Moving right along: Board of Ed membership

Periodically, I am asked about the length of terms of the current Board of Ed members, particularly given that we have a largely Baker-appointed Board and an ostensibly more education-friendly Governor now. While the state does have this chart, it's not fully updated, has weirdly set everything to June expiration dates (which isn't in state law), and has more than one ending date just plain wrong.

I did the first version of this post in 2017, with an update in January of last year.

Board of Ed: Student Opportunity Act reporting -> goal setting

 which is one of my personal irritants, because of how the Commissioner has chosen to do it, so...
we should also perhaps note that this presentation has 98 slides

October Board of Ed: opening remarks

The agenda is here. 
The livestream is here.
posting as we go once it starts
Opening by James Morton, Vice Chair who says Chair Katherine Craven is on her way

Public comment:
what's missing in this theory of action: students deserve to be challenged at the level at which they need challenge
"we don't talk about those kind of issues here very frequently"
"we're developing people, we're developing adults..."

Commissioner Riley: welcomes Paymon Rouhanifard to his first meeting
"we're thrilled to have him"
second annual STEM week last week; had the chance to visit many schools
see students do many engaging tasks, involved in deeper learning
Boston comprehensive review: over 900 classrooms in about 100 schools observed
report finalized this winter
supplemental budget coming out this week, we think
have to "legally" figure this out by October 31..."legally is so strong a word" quips the Secretary
over 500 schools express interest in Kalidoscope; over 60 schools have begun formal application
finalists around Thanksgiving, selection around turn of year

Secretary: thanks all of those who participated in STEM week
"already producing tremendous results"

New Board of Ed member: Paymon Rouhanifard

State House News is reporting that Governor Baker is appointing Paymon Rouhanifard to the Massachusetts Board of K-12 Education. He will replace Margaret McKenna (whose terms are up, and who I will MISS!).
As for Rouhandifard, who moved to Massachusetts this year from New Jersey (when his wife Sara Rouhandifard, assistant professor of bioengineering at Northeastern, began working there), his best-known and most recent connection with education was as the receiver of the Camden Public Schools, appointed by Governor Chris Christie. You can read his reflection on that experience here, which opens with this:

Only New Orleans, which was re-created as a nearly all-charter district after Hurricane Katrina, has a higher proportion of students in charters.

The best piece looking at him and his work is from Eliza Shapiro in Politico; she would tell you herself to ignore the headline. Note his close relationship with the Democratic party chair, the state's adoption of the "Renaissance" model for charters, and consider the recent New Bedford parallel. He also did say to Shapiro: “We don’t know how much right now it costs to educate a student in poverty living in Camden,” which potentially could bear out in terms of the Board's position (or lack thereof) on the foundation budget reconsideration.
His two years of teaching in New York City were with Teach for America and he did go through Broad Center. His position with Propel Inc is as a result of a partnership with John White, the state superintendent of the Louisiana school system.
His speech last year at MIT in which he said:

If life outcomes are indeed what we are about, we should welcome state test scores going down.

 ...is I think the piece that is perhaps most interesting, which he knew:

As he sipped a green tea at a Starbucks outside of Boston, where he recently moved with his family, Rouhanifard flashes a quick grin when asked about his comment. “That may have been the most provocative thing I said that day,” he says. “It was intentional.”

If you're interested, read the whole thing, but a final piece of interest:

The basic rule, what we would want for our own children, should apply to all kids.

That's a pretty good perspective for a Board member to be using.