National Report Praises School-Choice System for New York City Students

By SAM DILLON

Published: November 29, 2011, The New York Times

New York has the most effective school-choice system of any of the nation’s largest school districts, allowing students and parents the most freedom and providing them with the most relevant information on educational performance, according to a new Brookings Institution report scheduled for publication online Wednesday.

But even New York got a B under the report’s A-to-F grading system, with Brookings saying the city provided the least useful online information for comparing schools and giving it low scores in several other categories.

The Chicago public school district, which has the nation’s third-largest student population, after New York and Los Angeles, ranked second in choice, with a B. Los Angeles was 21st, with a C, and the Orange County district in Florida, which includes Orlando, came in last, with the report’s lone D.

Brookings, which has advocated expanded choices for students, rated districts in 13 categories, including availability of charter, magnet and affordable private schools; policies on virtual education; and “restructuring or closing unpopular schools.” Grover Whitehurst, a senior fellow at Brookings who developed the index, said districts were allowed to “put their best foot forward” and be judged on a particular aspect of their system — in New York, for example, officials showcased the process for assigning students to high schools.

New York’s eighth graders fill out high school applications ranking as many as 12 choices, and the high schools, in turn, rank applicants based on their portfolios, test scores, geographic proximity and other factors. A computer then matches students to high schools. This year 48 percent of all students were assigned to their first-choice high school.

There is less choice for middle schools and, especially, elementary schools, as most New York City students attend schools in whichever of the city’s 32 community districts they live.

That system is how students are assigned to schools in most of the nation’s 15,000 school districts, said Dr. Whitehurst, who is a proponent of more choice.

“The typical pattern across the country is residential assignment,” he said. “To the degree that there is choice within the public schools, it’s mostly limited to a few magnet schools.”

The Brookings report, called the Education Choice and Competition Index, awarded no A’s or F’s: the nation’s 25 largest districts earned 6 B’s, 18 C’s and 1 D. “Nobody was close to perfection,” Dr. Whitehurst explained, “and no district was terrible in everything.”

In Orange County in Florida, for instance, students have better virtual-school options than do New Yorkers, and the district’s Web site is easier to understand and navigate than New York’s, the report said. But Brookings said the district did not provide students and parents with much actual choice because most students are zoned to attend a school near their residence.

A spokeswoman for the district disagreed, noting that Orange County has several magnet schools and 30 charter schools and that it provides some students free busing to attend them.

“Holy mackerel, that’s so inaccurate,” the spokeswoman, Katherine P. Marsh, said of the report, noting that 26,000 of the district’s 179,000 students last year chose to attend a school other than the one for which they were zoned
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An “American” Approach to K-12 School Reform

Posted: 30 Nov 2011 ,EducationNext A recent series in The Atlantic has explored the “secrets of innovation” and asked which nations the U.S. ought to emulate in seeking to regain our competitive edge. As part of it, I was asked to offer my take on the K-12 question. Despite all the preaching by the high priests of international mimicry (see Marc Tucker’s new book Surpassing Shanghai or, well, anything by McKinsey & Co.), I counseled that the U.S. would do well to chart our own course. (An earlier version of this piece appeared in The Atlantic, but I thought I’d share a tweaked version with RHSU readers.) When asked how to boost America’s educational competitiveness, a staple response is the emphatic assertion that we need to be more like Nation X. It can be South Korea, Finland, or wherever country the guru has visited most recently. But, just for a moment, let’s entertain the radical proposition that a better course is to tap into uniquely American strengths like federalism, entrepreneurial dynamism, and size and heterogeneity. Those besotted with international envy find it hard to accept that America’s “handicaps” are the inevitable flip side of its unique strengths. Rather than figuring out how to undo them, we would be better served figuring out to leverage them. American federalism frustrates “Nation Xers,” who see states not as laboratories of innovation but as unruly children that need to be firmly brought into line. Thus, they champion national policies for teacher recruitment, preparation, and evaluation. Yet, as with welfare reform, our federal system offers invaluable opportunities to explore different approaches to incentives, monitoring, and delivery. Since the “right” model of teacher evaluation or preparation is hardly self-evident, much less the “best” way to help teachers use new technologies like computer-assisted tutoring or online instruction, this natural variation provides an invaluable asset. American growth and prosperity have long been fueled by a dynamic private sector supported by sensible public investments in research, transportation, and ensuring honest and open markets. In automobiles, air travel, appliances, media, personal technology, software, and any number of venues, entrepreneurs have lit our path. America is a really big country. By population, it’s the third largest in the world, and it boasts the most racially and culturally diverse society in history. This is a huge impediment for those who dream of mimicking national policies suited to tiny islands of homogeneity, like Finland. However, this makes the U.S. capable of embracing and supporting many models of teaching and schooling, with each still able to reach critical mass. The idea that America has unique competitive advantages in K-12 is a radical one. More prevalent are grandiloquent international best practice reports, from the likes of the National Center on Education and the Economy or McKinsey & Co., in which the authors identify a couple of homogenous nations the size of Minnesota that produce good test scores, cherry-pick a few of their educational practices, and then draw broad prescriptions. Such reports represent a triumph of the bureaucratic mindset and a disdain for America’s historic strengths. Earlier this year, the Washington Post‘s Charles Lane eviscerated the fascination with Germany’s economic “miracle” as a case of latching onto a “foreign flavor of the month.” He recalled the awe that the smart set once evinced for the economies of “Japan, Inc.” and the Soviet Union, and noted that Germany’s current success benefits from liberalization “that made the country a little bit more like…the United States.” Lane wisely advised, “[While] there’s plenty we can learn from the Germans, Japanese, Chinese, [and everyone else]…Americans need to identify our comparative advantages–social, cultural, political and economic–and exploit them, instead of worrying about copying the competition.” Embracing America’s comparative advantages requires appreciating that, when the world changes, the challenges, as well as the tools, talent, and technology at our disposal, also change. Seeking to provide high-quality instruction to every child in the 21st century is a sea change from our agenda a century ago–when we only expected one student in ten to finish high school and when it was impossible to instruct a child who was 1,000 feet away. Today, we can meet new demands by drawing upon a talent pool and tools unimaginable in 1911. American K-12 schooling is a hotbed of dynamic problem-solving on this front. Non-profits like Teach For America, Florida Virtual School, The New Teacher Project, Carpe Diem, and Citizen Schools are showing new ways to recruit and utilize educators. For-profits like Wireless Generation, Tutor.com, Pearson, Discovery, and Rosetta Stone are offering up a range of ways to harness new tools and technology to support teaching and learning. Figuring out how to leverage these new problem-solvers is a place where our state systems, districts, and schools have fumbled badly. This is an area where would-be reformers have devoted far too little attention. Meanwhile, not only have the “best” performing nations not done any better on this count, but the schemes promoted by those covetously eyeing Finland inevitably entail oodles of regulations and rule-writing calculated to stifle such providers. Indeed, if we look to nations that are gearing up to lead the pack in 2052, rather than 2012, we see that countries like Qatar and India are busy spying on these American ventures to help them make the leap. We would be well-advised to take the hint, and to push forward by drawing on what the U.S. has always done best. -Frederick Hes

Published Online: November 29, 2011

After Long Stalemate, Mich. Poised to Have School Anti-Bullying Law

By The Associated Press

Premium article access courtesy of Edweek.org.

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Lansing, Mich.

Gov. Rick Snyder is "very likely" to sign legislation that will require Michigan schools to adopt anti-bullying policies, his administration said Tuesday, just after lawmakers approved a new version without a clause that critics said would have allowed religious-based verbal harassment.

Having the measure become law would cap a roughly decade-long effort by supporters of the proposal. The Senate approved the bill 35-2 Tuesday and the House had already passed it, meaning it heads to Snyder. The Republican governor advocated for the law and is expected to sign it pending final review.

"The governor believes bullying at any time, under any circumstances, is wrong. Period," his spokeswoman Sara Wurfel said in a statement.

Public schools will have six months from the new law's effective date to adopt anti-bullying policies.

The bill does not include disputed language from a previous Senate version, which Democrats had said offered a blueprint for getting away with bullying in schools. That bill had said it "does not prohibit a statement of a sincerely held religious belief or moral conviction" of a student or school employee. That wording was dropped from the final version after the House wouldn't agree to it.

Michigan is one of only a few states without a state law requiring anti-bullying policies in schools. Efforts to pass a law have fizzled for years as lawmakers argued over the contents. Some conservatives, for example, had been worried it was an effort by gay rights advocates to carve out special protections for homosexuals.

After some give-and-take, lawmakers agreed this year on a bill that requires policies saying "all pupils are protected" under the measures and bullying is prohibited "without regard to its subject matter" or motivation.

But some supporters of anti-bullying policies feel the bill headed to Snyder also is not detailed enough and does not include enough reporting requirements.

Kevin Epling, whose 14-year-old son Matt killed himself after a hazing incident in 2002, said the measure isn't perfect but is still an important step to crack down on bullying and harassment in schools. The bill will be named "Matt's Safe School Law.""It sets us in the right direction, it gets everybody on the same page," said Epling, who was preparing to make an anti-bullying presentation at a Michigan high school on Tuesday when he heard about final passage of the bill. "It sends a message across the state that bullying is not to be tolerated in any form."

Some lawmakers say the bill isn't detailed or tough enough to be effective. They want tougher reporting requirements, more protections against cyberbullying and more detailed lists of reasons why students can't be bullied, such as sexual orientation, race and weight.

Sen. Glenn Anderson, D-Westland, said the measure "falls far short" of what should be done to protect students.

Sen. Mike Green, R-Mayville, also voted against the bill. Green said in a statement that he supports policies that prohibit bullying, but he also supports local control of schools and that the state should not be dictating a policy.

New Study on Hispanic Achievement Paints Stark Picture

By Lesli Maxwell on November 29, 2011 , Education Week

A brand-new study examining the nation's fastest-growing population of students—Hispanics—is out today, and the findings are pretty bleak.

The Council of the Great City Schools has just published "Today's Promise, Tomorrow's Future: The Social and Educational Factors Contributing to the Outcomes of Hispanics in Urban Schools," which takes a close look at how Hispanic students in urban school systems are faring compared with their white peers nationally.

The report also delves into the achievement of Hispanic students who are formerly English-language learners and compares how they are doing with their Hispanic peers who are ELLs and their Hispanic peers who are not.

Among the key findings, according to researchers with the council:

•When it comes to "readiness to learn," Hispanic children face several disadvantages compared with their white peers. Thirty-three percent of Hispanic children in 2008 lived in families where no parent had full-time employment compared with 21 percent of white children. And in 2007, 27 percent of Hispanic children lived in poverty compared with 10 percent of white children. Those factors and others translate to Hispanic children being less likely than their white or black peers to recognize letters of the alphabet, knowing how to write their name, or being able to count to 20 or higher.

•On the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP), Hispanic and ELL proficiency rates in reading from 2003 to 2009 were at least 26 percentage points below the rates for white students in 4th grade and 24 percentage points below white students' in 8th grade. For math in those same years, the proportion of Hispanic students performing at or above "proficienct" was at least 29 percentage points lower than for white students in 4th grade and 26 points lower in 8th grade.

•The average scores for Hispanic students who were former ELLs were significantly higher than their Hispanic peers who were ELLs in both subjects.

•Overall, reading and math achievement for Hispanics and Hispanic ELLs on NAEP in certain large city school systems was generally lower than their respective peers in public schools nationally. But some urban systems were an exception—Austin, Texas; Miami-Dade; and Houston among them—and generally produced higher scores in 2009 among Hispanic and Hispanic ELLs than their peers in other large cities.

•Hispanic students in 2008 were much more at risk of dropping out than their white and black peers: 21/2 times more likely to drop out than white students and almost twice as likely as black students. And in 2010, fewer than two out of 10 Hispanic students took an Advanced Placement exam compared with six out of 10 white students.

The council makes no recommendations for how to tackle these difficult issues for Hispanic students, but does intend to bring together a panel of leaders to brainstorm and provide advice on how to improve the school experience and outcome for them.

Inclusão social pode reduzir violência contra juventude negra, admitem petistas

29 de novembro de 2011  Informes | BR A violência contra jovens negros foi tema da audiência pública sugerida pelo deputado Alessandro Molon (PT-RJ) nesta terça-feira (29), na Comissão de Segurança Pública e Combate ao Crime Organizado da Câmara. Segundo o deputado, o Plano Nacional de Combate à Violência contra Jovens Negros é fundamental, e sua elaboração está prevista no Plano Plurianual (PPA) 2012/2015. "Se é verdade que a violência é um flagelo para todo o país, é verdade também que ela atinge mais fortemente os jovens negros. Para cada jovem branco que morre assassinado no Brasil, morrem assassinados 2,6 jovens negros. Queremos combater a violência contra todos, mas proteger os que estão mais vulneráveis, para evitar que continue esse extermínio da juventude negra. Para isso, é preciso ações afirmativas, que garantam um futuro melhor para os jovens negros e evitem que a nossa juventude seja seduzida por um caminho muitas vezes, sem volta, que é o caminho do crime", afirmou. A iniciativa do petista foi elogiada pela Secretária de Políticas de Ações Afirmativas da Secretaria de Políticas de Promoção da Igualdade Racial, Anhamona Silva de Brito. Ela defendeu a "radicalização" do debate e a busca de caminhos que assegurem os direitos à vida, sobretudo, da juventude negra. "Vivenciamos um processo de violência que reduz as chances de vida da juventude negra, apontada por indicadores sociais, como o Mapa da Violência 2011- Os jovens do Brasil, cujo estudo foi coordenado pelo sociólogo Julio Jacobo Waiselfisz. O racismo é a macro causa e o homicídio, a causa geradora da morte violenta. Vivenciamos um processo de estigmatização da pessoa negra. Os negros são tidos como potenciais criminosos e isso repercute na decisão de acionar ou não o gatilho, de agir ou não de forma violenta. Este é um fato e precisamos considerar a banalização da violência brasileira", afirmou. Para o ex-ministro da Secretaria de Políticas de Promoção da Igualdade Racial (Seppir), do Governo Lula, em 2008, e vice-líder da bancada do PT, deputado Edson Santos (RJ), trata-se de uma herança escravocrata. "Não basta cuidar apenas da inclusão social dos negros, principais vítimas da violência, mas qualificá-los, inserindo-os no mercado de trabalho. A transversalidade tem sido o principal instrumento do governo para enfrentar o problema da juventude, com ações conjuntas na educação e trabalho", destacou. A secretária anunciou a criação da Sala de Situação da Presidência da República, coordenada pelo ministro Gilberto Carvalho, da Secretaria Geral . A sala foi criada, na gestão de Luiza Bairros, com o objetivo de avaliar as causas, buscar caminhos e assegurar direitos à população negra. "A sala de situação viabiliza a otimização de políticas públicas no âmbito federal, dos estados e municípios", elogiou Edson Santos. Participaram também da audiência, os deputados Luiz Alberto (BA); Dalva Figueiredo (AP) e Benedita da Silva (RJ). http://www.sangari.com/mapadaviolencia/ Ivana Figueiredo

Roberto Abdenur - Quem depende da China?

A 'China-dependência' não se coloca apenas para o Brasil, mas para toda a economia internacional

Analistas tanto no Brasil quando no exterior começam a indagar-se até que ponto está nosso país a tornar-se altamente dependente da China. Para ser avaliado, merece o tema ser colocado em perspectiva.
Ao início de minha gestão como embaixador em Pequim, em 1989 (lá fiquei até 1993), tinha o Brasil -surpreenda-se o leitor- PIB maior que o da China (US$ 400 bilhões ante US$ 380 bilhões). O comércio bilateral era pouco superior a US$ 3 bilhões/ano até o final dos anos 90.

Na última década, contudo, deu-se crescimento exponencial das trocas, que hoje se aproximam dos US$ 70 bilhões. Pela primeira vez, a China desponta como nosso principal parceiro comercial, superando décadas de liderança dos EUA. Assume também, quase da noite para o dia, o papel de principal investidora no país em termos correntes. Foram quase US$ 10 bilhões em 2010.

Quanto aos PIBs, após três décadas de crescimento vertiginoso, de cerca de 10% ao ano, a economia chinesa é hoje o triplo da brasileira (US$ 6 trilhões contra US$ 2 trilhões). Uma parceria estratégica foi lançada em 1993, quando havia paridade entre os dois países em termos de dimensões econômicas.

Hoje, a parceria se desdobra em quadro de forte assimetria quantitativa, dada a brecha entre os PIBs. E há uma assimetria qualitativa: cerca de 90% de nossas exportações são commodities, e a parcela de manufaturados chineses em nossas importações é de 90%. Quanto ao poder de fogo financeiro, as reservas chinesas (US$ 3,3 trilhões) são dez vezes as nossas.

Esse quadro se afigura carregado de conotações negativas. Não é bem assim. O relacionamento bilateral não pode ser visto em termos estritamente mercantilistas. Desde 1993, armou-se aos poucos uma frondosa e bem organizada tessitura de esquemas de diálogo, intercâmbio e cooperação. De resto, há mutualidade na dependência, pois são essenciais para Pequim muitas commodities fornecidas pelo Brasil.

A questão da "China-dependência" não se coloca apenas para o Brasil. A esta altura da crise, é toda a economia internacional que se vê dependente do dinamismo chinês. É a China a única gigantesca usina de intenso crescimento a contrabalançar a estagnação geral (também Brasil, Índia e outros emergentes vão na contramão da recessão, mas só a China tem dimensões capazes de realmente compensar a queda nas outras grandes economias).

A indagação é a de saber-se até que ponto certo desaquecimento na economia chinesa pode agravar-se a ponto de afetar perspectivas mundiais já pouco animadoras. Não há dúvida de que a ligeira desaceleração em curso afeta as commodities.

Mas cabe ter-se em conta que a China inicia agora um novo plano quinquenal, em que a ênfase está em obter, como lá se diz, um crescimento harmonioso. A demanda por algumas commodities pode arrefecer-se, mas por outras -como alimentos- tenderá a expandir-se.

Não está o Brasil, portanto, tão mal assim em sua interação com a China. Interdependência é o que melhor define esse relacionamento. Mas, não há como negar, temos de estar atentos ao que possa suceder no autodenominado país do centro, na esperança de que não descarrilhe aquela que hoje é a maior locomotiva da economia internacional.

Luiz Pinguelli Rosa - A mudança climática e a Rio+20

CONTEÚDO LIVRE »

A crise financeira monopoliza emoções; a mudança climática, atualmente, não é prioridade mundial e, nesse cenário, será relativizada durante a Rio+20 

Foi divulgada recentemente a proposta do Documento de Contribuição Brasileira à Conferência Rio+20. O Itamaraty teve papel importante, ao lado do Ministério do Meio Ambiente, na elaboração do documento, com base nos trabalhos de comissão que promoveu consultas à sociedade e a órgãos do governo. A julgar pelo texto, a questão da mudança climática não terá prioridade na parte oficial da Rio+20.

O documento a inclui no capítulo sobre desafios do desenvolvimento sustentável, entre 25 itens, cuja relevância é reconhecida como erradicação da pobreza extrema, que ocupa o primeiro lugar. Embora a mudança climática tenha influência entre vários desses itens, o documento não aponta como essa transversalidade será tratada e relativiza o tema na Rio+20.

A negociação na Convenção-Quadro da ONU, originada na Rio-92, não vai bem. A meta preliminar era de que, no ano 2000, os países desenvolvidos e ex-comunistas reduzissem suas emissões dos gases do efeito estufa ao valor que tinham em 1990, em particular o CO2, principal responsável pelo aquecimento global. Como as emissões não estavam sendo reduzidas, ao contrário, aumentavam, na Conferência de Kyoto, em 1997, mudaram-se as metas e o prazo, que se esgota em 2012, ano da Rio+20.

Os EUA nem mesmo ratificaram o Protocolo. Portanto, a redução mundial das emissões até 2012 ficará muito abaixo da necessária para se chegar ao fim do século dentro do limite de 2 graus Celsius de aquecimento. As mudanças climáticas trarão riscos para o futuro da humanidade. A redução das grandes geleiras é um indício dado pelo IPCC.

Os países em desenvolvimento tendem a aumentar emissões com o crescimento econômico, seguindo os padrões de produção e de consumo dos países desenvolvidos, que são trazidos pelas grandes empresas transnacionais. Por outro lado, as classes de renda mais alta têm alto consumo de energia per capita, enquanto a população pobre tem consumo de energia muito baixo.

Assim, a desigualdade na emissão de gases do efeito segue a desigualdade na distribuição de renda. Deve-se resolver o problema das emissões juntamente com o da exclusão. Doze milhões de brasileiros não tinham luz elétrica no início do Programa Luz para Todos.

Na Conferência de Copenhague, em 2009, o Brasil assumiu o compromisso de reduzir, em 2020, voluntariamente -pois não está obrigado pela Convenção-Quadro-, as suas emissões em até 38,9% da emissão projetada para aquele ano.

A maior parte vem do desmatamento, que tem sido reduzido, embora haja dúvidas neste ano. Para se chegar a esse compromisso, houve um processo no qual o Fórum Brasileiro de Mudanças Climáticas teve uma relevante contribuição.

O presidente Lula teve importante papel em Copenhague, onde compareceu com a futura presidente Dilma e protestou contra o rumo da Conferência em direção ao fracasso, que acabou ocorrendo, apesar do compromisso brasileiro.

A Conferência do ano seguinte, 2010, em Cancún, não avançou muito; possivelmente, esta é a tendência da Conferência de Durban, que ocorre agora.

A prioridade mundial, hoje, não é a mudança climática. A crise financeira monopoliza as emoções: basta ver a reação à possibilidade de a Grécia submeter a um referendo popular as condições exigidas pela Alemanha e pela França para renegociarem sua dívida.

Só faltou a União Europeia proibir a leitura de "A República", de Platão, como obra subversiva.
 
LUIZ PINGUELLI ROSA, físico, é diretor da Coppe-UFRJ (Coordenação dos Programas de Pós-Graduação em Engenharia da Universidade Federal do Rio de Janeiro) e secretário do Fórum Brasileiro de Mudanças Climáticas. Foi presidente da Eletrobrás (2003-2004).