Former P.G. Superintendent John Deasy finalist in CA school system

...John Deasy was named Wednesday as the finalist to become superintendent of San Joaquin County’s largest school district.

“I’m thrilled to be taking the job,” Deasy, 58, said during a phone interview from Los Angeles. “I’m humbled, honored and very thankful for the board to consider me.”

Deasy’s career in education spans 35 years, with beginnings as a high school teacher, principal and several superintendent roles on both coasts.

Most recently, Deasy led Los Angeles Unified, the nation’s second-largest school district, from 2011 to 2014. Before that tenure, he served as superintendent in Prince George’s County Public Schools in Maryland from 2006 to 2008, Santa Monica-Malibu Unified from 2001 to 2006, and Coventry Public Schools in Rhode Island from 1996 to 2001.

After his time at LAUSD, he became superintendent consultant for the Broad Center, where he coaches current and emerging national education leaders, according to an online biography. He also maintains a management consulting practice and is active on a number of boards, including those of UnboundED, College Summit and Cambiar.

He is the board chairman of Reset: New Day, New Year, an alternative prison for young men, and editor-in-chief of “The Line,” a magazine dedicated to civil discourse on pressing social issues, education and social justice.

Born in Boston and raised both there and in Providence, Rhode Island, Deasy earned his bachelor’s and master’s degrees from Providence College and a doctorate from the University of Louisville in Kentucky...

http://www.recordnet.com/news/20180502/former-los-angeles-superintendent-picked-to-lead-stockton-unified

Gates Foundation to Shift Education Focus

Marking a new chapter in education philanthropy, the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation will step back from its traditional education reform agenda to instead invest close to $1.7 billion over the next five years on new initiatives that include a focus on building networks of schools...

https://www.usnews.com/news/education-news/articles/2017-10-19/gates-foundation-pledges-17-billion-to-k-12-education-will-focus-on-building-school-networks

New MD State BOE President and his connection to Gates Foundation

The Maryland State Board of Education has tapped an education policy expert who helped found a charter school as its new president.

Andrew R. Smarick, 40, appointed last year by Republican Gov. Larry Hogan, was unanimously elected Tuesday by the 12-member policy-making body and will serve a one-year term.

Smarick is a partner at Bellwether Education Partners, a nonprofit that works to improve K-12 education for low-income students, and recently served on the Commission to Review Maryland’s Use of Assessments and Testing in Public Schools, which issued recommendations earlier this month.

Soure:  The Washington Post

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In November of 2013, the Gates Foundation gave a grant to Bellwether Education Partners.

 

http://www.gatesfoundation.org/How-We-Work/Quick-Links/Grants-Database/Grants/2013/11/OPP1096128

Bellwether Education Partners, Inc.

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Date: November 2013 
Purpose: to support CoreSpring, an initiative to build a bank of shared Common Core aligned formative item and assessment resources that assure improved discoverability, availability and interoperability 
Amount: $1,981,978 Term: 24 
Topic: College Ready 
Program: United States 
Grantee Location: Sudbury, Massachusetts

WPost: Secret policymaking on school reform is on the rise

But, The Washington Post won't report on what goes on in Montgomery County Public Schools. Same story here, but no reporting.  Why not?  

Secret policymaking on school reform is on the rise

Coming to MCPS via Gates Foundation: Peers teaching Peers is good for everyone

From Twitter we learn that "Next week is the launch of the MCPS Personalized Instruction Cohort."         Here is the MCPS page that might explain what "personalized instruction" means.                               We checked the MCPS website and couldn't find any discussion of this in Board of Education minutes, but if you can find where the Board of Education discussed and voted on this, please let us know! 

All we do know is that MCPS got a $100,000 grant from the Gates Foundation to do something with "personalized learning."  

Breaking News: $100,000 Gates Grant Awarded to MCPS

Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation Awards a $100,000 Grant to Montgomery County Public Schools
Nov 9 2013 05:59:44:000AM
Recipient: Montgomery County Public Schools
Location: Rockville, Maryland, United States of America
Recipient URL: www.montgomeryschoolsmd.org
Grantmaker: Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation
Grant Amount: $100,000
Grant Period: 09/26/13 - 01/31/14
Duration: 4 months
Fiscal Year End: 12/31/13
Description: to support the development of a system-level strategic plan for personalized learning
Geographic Area Served: North America

Source: Glass Pockets

Pearson, Gates, Wireless Generation the future of classroom testing

Bill Gates recently granted Clemson University nearly $500,000 for development of Galvanic Skin Response Bracelets as part of the Gates MET Project. This movie shows what the future of Gates MET project may look like.


These are all companies that former Superintendent Jerry Weast has partnered with in some way. The only thing missing from this video is Jerry Weast telling the world how this will close the gap.

NYT: Behind Grass-Roots School Advocacy, Bill Gates

...In some cases, Mr. Gates is creating entirely new advocacy groups. The foundation is also paying Harvard-trained data specialists to work inside school districts, not only to crunch numbers but also to change practices. It is bankrolling many of the Washington analysts who interpret education issues for journalists and giving grants to some media organizations.

“We’ve learned that school-level investments aren’t enough to drive systemic changes,” said Allan C. Golston, the president of the foundation’s United States program. “The importance of advocacy has gotten clearer and clearer.” 

The foundation spent $373 million on education in 2009, the latest year for which its tax returns are available, and devoted $78 million to advocacy — quadruple the amount spent on advocacy in 2005. Over the next five or six years, Mr. Golston said, the foundation expects to pour $3.5 billion more into education, up to 15 percent of it on advocacy. 

Given the scale and scope of the largess, some worry that the foundation’s assertive philanthropy is squelching independent thought, while others express concerns about transparency. Few policy makers, reporters or members of the public who encounter advocates like Teach Plus or pundits like Frederick M. Hess of the American Enterprise Institute realize they are underwritten by the foundation...

... Mr. Hess, a frequent blogger on education whose institute received $500,000 from the Gates foundation in 2009 “to influence the national education debates,” acknowledged that he and others sometimes felt constrained. “As researchers, we have a reasonable self-preservation instinct,” he said. “There can be an exquisite carefulness about how we’re going to say anything that could reflect badly on a foundation.” 

“Everybody’s implicated,” he added...

Full Article Here 

Former MD Superintendent on teacher salaries

Gates Foundation’s Education Deputy: Reform Teachers’ Pay Structure

 ...Dr. Deasy is the recently hired deputy director of education for the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, and former superintendent of Prince George’s County Public Schools in Maryland. He was an afternoon speaker at Santa Clara County Office of Education’s Charter School Summit...

...Deasy said there is a “currency of privilege” for those parents in the know and with the highest education levels to have the ability to make certain their children receive the best teachers in the school at each grade level. This practice obviously flies in the face of equity for all. Students who live in circumstances of poverty do not get the best teachers. SJ 2020 take note.

Deasy said we know who the best teachers are in each school. The most effective teachers, about 25% of a school’s faculty, get more than a year’s growth per student for a year of study.  We must turn schools into a culture of performance rather than one of compliance, Deasy opined.

In order to make this critical transition we must change the manner to which we use public money to fund teacher salaries. Those teachers with highly successful skill sets for increasing student achievement for all their students are not compensated well enough in today’s salary structure practices.

It will not take more money to be poured into the system of public education, but a reallocation of the way we currently spend our bucks.  For example, Deasy said $8.4 billion dollars nationally goes into compensate teachers with a Masters (MA/MS) degree yet there is no relationship between a MA degree and increased student achievement. Of course, we also compensate teachers based on the number of years of experience and the number of units accrued beyond a BA degree, yet there are no corollaries to increases in student achievement for either. School districts spend 1.5% of their certificated salaries for what is called “step and column” movement each year....