Texas Education Agency » RED HOT CONSERVATIVE

TEXAS EDUCATION IS A FAILURE

Aug 16

Posted by Ginger in Featured Post

The Texas House Public Education Committee met this past Monday, August 12, 2024 for 9 hours. 7 of those hours the committee spent hosting and questioning invited out of town speakers. Those that support the Committee’s political agenda. At 4pm the Texas taxpayers, moms, dads, grandparents were given a mere 2 minutes to give their testimonies. It was more than evident that “We the People” who vote these politicians into office were just mere serfs in their eyes.

Whole most of the committee members stayed on point and in their seats listening and asking questions of invited quests felt the need to escape their seats with no questions once “We the People” took to testifying.

This is the link to the full House Education Committee Hearing. Public testimony started at 7 hours into the hearing. Watch the lack of respect offered those prior and after to the 7 hour mark. Texas Education Commissioner, Mike Morath was the first to speak on the panel. In his speech he testifies that over 50% o Texas Students are failing the STAAR test. Get that 50%? Why is he still the commissioner?

Below are testimonies from many of us who spoke before the Texas Public Education Committee regarding our failing Education System and their alignment with Globalist organization UNESCO through programs like the International Baccalaureate and HB 1605. HB 1605 is a technology vendor bill ushering in UNESCO’s Open Education Resources leading students further away from textbooks to online devices. All so called Texas Conservatives Representatives voted for HB 1605 with the exception of Senator Bob Hall.

Many of us have testified with before the Texas House and Senate Education committee’s for years telling them to get our children off of one to one devices (technology) and back to a classical education with a textbook, pen and paper. Sadly, our politicians are only interested in catering to lobbyists and vendors have thrown the next generation of students under the bus on their watch.

https://www.facebook.com/alice.linahan1/videos/1216260556078779

Tags: Alice Linahan, Education, Erin Green, Ginger Russell, Hollie Plemons, Meg Bakich, Mike Morath, moms dads, Taxpayers, Texas, Texas Education Agency

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“Texas School Children To Be Unable To Read Patriotic Documents”

Jan 06

Posted by Ginger in Featured Post

ACTION ALERT: Texas public school students to be unable to read the Declaration of Independence, the Constitution – no cursive writing to be taught

To voice objections to no cursive writing — The public is encouraged to send their comments to the TEA at the following address: TEKS@tea.texas.gov and/or to write to the Texas State Board of Education members:

http://tea.texas.gov/About_TEA/Leadership/State_Board_of_Education/Board_Members/SBOE_Members/

1.5.16 — ADDENDUM TO MY CRITIQUE OF THE NOV. 2015 ELAR/TEKS DRAFT SENT OUT YESTERDAY–

Today, I am sending out an addendum to the critique of the Nov. 2015 DRAFT OF THE ELAR/TEKS that I sent out yesterday (http://www.educationviews.org/critique-nov-2015-texas-elarteks-draft/ ) in which I verbalized my four Objections to what the Texas English / Language Arts / Reading (ELAR) Review Committee Members had produced.

The reason for this separate addendum is to explain thoroughly my concern that the leadership of the ELAR/TEKS Review Committee Members (RCM) chose to follow the Type #2 philosophy of education as exhibited in the Common Core Standards by taking away cursive handwriting from the Texas public schools.

Here is my Objection #5 which should be added to the Objections #1 – #4 in yesterday’s critique. I have also added Objection #6 at the end of this addendum:

OBJECTION #5

The present ELAR/TEKS document (Beginning with School Year 2009 to the present) states:

(23) Oral and Written Conventions/Handwriting, Capitalization, and Punctuation. Students write legibly and use appropriate capitalization and punctuation conventions in their compositions. Students are expected to:

(A) write legibly in cursive script with spacing between words in a sentence. (http://ritter.tea.state.tx.us/rules/tac/chapter110/ch110a.html#110.14)

In the Nov. 2015 ELAR/TEKS Draft, no mention is made of cursive writing to be taught in Grade 3.

Texas is one of the few states that requires cursive writing to be taught, starting in Grade 3. However, for some time, this state mandate in the present ELAR/TEKS to teach cursive has been ignored; and many Texas teachers have quit teaching cursive or correct handwriting habits.

Because Grade 3 teachers have quit teaching cursive, then the students going forward from Grade 3 have no longer had the ability to write nor to read cursive. Because the skills learned in ELAR are competency-based (build upon one another) and because the ELAR/TEKS set explicit goals at each grade level/course level, once students are taught to master a certain skill, then they are to be held accountable in the future grade levels to demonstrate that mastery.

In other words, once students are taught cursive in Grade 3, teachers in the succeeding grade levels can expect students to write cursively and to read text written in cursive writing.

The Common Core Standards deliberately do not support the teaching of cursive writing for two reasons: (1) The agenda behind Obama’s Common Core Standards is to dumb down students to the same common level, and (2) Obama and his administration are indoctrinating students into the social justice agenda.

One of the best ways to indoctrinate this and future generations of students is to make sure they can no longer read the historical documents upon which our nation is founded.

Beyond the obvious (e.g., personal thank-you notes, friendly letters, etc.), if students can no longer read cursive writing, they will not be able to read the primary sources upon which our country is built — the Constitution, the Declaration of Independence, journals, diaries, love letters, historical documents, ledgers, etc.

Students will also not be able to read historical and literary documents that come from Britain and other English-speaking nations. This means that large portions of resources in every museum and library in this country and throughout the world would be unintelligible to generations of non-cursive-reading students. They would be forced to have someone else interpret these documents for them which is a dangerous thing in today’s politically correct world.

The advantages of cursive are well documented. Cursive is a much faster form of handwriting than printing because each letter flows into the next letter. If people are without computers and need to be able to take or write notes, their handwriting speed would be severely impaired if they did not know how to write cursively.

Computers are not always accessible and do not always work. Schools are already finding that out as they put their students in digitized textbooks. When the network or the device goes down, all learning stops! As schools are forced to cut their technology budgets and the layers of tech support staffers are overcome with the deluge of techie devices in the schools, these “computer down” occurrences are occurring much more regularly.

Nothing forces students to pay attention to detail better than their having to write their compositions, test answers, open-response questions, timed writings in longhand; and cursive prioritizes classroom time.

When people go into an office to apply for a job, they generally have to fill out applications in longhand. Being able to write quickly, neatly, and clearly gives the prospective employer a favorable impression of the applicant.

How many of us who go to doctors’ offices, dentists’ offices, and hospital/clinic offices frequently are asked to fill out forms? Again, being able to write quickly, neatly, and clearly expedites those office visits and gives healthcare workers important information about our health.

We also have credible research done by qualified, peer-reviewed, published researchers that proves cursive is good for the brain.

6.2.14 – “What’s Lost As Handwriting Fades” – by Maria Konnikova – New York Times, Science – http://www.nytimes.com/2014/06/03/science/whats-lost-as-handwriting-fades.html?_r=0

Excerpts from this article:

…psychologists and neuroscientists say it is far too soon to declare handwriting a relic of the past. New evidence suggests that the links between handwriting and broader educational development run deep.

Children not only learn to read more quickly when they first learn to write by hand, but they also remain better able to generate ideas and retain information. In other words, it’s not just what we write that matters — but how.

“When we write, a unique neural circuit is automatically activated,” said Stanislas Dehaene, a psychologist at the Collège de France in Paris. “There is a core recognition of the gesture in the written word, a sort of recognition by mental simulation in your brain.

“And it seems that this circuit is contributing in unique ways we didn’t realize,” he continued. “Learning is made easier.”

… When children had drawn a letter freehand, they exhibited increased activity in three areas of the brain that are activated in adults when they read and write: the left fusiform gyrus, the inferior frontal gyrus and the posterior parietal cortex.

By contrast, children who typed or traced the letter or shape showed no such effect. The activation was significantly weaker.

…In another study, Dr. James is comparing children who physically form letters with those who only watch others doing it. Her observations suggest that it is only the actual effort that engages the brain’s motor pathways and delivers the learning benefits of handwriting.

Virginia Berninger, a psychologist at the University of Washington, demonstrated that “When the children composed text by hand, they not only consistently produced more words more quickly than they did on a keyboard, but expressed more ideas… When these children were asked to come up with ideas for a composition, the ones with better handwriting exhibited greater neural activation in areas associated with working memory — and increased overall activation in the reading and writing networks.”

Dr. Berninger goes so far as to suggest that cursive writing may train self-control ability in a way that other modes of writing do not, and some researchers argue that it may even be a path to treating dyslexia. A 2012 review suggests that cursive may be particularly effective for individuals with developmental dysgraphia — motor-control difficulties in forming letters — and that it may aid in preventing the reversal and inversion of letters.

…the benefits of writing by hand extend beyond childhood. For adults, typing may be a fast and efficient alternative to longhand, but that very efficiency may diminish our ability to process new information. Not only do we learn letters better when we commit them to memory through writing, memory and learning ability in general may benefit.

Two psychologists, Pam A. Mueller of Princeton and Daniel M. Oppenheimer of the University of California, Los Angeles, have reported that in both laboratory settings and real-world classrooms, students learn better when they take notes by hand than when they type on a keyboard…the new research suggests that writing by hand allows the student to process a lecture’s contents and reframe it — a process of reflection and manipulation that can lead to better understanding and memory encoding.

========

MY RECOMMENDATIONS FOR THE ACTUAL HANDWRITING STANDARDS

Not only should cursive handwriting be restored to the Nov. 15 ELAR/TEKS Draft going forward, but the teaching of good handwriting habits should be taught systematically beginning in Kindergarten. As I stated in my comments from 1.4.16, the Oral and Written Conventions strand should be restored to the Nov. 2015 ELAR/TEKS Draft going forward, and the following elements should be added to that strand:

KINDERGARTEN

The student is expected to:

(A) Practice good posture when seated at a table/desk for writing purposes.

(B) Practice proper pencil gripping (using correct fingers to form vise to hold writing tool) while correctly positioning hand and arm in relationship to paper and desk.

(C) Produce correct formation of letters using starting point, directionality, and ending point for each letter.

(D) Identify the top/bottom, front/back, margins, lines on a sheet of paper.

GRADE 1

The student is expected to:

(A) Practice good posture when seated at a table/desk for writing purposes.

(B) Practice proper pencil gripping (using correct fingers to form vise to hold writing tool) while correctly positioning hand and arm in relationship to paper and desk.

(C) Produce correct formation of letters using starting point, directionality, and ending point for each letter.

(D) Identify margins and margin forming lines.

(E) Identify appropriate times for writing outside the margin lines.

(F) Start writing close to left margin line.

(G) Form all letters so they rest on baseline.

(H) Demonstrate correct starting point and stroke sequence for each letter.

(I) Form both lower and upper case letters in correct manuscript style.

(J) Form all letters so they occupy proper space in relationship to other letters.

(K) Allow space between words.

(L) Start next line at the left margin when one line is complete.

(M) Form both lower and upper case letters in correct handwriting style.

GRADE 2

The student is expected to:

(A) Distinguish cursive from printed writing.

(B) Explain the purpose of cursive writing.

(C) Identify appropriate times to use printed writing (e.g., maps, charts) or cursive.

(D) Demonstrate how to form the connecting line between any two given letters.

(E) Produce neat, legible cursive writing (e.g., consistent slant, correct letter formation, correct size).

GRADE 3 – ENG. IV

The student is expected to:

(A) Use neat, legible cursive writing on most school work.

(B) Produce neat, legible cursive writing (e.g., consistent slant, correct letter formation.

OBJECTION #6

In the Nov. 2015 ELAR/TEKS Draft, the wording is as follows in the Introductions for K through Eng. IV:

Introduction

(a)(6) Statements that contain the word “including” reference content that must be mastered, while those containing the phrase “such as” are intended as possible illustrative examples.

I would like to see this wording clarified by deleting the above explanation and inserting the following:

If the curriculum element says “such as” or “e.g.,” – (1) teachers may teach, (2) textbooks/instructional materials must include, (3) the element preceded by “such as” or “e.g.” may or may not be tested on STAAR/EOC’s

If the curriculum element says “including” – (1) teachers must teach, (2) textbooks/instructional materials must include, (3) element is permissible to be tested on STAAR/EOC’s

Donna Garner

Wgarner1@hot.rr.com

Tags: cursive, DONNA GARNER, ELAR, Patriotic Documents, TEKS, Texas, Texas Education Agency, TEXAS STATE BOARD OF EDUCATION

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Texas Grocery Magnate Forbids ‘Open Carry,’ Opposes School Choice, Supports Sanctuary Cities

Jan 03

Posted by Ginger in Featured Post

by Merrill Hope 3 Jan 2016

Charles Butt, the Texas billionaire magnate behind the H-E-B supermarket chain which forbid the open carry of firearms law that went into effect January 1, 2016, opposes school choice, funds anti-school choice lobbyists, and is even credited for his role in killing a 2011 state bill banning “sanctuary cities.”

Butt is the 2015 fourth richest Texan and Forbes’ 44th wealthiest person in America with a net worth of $10.7 billion known for funneling hard earned assets into educational lobby groups that fight school choice, although the 77-year-old grocer received a private Ivy League college education that included an undergraduate degree from the University of Pennsylvania’s prestigious Wharton School and a master’s in business administration from Harvard. Texas Watchdog stated Butt believes that private competition “undermines government schools.”

His vested interest in Texas public education includes H-E-B handing out $800,000 a year to public education pursuits through the Excellence in Education Awards. In 2006, he founded Raise Your Hand Texas, which lists Butt as an advisor. The Texas Tribune describes Raise Your Hand Texas as a “seasoned lobbying force on education issues at the Capitol.”

However, Raise Your Hand Texas is a corporate sponsor of the Texas Tribune and Butt contributed $500,000 to the Tribune in 2014, with his all-time contribution to them at $1,150,000. Last year, the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, primary funder of the Common Core State Standards, donated $249,763 to the Tribune.

Texas Watchdog charged Raise Your Hand Texas “pushes for increased public school funding while opposing every substantive education reform at the state legislature,” including supporting and funding candidates who oppose reform efforts to the state’s education system, and measures that expand parental rights.” The dubbed Butt a key player blocking school choice instead “propping up a faltering public monopoly.”

David Anthony, who heads up Raise Your Hand Texas, was one of 35 Texas public school superintendents instrumental in formulating a new vision for “future ready” classrooms under the Texas Association of School Administrators (TASA), another powerful education lobby.

In 2015, Breitbart Texas reported on the jarring conflict-of-interest that arose at the onset of the state’s last legislative session because House Education Committee Chairman Jimmie Don Aycock’s daughter, Michelle Smith, works for Austin-based lobbyist powerhouse HillCo Partners, which Texas Monthly placed “at the top of the lobby pyramid” since 1998. Smith’s two key clients were Raise Your Hand Texas and Fast Growth School Coalition (FGSC), which promotes rapid growth and spending on building new public schools statewide. Public outcry over the father-daughter connection put Aycock’s chairmanship at risk. Breitbart Texas reported that Smith withdrew her lobbyist registration status at the onset of the 84th Legislature to thwart that outcome.

Butt also funds the Texas Parent PAC, the largest recipient of his 2014 contributions at $1,498,000 and recognized as a top “power PAC” in the state. Texas House Speaker Joe Straus (R-San Antonio), who appoints the House Education Committee, received $168,000 from Butt that year. Butt contributed $161,458 directly to the committee members, according to the Austin American-Statesman. Texas Watchdog highlighted that the largest contribution chunk, $76,920 went to Straus’ committee chair pick Aycock (R-Killeen), also the lead author on the state’s 2013 college and career ready standards, House Bill 5.

Texas Parent PAC contributed another $81,931 to House Education Committee members, according to Texas Watchdog. The Parent PAC has proudly endorsed Aycock since his 2006 election, although he announced last summer he would not run again. In 2013, he voted against vouchers. Last year, Senate Bill 4, an education tax credit scholarship bill designed to help low-income and at risk K-12 students, was sidelined in the House Ways and Means Committee after passing in the Senate. The House never gave it a hearing.

Yet, in the 11th hour of the legislative session, the House flung House Bill 1891 out for a vote. This big government community schools initiative backed by the Texas American Federation of Teachers was the union’s solution to combat public charters, Breitbart Texas reported. Its inspiration was the American Federation of Teachers Promise Schools, a co-initiative with the Albert Shanker Institute, a proponent of Common Core state standards.

Like Raise Your Hand Texas, Texas Parent PAC opposes school choice, which means different things to different advocates on both sides of the debate. Breitbart Texas reported the premise behind “school choice” as educational options decided upon by families and not educrats whether that choice is public, charter, private, parochial, or home school. School choice opponents often depict advocates as trying to dismantle public education and privatize schooling, attack teachers, and drain taxpayer funds from public schools.

“Not so,” Americans for Prosperity State Director Michael Hasson told Breitbart Texas last year. He said the point of school choice was to “maximize” educational opportunities. “Education is the gateway to the American Dream. It’s ridiculous to assume we can eradicate the system. We want to strengthen it,” he said.

In 2013, Raise Your Hand Texas supported virtual (online) education and adding more charter schools, although they pushed for legislation that limited the reach of the proposals backed by pro-school choice advocates, the Texas Tribune reported, saying Butt created Raise Your Hand Texas to “combat private school vouchers.” Groups like Texas Freedom Network oppose school choice because they do not want taxpayer dollars to move out of the system with the child. Arizona, Florida, and Nevada embraced education savings style “voucher” accounts (ESA) as a means to flee failing schools and empower parents in making educational decisions for their children.

In December, the Texas Education Agency released its Public Education Grant (PEG) list for its 5.2 million publicly educated K-12 students and it identified the degree to which the system failed — 1,532 campuses landed on the list for poor test scores or unacceptable ratings, an increase from the previous year’s 1,199 failing schools. Texas has approximately 8,600 campuses totalling 1,200 school districts and charters.

Texas Public Policy Foundation’s Kent Grusendorf described a core conundrum of the public education “monopoly.” He wrote: “Thousands of great people work in the field of public education. Unfortunately, union leaders, bureaucrats and politicians all think they can tell teachers what is best. We must set educators free. We must set our children free.” He underscored that historically “monopolies are inherently inefficient in the allocation of resources,” adding that Texans spend over a quarter of a million dollars per year for a classroom of 25 students where the average teacher earns $50,000. “In order to advance professionally, great teachers must leave the classroom, where they have great value to the institution, and move into administration, where in many cases, they add less value,” he noted.

In 2011, Butt, along with Houston homebuilder Bob Perry, no relation to former Gov. Rick Perry, worked to kill important legislation in the fight against illegal immigration. H-E-B operates 300-plus markets in Texas and also 52 in Mexico. Through HillCo Partners, they applied pressure to the state’s House panel to block Perry’s anti-sanctuary cities measure. The supermarket mogul gave nearly $2.2 million to squash the bill, the Dallas Morning News reported, footnoting that Texans for Public Justice ranked Butt third among givers to legislative candidates in 2008.

That blocked legislation would have allowed law enforcement officers to inquire about the immigration status of people they detained, the Houston Chronicle reported. Since the Texas legislature failed to pass any anti-sanctuary cities measures, Gov. Greg Abbott made this a 2015 priority, coming up with his own plan to deal with law enforcement officials who won’t enforce the law, Breitbart Texas’ Bob Price reported. In October, Abbott called to end sanctuary city policies in Texas, Price also reported. That came in response to a Dallas County Sheriff who intended to lighten up on immigration holds for jailed illegals and legal aliens, no longer detaining them for Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE). Abbott said these types of sanctuary city policies will “no longer be tolerated in Texas.” A week later, he announced a new plan to strip state grant funding from county sheriffs with a Sanctuary City policy of not honoring ICE detainers, Breitbart Texas reported.

The Texas H-E-B stores will continue to abide by state CHL laws and allow concealed carry of handguns in stores..

Follow Merrill Hope on Twitter @OutOfTheBoxMom.

Tags: Breitbart Texas, Charles Butt, HEB, Jimmie Don Aycock, Joe Straus, Merrill Hope, Out of the Box, Raise Your Hand Texas, Texas, TEXAS EDUCATION, Texas Education Agency, Texas Freedom Network, texas legislature

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Emotional Child Abuse at “Fort Worth Academy of Fine Arts”

Nov 10

Posted by Ginger in Featured Post

I was contacted by mother, Carrie Huffman today regarding the emotional abuse of her daughter by teacher, Patricia Jacobson at the Forth Worth Academy of Fine Arts. Ms. Huffman has contacted and reached out to the school administration repeatedly with no satisfaction regarding the treatment of her daughter. Ms. Huffman has also contacted her local police department seeking help in resolving the situation. A detective has now been assigned to the case.

Ms. Huffman posted the following on her facebook page.

Below is a letter to the Texas Education Agency seeking their assistance in this matter. Will TEA or the school protect this child?

Craig Shreckengast

*** Please not at the bottom of the page please view principal, Mr. Shreckengast professional response to this blog.******

November 4,2015 Carrie Huffman c/o Kailey Huffman

Texas Education Agency

Re: Complaint of abuse to minor child and administrative negligence by Fort Worth Academy of Fine Arts

Texas Education Agency My daughter Kailey is an advanced art student at FWAFA. She has an art teacher Patricia Jacobson two class periods everyday. Jacobson is abusive not only to Kailey but to several of the children. She is emotionally,mentally and verbally abusive, then tries to be physically affectionate. She screams,cusses, calls names, humiliates, etc. and has for a while. The administration refuses to acknowledge any wrong doing despite the constant reports. Parents have had to pull their children out of school over this teacher because of their refusal to protect the children. That seems serious yet it’s ignored. Kailey has put up with Jacobson yelling, humiliating, being threatening by standing over her screaming at her repeatedly to stand up right then etc. Kailey has begged me to please let her handle it knowing that reaching out to anyone simply gets her called into a meeting with Jacobson whom then sugar coats her behavior and makes it appear as if my child just misunderstands her intentions. Then when Jacobson is alone with the kids it’s hell to pay. Kailey spent a week in the counselors office about a month ago during Jacobson’s class period crying and unable to attend her class due to fear of her lashing out yet again. Kailey has generalized anxiety disorder and Jacobson is well aware of this. Monday November 2, 2015 after telling Kailey in her first period class that her painting was nasty, Jacobson grabbed a paintbrush mixed the colors on her pallet and painted all across Kailey’s canvas. Then Jacobson yelled “now fix it!” My daughter said yes ma’am, doing all she could to hold it together until she could get out of the class and make it to the restroom. Two class periods later sadly it started again. Kailey is new to what they are working on in this class which is AP fibers. She requested help previously and the teacher told her she would help when the other kids were at that point. She told her to undo and redo hers repeatedly while waiting for help. Which is what she did. The teacher then loudly started to accuse my daughter of not doing anything and asking if she planned to actually work that day at all. Jacobson knew she didn’t know how to proceed to the next step and started patronizing her because another student with 6 years experience had more done. The other student spoke up about her experience and then Jacobson began really yelling and saying you’re gonna have to take this home and actually do something for once. Kailey replied yes ma’am and I can work on it in my 8th period class because it’s my art practice period. Jacobson yelled at her to stop making excuses and trying to manipulate her like she does everyone else in her life. Yelling at Kailey again in front of the class. Kailey finally started to tear up at which time Jacobson informed her she better figure out a better way to deal with her than crying about it. She told her to stop crying. My daughter tried really hard to compose herself but Jacobson demanded Kailey look her in the face which made it impossible for her. She continued to demand Kailey speak to her like an adult but trying to stop crying and trying to talk at the same time doesn’t really work. Jacobson however continued and Kailey started to have a panic attack and struggle to breathe. Jacobson then demanded my child go get a mirror and watch herself. Continually yelling that she couldn’t watch if she was crying and she better stop. My daughter struggling to breathe and trying desperately to do so Jacobson said, you can stop that right now because it won’t work with me. Jacobson then patronizing my child insisted she mimic her breathing saying its like this taking in a deep breath then blowing it out sarcastically. When Kailey couldn’t because she was actually having a panic attack, (not a chosen behavior) it angered Jacobson even more. My daughter began to get light headed because she couldn’t get good breaths. She was afraid to put her head down so she tried to hold her head up with her hand so she didn’t look away from the mirror. This infuriated Jacobson and she told her to get her hands off her face and keep them off. Jacobson then said you are gonna have to find a better way to deal with me and that Kailey should get on some medication so she could deal with life. Totally out of line considering for one she isn’t a mental health professional, her parent and has no Right to talk about Kailey’s private issues in front of the class! After about 15 minutes Kailey was able to somehow get her breathing under control and Jacobson finally backed off. Kailey tried to just keep her head down focusing on her work. Within about ten minutes Jacobson started again. Kailey tried not to cry but she kept on. Jacobson grabbed Kailey by the face with both hands forcing her to look at her while she spoke. Jacobson insisted Kailey come to her when she was feeling anxious and they would work through it together. Still holding her face Jacobson pulled Kailey toward her and kissed her on the forehead then walked away. She walked back over shortly thereafter and said they would figure out a better way for Kailey to handle her anxiety. Then she pulled Kailey close to her forcing her to hug her. Absolutely not! I believe this is another way for her to make Kailey feel vulnerable to her control and aware of her ability to make her behavior appear to others that she cares. Kailey didn’t want to be touched by Jacobson at all and it’s just another controlling move on her part. Kailey asked repeatedly to go to the restroom or the counselor and she was told no that was just another escape. I have told her in the past if she ever gets this way to get up and leave the room it is also in her 504 that she be permitted to do so. At one point Kailey tried to get up and leave but Jacobson immediately bowed up to her and said sit back down now! We went to the principal Craig Shrekengast whom asked Kailey what appeared to trigger Jacobson’s outburst. Kailey said a lot of times she just comes in cranky but one thing is if you are absent she will be really mean when you return. Shrekengast looked at Kailey and said well do you have a lot of absences? This bothered me and I said wait a second, are you saying if she had a lot it would justify her behavior? He immediately looked at me and said I am talking to Kailey right now. I reminded him that Kailey is a minor and I’m her mother and it was important to me that my child understand that behavior wouldn’t be justified for any reason. Kailey then explained she is always saying I don’t do my work. He replied, well do you? Kailey said yes sir. She told him about the painting and her painting across it angrily and telling her it was nasty. He tried to say it was no different than when you turn in a paper you have written and the teacher makes corrections on the page. I strongly disagree. He asked if she was always negative about her work and Kailey said no the last thing I turned in she said I had outdone myself. He replied we’ll see so she compliments you. As if it excused the abusive outbursts. I tried to explain it would be as if I insulted him only to try and sugar coat it with a compliment. He then demanded My daughter and myself leave his office. I then went to the superintendent Clint Riley whom had a very similar demeanor as the principal. He informed me that there are parents that love Jacobson. That may be true but I know that she has had so many complaints about being mentally and emotionally abusive, cussing and calling kids names, belittling and ridiculing them even stating she wanted to hit kids but they refuse to acknowledge this or protect our kids. Jacobson accuses Kailey of using her anxiety as an excuse to manipulate people. Kailey is not a manipulative child. She is quiet and very reserved. She says she goes to school to learn not to socialize. She is very respectful and follows rules. She is an honor student and has NEVER had a disciplinary issue ever. She has been at FWAFA since third grade and is now in eleventh. I after trying to reach out to counselors many times over the last year, the nurse, the principal, the executive director and even going to the school board where they refused to allow me to address them, have realized they are not going to protect Kailey from this woman and he actions are escalating. After the two class periods of torment and humiliation followed by her forcing Kailey to allow her to hold her face, kiss and hug her I chose to contact the the police because it’s very apparent the Administration isn’t going to protect my child or any other child from this woman’s abuse. The police said that what my daughter was describing would definitely be considered assault by contact. So we chose to move forward with filing a police report. When the detective contacted Riley about Jacobson, he lied to her and said he wasn’t aware that she had grabbed my daughters face, kissed her or forced her to hug her. Which is completely false. I sat in his office the day it happened and told him after talking to Shrekengast about it with Kailey only minutes before. He also told the detective there had never been issues with this teacher. Another false statement. I know a mom pulled her child out a year and a half ago when Riley refused to protect her 5th grader by moving him to an alternate class. Jacobson cussed at her son on more than one occasion, got in his face, called him a names and would take him in the hall alone and intimidate him making him fearful to go to school. She basically tormented him for a year and nine days before his mom finally realized she had no other choice because Riley was going to punish her child for her insisting they protect him from Jacobson. I tried to bring up to Riley that I was well aware that many other students have and continue to have problems with her being a bully. One of their most talented and promising art students dropped art just so he could get away from her mistreatment. Riley was told by me and Shrekengast by Kailey with me in his office also that Jacobson grabbed her face, kissed her and made her hug her in a controlling don’t forget I’m the boss kind of attempt to make a point. Yet, Mr Riley refuses to move my child to another class. He insisted he would “look into it at his earliest convenience” but that if she wasn’t back in that class twice a day in the meantime it would be considered Unexcused. I tried to take Kailey to school the next morning and by the time we got there she was shaking and sick to her stomach. I asked Riley to tell me how he would ensure that my daughter would not be subjected to this type of abuse at the hands of Jacobson again and he said she can feel safe at school. She clearly can’t and doesn’t. Then following his so called investigation where he met with the teacher, counselors and special programs staff but not ONE student that was in that class and witnessed this terrifying episode, he informed me he found absolutely no wrong doing on the part of Jacobson and that my claim of disability harassment by her insisting my child find a better way to deal with her anxiety possibly medicating herself in front of the entire class was completely unfounded as well. I spoke to the mother of one of the other students in this class on Monday that witnessed this terrifying display by Jacobson at the request of the detective and she informed me that her daughter came home from school that afternoon visibly shaken and told her all about what had happened and how sad it was to see her treat Kailey so cruel and she just wouldn’t stop. The kids are all afraid of her. I truly don’t know what it’s gonna take for the administration to actually be held accountable for knowingly protecting a teacher that has a history of abusive and unethical behavior and continues to get away with it. By law I was under the impression that if they knew of even one incident of abuse having that kind of affect on a child that they were legally obligated to report it and if they didn’t they could be found guilty of abuse by omission. How can this be allowed to continue and me be expected to force my terrified child with severe anxiety to have to attend two class periods a day with this woman that has so blatantly harassed and abused her in front of a host of other students? The woman that calls kids names cusses at them and gets aggressive? How is it I’m supposed to expect that my daughter should believe she is safe there and that the administration will keep her safe? She attempted to leave the room as I instructed her to do and Jacobson immediately piped up and made her very aware she better not even try it. What is wrong with that? They have failed to protect Kailey and so many other children time and time again. They refuse to address this behavior and won’t even allow me to meet with her. How can my daughter have access to her instruction without being terrified? She is a child with a disability and even if she didn’t have a disability no child should have to fear this kind of attack from a teacher. This is disability harassment, abuse of power and blatant negligence by this administration. Complaint after complaint, kids going to the counselors trying to cope with Jacobson and it goes unreported and unaddressed. Instead they ignore it and continue to subject our children to this teachers abuse covering it up for her. It’s sick. There are so many parents that have begged for help yet nothing. This is not an isolated incident and my daughter has done her best to try and deal with Jacobson being nervous and anxious daily waiting for the next episode. What is gonna have to happen before someone will protect our children? Thank you in advance for any assistance you can provide me in making school attendance safe for my daughter.

Sincerely, Mrs. Carrie Huffman

__________________________________

Patricia Jacobson

Principal, Craig Shreckengast’s response.

So Mr. Shreckengast are you saying that this student is lying to her parents? Seriously?

Tags: Carrie Huffman, Clint Riley, Craig Shrekengast, Fort Worth Academy of Fine Arts, Forth Worth Art Academy of Fine Arts, kailey huffman, Patricia Jacobson, Texas Education Agency

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WARNING: TEXAS ISD’s PERFORMING “CONTROVERSIAL” PSYCHOLOGICAL TESTING

Sep 10

Posted by Ginger in Featured Post

The police state is ascending to new heights. President Bush & Obama’s agenda are to have all public school students undergo a mental health screening and unbeknownst to some parents that is taking place through our public school systems. The days of children being the sole property of their parents is slowing fading away one step at a time? Where does the public school system get their authority? Where are our Texas legislators on this issue?

Richardson ISD sent out a parental announcement to 7th grade parents to consent to having their child tested. (See Below).

The program being used in called TeenScreen. The Texas legislature passed SB 831 which says districts must use programs from a specified list for best practices for screenings. The program in question TeenScreen is not on the list.

Despite the fact that the “TeenScreen” program fell under heavy criticism and was shut down in 2012, Texas school districts are still using the program to screen students for mental illness.” http://healthimpactnews.com/2012/teenscreen-operations-have-shut-down/.

According to this article:

http://www.cchrint.org/issues/psycho-pharmaceutical-front-groups/teenscreen/

-Shaffer [TeenScreen creator] has long-term ties to drug companies and is a consultant for Hoffman La Roche, Wyeth and GlaxoSmithKline (GSK).^[9] He has been a member of a consensus panel discussing child and adolescent “bipolar” by: Abbott, Bristol-Myers Squibb, GSK, Janssen, Johnson & Johnson, Eli Lilly, Novartis, Pfizer, and Solvay.^[10]

-TeenScreen refuses to divulge the source of its funding. The website says they are funded by private family foundations, corporations and individuals. The national office of TeenScreen says it does not control its local chapters seeking pharmaceutical company funding.^[15] In Tennessee, for example, Eli Lilly funded the program, which determined that over 50% of the 170 students surveyed ended up at a therapist’s office.^[16]

https://uniteforlife.wordpress.com/category/teenscreen/page/2/

-One of the most successful, and alarming, off-label marketing scheme that needs to be investigated is the TeenScreen program.

-By use of TeenScreen, the drug companies have gained access to the nation’s 50 million public school children.

-Billed as a mental illness screening program aimed at suicide prevention, it is already being administered to students in schools all across the country and children are being labeled mentally ill on a regular basis, with the only treatment offered naturally being drugs.

-Tugging at the heartstrings, TeenScreen is presented to naive parents as a harmless little survey that may save their kids from suicide.

-However, parents are not being told about the life-long consequences that can result from a child’s diagnosis of mental illness by way of this harmless survey.

Richardson ISD’s Counselor, Laurie Jackson’s message above you gives parents a link to the Suicide and Crisis Center of North Texas. I called the Center to verify that they were using the “TeenScreen” program and they verified they were. I also emailed Laurie Jackson the following email.

Why are you subjecting students to Teen Screen. Can you tell me who is funding this program? Does the district have licensed Psychologist on campus to administer this?

I received the following response from Brenice Murlette PhD, with Richardson ISD…..

The TeenScreen questionnaire was developed by Columbia University and research has concluded that it is effective in identifying youth with possible emotional problems. It is the only screener recommended for youth by the state of Texas.

It should be known that there is inaccurate information on the internet about TeenScreen. In response, we want our community to know that there is not a company connected to TeenScreen or to the confidential results. RISD has partnered with the North Texas Suicide and Crisis Center (a non-profit organization) whose objective is to educate the community on teenage depression and suicide. Other school districts have been utilizing this screening for many years (Allen, Coppell, Grapevine-Colleyville, Highland Park, and Melissa ISD to name a few).

Parent permission is required. The screening is free, offered during the school day in the computer lab and if the student is identified as depressed or showing signs of suicide ideation, he or she is then interviewed by a mental health professional to determine the level of risk. The youth’s family is contacted and referrals for mental health resources are given.

Brenice Murlette PhD

Responsive Services Counselor Support

Richardson ISD Guidance & Counseling Department

469-593-7414 (email is the best way to reach me)

I responded asking for clarification as to what data on the internet was inaccurate and would the students screening results be entered into the Longitudinal Data System. I have received no response. Parents should be greatly concerned that you local school would/could administer mental health screenings on your child. There is no information private today within a school system. All data is available to 3rd parties outside the district despite what the district may tell you.

The following was sent home from Allen ISD.

Additional info below:

TeenScreen said to be unreliable.

TeenScreen: Life Saving Intervention or Orwellian Nighmare.

TeenScreen National Center for Mental Health Checkups

http://www.cchrstl.org/documents/TeenScreenWhitePaper.pdf

Tags: Alen isd, Allen ISD, Brenice Murlette PhD, Coppell ISD, Grapevine Colleyville, Highland park ISD, Melissa ISD, Richardson ISd, Shaffer, Texas Education Agency, Texas Education Service Centers, Texas ISD

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Texas STAAR Testing is a JOKE!!

Apr 27

Posted by Ginger in Featured Post

STAAR TESTING

1. Pearson Publishing provides the STAAR/EOC questions, grades tests, decides on scoring (who passes and who fails), and prepares and scores 5th and 8th STAAR retests.
2. Pearson Publishing has not been shown to be a reputable company-recent information shows Pearson Publishing shareholders as being terrorists.
3. STAAR tests cover TEKS for the entire school year. Students are not prepared to take STAAR tests in March and April.
Let me be very clear about this: TEKS for the entire school year cannot be properly taught before the STAAR tests.
The STAAR tests are given early so that time remains for review and retesting for students who fail the first STAAR tests.
4. Once STAAR tests are taken, the remaining days of school are spent retesting students who failed.
After the STAAR tests are given, school is basically childcare for students who pass the STAAR tests.
5. Michael Williams, the Commissioner of Education, changed the testing code requiring that all students 3-8 go to summer school if they failed STAAR reading and math. The Federal Government provides money for summer school, thus schools make money if your child fails the STAAR and is required to attend summer school.
6. There is NO STATE retest given to all 3rd, 4th, 6th, and 7th graders attending summer school. Individual schools are responsible for this. Teachers who taught and prepared tests during the school year may be the same teachers teaching and preparing tests for summer school.
7. TEA is aware that there are errors on past STAAR/EOC tests. These errors have been reported. TEA has responded with answers including that while there may be more than one correct answer, it is the best answer that is counted correct. In other words, TEA chooses not to acknowledge that they make mistakes. This would result in grade changes, which would be expensive.
8. The STAAR/EOC tests have no positive educational value for your child. The results of the STAAR/EOC test are used to determine whether a child is promoted or not.
9. The STAAR/EOC scores do not provide data that is used to benefit your child. While it is said that students are given additional assistance in areas they scored poorly in, because of open enrollment (inclusion) students are not placed in classes based on STAAR/EOC scores.
10. The focus of Texas education is the STAAR/EOC tests. Thus, your child is being taught bits and pieces of information that is most likely to be on the tests.

There is so much more that will not fit on one sheet of paper. For more information, please contact directly at: ASKJVC@aol.com
Sincerely,
Janice VanCleave
www.TxCscopeReview.com

Texas Education has taken on a very liberal turn that will not benefit students in the long run. The terminology is often changed in order to confuse parents and the community. Today you will hear the term 21 Century Learning. What is the world does this mean?

Tags: 21ST CENTURY LEARNING, ANTI CHRISTIAN, Credintialed to Destroy, FEDERAL GOVERNMENT, Janice VanCleave, Michael, Pearson Publishing, STAAR, STAAR TESTING, Texas, Texas Education Agency, Texas Education Commissioner, TXCSCOPEREVIEW.COM

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TEXAS LEGISLATION PROMOTES ……”UNITED NATIONS AGENDA”!

Mar 04

Posted by Ginger in Featured Post

The 73rd Texas Legislation gave way for the Texas Education Agency to implement and promote the United Nations Socialist Agenda thorough out Texas Schools with the use “International Baccalaureate” Programs.

Our world is falling apart at the seams. Across the globe some of the most horrendous brutal murders are being committed on the innocent and the hatred of America grows across the world daily. And here in Texas we are implementing a global program set on removing American Exceptionalism and the History of what made the US the greatest country in the world. Does this make sense? Absolutely not.

The International Baccalaureate Program Mission statement:

The International Baccalaureate® aims to develop inquiring, knowledgeable and caring young people who help to create a better and more peaceful world through intercultural understanding and respect.

To this end the organization works with schools, governments and international organizations to develop challenging programmes of international education and rigorous assessment.

These programmes encourage students across the world to become active, compassionate and lifelong learners who understand that other people, with their differences, can also be right.

Nothing like brainwashing your children with “social and emotional” learning? This is not about education but about making “global citizens” out of our children. This has got to stop if we are going to preserve our American Heritage and our Freedom. Why are Texas schools signing up for this expensive program to become World Schools? To create world citizens out of our children for a One-World government?

For additional info on the IB program check here.

Tags: Global Citizens, IB, one world government, Texas Education Agency, UNITED NATIONS AGENDA, United Nations Agenda 21

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ESCs Exposed-Part 2: No Accountability

Feb 23

Posted by Ginger in Featured Post

by Janice VanCleave

Texas Education Service Centers (ESCs) were established to provide service to school districts in different regions of Texas. Schools in rural areas have different needs than do schools in cities.Thus, 20 ESCs were established to provide specific services to met the needs of school districts within each region.

The ESCs were originally supported by the state. In 2003 the state legislature allowed the ESCs to sell products and services to bring in more funding. This ended these agencies being a service to schools and opened the door for poor quality products and programs to be produced and sold to public schools.

The ESCs are allowed to be self-governed, thus there has and still is no one who evaluates the quality of the ESC products.

State legislatures, TEA and the State Commissioner of Education, like the ostrich in the illustration seem to keep their head buried in the sand. They certainly were not paying attention when the ESCs created a one-size-fits-all K-12 instruction material for core curriculum (math, science, ELAR, social studies). To add a touch of credibility to this unvetted material called CSCOPE, the ESCs advertised the CSCOPE lessons as being “state lessons.” This is printed on the original CSCOPE materials. Since the ESCs are not held accountable for what they do, the original CSCOPE lessons had plagiarized content. This was not discovered because Texas school superintendents forced their teachers to sign a non-disclosure contract with the ESCs. Teachers signed or they had no job. They agreed to reveal the content of the CSCOPE lessons. The penalty could be legal court action. This divided the staff in Texas schools. As a teacher, I would not respect a superintendent who cared so little for his/her staff that such a contract was mandatory for employment.

Q1 Who is suppose to oversees the ESCs to confirm that state grant money is spent as directed?

A1 TEA is responsible for confirming that grants from the state are used as described. I cannot testify to all grants given to the ESCs from the state of Texas, but the outside evaluation of the Rider 42 PD grant of $150 Million dollars was spent and the product and services were far below par, yet
yet TEA paid the ESCs the grant money.

Q2 Are the boards of trustees for each of the ESCs doing their job?

A2 Some of the ESC employees say having a board of trustees for the ESCs is a joke. The ESC directors handpick these trustees for their ESC.

Q3 Isn’t the Commissioner of Education suppose to oversee the ESCs to make sure they use money correctly?

A3 State Commission of Education, Michael Williams, allowed the ESCs to develop the rules governing the ESCs.

Basically all the Texas Education Service Centers are given “blank checks” with no real checks-and- balances for verifying what money is used for. Only a very small handful of top directors within each Education Service Center are privy to what happens to the yearly inflow of multi-millions of dollars received by each ESC. The ESCs receive Federal Grants as well as grant money from the state. How much and what the money is to be used for is only known by the elite few within the ESCs.

The long and short of it is that the ESCs have evolved from service centers to being part of a very corrupt network. It is difficult to follow the money trail because of the secrecy and misappropriation of funds. It is all hush hush when it comes to where grant money goes.

Q4 Why did Robert Scott resign from being the state commissioner of education?

A4 Scott resigned soon after the midwinter TASA conference when he basically did an 180 degree turn from where we all thought he was on many things. Most people considered Robert Scott to stand behind conservative education values.

When the superintendents at the TASA conference gave Scott a standing ovation for supporting TASA’s goals, we realized that he had been a wolf in sheep clothing or had for some reason been persuaded to support TASA’s goals of implementing Common Core and its assessments.

Q5 I personally think the TEKS and the STAAR do not meet the expectations described. The science TEKS are very vague, and some science TEKS are not correct. When I ask for clarification or to report an error, the answer is always that I just do not understand the objective of the TEKS. Is this attitude the same for everyone who asks questions?

A4 Their patronizing attitude is how TEA and the ESCs get away with so much. It intimidates so many including good educators who might work at TEA or the ESCs. We are patted on the head like we just don’t understand the big picture. We get the picture, shut up and do what we say and don’t ask questions.

ESC’S EXPOSED-PART 1

Tags: ASSESSMENTS, Common Core, esc's, Michael Williams, ROBERT SCOTT, STAAR, TASA, TASB, TEKS, Texas, Texas Education Agency

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Texas ESCs Exposed-Part 1

Feb 19

Posted by Ginger in Featured Post

February 18, 2015 by Janice VanCleave

Texas Education Service Centers (ESCs)

Some of the present and past employees of the Texas Education Service Centers (ESCs) want the public, the Texas legislatures, the Lt. Governor, the Attorney General as well as the Governor to know the truth about the ineffective use of money poured into the ESCs each year.

The ESC employees providing answers include directors, specialists, consultants, and general staff representing many of the ESC regions. While remaining anonymous in this report, those providing answers assure me they will gladly speak directly to state legislatures, the Lt. Governor, the Attorney General as well as the Governor. The Commissioner of Education is not on this list because he as did his predecessor, Robert Scott, supports the actions of the 20 ESCs directly or indirectly by allowing these agencies to govern themselves.

Not everyone who works at the ESCs is involved in the misappropriation of funds or the creation and promotions of Anti-American instructional materials. Many ESC employees would like the Commissioner of Education and the state legislatures to cut off all funding to the ESCs. When the “chee$e” is removed, the rats will look for “chee$e elsewhere. The ESCs can then return to being Service Centers, instead of vendors with a monopoly over instructional materials.

When action is taken against the ESCs, school supervisors will no longer have any reason for not doing their jobs. They will no longer have the “common core” look-alike programs produced and sold by the ESCs promoted by TASA. WOW! I remember how wonderful Texas education was before TASA and long before TEKS and TAKS and STAAR. Texas education was modeled by other states. The textbooks that Texas selected were also selected by other states. Now few Texas schools have real textbooks and the education standards are at rock bottom. How can our Texas Commissioner of Education show his face when students can pass state math assessments by only answering less than 40% of the questions, yet many students fail?

Q1 & Q2 refer to CSCOPE, which the ESCs now refer to as TEKS Resource Service (TRS). The ESCs have been banned from selling CSCOPE lessons.

What was the objective of the CSCOPE conventions (now called the TRS conventions)?

The ESC staffers who actually present CSCOPE workshops that have been describe them as cheer-leading sessions to build support for CSCOPE or provide general overviews that use ppts that are within the CSCOPE site.

The ESC staffers who present CSCOPE workshops generally are not invited to the CSCOPE conventions. Instead, mostly the ESCs send about a dozen ESC consultants who do no CSCOPE support work with schools using CSCOPE. These are Special Education and other specialists that never work with districts in regard to CSCOPE. We did ask why they were going and got no answer.

FYI: There is a lot of unnecessary money spent sending ESC specialists to conventions and workshops that have nothing to do with the area they work with. No one confirms that money spend on travel is necessary. No one confirms that training, even in other states, is ever used to train educators.

ESC staffers are basically kept in the dark, but are supposed to do CSCOPE workshops as well as our regular ESC workshops. No compensation is given for the extra work. As previously stated, many who attend the CSCOPE conferences do not present CSCOPE training to educators.

When the ESCs were banned from selling CSCOPE lessons, were the ESC staffers aware that the CSCOPE lessons were to be given to school districts? Also, were staffers aware that the gutted CSCOPE instruction material would continue to be sold to Texas schools?

We get few to no answers when we ask about CSCOPE. This program was brought in and we were told that it would be used. No questions asked. I can tell you that what we know about CSCOPE in-house is different from the verbiage given to the public. We get little to no clarification about what is going on —basically we know to just keep our mouths shut and don’t ask questions.

Project Share– Is this something established by TEA?

FYI: Project Share is a website where Texas teachers should be able to find free instructional materials for all grades and subjects. The first materials mandated by the 81st legislature in the Rider 42 grant to be posted on the Project Share website were TEKS transition materials. These were professional development materials that compared the old TEKS for TAKS with the new revised TEKS for STAAR. Academies or teacher professional TEKS training were to be given free and the training materials were to be posted in the Project Share website. $150 MILLION dollars was given to develop materials for the Rider 42 grant math, science, ELAR, and social studies academies as well as create the Project Share website. To this day, 2/18/2015, there are Texas teachers and Texas school superintendents who are not aware that Project Share exists. Few Texas teachers attended or even knew about the Rider 42 PD academies.

Ervin Knezek was an ESC employee when CSCOPE was developed as well as when the Rider 42 grant of $150 MILLION dollars was being spent developing the Rider 42 academies and “Project Share.” Knezek resigned from ESC 13 in June, 2010 and established the company Lead4Ward in Washington, State in June, 2010. What was suppose to be part of CSCOPE and wasn’t is on Knezek’s Lead4Ward website. What was suppose to posted on the Project Share website can be found on Knezek’s Lead4Ward website.

Yes, TEA rolled Project Share out and every school district is supposed to have access.
But there are levels of access to the Project Share website. ESC staffers used Project Share like a linked-in account to share ideas or materials. This was the original idea for Project Share. Not only were the Rider 42 academy PD materials to be available, but teachers were to be able to publish materials that they found successful. Also, teachers were suppose to be able to have accounts where they could share ideas with other educators.

Interestingly, some of the ESC staffers have now been blocked to our share boxes. We had access to these share boxes last year, but now there is a public outcry about the CSCOPE lessons, a lot of information is no longer available. We are not sure why except that there is such paranoia in all the ESCs. If what is being told to the public is true about the CSCOPE lessons, why has the ESC leadership become so secretive about files that were freely accessible last year? What was open is not very hush hush and private. The directors of the ESCs seem to be concerned about information shared on the Project Share website. They must be trying to keep up with the answers they are giving about CSCOPE since they give different answers depending on who asks the question.

Overall, most consider Project Share, like the Rider 42 PD academies expensive projects that have been very ineffective. This is due to the ESCs not developing the website and TEA not following up to see that they do. Like all grant money, once the money is gone regardless if the project is not complete, the ESCs are on to doing what ever brings in more money.

The “jig” will be over if the ESCs are ever thoroughly investigated by someone who doesn’t benefit in some way from the actions of the ESCs.

Did State Education Commissioner Robert Scott initiate the idea for Project Share?

The plans for Project Share apparently have been bubbling for a while. Scott was so focused on internal issues that we are not sure he was very aware of Project Share, sad to say.

The Rider 42 grant provided the initial money for Project Share, thus the ESCs were to develop the content posted on this website. Project Share is affiliated with Epsilen, which is a Common Core company. Why is TEA and the ESCs using a Common Core Company when Texas is forbidden to implement Common Core? Has everyone just turned a blind eye to what grant money is used for?

We totally agree with this– No one asks or even watches what the ESCs do. As to Common Core, TASA promotes Common Core and TASA and the ESCs work together. In fact, wha ever the ESCs sell, Texas school superintendents generally buy it because TASA promotes what the ESCs sell. TASA is after all the Texas Association of School Administrators.

Comment from Janice

Think About This!

1. The ESCs provide superintendent certification training as well as training required for School Board Members. Thus, school superintendents and school board members are indoctrinated with constructists (common core progressive) education philosophy used in creating the CSCOPE instructional materials as well as the “Vision Learning” materials sold by TASA. Of course Common Core education philosophy is used in Texas Schools, but it has different titles, such as CSCOPE a.k.a. TRS Instructional Material, and Vision Learning.

2. Texas School Superintendents and School Board Members use district school taxes to pay for their personal membership fees into private organizations (TASA/TASB) who lobby for different education bills that benefit the primary objective of TASA/TASB, which is to TRANSFORM TEXAS EDUCATION.

Yes, our Texas legislatures are swayed by TASA lobbyists as well as the Microsoft lobbyist Thomas Ratliff (illegal member of the State Board of Education) to pass bills that promote Transforming Texas Education so that it is comparable to common core.

This is part I of a series of Questions from me and Answers from ESC # 1-20 staff past and present. The following will be addressed in following parts of this series on the “Unpacking of the ESCs.”

1. In Nov. 2011, Marlin school superintendent Marsha Riddlehuber and the district instructional director, Jamie Johnson would not allow me to view the content of the CSCOPE lessons used in Marlin ISD. Becca Bell the CSCOPE director also refused me access to the content of the CSCOPE lessons. Why? What were they hiding?

2. During the time that CSCOPE lessons were being sold to Texas public schools, the state comptroller, , allowed the ESCs to write their own evaluation. This is obvious since the wording of the comptrollers evaluations were word-for-word the same as publicity written by the ESCs to promote the CSCOPE materials. Did the comptroller ever ask anyone about the CSCOPE product that was not benefiting in some way?

These questions and many more will be coming soon.

ESC’S EXPOSED PART 2

Tags: 81st Legislature, Cscope, DAN PATRICK, Ervin Knezek, Lead4Ward, project share, Rider 42, ROBERT SCOTT, TASA, TASB, TEKS Resource System, Texas Education Agency, Texas Education Service Centers

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Childhood Criminalized: Suspended in Elementary School

Feb 08

Posted by Ginger in Featured Post

by Merrill Hope8 Feb 2015

A nine-year-old Texas schoolboy was suspended from his elementary school for posession of a “magic ring.” Remember the poptart gun? The Nerf gun? The Lego gun? The pointed finger gun? In another time, these typical childrens’ toys would have gotten as little notice as the old fashioned cap gun but in a world where the list of childhood offenses also includes possession of a novelty pen or a Hello Kitty bubble gun, it comes as little surprise that a Lord of the Rings “magic ring” would land Aiden Steward in suspension from his elementary school in Kermit, Texas.

The story spread like wildfire from Yahoo News! to FOX News, originating with the Odessa American’s original report on the budding fourth grade magician who was accused of “terrorizing” his classmates because he said that he would make them “disappear” with his Hobbit prop. Unfortunately, in the 21st Century classroom, displays of “make-believe” are not taken with a grain of salt. Instead, they are perceived through a wary eye, often warranting the kind of macabre school sanctioned remediation that transforms kiddies into criminals.

Two years before Aiden’s run-in with campus zero tolerance policies, seven year-old Alex Evans, a Colorado second grader suspended for throwing an imaginary hand grenade while pretending to “rescue the world” from “pretend evil forces,” and, as the New American reported, “Little Alex, it turns out, violated his school’s ‘absolutes’ against fighting and weapons, ‘real or imaginary.’” There was also seven-year-old Christopher Marshall from Virginia, who was suspended for using a pencil to “pretend shoot” a bad guy — his friend, who, in turn, was also suspended for “pretend shooting” Christopher back.

Welcome to public school, a place where the US Department of Education’s Office of Civil Rights March 2014 snapshot of the 2011-12 school year showed that boys, as a demographic group regardless of race and/or socioeconomic strata, represented 79% of preschool children suspended once and 82% of preschool children suspended multiple times, although boys only represented 54% of preschool enrollment.

Even a Yale University study revealed that boys are nearly five times more likely to be expelled from preschool than girls.

According to the Texas Education Agency (TEA) Public Education Information Management System (PEIMS), which is the longitudinal database that tracks student population, 5,289,752 students were enrolled in Texas public schools in 2013-14. Of those, 2,572,354 were girls and 2,717,398, boys — In-School-Suspension (ISS) was handed out to boys 921,120 times, that’s 43% higher than girls who only had 390,781 ISS actions filed against them, also according to PEIMS. The TEA reported that the number of all students who served in ISS K-12 statewide in 2013-14 was 524,268, of which 352,868 were boys, 171,400 were girls.

The Texas Education Code 37.005 defines suspension: (a) The principal or other appropriate administrator may suspend a student who engages in conduct identified in the student code of conduct adopted under Section 37.001 as conduct for which a student may be suspended. (b)A suspension under this section may not exceed three school days.

ISS is a newer phenomenon that allows schools to receive their Average Daily Attendance (ADA) dollars, which is the combination of federal and state funds that school districts nationwide receive per student per day just because the child shows up. With ISS the “suspended” child is sequestered yet housed on the campus and is technically “in school,” rather than an Out-of-School Suspension (OSS), which is treated as an absence.

However, ISS is particularly troubling to Texas Appleseed because, unlike OSS, there are no limits on the number of days a student may spend in ISS, according to the non-profit organization’s School to Prison Pipeline project. In their backgrounder Texas School Discipline Policies: A Statistical Overview it states, “ISS programs generally do not consist of any instructional time – most ISS programs are run like a study hall, and are not staffed by a certified teacher.”

The report also points out that school districts are required to refer students to ISS for certain types of violations, usually those involving drugs, weapons, or violent behavior. However, the Texas Education Code gives school districts the authority to refer students for “discretionary” offenses that generally include behavior like use of profanity, failure to turn in work, or behavior that teachers label “disruptive.”

Problem is, “disruptive” can be a broadly used term and in the all-encompassing-compliant-or-else environment being fostered and dictated by zero tolerance policies and safe schools plans, the one demographic feeling the self-esteem squeeze in all this are boys.

Jason Steward, the nine-year old’s father told Breitbart Texas that Kermit Elementary School Assistant Principal Danny Camp accused Aiden of being a “racist” in September 2014. Aiden was a newly enrolled student. The administrator did not even know his son when when he was playing a “hold your breath the longest” game to see whose face would turn reddest. An innocent comment Aiden made about another child’s dark-skin became a socially-charged rally cry for equity. According to Steward, Aiden was scolded by Camp, not for calling another boy black but for mistaking the boy was African-American when he was Hispanic.

Steward tried to explain to Camp that Aiden did not mean anything derogatory and was just pointing out skin color differences. “How is a nine-year-old boy supposed to know what is PC?,” Steward told Breitbart Texas.

It did not matter. Aiden got his first ISS. The second came in mid-October over allegedly “sexually graphic” material the boy brought into school. It was from the Big Book of Knowledge and was an illustrated science class cut-away belly-only diagram of a pregnancy. Not exactly Playboy.

With the third incident, the Stewards turned to the media. They felt there was nowhere else to turn. The TEA cannot intervene. Suspensions are considered a local matter, spokeswoman DeEtta Culbertson told Breitbart Texas.

The underlying issues behind the suspensions are not new. In 2001, Christina Hoff Sommers identified a war on boys that grew out of what she termed a misguided feminism. It is one that has emasculated the classroom. By 2013, Sommers worried that the public schools had become too hostile for boys. She wrote, “In grades K-12, boys account for nearly 70% of suspensions, often for minor acts of insubordination and defiance.”

Regardless of racial, ethnic or socioeconomic strata, Sommers pointed out cases of 7-8-9 year-old boys charged with suspensions, yet there was “no insubordination or defiance.” All these youngsters may have been guilty of was was being a boy. Sommers emphasized that in “today’s school environment, that can be a punishable offense.”

This rigidity continues into the middle and high school years. Zero tolerance is the backbone of “safe schools” and “threat assessment” plans that rolled out in public schools long before Columbine (1999) or Sandy Hook (2012). The Safe School Initiative was a joint project of the US Department of Education and the US Secret Service to prevent school shootings.

USA Today reported that these harsh public school zero-tolerance policies took hold in 1994 when “Congress required states to adopt laws that guaranteed one-year expulsions for any student who brought a firearm to school. All 50 states adopted such laws, which were required to receive federal funding. Many legislatures went further, expanding the definition of a weapon and further limiting the discretion of school administrators.”

Today, Texas public education budgets heavily for security systems, in-house campus police and zero tolerance programs; yet, the Bureau of Justice Statistics reported that only approximately 1% of students ages 12 to 18 reported a violent victimization at school. Sommers highlighted that this figure is one-tenth of 1%. Bottom line, as Sommers suggests, the overwhelming majority of boys are not sociopathic.

Yet, in today’s dystopian classroom, the male student finds himself struggling in a “climate” that generally favors more compliant and less kinetically wired girls.

“Across the country, schools are policing and punishing the distinctive, assertive sociability of boys. Many much-loved games have vanished from school playgrounds,” Sommers wrote, spotlighting that “tug or war” has been replaced by “tug of peace” and dodge ball and tag are considered “bullying” or “human target” games. They are banned in many states.

The Huffington Post reported that in Massachusetts, one Superintendent of Schools said that their district spent a lot of time making sure their kids were “violence free”. In California, pee-wee basketball is “score-free” so as not to hurt the other team’s feelings.

The American Psychological Association (APA) Zero Tolerance Task Force questioned, in 2008, if after 20 years all these zero tolerance policies have only negatively affected the relationship of education “with juvenile justice and appear to conflict to some degree with current best knowledge concerning adolescent development.”

The APA also noted that “Rather than reducing the likelihood of disruption, however, school suspension in general appears to predict higher future rates of misbehavior and suspension among those students who are suspended.”

Sommers, too, wondered about the on-going mad science experiment in public schools. It is designed “to re-engineer the young-male imagination.” She noted that this attempt is only succeeding in one way in the public schools — in sending a clear and unmistakable message to millions of schoolboys: You are not welcome in school.”

Meanwhile, elementary school-aged boys just like Aiden Steward walk away with quite a “ding” on their school permanent records.

Breitbart Texas attempted to contact Assistant Principal Camp and Kermit Elementary principal Roxane Greer for comment but was redirected to Bill Boyd, Superintendent of Schools office. The superintendent’s secretary said they were issuing a press release only on the matter. Breitbart Texas requested it several times. It was not sent to us before press time.

Follow Merrill Hope on Twitter @OutOfTheBoxMom.

Tags: Aiden Steward, ANTI CHRISTIAN, Breitbart, child abuse, Education, fox news, Kermit ISD, Kermit Texas, Merrill Hope, Texas, Texas Education Agency, Yale

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Texas Education Agency Implementing COMMON CORE

Jul 25

Posted by Ginger in Featured Post

Houston Independent School District received 30 Million in race to the top money. States or districts receiving funds are obligated to implement common core. HISD along with the Texas Education Agency are implementing the common core standards through their Texas Virtual School Network online school, Texas Connections Academy. I called the school @ 281-661-8293 and their representative validated they were in fact common core aligned. So when you hear that Common Core is illegal in Texas don’t buy it. Our education establishment has found many loopholes in transforming our education system.

The Blaze addresses Texas Connections Academy.

Tags: HOUSTON, Texas, Texas Connections Academy, Texas Education Agency, Texas Virtual School Network

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Education 101

Jun 09

Posted by Ginger in Featured Post

“Education 101”

by Donna Garner

6.9.14

http://www.educationviews.org/education-101/

Where should concerned parents and the public start when it comes to understanding the educational jargon used by the schools? Having taught for more than 33 years, I know the confusion that abounds as people attempt to enter the world of education acronyms!

I receive frequent queries from people who make this type of statement: “Donna, I am so worried about my child. I know he is not learning what he should, but I do not know what to do. I feel inadequate to talk about Common Core/CSCOPE to the teacher and/or administrators, yet I believe I should be fighting to protect my child.”

EDUCATION 101: LESSON #1

First, we have to understand the two education philosophies – Type #1 vs. Type #2:

http://www.educationviews.org/comparison-types-education-type-1-traditional-vs-type-2-cscope-common-core/

EDUCATION 101: LESSON #2

Second, we need to understand the realities of those who are involved in the education world that surrounds Common Core/CSCOPE. I call it “the RED, YELLOW, and GREEN” people.

The “RED” people working in the background are using the “YELLOW” and the“GREEN” people as pawns to make sure that America is dumbed down so that future voters and the destiny of our country are completely changed from the Great American Way.

The “RED” people know exactly what they are doing. They have long-term goals to change America, and they realize that the best way to do this is to indoctrinate this and succeeding generations of school children into the Common Core philosophy.

Into the “RED” group fall the proponents of the Common Core Standards/CSCOPE, Obama, Arne Duncan, Bill Gates, Linda Darling-Hammond, Bill Ayers, liberal-left politicians, the drive-by media, national education organizations, and many other left-leaners.

The “YELLOW” people are those who are driven by greed, money, power, and fame. Many of these people are vendors, lobbyists, or school employees who overlook the egregious content of their products so long as they themselves are benefitting. Into this group fall Bill Gates, Pearson, U. S. Dept. of Education employees, Jeb Bush, Mike Huckabee, Common Core/CSCOPE/Education Service Centers/TEKS Resource System employees, Thomas Ratliff (Texas State Board of Education member), TASA, TASB, the Ratliff and Moses clans, Achieve, Inc., Fordham Institute, etc.

The “GREEN” people (many of whom are educators)are those who go-along to get-along; they follow the status quo and are content to go along with whatever teaching fad is in vogue at the present time. These people are not bad people but are easily deceived by those who have ulterior motives (i.e., the “RED” and “YELLOW” people).

Politicians can come in all different colors – RED, YELLOW, or GREEN.

Those politicians whose aim is to change America from a capitalistic, free-market Republic into a Socialist, Communist, Marxist country are “RED” people.

Those politicians who seek fame, fortune, and/or control for themselves are “YELLOW” people.

Those politicians who choose to be blind followers are “GREEN” people.

EDUCATION 101: LESSON #3 FOR TEXANS– TEKS

We here in Texas should be very pleased with our Type #1 TEKS (Texas’ curriculum standards). We realize the new TEKS (adopted since 2008) in ELAR, Science, Social Studies, and Math are not perfect; but at least a high percentage of the elements are intentionally explicit, knowledge-based, academic, clearly worded, grade-level specific, and measurable. That is more than can be said of the Common Core Standards and of the other states’ standards that are built upon Type #2.

Because our Texas law requires the state-mandated tests to follow the TEKS, then our STAAR/End-of-Course Tests (EOC’s) are largely Type #1 tests. Type #1 State Board of Education members have taken the STAAR/EOC’s and have affirmed they are aligned with the Type #1 TEKS.

Pearson, who normally is totally in league with Type #2, has the Texas contract for the STAAR/EOC’s; but Pearson has been monitored very closely by the past Texas Commissioner of Education (Robert Scott), the present Texas Commissioner of Education (Michael Williams), and by Type #1 SBOE members to make sure the Pearson test bank is aligned with the Type #1 TEKS.

We have been told that even though Pearson had to create a different test bank for Texas from that of the Type #2 test bank used in other states, the Pearson staffers actually found it was much easier to create good test questions for the STAAR/EOC’s because of the explicit/grade-level–specific/measurable Type #1 wording in the new TEKS.

EDUCATION 101: LESSON #3 FOR TEXANS– STAAR/EOC TESTS

The STAAR/EOC’s are not perfect, but they are built upon the best Type #1 curriculum standards in the entire U. S.

We are telling parents IN TEXAS NOT TO OPT THEIR CHILDREN OUT OF THE STAAR-EOC’S because it is those Type #1 tests that are the only way we have to force Texas educators (many of whom are “GREEN” people) to follow the Type #1 TEKS.

How will parents know whether their child’s teacher has actually taught the new Type #1 TEKS and taught them well if there is no objective measurement (e.g., STAAR/EOC’s) at each grade level/course except for the teacher’s own grading system?

What if a huge number of Texans opt out their children from the STAAR/EOC’s, and the state testing data from the Texas Education Agency is no longer valid?

What if the child’s teacher taught Type #2 curriculum materials instead (e.g., Guided Reading, CSCOPE, Safari Montage, TASA iCLOUD, Lead4Ward, Pat Jacoby’s AuthenticLearning.com, Expeditionary Learning, etc.), and the parents opted out their child from the STAAR/EOC tests? How will parents know before it is too late and their child has been indoctrinated and/or “dumbed down”?

What if parents find out too late that their Suzy Q. had teachers in several untested STAAR/EOC grade levels/courses who taught Type #2 lessons instead of the Type #1 TEKS? Example: Type #2 — no systematic teaching of phonemic awareness/phonics, no systematic teaching of grammar/usage/correct spelling/cursive writing, no emphasis on learning the four math functions to automaticity –

Now Suzy Q. is in Grade XXX and is several grade levels behind in her pre-requisite skills because her Type #2 teachers have been passing her right along because of their subjective evaluations. Suzy Q.’s parents have opted to keep her out of STAAR/EOC testing, and they have not had an objective “measuring stick” to help them to know that Suzy Q. is academically being left behind. Now it is almost too late, and it will be close to impossible to go back and help Suzy Q. to learn the Type #1 skills that she should have been learning all along.

This same scenario could happen if the grade-level-specific STAAR/EOC’s are not required yearly and/or if parents opt out their children from taking them. The way to get teachers to teach the Type #1 academic knowledge and skills mandated by the Texas Education Code at each grade level/course is to hold them and their students publicly accountable on the STAAR/EOC’s. “What gets tested gets taught. What gets measured gets treasured.”

HB 5 passed by the last legislative session decimated the high-school STAAR/EOC tests (reducing the number of EOC’s from 15 to 5), but the Grades 3 – 8 STAAR tests are still in place. If we lose the leverage that those tests give the public, Texas teachers (many of whom are the “GREEN” people) will go right back to their Type #2 curriculum units that the old 1997 TEKS/TAKS utilized. Without the STAAR/EOC test results, parents will have no way to prove whether Suzy Q. was taught Type #1 or Type #2.

Sadly, Texas was right on the cusp of authentic education reform with all students K – 12 moving into the new TEKS/STAAR/EOC’s and the rigorous but doable 4 x 4 graduation plan when our legislature dominated by “YELLOW” people (and by powerful “RED” people) dumbed things down with HB 5. The vendors and lobbyists (“YELLOW” people) got their way which suited the “RED” people perfectly.

EDUCATION 101: LESSON #4 FOR COMMON CORE STATES

On the other hand, people WHOSE CHILDREN ARE IN THE COMMON CORE STATES SHOULD DEFINITELY OPT OUT THEIR CHILDREN FROM THE PARCC/SMARTER BALANCED ASSESSMENTS AND FROM THE ACCOMPANYING COMMON CORE NATIONAL AND PERSONALLY INTRUSIVE DATABASE. Those assessments are meant to indoctrinate children’s minds, and there are over 400 data points of personal information that are set to be collected by the national database if the Common Core roll-out is allowed to go forward.

EDUCATION 101: LESSON #5

Type #2 CSCOPE (the Texas version of Type #2 Common Core Standards) came slithering into Texas under the radar and captured 845 school districts during the time that the rest of us were fighting to get the Type #1 TEKS passed(2008 – 2012).

The reason CSCOPE successfully infused itself into so many Texas schools is because 20 of the 19 Education Service Center (ESC) directors formed a corporation (TESCCC) and then began selling CSCOPE and its curriculum management system through the ESC’s. These are mostly “YELLOW” people.

Administrators (mostly “GREEN” people) fell for the “YELLOW” people’s plan and took their local taxpayers’ dollars and poured them into CSCOPE.

SB 6 was passed in 2011 by the Texas Legislature, and SB 6 made it possible for locals to purchase instructional materials (IM’s – digitized curriculum, textbooks, etc.) such as CSCOPE by utilizing the Permanent School Funds.

SB 6 took away the authority over IM’s from the elected members of the SBOE. SB 6 basically set up a “work around” so that locals no longer have to purchase the IM’s that have gone through the SBOE public hearing process. The SBOE public hearing process catches factual errors that are documented, and publishers have to correct them or else pay a monetary penalty.

SB 6 provides for no such SBOE public process, and the IM’s that are sold to schools under SB 6 (e.g., CSCOPE) have not been through careful public scrutiny. In fact, CSCOPE materials could not be viewed by the public because teachers had to sign agreements saying that they would not show CSCOPE materials to Texas parents.

Once we were sufficiently able to publicize the Texas law (TEC Title 2, Subtitle E, Chap. 26, Sec. 26.006 —http://www.statutes.legis.state.tx.us/Docs/ED/htm/ED.26.htm ) which requires parents to be able to see all curriculumtheir children are taught (even digitized materials), then the TESCCC shut itself down.

Many Texans thought the problem was resolved only to find out a few months later that the TESCCC had rebranded itself as the TEKS Resource System. The “YELLOW” people put CSCOPE lessons into the public domain, but districts who purchase the TEKS Resource System are basically using the Type #2 CSCOPE lessons and making sure teachers utilize them by forcing their students to take the assessments sold by the TEKS Resource System.

EDUCATION 101: CONCLUDING LESSON

The reason that Texas public school students are struggling on the STAAR/EOC tests is that they have not been taught the Type #1 TEKS at each grade level/course during the years leading up to the first administration of the STAAR/EOC tests. How do we force the “GREEN” people to start teaching the Type #1 TEKS? It is to use the “measuring stick” – the Type #1 STAAR/EOC tests – to pressure the “GREEN” people through public disclosure of those test scores to teach children Type #1 curriculum.

By doing this, we will divest ourselves of the “RED” people with their Type #2 indoctrination and the “YELLOW” people who are involved because of greed, money, power, and fame.

Parents in Common Core states must opt their children out of the Common Core assessments to protect their children from the indoctrination of the computer-adaptive tests. Parents in Common Core states must battle to keep their own family’s personally identifiable data from being poured into the Common Core national database which can be shared with third parties without parental permission.

EXCITING NEWS

6.6.14 — “We Have the Answer: #CANiSEE Solutions Conf. On Demand for a Year” — by Donna Garner — http://www.educationviews.org/answer-canisee-solutions-conf-demand-year/

Donna Garner

Wgarner1@hot.rr.com

Tags: DONNA GARNER, green, Jeb bush, Progressive, Red, TEXAS EDUCATION, Texas Education Agency, Type 1, Type 2, yello, yellow

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TEXAS: COLLEGE & CAREER READINESS STANDARDS = COMMON CORE ALIGNMENT

Mar 02

Posted by Ginger in Featured Post

The Texas Education Agency along with many counterparts have joined ranks with the progressive agenda of liberal Linda-Darling Hammond. Hammond is a sought after figure in implementing progressive education policies and was a spokesperson for Barack Obama during the 2008 election and an associate of Weather-Underground Bomber Bill Ayers.

David Conley with Educational Policy Improvement Center (EPIC) coauthored a an article with Linda Darling Hammond promoting a total transformation of America’s Education with Common Core Standards. Below are different Texas Agencies who have partnered with EPIC’s agenda including Texas Education Agency.

This week in Austin David Conley will be speaking in Austin at the SXSW edu conference. His topic is on no other than “Big Picture behind Common Core.”

The Texas Higher Education Board reports to the Sunset Commission that College and Career Readiness Standards are largely aligned with Common Core. Here is the report and the following statement is on page 12.

Tags: Common Core, David Conley, Education Policy Improvement Center, Linda Darling Hammond, Texas, Texas Education Agency, TEXAS HIGHER EDUCATION BOARD

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Beaumont ISD Raided by FBI – Admins Stole Millions – Texas to Take Over School District?

Nov 09

Posted by Ginger in Featured Post

by David Bellow

The Federal Bureau of Investigation has raided the Beaumont Independent School District and homes of two top School Officials. The FBI is assisting the US Attorney’s Office investigate allegations that School Officials created bogus accounts to steal money from the school and from the taxpayers. There is no official figure but rumors are that the total stolen could be in the millions of dollars.

No one should really be surprised at this I suppose. We are talking about the notoriously corrupt Beaumont ISD. I have written several articles about Beaumont ISD corruption in the last few years and I never even scratched the surface. My most recent article about Beaumont ISD was only a couple of weeks ago and was about a Federal Judge ruling the Beaumont ISD/DOJ election was illegal and also about BISD paying a top Administrator, Jessie Haynes, to be a fugitive.

According to KBMT Channel 12 News in Beaumont, “Agents with the Federal Bureau of Investigation raided the administration building early Thursday morning. They also raided the home of the district’s Director of Finance Devin McCraney and the home of District Comptroller Sharika Allison.”

The Texas Education Agency is currently investigating BISD. It is believed that the TEA discovered the mismanaged money trail and contacted the Federal Authorities which led to the raid. The State of Texas denies that they knew anything of the FBI raid and the TEA says their investigation is unrelated to what the FBI is investigating.

Will this latest incident be the straw that breaks the camel’s back and forces the State of Texas to take over Beaumont ISD? This would not be the first time. Beaumont ISD has a long history of corruption and the State of Texas has had to take over the School District at least once before.

BISD School Board Member Mike Neil has been fighting to correct problems in the school district ever since he was elected. Neil told KFDM Channel 6 Newsin Beaumont, “There’s no doubt in my mind there’s been corruption in the past,” said Neil. “Whether or not there’s currently corruption, I’m not going to say. But there’s no doubt in my mind this is not a correctly run district, especially from a business standpoint.”

Tags: Cscope, Devin McCraney, Education, FBI, Jessie Haynes, KFDM Channel 6 News, Sharika Allison, TEA, Texas, Texas Education Agency

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Texas Patriots Needed in Austin Friday, Sept 13th

Sep 11

Posted by Ginger in Featured Post

The State Board of Education’s Ad Hoc Committee on CSCOPE is having a hearing this Friday, Sept. 13 @9am. If you care about the direction of our state, country and most importantly our children we need You! We are asking Parents & Taxpayers to come voice your opposition on the Marxist/Progressive takeover of our Texas Public School System with CSCOPE/Project Based Learning/CommonCore. You may register up to Friday morning by calling 512-463-9007.

The Hearing with be at the Texas Education Agency, 1701 N. Congress Avenue, Austin, Texas, 78701.

Tags: Common Core, Cscope, Education, Project Based Learning, SBOE, Texas, Texas Education Agency

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Texas STEM Academies contribute to the Decline of American Sovereignty

Sep 10

Posted by Ginger in Featured Post

“21st Century Learning Skills” has become the “MANTRA” of progressive educators in hopes of implementing a total transformation in how students are taught with the end result being globalization, diversity and equity. WAKE UP AMERICA!!!!!! Watch the video below and see what our educators have in mind when it comes to teaching you child…America will not last under this transformation which has a foothold in our Texas Schools.

America’s sovereignty is being torn apart at the seams and the Texas Education Agency is contributing to its demise. Through State, Federal and Grant funding the Texas Education Agency has set up Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM) Academies across the State of Texas. STEM Academies work to transform the way students are educated with the use of a Marxist teaching philosophy of Project Based Learning (PBL). PBL is based on the collective and not individual achievement. Absolute truth is not taught and everything is up for debate within a collective group.

The idea of project based learning is to create diversity and equity; with the United Nations is backing the agenda. IRINA BOKAVA, the Director General of UN Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organizations, (UNESCO) was quoted as saying….

unesco

It does not take long with a little research to see the tie to Obama’s agenda, global organizations and STEM. Don’t get me wrong I love the STEM disciplines but the STEM flag being waved here takes on a whole new agenda than just educating your children… the goad is a total transformation

Texas STEM Funding

Texas STEM Centers

Below is ESC REGION 13 Summer Schedule for their STEM Transformation Institutes.

About-STEM-Results-How-To

ESC #1 STEM Workshops for 2012/2013

tstem esc1

Tags: Cscope, MANTRA, PBL, Progressive, stem, T-STEM, Texas Education Agency

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Texas Education Agency Endangers Students and Families

Sep 03

Posted by Ginger in Featured Post

The Texas Education Agency (TEA) is working on collecting data on your children and you. They have applied and received millions of dollars from the federal government to implement a data collection system called Texas Longitudinal Data System. Bill and Melinda Gates, The Dell Foundation have also assisted in funding the project.

You as a parent will told that that the “data collected” on your child will be used by the education system to better prepare your child for the workforce. Anytime the government implements a system to benefit their agenda they will sell it to the public as a benefit to you. THEY LIE!

The Texas Education Agency have been collecting data for years but not to the this extreme. Texas data collection has been referred to (PEIMS) Professional Education Information Management System. Claiming it’s not current and up to date TEA applied for federal money to improve the Data Collection to a great extent and with no thought to violation of student and family privacy. TEA received in upwards of 40M to implement the Statewide Longitudinal Data System.

Texas Student Data System (TSDS)

Check out the following web sight on Texas’s compliance with Data Collection. They have met 8 out of 10 of their goals.

Tags: Data Quality Campaign, Education, Statewide Longitudinal Data Systems, STUDENTS, Texas Education Agency

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WARNING: Texas Students Data Collected!

Aug 15

Posted by Ginger in Featured Post

Texas Schools now welcome students online activity during school hours, while at one time it was monitored and restricted. Why, you might ask? Besides from the fact they are steering away from a traditional to a more constructivist teaching philosophy of education, personal data is being collected on your child.

One thing I have learned when the powers at be implement something that is sold to save you time or money or will be a benefit to you, it ultimately will remove more of your privacy or freedom. This is being sold as a cost saver to your local school district and will help you when it comes to helping your child be college ready. Seriously? The Texas Education Agency along with Texas Education Service Centers and other agencies have been working on implementing a system called Texas Student Data System where your child will be traced from the time they enter the public school system (great reason to home school) until they finish college. Give me a break! This is nothing more than the Government’s attempt at removing freedom and collecting data on families and limiting parental involvement. The state thinks they know better what is best for your child.

Your local district has a PEIMS (Personal Education Information Management System) employee that works on collecting data and sending it to the appropriate WAREHOUSE. With federal funds the Texas Education Agency received through the American Recovery Reinvestment Act opened up for students data to be shared outside of the State and available to various researchers.

There are no boundaries as to what these organizations will do when it comes to our children. There is nothing sacred or private any longer when it comes to your family if you have entered the government public school system.

Each Texas Education Service Centers assist with the collecting data on students. They each have “Texas Student Data System employees” aka CHAMPIONS” that have your child’s best interest at heart. NOT! You have seen this is not true with the Education Service Center’s deceptive plan of implementing CSCOPE in the Texas School System. CSCOPE assessment/test are mandatory within a district that has purchased it and students test results are recorded in a data system. These test never come home for parents to review.

Your child will receive a Unique ID number once they enter the “system” that will stay with them along with he personal online StudentGPS dashboard with photo (see below). Personal Information will be collected and coded. What will be collected? Name, Sex, Test Scores, Finances, activities, discipline, parents info, personality characteristics, psychological analysis, academic competency, etc.