Tzimmes and borscht.
Minnesota Republican Senators say, “Throw out NCLB.”
Minnesota Senate Republicans said today they want the state out of the controversial No Child Left Behind law. They will take action even if it means the loss of $150 million in federal aid. Pioneer Press
Send a tax-deductible check to FairTest.
Brother Mike on Small Talk received a request from Debbie Meier to make a contribution to FairTest, one of the leading voices against the misuse of testing and the emphasis on high stakes testing.
Anne and I make our list of organizations we send money to in December before the tax deadline. FairTest is on our list. Yours too?
The KIPP version of staff development: A couple of days in the Bahamas.
My last staff development had us sitting in the south gym listening to some consultant talking about “difficult conversations.” Of course, the actual difficult conversation was the one where we would have asked what the hell he was talking about.
KIPP charter schools have a better idea. Send the staff to the Bahamas!
The NY Post reports:
KIPP, one of 52 schools nationwide run by the Knowledge Is Power Program, sent 49 staffers on a five-day trip to the Dominican Republic in June 2005 and 21 staffers on a five-day trip to the Bahamas in June 2006.
The school serves about 250 kids in the fifth through eighth grades.
The all-inclusive trips - covering airfare, hotel, food and booze - ran as high as $1,119 per person, the report said.Math teacher Frank Corcoran, who attended a foray this year to the Dominican Republic, said formal meetings made up about 40 percent of the trip, but informal school-related chats dominated the spare time.
“So it feels like work even though people are walking around in swim trunks,” he said. “Everyone comes out feeling motivated and pumped up, whereas at the end of the school year you’re just burned out.”
Yes. I know the feeling. Well at least the part about ending the year feeling burned out.
I’m not familiar with the $1100 trip to the Bahamas, the meetings in bathing suits, the booze, the hotel room and the airfare. These must be the “make the world a better place” charters that Kevin Carey was talking about in the previous post. That’s “make the world a better place,” one junket at a time.
Tip of the hat to NYC Educator.
UPDATE: Russo doesn’t see what the problem is unless it gets “crazy out of hand.” When would that be, exactly? When the hotel rooms hit $2K? When public school teachers have to buy their own toilet paper, but public funded charters like KIPP are sending some staff members on junkets to the Bahamas, I’d say it’s out of hand.
