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Sunday, March 24, 2024

ICYMI: Wavin' Those Palms Edition (3/24)

Every year I wonder just how many palm frond suppliers out there. It can't be that lucrative a business, yet once a year demand must spike enough to provide children across the nation with the opportunity to poke a tickle their friends and siblings in church. 

For those of you new to the blog, this is the every-Sunday collection of links to things that I think are worth reading (but did not already mention or link to in anything I wrote last week). You are encouraged to share from the original link and give the writers a little love and attention. Tips and suggestions always appreciated.

Here's the list for the week.

City Council Races Could Complete Andrew Wommack’s “Takeover” of Woodland Park

Logan Davis re4ports for the Colorado Times Recorder about how one religious right group is working to take over the schools and the town in Woodland Park.

5 Things I Would Never Do With My Own Kids After Working As A Teacher

A perfectly fine HuffPost listicle, including an appearance by Jose Luis Vilson.

No, Teachers Are Not in a Panic About ChatGPT

Anne Lutz Fernandez puts ChatGPT panic in the proper context of student authentic work and the larger history of student writing assignment integrity (looking at you, Cliff's Notes).

My curriculum not the reason kids can’t read

It probably won't me a thing to the Hanford fanfolks, but Lucy Calkins has finally written a response to all the criticism of her work (or at least the portrayal of her work that gets criticized).

The Great Textbook War

An NPR Throughline audio episode, featuring Charles Dorn and Adam Laats, reminding us that we've seen this movie before, and it always ends the same way for the book banners.

Banned in Boston: Coverage of Walton Family Spending on K-12 Interest Groups

Dark money expert Maurice Cunningham takes a look at just how much money the Walton's have been spending to push privatization. Then he looks at how little it has been reported by certain newspapers.


Jose Luis Vilson takes a look at school choice, how it has led to some rot, and how it ignores the larger purpose of schools.

Classical Charter Schools of America Pays ACLU $1.456 Million in Gendered Uniform Lawsuit

The lawsuit involving that North Carolina charter that wanted its fragile girlfolk to wear skirts has finally reached a settlement. 

Dark money group goes after GOP House member for opposition to Tennessee school voucher plan

The DeVos family's American Federation for Children is going after voucher opponents in Tennessee (just like they did in Texas). This is how out of state billionaires work to get their preferred policies passed.


I wrote a review about Gayle Greene's book a while back. Short version: buy it and read it. Here's Bob Shepherd with another good argument for picking up this excellent argument for human education.

Where are all the teachers? Breaking down America's teacher shortage crisis in 5 charts.

USA Today of all places ran this set of charts drawn from some of the research out there. Florida, Arizona, and Nort Carolina have the highest demand. Hmmm, go figure.

'Free Mom Hugs' volunteer labeled 'groomer' by hate group. Here's how she responded.

A nice account of one group's response to more M4L baloney. Not updated to include the post in which M4L doubled down on the groomer accusation, but they did, because of course they did.

Competency-based education failure raises concerns with new standards

CBE continues to be a great system except when you try to actually implement it. New Hampshire reports on its troubles trying to make it work.


Thomas Ultican looks at the latest in voucher fraud activity, and why we can expect plenty more. 

My Kid's Textbook Doesn't Know We Elected a Black President

Jess Piper looks at some of the direct effects of refusing to fully fund schools. Like history textbooks that are old enough to vote.

Will Reforms by Texas and an Audit by Federal Charter Schools Program Be Enough to End Shady Practices at IDEA Charter Schools?

The IDEA charter chain has been a source of shady shenanigans for quite some time. Jan Resseger asks if there's any reason to believe that things will get better.

Who Carried You?

TC Weber offers a parental perspective on laws that mandate schools outing LGBTQ students. 

Open season on scholars of race

Wondering what Chris Rufo's been up to lately? Don Moynihan reports on the building of "plagiarism" as a tool for going after scholars of color.

Automakers Are Sharing Consumers’ Driving Behavior With Insurance Companies

The New York Times reports on another frontier in the surveillance state. That computer in your car is not your friend.

This week at Forbes.com, I wrote about the sequel lawsuit to Carson in Maine (about making religious schools follow antidiscrimination rules if they want to collect voucher bucks) and looked at the great book about grading by Jack Schneider and Ethan Hutt.

Also, at the Bucks County Beacon, a look at how Pennsylvania stacked up (a middling C) in the NPE report on how well states support public education

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