Today, I went to the Strike Captain meeting of the Seattle Education Association (SEA, the union that represents Seattle’s teachers and educational support staff) and I can tell you that our educators are fired up and prepared to strike, if necessary, to win a contract that helps us achieve the education system that Seattle deserves. …
Continue reading Ready to Strike for the Schools Seattle’s Students Deserve!
Last Thursday I flew to New York City to take on Peter Cunningham, the former U.S. Assistant Secretary of Education (under Secretary Arne Duncan, during President Obama's first term), in a debate hosted by Al Jazeera America’s program The Third Rail. We debated the question, "Is public education in the U.S. broken beyond repair?" I …
On January 19th of this year--Martin Luther King, Jr. Day--I was pepper sprayed in the face by an officer of the Seattle Police department. Now, we are filing a lawsuit in a federal court to seek justice. At this year’s Martin Luther King Day celebration, I was deeply honored to be asked to deliver the …
During the last days of the school year I wrote an essay for my website, I Am An Educator.com, about my kindergarten son opting out of the MAP test. I received an overwhelming number of positive responses to that piece, but none more powerful than from a mother from Minneapolis, Minnesota. Kelly Pylkas-Bock expressed her …
Last week the Seattle School District told my kindergarten son to take the Measures of Academic Progress (MAP) test. Given my intense relationship with this specific standardized test--an exam that has forever altered the course of my life--this was a particularly unsettling moment for me. As an authentic assessment activist, I had helped organize a …
Continue reading Scrap the MAP Test: My Kindergartener Joins the Opt Out Movement!
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