Last week, while I was on blog hiatus, the President and Congress topped off months of increasing rancor by cobbling together a last minute debt deal. There are several key edu-world takeaways that can too easily get lost amidst the languid summer heat. So, let's take a moment to flag them. After all, edu-advocates don't seem to have a clue as to what's ahead. As the debt deal was getting resolved, the Committee for Education Funding--a decades-old alliance of 80-odd trough-snuffling universities, education associations, and assorted hangers-on--issued a hand-wringing letter that said, "We fear that education programs will face multiple ...

Hidy, all. It's me. I'm back from points south, west, north, and so forth. I want to thank our terrific line-up of guest bloggers for their outstanding work. Anyway, I was going to settle in with a few broad musings, but I'll hold that for a moment in light of ED's decision, teased Friday but embargoed until this morning, to test new heights of hubris when it comes to ESEA. On Friday afternoon, in a hush-hush press call, Secretary Duncan and White House domestic policy honcho Melody Barnes told a handful of select national press more details about their scheme ...

Note: Michael Bromley, a teacher in Washington, DC, is guest-posting this week. I'm finally coming to terms with modern education theory, or pedagogy. Six years ago I was hired to teach U.S. Government, and was put directly onto something called "World Cultures." I was given the textbook and told to teach the first three chapters on prehistory and the first civilizations. I'd never even heard of "Sumer," although "Mesopotamia" and "the land between the rivers" sent me back, most vaguely, to my own high school ancient history class. I spent the next four years teaching this class, running it ...

Note: Michael Bromley, a teacher in Washington, DC, is guest-posting this week. My colleagues groan when I say it, and then tell me to shut up: teachers are over-paid. Truly, we are. To argue that teachers are underpaid defies logic and means nothing: based on what? Oh, teachers are socially important, so they should be well-paid. Okay, measure that importance for me, will ya? Let's see, if I fail five fewer kids this year will you give me a raise? That won't work. What if I passed 'em all? Hmm. As with all attempts to quantify, measure, and manage education, ...

Note: Michael Bromley, a teacher in Washington, DC, is guest-posting this week. My first experiences teaching came as a substitute teacher in Montgomery County. It was useful work, flexible, and fun. It culminated in a long-term subbing job for the last months of the year for a government teacher on maternity leave. These two months led me into teaching as a profession. My college degree in writing (English Lite), prepared me none for teaching government, much less much of anything. My prior business experience gave me no academic credentials, although I did spend my million-plus miles on American Airlines reading ...

Note: Jeff Henig, a professor of political science and education at Teachers College, Columbia University, is guest-posting this week. "Follow the money" can be good advice. Knowing who is footing the bill--for a political campaign, policy notion, or advocacy group--doesn't tell you all you need to know; candidates, policies, and organizational platforms need to be judged ultimately on their own merits. But you're right to put on your skeptic's glasses if Walton Family Foundation is sponsoring a conference on elected school boards; if the American Federation of Teachers is funding a study of charter schools; or if Eli Broad is ...

Note: Jeff Henig, a professor of political science and education at Teachers College, Columbia University, is guest-posting this week. There is a satisfying solidity to the term "data-based" decision-making. But basing decisions on data is not the same thing as basing them on knowledge. Data are collections of nuggets of information. Compared with "soft" rationales for action--opinion, intuition, conventional wisdom, common practice--they are hard, descriptive, often quantitative. When rich and high quality sets of data are mined by sophisticated and dynamically-adjusted algorithms, the results can be powerful. Google's search engine is the prime example here. Google scores web pages based ...

Note: Jeff Henig, a professor of political science and education at Teachers College, Columbia University, is guest-posting this week. A bit over ten years ago (December 2000), Mel Gibson--not yet the semi-pariah he's become due to his high profile breakdowns--starred in the movie "What Women Want." The premise was that men and women were so alien from one another and so unlikely to communicate honestly and directly that it takes a freak accident (giving Gibson's character the ability to hear women's thoughts) for any kind of real cross-gender understanding to develop. I think about this sometimes when I listen to ...

Note: Cole Farnum, a teacher in New York City, is guest-posting this week. As a beginning educator embarking on a career in schools, I am constantly reflecting on how I can improve what I do and, more deeply, who I am. My series this week was about exploring why I'm at risk of failure as a beginning teacher, the challenges I faced with colleagues in schools, and a shared mindset between early career educators like myself and my more-experienced colleagues that will help us challenge and support one another. In the process, I've outlined the basic elements of my philosophy ...

Note: Cole Farnum, a teacher in New York City, is guest-posting this week. As a beginning teacher, I've experienced times when communicating with my colleagues has been challenging. I've discovered that allowing alternative perspectives to inform my own, not just working harder as an individual, is the key lever to continuously improving my teaching. That's why my next steps for improvement are so ambitious: I'm relying solely on my colleagues to challenge and support me. And as I'll explain, experienced teachers committed to growing as educators (like the successful Zak Champaign) must also rely on beginning teachers like me. What ...