June meeting of the Board of Ed

The Massachusetts Board of Education has their regular monthly meeting on Monday and Tuesday of next week; you can find the agenda here.
On Monday night, they'll be continuing their discussion of teacher evaluation, particularly the section having to do with "impact on student learning," one which is particularly relevant given the Senate's passage of a budget item that would eliminate that as a state requirement (as it no longer is a federal one).  The panel that will address this is:

• Henry Braun, Director of the Center for the Study of Testing, Evaluation and Education Policy, Lynch School of Education, Boston College
• Thomas Gosnell, President, American Federation of Teachers Massachusetts
• Barbara Madeloni, President, Massachusetts Teachers Association
• Martin West, Associate Professor, Harvard Graduate School of Education

DESE is including as backup on this item a joint white paper from the teachers' unions addressing it, with their own remarks embedded in it. 

Also on Monday night, the Board will be discussing digital learning, regarding which the state says "Our goal is not to determine which model is the best, but rather to support schools and districts in providing options and models best suited to students' learning needs and preferences." On Tuesday, the Board will have a new member joining them: Nathan Moore, a rising junior at Scituate High School, is the new student member of the Board. The briefing gives an overview of the Commissioner's intent on his opening comments, including what DESE has done around outreach for the state's new ESSA plan. These are the Rennie Center's "Shaping the Future of Accountability" breakfast and the Board's Accountability and Assistance Advisory Council meetings with DESE. 

The Board will hear updates from the Level 5 districts (Lawrence, Holyoke, and Southbridge) and the Level 5 schools. The Board will discuss and be asked to vote in new Digital Literacy and Computer Science standards. Upon this vote, DESE will distribute the frameworks that accompany the standards. The Board will receive an update on MCAS 2.0. Note that DESE announced today that they have awarded the contract to Measured Progress, which will subcontract with Pearson. The Board will conduct the annual review of the Commissioner; there is no attachment for that, but Mary Ann Stewart has posted an update about it. UP Academy-Springfield (part of the Springfield Empowerment Zone) is looking for an extension on their opening date. They were to open this fall; they now wish to defer that by one year.Pioneer Valley Chinese Immersion Charter School wants the Board to overrule the Commissioner's denial of their expansion from a June 2014 request. The Board is being asked to vote to end some outdated regulations regarding an expired teacher quality grant, school construction (now covered by MSBA), and independent and agricultural institutes (which was part of a now-repealed law). The Board will get an update on the FY17 budget (they haven't met since the Senate passed their version).  They are also being asked (as per usual) to vote to delegate authority to the Commissioner to act over the summer break, and they're voting on next year's meeting schedule.
I will not be at next week's meeting, due to its late date in the June calendar. 

The mixed messages we give kids on technology

I read this great piece by Melinda Anderson in the Atlantic on how internet filtering hurts kids about the same time that I started putting together my latest presentation for MASC on social media. I started to work on this at a high school ...which has social media blocked on their wifi.
Thus the media that is important enough that school committee members are going to special training sessions on using it themselves and figuring out how to use it for their districts is not important enough to allow our students access to.
And we claim to be raising 21st century citizens.

I see some who (still) think that the online universe is a passing fad, as if in twenty years, no one will be connecting electronically anymore. I hear this particularly in district discussions about cell phone use, when those who haven't seen a class full of high school students pull out phones when asked to look something up opine about what kids are doing online.

If we want students to responsibly use media of all kinds, we need to TEACH them to do that! It does not happen spontaneously. And yes, this is something that we hope parents are doing. But many are not, and in many cases, schools are better equipped to instruct.

If one of the skills kids need to get along is how to ignore Facebook at work, shouldn't they be learning that now?

Just as we teach students to read articles with a critical eye, to check their math problems, to do science experiments safely, to work with each other respectfully, we need to teach them to read online with a critical eye, to check their online sources, to work online safely, and to teach them to interact with others online respectfully.

We want kids to know what's going on in the world? Most of us aren't waiting for a daily paper or the nightly news for that.

We want kids to be involved advocates? Most of that organizing is happening online.

We want kids to active citizens? Much of that activity is taking place online.

We are doing our kids a real disservice to block all such activity rather than to direct and interact with it.

The Board of Ed meets next week

The Board of Ed meets next week. You can find the agenda here. 
As the Commissioner has recommended Southbridge for receivership, the Board's Monday night portion is a public hearing on state receivership in Southbridge. It starts at 4:30 and is in the auditorium of their administration building at 25 Cole Avenue. The Commissioner has repeatedly said that he does not anticipate a vote until their February meeting, but note that it is on the agenda for Tuesday morning as well.
The first part of the Tuesday portion is a joint meeting with the Board of Higher Ed. That is at Roxbury Community College in the Reggie Lewis Track and Athletic Center. They're discussing the revised definition of college and career readiness, to include civics, and their other common initiatives.
Sometime after ten, they'll move to their regular agenda. That includes Southbridge, the recommendation that Dorchester Collegiate Charter lose their charter (if you missed it, do read this column from their headmaster, raising some really interesting questions about how we judge schools and what the state actually wants charter schools to do), a few charter school amendments (Benjamin Banneker and South Shore Charter), and a preview of the new charter school applicants. They're also getting the dropout and graduation results from last year. 
They should be sending the digital literacy standards out for public comment and voting on the science and technology standards (finally!). They're also getting an update on the civics conversation including a timetable on revising the history and social studies standards and adding assessments; that would be some sort of a history MCAS. 
They'll have their monthly update on Holyoke and their monthly update on the Level 5 schools.
Not many links in the above, as there aren't many backups posted as yet. They'll have more up as the week goes along. 

I do plan to attend and blog all of the above

Board of Ed summary

I send this out to the School Committee and MASC list-serv every month. Posting here for those who might find it of interest.

The Board of Ed met Tuesday, and while, the main item on their agenda was the accountability report, their focus was much more on individual districts and schools.

Notes on opening comments by the Commisioner, Chair, and Secretary

Notes on public comments  which were either on charter schools facing some form of action or on the proposed computer science and digital literacy standards

The update on Holyoke which happens monthly not surprisingly focused mainly on the recent report on conditions for students at the Peck school; the Board in particular was concerned that they hadn't heard more from the Commissioner earlier, particularly as the district is under state receivership.

The presentation on accountability levels was fairly brief. While they didn't mention the increased risk of MCAS schools falling, they did mention the increased chance of PARCC schools rising.

The presentation on Southbridge did not recommend that they be put in state receivership, but (as someone who has now heard several rounds of these discussions) it sure sounds as though it is headed that way. There's a link there to the report; I'd strongly recommend reading the section on school committee leadership starting at page 20 in the PDF.

The initial presentation of the proposed digital literacy/computer science standards was at this meeting; the proposal is for them to go out for public comment in January. 

And there was a bit of a conversation on the Foundation Budget Review Commission (but only a bit).

As per usual, errors mine, questions welcome. I also do have paper copies of the PowerPoint presentations, should anyone be interested in shots of those.

Digital Literacy standards

the backup is here
Chester: "great effort and a great advocacy of this public/private partnership"
students consuming and creating information
creating and modifying technology
technology in several different contexts

"our work is focused on the standards, which provides the foundation of what we're doing"
"how public education should embrace computing"
"work together to introduce computing more broadly to every student in the state at every grade level"
hasn't been a lot of controversy: "everyone just is saying 'how'"
fluency in uses and impact of technology for living, learning, and working
huge gap between number of job postings and number of graduates in computer science
"computing historically has not been part of STEM"
disproportiate enrollment of white males
moving forward towards formal adoption: public comment in January with adoption proposed for spring

four strands proposed:

• computing and society
• digital tools and collaboration
• computing systems
• computational systems

practices: connecting, creating, abstracting, analyzing, communcating, collaborating, and researching

grade span standards, flexibility for schools, no plan to mandate assessment

a lot of the societal impact stuff will evolve over time and will need to be updating
are designed to be "integratable" with other courses

Board of Ed public comments

first comments from some from Dorchester Collegiate Charter
headmaster and Board chair
"hear today not to ask you to vote against Commissioner's recommendations"
asks that they be allowed to continue:
three points:

1. unique mission to address students who have struggled (requiring counseling in many cases)
2. significant growth in MCAS: level 2 school
3. strong academic program in place

Board of Ed meets next Tuesday

The Board of Ed meets Tuesday, December 15 (and only Tuesday; there's no Monday night meeting this month). You can find the agenda here.

• The big report will be on today's release of school accountability levels on which more to come!
• Southbridge is officially on the agenda this month.
• Cape Cod Lighthouse Charter School is looking to amend their charter
• There's a report on probation for Global Learning Charter Public School.
• There's a report on probation and next steps for Dorchester Collegiate Academy Charter School.
• New proposed digital literacy and computer science standards are introduced for an initial discussion.
• There's a section on the Foundation Budget Review Commission(!)
• There's also the monthly report about Holyoke.

And yes, I'll be there and blogging.