New York: How Charter Schools Won the Right to Hire Unqualified Teachers

Diane Ravitch's blog

Jake Jacobs reports the complicated political story behind the decision by the State University of New York’s charter committee to allow its nearly 200 charter schools to hire unqualified teachers. New York State has high standards for new teachers. SUNY has some of the best education programs in the state.

Yet a SUNY  committee selected by Governor Cuomo decided that charter schools it approves need no qualifications at all, not even a college degree, not even a high school degree.

Behind this tangled tale is Eva Moskowitz’s Success Academy Charter Chain, which has such a high teacher turnover rate (as much as 60% annually in some schools) that she is faced with a perennial teacher shortage.

Read on to learn why SUNY would undermine teacher professionalism.

View original post

Why We Should Not Teach Tech in Kindergarten

Diane Ravitch's blog

Veteran educators Shaheer Faltas and Kate Nicholson explain why little children should not be taught coding and computer science. 

Although they write about kindergarten children, the basic principles are the same for very young children of 6 and 7. They may enjoy playing on the computer but take care not to start direct instruction and career preparation for little children. I am not sure when children should start preparing for the computer age, but what they write sounds reasonable to me. What do you think?

They write:

“President Trump and Education Secretary Betsy DeVos intend to prioritize science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) education by making available $200 million in grants and recommend that coding and computer science skills be taught in K-12 schools across the nation. Though the intention to improve K-12 education is admirable, doubling down on technology in America’s kindergarten classrooms is not the answer.

“As a lifelong…

View original post 239 more words