{"id":13540,"date":"2014-06-01T00:03:16","date_gmt":"2014-06-01T08:03:16","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.richgibson.com\/blog\/?p=13540"},"modified":"2014-06-01T00:03:16","modified_gmt":"2014-06-01T08:03:16","slug":"rouge-forum-dispatch-conference-and-the-return-of-the-rouge-forum-news","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.richgibson.com\/blog\/rouge-forum-dispatch-conference-and-the-return-of-the-rouge-forum-news\/","title":{"rendered":"Rouge Forum Dispatch: Conference and the Return of the Rouge Forum News!"},"content":{"rendered":"

We Say Fight Back!<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

You\u2019re Welcome to Join Us for the Rouge Forum Conference and David Barsamian leading the<\/strong><\/p>\n

Adam Renner Education for Social Justice Lecture<\/strong> rougeforumconference.wordpress.com\/rf-2014-program-schedule\/<\/a><\/p>\n

\"renner-adam\"<\/a>
\nRouge Forum 2014 runs from June 5-7 at Metropolitan State University of Denver. Check out the details here. rougeforumconference.wordpress.com\/adam-renner-education-for-social-justice-lecture\/<\/a><\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

Every year the Rouge Forum honors the life and work of Adam Renner (August 18, 1970 \u2013 December 19, 2010) by inviting a critical scholar, educator, or activist to deliver the Adam Renner Education for Social Justice Lecture.<\/p>\n

Adam was a teacher, scholar, musician, revolutionary activist, martial artist, and lover of life. His courage took remarkable forms, from being willing to sacrifice to help others, to always learning, and altering his views, on the path to discover what is true in order to make the world a little better. What could be a more powerful legacy?<\/p>\n

He received his BA in Mathematics from Thomas More College. While teaching mathematics at Seton High School in Cincinnati, OH, he completed his MEd at Northern Kentucky University. In 2002, Adam received his PhD in Cultural Studies at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville and subsequently worked as a professor at Bellarmine University in Louisville, KY.<\/p>\n

His scholarship focused on service learning, social difference, social justice, and pedagogy and he published in numerous journals including Educational Studies, EcoJustice Review, High School Journal, Journal of Curriculum Theorizing, Rethinking Schools and more. (Many of Adam\u2019s publications are available to read here.)<\/p>\n

Along with his life partner, Gina Stiens, he created a service partnership with schools and social service organizations in Jamaica and taught an ongoing course, \u201cEducation for Liberation or Domination: A Critical Encounter in Jamaica.\u201d He was a key leader and organizer in the Rouge Forum serving as Community Coordinator and as editor of the Rouge Forum News.<\/p>\n

In the fall of 2010, Adam left his professorship at Bellarmine University and returned to the school classroom, as a math teacher at June Jordan School for Social Equity in San Francisco.<\/p>\n

Restored to Life! \u00a0<\/strong>The Rouge Forum News (Editor’s note:
\nThe Rouge Forum News began as a zine in 1999, morphed into a PDF and is now the purveyor of curated online content. The Rouge Forum is an organization of educational activists that focuses on issues of equality, democracy, and social justice. We hold annual conferences that bring together students, teachers, professors, and activists who are striving to overcome racism, national chauvinism and sexism in an increasingly authoritarian and undemocratic society. Join us!<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

Insightful and inciting news and comment, since 1999<\/em> \u00a0http:\/\/paper.li\/RougeForum\/1401566358?subscription_id=184b6170-e947-11e3-9a21-002590d6792d<\/strong><\/p>\n

Rouge Keynoter Paul Street: Those who have put out the others’ eyes \u00a0<\/strong>\u201cU.S. policy\u2026has nothing to do with democracy, sovereignty, or human rights. It\u2019s about money and power. Who are the big players going to be in the world\u2019s biggest growth center, that\u2019s all that matters\u2026. Washington does not want a peaceful solution. Washington wants a confrontation. Washington wants to draw Moscow into a long-term conflict in Ukraine that will recreate Afghanistan in the 1990s. That\u2019s the goal, to lure Putin into a military quagmire that will discredit him in the eyes of the world, isolate Russia from its allies, put strains on new alliances, undermine the Russian economy, pit Russian troops against U.S.-backed armed mercenaries and Special Ops, destroy Russian relations with business partners in the EU, and create a justification for NATO intervention followed by the deployment of nuclear weapons on Ukrainian territory\u201d (Mike Whitney, \u201cIs Putin Being Lured into a Trap?\u201d Counterpunch, April 15, 2014). \u00a0http:\/\/zcomm.org\/zmagazine\/those-who-have-put-out-the-peoples-eyes\/<\/p>\n

Congratulations on the publication of<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

\"Dave<\/a>www.amazon.co.uk\/Immiseration-Capitalism-Education-Austerity-Resistance\/dp\/0952204231<\/a><\/p>\n

The Little Red Schoolhouse<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

\"capitalist<\/a>AFT and NEA Bosses Helped Create, and still love, the Common Corpse <\/strong>But teachers unions say that those who are calling for a full rejection of the Common Core are exploiting the broader discontent about the rollout of the standards and new tests.\u201cThe Tea Party is using the frustration with the implementation as the guise to eliminate standards in schools and to destabilize public education,\u201d said Randi Weingarten, president of the American Federation of Teachers, the country\u2019s second-largest teachers union. Its executive council \u00a0recently passed a resolution supporting \u201cthe promise and potential of the Common Core State Standards.\u201d\u00a0http:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2014\/05\/30\/education\/common-core-standards-face-a-new-wave-of-opposition.html?partner=rss&emc=rss<\/p>\n

Newark Can’t learn that doing school reform without social and economic reform won’t work: Schooled (New Yorker)\u00a0<\/strong>The goal was not just to fix the Newark schools but to create a national model for how to turn around an entire school district. \u00a0The abysmal performance of schools in the poorest communities has been an escalating national concern for thirty years, with universities, governments, and businesses devoting enormous resources to the problem. In the past decade, a reform movement financed by some of the nation\u2019s wealthiest philanthropists has put forward entrepreneurial approaches: charter schools, business-style accountability for teachers and principals, and merit bonuses for top performers. President Obama and Secretary of Education Arne Duncan created Race to the Top, a $4.3-billion initiative to induce states to approve more charter schools and to rate teachers based on student performance….lmost four years later, Newark has fifty new principals, four new public high schools, a new teachers\u2019 contract that ties pay to performance, and an agreement by most charter schools to serve their share of the neediest students. But residents only recently learned that the overhaul would require thousands of students to move to other schools, and a thousand teachers and more than eight hundred support staff to be laid off within three\u00a0http:\/\/www.newyorker.com\/reporting\/2014\/05\/19\/140519fa_fact_russakoff?currentPage=all<\/p>\n

More DC Principals Quit–and more to come \u00a0<\/strong>The list is sure to grow in coming weeks, with some principals announcing voluntary departures and the school system firing others via letters of \u201cnon-reappointment.\u201d Principals work on one-year contracts, and administrators can choose not to renew them without giving a reason.About 20 percent of schools had to replace their principals last year, a somewhat lower percentage than in the previous two years but still much higher than in neighboring suburban school systems. Parents and activists have long said the level of turnover leads to instability and stagnation in too many city schools….Morale among principals suffered this year when more than half were rated less than effective on new evaluations that gave significant weight to students\u2019 standardized test scores. DCPS officials acknowledged that they should have done a better job explaining how the evaluations would work. They have since tweaked them and say they plan to look at further changes in the future.www.washingtonpost.com\/local\/education\/dcps-is-losing-at-least-eight-veteran-principals\/2014\/05\/22\/ab2eef8e-e1b3-11e3-9743-bb9b59cde7b9_story.html<\/a><\/p>\n

The college presidents were appalled. Not only had President Obama called for a government rating system for their schools, but now one of his top education officials was actually suggesting it would be as easy as evaluating a kitchen appliance. <\/strong>\u201cIt\u2019s like rating a blender,\u201d …<\/strong>\u201cApplying a sledgehammer to the whole system isn\u2019t going to work,\u201d said Robert G. Templin Jr., the president of Northern Virginia Community College. \u201cThey think their vision of higher education is the only one.\u201d Many college leaders accuse the president of grasping for a simplistic solution to what they call a crisis of soaring tuition.<\/p>\n

The rating system, which the president called for in a speech last year and is under development, would compare schools on factors like how many of their students graduate, how much debt their students accumulate and how much money their students earn after graduating. \u00a0\u00a0http:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2014\/05\/26\/us\/colleges-rattled-as-obama-presses-rating-system.html?hpw&rref=education<\/p>\n

\"Capitalist<\/a>472 Teachers take San Diego Buyout as District hunts for cheaper and more-stupid, workers \u00a0<\/strong>The wave of retirements will do more than save money. It will trigger the first teacher recruitment effort to fall under new diversity goals to staff classrooms with educators who better reflect changing demographics of students; begin to \u201cright-size\u201d the teaching force in a district that is losing enrollment; and ease the transition to new Common Core academic standards, as less-experienced educators are still developing their formative professional practices. \u00a0http:\/\/www.utsandiego.com\/news\/2014\/may\/24\/tp-472-take-district-incentive-to-retire\/<\/p>\n

Dallas Goes Pay For Performance (unlike Banksters, GM and Chrysler bosses, etc \u00a0<\/strong>Under the new system, teachers will be paid based on points received in their two most recent evaluations, except in the roll-out year when only first-year ratings will be used. Their pay would not drop below their 2014-15 salary. Classroom performance will make up 50 percent of the evaluation for most teachers. Student test scores will account for 35 percent, and student surveys will make up 15 percent.<\/p>\n

Ratings range from \u201cunsatisfactory,\u201d with a $45,000 salary, to \u201cmaster\u201d at $90,000. Teachers new to the profession will come in at the \u201cnovice\u201d level and be paid $47,000; those with experience could come in at higher levels. Teachers currently making below $47,000 will be brought up to the \u201cnovice\u201d level. The district has said that 28.5 percent of its 10,000 teachers make under $47,000.<\/p>\n

Before teachers reach the \u201cproficient II\u201d level ($59,000), they would have to go through a \u201cdistinguished teacher\u201d review. The top level, \u201cmaster,\u201d requires two years at the \u201cexemplary II\u201d level and at least four years as a \u201cdistinguished teacher\u201d in a low-rated school. \u00a0http:\/\/www.dallasnews.com\/news\/education\/headlines\/20140523-new-dallas-isd-teacher-pay-for-performance-plan-is-key-part-of-district-reform-effort.ece<\/p>\n

The International Hot War of the Rich on the Poor<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n