Education Week - October 28, 2015 - 1

Education Week

VOL. 35, NO. 10 * OCTOBER 28, 2015

edweek.org:

BRE AKING NEWS DAILY

Study Paints
Chaotic View
Of Testing

BEYOND BIAS
Countering Stereotypes in School
Second package of stories in a yearlong series

Review of 66 Urban Districts
Gauges Scope of Practice

Courtney Perry for Education Week

By Denisa R. Superville

TARGETED SUPPORT: Michael V. Walker, bottom left, the director of Minneapolis schools' Office of Black Male Student Achievement, greets students
before the group heads into a college fair. A growing number of urban districts are creating special offices to address educational disparities. PAGE 14

Unequal Access to Advanced Classes Targeted
By Sarah D. Sparks
Elk Grove, Calif.

It's no secret that gifted and honors
classes are often whiter and wealthier
than their schools as a whole.
At every stage of students' educational careers, the pipeline to academically advanced study narrows for
many low-income and minority students. Research suggests years of little biases add up, shaping who gets
identified for gifted education and
advanced courses and how many
hoops they jump through to do so.
And with politicians and policymakers increasingly focused on promoting
rigorous, "college-ready" coursework,
those leaks can leave thousands of the

ISSUES IN PLAY
AS ESEA SIMMERS
Vulnerable programs and
a pitch to allow school
choice with Title I money
complicate the picture as
congressional
negotiators prepare to
get down to business on a
reauthorization of the
Elementary and
Secondary Education Act.
PAGE 16

most promising students behind.
Here in Elk Grove, a suburb
of Sacramento, Calif., the school
district has invested more than
$860,000 in overhauling the giftedand advanced-course procedures
that unintentionally discriminate
against poor and minority students.
In the process, teachers and administrators are learning how to see
students' potential in new ways.
"It's a very challenging process," said
John B. Diamond, a University of Wisconsin-Madison associate professor
of educational leadership and policy
analysis who studies bias in schools.
"When people see evidence of disparities, they tend to filter it through

"Are you sure you belong here?"
There is perhaps no more critical question for a disadvantaged student entering an advanced class, none more likely
to rattle in the back of even the most gifted student's brain.
And when coming from a teacher or student, it's also just one
example of a "microaggression," an incident of everyday discrimination that students encounter that may contribute to lower
performance and disengagement. But educators and researchers are fighting back, with efforts to both curb microaggressions
and buffer students against them and help them cope.
Gabrielle "Ellie" Bennett moved to the mostly white St. Louis
suburb of Rockwood, Mo., in 2nd grade, after being in a gifted

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Fighting Subtle Bias
By Sarah D. Sparks

A high-profile lawsuit targeting the Los Angeles school district
highlights the collision of two little-known, murky areas of teacher
policy: the district's process for investigating teachers accused of misconduct, and the state's rules for dismissing a teacher found guilty of it.
The suit, filed this month, charges

that the district has unfairly targeted veteran teachers on trumpedup claims of misconduct. It is being
brought by the nationally prominent teacher Rafe Esquith, who was
recently fired by the school board
after a district investigation leveled charges of personal misconduct.
The exact charges have not been
released, but the investigation had
reportedly looked at, among other
alleged improprieties, whether Es-

PAGE 9 >

DIGITAL DIRECTIONS

In L.A., Tensions Rise Over Teacher Investigations
By Stephen Sawchuk
& Ross Brenneman

Students across the nation are taking
tests that are redundant, misaligned
with college- and career-ready standards, and often don't address students'
mastery of specific content, according to
a long-awaited report that provides the
first in-depth look at testing in the nation's largest urban school districts.
The comprehensive report by the
Washington-based Council of the Great
City Schools examines testing in 66 of
the council's 68 member school districts,
looking at the types of tests administered, their frequency, and how they are
used. The findings are expected to add
hard numbers and evidence to the fractious national debate around whether
U.S. students are being overtested.
The study found, for instance, that
8th grade students in an urban district
spent an average of 4.22 school days taking mandatory tests last school year-
the most test-taking time of any grade
level. That's not counting optional tests
and those given periodically by teachers
to gauge student progress. And the re-

quith exchanged inappropriate
emails with students and kept sexually explicit images on his school
computer. He has repeatedly denied
the accusations.
The law firm representing Esquith
says that some 2,000 teachers said
that they, too, have been harmed by
district investigations, and could potentially join the suit.
The district ramped up its investiPAGE 11 >

'Ephemeral' Apps
Put School Leaders
In Tricky Spots
By Benjamin Herold
Schools are facing growing challenges
from so-called "ephemeral messaging"
apps, which allow users to send mobileto-mobile content that disappears without
a record after it has been read by the intended recipient.
Take Snapchat, which a growing number of teachers cite as a cause of classroom
disruption. Some districts are moving to
block student access to the popular app,
which now claims more than 100 million
users worldwide.
And even more vexing may be the use
of such new technologies by school administrators. Is it appropriate and legal,
for example, for a superintendent to conduct district business using Cyber Dust,
an app the company's website boasts will
let professionals communicate freely via
disappearing text messages that "provide
absolute discretion and can never be recovered once they're gone"?
That very situation is the source of a
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Education Week - October 28, 2015

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of Education Week - October 28, 2015