The Parent Power movement is growing by leaps and bounds. Still, our so-called “leaders” are employing a variety of methods to stave off the inevitable. Embattled leaders seldom read their situations accurately. Hubris is a blinding malady, and the Republican leaders in the Florida legislature are blind indeed.

Aptly named Florida House Rep. Marlene O’Toole, the House Education Committee chair, essentially told everyone listening (and there were lots of us) that Opting Out is not an option, and that if we didn’t like it, to just go enroll our kids in private schools. Said O’Toole to reporters after the committee held one of its infamous predetermined outcome meetings Friday:

“In public school … you cannot opt out of the tests,”  “Every child must have a test. As a parent, if I don’t want to do that … I have the option to take my child and put them in a private school.”

First off, why did she choose to use the first person in her blithering statement? O’Toole, born February 18, 1945, definitely does not have any children in a Florida public school. That alone is a huge problem. We have an entire corps of corporatizers and their cronies attempting to run over the will of school parents across the state of Florida, and they have zero stake in public schools whatsoever other than imploding the entire system in order to line their pockets.

Secondly, she said, “Every child must have a test.” We’re not talking about a test. We’re talking about a very shitty test. We’re talking about too many tests. We’re talking about public education being hijacked by tests.

Back to that pocket-lining thing:

Let’s examine O’Toole:  According to Lauren Ritchie of the Orlando Sentinel, O’Toole admitted that she violated Florida’s ethics laws back in March of this year, but not before a lengthy bout of bullshit on her part. The law she broke is the one that requires a lawmaker to disclose when voting on a measure that will put money in his or her own pocket. O’Toole voted several times to give public money to the “nonprofit” organization Take Stock in Children while in its employ. So-called “nonprofits,” especially the sort that employ political cronies to serve as officers or members of their boards, often serve as little more than big salary vehicles for the influential. In O’Toole’s case (how I love her perfect name!) she was on the payroll to the tune of $50,000 while voting on acts to give the same organization money. That makes her a criminal.

To be clear, Florida isn’t exactly a government ethics rules powerhouse. In fact, Florida has some of the most pitiful ethics rules in the whole country. You have to be a real screw-up to violate them, and violate them she did. She wasn’t even required to sit out the vote; she just had to be honest about her dealings with Take Stock in Children. She chose the opposite.  That makes her an abject liar.

Lawmakin’ Legg

State senator John Legg says that we ought to just get over it. Seriously, there are very few Florida politicians who come even remotely close to him in being artfully deceitful. Every dog has his day. His day is coming. Ol’ JohnnyBoy, like his good buddie Richie Corcoran over in the Florida House, stands to make a whole lot of money if he and his charter chums can just get Florida public education to collapse under the weight of all the assessments they have imposed. Regarding Florida’s school grading sham-scam, Johnny says that the legislature’s hands are tied because it can’t vote until January, and Pam Stewart’s Department of Miseducation is bound by statute to issue school grades in December.  Are we to believe that the legislature has tied its own hands, in effect forbidding itself from prescribing an antidote to this latest legislative clusterfuck? Johnny wants us to.  This guy is so full of audacious pretentiousness that he can’t see the peasants, oops, parents gathering pitchforks and axe handles.

Stewart the Stool

Truth be told, Stewart herself is flouting her own responsibility in this big rotten mess. She has played the part of innocent observer for most of the duration of the FSA saga, loathe to utter a word before first checking with her corporatizing handlers in the legislature. She’s a fit and proper toad, and takes ass-kissing for fun and profit to an entirely new level. With administrative law authority, she has the power to cite gross irregularities in both the content and administration of last year’s FSA debacle and declare it too unsound to base school grades on. That is her authority.  She won’t do that, however, because the scoundrels in the legislature need someone to point their fingers at when they say that they are powerless to fix this massive fuck-up.   Towards the end of the kangaroo court education committee hearing today, you can see Reggie Fullwood’s surprise when O’Toole brazenly takes the floor from Stewart and issues her own stupefying rant of anti-Opt Out rhetoric. When she was finished, Stewart laid a big verbal smooch right on usurper O’Toole’s backside, as if she really needed to prove to us just who she takes her orders from.

It also turns out that Stewart and her fellow minions had a look at the recent “validity study” and were able to make suggestions about the final product before it was issued to the peasants (damn!) public. That alone ought to invalidate the whole charade. Where in God’s name is the Department of Justice? I guess in the case of Florida, it would be the FDLE, and it’s quite obvious to any casual observer that those folks don’t bother with government.

It Damn Sure Ain’t Over

O’Toole, like most overconfident despots, seemed to foolishly believe that she had, in all her capital-criminal might, put the matter to rest once and for all, and actually issued a sort of admonition to the rest of the committee that, (after a nauseating mono-drone-on-and-on-blah-blah-blah-listen-to-me-talk-soliloquy) “Cause dat’s what we have to say as a group.”

Cindy Hamilton, the mother of an Orange County high school senior and the leader of Opt Out Orlando, disputed the officials’ arguments that refusing the tests is illegal.

From Politico Florida:

Students’ participation in the testing is required by law, she said. But parents who have joined the protest have largely instructed their children to sit for the test — thereby participating — and simply refuse to answer any questions.

Hamilton said the opt-out movement is a form of civil disobedience, and that “we are not asking permission.”

“Basically what she said was, ‘Comply or get out,’” Hamilton said. “That’s a threat to all citizens of Florida. Public schools belong to the public, and we’re going to take our schools back. We’re not planning to leave.”

If you are a public school parent and you share our revulsion at a state government that is bent beyond redemption on testing your child’s school right out of existence, then go to The Florida Opt Out Network and get in the fight! The testing terrorists are on the ropes and they’re starting to squirm in their big, cushy, leather committee chairs.

PW-Withering is a writer for ConversationED. Check out PW’s website here for more edgy commentary on education issues.

http://thewitheringapple.com

I have written many resumes over the years. However, I have sorted through hundreds more in my career. Some were really bad, most were average, and very few knocked my socks off. But I did take notice of the ones that stood out and I identified key components that all awesome resumes have in common.

One thing to remember when constructing your resume, is that resume building is a skill that must be practiced again and again. So if you’re a high school or college student, who’s just starting out, or if you’re someone getting back into the workforce after a long hiatus, these small but impactful practices go a long way when beginning the resume process.

1. Forget the objective. Don’t put an objective line at the top of your resume or anywhere on your resume for that matter. The act of sending your resume to an employer or to a college is your objective. For example, let’s say you’re sending your resume to obtain a position as a summer camp counselor. Putting the objective: to obtain a position as a camp counselor, is slightly redundant don’t you think? We get it; you want to be a camp counselor. That’s why you’re applying for the job.

2. Use words from the job description in your resume.  Many companies and organizations use automated resume sorting software. Basically, a robot is most likely reading through the hundreds, and sometimes thousands, of resumes at the company where you want to work. That robot selects resumes that have key words from the job description. Only then does the resume get to the boss. So use words from the job description! For example, if the job description says they are looking for someone to organize systems or someone who is meticulous with details, put that in your resume – those exact words. Then the robot will put you in the pile for the boss to read.

3. Tailor your resume. People often make the mistake of using one resume for multiple jobs. You need a different resume for each job you are applying for. Each resume doesn’t have to be completely different. However, if you are following the tip in number two above you need different resumes with different key words. Think about the robot!

4. Have someone, other than you, proof your resume. When you are working on something for a long time, you get used to the mistakes and miss them. In fact, I have come across many resumes with silly grammar and spelling errors. Everyone makes silly grammar and spelling errors. That’s why it’s important to have someone, other than you, proof your writing – preferably, someone who knows how to spell.

5. Spend time. Don’t write your resume in one day. Let it sit for a day and go back to it. I bet you’ll find things you want to change. Time makes things better, especially writing. Give your resume a day and revisit it.

6. Be proud. When writing your resume, get into the frame of mind that you are awesome and this is your chance to show prospective employers how awesome you are. Maybe listen to Beyonce or watch your favorite home run or touchdown before you start your resume. Whatever you need to do, get pumped to show that robot you’re amazing.

If you’re interested in more information about courses we will be offering related to resume building, please click the link below and we will send you a building a badass resume checklist.

Get the Awesome Resume Checklist HERE!

For many, the term “community schools” conjures up the idea of schools as the hub of the town, with experienced principals and credentialed career teachers. We think of these schools as designed for the public good, with strong PTAs, afterschool programs, and health screenings which include a school nurse.

Most important, the community, we assume, owns these schools. They should be public in the truest sense of the word with plenty of electives including the arts and sports. With luck, community schools stay open into the evening with course offerings for adults and students! They are overseen by strong, involved school boards, we think.

Some of us might remember our own public schools as community schools when we were young. Others think their schools needed help. But all of us probably agree that community schools should be schools the community gets behind and is proud of—a source of support for families and the town or city.

The elephant in the room with community schools is…you guessed it…racial diversity. Unless the surrounding neighborhood is multicultural, community schools run the risk of being segregated.

Also, many parents might be scratching their heads. They have not forgotten the closure of what they believed used to be their community public schools. They might wonder if they will be getting their old schools back.

So, aside from the problem with integration, or the lack of it, upon hearing the term community schools, it is easy to get a warm fuzzy feeling that something good is happening in education. Maybe the tide is turning. Perhaps too, our neighborhoods are changing when it comes to ethnicity.

Alas, however, upon examining today’s term “community schools,” one realizes quickly, that they are usually charter schools.

Here is the Ohio definition of community schools.

Community schools, often called charter schools in other states, are public nonprofit, nonsectarian schools that operate independently of any school district but under a contract with an authorized sponsoring entity that is established by statute or approved by the State Board of Education. Community schools are public schools of choice and are state and federally funded.

If they aren’t charters, they are poor traditional public schools relying on some business in the community to keep the school afloat. Chances are it will only be time before they are turned into a charter. Some choice.

The mention of public-private ownership whenever community schools are mentioned, gives it away. Certainly private business has an interest in supporting local public schools. They should donate to them to help them thrive. But public schools should not be so poor that the community must rely on outsiders to keep the school open.

Public-private partnerships implies more than volunteerism. It involves ownership. We know ownership means business will run the schools—even possibly make a profit off them. They will also drive career teachers and reputable principals and superintendents out of the system. They will claim they are too costly.

In some places charter schools have turned into for-profit businesses with stocks trading on Wall Street. How does this make it a community school?

Certainly, there are charters that are run by sincere individuals doing good work. Those aren’t the charter schools I refer to. And if the ECAA passes with wraparound health services that would be a good thing. However, there is uncertainty with that part of the bill.

Also, many public schools used to offer wraparound services. They had school nurses and health screenings. Poor children usually had access to primary health and dental care. Who will monitor whether children get those services in their charter schools? Real public schools should still be able to offer those services.

The main lobbying group for community schools is the Coalition of Community Schools. It is troubling upon studying their website that anyone can start a community school. And they mention “personalized learning” which has become a euphemism for online instruction. Will the new community schools eventually be like the online Rocketship charter schools?

It is also interesting that they talk little about teachers on their website.

A traditional public school is a real community school. It is a school that rejects no one. It has legitimate career teachers and principals.

So hearing all the hype about community schools in the new Every Child Achieves Act is deceptive, because when most of us think of community schools we are dreaming of something different than charter schools. I don’t know about you, but I don’t like bologna.

Nancy Bailey is an education activist and a former special education teacher.  Her book is titled Misguided Education Reform: Debating the Impact on Students.  Her blog is http://nancyebailey.com. Catch up with her on twitter @NancyEBailley1

Citation Link:

Baron, Kathryn. “Senate Bill Keeps After-School and Community Schools in ESEA.” Education Week. July 17, 2015.

Some facts:

No Child Left Behind (NCLB) is a disaster.

It took the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA) – a federal law designed to ensure all schools get equitable resources and funding – and turned it into a law about standardized testing and punishing schools that don’t measure up.

This was a Republican policy proposed by President George W. Bush.
But now that the ESEA is being rewritten, those pushing to keep the same horrendous Bush era policies are the Democrats.

Almost all of the Democrats!

That includes so-called far left Dems like Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren!

It comes down to the Murphy Amendment, a Democratically sponsored change to the ESEA.

This provision was an attempt to keep as many Test and Punish policies as possible in the Senate rewrite.

The amendment, “reads more like NCLB, with its detailed prescription for reporting on student test results, for ‘meaningfully differentiating among all public schools’ (i.e., grading schools), including publicly identifying the lowest five percent, and, among interventions, potentially firing staff and offering students the option to transfer to other schools and using part of the budget to pay for the transportation,” according to blogger Mercedes Schneider.

Education historian Diane Ravich adds, “This amendment would have enacted tough, federal-mandated accountability, akin to setting up an ‘achievement school district’ in every state.”

Thankfully it was voted down. The ESEA will probably not be affected. The rewrite was passed by both the House and Senate without these provisions. Once the two versions of the bill are combined, it is quite possible – maybe even probable – that we’ll have a slight improvement on NCLB. Sure there is plenty of crap in it and plenty of lost opportunities, but the ESEA rewrite looks to be a baby step in the right direction.

The problem is this: the failed Murphy Amendment shows the Democrats’ education vision. Almost all of them voted for it. Warren even co-sponsored it!

When it was defeated and the Senate approved the ESEA rewrite, Warren released a statement expressing her disapproval. But if you didn’t know about the Murphy Amendment, you could have read her criticisms quite differently.

She says the (ESEA rewrite) “eliminates basic, fundamental safeguards to ensure that federal dollars are actually used to improve both schools and educational outcomes for those students who are often ignored.”

That sounds good until you realize what she means. “Educational outcomes” mean test scores. She’s talking about test-based accountability. She is against the ESEA rewrite because it doesn’t necessarily put strings on schools’ funding based on standardized test scores like NCLB.

She continues, “Republicans have blocked every attempt to establish even minimum safeguards to ensure that money would be used effectively. I am deeply concerned that billions in taxpayer dollars will not actually reach those schools and students who need them the most…”

She is upset because Republicans repeatedly stripped away federal power to Test and Punish schools. The GOP gave that power to the states. So Warren is concerned that somewhere in this great nation there may be a state or two that decides NOT to take away funding if some of their schools have bad test scores! God forbid!

And Warren’s about as far left as they come!

What about liberal lion Bernie Sanders? I’d sure like an explanation for his vote.

It makes me wonder if when he promised to “end No Child Left Behind,” did he mean the policies in the bill or just the name!?

The Democrats seem to be committed to the notion that the only way to tell if a school is doing a good job is by reference to its test scores. High test scores – good school. Bad test scores – bad school.

This is baloney! Test scores show parental income, not academic achievement. Virtually every school with low test scores serves a majority of poor children. Virtually every school with high test scores serves rich kids.

Real school accountability would be something more akin to the original vision of the ESEA – making sure each district had what it needs to give kids the best education possible. This means at least equalizing funding to poverty schools so they have the same resources as wealthy ones. Even better would be ending our strange reliance on local property taxes to provide the majority of district monies.

But the Dems won’t hear it. The Murphy Amendment seems to show that they’re committed to punishing poor schools and rewarding rich ones.

I really hope I’m wrong about this. Please, anyone out there, talk me down!

Up until now I’ve always been with the Democrats because they had better – though still bad – education policies than the Republicans. I’m not sure I can say that anymore. In fact, it may be just the opposite.

Which party is most committed to ending Common Core? The Republicans!

Which party has championed reducing federal power over our schools and giving us a fighting chance at real education reforms? Republicans!

Which party more often champion’s parental rights over the state? Republicans!

Sure, most of them still love vouchers and charter schools. But increasingly so do the Democrats.

This vote has me rethinking everything.

Our country’s education voters may have just been abandoned by their longest ally.

Where do we go from here?

Steven Singer is an educator and blogger. His website is https://gadflyonthewallblog.wordpress.com and you can follow him on twitter @StevenSinger3

You could almost taste it.

The children filing into the classroom were mumbling to each other, gesticulating violently, pointing fingers.

And out of all that jumbled noise – like a TV showing a scrambled channel – only one word came through clearly.

Baltimore.

The bell rang its muffled cry – just another dissonant note lost in the chatter.

I held up my hands and began to quiet them.

But then stopped.

Exercises about vocabulary, analogies, sentence construction and figurative language waited patiently on the board. They’d have to wait until tomorrow.

There was something going on here more than just teenage drama. My middle school kids were shaken and upset. As a white teacher who presides over classes of mostly minority students, I shouldn’t have been surprised that the events in Baltimore would weigh heavily on their minds. They were on mine, too.

So I quieted my 8th graders with a question: “Are you talking about Baltimore?”

A collective shout of various disconnected assents.

“Who can tell me what’s happening there?” I asked.

They quieted and raised their hands.

We were back in school again.

They told me what they knew, which was surprisingly little. They knew people of color were rioting in Baltimore. They thought a black man had been shot.

I said, “He wasn’t shot. Does anyone know his name?”

No one did.

“Has anyone heard of Freddie Gray?” I asked.

None of them had. So I told them.

I told them that Gray was a 26-year-old black man in Baltimore who died under mysterious circumstances while in police custody. I told them he was arrested because he met an officer’s eye, got scared and ran. The police arrested him and found a knife on him.

I told them there was a cell phone video of Gray being arrested. He was being dragged to the police car screaming in pain. After about 30-45 minutes he was taken to the hospital. His spine was 80% severed from his neck. He had a bruised larynx and broken vertebrae. He eventually died from his injuries.

They wanted to see the video. At first I refused because I clung to some optimistic hope we might get back to my lesson plans. But one look at their eager faces and I gave in.

I have never heard them so silent. Never. They watched the video and an accompanying news report as if they were the about life and death. I guess they were.

Then we went around the room discussing what we’d seen and what it meant.

More than anything, I just let my kids talk.

You’d be amazed at what they had to say. Some highlights:

• It’s really hard to be a black person in America. Black people – especially boys – are being murdered by the police. They assume if you’re sagging your pants, you have a gun on you.

• White people can put their hair in cornrows and dress “ghetto” but when they change their hair back and put on different clothes, they’re still white. I can’t change my face. The police still look at me like I’m an animal and a criminal.

• Lot of boys I know sell drugs so they can support their mommas. It’s not for them. They want their mommas to have it easier. They do it out of respect for all their mommas have sacrificed to bring them up and feed them.

• There’s no such thing as race. It’s just a color. We’re all the same.

When it came to the riots, the class was sharply divided – and not on racial lines.

Some kids said that people rioting in Baltimore are being “trashy” and “ghetto.” They’re making black people look bad. “How does stealing the new Jordan’s help Freddie Gray?”

Others thought the violence was completely justified.

In fact, some of my girls were so angry they wanted to go to Baltimore and join the tumult. They were so mad, they wanted to ditch school and riot right here in Pennsylvania.

“This didn’t start with riots,” I told them. “It started with protests. Can someone tell me the difference?”

They calmed again and tried to answer the question.

We started to define both terms. We decide that a riot was chaos, unorganized and had no purpose. A protest was just the opposite – organized and purposeful.

The anger resurfaced.

“I don’t care, Mr. Singer!” a big girl in the back shouted. “They always be out to get us, and when it goes to court no one does nothing!”

I pointed in her direction and nodded. We talked about it. Many felt the same way. If you can’t trust the police and the courts, who can you trust?

I moved forward into the middle of the room.

“Dr. Martin Luther King said, ‘The arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends toward justice.’ Does anyone know what that means?”

We decoded it. We decided it meant that it might take a long time, but justice usually wins in the end.

I nodded. 

I asked them if Dr. King ever rioted. They said no. I asked them if Dr. King ever protested. They smiled and said yes.

We talked about the Civil Rights movement. We talked about how organized, peaceful protests won us many of the rights we have today. We talked about Mahatma Gandhi and how passive resistance won the country of India.

And then the talk changed.

No more talk of riots.

We talked about protests – what they looked like today and how they worked.

“I’m going to go down Main Street and protest this Sunday,” another girl said with tears in her eyes. “I have the right to think my thoughts and no one can stop me thinking them.”

Others mumbled agreement and said they’d go with her.

I asked her what she’d do – just march back and forth. She didn’t know. I told her about die-ins – how people would just drop to the ground and stay there to represent the people being murdered.

The class took it from there. They planned to do a die-in. They’d do it at the exact time Freddie Gray died. They’d bring signs that said “Black Lives Matter.”

I asked the girl who originated the idea if she went to church. She said she did. I told her she might want to tell them what she was planning. She should tell her parents. Maybe they’d join her.

She beamed. Her grandfather is a retired police officer and she thought he’d come along. She said she’d talk with her pastor Saturday.

All this in the space of 45 minutes. 

By the time the bell rang again, they were literally marching and singing “Protest!” as they walked off to lunch.

We never got to the planned lesson, but I’m not sure that matters.

Did I overstep my bounds as teacher?

I don’t think so. Something had to be done. These kids were hot. They wanted to tear something apart. But after our discussion they had an outlet, a plan.

Will they go through with it? I don’t know.

Frankly, that wasn’t the point. In the classroom, I’m not an organizer. I’m a teacher.

I’ve lost too many kids to the streets. Drugs, violence, neglect, juvenile detention.

“Promise me something,” I said in the middle of our discussion.

“Mr. Singer, it looks like your going to start crying,” one of them said awed and frightened.

“Please. Whatever you do, be safe,” I said.

“If a cop asks you to do something, you do it. Don’t run. Don’t yell and scream.”

“But, Mr. Singer!”

“Honey,” I interrupted, “I’m not saying to give up fighting for your rights. But you have to live long enough to tell your story. Freddie Gray isn’t around to have his day in court. Neither is Trayvon, Michael or Eric. You know what I mean?”

They nodded.

Teachers can’t make anyone to do anything.

The only thing they can do is get you to think.

I did that. I just hope it’s enough.

I’m never surprised when people point out how adorable she is. It’s as if they are sharing with me something as obvious as her gender. “You have a little girl.”

Of course I do.

Last Tuesday in the doctor’s office, I thumbed through People magazine and caught up on my celeb gossip, while my daughter wrote in her notebook. She held the pencil like a little law student and scribbled furiously on her pastel colored note pad. The lady sitting across from us in pressed Capri pants and striped shirt was staring at her and smiling adoringly. She looked like she had just stepped out of a Talbots catalogue. 

“Oh my goodness, she’s so precious. How old is she?”

“I’m five,” my daughter proudly, declaring age before I could. She continued, “I turn six in May!”

“She’s in kindergarten, then?” The woman asked.

“Yes,” I said and hoped to leave it at that.

I looked at my phone and saw 10:03AM on the screen. And waited for her next questions.

“No school today?” The woman asked.

“No,” I said. “We homeschool.”

“Ohhhhh.” The woman said and shifted in her chair.

Her face changed from an adoring smile towards my “precious” child, to a look of disdain and judgment toward me and my mothering skills. How could I deprive my daughter the school experience? How could I be dragging her with me to doctor’s appointments when the rest of the world is in school, where they belong?

“Don’t you worry about socialization?” She pried.

There it is! The question everyone is the most worried about when I reveal my daughter and I are homeschoolers.

I contemplated unleashing my arsenal of information to combat her socialization question which as really a comment. I could have said any of the following:

• “I was an assistant principal and teacher for years, and I assure you, being social is not encouraged in school.”

• “Public school doesn’t mimic a social environment at all. Where in life do you have to sit in a desk all day, not talk to the person next to you, and ask permission to use the bathroom?”

• “There is no research to suggest kids are better off socially because of compulsory education.”

I don’t know when homeschooling and socialization, or lack there of, became synonymous. I have no idea what studies these people have read to question the social skills of homeschool children. I have looked for such studies and cannot find them. But 9 times out of 10, when I say, “homeschool,” they say, “socialization.”

I am astounded by the unexamined assumptions people have about homeschool, especially regarding the social aspect of a child’s life. In a recent article, John Gatto – author of many books including Dumbing Us Down: The Hidden Curriculum of Compulsory Schooling and Weapons of Mass Instruction: A School Teacher’s Journey through the Dark World of Compulsory Education – addresses some of these assumptions.

• Social togetherness is promoted best by school.
• Without schooling, young people would find each other intolerable.
• The safest adult companions for children are government-licensed experts (teachers and principals).
• Students who escape state oversight (school) will become immoral.

Gatto asserts there is no research to support these claims. There is, however, a ton of research that supports the need for schools to work on social and emotional skills because the current education climate is lacking in this area.

You can find them here: http://www.channing-bete.com/prevention-programs/paths/SEL.html and here: http://www.nasponline.org/resources/factsheets/socialskills_fs.aspx and here: http://www.ascd.org/ASCD/pdf/journals/ed_lead/el_196902_elder.pdf

The research says that schools don’t do enough to foster social and emotional skills in students because schools are focused primarily on academic achievement rather than whether or not a student feels good about herself, or whether a student can navigate his social context.

In public school happiness and wellbeing isn’t a priority; passing the test is.

Students sit in desks all day long, aren’t permitted to socialize and are focused on increasing their reading levels and test scores. The majority of the day is spent preparing for tests. Recess has been all but eliminated in many schools, and in some schools, silence is required during lunchtime. That’s right, no talking during lunch.

I teach student teachers at the university and some are so upset about the silent lunches they have observed during their internships in elementary schools that many are writing their research papers on the topic.

Perhaps the most detrimental to social skills is the way schools categorize students based on test scores. Gatto and many other educational researchers state organizing groups based on ability (referring to students as level 1s, 2s, 3s and so on) does substantial harm to all citizens and creates and reinforces a caste system within schools.

According to the NICHD Early Childcare Research Network, parental warmth and sensitivity have emerged as two of the most significant predictors of children’s social development.

I looked at the woman judging me and thought about saying, “Yeah, look at her. She’s completely awkward isn’t she? It’s probably because I lock her in the closet all most of day. But every once in a while I let her out. Usually she runs around, pees her pants and acts like a complete animal.” I thought about shrugging my shoulders and saying, “But today’s a good day, I guess. Progress not perfection, right?”

Then I realized going against the norm is hard. It makes people ask questions about society and our role in it. It makes people, feel insecure. I shouldn’t care when a woman asks me a gratuitous question about my kid or my decisions.

So instead of being snarky or defensive I just said, “She’s a happy, well-adjusted kid.”

The woman pursed her lips and raised her eyebrows and I went back to my magazine. I would much rather look at celebrities pumping gas than have the socialization debate with a woman in a waiting room, anyway.

Homeschool was weird.

My family worked as teachers and administrators in public schools. We were public school people. We believed in that institution.

Then my beliefs changed.

I began a doctoral program in education that introduced me to extensive research about learning environments – research that didn’t match what was happening in our public schools.

For example, the CDC recommends a minimum of 20 minutes of recess every day for students in grades K-8. However, students in public school aren’t getting even close to that. In fact, parents in Florida had to beg for 15 min of recess for their kids. All the while, districts pushed back wanting to replace playtime with test prep.

In addition, an infinite amount of reading research exists that addresses the implications of pushing students to read too much too soon. Yet education reformers continue to push students to read more at an earlier age, all in the name of higher test scores.

In fact, a study conducted by Turner and Paris found that students who were pushed to read or score well on reading tests actually began to withdraw from reading and books. The study stated:

The motivational outcomes of literacy tasks influence how students interpret their roles in learning to read. Those interpretations can affect their desire to persist and to remain involved in literacy.

A lengthy research study isn’t necessary when common sense tells us the kill and drill factory model, currently mandate by non-educators, doesn’t work. Worse, it’s detrimental to learning. 

I read the studies and understood the problems. But when my little girl turned 5, I enrolled her in public school anyway…because that’s what we do; we put our kids in school where we think they belong.

My daughter, with big brown eyes and the voice of a cartoon elf, builds castles with serving spoons and fuzzy blankets. She flies cardboard boxes over clouds made of couch pillows. She plays in the imaginary lands of the stories she has created.

Public school administrators and policy makers have deemed this type of play an unnecessary, waste of time.

A little over a year ago, I left my job in public education to become an education activist, to change the system I knew was completely broken. Seven months later, without even flinching, I enrolled my kid in kindergarten, knowing full well that play would not be permitted, and she would be pushed toward Common Core.

One Friday morning, unusually quiet, with the yellow school bus approaching the stop, my daughter squeezed my hand and said, “Mom, I don’t want to go to school anymore.”

I cast aside her statement as normal and said, “Everyone feels that way sometimes. But school’s really important.” 

“Yeah,” she said desperately, “but all we do is work, work, work. We don’t get to play. I have to do all these papers and I don’t even know what they want me to do. It makes me so nervous.” 

“Well honey, what would you do if you didn’t go to school?” I asked her.

She just looked at me and said, “You don’t go to school anymore. What do you do?” 

Then she walked up the bus steps, took her seat by the window, and waved to me as the bus pulled away.

I stood there for a while. She was right. I had allowed myself to leave the public school prison and venture out on my own to start a new career, a new path. Yet, I was forcing her to get in the machine day after day, because that’s what we do; we send our kids to school. 

And…because homeschool is weird.

The next morning the big, yellow school bus came and went without my daughter on it.

Instead she and I cooked breakfast together. She sat on the counter in her underwear and cracked the eggs, swimming her legs happily.

As we ate our breakfast, she read me her favorite book, Olivia and the Fairy Princess. Then she said, “Can we go for a bike ride, Mommy?”

I thought why not?

Downstairs she stood next to her bike and snapped on her pink, Mohawk helmet. She hopped on and rode off yelling, “Look, Mom! I can go really fast.”

I thought to myself, we should be doing sight words or maybe some math instead of riding bikes. I felt like we were doing something wrong; I felt weird. We might not have left society for a commune in Utah, but we were certainly in uncharted territory.  And I – the education activist, the doctoral student and most importantly, her mother – questioned my ability to to provide her with what I was leaving behind in public school.  

Then I relaxed and knew we would get to all that. But first, we would play.  

Now, if you Google Little House in the Big Woods you will find a gazillion ways to address the Common Core. The books are considered a must read, and it appears that if you aren’t exposed to reading them, early on, you will not go far in life. There are even picture books to pave the way for the chapter books to make sure teachers and their students don’t flub up and miss out.

Those books were not made to appear like I would be a failure if I didn’t read them when I was young. No one warned me that I wouldn’t be able to get into Harvard if I didn’t read them. I, quite frankly, never heard of Harvard or any other college in third grade.

When I first read Little House in the Big Woods, I wasn’t made to learn about Laura Ingalls Wilder the author, or given a whole long list of vocabulary words out of the book to define. I didn’t have to locate descriptive words—no one graded me down if I didn’t know what quinine meant.

I didn’t have to identify alliteration and the syllables in the words. I didn’t need to prove I could identify singular and plural nouns or the parts of speech. I wasn’t made to go back and describe the cliffhangers, although I probably did tell my little friends about some of them. I didn’t even have to write about the story using graphic organizers.

I only remember yearning for time after school and on the weekend to be able to immerse myself in the story. And, much to my delight, when I finished Little House in the Big Woods, I discovered On the Banks of Plum Creek!

I am not saying that it isn’t nice to learn additional things surrounding a novel. I think older students might benefit from this, and younger children might enjoy learning facts about a story. I read Mary Poppins to my daughter after she saw the movie, and we both got a kick out of learning the meaning of a perambulator. Children are usually naturally curious.

But it is the whole crisis idea behind Common Core…the benchmarks and scaffolding…the outrageously wordy micromanagement, applied to teaching, that we should all question. It is the marketing of programs that promise to fill every child with all the knowledge, we are told, children will ever need, so they won’t disgrace their country and be economic losers in the long run.

This message–if children are not presented the Laura Ingalls Wilder books this way–they will surely fail, is a wrong message. It is harmful to children and discourages them from the pure, great joy of reading.

I read these books in the 1950s. And children have learned to read in public schools for years since then. There was never any real crisis. Certainly, there will be children who have difficulty learning to read, and they will need extra assistance. But from what I’ve seen, and as a teacher who once worked with middle and high school students with reading difficulties, Common Core isn’t it.

A while back I returned to the Laura Ingalls Wilder’s series and finished reading the books about when she became an adult. I was just as excited about reading them, at this time, as I was when I was a child.

That is the beauty of the joy of learning. It should never leave you. But I don’t think I would have ever cared to return to those books if I’d had to learn about them originally with Common Core strategies. It would have seemed like too much of a chore.

Nancy Bailey is an education activist and a former special education teacher.  Her book is titled Misguided Education Reform: Debating the Impact on Students.  Her blog is http://nancyebailey.com. Catch up with her on twitter @NancyEBailley1