Textbook Publishers Come Under Attack

Worse Than Awful: An Insider’s View of Educational Publishing « The Core Knowledge Blog: "The “new normal” in educational publishing is “a severe lack of oversight in the quality of curriculum being produced” and a “frightening apathy” to do anything about it. Keeghan’s piece, “Afraid of Your Child’s Math Textbook? You Should Be” is a jeremiad. It does for textbook publishing what The Jungle did for the meatpacking industry. Keeghan paints a bleak and dispiriting picture of a business gutted by mergers, competition for fewer available dollars, and an increased focus on sales and marketing at the expense of producing quality products. Materials rushed to market at breakneck speed are “inherently, tragically flawed.” Plus the pool of qualified writers and editors is drying up, and those doing the work “often don’t have the necessary skills or experience to produce a text worthy of the publisher’s marketing claims,” she writes."

Textbook Publishers Come Under Fire From Former Contributor - Curriculum Matters - Education Week: "A provocative new blog post offers a sharp critique of the current state of educational publishing, with the author—a former longtime contributor to textbooks—explaining why she's abandoned that work and believes the quality of curricular materials has declined precipitously. (Hat tip to Robert Pondiscio from the CoreKnowledge blog for alerting me to this through a Tweet this morning.) "Over the last few years, I've stopped developing and writing educational books; there's no longer any satisfaction in the work, no demand or appreciation for a product well crafted, no way to make a decent living or produce something that I feel proud to have my name attached to," writes Annie Kheegan in her Chronic Sense blog. The blogger said she worked for more than 20 years in educational publishing as a product developer, writer, and editor of curriculum materials for grades K-8."

Afraid of Your Child's Math Textbook? You Should Be. - Annie Keeghan - Open Salon: ". . . And so, I say to parents: Take a good look at the materials your children are bringing home. And to educators: Look at what you’re purchasing. Don’t be satisfied with the classic “thumb through” and don’t take those marketing materials or the sales pitch at face value. Take the time to study the materials; match them to your state’s desired standards and preferred benchmarks. If they’re not a good fit, take a pass and develop your own if you must. The only way kids are going to become better educated through the materials you buy, to increase their rankings among those 30 other countries, is to break the cycle and stop buying those books that are—there’s no other way to put it—crap. "

Teachers need training to spot campus molesters
San Jose Mercury News
By CHRISTINA HOAG AP LOS ANGELES—Many school teachers across the nation are trained to pick up on clues of child abuse and neglect, but most are not trained to spot the signs of classroom pedophiles, leaving a gray area that could help teacher ...

It's back to learning for teachers now
Times of India
JAIPUR: With reforms in the education system rapidly changing teaching and learningmethodology, teachers are finding it difficult to cope up with the frequent changes. As kids are being exposed to modern technology at a very young age, their attitude, ...

More teachers 'quitting the classroom over indiscipline'
Telegraph.co.uk
Almost 9000 teachers took early retirement last year, according to data from the Department for Education. Photo: GETTY By Graeme Paton,Education Editor Figures show almost 9000 state school teachers in England quit before the statutory retirement age ...

Telegraph.co.uk

The Education Report: A different kind of charter school for Oakland?
San Jose Mercury News
Tonight, the principals of ASCEND and Learning Without Limits turned in revised applications -- this time, for "partnership charters," which would work more closely with OUSD. The faculties at both schools voted last fall to separate from the district ...

Retired teachers' insurance to lose state subsidy under Quinn plan
The State Journal-Register
Pat Quinn wants to end the state's contribution to the Teachers' Retirement Insurance Program in the budget year that will start July 1. The state was expected to contribute nearly $87 million to TRIP next year. It is unclear how that money will be ...

Trumbull Teachers Union Opposes ConnCAN
Patch.com
by Tammy Baillargeon The Trumbull Education Association would like to respond to your letter of 11/18/11, notifying us that Trumbull High School has ranked in the top 10 list for low-income student performance, Hispanic student performance and ...

Higher education experiment planned in suburban KC
STLtoday.com
Amid concerns that students are going into debt to earn degrees that aren't preparing them for jobs in emerging industries, a coalition of suburban Kansas City business, community and education leaders is planning an experiment to make college cheaper, ...

Recommended: More California teachers accused of sex crimes
msnbc.com
By Patrick Healy, NBCLosAngeles.com Allegations of teachers committing sex crimes against California children increased last year, even though total teacher misconduct complaints declined, according to figures compiled by the state's Commission on ...

Teachers' dispute splits B.C.
The Province
The release of the poll is the latest salvo in the months-long fight between the 41000 members of the BC Teachers Federation and their ultimate boss, Education Minister George Abbott. The phone survey of 400 BC adults, conducted Feb.

More public backing for public-school teachers in contract dispute: Survey
Vancouver Sun
The survey of 400 BC residents over 18 years of age was conducted last Thursday and Friday, just as BC Education Minister George Abbott said he has asked his staff to prepare legislation to end the dispute. He made that announcement after a government ...

BC teachers to vote on full-scale walkout
The Province
Government continues to insist teachers accept its net-zero mandate, which allows for pay increases only if other financial concessions within the contract are made. Two weeks ago Education Minister George Abbott announced that Trevor Hughes, ...

Santorum defends calling Obama a 'snob'
Los Angeles Times
It's not stuck-up, though, to pursue a higher education. Rick Santorum parsed the difference Sunday morning on NBC's "Meet The Press." Appearing at a campaign stop in Troy, Mich., Santorum -- his voice thick with derision -- said on Saturday: ...

Los Angeles Times

Teachers, Students, Facebook Don't Mix
Patch.com
In a nutshell, the question was, should teachers and students be friends on Facebook? The story goes that a teacher from Maine accidentally posted a picture of himself naked on Facebook and, since he was “friends” with some of his students, well, ...

Teachers unions: 'No' to tenure plan
The Hour
Calling it a "leap of faith," when they signed on to the historic teacher evaluation framework, Phil Apruzzese, head of the state's largest teachers union, told EducationCommittee members that he has second thoughts. "We run the risk of losing good ...

Rick Santorum Stands By Comment That Obama Is 'A Snob'
Huffington Post
Making the rounds of the Sunday news shows, Rick Santorum reaffirmed his criticism of President Barack Obama as "a snob" for supporting a platform of universal higher education. The former Pennsylvania senator argued that Obama's encouragement of ...

Teachers divided over validity of scorecards
New York Daily News
I'm sad for those teachers,' fifth grade teacher says. By Kerry Wills AND Ben Chapman / NEW YORK DAILY NEWS The United Federation ofTeachers, which lost its suit to block media organizations from publicizing the names, slam the data as inaccurate and ...

New York Daily News

Evaluation Breakthrough: Agreement sets standards for all state teachers; now ...
Syracuse.com (blog)
The money was tagged last month because the schools still lacked a new system for evaluating teachers. Since then, union and district negotiators and state EducationCommissioner John King have agreed on a teacher evaluation plan for the ailing schools...

Police use batons to quell teachers' stir
Himalayan Times
SURKHET: Demanding fulfillment of their 23-point demand school teachers across the country demonstrated on Sunday. The police intervened soon after the teachers reached district education office Surkhet to stage sit-in. Teachers clashed with the ...

BC teachers declare day of action Monday
Victoria Times Colonist
By Jennifer Saltman, The Province February 24, 2012 Susan Lambert, president of the BCTeachers Federation, blames the Liberal government for an 'impasse' in contract negotiations. The provincial government's decision to legislate teachers back to work ...

Teaching Chinese in the Digital Age
Santa Barbara Independent
By Kevin Zambrano Given China's ever-growing presence in international politics and economics, schools across the country are beginning to embrace the teaching of Mandarin Chinese. Their hope is that proficiency in the language can lead to future ...

Baltimore Co. students honor teachers from segregation era
Baltimore Sun
"That was a lot of money for a poor boy with a high school education," Bartee recalled Saturday. "I owe it all to my teachers. ... There's no question that the training I got carried me a long way. I'm thankful. I'm blessed.

Teacher-Data Reactions: Absorbing New Rankings With Caution
Wall Street Journal (blog)
Concerns over how parents might use — or misuse — the rankings of thousands of fourth- through eighth-grade teachers drove much a significant part of the debate over the release. The Wall Street Journal, along with other media organizations, ...

Report: Tenured Teachers Rarely Let Go
Patch.com
Dannel P. Malloy works to restructure the tenure system in public schools, the Connecticut Post found in an investigation that hardly any tenured teachers are fired. Out of 53000 tenured teachers in public schools, only 40 were fired in the past two ...

U.S. News - More California teachers accused of sex crimes
By Patrick Healy
Allegations of teachers committing sex crimes against California children increased last year, even though total teacher misconduct complaints declined, according to figures compiled by the state's Commission on Teacher Credentialing. During the ... Whileteaching third grade at Inglewood's Beulah Payne Elementary School in 2008, Hernandez allegedly molested an 8-year-old girl, according to Sanford Jossen, the attorney who has filed a lawsuit on behalf of the girl and her mother.
Newsvine - U.S. News - Articles

On Teaching « Modeled Behavior
By Karl Smith
On Teaching. Sunday ~ February 26th, 2012 in Economics | by Karl Smith. A grad student asks Tyler for his pointers. The most important lesson is to use the right textbook. Beyond that: 1. Give a damn. 2. Get to the point when you speak. 3. Expect something from them. 4. Teach to the students who are interested in learning. 5. At all levels, do not overestimate the ... If you are like most first time teachers the key is to show up and start talking. I'd like to say that your students are as afraid ...
Modeled Behavior

Santorum Doubles Down On Education Remarks: Liberal ...
By Josh Feldman
Rick Santorum's latest line of attack against President Obama is that he has a vested interest in getting everyone to go to college, which makes him a snob who wants young people to be indoctrinated by liberal professors. Santorum defended ...
Mediaite

NYC Educator: The Annual Shaming of the Teachers
By NYC Educator
Casey claims only extremely low scores will jeopardize teacher jobs, but Michael Winerip shows it's entirely possible for good teachers to get low scores: According to the formula, Ms. Isaacson ranks in the 7th percentile among her teaching ...
NYC Educator

DownWithTyranny!: In NYS's education war, Diane Ravitch asks ...
By KenInNY
I just wrote about the first part of a new two-piecer she's written {"With such powerful forces for mis-education arrayed against actual learning, is there any hope for Americaneducation?"), highlighting the radically .... It will also profoundly demoralize teachers, as they realize that they have lost their professional autonomy and will be measured according to precise behaviors and actions that have nothing to do with their own definition of good teaching. Evaluators will come armed with ...
DownWithTyranny!

Mobile Learning On The Interwebs « Virtual School Meanderings
By mkbnl
... MentorMob helps teachers aggregate online content into a learning'playlist'Materials for teaching and learning exist everywhere online: in YouTube videos, SlideShare presentations, and published articles, for example. MentorMob is a free new platform that helps teachers collect, or “curate,” this ...
Virtual School Meanderings

U.S. News - More California teachers accused of sex crimes
Allegations of teachers committing sex crimes against California children increased ...While teaching third grade at Inglewood's Beulah Payne Elementary School in 2008, .....California are taxed to death for education and what do we get ?
usnews.msnbc.msn.com/_.../10510795-more-california-teache...

Teachers need training to spot campus molesters
By CHRISTINA HOAG AP LOS ANGELES—Many school teachers across the nation are.... a second-grader out of physical education class and taking her to an empty ...
www.mercurynews.com/breaking-news/ci_20049628

Teachers: An Invitation to Respond to Your Data Report
The Education Department said Thursday that it plans to release the ... About 12000 fourth through eighth grade public school teachers who teach math, ...
www.nytimes.com/.../teachers-an-invitation-to-respond-to-you...

Teachers React to Release of Data
By Maria Newman Teachers throughout the city have been objecting to the public ...Schools not to publish the data released by the Department of Education.
www.nytimes.com/.../2012/.../teachers-react-to-release-of-data/