Anonymous wrote:
"New Post - Expect Great Things!
The 5 year strategic plan has launched.
http://www.ppsstrategicplan.org/strategic-plan
Among the hilights - creating an office of school transformation, lots of bright pictures and celebration, and a variety of phased initiatives which are linked to the council of great city schools recommendations. Also metrics for tracking progress.
Is this the answer to improvement within the PPS? "
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
22 comments:
To the blogger who most recently ( April 22 @ 7:45AM )posted these sentiments:" There are many many, resources available from PDE (no charge and open access) that teachers, students, parents, community can use to advance "proficiency" for ALL students at UPREP."
Do you have a seat at the table in this new addition to the administration - The" Office of School Transformation." ?
Indeed the more looming question is: Who is seated at the head of this table?
Did the administration withhold the name of this individual because they feared it would bury the lead?
thanks for the link, so far I've read almost half of the report. I found it incredibly insightful and incredibly disheartening.
All those years and all that money and all the restructuring that I watched on the Board meetings coming to these conclusions is incredible. Now I understand so much better what the teachers on this site were saying. Central Office should be ashamed of themselves and while I'm at it, the teachers union bosses should be ashamed as well. Why weren't they looking out for their members?
This dysfunction is beyond belief and I am without words.
I should have taken notes.
It's a deep read and I would love to hear some feedback from other posters.
No, is the answer to question #1. While this many not be the best time to (for me), I would like the opportunity to inform the new PPS administration regarding these "resources" and how to use them integrally, as one critical piece of the "transformation" that must become a part of the PPS plan.
This would be done as a volunteer with knowledge, expertise and experience that could very quickly advance substantially student performance (reading, writing, speaking, math and science) SKILLS for ALL PPS students with special differentiation regarding race and age.
5:09PM
" Over four months, approximately 3,500 individuals provided
frank, and much-appreciated feedback. This level of engagement demonstrates that Pittsburgh residents and staff
care about our youth and expect all Pittsburgh Public Schools to deliver a high-quality education to all students."
You could not find an opportunity during the above period of time to inform the new PPS administration regarding those "resources"?
Show-up at a PSCC meeting in a low performing school and share your expertise and experience.
Never make assumptions about what someone else has or has not done. The person speaking at 5:09 never misses an opportunity to share the information and resources spoken about here.
Yes, much is shared at every opportunity to inform Pittsburgh School participants (students, parents, community, school/district administration, staff, parents, teachers)
and may be (or not) used to improve academic performance.
The schools and districts that use the resources are successful. Those who do not have spent the last ten years struggling to reach "proficiency" in basic competencies.
Many (school people) have other agendas that pave the way for individuals to prosper personally without concern for students. ( The worse the results the more money will be spent in search of remedies of one sort or another. And so it goes . .
So with 47.9% proficiency, the goal is to increase proficiency in literacy and math for all students.
It is your opinion - 9:50PM- that if PPS were to use the information and resources that you speak of and PDE provides freely - they would be successful. Correct?
So then... what assumption are we left with?
And can we expect "great" things if they don't?
9:50, please include in your list of "school participants" TAXPAYERS.
I would especially like that word used along with community. That's how I see myself.
Thank you.
Also, no one has commented on the actual report? I'm disappointed about that. I saw this as an opportunity and a benchmark to track something very pivotal going forward.
The actual report is more accurate than expected, further confirming the problems persistently carried forward by the Superintendents of the last ten years who had neither the skills nor the knowledge to create or maintain an quality educational system. Too many people in key positions without the expertise, experience, credentials, qualifications, background, knowledge, or basic skills for the "jobs" that they held.
The problems were clearly observed, identified, and set forth in the 175 page report by successful, national, long-term "educators" who spent a few months in our Pittsburgh Public Schools and knew what quality educational "practice" should look like.
This new administration has reached out and will shift into "quality education" with the right people in the right places district-wide.
http://www.post-gazette.com/news/education/2017/04/30/Pittsburgh-city-schools-facing-similar-problems-from-the-past-Advocates-for-African-American-Students-Wanda-Henderso
Astonishing to me that the "Advocates for African American Students", who held a mock funeral in 1992 along Bellefield Avenue protesting the newly named white superintendent Louise Brennen over the black candidate Loretta C. Webb were silent under the black leadership of the past decade of Linda Lane and Thomas Sumpter even though racial disparities persisted.
The same organization that did the recent report, the Council of Great City Schools, did a report while Mark Roosevelt was superintendent. The report was positive but the results were not.
Why do you, 3:35 state your "astonishment" regarding the ongoing, relentless, actions, protests, legal actions, etc of the "Advocates" during the reign of Linda Lane and Tom Sumpter? The pursuit of justice for Black students by the Advocates never wavered in words or actions. Certainly, during the past 25 years, with an emphasis on the past 10, the work of the Advocates was routinely overshadowed by the "same old, same old" promises without the concrete action-oriented changes in educational practice that is required for our Black students to flourish---reversing the current "gaps" caused by educators, as opposed to those being blamed---students, parents, and communities.
It would be hard to overshadow a "requiem of sorts played out at the Pittsburgh Public School offices in Oakland " that is relentless and ongoing -" casket, visitor guest book and all ."
That kind of advocacy is poignant and powerful and attracts the public's attention but it must be sustained. I can't recall any protest marches for racial disparities outside Bellefield during the Lane tenure. What happened to the "urgency" marked by a mock funeral?
You make 'noise' until your voices are heard and change happens.
"Noise," rarely, overpowers money and wealth in the likes of Bill & Melinda Gates & Edythe & Eli Broad. These are the people that placed Lane & Roosevelt, et al in PPS.
Put 'them'( Gates & Broad ) in the casket for their failed policies in meeting the needs of Black students and I will guarantee that sustained bad publicity overpowers money and wealth every time.
Just read a Pittsburgh Courier article mentioning the ed committee meeting tonight will include code of conduct on the agenda. always a hot topic.
Watch the video from Heinz Field.
https://vimeo.com/215338197
Black teachers, parents, community groups in the Hill and other sections of Pgh, are always silent if the top administrator and others at the top are African American. I seen this many times in the schools in Pgh that I taught in. Oh, yes, I forgot to mention people on the board like Thomas Sumpter and Regina Holley.
Isn't promoting Historically black colleges and universities going against the Pittsburgh Promise?
And why can't one be against the Pittsburgh Promise?
can you go to an out of state school on the promise just because it's historically black? do they make an exception for them, because we have 1 or 2 in state hbc schools in PA.
Pittsburgh Promise money is for schools in PA. Period. No exception for a kid going to a school outside of PA, I think.
The terms of the Pittsburgh Promise have been changing, and mostly for the worse.
One can not take a "gap year" and then start school and get four years of funding. The clock for the Pittsburgh Promise starts right away and expires 4 years after the student graduates from PPS. That's very bad.
We all know the PP pays, at the most, only $7,500 per year and not $10,000.
Post a Comment