John O'Connor is the Miami-based education reporter for StateImpact Florida. John previously covered politics, the budget and taxes for The (Columbia, S.C) State. He is a graduate of Allegheny College and the University of Maryland.
The band GOODING performs at Miami Beach High School. The band visits schools around the country to play their music and teach financial lessons.
You might be forgiven for mistaking Miami Beach High School’s auditorium for the Fillmore Thursday.
Students waved lit cellphones above their heads.
They sang along with “whoa-oh-oh” choruses.
But when the concert ended, they got a lesson in what some have dubbed nature’s most powerful force.
“It’s called compounding interest,” says Gooding, the guitarist who uses only the one name professionally and is lead singer of a band by the same name (though in all caps). “Raise your hand if you know what compounding interest is? I won’t make you say it. Awesome.”
If you watch shows like CSI or have seen a car commercial, you’ve probably heard GOODING’s music.
The more technology, the worse the performance on tests — This was the big conclusion. The students who spent the most time using computers or on the Internet in school did worse than expected on international tests.
The students who ranked in the middle for technology use — what the OECD called moderate use — did the best on international tests.
“That’s pretty sobering for us,” said Andreas Schleicher, who leads the OECD’s education efforts. “We all hope that integrating more and more technology in school is going to help us actually to enhance learning environments. Make learning more interactive…but it doesn’t seem to be working like this.”
FDLE has closed its investigation of the FSA hacking, but is offering few answers about who did and why.
The Florida Department of Law Enforcement has closed its six-month-old investigation into a cyber attack during Florida Standards Assessments testing this spring. The agency isn’t saying who tried to shut down testing by overloading servers, or why.
But law enforcement officials said no personal student data was accessed during the attack.
FDLE said they found more than 29,000 Internet addresses were used to swamp servers run by test contractor American Institutes for Research. Some of the addresses were in the U.S., but most were believed to be foreign.
Education Commissioner Pam Stewart thanked the agency for a quick response.
“I want to reassure our state’s students, parents and educators that, because of the nature of the cyber-attack, no student information was accessed and the content of the assessment was not compromised,” Stewart said in a statement. “I am pleased that the additional safeguards were effective, and we will continue working with AIR to ensure they have all of the necessary protections to provide for a smooth testing experience this year.”
The Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development oversees the largest international math and reading exams in the world. The group recently looked at the availability and use of computers and Internet in school and compared it to how those countries were doing on international tests.
One conclusion: the more time students spend online in school, the worse they do. Students with moderate technology use performed best on international exams.
“That’s pretty sobering for us,” said Andreas Schleicher, who leads the OECD’s education efforts. “We all hope that integrating more and more technology in school is going to help us actually to enhance learning environments. Make learning more interactive…but it doesn’t seem to be working like this.”
At some schools only a small percentage of students who attend using federal grants or loans earn more than a high school graduate a decade after enrolling in college.
The data links students who received federal financial aid to what they reporting earning on their tax forms a decade later.
Just one-third of students who attended four Dade Medical College campuses earned more than a high school graduate. Earnings also typically were low for students attending one of Florida’s Bible colleges.
Bus routes have been redrawn. And the district sent up flares, looking to hire anyone who wants to drive a bus.
It’s the first crisis new superintendent Robert Avossa has had to face since taking over the job in June. And he says it could have been avoided if district leaders had listened.
“The lesson to be learned is that our bus drivers, right? Sort of the low man on the totem pole,” Avossa told a gathering of business leaders last week, “were waving the big red flag to the management over in transportation saying ‘We have a problem.’ And the management decided not to listen…That’s problematic.”
Avossa has traveled all over Palm Beach County to find others with similar advice about how to run the district.
Miami-Dade Superintendent Alberto Carvalho and chief academic officer Marie Izquierdo.
The superintendent of Florida’s largest district says an outside review of the state’s new test shows that Florida students weren’t being tested on what they were expected to know.
Miami-Dade Superintendent Alberto Carvalho says a review of the Florida Standards Assessments released today shows that on some exams as many as one in three questions weren’t testing Florida standards. That’s because Florida hired a contractor, the American Institutes for Research, which repackaged test questions originally written for a Utah exam.
Standards outline what students should know at the end of each grade.
“Teachers taught Florida standards,” he said, “but kids were not assessed on Florida standards.”
Carvalho says that and other problems identified by an outside reviewer, Alpine Testing Solutions, are enough reason for the state to not issue A-to-F school grades this year. Carvalho was backed by the Florida Association of District School Superintendents. The group issued a press release saying it still had “serious concerns” about the Florida Standards Assessments.
But the review also found that after problems with computerized testing, “scores for some students will be suspect.” The reviewers recommend that state test scores are not the sole basis to determine whether students graduate or if they are placed in remedial courses.
Lawmakers ordered the review of the Florida Standards Assessments after testing problems this spring. School districts around the state reported students had problems logging into the exam and some students were kicked out while taking the test.
The state hired Alpine Testing Solutions to conduct the review.
“This is welcome news for all of us,” Education Commissioner Pam Stewart said of the results. “Now all Floridians can share my confidence of the assessment.”
Stewart said any disruptions to testing are unacceptable and the state department of education will work with the testing company, American Institutes for Research, and school districts to try and prevent future problems.
Florida has one of the highest rates in the country — federal data shows just seven states have a higher percentage of low-income students.
That means more students qualify for — and depend on — free meals provided by school districts. And meal service is now a year-round jobinstead of just when school is in session.
Ever planned Thanksgiving for a dozen relatives? Now imagine planning 200,000 lunches daily.
In Miami-Dade County schools, those meals starts in the district’s test kitchen, where Donna Drummond demonstrates how she makes spinach lasagna, a new addition to menus this year.
She ladles sauce into a pan. Then she places the frozen lasagna rolls — made with whole grain pasta and mozzarella cheese — into the pan.
The dish is designed to be easy and quick to make for hundreds of students. It comes with a salad and a breadstick spiked with low-fat mozzarella cheese.
A new breakfast choice is the guavalito, a lower-sugar version of Miami’s ubiquitous guava-and-cheese pastry. It’s just 100 calories.
These new choices are part of a menu this year featuring more vegetarian options.
William Haft with the association says it’s surprisingly difficult to track down who runs a charter school.
“We want to help the authorizers, help districts make good decisions,” Haft said. “You want to know how well they’ve been doing, how they’ve been performing… where they’re been doing it.”
Nearly one in three Florida charter schools have closed since the state first allowed the publicly funded but privately run schools. And Florida charter schools were three times as likely to close during their first year than they were nationally during the 2013-2014 school year.
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