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Sunday, February 25, 2024

ICYMI: Audition Edition (2/25)

Tonight we have our first round of auditions for a local theater production of Jesus Christ, Superstar. I'm music directing this time around, and I'm excited. Like most 70s church kids, I have a special place in my heart for the show. It was the first vinyl album I actually wore out (the second was Queen's Night at the Opera). The audition phase of a theater production is always the scariest part; you're just hoping like crazy that the pieces you need to put a production together will show up. It's easy for a Broadway director--they can decide exactly what they're looking for and then get to choose between twelve of them. Community theater is much more a matter of doing the best you can with what shows up. Probably why the whole exercise seems vaguely familiar to teachers.

At any rate, here's your list for the week. Remember, sharing is caring.


Paul Thomas explains, again, with charts, how the NAEP scores are used to manufacture a crisis. 

A look at the science of reading movement through the eyes of the radical middle

Another view of the Science of Reading movement from Sam Bommarito.

Supreme Court Allows Pro-Diversity but Race-Neutral Admissions Policy at Selective Virginia High School

A good explanation of the Supreme Court decision not to decide about admissions to a selective high school and what it all means, from Jan Resseger.

NC church whose pastor says women that wear shorts invite rape has received millions in public tax dollars for school vouchers

If you follow Justin Parmenter on social media (and you should) you know he's been talking about the many discriminatory schools collecting taxpayer dollars under North Carolina's unregulated voucher system. Here's one of the most egregious examples. 

Time To Bring On The Dancing Bears

TC Weber with some on the ground view of the Tennessee voucher fight

York County militia supporter’s request for info on district employees spurs policy change

Well, that's not alarming at all. Local militia guy wants the personal info of district employees who have been critical of new conservative members of this Virgi9nia district. Yikes. Brian Reese reports for 10WAVY.

Who gets to decide which books are appropriate for a school library in Oklahoma?

Kolby Terrell provides reporting for KOCO about the newest flap in Oklahoma, where Education Dudebro Ryan Walters says the he's the decider, local control be damned.

'It's absurd': North Fort Myers teacher resigns after school removes in-class library

Dan Glaun reports for Fort Myers News-Press. It's a story providing the six gazillionth example of how administrators can either blunt bad policy or make it way worse. 


Francie Diep takes on the current resurgence of this controversy, and manages to include quotes from Akil Bello, testing guru. 
“If you like the test, just admit you like the test,” said Akil Bello, a director at FairTest, which advocates for more limited uses of standardized exams. “Stop blaming Black and brown students for your love of the test.”
What the Globe Left Out of “MTA Exerts More Power”

The Boston Globe is remarkably consistent in its opposition to public schools and the teachers who work there. Fortunately, Maurice Cunningham is here to fill in the parts of the story the Globe likes to skip.

Woke/Not Woke

Nancy Flanagan does that thing she's so good at-- connecting a whole lot of education dots.

Pennridge School Board Scraps Hillsdale-Influenced Elementary Social Studies Curriculum

For those following the Pennridge saga, some good news. 

The far side of the creek

Paul Bowers on leaving church, leaving journalism, and never leaving home. There's a lot here, including the battle against censorship, and it's so well crafted. 

Authorizing Chaplains In Florida’s Charter Schools


Sue Kingery Woltanski talks about one more way to religify supposedly public schools.


David Lee Finkle. blogger and cartoonist, discovers that education news is so repetitive that he has accidentally repeated himself.

At Forbes.com I took a look at a new report that shows Democrats and Republicans are way apart on LGBTQA and race issues in school, but actually strongly united in support for public schools over vouchers. Also, a report shows how much extra vouchers are costing Arizona taxpayers

Feel free to join me on substack (in fact, it is free). 


1 comment:

  1. Thank you Sam Bommarito. Exactly. One thing more, as a Speech Language Pathologist, I think we need to include a hard look at a child's listening comprehension and oral language. Even a mild language deficit negatively impacts acquisition of literacy and can predict which children may be dyslexic.

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