good and bad are my personal reflections as I approached the end of this school year.  You may or may not find it relevant, but it will give you a sense of how I operate, and what matters to me.

And now ... reflections & questions is another personal reflection.  I drafted it as I begin this my 60th year, and posted it in the early hours of May 23, my 59th birthday.   Since my vocation is as a teacher, personal reflections are inevitably connected with my life at school.  THis piece is very personal.

Need a Tutor?  Call India was also posted on May 23.  It is about a phenomenon of outsourcing in education.  The implications are scary, given that one part of NCLB is the transfer of federal education funds to provide tutoring for students in schools that fail to meet Annual Yearly Progress.  This one is not all that long, and it is an issue about which we should be watchful.

PEN Public Education Network provided some selections from the weekly email from the Public Education Network, which is an invaluable source for anyone interested in education, providing not only links for news articles, but also things like sources of funding for teachers and schools, etc.  Take a look, and if you have any interest, I point you at how you too can sign up for this weekly Newsblast.

Finally, Memorable teacher(s) - whom do you remember?.  This was inspired by a visit yesterday to my alma mater, Haverford College, for a glee club reunion, where we were conducted by the long time 928 years) choral director at the College, Bill Reese, now 95 years old.  I give my memories of four teachers, one high school and three at Haverford, who had a huge influence on me, and I encourage others to offer their memories in the comments.   Some of those, such as that by Plutonium Page, are by themselves worth the read.  This was on the recommended list for several hours, and has over 90 comments, most of which I promise are not by me.


If you care about education, posted on April 16, gives an explanation of the Public Education Network, with some samples from that week's electronic newsletter.   This is a good resources for those that want an easy way of following major issues in educational policy.


Some education resources, posted April 18, contains some selections without comment from the newsletter of the Coalition for Essential Schools, and organization based on the work of Ted Sizer.


warning about a new "report" on teachers  was posted on April 19.  This is the diary in this group most likely to have been read, as it was on the recommended list for about 24 hours.  It addressed a report issued by the Progressive Policy Institute with which I found a number of problems, but which since it was getting some publicity was important to discuss.  I will note that for this diary the discussion in the comments is worth taking the time to read perhaps in its entirety.  WARNING  -- there are over 300 comments, and the thread stayed active for several days.


commercializing all of education? explores the decision of the US Department of Education to defund the work of the Eisenhower  National Clearing House for Mathematics and Science Education.  It is based on an email bulletin from Eschool News online  -  another valuable resource on educational issues, and was posted on April 20th.  This is a diary you may well not have seen.


Teachers and the law was also posted on April 20, and similarly scrolled by without much action.  It contains information from the Reach Every Child website of Alan Haskvitz, and contains information that may prove useful to some on this list


Don't let my critics in explores a conflict at George Mason University.  Posted on April 27, it includes selections from the online column the day before by Jay Mathews, principal education writer for the Washington Post.  It shows how even in education people on the right (in this case Checker Finn) are unwilling to have meetings where those who oppose their views (in this case Jerry Bracey) are even allowed to attend.


What does it mean to be a teacher? A reflection on what life as a teacher is like, from my perspective as a high school social studies teacher.  Posted March 20. As I note in the intro,

The least of the problems is a response on the issue of cheating on tests required by the Federal "No Child Left Behind" (NCLB) law.  It was an extended version of something I began as a comment on another thread, and includes a quotation from Walt Haney's magnificent analysis of how the so-called Texas Miracle in education was actually the result of cooking the books in other ways.  I believe this diary provides a good summary of some of the issues confronting public education, and I asked people what they were doing to help save public education.


Do you REALLY want to read THIS diary?, posted March 31, was my reflection on the process of National Board certification for teachers, written just after I had completed my last part, the Assessment Center Testing.  Like many of my diaries, it is very much of a personal reflection and analysis, but perhaps may give some insight into the process.


Saving Public Education - Saving Democracy largely consists of a statement posted with permission by five researchers in education, E. Wayne Ross, Kathleen Kesson, David Gabbard, Sandra Mathison, & Kevin D. Vinson.  I felt it was very much on point as to what is really at stake in some of the battles currently going on in the field of public education policy.


Education and "The Mighty Wurlitzer"  is the title I place on a piece by well known education writer Gerald Bracey, who gave me permission to post a piece he had written on how the right manipulates public discourse on education.


F for Assessment - today's education diary was posted on April 3.  It contains selections and analysis by me of an article by Jim Popham, noted expert and former president of AERA, on how our current program of assessment is badly flawed.


Cheapskate Conservatives Cheat Students, posted April 4, takes you through a few selections of an article by that title written by Richard Rothstein, who used to write the education column in the NY Times.


Teacher quality and NBPTS certification posted April 5, takes the reader through an article by Andy Rotherham originally published in Education Week .  As one who had been undergoing the NBPTS process, I thought it worthwhile to consider his points and offer a brief response of my own.


More than an exit exam? offers selections from a report strongly recommending the use of multiple measures to determine high school graduation, with as usual a few personal comments by me.  The piece itself comes from the School Reform network based at Stanford, and the best-known of the authors is Linda Darling-Hammond.


The loss of hope? , written on April 10 as I sat in a Starbucks with my wife, is only partially about education.  It is an explanation of why I keep teaching even as I can hold out little hope that anything I do will make any kind of difference on big picture issues. Perhaps as much as anything, it is a self-exploration shared with the community.


Fed Educ Law Causes Cheating? discusses a new report done by Nichols and Berliner on behalf of the Great Lakes Center.  Includes executive summary of report.


Bush Proposed Education Cuts relying  on an analysis originally prepared by National School Boards Association, the information passed on by Fairtest provides a detailed look at what Bush's budget would do to Federal support of education


Among School Children, Class Size Does Matter an op ed I wrote a number of years ago that appeared in a now-defunct chain of suburban DC papers, in their Montgomery and PG editions.  This piece was also picked up by a number of email services.  it represents my musings on how the issue of class size can be explained.


A Teacher's View - the Real Battleground This includes some musings on my own teaching, which serves as the basis for my concern that the kind of teaching I can do now is under real threat, and ultimately challenges readers  -- what will they do to support public education?  This diary stayed on the recommended list for the better part of 24 hours.


EDUCATION: If you oppose NCLB, read this is based on an item enclosed in a email I received from an educational listserv.  I had the author's permission to post the email, which describes a forum of progressive educators that "agenda of promoting a progressive, democratic vision of public education that supports the good work many schools are doing while pushing the public policy agenda in a direction counter to the current prevailing wisdom."   The organization is funded in part by Soros.  I encourage people to explore it.


So who knows what something means? starts with a tale about how the author of a piece used in a standardized test who discusses real problems with the questions used  and the answers accepted.  I then go into an extended set of remarks of my own about the problems with the kinds of testing we are now doing.


What is a good teacher? offers for your reading the text of a piece of that title by Alan Haskvitz, an award-winning teacher (his cv blew me away) .  I was glad to see that many of the traits he discusses others find in me.


IMPORTANT - 3 Articles on Education  describes 3 important commentary pieces, by Nel Noddings, Ronald S. Byrnes, and John Merrow, that appeared in a single issue of Education Week .  I provide extracts from each article, a wee bit of my own commentary and background on the authors, and encourage others to go read the pieces.


But is it SCIENTIFIC? discusses in detail a symposium on educational research,  that were available on line,  from Teachers College Record .  The symposium was framed around a set of questions, which I provided in a blockquote in the diary, and which I do so here:



.  This was actually my second diary on the same subject, because the first one, an important TCR for educational issues, scrolled by so quickly.  


on the finances of public school education was actually originally written as a comment way down on another diary.  I offer some details about systems I know here in Washington, and invited others to participate in a dialog, which ultimately got 23 comments.


How the Right will kill Public Education used a story in the Charlotte Observer about the possibility of granting tuition tax credits for attendance at public schools.   This diary provoked a lengthy discussion, with 233 comments.


Thoughts on a teacher's week was cross-posted from my own blog because I wanted some feedback, and I don't get many comments on my own blog.  It uses some of the events from a week in my classroom to talk about teaching, but also about more.


so how many kossacks are teachers? included a poll, and got a number of us to offer some information about our own roles in the world of education


I hope this diary has been of use to at least some readers.