Category Archives: Uncategorized

Well, that’s new. You get used to the name, and to the appearance, of a website you visit almost on a daily basis. Then one day, a Tuesday early in January, it changes. Ed News Colorado as we knew it is no more, but now is part of a four-state online education news service. From now on, I turn to Chalkbeat Colorado as a vital source to find out what’s going on in schools, districts, and of course, at the State Capitol. Oh yes, the Capitol. Tomorrow after all is the beginning of another legislative session, a time for parents and taxpayers to hold their breath and, if need be, get ready to do battle. A good place to start is reading the Legislative Preview 2014 by Ed News Chalkbeat Colorado’s Todd Engdahl.

I love it when people make my job easier. (What? Ok, no, blogging here isn’t a “job,” child labor laws being what they are and all.) It’s even better when that aid comes from one of my Education Policy Center friends. Marya DeGrow has written two timely posts for the new Colorado School Grades blog — an innovation after the third year of data released rating schools across Colorado from A to F. Marya’s first post explains how student learning styles may fit certain types of programs. The second highlights some of the great tools on the fabulous School Choice for Kids website:

Thanks once again to the edublog linking queen Joanne Jacobs, a December Scientific American column by psychologist Scott Barry Kaufman caught my attention. And it should yours, too. The author unpacks a study of Boston students that found while some schools improved performance on standardized academic assessments, they didn’t really improve measures of cognitive ability. In other words, better schools boost scores on math and reading tests, but those students’ brain skills still are functioning about the same. Kaufman begins the column by citing some of his own recent research that unsurprisingly shows “good standardized test takers also tend to have high cognitive ability.” I am curious to see more about how the two results mesh. As more schools increase test scores without registering an effect on brain skills, does the identified relationship or tendency fade?

Unbelievably, another new year is already underway, and I’m left to ponder what kind of hopes it holds out for Colorado kids and families seeking the best educational opportunities and outcomes possible. While I recover from the blissful batch of toys, games, and goodies, it seems like a perfect time to ponder what might emerge out of the chaos in 2014:

(H/T Ed News Colorado) Yesterday’s Washington Post posted a story under the headline “Colorado’s Hickenlooper wants to put school budgets online”: “So far, no state’s ever had total transparency on how their tax dollars are spent to every school,” Hickenlooper said in a recent interview. Looking ahead to 2014, it’s encouraging to read about bipartisan political will to track every dollar of school spending. Now that the smoke from Amendment 66’s smoldering wreckage has started to clear, it’s nice to see greater financial transparency as a serious policy discussion rather than a selling point for a (failed) billion-dollar tax increase. But will the governor continue to insist that creating this kind of online financial transparency would cost $18 to $20 million?

‘Tis the Christmas holiday season, and maybe (just maybe) my last posting of 2013. Nobody’s in school now, and education policy drifts even further from the brain as visions of sugarplums (or actually, new Lego sets) dance in small children’s heads. Nonetheless, the season provides a great opportunity to drive home an important point about the research that underlies education policy debates. Jay Greene yesterday dispatched a message to Marc Tucker and Diane Ravitch, urging them to contact Santa Claus. (As a small aside, let me make the point that contacting the big jolly man in the red suit can be a difficult task. I’m still trying to get an explanation why last year I got earmuffs, mittens, and socks rather than a new PlayStation.) Greene points us to a fabulous Education Next piece by Matthew Chingos with the provocative title, “Big Data Wins the War on Christmas.” It seems the Harvard graduate and Brookings Institution fellow stumbled onto some fascinating research data from the latest PISA international test results.

Three is a magic number… Yes it is! This week Colorado School Grades (CSG) issued their 3rd annual report cards of every public school in the state. If you don’t know what the website is about, I’m not going to rehash the basics except to say:

A couple of stories this week in Ed News Colorado serve as a reminder that whether or not there are new laws or reforms to debate, some kind of change will keep coming to the state’s schools. First comes from the State Board of Education’s Wednesday meeting, where we learned that schools and districts will have exactly one year reprieve on their formal accountability ratings after the new testing begins in 2014-15: As for teachers, their students’ performance on the new tests will factor into their year-end evaluations starting in 2016. “Some states declared a timeout,” said Elliott Asp, the special assistant to the commissioner and one of the architects behind the state’s plan for testing. “We don’t want to go there.” We want to ensure greater accountability for learning results. But the shift to a new kind of testing system realistically demands some sort of accommodation. Providing a year’s worth of reprieve from sanctions or other consequences makes sense on the surface. The story drives home the reality of coming changes — a computerized test-taking system with new assessments rolling out in 2014-15. That puts the consequences back to 2015-16.

The power and potential of blended learning stand out in several ways. It can give students more control over their education — like having a customized playlist — and enable them to advance at their own pace. It can expand the reach of effective teachers and allow them to focus time more efficiently on what they do best. It can foster more innovation to speed up the process of building effective learning systems. And it can do all that without requiring new revenue. Some of the greatest potential to help students lies in Colorado’s rural areas, and some districts have begun to embrace the possibilities. But in order to make blended learning work, they have to access digital technology in the form of high-speed Internet access. Hence, an eye-catching new story by Andy Vuong in the Denver Post (H/T Complete Colorado):

The national teachers unions have christened today a “National Day of Action.” So rather than spend too much time sitting here working on the blog, I am going to get busy and play ball outside. Then after awhile when I get cold, it will be time to go inside and take action with my Legos and video games (until my parents make me participate in cleaning up and setting the dinner table, that is). But that doesn’t mean you can’t learn more about the National Day of Action. In (almost) 12 Days of Christmas style, Mike Antonucci breaks down the union-sponsored list of activities. For some reason, it looks different than my own plan to commemorate the second Monday in December.