Education Party

Help Stamp Out Cancer

2009-03-27T16:02:00.001-07:00

The Party of Yesterday

2008-10-26T10:55:00.001-07:00

Two years ago, a list of the nation’s brainiest cities was put together from Census Bureau reports — that is, cities with the highest percentage of college graduates, which is not the same as smart, of course.

These are vibrant, prosperous places where a knowledge economy and cool things to do after hours attract people from all over the country. Among the top 10, only two of those metro areas — Raleigh, N.C., and Lexington, Ky. — voted Republican in the 2004 presidential election.

This year, all 10 are likely to go Democratic. What’s more, with Colorado, New Hampshire and Virginia now trending blue, Republicans stand to lose the nation’s 10 best-educated states as well.

It would be easy to say these places are not the real America, in the peculiar us-and-them parlance of Sarah Palin. It’s easy to say because Republicans have been insinuating for years now that some of the brightest, most productive communities in the United States are fake American — a tactic that dates to Newt Gingrich’s reign in the capitol.

Brainy cities have low divorce rates, low crime, high job creation, ethnic diversity and creative capitalism. They’re places like Pittsburgh, with its top-notch universities; Albuquerque, with its surging Latino middle class; and Denver, with its outdoor-loving young people. They grow good people in the smart cities.

But in the politically suicidal greenhouse that Republicans have constructed for themselves, these cities are not welcome. They are disparaged as nests of latte-sipping weenies, alt-lifestyle types and “other” Americans, somehow inauthentic.

If that’s what Republicans want, they are doomed to be the party of yesterday.

Not only are we becoming more urban as a nation, but we’re headed for an ethnic muddle that could further shrink the party of small-mindedness. By 2023, more than half of all American children will be minority, the Census Bureau projects.

Ronald Reagan was lashed by liberals for running a “Morning in America” campaign, but he knew this country, at heart, was always tomorrow-looking — and he fared very well in educated cities as well as small towns. “Whatever else history may say about me when I’m gone,” said Reagan, “I hope it will record that I appealed to your best hopes, not your worst fears.” Barack Obama, who brings that music to the stage, leads by 30 points on the “hope and optimism” question in polls.

Spurning the Reagan lesson, John McCain made a fatal error in turning his campaign over to the audience of Rush Limbaugh and Sean Hannity. In so doing, he chose the unbearable lightness of being Sarah Palin, trotted out Paris Hilton and labeled Obama a socialist who associates with terrorists.

At a recent Palin rally, the crowd started chanting, “We want Fox!” McCain has given them just that. But how isolated and out-of-touch is this audience? At the end of each debate, a sure-fire way to decide who won was to look at the Fox viewers poll — typically showing a landslide for McCain. Within a day, scientific surveys found big wins for Obama.

Whether Americans are real or fake, they can see through Palin, a woman who couldn’t correctly answer a third grader a few days ago when asked to explain the duties of vice president. Somewhere, between the shuffling to costume and accessorize Palin with a $150,000 wardrobe, her handlers never handed her a copy of the Constitution.

Republicans blow off the smart cities with the counterargument that they win the exurbs — the frontier of new homes, young families and the fresh middle class. And it’s true, in 2004, George Bush won 97 of the 100 fastest-growing counties in America.

That will not happen this year. Polls show McCain is losing 20 percent of self-described moderate Republicans. And new registration figures and other polls indicate that Obama will likely win such iconic exurban centers as Washoe County, Nev., Loudoun County, Va., and Wake County, N.C.

But in the kind of pattern that has held true since McCain went over to the stupid side, his brother recently referred to suburban northern Virginia as “communist country” and a top adviser, Nancy Pfotenhauer, said it was not “real Virginia.”

Here in Seattle, it’s become a one-party city, with a congressman for life and nodding-head liberals who seldom challenge a tax-loving city government. It would be nice, just to keep the philosophical debate sharp, if there were a few thoughtful Republicans around.

That won’t happen so long as Republicans continue to be the party of yesterday. They’ve written the cities off. Fake Americans don’t count, but this Election Day, for once, they will not feel left out.

ED in '08

2008-10-07T07:34:00.000-07:00

This is from the Ed in '08 website:

To boost America’s economy we must focus on strengthening K-12 education.

Why? Economists estimate that if America raises student skills closer to that of European nations, the U.S. economy would grow by an additional 5% over 30 years resulting in an extra $1.5 trillion in 2037 alone—more than triple current U.S. spending on K-12 public education.

Obama opens education debate with McCain

2008-09-10T04:22:00.000-07:00

Democrat Barack Obama reached for middle ground on education this week, opening a debate with John McCain over who would do more to put good teachers in classrooms and help parents find alternatives to bad schools.

Conceding that both parties have worthy ideas, Obama set out to prove that he's not captive to teachers unions, as his rival claims, and that there is more talk than action in McCain's plans for schools.

McCain tossed red meat to Republicans at their convention last week, saying Obama wants schools to answer to unions and entrenched bureaucracies, while he would hold them accountable to parents and kids.

A look at where the presidential candidates stand on some key education issues:

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SCHOOL CHOICE

For years, "school choice" has meant giving taxpayer dollars — vouchers — to parents to send kids to private school if their neighborhood schools were bad. Charter schools are in the mix too; they are publicly funded but operate independently, free from some of the rules that constrain regular schools.

McCain says he's for school choice, and he got big applause when he talked it up last week at the Republican convention.

"Parents deserve a choice in the education of their children," he said. "And I intend to give it to them."

But McCain is not proposing a federal voucher plan. Instead, he wants to expand a voucher program in the District of Columbia only.

The Arizona senator did propose a federal voucher program when he ran for president in 2000, but his advisers say President Bush's No Child Left Behind Law, enacted in 2002, is aimed at giving parents more choice. McCain would make improvements to that; for example, he would expand children's access to tutoring services.

No Child Left Behind lets parents transfer their children from failing schools to better-performing public or charter schools — assuming there is a better school in the area, which is not always the case. Obama doesn't think vouchers are the answer; many Democrats agree. On Tuesday, the Illinois senator gave his answer to the school-choice dilemma: Create an array of new public schools, and double the federal money for charter schools to more than $400 million.

"Charter schools that are successful will get the support they need to grow," Obama said in Riverside, Ohio. "And charters that aren't will get shut down. I want experimentation, but I also want accountability."

Obama was campaigning Wednesday at a Norfolk, Va., high school.

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NO CHILD LEFT BEHIND

The next president will inherit the immensely unpopular No Child Left Behind education law. The law is so disliked, a majority of voters said they would be more likely to vote for someone seeking to repeal the law, according to an AP-Yahoo News poll in June.

Yet voters do not have that choice. Neither Obama nor McCain seeks to do away with the law, which still has bipartisan support on Capitol Hill.

Instead, Obama and McCain each say they would keep the law and make it better.

"I don't think we should scrap it," McCain said earlier this year in Youngstown, Ohio. "People say, `Just scrap it.' I think it needs to be built on, revised and fixed."

Obama said Tuesday, "Of course, we have to fix the broken promises of No Child Left Behind."

But the question remains just how the candidates, Obama in particular, would "fix" the law.

No Child Left Behind requires annual state tests in reading and math. The goal is that by 2014, every pupil will be able to read and do math at their grade level. The law imposes sanctions on schools that fail to make progress.

Obama has criticized annual tests, which has the law's supporters worried he might gut an essential requirement. And he has the backing of teachers' unions, which strongly dislike the law.

"Don't tell us that the only way to teach a child is to spend most of the year preparing him to fill in a few bubbles on a standardized test," Obama said Tuesday. "Let's finally help our teachers and principals develop a curriculum and assessments that teach our kids to become more than just good test-takers."

Congress and the White House will be in no hurry to tackle No Child Left Behind, which was due for a rewrite last year; the economy, the war and health care are more pressing concerns.

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TEACHER QUALITY

In an effort to get better teachers into classrooms, both candidates support tying teacher pay to student performance.

It's a sticky issue for Obama, who was booed when he mentioned his support for performance pay raises in an address via satellite to the National Education Association.

And so Obama is trying to accommodate teachers who might be hostile to the idea, saying he wants performance pay raises to be negotiated by teachers, not imposed on them. And he says raises should be tied to, but not based solely on, standardized test scores.

"We can do this," Obama said Tuesday. "From Prince George's County in Maryland to Denver, Colo., we're seeing teachers and school boards coming together to design performance pay plans."

He added that he wants teachers doing a poor job to get extra help, but that if they don't get better, they'll be replaced.

McCain emphasized that sentiment at the GOP convention.

McCain said he means to "attract and reward good teachers — and help bad teachers find another line of work."

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MONEY

Democrats have chastised the Bush administration for spending less on No Child Left Behind than was originally promised. Obama promises to spend all that was pledged; McCain wants to keep education spending at current levels.

The government has spent about $25 billion a year on No Child Left Behind programs, an average of nearly $11 billion less annually than what was promised.

Obama proposes to spend at least $19 billion on education, much of it on early childhood education. He would encourage, but not require, universal pre-kindergarten. And he wants a tax credit to pay up to $4,000 of college costs for students who perform 100 hours of community service a year

With the budget stretched thin, a huge infusion of cash for early childhood education or college costs seems unlikely. Federal education spending has been rising for more than a decade.

To pay for his plan, Obama has said he would end corporate tax deductions for CEO pay, cut congressional and federal agency spending and delay NASA's moon and Mars missions.

Obama on Education

2008-09-09T11:23:00.001-07:00

Sen. Barack Obama on Tuesday detailed his plan to strengthen the education system and charged that the Bush administration's "failure to act has put our nation in jeopardy."

Sen. Barack Obama talks education in Riverside, Ohio, on Tuesday.

"Our kids and our country can't afford four more years of neglect and indifference. At this defining moment in our history, America faces few more urgent challenges than preparing our children to compete in a global economy," Obama said at a campaign event in Riverside, Ohio.

Obama also charged that Sen. John McCain hasn't done "one thing" to improve public education.

Obama's speech came as his campaign released an ad that said McCain's economic plan would divert funds from public education. McCain's campaign called Obama's allegations a "desperate attack."

Obama said he wants to see more investments in early childhood education, which he said would better train students in reading and math, and increase the likelihood that students would pursue higher education.

The senator from Illinois also proposed a $4,000 tax credit to middle-class college students who agree to a year of public service.

Obama said he supports the original goals of the Bush administration's No Child Left Behind program, but he said teachers must have better resources in order to live up to the program's promise to educate every child.

"We must fix the failures of No Child Left Behind. We must provide the funding we were promised and give our states the resources they need; and, finally, meet our commitment to special education," he said.

Obama also said teachers should play a role in developing a plan to raise their pay based on performance.

The Democratic candidate called for the creation of an "Innovative Schools Fund" to help school districts develop what the campaign calls a "portfolio of successful public school types," including charters and nonprofit schools.

Obama said parents need more choice when it comes to picking a school, and he vowed to double the funding for "responsible" charter schools.

"Charter schools that are successful will get the support they need to grow. And charters that aren't will get shut down," he said.

The ad the Obama campaign released Tuesday linked education policy to economics and painted McCain as "out of touch and behind the learning curve."

McCain's campaign said the ad was completely untrue.

"Without a single achievement on education reform, Barack Obama has resorted to a desperate attack with absolutely no basis in fact. John McCain has proposed new education reforms to empower parents and students while reducing the influence of the unions and government bureaucrats that support Barack Obama's candidacy," spokesman Tucker Bounds said.

"Nothing that John McCain has proposed would reduce funding for public schools, but in fact he has pledged additional funds to improve education -- and Barack Obama knows it."

McCain's education plan is touted as "Excellence, Choice and Competition in American Education." It involves recruiting teachers who graduate in the top of their class, providing schools with better resources, giving parents more choice among schools, providing bonuses for teachers who go to underperforming areas and cracking down on wasteful spending, among other things.

The senator from Arizona detailed his education policy in July.

McCain on Tuesday held a rally with his running mate, Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, in Lebanon, Ohio. Ohio is a key battleground state, and no Republican has won the White House without winning it. Watch more on the campaign efforts in battleground states »

The two have been calling themselves the "original mavericks" as they campaign together in swing states.

"I've fought corruption. It didn't matter whether the culprits were Democrats or Republicans. I fought people on spending on things you neither need more want," McCain said before an estimated crowd of more than 5,000 in Lebanon.

Palin praised McCain for supporting troops in Iraq, saying "McCain refused to break faith with the troops who have brought victory within sight. And as the mother of one of those troops, he's exactly the kind of man I want as commander in chief."

Earlier Tuesday, President Bush announced a plan to withdraw about 8,000 U.S. troops from Iraq by February and to beef up the U.S. military presence in Afghanistan. Watch Bush's announcement »

Obama has repeatedly called for a timetable for troop withdrawal, while McCain supports a withdrawal based on conditions on the ground.

In response to the president's announcement, Obama said, "In the absence of a timetable to remove our combat brigades, we will continue to give Iraq's leaders a blank check instead of pressing them to reconcile their differences."

Obama said he was glad the president planned to send more troops to Afghanistan, but said "his plan comes up short -- it is not enough troops, and not enough resources, with not enough urgency."

Parents - the other side of the equation

2008-08-16T19:34:00.000-07:00

Education can only work if there is support at home. Let's face it - kids learn better if education is reinforced by their parents. To this end, I want to provide some links that might help parents help the schools and their kids.

The National Education Association (NEA) - This is a great first step. The NEA is very active in supporting public schools around the country.

The Compact for Reading Guide is a user-friendly handbook designed to walk your family-school compact team through the steps of building and implementing a Compact for Reading. It provides information, strategies, examples, and checklists to help parents, educators, and community members develop effective, workable compacts that can improve your school, increase family involvement, and increase student skills and achievement in reading.

Early Childhood Activity Calendar - filled with helpful tips and special activities that promote reading and language skills for young children. Calendar sheets for June 1998 to May 1999. Calendar may be old but activities are still fresh!

Family Times - Scott Foresman says that you are your child's first and best teacher. To help you, they provide activity sheets which you can print for use at home. Kindergarten | First Grade | Second Grade | Third Grade | Fourth Grade | Fifth Grade | Sixth Grade

Helping children learn about reading - from the National Association for the Education of Young Children

Helping your child learn to read - A parent's guide

Helping Children with Learning Disabilities to Succeed - Learning To Read/Reading To Learn

Now this looks like a promising idea....

2008-08-16T16:54:00.000-07:00

I'm not a teacher. I don't have the patience or skills necessary to stand in front of a group of people and impart knowledge. But I respect the people that do and I have talked to a lot of them. One thing I hear a lot is that many teachers feel like they are living in a bubble - they don't have many people to talk to. That is why I think this site - ePals forum for teachers might just be a good idea. If you're a teacher, take a look - it might help to go and ask a question.

Of course, that is not the only forum for you to go to. You might want to try out TeachersTalk, which seems to have a vibrant and intelligent community. Or MES-English.com which will work just as well. Or all three...

The thing is, these sites and sites like them are addressing at least one of the issues surrounding the challenge of preparing children for the 21st century. If you're a teacher why not give them a try - they are free and might give you some good ideas you can try in your classroom.

Are US Voters Informed Enough About Science?

2008-08-13T06:03:00.001-07:00

For decades, educators and employers have worried that too few Americans are preparing for careers in science. But there's evidence to support a new, broader concern in this election year: Ordinary Americans may not know enough about science to make informed decisions on key questions.

We need to teach our children in order to get better leaders... Make education reform part of your vote in 2008 and beyond!

First post

2008-08-10T06:06:00.000-07:00

What is this?

The Education party is a movement founded on the belief that education can solve the problems that we face. We must put educating the next generation and the generation after that at the forefront of this generation.

How will we accomplish this? What can we do? After all, money (Not enough, but that will be another post) is funneled into schools, but we are still graduating class after class of people that lack very basic skills. Some cannot read. Most cannot reason through a problem from start to finish. School has become (With exceptions) a place to prepare young people for low level jobs in the world. We are not giving the next generation the mental tools that they require to continue to move this world forward.

In many countries around the globe, education is not even a guarantee – many children grow up illiterate, follow in their parents footsteps and die destitute just as their parent did. We must break this cycle.

The Education party (Which, right now consists of one person – me) is envisioned as a global movement. It is not a political party – this is too important of a movement to rely on government. I foresee a grass roots campaign to help teach people, young and old, worldwide the skills of critical thinking – the skills they need to make smart moves in their lives.

Education is the silver bullet. It can solve every problem we have – from bad stock markets to climate change to how to feed the burgeoning masses of people living on this planet to finding a way to leave this planet. It can point to a better future and it can make the present better.

How will this happen?

I want to find a way to connect teachers with students. Teachers can be anyone who wants to impart their knowledge and students are anyone who wants to listen. The Internet is a wonderful tool for bringing people together – let's use that tool to effect a true change in this world.

This blog is only the first step. I need your help – I need responses that say what you think should happen. And I cannot do this all on my own – I will need people worldwide that will donate time to helping others. My vision is to find a way to do this that will not entail people using their own money. I don't know how yet, but that will come – I need your suggestions.