“Following a public outcry from parents and teachers, the Los Angeles Unified School District has decided to make timed reading tests optional for most transitional kindergarten students.” LA Times.
Who the hell at the District came up with the idea of timed reading tests for four year olds in the first place?
Is always evolving. This fall’s iteration. Would you sign up?
The Art and Science of Human Connection—Ron Byrnes, Education
In this seminar we work together to improve as readers, discussants, and writers while exploring the challenges and rewards of meaningful friendships. Our readings, discussions, and writing overlap with the University’s Wild Hope Project, which asks, “What will you do with your one wild and precious life?” We will be as introspective and transparent as possible as we get to know one another’s stories and draw on history and social sciences to explore what’s most important in life. Among the questions we’ll consider: What makes life most meaningful? How do we want to balance work and individual economic aspirations with recreation and close interpersonal relationships with others? What is easy about making friends and what is hard? How can we be better friends to ourselves and others? And does social media make it easier or harder to build strong interpersonal relationships?
Or anyone lacking superhuman interpersonal skills.
Jessica Winters’s story in The NewYorker titled ” The Meltdown of a Middle School in a Liberal Town” (April 3, 2024) left me wondering how a school district starts over. It’s a case study of things completely falling apart in an Amherst, Massachusetts public middle school. It features angry parents, school personnel ignoring the separation of church and state, educators wholly unprepared to work with trans students, cultural conflicts of all sorts, and many other layers of public school dysfunction.
Today there’s a similarly harrowing story in The New York Times, titled, “A Principal Confronted a Teenage Girl. Now He’s Facing Prison Time.”
The heart of the matter:
“For educators everywhere, the criminal prosecution of Mr. Sanchez for an action that schools typically handle using their own disciplinary codes opens up new levels of potential risk. Fights are part of high school life. If a school official can be not just disciplined but also jailed for intervening to break up or prevent a fight, what are teachers supposed to do?
In an interview, Mr. Sanchez mentioned a fight last year in which a teacher told the students to stop but did not physically separate them. ‘And the parent was just so upset when they saw the video, like, ‘Why isn’t this person stopping it?’’ he said. ‘And to be honest, I was a little upset, too. I didn’t say that to the parent, but I did say, ‘Well, because sometimes people are worried about liability.’”
Recently, I did a writing workshop with fifteen K-12 teachers who are seeking school principal certification. More specifically, they were applying for grants that provide them substitutes for their classrooms so they can get the required hours interning as administrators-to-be.
Impressive group, but after reflecting on these stories, I can’t help but wonder if they know what they’re committing to. The numerous simultaneous challenges they will soon face. The public’s anger and disregard for one another. The tenuousness of the public commons. The toll it will take on them and their families.
My guess is not entirely, because if they did, they’d probably choose professional paths where mere mortals stand much better odds of succeeding.
College financial crisis edition. Same ol’ story at the local Catholic liberal arts school, declining enrollment, shit retention rates.
“. . . options are currently being discussed, such as continuing freezing staff vacant positions (currently 25 staff positions are frozen), lowering adjunct faculty course loads, decreasing the number of cross-listed and co-taught courses, and lowering or freezing the employer 403(b) contribution benefit. Please know that any budget-saving measures enacted will not impact the student experience, university officials say.”
A static, older faculty with increasingly negative attitudes towards their employer won’t have any impact on the student experience. LOL. Tell me another one!
How about writing directly to students from the time they start school?
Social studies education more specifically.
From the Independent:
“A quarter of Americans falsely believe federal law enforcement ‘probably’ or ‘definitely’ orchestrated the attack on the US Capitol on January 6, a claim at the centre of a persistent conspiracy theory promoted by right-wing media, Republican officials and former president Donald Trump.
The results of a Washington Post-University of Maryland poll also found that 34 per cent of Republicans and 44 per cent of Americans who voted for Mr Trump continue to believe that FBI operatives organised and encouraged the attack.”
Of course, when it comes to our collective mania, more is it at play than just social studies education, but no one seems to be saying the obvious that history and civics coursework is doing little to promote a critical thinking, media-literate citizenry.
I propose we start from absolute scratch with a complete rethinking of social studies education K-12. I’m too old, too worn down by the lecturing/memorizing status quo, and too cynical to be any more specific.
And yes, you’re right, that is one sad(sick) and deflating final sentence.
A fave PressingPauser of mine, well before he started calling me Kyrie Irving for not getting jabbed enough (and my ball handling skills prob), is a distinguished academic who has written extensively about the elite in the (dis)United States. He must be having a field day with the college Presidents’ Congressional testimony brouhaha, given the uber-elite law firm that prepped the Presidents before they testified; the Presidents themselves; and especially, the ultra-wealthy business titans like those on Wharton’s Advisory Board at the University of Pennsylvania. Money is leverage.
I look forward to his write up.
He hasn’t asked for my help yet, but the main take-away from Testimonygate is that Bill Ackman is a doofus who let his ego get the best of him.
Ackman, of course, is right that anti-semitism is wrong and that Jewish students should not be scapegoated for highly contentious U.S. foreign policies. They, like all Jewish citizens, should feel and be safe.
But, Ackman over clubbed big time. The New York Times explains:
“On Nov. 4, he (Ackman) wrote a four-page letter to Dr. Gay, outlining his concerns about antisemitism on campus and what he called double standards on campus for different racial and ethnic groups. He offered a detailed list of actions he wanted the university to take.”
The Times adds, “After sending that letter, he said he had minimal contact with Harvard.” What a shocker, Harvard didn’t want a wealthy alum to tell them exactly what to do. I’m sure Ackman wouldn’t mind if Harvard told him exactly how to run his business. How does someone so incapable of “reading the room” achieve Ackman’s level of business success?
Business success, of course, is relative. Ackman’s net worth is only a few billion. Dig this “paragraph to ponder” from the same story.
“He (Ackman) has given tens of millions of dollars over the years to Harvard, but does not rank among the top donors at a school that has landed numerous nine-figure donations. His largest gift dates to 2014, when he and his former wife announced a $25 million donation to expand the economics department and endow three professorships.”
Note to Bill. With a $50 billion endowment, you have to give a lot more than $25 million to get a four-page letter read.
The Times says Ackman is acting from deep-seated resentments towards his alma mater that have built up in recent years. On Twitter, Ackman wrote a four page letter of sorts saying the underlying premise of the NYT’s story was wrong, that he harbors no resentment towards Harvard. Then he details all the things that have gone wrong between the U and him. What’s a synonym for “resentment”, bitterness, animosity, enmity?
The Harvard Board, and large numbers of its faculty, have backed Claudine Gay, Harvard’s newish President. In large part, I suspect, because they think she has what it takes to successfully lead the institution going forward. But also, no doubt, to stick it to Ackman and his egomaniac billionaire ilk.
One of my favorite parts of Succession was when Jeremy Strong as Kendall Roy would sit in the back of his driver’s car and lose himself in rap music in preparation for a big board meeting.
Ackman should channel Kendall Roy. With this Kendrick Lamar chorus.
Bitch, be humble (hol’ up, bitch)
Sit down (hol’ up, lil’, hol’ up, lil’ bitch)
Be humble (hol’ up, bitch)
Sit down (hol’ up, sit down, lil’, sit down, lil’ bitch)
Fall semester is a wrap, well, except for all the grading. Last day of classes. Two dudes in the hallway. “If I’m ever a teacher,” the first says, “I’ll probably be the worst of all time.” Second, “That’s terrible self talk.”
By Darbe Saxbe. Filled with important insights.
And compare notes.
The pastor says, “I can tell when my congregation is with me. When they’re watching and listening intently, we’re connected.”
The comedian says, “I can tell when my audience is with me. When they’re watching and listening intently, we’re connected.”
The educator says, “I can tell when my students are with me. When they’re watching and listening intently, we’re connected.”
One never arrives as a teacher. On the best days, a distinct majority watches and listens intently. And the connection is strong. More often, some watch and listen intently, while others are elsewhere. The eternal challenge is tilting that balance.
Pressing Pause 