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eaglehttps://sunlightonthewater.wordpress.com

New Orleans Recovery School District, ACT Outcomes, and Falling Through the Cracks

August 28, 2015 by eagle

This post includes information on Louisiana’s Class of 2015 ACT scoring outcomes and is chiefly focused upon the Recovery School District (RSD) in New Orleans. It is as much a post about who in RSD is taking as it is about who is not.

According to the Louisiana Department of Education (LDOE) district enrollment counts for February 2015, Orleans Parish School Board (OPSB) enrollment is 13,173, and New Orleans RSD enrollment at 30,448.

In July 2015, Jessica Williams of Nola.com published information about the Louisiana’s Class of 2015 district ACT composite scores. In that article, Williams included a search engine for ACT composites related to schools and districts. Specifically, Williams’ search engine allows one to look up some schools/districts to see 1) the number of seniors who took the ACT, 2) the percentage of those seniors who scored at or above 20 on the ACT, and 3) the percentage of…

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I am a mere instrument, the music is his

August 28, 2015 by eagle

Just A Crazy Dreamer

Dancing within and without; there are times, when I do mistake the dance to be mine

With inflated ego, I go round and round; being it all. both the dancer and the dance;

In those moments of seeking and enjoying fame, little do I remember the privilege that comes attached to the “I”;

The privilege of being born with both legs, the privilege of being in a household with enough to eat;

The privilege of having water coming out of the taps when need be; The privileged access to hear quality music;

The privilege of having a choice; the privilege of being able to make one;

Little do I remember; all that went into the making;

The background work that was put in by the invisible side-casts;

The roles that my grand-mother played by sacrificing her choice to put my father’s education first;

The role played by my dad’s sacrificing his choice…

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Why Indiana has charter schools and Kentucky doesn’t

August 28, 2015 by eagle

School Matters

Indiana has one of the most active charter school programs in the nation while Kentucky has no charter schools, not even a law that allows them. How did that come about?

Sociologist Joe Johnston attributes the divergence to perceptions of public schools in the state’s biggest cities: negative for Indianapolis and generally positive for Louisville. And he traces those perceptions back to district boundary decisions made 40 years ago.

“It’s become so common to think of urban schools as failing, as these places that can’t possibly succeed,” he told me. “It’s interesting that, when you change the boundaries and have a different sort of school district, people can rally around that.”

Johnston, an assistant professor at Gonzaga University, conducted research on the history of charter school debates in Indiana and Kentucky as a graduate student at Indiana University, where he received a doctorate in May. He presented his study Saturday…

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Lax Kw’alaams First Nations Band Asserts Right To Lelu Island, Slated For LNG plant

August 27, 2015 by eagle

Warrior Publications

The site of the proposed Pacific Northwest LNG plant, Lelu Island, near Port Edward,
Photograph by: http://www.lonniewishart.com , Vancouver Sun

By The Canadian Press, August 26, 2015

LELU ISLAND, B.C. — Some members of a north coast First Nation are gathering on a small island near Prince Rupert, B.C., to protest plans for a liquefied natural gas project.

Members of the Lax Kw’alaams band are preparing to set up tents and carry out other activities on Lelu Island, which they claim as traditional Tsimshian territory.

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Women of Substance and Heart

August 26, 2015 by eagle

Voices from the Margins

Carol A. Hand

“The woman is the foundation on which nations are built. She is the heart of her nation. If that heart is weak, the people are weak. If her heart is strong and her mind is clear, then the nation is strong and knows its purpose. The woman is the center of everything.” (Late Elder, Art Solomon (Ojibwe), For the People: Teachings on the Natural Way) (Source – Shannon Thunderbird)

Across the past three generations in my family, it has been the women who nurtured the children and ultimately ended up as the primary economic providers. We are women of little importance when viewed from the prevailing paradigm that values material wealth, elite status, or fame – a nurse, a social worker, and a teacher. Yet each in her own ways continued to bring health, respect, kindness, and light into the lives of others.

Photo: Family Photo for my…

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Lawsuit: NSA put surveillance cone over Salt Lake City 2002 Olympics

August 21, 2015 by eagle

How sad is it that we have to go outside the U.S. media to get stories like this…and how sad is it that he could not find any of the so-called civil rights groups to take on this lawsuit?? People, you need to grow a backbone and stand up to the infringement of your Constitutional rights — especially the First, Second, and Fourth Amendments. Because the civil rights groups either are unwilling or incompetent to fight for you. It means every single one of us needs to do what I did in Fort Wayne. Even though you’re scared, you need to stand your ground. I never, ever, ever said it was okay to take away my Constitutional rights after 9/11. Only the chicken littles did that. And they’re the same ones right now who are the sheep.

And, by the way, they were doing this BEFORE 9/11. They just needed “another Pearl Harbor” to destroy your civil rights.

In British Columbia, indigenous group blocks pipeline development

August 21, 2015 by eagle

Warrior Publications

Gate at Unist’ot’en camp, photo: Al Jazeera.

by Michael Toledano, Al Jazeera, August 20, 2015

HOUSTON, British Columbia — In a remote mountain pass connecting the Pacific Coast to the interior of British Columbia, a region brimming with wild berries and populated by grouse and grizzly bears, felled and painted trees have been laid across a logging road to form an enormous message. Directed at air traffic, it reads “No pipelines! No entry!” The warning marks off land where the government of Canada and a First Nations clan hold irreconcilable views of what should happen to a 435-square-mile area each claims as its own.

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Indigenous Protestors tell McCain to get off their lawn… **edited

August 18, 2015 by eagle

…sort of. Heh.

From what I understand, there were heavy metals flowing into the river….and the EPA said it was quite all right to drink it!!

WTH??

And I don’t believe for a second that it was an “accident”. Stay tuned.

**edited: Oh, and this morning, Joe Donnelly was on the local radio speaking about all those nasty, nasty EPA regulations for safe drinking water that get in the way. What a putz.

from a loyal teachers union member – Dear NEA Retired: HOW DARE YOU!

August 18, 2015 by eagle

Reclaim Reform

Today, August 17, I received the new Summer 2015 issue of neaTODAY: for NEA-Retired Members with the following cover article:

NO PLANS TO RETIRE! ~ 87-year-old school counselor’s high-touch, personal approach boosts student success.

NEA President Lily Eskelsen Garcia and the NEA Board continue to take funding, in spite of openly promising otherwise, from Bill Gates and other billionaire funders of Common Core State Standards. They accept that money for an NEA Foundation. Therefore they approve of CCSS which comes with attached high stakes tests. The high stakes tests are used as hire-fire decision makers for teacher evaluations. Value Added Modeling (VAM and the other alphabet soup mix of unproven teacher evaluation models) allows teachers to be fired without just cause before they become too old, too ill or too expensive by reaching retirement age. The cover story lauding a person who has no plans to retire sends a “happy”…