In the first large-scale analysis of new systems that evaluate teachers based partly on student test scores, two researchers found little or no correlation between quality teaching and the appraisals teachers received.

The study, published Tuesday in Educational Evaluation and Policy Analysis, a peer-reviewed journal of the American Educational Research Association.

Hedge Fund Titans Hum a Happy Tune as They Target Public Schools   by Sam Pizzigati  on Moyer and Company

But the real enormity of America's annual hedge fund jackpots only comes into focus when we contrast these windfalls with the rewards that go to ordinary Americans. Kindergarten teachers, for instance.

The 157,800 teachers of America's little people, the Bureau of Labor Statistics tells us, together make about $8.34 billion a year. Hedge fund America's top four earners alone last year grabbed $10.4 billion.

ACT vs. PARCC: A Side-By-Side Comparison  by  Gerri K. Songer in Education on the Gerri Songer Blog

What is the difference between the ACT and PARCC?  My conclusion from the onset of my career in education twenty-three years ago is that ACT is a dreadful attempt to assess student learning.  Now that PARCC has hit the scene, ACT is beginning to look significantly better!  But please, don't take my word for it!  Compare these assessments for yourself.  

 60 Years After Brown v. Board, Will Congress Revive a Dual School System?  by Diane Ravitch on the Huffington Post

Congress is considering new charter legislation, awarding more money to the charter sector, which will operate with minimal accountability or transparency.  Make no mistake: on the 60th anniversary of the Brown v. Board decision, Congress is set to expand a dual school system. One sector, privately managed, may choose its students, exclude those who might pull down its test scores, and kick out those it doesn't want. The other sector -- the public schools -- must take in all students, even those kicked out by the charters.  

Mixing Education With Politics  by Peter Greene on the Huffington Post Blog

There's a great line, usually attributed to Rev. Gene Carlson of Wichita, about religion getting involved in politics:

When you mix religion and politics, you get politics.

His point was that while you may think that political power gives you leverage you need to engineer the social changes you want (in Carlson's case, conservative Christian changes), politics always ends up in the driver's seat.

Studies Highlight Complexities of Using Value-Added Measures  by Holly Yettick  in the EdWeek Blog

In a study published Tuesday in the peer-reviewed journalEducational Evaluation and Policy Analysis, Morgan Polikoff, an assistant education professor at the University of Southern California in Los Angeles, and Andrew Porter, an education professor at the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia, found no association between value-added results and other widely accepted measures of teaching quality, such as the degree to which instruction is aligned with state standards or the contents of assessments.  

Our Impoverished View of Teacher Education  by Jim Burns  in the Teachers College Record.

Returning to David Berliner's (2006) Our Impoverished View of Educational Research, this commentary reflects on what the author conceptualizes as an impoverished view of teacher education. Drawing on his experience working in teacher education and contextualized in Taubman's (2000, 2009) analysis of educational audit culture, the author concludes that in the context of corporate reform discourses, teacher educators must reflect on the role of teacher education programs in the face of mounting threats to public education.  

7 big problems-and solutions-in education  by Laura Devaney in eSchool News

Education has 99 problems, but the desire to solve those problems isn't one. But because we can't cover 99 problems in one story, we'll focus on seven, which the League of Innovative Schools identified as critical to educational innovation.  While these aren't the only challenges that education faces today, these seven problems are often identified as roadblocks that prevent schools and districts from embracing innovation.

Javier Hernandez in the The New York Times

A primary rationale for the creation of charter schools, which are publicly financed and privately run, was to develop test kitchens for practices that could be exported into the traditional schools. President Obama, in recently proclaiming "National Charter Schools Week," said they "can provide effective approaches for the broader public education system."