Tuesday, July 7, 2009

NEA and Arne Duncan

Last week, I had the opportunity to speak on a panel with the Secretary of Education. Watch the video here, and see the full text of the interview:

http://www.nea.org/grants/33697.htm#

A shout out from LDH!

At the NEA Representative Assembly, Linda Darling-Hammond received the Friend of Education Award. During her speech, she commended our Math and Science Leadership Academy! Here's the exerpt:
These new schools are not only charters, they are more often regular public schools in districts from Gorham, Maine to Seattle, Washington, from Minneapolis to Birmingham. This fall in Denver, in Math Science Leadership Academy supported by the Teachers Association, will open led by teacher leaders and a group of teachers half of whom are national board certified to offer a challenging supported curriculum for in a low-income Latino community, where previous shortages are now ended because teachers are lining up trying to get hired to come into this school. Where teachers have the opportunity to be effective with learners with good leadership, with sound curriculum, with thoughtful learning, that's where teachers will want to teach.
These schools like those in high-achieving nations focus on critical thinking and problem solving, on 21st century skills, not just on bubbling in answers to multiple-choice tests. To support this work, we not only need to create opportunities for teachers to reinvent schools, but we also need to create a new framework for No Child Left Behind. That does not leave the money behind, and that understands that we need multiple measures of student learning.

Click here to read the full text.