TakePart Social Action Network™

Charter Schools Part I: A Closer Look

blair@takepart.com — Fri, 17 Jul 2009 02:28:30 +0000

In his letter to the editor published yesterday in the New York Times, James D. Merriman sings the praises of New York State’s charter schools. Not surprising, since Merriman is Chief Executive of the New York City Charter School Center. But he also acknowledges that too many charter schools fare no better than district public schools, and sometimes fare even worse. This information comes from an influential (and controversial) study published last month by Stanford University’s Center for Research on Education Outcomes (CREDO) called Multiple Choice: Charter School Performance in 16 States.

Since charter schools play such a key role in our national reform agenda, I’ve decided to start a mini-blog-series called “Charter Schools” in which I’ll be taking a closer look at this increasingly popular alternative to traditional public schools. And what better place to start than by analyzing CREDO’s study in greater detail.

What makes CREDO’s study most unique is definitely its scope. This is the first national assessment of charter schools to present longitudinal data on student achievement using data from over 70 percent of all charter school students in the United States. (Over 1.7 million records from 2403 charter schools in 15 states and the District of Columbia were analyzed.) Further, the study’s methodology is also unique in its use of “virtual twins.” For each charter school student, a “virtual twin” is found who attends a local traditional public school and matches the charter school student on certain key variables (demographics, proficiency in English, and participation in special education or subsidized lunch programs). This enables researchers to compare charter school students’ learning gains with those of their public school counterparts.

Multiple analyses were conducted on the data yielding many different results. Here are (in my opinion) the four most significant findings:

1) Across all charter schools studied, 46 percent show no significant differences in student math gains than their traditional public school counterparts. Only 17 percent show significant math gains that exceed traditional public schools, and 37 percent actually show significantly lower gains. (In plain English, this means that in 83 percent of charter schools studied, students would have done just as well or better in math if they attended local traditional public schools instead. Or so the study suggests.)

2) Charter school effectiveness varies widely by state. Those that show significantly higher learning gains for charter schools compared to traditional public schools are: Arkansas, Colorado (Denver), Illinois (Chicago), Louisiana and Missouri. Those that show no significant differences in gains are: California, District of Columbia, Georgia, and North Carolina. And those showing significantly lower gains are: Arizona, Florida, Minnesota, New Mexico, Ohio, and Texas.

3) Differences in state charter policies are associated with differences in students’ academic success. States with charter school caps tend to show significantly lower academic growth among charter schools, as do states with multiple charter school authorizers, and those that do not provide an avenue for charter school operators to appeal adverse decisions on applications or renewals.

4) Charter schools have significantly different impacts on students with different backgrounds. Black and Hispanic students show significantly lower learning gains than their virtual public school twins, while students living in poverty and English Language Learners realize significantly higher gains in charter schools. Students in Special Education programs show no significant differences in learning gains compared to their virtual twins.

So what does all this mean? Stay tuned for tomorrow’s post where I’ll delve into an analysis of this study and of its implications.

(Photo: Conspirator’s flickr photostream/ Creative Commons)

Raw Food: Delicious and Healthy

blair@takepart.com — Fri, 17 Jul 2009 01:41:09 +0000

I have embarked on a new adventure. Not bungee jumping or white water rafting. This is a different kind of adventure. One that involves raw fruits, vegetables, nuts and grains paired with fresh herbs and spices. My adventure began because I wanted to be healthy, have more energy and support my local farmers. Plus I thought it would be fun to try a new way of eating.

The raw vegetables I used to eat were mainly salads with lettuce, carrots, cucumbers and tomatoes. I was however eating a decent amount of cooked vegetables in pastas, and cooked grains paired with meat dishes. The thing is, when you cook vegetables and grains you sucks a lot of the nutrients out. What’s the use in eating broccoli or spinach without the good stuff like chlorophyll and vitamin C? Thus began my raw food adventure. (I call it an adventure so I don’t get cynical when I’m craving a juicy filet mignon and french fries).

My two biggest worries when I started were:

I like hot food. It makes me feel warm and fuzzy inside and brings back memories of eating homemade pasta in my grandmother’s kitchen.
Vegetables can be boring, fruits can be sugary and grains don’t have a lot of taste.

I stopped worrying after I discovered unique and delicious raw food recipes in the cookbook, Raw: The Uncook Book: New Vegetarian Food for Life by Juliano Brotman with Erika Lenkert. Juliano includes recipes for raw pizzas, pastas, burritos, stir fry and many more yummy dishes. Granted, they aren’t the dishes made from ingredients you’re used to but that’s part of the fun.

For my first dish from Juliano’s cookbook I made a stir fry without the “fry”. Some of the ingredients include daikon, zucchini, nama shoyu (live soy sauce - I found this at Whole Foods), “sprouted” brown rice (rice that isn’t cooked fully to preserve the nutrients), fresh ginger, zucchini, red peppers, beets, green beans, fresh squeezed orange juice and several other fresh herbs, vegetables and dressings that I normally wouldn’t have put together. What’s great about this recipe and a lot of other raw food dishes is they give the impression of being “hot” by including foods like red peppers, jalapenos, fresh ginger or garlic. The finished product was absolutely delicious and I wasn’t tired and stuffed after dinner. I felt good. What a concept?

If you want to learn more about the benefits of raw food, visit Planet Raw and buy Raw: The Uncook Book: New Vegetarian Food for Life. If you’re not one for preparing meals at home, you go to a raw restaurant near you. Cru in Los Angeles is delicious as is Pure Food and Wine in NYC.

Grinding Out Hunger in Santa Cruz

blair@takepart.com — Fri, 17 Jul 2009 00:16:51 +0000

Santa Cruz Skate Shop owner Danny Keith is on a mission to end hunger in his community by energizing young skaters to give back. Since 2004, Keith’s organization, Grind Out Hunger, has partnered with local schools to educate youth about hunger in their backyard and encourage students to donate food.

Every year, a number of schools take part in a friendly competition to see which student body can collect the most food donations, with the top 3 contenders sharing $1,200 in Santa Cruz Skate Shop gift certificates. Using innovative, student-driven projects, the more than 50 participating schools were able to collect 150,000 pounds of food in 2007–and the organization’s reach continues to grow.

In the vein of other skateboard nonprofits, Grind Out Hunger has partnered with Skateboards.com and Feeding America (formerly Second Harvest) to get food donations to families in need. A recipient of Feeding America’s Generation Next award, Keith hopes the program will serve as a model for food banks around the country to engage local youth, especially those interested in skateboarding. He is currently working on a DVD and media kit that will eventually be distributed nationally, and has designed a Grind Out Hunger skateboard deck (left) with all proceeds going to the rapidly growing organization.

“I enjoy being able to bring the message to the action sports youth in our area,” Keith says. “I feel that if informed kids have the biggest hearts and love a competition.”

Greenpeace Takes Us From Sea to Shelf

blair@takepart.com — Thu, 16 Jul 2009 22:14:48 +0000

This afternoon, a friendly little reminder from Greenpeace about the reality of our fish supply and what it means when you eat and buy fish.

It’s time to change things up! As I learned while watching the amazing film The Cove, fish are connected to a lot of things and working towards more sustainable fishing practices is something we must start to do.

Pass this video on to your fish eating friends and look below for how you can take action with Greenpeace.

MTV Launches EU Concert Tour For Climate Change

blair@takepart.com — Thu, 16 Jul 2009 22:07:03 +0000

MTV will team up with the European Union to launch a concert tour next month aimed at raising awareness about climate change amongst young people. I’m happy to see that MTV is using it’s wide influence to encourage kids to speak up about protecting the planet, and perhaps focusing a little less on reality shows. The tour is part of the EU’s “Play to stop - Europe for climate” campaign and each stop along the tour will be planned around major climate change events in the neighboring cities.

The concerts will feature Moby as one of the headliners, but it’s unclear to me what the carbon footprint of the extravaganza will be. I would hope that the organizers will make a strong effort to reduce the usual obscene amount of waste produced on tours and find a green source of energy to power the shows, otherwise their plans will be in vain. Of course, knowing Moby, I’m sure the events will be pretty green. The tour will travel through eleven countries and will also feature TV spots and webcasts, so even if you can’t make it over to the continent this summer, you can check it out from home.

Photo: joe crawford (artlung)’s flickr photostream (creative commons)

Obama Administration Reverses Bush on Old-Growth Logging

blair@takepart.com — Thu, 16 Jul 2009 21:20:18 +0000

Here we go again with the Obama administration undoing a Bush administration policy. Pretty soon they’re going to run out of these, I just know it. Anyhow, today’s reversal comes to you from the Interior Department, which has reinstated limits on logging of old-growth forests in Oregon. The New York Times reports on Interior Secretary Ken Salazar’s decision:

Veering between swipes at “indefensible” moves by the Bush administration and pledges to step up noncontroversial timber sales, Mr. Salazar said in a conference call with reporters that he was reinstating a compromise reached 15 years ago to limit logging with the goal of protecting watersheds, trout and salmon fisheries and endangered birds like the spotted owl.

Calling the Bush policy one of many “mistakes” and “legal shortcuts,” Salazar reversed the policy that would have doubled the amount of logging allowable in the region under an agreement reached under President Clinton, and “would have allowed timber companies to cut up to 502 million board-feet of lumber annually from 2.6 million acres of forests.”

This is probably not a politically popular move in Oregon, as the logging industry would supply jobs to a state that has over 12 percent unemployment. In the county where the logging would take place, unemployment is almost 17 percent, thanks in large part to the timber industry shedding jobs. So, you can see how there might be some anger from those that live there. But, the administration believes that the policy was ill-conceived and dangerous to wildlife, so they shut it down. As a lawyer with Earthjustice said, “This is a big step for the Obama administration take.”

photo credit: Sam Beebe / Ecotrust’s flickr photostream/Creative Commons

Los Angeles Ranked Worst City For The Homeless

blair@takepart.com — Thu, 16 Jul 2009 20:36:23 +0000

In addition to having one of the countries largest homeless populations, Los Angeles has now been ranked as the worst city to be homeless in a report by the National Law Center on Homelessness & Poverty and the National Coalition for the Homeless. A few months ago I discussed the ongoing debate over how the city is handling such a large and growing homeless population, and this report seems to confirm that Los Angeles criminalized homelessness, rather than finding more appropriate ways to combat the problem. The survey, Homes Not Handcuffs, ranked 273 cities based on the number of laws that target the homeless by making it illegal to sleep, eat or sit in public places, with Los Angeles listed as the “Meanest” of the top ten worst offenders.

As the foreclosure crisis and flailing job market continue to find more people without shelter, these cities need to adopt better methods of helping people get back on their feet, rather than trying to sweep away the challenge with aggresive police tactics. Homelessness is a difficult, multi-faceted problem that will require the earnest cooperation of government and non-profit organizations to develop a system that provides the support people need. The solution will not be found by locking people up for petty crimes or shutting down tent cities. Hopefully Los Angeles and the other “meanest” cities will look to the examples set by other cities working to provide constructive alternatives to criminilization, which are highlighted in the report, including increased funding for transitional and permanent housing, and other outreach programs.

Photo: joshuaandrachel’s flickr photostream (creative commons)

Australian Town Bans Bottled Water

blair@takepart.com — Thu, 16 Jul 2009 19:39:47 +0000

Residents of Bundanoon, a small town southwest of Sydney, Australia, have taken a quiet, but monumental stand against the bottled water industry by voting to stop all sales of bottled water in the town. The amount of energy (and oil) the town will save by eliminating bottled water will be huge, but perhaps more importantly they will ensure that their local aquifers remain in the public trust and are not drained by private interests. Hopefully their efforts will inspire other municipalities to protect their water supply from being shipped off, bottled and sent elsewhere (or resold in their own stores).

The “Bundy on Tap” campaign, as it’s called, didn’t even begin as an environmental movement, but by protecting the vital, and in many places dwindling, resource they will be making a huge difference for the planet. By refocusing our attention and funding to protecting local water supplies, and improving public access, we can drastically cut down on the waste produced by bottling and shipping water, and ensure that clean drinking water is avaliable for future generations. Bundanoon is a shining example of the powerful impact a community can have when they rally together, let’s hope other follow their lead.

Photo: klearchos kapoutsis’ flickr photostream (creative commons)

Celebrate Mandela Day July 18th!

blair@takepart.com — Thu, 16 Jul 2009 19:24:20 +0000

This Saturday July 18, 2009 is Mandela Day, celebrated each year on Nelson Mandela’s birthday (Mandela turns 91 this year). Mandela Day honors Nelson Mandela’s life and is a global call to action for people to recognize their individual power to make an imprint and change the world around them. Organizers are asking people around the world to take some time to make a contribution to the world around them on Saturday and everyday! This year, New York City will be the home of Mandela Day with a huge concert at Madison Square Garden featuring Stevie Wonder, Alicia Keys, Will.i.am, Aretha Franklin, Wyclef Jean, Cyndi Lauper, Josh Groban and more. Check out the video below asking people to volunteer just 67 minutes of their time to help others, a figure correlating to the 67 years Mr. Mandela has spent fighting social injustice:

People are encouraged to visit the Mandela Day site to find volunteer opportunities, pledge a commitment to service and/or upload your video about how you can make an imprint on this world.

The Neda Project

blair@takepart.com — Thu, 16 Jul 2009 18:30:37 +0000

Celeste, a blogger at BUST.com has started the Neda Project in honor of Neda, a woman who was shot in the street as she approached a protest in Iran and to honor all of the Iranians, men and women alike, who are fighting and dying for human rights. The project began when Celeste made made a shirt that reads ” I AM NEDA” she explains “I made the shirt because the only real difference between us is that I can make a shirt like this, and wear it in public, while she gets shot to death in the street just for being young, female and near a protest.” The project is encouraging readers to make a shirt that says “I AM NEDA” and take a picture of yourself wearing it and send it to celeste114@bust.com. The hope is that wearing these shirts will raise awareness about the injustices in Iran. Above is a photo sent in by a soldier in Iraq. Read his letter after the jump.
From the above soldier to BUST
Hope it’s not too late. I am a soldier in the us army. I am currently in Iraq, but was home on leave in the states when this incident occurred. I couldn’t even watch the whole video without cringing at first. It made me weep in the hotel room I was sharing with my girlfriend in dallas. She sent me the link to this article and i wanted to make a shirt right away. unfortunately it’s taken me some time to get it done. I don’t know if it’s too late to be posted, or if you got enough pictures for your purpose, but just in case i wanted to contribute. I know I don’t represent much of the people I serve with, and that saddens me. it’s hard for me to relate to many of these people. but even in the military there are those of us that see what is happening in the world, and we are also appalled. I’m only one country away from Iran, and there’s still so little i can do. for what it’s worth, I hope this helps, somehow.