Yong Zhao says to ignore PISA

The idea of nations competing to reach the top of the Programme for International Student Assessment (Pisa) league tables makes as much sense as university students competing to see who can drink the most beer, according to Professor Yong Zhao, from the University of Oregon in the US. 

He told TES: “You’re maybe the best drinker but you’ve got to think, ‘Is it good for you and does it matter?’”

The rest is here.

Democratic State Committee votes No on 2

Here is the text of the resolution passed last night: 

WHEREAS, the Massachusetts Democratic Party platform states that “Massachusetts Democrats are committed to investing in public education”; and
WHEREAS, the national Democratic Party platform states that charter schools “should not replace or destabilize traditional public schools”; and

WHEREAS, more than $400 million in taxpayer money was diverted to charter schools statewide last year from local school districts, forcing cuts to programs that families and students value; and
WHEREAS, charter schools typically serve far fewer special needs students, English language learners and economically disadvantaged students than the traditional public school districts they are located in and use hyper-disciplinary policies and suspensions for minor infractions to push out students; and
WHEREAS, charter schools use public funds, but local communities and their school committees have no control over their design, approval, operation or renewal; and
WHEREAS, Question 2 on the November 2016 ballot would allow the state to approve 12 new charters schools a year, every year, forever, with no limit on how much money a single district could lose; and
WHEREAS, this would nearly triple the number of charter schools in just ten years and take away more than $1 billion a year from our local public schools within several years; and
WHEREAS, the Question 2 campaign is funded and governed by hidden money provided by Wall Street executives and hedge fund managers; and
WHEREAS, the unfettered expansion of charter schools, at the expense of local district public schools, that would occur if Question 2 passes is clearly at odds with the national and state party platforms, and would lead Massachusetts in the wrong direction;
THEREFORE, let it be resolved that the Massachusetts Democratic State Committee opposes Question 2

First round charter school applications are in

Do, please, note the "first round" above: the applicants must be invited to apply further. DESE's announcement is here.

Brockton, of course, has a new charter school as of this year that is struggling to fill its seats. The Lynn application has been getting press as it's a national finalist in a competition for funding; it's also familiar, as Jennifer Berkshire points out:

Thought Mass. finalist in XQ Super School Project sounded familiar. State has rejected his proposal to open school in Lynn, MA 4 times.

— EduShyster (@EduShyster) August 15, 2016

The Old Sturbridge Village application also was turned down last year.

As for expansions: 

The focus, not surprisingly, is again on Boston. The Pioneer Valley Chinese Immersion Charter was more or less told to do this by the Board, who refused their application for reconsideration back in the spring.

$150 million over five years

That's how much the state will pay for the new MCAS exam.

Worcester School Committee meetings this week

Two meetings for the Worcester School Committee this week: TLSS and the full committee.
The Teaching, Learning, and Student Supports standing committee is posted as meeting tomorrow at 5:30, but there's no agenda posted online. UPDATE: You can now find it here.
The full committee meets Thursday at 4 pm; you can find the agenda here.
There are a number of recognitions, including Al Ganem, who is now the superintendent of the Hampden-Wilbraham school district.
The report of the superintendent is the annual opening of school report (no link as yet, as the report isn't posted).
Goddard would like a voluntary school uniform (consider this your periodic reminder than any such uniform policy in the public schools must be voluntary, as students are guaranteed the right to an education).
As you may have seen in today's T&G, the nearly annual request for a report on school choice students is on the agenda. Something that appears to be being missed in the reaction thus far is the way the numbers skew older. That somewhat has to do with growing numbers of surrounding districts cutting off on school choice students; once a student has choiced in, they can stay until graduation, so in some districts, only older students who were already in would be allowed. However, it does argue that at least some of these are students who have attended the Worcester Public Schools and left. I don't think a video is going to convince those students that they've missed something.
There is a multiple part response to Miss Biancheria's inquiry on Durham, transportation, the new transportation person, and invoices, including the 23-page contract with Durham.
The administration is (again) asking that an items that the administration doesn't respond to within 24 months be automatically filed. Note that this would allow administration to kill an item they didn't want to report on by letting it age out. I'm not saying that they would; but it would be possible. 
Mr. O'Connell wants a program for gifted students, to know if the annual grant assurances document has been signed, if the guard shack at Burncoat should be removed (can they do South's, too?), to submit a grant request to MSBA for technology, and to...sign warrants?

gb #6-281 - Mr. O’Connell (August 10, 2016) To implement the provisions of the November 1995 letter of the Commissioner of Education, and the Advisory on School Governance which accompanied it, that "the school committee remains the body responsible for approving and transmitting school department expenditures to the municipal accountant for the drawing of warrants. The Department of Revenue's Division of Local Services has advised that all school department bills must be approved by the school committee. When the superintendent, or principal and superintendent, have statutory authority to incur expense, the Department of Revenue advises that the bills must be approved by them as well as by the committee."

Okay, maybe we'll come back to that one...here
Mr. Monfredo wants to thank Houghton Mifflin for a book donation, to UMass Med for a donation to Worcester Tech (which wasn't received by the school committee), a report on the summer programs, to include the Heimlich maneuver in CPR training, to participate in Constitution Day in September, and to recognize a WEC donation.
Miss Biancheria wants a report on the new bus routes.
The administration is forwarding the Substance Use, Treatment, Education and Prevention for related policy changes.
They want to file a list of items requesting reports from Ms. Colorio, Mr. Monfredo, and Mr. O'Connell.
They're requesting acceptance of a $10,000 grant for Career and Technology Education.
There are a series of prior fiscal year payments.
There also is an executive session after the meeting for deliberation around collective bargaining for bus drivers and monitors, for custodians, and for teachers.

"heartbreaking" levels of violence reported by gay, lesbian, and bisexual youth

As the Times reported earlier this week, a recently released report from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention found horrifying reports from gay, lesbian, and bisexual teenagers:

These adolescents were three times more likely than straight students to have been raped. They skipped school far more often because they did not feel safe; at least a third had been bullied on school property. And they were twice as likely as heterosexual students to have been threatened or injured with a weapon on school property. More than 40 percent of these students reported that they had seriously considered suicide, and 29 percent had made attempts to do so in the year before they took the survey. The percentage of those who used illegal drugs was many times greater than their heterosexual peers. While 1.3 percent of straight students said they had used heroin, for example, 6 percent of the gay, lesbian and bisexual students reported having done so.

Dan Savage, in his usual blunt way, wants to know what straight adults are going to do about it:

The LGBT community will do what it can—we will scream and yell, we will give money to GLSEN, we will try our best to let LGBT kids know that life isn't high school and share our coping mechanisms and strategies for getting through it—but if decent and loving straight people don't do something, if decent and loving straight people don't take action, if there aren't social and legal consequences for indecent and unloving straight people (why aren't parents who throw their queer kids out charged with child endangerment?), this won't stop.

 Our kids. Our schools. Our problem to fix.

Update on the Brockton charter school

h/t to Sue Doherty of Brockton for sharing this:
When we last left New Heights Charter opening in Brockton, they were asking for a change to their charter for fewer days, because they didn't have a building that was going to be ready on time. They also didn't have anywhere near the projected enrollment, despite that purported silent need being the reason the majority of the Board of Ed voted in favor of it. This was covered by Diane Ravitch in a post yesterday. 
The Brockton Enterprise has now reported that the shorter school year has been granted (by the Commissioner, not the Board of Ed), and they've come to some rather expensive resolution of the building issue:

Jacqueline Reis, a spokesperson for the Massachusetts Department of Elementary and Secondary Education, said on Friday that state officials believe that New Heights Charter School of Brockton will now open at 1690 Main St. The new proposed location is the former Verizon division headquarters, which was sold earlier this year for $960,000, to a company called 1690 Main Street LLC...The charter school previously said that it would open on August 23 at 141 Main St., in the Tuxedo’s by Merian building, following renovation financed by a $575,000 loan to make the property code compliant with Massachusetts education standards...Walker previously said that the charter school would pay $893 per student annually for five years to rent out a 30,000-square-foot school space in the Tuxedos by Merian building in the center of the downtown area. With 315 students expected for the first year, from grades six through eight, the lease could be as high as $281,295 to begin with.

So there's a $575,000 loan for renovations plus $281,295 rent on the 141 Main Street building ('though one would hope that some of the rent might be waived if the school isn't actually occupying the building). They then are renting the 1690 Main Street building (and from whom? Is that group associated with the school?) for some sum of money, a building which, given that it was an office building is probably also going to need at least some renovation in order to be a school. They're doing all of this out of a $4M annual budget, with an additional $250,000 of fundraising from the state charter association.
Here's why this in particular is a concern: financial management has been a weakness of charter schools in the past, and, in particular, buildings and renovations are among what sunk Spirit of Knowledge here in Worcester.