Parents opting their kids out of technology at school

 I thought this piece from NBC on parents opting their children out of technology at school, of interest: 

National organizations representing administrators, school technology officers and teachers have urged caution against lumping in classroom screen time with recreational device use at home, saying they need to prepare students for employers who expect students to be fluent with digital tools and artificial intelligence.

But the parents opting out point to research showing that students who used computers at school performed worse academically and that information is better retained when read on paper. And education experts say there’s a significant difference between educating students about technology and completely relying on educational technology.

“It’s a bit of a mirage,” said Faith Boninger, a researcher at the University of Colorado Boulder’s National Education Policy Center who has studied flaws in digital platforms used by schools. “Students don’t need to be consumers of this technology in order to be able to use it in 10 or 15 years, when it’s likely going to be something else entirely.”

I found it particularly interesting that, towards the end of the article, they have quotes from Montgomery County, Maryland: 

The Montgomery County Council of Parent-Teacher Associations is pressing the district to provide a formal process to request “non-screen alternatives” for families that have “made the conscious effort to limit their children’s exposure to screens.”

Lisa Cline, a Montgomery County mom who chaired a parent advisory committee focused on technology, said she opted her son out when he was in third grade and then requested each school year that his teachers keep him off screens as much as possible until he graduated high school last year. She said she hopes to work with the advocacy group Fairplay for Kids to launch a national campaign urging parents to opt out of school-issued devices.

“I think it’s a win, actually, if we get to that point where the default is you opt in,” Cline said.

 Montgomery County schools were in the news last year as they were the district sued in the Mahmoud case, which I wrote about here, in which the Supreme Court provided for pretty sweeping parental opt-outs on religious grounds for their children in public schools. While the case is not mentioned in the article, I suspect that is only a matter of time. 

Locally, I'm still rather stunned that this was part of the reporting of a local subcommittee meeting: 

Massachusetts state standards in action

While it is school vacation week here in Massachusetts, I came across two things over the weekend that were the Massachusetts state education standards in action.

First, this post from the Governor's thread on the new AI-bot that the state is using:

Bluesky post from Governor Healey's account says "Government should embrace new technology --safely and securely--to make life easier for our families and businesses"

The word "should" is doing a lot of work there. That would be grounds for a solid discussion under one of the four strands of our state technology and computer science standards, Computing and Society, which includes both "ethics and laws" and "interpersonal and societal impact." In high school, this includes the following standard [9-12.CAS.c #5]:

Analyze the beneficial and harmful effects of computing innovations (e.g., social networking, delivery of news and other public media, intercultural communication). 

It would behoove the Governor and her administration to do so before continuing to thrust this unwanted change upon us.

In the second case, high school and middle school students in Massachusetts have been organizing walkouts to protest against ICE. This analysis, research, organization, and action is directly reflective of the state's required civics project in both middle and high school, for which you can find the reference guide below. 

Most notably, the overall requirement is:

 Students complete the real work of engaged, informed participants in a democracy by identifying issues and advocating for change in their communities.

And:

 They move beyond the walls of the classroom and exercise their voice.

The thing about education: it isn't, in the end, supposed to be theoretical. Either we mean it, or we don't.

Let's talk about some things you could donate to today

It's almost Valentine's day, and in that spirit, here are some places that could use your love:

• With my usual caveat that I hate that this exists and we should just USE PUBLIC FUNDS TO FUND PUBLIC EDUCATION: With the code "HEART" today, your donation to Donors Choose is doubled. Here's Worrcester. Note that they're also running a specific (needed) focus on Minnesota. If you'd like to help a Minnesota classroom in a place dear to my heart get baby chicks to raise, you can support this effort.
  
  
• The Stand with Minnesota page continues to be an excellent resource for supporting those living under federally-imposed terror, which has not, despite the headlines, ceased.
  Note that if you scroll down, you can find a "for schools and students" section. 
  
  

• I am a big fan of "just feed people who are hungry" sort of outreach, and locally, the Mustard Seed Catholic Worker does that. So does St. John's Food for the Poor, which is also now running the overnight shelter here in Worcester. In both cases, please note that there are ways to sign up to volunteer on those pages, too.
  
  

• LUCE Massachusetts has a regularly updated "Milkweed" page, which shares mutual aid requests coming in from across the state. If you wonder about the name: 
  

   Just as monarch butterflies use milkweed plants to deter predators and create safe conditions during migration, immigrant families need community support when facing ICE enforcement. Be the milkweed.

   

my photo taken some years ago in western Mass

Some things to look at from across the country

•  In another round of trying to get religious charter schools to happen, Oklahoma has rejected a Jewish charter school, and the proposers plan to sue. This is of course aimed at getting such a case back in front of the U.S. Supreme Court, whose 4-4 decision last year on St. Isidore of Seville Catholic Virtual School was due to Justice Amy Coney Barrett recusing herself.
  
  
• South Carolina has advanced a bill out of their education committee which would bar districts from having minimum grades rather than the grade actually earned for students. One might expect the conservative support, but I'll observe that support also came from their state teachers' association. 
  
  
• Maine is looking at their school funding formula. I thought this part was especially interesting: 
  

  Maine Educational Policy Research Institute proposes a 90/10 model for calculating how much of their costs districts can afford to cover with local funding. That means 90% of the expectation would be based on property taxes (the current system) and 10% would be based on the economically disadvantaged student rate. Researchers found that rate to be the best proxy for the poverty level in a community.

  Note that Maine's formula does include transportation, which Massachusetts does not include. Also this is an "I know, right?" with a different answer: 
  

   Johnson said special education is the area of the model that is “the most under stress.” Because of a step in the formula that bases state funding on past spending, the current formula disproportionately privileges wealthier districts.

  But before changing the formula, the institute proposes shifting special education to a regional model, wherein districts would collaborate on providing special ed services. Researchers are planning a forthcoming special education-specific report.

Wise words from South Dakota on state oversight and cell phones

 Excellent commentary piece from South Dakota: 

....passage of the bill flies in the face of local control for school boards. While SB 198 leaves it up to local boards to decide on discipline and what constitutes a school day, it takes away their power to decide on the use of cellphones in a one-size-fits-all policy.

The beauty of local school boards is that they reflect the wants and needs of their communities. Some have students squirrel away their phones all day. Others give students access to their phones during lunch. Still others use the freedom for students to have a phone during the school day as a lesson in responsibility.

Banning student cellphone use in schools sounds good on the surface. So did substituting ag classes for science classes and allowing athletes to substitute sports participation for a gym credit. Whenever the Legislature gets into the business of micromanaging school districts, there are pitfalls aplenty.

go check what cameras your district has

 ...and what cameras might have been placed on district property by the police¹, due to what has been uncovered in an article jointly reported by The 74 and The Guardian:

The audit logs originate from Texas school districts that contract with Flock Safety, an Atlanta-based company that manufactures artificial intelligence-powered license plate readers and other surveillance technology. Flock’s cameras are designed to capture license plate numbers, timestamps and other identifying details, which are uploaded to a cloud server. Flock customers, including schools, can decide whether to share their information with other police agencies in the company’s national network.

Multiple law enforcement leaders acknowledged they conducted the searches in the audit logs to help the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) enforce federal immigration laws. The Trump administration’s aggressive DHS crackdown, which has grown increasingly unpopular, has had a significant impact on schools.

Note that this may well not even be your local police department doing the search for ICE: 

Flock searches are typically broad national queries, and officers do not select individual cameras, he explained. Instead, with each search request, the system automatically checks every camera that Flock customers share with the nationwide database, including those operated by school districts.

The closing is very apt:

 “School districts are in a unique position, they have a unique level of responsibility to protect their students in specific ways”, including their privacy, Wandt said.

 It's worth noting that Flock has partnered with Ring, they of the Super Bowl ad that, while attempting to convince us all that they wanted to find lost puppies, made it newly clear that having a Ring camera is to now be part of a national surveillance network. While the comment from Ring was:

For the record, Ring says Search Party is not designed to process human biometrics, and that Search Party footage is not included in the company’s Community Requests service, which allows law enforcement to request video for voluntary sharing by Ring users. 

...do you want that on your house? Let alone in your school. 

Go ask.  

__________________________________________
¹my recollection is that there are cameras that are on WPS property that are not WPS-controlled. Someone may want to look into that?
UPDATE: The city's contract on their cameras does not allow them to be shared with other agencies. I appreciate knowing that! 

Secretary Tutwiler to step down Friday; Steve Zrike will succeed him in March

 The Secretary announced his departure on Instagram this afternoon: 

View this post on Instagram

A post shared by Executive Office of Education (@masseoe)

State House News Service reports here. WGBH reports here.

The Secretary, as a reminder, is an appointed position, serving at the pleasure of the Governor. They head the Executive Office of Education, and they have a voting seat on the three Boards that oversee public education in Massachusetts: Early Ed and Care; Elementary and Secondary Education; and Higher Ed.

Zrike has been superintendent of Salem since 2020; Lt. Governor Driscoll was mayor in Salem when he was appointed and was a member of the School Committee. He previously was the receiver of Holyoke.