Listen to BlogTalkUSA.com "Eyes Wide Open DemBlogTalk" talk radio program cohost Rheana Nevitt Piegols and special guest cohost for the evening Texas Young Democrat Michael Messer discuss standardized testing in Texas public schools, charter school vouchers and much more... Program recorded live on Tuesday January 24th, at 8:30 PM CST.
Tuesday, January 24, 2017
Standardized Testing Overwhelming Texas Public Schools
A standardized test is a test that is administered and scored in a consistent, or "standard", manner. Standardized - one size fits all - tests are theoretically designed in such a way that the questions, conditions for administering, scoring procedures, and interpretations are consistent and are administered and scored in a predetermined, standard manner.
The chief indicator by which most public schools and educators are judged today is student performance on standardized tests. If a school's standardized test scores are low, the school's teachers and staff are judged to be ineffective.
Standardized test scores are what state legislators who allocate public school funding today rely on to evaluate public school performance levels. Test scores determine not just how much funding public school districts and individual schools within districts get, but which public schools are allowed to stay open and which are closed and then turned over to charter school corporations to operate.
Test scores are also used to hire, fire, and compensate teachers. Today, 35 states require teacher evaluations to include these scores as a factor—and many states have introduced new tests just for this purpose. Test scores are also used to determine whether students can move on to middle and high school, be admitted to Honors and AP programs, and graduate from high school.
Monday, January 23, 2017
Republicans Plot Deep Cuts To Seniors' Social Security Retirement Checks
Republican Rep. Sam Johnson (R Tx.), the chairman of the Ways and Means Social Security subcommittee announced in December his "plan to permanently cut save Social Security."
Johnson's Social Security Reform Act of 2016 (H.R. 6489) includes cuts Republicans have been impatient to enact for decades. Johnson bill violates candidate Donald Trump's firm promise to protect the program. But members of President Trump's new administration are not only on board with the Republican plan to cut Social Security benefit checks, they strongly favor privatizing Social Security.
Johnson has led Republicans on the Social Security subcommittee for a decade, so it’s not surprising that the bill is made up of a lot of ideas they have supported in the past. Johnson's Reform Act proposes 15 changes. Of those, 10 have impacts under 0.10 percent of funding. Many are considered "negligible." The big cuts come in three provisions of Johnson's bill:
Johnson's Social Security Reform Act of 2016 (H.R. 6489) includes cuts Republicans have been impatient to enact for decades. Johnson bill violates candidate Donald Trump's firm promise to protect the program. But members of President Trump's new administration are not only on board with the Republican plan to cut Social Security benefit checks, they strongly favor privatizing Social Security.
Johnson has led Republicans on the Social Security subcommittee for a decade, so it’s not surprising that the bill is made up of a lot of ideas they have supported in the past. Johnson's Reform Act proposes 15 changes. Of those, 10 have impacts under 0.10 percent of funding. Many are considered "negligible." The big cuts come in three provisions of Johnson's bill:
- Raise the retirement age from 67 to 69 for Americans who are currently 49 or younger
- Change the Primary Insurance Amount (PIA) benefit formula that determines the size of a retiree’s initial payments
- Change the method for calculating inflation so the program's cost of living adjustments rise according to chained CPI, a far less generous metric than the current law’s inflation index.
Sunday, January 22, 2017
March Then Act - Building Political Infrastructure To Win
Those who participate in protest marches must take the next steps to define actual demands and priorities for candidates to take to voters in 2018-20. They must work every day to help those candidates win their elections. It can be done. If you don't think it can, just remember the tea party did it during the last President's first mid-term in office.
But without a path from protest to power, the Women's March will end up like Occupy. It is exciting when a protest meme leaps from social networks to the streets, capturing the imagination of millions. But it is all too easy to succumb to the false hope that a big splashy protest march is a transformative tsunami that leads to ballot box victory on election day. A big splashy protest march is only the first step on the long and often difficult road to winning elections.
Democrats have about 90 weeks until early voting starts for the Nov 2018 election. Activists at the county and neighborhood levels must work every week to identify every Dem leaning voting age citizen, documenting their contact and demographic info. As Democratic leaning people are identified, county level organizations must plan and execute programs that build relationships with those people to make them an active part of the Democratic base.
Those programs must be designed to invite that disconnected part of the electorate to participate in regular conversations at house and town hall meetings, and on social media. Democrats must do old fashioned base building work, and learn how to combine Internet and mobile communication with those traditional community organizing activities to accomplish that mission.
But without a path from protest to power, the Women's March will end up like Occupy. It is exciting when a protest meme leaps from social networks to the streets, capturing the imagination of millions. But it is all too easy to succumb to the false hope that a big splashy protest march is a transformative tsunami that leads to ballot box victory on election day. A big splashy protest march is only the first step on the long and often difficult road to winning elections.
- The Guardian: Without A Path From Protest To Power
- The Women's Marches may have been the largest demonstration in US history
Democrats have about 90 weeks until early voting starts for the Nov 2018 election. Activists at the county and neighborhood levels must work every week to identify every Dem leaning voting age citizen, documenting their contact and demographic info. As Democratic leaning people are identified, county level organizations must plan and execute programs that build relationships with those people to make them an active part of the Democratic base.
Those programs must be designed to invite that disconnected part of the electorate to participate in regular conversations at house and town hall meetings, and on social media. Democrats must do old fashioned base building work, and learn how to combine Internet and mobile communication with those traditional community organizing activities to accomplish that mission.
In the realm of political plays, it does seem that the most important number for Democrats in the near term is Democrats need gain only 24 U.S. House seats to be the majority in that chamber.
As the majority party, Democrats can block legislation, conduct investigations, and more to limit the GOP agenda, and perhaps set the stage for bigger gains in 2020. It's do-able in a wave year - maybe a pro-women wave election year.
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