How can you argue with better education for American students? Why would you NOT want more money invested in our education system?
Race to the Top is designed to do both of these things. They are the social needs that people have been pushing for for so long. It is a program designed to promote proactiveness in schools. I like that, why throw away money to unfruitful resources? No, make it a challenge. If you want the resources prove that you are going to put them to good use.
So let’s look at the reform ideas in Race to the Top:
1. Designing and implementing rigorous standards and high-quality assessments.
2. Attracting and keeping great teachers and leaders in America’s classrooms.
3. Supporting data systems that inform decisions and improve instruction.
4. Using innovation and effective approaches to turn-around struggling schools
5. Demonstrating and sustaining education reform.
Seems straight forward to me; the government is saying they will create and put into action tests and measurements of those tests in order to keep teachers, students and schools from slacking, instead, they will keep improving and deter them from mediocrity.
Tuesday, April 20, 2010
Read me
There are four specific areas of reform that Race to the Top wants to make:
• Adopting standards and assessments that prepare students to succeed in college and the workplace and to compete in the global economy;
• Building data systems that measure student growth and success, and inform teachers and principals about how they can improve instruction;
• Recruiting, developing, rewarding, and retaining effective teachers and principals, especially where they are needed most; and
• Turning around our lowest-achieving schools. (ed.gov)
Adopting standards and assessments that prepare students to succeed in college and the workplace and to compete in the global economy
Preparing students to succeed in college and the workplace huh? College is becoming a less viable option for many students because of the continually increasing cost of it. Due to decreased state funding at the federal government the U of M has a $100 million cutback. The primary way that U will pay for this will be with increasing tuition again. I’m not sure if building towards a new future in college is effective if there is not a manageable way to pay for college.
Building data systems that measure student growth and success, and inform teachers and principals about how they can improve instruction
The idea is good and all but it sounds so hard to actually implement. From what I understand about learning each student is different and requires slightly different things to maximize their learning potential. In this way the prospect of creating a system that measure students and then formulates some plan on how to improve instruction seems like a pipe dream.
Recruiting, developing, rewarding, and retaining effective teachers and principals, especially where they are needed most
Not every classroom can have a teacher like Jamie Escalante to teach troubled youth (watch Stand and Deliver). Also from how I see it, to develop better teachers we would need to improve the conditions in which they obtain their teaching ability. A teacher needs to get a college degree, which is becoming increasingly expensive. Financially speaking teaching is not a good career course.
Turning around our lowest-achieving schools
That is a legitimate concern. Show me a plan on how you’re going to do this. I have yet to see an actual good, proven plan of action. Show me that plan and maybe we can warrant the $500 million Tennessee got.
• Adopting standards and assessments that prepare students to succeed in college and the workplace and to compete in the global economy;
• Building data systems that measure student growth and success, and inform teachers and principals about how they can improve instruction;
• Recruiting, developing, rewarding, and retaining effective teachers and principals, especially where they are needed most; and
• Turning around our lowest-achieving schools. (ed.gov)
Adopting standards and assessments that prepare students to succeed in college and the workplace and to compete in the global economy
Preparing students to succeed in college and the workplace huh? College is becoming a less viable option for many students because of the continually increasing cost of it. Due to decreased state funding at the federal government the U of M has a $100 million cutback. The primary way that U will pay for this will be with increasing tuition again. I’m not sure if building towards a new future in college is effective if there is not a manageable way to pay for college.
Building data systems that measure student growth and success, and inform teachers and principals about how they can improve instruction
The idea is good and all but it sounds so hard to actually implement. From what I understand about learning each student is different and requires slightly different things to maximize their learning potential. In this way the prospect of creating a system that measure students and then formulates some plan on how to improve instruction seems like a pipe dream.
Recruiting, developing, rewarding, and retaining effective teachers and principals, especially where they are needed most
Not every classroom can have a teacher like Jamie Escalante to teach troubled youth (watch Stand and Deliver). Also from how I see it, to develop better teachers we would need to improve the conditions in which they obtain their teaching ability. A teacher needs to get a college degree, which is becoming increasingly expensive. Financially speaking teaching is not a good career course.
Turning around our lowest-achieving schools
That is a legitimate concern. Show me a plan on how you’re going to do this. I have yet to see an actual good, proven plan of action. Show me that plan and maybe we can warrant the $500 million Tennessee got.
Mur links
1. a. Programme for International Student Assessment
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Programme_for_International_Student_Assessment
b. Anybody at all
c. This source is just an overall of what PISA is and the study results that they found. Wikipedia is useful in general as a collaboration of information about it all in one spot to be convenient to the reader. In particular though it lends us information as to why our education is being viewed as inferior to some countries through these tests.
d. This source is useful because it visually shows the ranking of United States children compared to other countries. In seeing that the US ranks significantly behind other countries I can now frame arguments around this fact. Even the actual terms of the test are never discussed it doesn’t really matter because most American’s would typically be awed by ever being behind any country that they view as even partially lower than themselves, and with the relatively low ranking US it’s pretty safe to say that there is at least one country that does this.
2. a. Should Kids Be Bribed to Do Well in School
http://www.time.com/time/nation/article/0,8599,1978589,00.html
b. Amanda Ripley
c. This source overviews a study conducted by Roland Fryer on ways to improve student results in a few different areas.
d. The use of this article was to show how to allocate the $500 million that Tennessee was given. The results of the study did show that progress was made through a cash reward system. The outlook on this is generally unpopular but it still worked. It was a very cynical way to support Race to the top.
3. a.Want a Higher GPA? Go to a Private College
http://finance.yahoo.com/college-education/article/109339/want-a-higher-gpa-go-to-a-private-college?mod=edu-collegeprep
b. Catherine Rampell
c. This article, at least to being, shows that there has been a study rise in GPA over the last 80 years. The article also touches on many more topics that I didn’t delve into.
d. This source was useful in the factual information that I could take from it. It also leads into many more interesting topics of discussion for the reader, only is if they read it though. The topic could easily expand into more blog posts.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Programme_for_International_Student_Assessment
b. Anybody at all
c. This source is just an overall of what PISA is and the study results that they found. Wikipedia is useful in general as a collaboration of information about it all in one spot to be convenient to the reader. In particular though it lends us information as to why our education is being viewed as inferior to some countries through these tests.
d. This source is useful because it visually shows the ranking of United States children compared to other countries. In seeing that the US ranks significantly behind other countries I can now frame arguments around this fact. Even the actual terms of the test are never discussed it doesn’t really matter because most American’s would typically be awed by ever being behind any country that they view as even partially lower than themselves, and with the relatively low ranking US it’s pretty safe to say that there is at least one country that does this.
2. a. Should Kids Be Bribed to Do Well in School
http://www.time.com/time/nation/article/0,8599,1978589,00.html
b. Amanda Ripley
c. This source overviews a study conducted by Roland Fryer on ways to improve student results in a few different areas.
d. The use of this article was to show how to allocate the $500 million that Tennessee was given. The results of the study did show that progress was made through a cash reward system. The outlook on this is generally unpopular but it still worked. It was a very cynical way to support Race to the top.
3. a.Want a Higher GPA? Go to a Private College
http://finance.yahoo.com/college-education/article/109339/want-a-higher-gpa-go-to-a-private-college?mod=edu-collegeprep
b. Catherine Rampell
c. This article, at least to being, shows that there has been a study rise in GPA over the last 80 years. The article also touches on many more topics that I didn’t delve into.
d. This source was useful in the factual information that I could take from it. It also leads into many more interesting topics of discussion for the reader, only is if they read it though. The topic could easily expand into more blog posts.
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