School Choice Week: AFP Hosting Viewings of ‘Waiting For Superman’

Posted on January 16, 2015 by A.P. Dillon

School Choice week is coming!

Americans For Prosperity (AFP) will be holding screenings of the film ‘Waiting for Superman’ in Cary and Garner on back to back evenings in January.

I’ve seen the film and highly recommend it.  Watch one of the trailers here.
As a follow-up, I recommend the book, The K-12 Implosion.

Here are the details and locations:

Monday, January 26, 2015 from 6:00 PM to 9:00 PM (EST)
Garner Performing Arts Center
Garner, NC
MORE INFO

Tuesday, January 27, 2015 from 6:00 PM to 9:00 PM (EST)
Cary Arts Center
Cary, NC
MORE INFO


 

 

 

Posted in A.P. Dillon (LL1885) | Comments Off on School Choice Week: AFP Hosting Viewings of ‘Waiting For Superman’

Convention of States Tour – 2015 NC Schedule

Posted on January 16, 2015 by A.P. Dillon

The Convention of States (CoS) tour schedule for North Carolina is now available. For those unfamiliar with CoS, you can read my previous article on it. Michael Westrich of CoS summarized what CoS is about quite nicely:

“Citizens for Self-Governance (CSG) recently launched the Convention of States (COS) Project with the expressed purpose of urging and empowering state legislators to call a Convention of States. Under the COS Project plan, this convention would be called “for the purpose of limiting the power and jurisdiction of the federal government.” Only amendments that fall under this category would be germane and up for debate.“

Downloadable CoS 2015 NC schedule

These scheduled stops are free and open to the public:

January 22 – Thursday
8:00 am – 9:15 am   Southport
Southport Trinity United Methodist Church
209 East Nash Street    Southport, NC  28461

12:00 pm – 1:00 pm  Goldsboro
Victory Freewill Baptist Church
1806 Wayne Memorial Drive    Goldsboro, NC  27534

7:00 pm – 9:00 pm  Raleigh
North Ridge Church
7601 Falls of Neuse Road    Raleigh, NC  27615

 

January 23 – Friday
7:00 pm – 9:00 pm    Winston-Salem
Thomas Jefferson Middle School
3500 Sally Kirk Road    Winston-Salem, NC  27106

 

January 24 – Saturday
10:00 am – 11:30 am    Mooresville
Trinity Baptist Church
221 Ervin Road    Mooresville, NC  28117

6:00 pm – 8:00 pm    Charlotte
First Baptist Church
301 South Davidson Street    Charlotte, NC  28202

 

 

Related:

Posted in A.P. Dillon (LL1885) | 2 Comments

Common Core Aligned: Getting Smart

Posted on January 16, 2015 by A.P. Dillon

CommonCoreAligned“…to create just these kinds of tests—next-generation assessments aligned to the common core. When the tests are aligned to the common standards, the curriculum will line up as well—and that will unleash powerful market forces in the service of better teaching.” – Bill Gates, 2009 Speech To Natl. Conference of State Legislatures

The goal is to align everything so that students and the money have nowhere to go but Common Core.

 

Reason TV has published a video titled, Silicon Valley Wants to Teach Your Kids.

Read the description for the video, emphasis added is mine:

Published on Jan 14, 2015

If you are someone who grew up sitting in a classroom every day; facing the chalkboard and watching the seconds tick by on a clock until the bell rang, then online education may feel a bit strange at first. But people like Tom Vander Ark, the CEO of Getting Smart, say that learning online is not only the future of education but one of the ways to make it more effective.

“These innovations in tools and schools make the opportunity for people to learn better every single month,” says Vander Ark to Reason managing editor Katherine Mangu-Ward. He admits that most students will still learn in the classroom, but online tools will be blended into their education, making the educational experience specific to their needs.

“Learning is becoming blended, it’s becoming personalized, and increasingly competency based, which means [students] show what they know and they progress based on mastery,” says Vander Ark, who had a hand in creating ed tech startups Coursea, Class Dojo, and Edmodo (which has already raised $30 million.)

The New York Times reported Jan. 11 that venture and equity financing for education technology companies was up 55 percent over the previous year at almost $1.87 billion.

Getting Smart is on the Common Core train: Common Core: A Platform for Equity & Innovation

About Tom Vander Ark:

Tom is Treasurer for the International Association for K-12 Online Learning (iNACOL), board chair of Charter Board Partners, and is a director of Bloomboard, Digital Learning Institute, Imagination Foundation, and Strive for College. Tom is a national advisory board member for Communities In Schools, National Association for Charter School Authorizers (NACSA), and New Classrooms.

Read more about iNACOL and the CCSSO here.

This push for digital learning and digital apps comes from familiar roots: Jeb Bush and Bill Gates.

Take a good look at the “Digital Learning Council“, convened by Jeb Bush.

I have first hand experience with Class Dojo. It is an app designed to track and influence student behavior in the classroom by giving and taking points away from students. The whole class can see the points.  It’s a shaming app, in my opinion, and teachers are using this without parental permission in many cases.

Related Reading:

* Crossposted at StopCommonCoreNC.org
Posted in A.P. Dillon (LL1885), Common Core | Tagged | 1 Comment

Charlotte Firm Study Paying $75 To Know Your Computer, Tablet Habits

Posted on January 15, 2015 by A.P. Dillon

Some company out there wants to know more about you and your 8-12 year old child’s tablet/smartphone/computer use and Accelerant Research apparently has been hired to find out more.

Gee, wonder what kind of outfits want to know that kind of data?

I found it kind of amusing the author didn’t bother to fill in the name of the person they were soliciting to in their email. See below

———- Forwarded message ———-
From: “Accelerant Research” <joshs.invite@accelerantresearch.com>
Date: Jan 12, 2015
Subject: Paid in-person research study in Charlotte Area – $75 for 45min

Good Morning [contact (“first name”)],

I am with a marketing research company in Charlotte called Accelerant Research, and we are recruiting parents and their kids (age 8-12) for a research study in Matthews, NC the week of January 19th. The 45 minute research interviews are on the subject of computer and smartphone/tablet use, and we’ll pay $75cash as a thank you to participants for sharing their time and opinions.

Please be assured that this is a legitimate research study.  We will not try to sell you anything, and we will keep your identity completely confidential.

If you are interested in participating, please click on the link below to take our short screening survey.  Or, if you know any parents in the local area that might be interested, please feel free to forward this message.

Click here to see if you qualify.

Even if you don’t qualify for this study, we invite you to sign up for our research panel (please do so atwww.ResearchPanel.org). We conduct other paid research studies all the time and will keep you in mind for future research. Just for registering for our research panel, you will be entered into a $500 sweepstakes drawing.

Thanks very much,

Josh Sauer
Project Director

Accelerant Research | 1242 Mann Drive, Suite 100 | Matthews, NC 28105
704.206.8503 (office) | 704.206.8499 (fax)
Posted in Uncategorized | Comments Off on Charlotte Firm Study Paying $75 To Know Your Computer, Tablet Habits

CCSSO President’s Homeschool Tweet Sees Backlash

Posted on January 15, 2015 by A.P. Dillon

Update: Thank you to Carolina Plott Hound for linking!

 

In yesterday’s article, CCSSO President Questions Testing For Homeschoolers, the question was posed by Dr. Atkinson that perhaps homeschoolers and private schooled children should be taking the same tests as public school children.

Here’s the original tweet:

This question has led to some backlash.
Better watch it, ya’ll. You might be accused of bearing false witness.

Some replies:

Also, apparently this particular mom’s feedback is valued:

Posted in A.P. Dillon (LL1885), Homeschool, June Atkinson, Testing, Twitter | Tagged , , | 1 Comment

NC #ASRC Handout has Author Missing

Posted on January 15, 2015 by A.P. Dillon

In going over the December meeting materials from the Common Core Academic Standards Review Commission (ASRC), there was one handout that was missing any notation of who the author was.

This handout had a header on it that said, “Legislatively Required Standards Review Process in Other States“.   A closer inspection of the original document’s properties showed it was authored by Michael Gilligan.

Michael Gilligan works for Achieve, Inc., one of the creators of Common Core alongside the CCSSO and NGA.

Snippet from his bio with emphasis added:

Michael’s career spans over 25 years in the education reform and not-for-profit sectors. Prior to joining Achieve, where his focus is on building state coalition support for the Common Core State Standards, the Next Generation Science Standards and working with the 35 American Diploma Project network states on their college- and career-ready agendas, Michael was Director of Strategic Initiatives and Resource Development at the Hunt Institute in North Carolina. Michael was on the start-up team for Hunt in 2002 and most recently led the Institute’s efforts to support states’ development, adoption and implementation of rigorous standards in ELA, math and science.

I sent an inquiry to the ASRC’s co-chairs and received a response from co-chair Andre Peek.  Mr. Peek indicated that this handout came from Eric Guckian, the education aide to Governor Pat McCrory. A copy of that reply is below:

Peek, Andre <andre.peek@nc.gov>Sun, Jan 11, 2015 at 8:24 PM
To: Lily Liberty <thell1885@gmail.com>, “Metcalf, Jeannie” <jeannie.metcalf@nc.gov>
Dear Ms. Dillon,
This was initial background information provided to me by our State Education Advisor, Eric Guckian.
Regards,
R. Andre Peek
Co-Chair, Academic Standards Review Commission
State of North Carolina
url: http://www.doa.nc.gov/asrc/

I reached out to Mr. Guckian for an official comment that same day.  Mr. Guckian asked if we could speak about it over the phone. I have yet to speak with Mr. Guckian on this item via the telephone but felt this piece of information needed to be brought to light given the ASRC meets tomorrow.   We all want as transparent of a process with the ASRC as possible.

 

 

Posted in A.P. Dillon (LL1885), Academic Standards Review Commission, Common Core, Pat McCrory | Tagged , | 2 Comments