1. Start Here - Big Picture
1.1. Going Public:(Documentary in Progress)
1.2. Connecting the dots
1.3. The major players
1.3.1. Broad Exposed
1.3.1.1. ALEC and the education reform agenda
1.3.1.1.1. Corporate Reform organizations
1.3.1.1.2. DOE emails reveal connection to Gates, Murdoch, etc.
1.4. America's education crisis and who stands to gain
1.5. Diane Ravitch video
1.5.1. Rise Above the Mark: Documentary
1.6. ALEC exposed
1.6.1. Which CEO made $5 million stealing your child's lunch money?
1.6.1.1. Privatizing schools
1.6.2. Creating a scheme to deem public schools "educationally bankrupt"
1.7. It's time to wake up America
1.8. Will this new teacher survive?
1.9. Ted Talk: Occupy Kindergarten
1.10. The Benevolent Arrogance of Self-Insulated Power
1.11. Laying Seige to NJ public schools
1.12. A Warning to professors From A High School Teacher
1.13. Challenging Corporate Education Reform & Ten Hopeful Signs of resistance
1.13.1. A Primer on corporate school reform
1.14. Let's apply the lessons of NCLB to the Common Core
1.15. What happens when profits drive reforms?
1.16. Conversations with Arne Duncan
1.16.1. Arne Duncan Open Letter Makes Teachers Furious
1.17. History of the reform movement
1.17.1. The Bait and Switch of the Reform Movement
1.17.1.1. Why The US is Destroying Its Educational System
1.18. A Call for President Obama to Change Course on Education Reform
1.19. You might be a reformer if...
1.20. Achievement Gap Starts Before School Starts
1.21. Bill Gates: Selling Bad Advice to Public Schools
1.22. Why 'School Reform' is a Misnomer
1.23. US vs High Achieving Nations
1.24. Ironic Extremes Lauding and Bashing Teachers
1.25. Will Firing 5-10% of Teachers Make us Finland?
1.26. What International Test Scores Really Tell Us: Lessons Buried in PISA Report
1.27. Is School Reform Making us Less Competitive?
1.28. Big Funders - CHART
1.29. How Billionaires Run Our Schools - MSNBC News Clip Interview
1.30. Reforms Parents Should Worry About Most
1.31. A Few Quick Fixes For School Accountability Systems
2. Actions to Take
2.1. Join SOSNJ
2.2. NJEA letter writing to State Board of Education members
2.3. Fair Test Organization
2.4. Join National Opt Out
2.5. Sign the National resolution against standardized tests
2.6. United Opt Out resources
2.7. How to help the movement
2.8. Opt Out Letters
2.8.1. Opt Out: An Open Letter to Parents
2.9. Eight steps to work for testing reform
2.10. NJ Opt Out of testing
2.11. If you Want to Save America's Public Schools: Replace Secretary of Education Arne Duncan With a Lifetime Educator."
2.12. Educate * Organize * Mobilize - A Toolkit
2.13. NJDOE Broadcast list - check regularly
3. Inspiration
3.1. MLK: There comes a time...
3.2. “Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed, citizens can change the world. Indeed, it is the only thing that ever has.” ― Margaret Mead
3.3. “I alone cannot change the world, but I can cast a stone across the waters to create many ripples.” AND "Do not wait for leaders; do it alone, person to person." ― Mother Teresa
3.4. Surely, we should demand more from our schools than to educate people to be proficient in reading and mathematics. Too many highly proficient people commit fraud, pursue paths to success marked by greed, and care little about how their actions affect the lives of others. - Nel Noddings
3.5. Excellence in education is when we do everything that we can to make sure they become everything that they can. - Carol Tomlinson
3.6. Pink Flyod - Another Brick in the Wall
3.7. Not on the Test - song
3.8. More Than a Number: song for kids
3.9. DangerousTalk
3.10. “What the best and wisest parent wants for his child, that must we want for all the children of the community. Anything less is unlovely, and left unchecked, destroys our democracy.” --John Dewey
3.11. With great knowledge comes great responsibility
3.12. Darkness can only persist in the absence of light
3.13. Rise Above the Mark: documentary trailer
4. Major Movements Across the Nation
4.1. Occupy DOE 2013
4.2. The end is coming. High stakes testing must go.
4.3. LA teachers use privitization to build community movement
4.3.1. California Governor Puts the Testing Juggernaut on Ice
4.4. Two moms take on Common Core
4.5. Rhode Island
4.5.1. Student zombies protest standardized tests in RI
4.6. Seattle Boycotts
4.6.1. Seattle Teachers Protest Exams
4.7. Opting out in NY
4.7.1. Long Island Principals - Open Letter opposing evaluating teachers with VAM
4.7.1.1. New Paltz School Board Unanimously Passes Resolution Against High Stakes Testing
4.7.1.1.1. NY mom writes a letter to NY state Department of Education re: memo sent to all district superintendents intending to scare them into not allowing families to opt out of standardized tests
4.8. Madison, NJ superintendent speaks out
4.8.1. The NJ Education Reform Train Wreck
4.8.1.1. The Teacher Evaluation Traveling Road Show Plays Trenton
4.8.2. Engelwood Panel speaks out against standardized tests
4.9. More than 130 Massachusetts professors and researchers urge less reliance on standardized tests
4.10. Is Texas ending standardized testing
4.10.1. Teaxas- revolts brewing against standardized testing
4.10.2. Thousands Rally in Texas for Education Reform
4.10.3. Robert Scott (TX) Blasts Common Core-Video
4.10.3.1. Former Texas Chief Takes Anti Common Core Show on the Road
4.10.4. Texas senators slam testing regime
4.10.4.1. Testing has become a 'perversion' claims ex Texas ed Commissioner
4.11. Federal commission on equity blasts reforms
4.12. Standardized tests boycotts
4.13. It is time we threw standardized tests out the door
4.14. Georgia wastes money on testing
4.15. Alabama Withdraws From Both Testing Consortia
4.16. Kansas - former Texas Education Commissioner addresses Legislature about dangers of Common core
4.17. Common Core Rumblings in Utah and South Carolina
4.18. Indiana Senate Votes to Halt Common Core Standards
4.19. Maryland Superintendent Calls for Three Year Moratorium on Standardized Tests
4.20. Standford - Pearson Test for New Teachers Draws Fire
5. Who profits?
5.1. Pearson
5.1.1. No Educator Left Behind: Pearson, Leading Scorer of Standardized Tests, Subpoenaed
5.2. Business Opportunities Seen in New Tests, Low Scores
5.3. Private Firms Eyeing Profits From U.S. Public Schools
5.4. Duncan Press Secretary working for Murdoch
5.5. Balancing Opportunity and Risk In North american K12 Publishing
5.6. Billionaires for Education Reform
5.7. Big Funders - CHART
5.8. Cuomo + Common Core + Pearson = profits$
6. Rebuilding Teachers Unions with a focus on Social Justice
6.1. New Teachers Union Movement in the Making
6.2. Lessons in Social Justice Unionism
6.3. Best resources for Understanding Why Teachers Unions are Important
6.4. Book- The Future of our Schools: Teachers Unions and Social Justice
6.5. Moving From Ideology To Evidence In The Debate About Public Sector Unions
6.6. The New Great Debate about Unionism and Collective Bargaining in U.S. - research study Cornell
6.7. How to Make a Misleading Public/Private Earnings Gap Disappear
7. NJDOE Documents
7.1. EE4NJ
7.1.1. Contradictions to MET Survey
7.1.2. Rubenstein
7.1.3. 50 Million Dollar Lie
7.1.3.1. Gates Still Doesn't Get it. Circular reasoning by bruce baker
7.2. Keep track of memos sent out by the state DOE
7.3. more EE4NJ
7.4. PARCC
8. Here comes the PARCC specifications
8.1. 5 Levels
8.2. levels, technology, etc.
9. Teach for America (TFA)
9.1. Ironies of TFA
9.2. Insights from College Student Re: TFA
9.3. Hidden agenda of TFA
9.4. Why TFA Can't Recruit in my Classroom
10. Alternatives: There is a Better Way
10.1. Education in Finland
10.1.1. Dan Rather Report
10.1.2. Canadian Radio Broadcast
10.1.3. Ted Talk: GERM that kills schools
10.1.4. Finnish Lessons
10.1.5. What Americans Keep Ignoring About Finland's Success
10.1.6. The Children Must Play
10.2. Create a Design
10.3. Alternate teacher evaluation model
10.3.1. research PAR
10.4. An Open Letter to Bill Gates: Why Not Measure This?
10.5. Zinn Education Project
10.6. WhyTeachers Should put Students to Work
10.7. The Value of a school librarian
10.8. Culture and work environment more important than salary
10.9. In Support of the Whole Child
10.10. Teacher Leadership as a School Improvement Strategy
11. Reform Topics
11.1. High Stakes Testing
11.1.1. What's Wrong? (Infographic)
11.1.2. Cartoon: When Teachers Are Forced to Teach to the Test
11.1.3. High Stakes Testing Research
11.1.4. Why Bill Gates Favors Testing
11.1.5. PARCC Testing Expense
11.1.5.1. Cost to Piscataway
11.1.5.1.1. Cost to Jackson
11.1.5.2. PARCC States
11.1.5.2.1. PARCC Homepage
11.1.6. Pressure to Raise Scores Corrupts
11.1.6.1. Campbell's Law
11.1.7. Narrowing of Curriculum
11.1.7.1. Arts in LosAngeles
11.1.8. Not a Valid Measure
11.1.8.1. Opting Out
11.1.8.1.1. Minority Opting Out
11.1.9. The end is coming
11.1.10. 10 facts you might not have known about high stakes testing in NYC
11.1.11. Definition of high stakes testing
11.1.12. What is NCLB
11.1.13. Appropriate use of standardized tests
11.1.14. Biggest testing scandal of all
11.1.15. Legal consequences of using high stakes testing to evaluate teachers
11.1.16. Battle Creek Editorial: High Stakes Testing is Killing Our Schools
11.1.17. Feds cut funding - but testing will survive
11.1.18. Smarter Balanced Assessment Consortium (SBAC)
11.1.19. Teachers sound off about testing
11.1.20. Has Testing Reached a Tipping Point?
11.1.21. Testing Mandates Flunk Cost-Benefit Analysis
11.1.22. Complete List of Problems with High Stakes Testing
11.2. Charter Schools
11.2.1. Why Hedge Funds Favor Charter Schools
11.2.2. Former Public Schools, Now Charter
11.2.3. How to Privatize in 12 Steps
11.2.4. Gulen Schools
11.2.4.1. Charter tied to Turkey-TX
11.2.4.2. Bill Gates Funds Gulen Schools (Source?)
11.2.4.3. Gulen Charters Expand in NJ
11.2.5. Charter school scandals
11.2.6. Corporate takeover of Illinios schools
11.2.7. Charter scandal in NJ
11.2.7.1. Effects of charter enrollment on Newark district enrollment
11.2.8. Chinese investors invest millions in Florida charters
11.2.9. Have a just closed public school ? Give it to a chater at no cost
11.2.10. From Portfolios to Parasites: The Unfortunate Path of U.S. Charter School Policy
11.2.11. Newark Parents and Activists Head to D.C. for Civil Rights Hearing Over School Closings
11.2.12. Florida Public Charter School Linked To Scientology
11.2.13. Revisiting The "Best Evidence" Theory of Charter School Performance
11.2.14. GREAT Charter School OVERVIEW by STAN KARP of the Education Law Center
11.3. New Teacher Evaluation Models
11.3.1. Connecticut
11.3.2. How NJASK will be used as a growth model for NJ teacher evaluation
11.3.2.1. Another example from the NJDOE website
11.3.3. NY - 19 Legislators
11.3.3.1. Comments on the NY Teacher/Principal Rating Models Report
11.3.3.1.1. 2011-2012 Growth Model for Educator Evaluation Technical Report
11.3.4. Speeding up the treadmill
11.3.5. A Teacher Evaluation Session Out of 'Star Wars'
11.3.6. Teachers Remain Skeptical About New Evaluation System
11.3.6.1. Teacher Evaluation Skeptics: Don't Doubt us
11.3.7. Teacher Evaluation: getting it right takes time
11.3.8. Ed Reform 101: Teachers
11.3.8.1. Overemphasis on Teachers' Effect on Student Achievement
11.3.8.1.1. Research on Teacher Effect on Student Achievement
11.3.9. A Validity Argument Approach to Evaluating Teachers with Value Added Scores - A research study
11.3.9.1. Researchers brief to congress on problems with value added measures
11.3.9.1.1. Value Added Measuring - a study
11.3.10. A Three Way Error Analysis of Educational Productivity
11.3.11. Take Your SGP and VAMit, Damit!
11.3.11.1. A Few Points About the Instability of Value-Added Measures
11.3.11.1.1. When Growth Isn't Really Growth
11.3.12. How to evaluate dentists (a metaphor on teacher evaluation)
11.3.13. Letter from Assessment Experts
11.3.14. Leading Mathematician Debunks Value Added Measures
11.3.15. Why We Shouldn't Link Teacher Evaluation to Test Scores
11.3.15.1. Why we Shouldn't Assess Teachers with Standardized Test Scores
11.3.16. Letter to district admin about unveiling teacher eval details March 2013
11.3.17. Jesse Rothstein: Using Value Added to Asses teachers. What could go wrong? video
11.3.18. American Education Research Association - A Research Briefing - Getting Teacher Evaluation Right - A Challenge for Policy Makers
11.4. Common Core
11.4.1. CCSS = more standardized testing
11.4.2. Gates financed common core
11.4.3. The not so common core standards: implications for all
11.4.4. Susan Ohanian blasts the common core
11.4.5. Choking on the Common Core Standards
11.4.6. Opposition to Common Core Grows Across the Political Spectrum
11.4.7. The Core Conundrum
11.4.8. Common Core Nationally Imposed - Timeline
11.4.9. Common Core background info
11.4.10. Speaking Back to the COmmon Core
11.4.11. Why I Cannot Support the Common Core Standards - Diane Ravitch
11.4.11.1. WhyThe Common Core Will Fail
11.4.11.1.1. My Concerns About The Common Core
11.4.12. infographic
11.5. Virtual Schools
11.5.1. Some Cyber Schools Falling Short of their Sales Pitch; NPR
11.5.2. k12 website
11.6. Poverty
11.6.1. Bill and Arne's Misguided Adventure: An Open Letter
11.6.2. How to address poverty
11.6.3. Will more Gatesian measurements improve education for the poor?
11.6.4. Study shows growing education gap between rich and poor