Assistant athletic trainer stipend: $5500
Assistant coach stipend: $6300
Head coach stipend: $9500
Advanced Placement teacher stipend: $0
Tuesday, February 22, 2011
Educon "News" A Possibily Satirical Look at Education in Texas
Educon news continues our interview with the royal governor of Texas
Educon News: A recent article indicated that the AP Program in Texas is very successful-more so than any other testing program and the state doesn't have to spend $78 million to have someone else develop it. Yet the legislature is stopping the small incentive program that subsidizes the AP exams. Do you think that's a wise thing to do?
RG: Absolutely, we need to not spend money an AP tests. This successful program is contrary to our goal. This helps student go to college and encourages all students to think they can be successful in college. Then a lot of just normal kids go to college and are successful. We don't want that! We only want the select few who can already afford to go to college. We don't want regular students to get any high-minded ideas. They might think to vote intelligently and then where would we be?
Educon News: So, the goal is not to lift everybody up but to keep most people down?
RG:Has that not been clear? We've spent a decade working towards that goal and we're closer than ever now...thank God for the downturn in the economy which gave us the excuse to push our agenda without being too obvious as to what we wanted.
Educon News: So what is your message to AP students specifically?
RG: Don't get such a big head. You just think you can handle college. Leave college to those who can afford it and have the right connections.
Educon News: Moving to a different subject...the state requires four years of all four core subjects-math, science, social studies, and English-which Educon News thinks is a good idea. But that requires more teachers and more books yet the state is not only not funding this but is cutting funding. Isn't that the type of thing that you complain about in regards to the federal government? Does this seem right to you?
RG: Of course. That along with harder and harder tests which we pay tens of millions of dollars to develop will undermine the public schools. Demand more and more and provide less and less. If we can keep this up, we'll demoralize teachers and students, we'll discourage talented young people to go into education, the wealthy will pull their kids out of the public schools and then we can have more private schools for my class of people. What's wrong with that?
Plus, we now are expecting them to do it without up-to- date textbooks. There's no way they can be successful and then we can complain about funding or, more precisely, underfunding public schools and then we can basically shut them down and save all those tax dollars for tax cuts for my friends. Sounds like a good deal to me.
Educon News: A recent article indicated that the AP Program in Texas is very successful-more so than any other testing program and the state doesn't have to spend $78 million to have someone else develop it. Yet the legislature is stopping the small incentive program that subsidizes the AP exams. Do you think that's a wise thing to do?
RG: Absolutely, we need to not spend money an AP tests. This successful program is contrary to our goal. This helps student go to college and encourages all students to think they can be successful in college. Then a lot of just normal kids go to college and are successful. We don't want that! We only want the select few who can already afford to go to college. We don't want regular students to get any high-minded ideas. They might think to vote intelligently and then where would we be?
Educon News: So, the goal is not to lift everybody up but to keep most people down?
RG:Has that not been clear? We've spent a decade working towards that goal and we're closer than ever now...thank God for the downturn in the economy which gave us the excuse to push our agenda without being too obvious as to what we wanted.
Educon News: So what is your message to AP students specifically?
RG: Don't get such a big head. You just think you can handle college. Leave college to those who can afford it and have the right connections.
Educon News: Moving to a different subject...the state requires four years of all four core subjects-math, science, social studies, and English-which Educon News thinks is a good idea. But that requires more teachers and more books yet the state is not only not funding this but is cutting funding. Isn't that the type of thing that you complain about in regards to the federal government? Does this seem right to you?
RG: Of course. That along with harder and harder tests which we pay tens of millions of dollars to develop will undermine the public schools. Demand more and more and provide less and less. If we can keep this up, we'll demoralize teachers and students, we'll discourage talented young people to go into education, the wealthy will pull their kids out of the public schools and then we can have more private schools for my class of people. What's wrong with that?
Plus, we now are expecting them to do it without up-to- date textbooks. There's no way they can be successful and then we can complain about funding or, more precisely, underfunding public schools and then we can basically shut them down and save all those tax dollars for tax cuts for my friends. Sounds like a good deal to me.
Student testing incentives on the chopping block
Student testing incentives on the chopping block
What do you say to the Texas high school students who took more than 325,000 AP exams last year, but won't get to take another if these schmucks have their way?
"Sorry kids. It's not like we were going to cut football. Giddyup, pardner!"
What do you say to the Texas high school students who took more than 325,000 AP exams last year, but won't get to take another if these schmucks have their way?
"Sorry kids. It's not like we were going to cut football. Giddyup, pardner!"
Thursday, February 17, 2011
Educon "News" A Possibly Satirical Look at Education in Texas
Educon "News"was able to get an exclusive interview with the Royal Governor (RG) of Texas. The transcript is below.
Educon: What are your plans to make up the budget shortage for education funding in Texas?
RG: What shortage? We have plenty of money to fund education.
Educon: How can you say there isn't a shortage. It's been in the news for months. Several billion dollars, teachers losing jobs, larger classes.
RG: A shortage implies that this was unexpected. This is just following our plan to create a country club state of two classes-the haves and have nots. First, we change the funding formula so that there is less money even when the economy is doing well and then we use the downturn in the economy to blame the fact that we simply don't want to pay for education. It cost a lot of money to educate everyone and that requires taxes which we should always be reduced until they are eliminated.
Educon: So you are not concerned about the lack of funds for schools or the broken promises to school children and teachers? We can end up with the worst school system in the nation.
RG: No, not the worst school system, just the cheapest public school system. Our model is kinda a mix of California and Mississippi...we'll underfund public schools, people with money will send their chidren to private schools and then not want to pay the taxes to support public schools, and we'll keep the poor off the streets until they are old enough to work for the rest of us at minimum wage. We'll make out like bandits.
Educon: Texas already rates 47th in state aid per pupil in ADA, 38th in current expenditures per pupil, 33rd in average salary of public school teachers, 43rd in high school graduation rates, and 50th in the percent of the population 25 and older with a high school diploma.Does any of this bother you?
RG: Yes, we should be 50th in all of those categories or, as we prefer to state it, 1st in the lowest state aid and 1st in the lowest tax rates. That has been our goal for the last decade and we're getting there.
More of our interview in a later post.
Educon: What are your plans to make up the budget shortage for education funding in Texas?
RG: What shortage? We have plenty of money to fund education.
Educon: How can you say there isn't a shortage. It's been in the news for months. Several billion dollars, teachers losing jobs, larger classes.
RG: A shortage implies that this was unexpected. This is just following our plan to create a country club state of two classes-the haves and have nots. First, we change the funding formula so that there is less money even when the economy is doing well and then we use the downturn in the economy to blame the fact that we simply don't want to pay for education. It cost a lot of money to educate everyone and that requires taxes which we should always be reduced until they are eliminated.
Educon: So you are not concerned about the lack of funds for schools or the broken promises to school children and teachers? We can end up with the worst school system in the nation.
RG: No, not the worst school system, just the cheapest public school system. Our model is kinda a mix of California and Mississippi...we'll underfund public schools, people with money will send their chidren to private schools and then not want to pay the taxes to support public schools, and we'll keep the poor off the streets until they are old enough to work for the rest of us at minimum wage. We'll make out like bandits.
Educon: Texas already rates 47th in state aid per pupil in ADA, 38th in current expenditures per pupil, 33rd in average salary of public school teachers, 43rd in high school graduation rates, and 50th in the percent of the population 25 and older with a high school diploma.Does any of this bother you?
RG: Yes, we should be 50th in all of those categories or, as we prefer to state it, 1st in the lowest state aid and 1st in the lowest tax rates. That has been our goal for the last decade and we're getting there.
More of our interview in a later post.
Thursday, February 3, 2011
I found a way to save some money.
From the Statesman:
The high cost of TAKS
By Eric Dexheimer | Thursday, March 19, 2009, 09:40 AM
Texas students have their TAKS week and we have ours. On Tuesday, I wrote how some school districts were rewarding their students with extravagant prizes for passing the standardized tests, including expense-paid trips to Hawaii and days off from school. The high stakes pay-offs demonstrate once again how important the exams have become to administrators, whose very jobs can depend on the outcome.
Another way to gauge how important standardized tests have become is dollars and cents. Not surprisingly, according to that measure, too, the assessments have become extremely important in recent years. Here are the numbers:
The Texas Education Agency outsources the Texas Assessment of Knowledge and Skills to NCS Pearson Inc., which helps develop the tests. In 2000, the agency signed Pearson to a five-year contract worth $47.45 million — about $9.5 million a year to administer tests to the state’s students.
When that contract expired, TEA and Pearson inked a new five-year deal. This time, though, it was worth $160 million, which, at $32 million a year, represented nearly a fourfold increase.
Since 2005, however, the contract has been modified several times. The result: This year alone the state will pay Pearson $88 million to test Texas children.
Why the big jump? “The predominant reason is the increase in the number of assessments,” says Gloria Zyskowski, TEA’s deputy associate commissioner of student assessments. Thanks to the Legislature’s fondness for standardized testing, as well as the growing requirements from the federal No Child Left Behind laws, Texas students are being tested more and more.
The original TAKS was implemented in 2003. Today, thanks largely to No Child Left Behind demands, the exam has multiplied to four different TAKS (“modified,” “alternative,” and “linguistically accommodated” versions, in addition to the standard exam). A new “End of Course” assessment is being added. During the 2002-03 school year, the TEA administered 60 separate standardized tests. This year, Zyskowski says, the number will be 138.
Testing-related materials add more to the bill. In 2004, TEA signed a four-year, $17.7 million contract with Grow Network for study guides designed for high school students who don’t pass TAKS. A 2006 contract pays Pearson another $8.8 million through 2011 for summer remediation study guides.
When added up, taxpayers will pay about $93 million this year to administer standardized tests to Texas students, Zyskowski says, or nearly ten times the cost of just nine years earlier.
The high cost of TAKS
By Eric Dexheimer | Thursday, March 19, 2009, 09:40 AM
Texas students have their TAKS week and we have ours. On Tuesday, I wrote how some school districts were rewarding their students with extravagant prizes for passing the standardized tests, including expense-paid trips to Hawaii and days off from school. The high stakes pay-offs demonstrate once again how important the exams have become to administrators, whose very jobs can depend on the outcome.
Another way to gauge how important standardized tests have become is dollars and cents. Not surprisingly, according to that measure, too, the assessments have become extremely important in recent years. Here are the numbers:
The Texas Education Agency outsources the Texas Assessment of Knowledge and Skills to NCS Pearson Inc., which helps develop the tests. In 2000, the agency signed Pearson to a five-year contract worth $47.45 million — about $9.5 million a year to administer tests to the state’s students.
When that contract expired, TEA and Pearson inked a new five-year deal. This time, though, it was worth $160 million, which, at $32 million a year, represented nearly a fourfold increase.
Since 2005, however, the contract has been modified several times. The result: This year alone the state will pay Pearson $88 million to test Texas children.
Why the big jump? “The predominant reason is the increase in the number of assessments,” says Gloria Zyskowski, TEA’s deputy associate commissioner of student assessments. Thanks to the Legislature’s fondness for standardized testing, as well as the growing requirements from the federal No Child Left Behind laws, Texas students are being tested more and more.
The original TAKS was implemented in 2003. Today, thanks largely to No Child Left Behind demands, the exam has multiplied to four different TAKS (“modified,” “alternative,” and “linguistically accommodated” versions, in addition to the standard exam). A new “End of Course” assessment is being added. During the 2002-03 school year, the TEA administered 60 separate standardized tests. This year, Zyskowski says, the number will be 138.
Testing-related materials add more to the bill. In 2004, TEA signed a four-year, $17.7 million contract with Grow Network for study guides designed for high school students who don’t pass TAKS. A 2006 contract pays Pearson another $8.8 million through 2011 for summer remediation study guides.
When added up, taxpayers will pay about $93 million this year to administer standardized tests to Texas students, Zyskowski says, or nearly ten times the cost of just nine years earlier.
Tuesday, February 1, 2011
Educon "News" A Possibly Satirical Look at Education in Texas
The associate superintendent of Training Instruction and Curriculum at Wayward ISD announced the adoption of a new acronym training which will revolution teaching at Wayward High School. Dr. Noe Itall said that the new approach to planning and teaching was a brand new effort backed by years of research-based data that would ensure that all students at WHS would be successful on TAKS, the ultimate measure of college & career readiness and all things important to life and administration bonuses. The new training modules are designed to implement lesson plans which are Creative, Relevant, Attention-getting, and Positive. According to Dr. Itall, the new training is the key to improving teacher planning. Lessons will be reformed to fit a new template so that all plans will look exactly alike and anyone could step into a classroom and teach the lesson. This would require re-doing all of the curriculum writing that was done the previous year that was last year's brand new approach supported by decades of research. Dr. Itall said that last year's lesson plan format which created plans that are Credible, Rigorous, Unexpected, and Diverse will be replaced.
Neither Dr. Itall nor any of his staff have any experience in teaching in high school but he doesn't consider that a drawback. He learned of this approach during a session at a conference last year where he also learned of the CRUD lesson plan structure. "We used to think that CRUD was the key to great teaching and student learning, but know we know that it's CRAP." Several high school teachers noted that there was nothing new or "improved" about either of these methods but that the re-writing of the curriculum would take hundreds of uncompensated and unnecessary worker hours. When asked if he had consulted with any high school teachers, Dr. Itall, looking perplexed by the suggestion, said, "No, why would I?"
Neither Dr. Itall nor any of his staff have any experience in teaching in high school but he doesn't consider that a drawback. He learned of this approach during a session at a conference last year where he also learned of the CRUD lesson plan structure. "We used to think that CRUD was the key to great teaching and student learning, but know we know that it's CRAP." Several high school teachers noted that there was nothing new or "improved" about either of these methods but that the re-writing of the curriculum would take hundreds of uncompensated and unnecessary worker hours. When asked if he had consulted with any high school teachers, Dr. Itall, looking perplexed by the suggestion, said, "No, why would I?"
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