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Black educational issues have transnational twins as does whiteness in education. Its a Global issue.

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small clip about 'whiteness' within education

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We talk a lot about cultural aptitude, whiteness and anti Blackness in Higher Ed and Teacher Education, but what about the lower grades?

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30 Issues | Facing Whiteness in Our Schools

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Several New York City private schools have attempted to address issues of race, class, and privilege as part of their students' education.

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Anti-bellum Africans sought to emancipate themselves through literacy using the scriptures as an illegal hermeneutic model to understand their conditions, interrogate their environment and psychoanalyze their slavers; a form of pre-critical race theory so to speak.

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When my students are uncomfortable with the content we are discussing in class , generally regarding inequity through racial marginalization and standards as whiteness, they use their privilege to silence me by redirecting their discomfort to generalizations about the quality of my teaching style or the organisation of the content or they just lie. They complain to the powers that be, I am ultimately silenced and the curriculum is adjusted. I get no white tears, they show me who's boss with great White pride. The amazing part is - This is their Urban Cohort. These students see Blackness as something they can help. Something that needs to be overcome.

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This is image for an add for an article titled "5 Actions White Educators Can Take to Help Make Schools Anti-Racist" - Everyday Feminism
There too many problems with this image and its messaging related to the issue to cover so I will just only name a few. 1. is the connection to Feminism and anti racism; not only is there no representation of a Black female child, but its Feminist Heroin representation is white. 2. The issue of anti Blackness is communal and stems from the 300 years of separation of families and the 300 years of the illegality of marriage in "Standard" anti-bellum American slave life. Still, issues of Black Boys and Black Girls are not only separated, pluralized and polarized, they are set in competition of each other. So where you see one Black male you do not see a Black female represented as his counterpart. And usually if you do, they are on opposite sides of a white heroin.

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HAAA! that last one is HILARIOUS!

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Standard influences of non Websterian dialect but American? much "standard" English pronunciation was influenced by "Slave English".  Privilege takes and codify's and keeps what it wants from the margins.

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The power of code switching

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DYSA African American English (or Ebonics) in the classroom

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Check out Websters definition of standard look at # 3-5

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a conspicuous object (such as a banner) formerly carried at the top of a pole and used to mark a rallying point especially in battle or to serve as an emblem; a long narrow tapering flag that is personal to an individual or corporation and bears heraldic devices...

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I've come in contact with this text many times over the past 5 years. Reading it--especially the representative, but not exhaustive, list of 50 privileges--helps me check my privilege.

"I have come to see white privilege as an invisible package of
unearned assets that I can count on cashing in each day, but about which I was "meant" tovremain oblivious. White privilege is like an invisible weightless knapsack of special
provisions, maps, passports, codebooks, visas, clothes, tools , and blank checks. "

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Today I filled in for a colleague who "teaches" an after-school skills program called FOCUS. At our school, students are "invited" to go to FOCUS after school if they are perceived to need help with skills in reading or math (these students also receive intervention during at least 3 other parts of the day). On top of the derogatory name for the program (which I think presumes that these "deficits" are a result of lack of focus),  the "curriculum" is a thick test prep workbook that they work through. FOR AN HOUR. AFTER A FULL DAY OF SCHOOL. FOUR DAYS A WEEK.

Naturally, the students I worked with today were NOT INTERESTED. I absolutely could not blame them. I had no prep, just the instructions about which story and questions we were supposed to get through. I did my best to humor them, but I was so ashamed at how we were masking the real injustices.

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I imagine that in some cases, strict adherence to pacing guides in a scripted curriculum results in the use of this pacing guide as an authority to oppress.........students may be really excited about a topic, so excited that they are taking longer than the guide says they should....the teacher responds "Guys, we have to stop because we have to do the other lesson tomorrow." As if the teacher is not in control, but this piece of paper (and what it represents) is. That sounds so helpless!

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I thought this was an excellent visual!

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Managing #Privilege. Very thought-provoking. Some things I'd not previously recognized. Most of it I've never been able to put into words, either for myself or others.

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A picture is worth a thousand words...

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The Men's Rights movement in a nutshell. I've already pinned this but I love it.

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This is an interesting spotlight on how even our "normal" is different from others around us. I know I often pause at how well-meaning friends and family presume things should be easy for me and don't realize how having special needs in my house impacts every decision I make.

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“Check Your Privilege” is an online expression used mainly by social justice bloggers to remind others that the body and life they are born into comes with spec

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'Nuf said!

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This Teacher Taught His Class A Powerful Lesson About Privilege

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More to navigate and negotiate... Like the measuring systems and monetary systems, I think it is expedient to have a standardized language. Our country is geographically larger than most of the world's political jurisdictions, so that means we encompass more cultural and regional differences. Having a uniform language is not only pragmatic but economically conducive. Nevertheless, this article mentions some insensitivity that should be addressed. Our reading last week in EDP565 talked about code-switching for academics as well as accommodating the different language accents and dialects as meaningful. Again, the privilege must be identified and used with discernment.

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You know, the one where a bunch of bilingual Americans sang the hymn in their native languages, including English, Spanish, Hebrew, Wolof, French, Tagalog, and Keres?

Remember how everybody loved it?

I don't either.

While many applauded the commercial's message of inclusivity and acceptance, social media and conservative news outlets decried the multilingual rendition as ugly, insulting and contrary to the nation's values.

The most common critique: "This is America, and in America, you speak English."

Such a sentiment clearly privileges English speakers. But we should take an even closer look because not all English speakers are privileged equitably in the United States.

Expressing racist, classist, ableist and sexist prejudices, many people maintain negative presumptions against those who speak English with "un-American" accents, or with "urban" or "rural" accents. Many criticize or make fun of speech differences, , the so-called "gay lisp," and so on.

In other words, it's not that all English is privileged. Instead, the USA tends to idealize Standard American English (SAE). SAE is essentially the neutral "non-accent" mostly associateded with the suburban Midwest.

Such SAE privilege - and conversely, the discrimination against non-English languages and non-SAE accents - manifests in many ways, though not for all of the reasons you might think.

Below are privileges that those who speak SAE have and a breakdown how SAE privilege harms non-SAE speakers.

1. You're Assumed to be American

Let's just get this out of the way: The USA has no official language! There is no federal law that states that citizens must speak English.

However, as evidenced by the negative backlash to the "America the Beautiful" commercial, many insist that to be American is to speak English.

This, of course, is a bizarre - not to mention oppressive - assertion because English doesn't even come from the USA. It comes from England!

Prior to imperial English colonization, there were hundreds of indigenous languages in what became the United States. And many are still spoken.

And, following the US Invasion of Mexico in the mid-19 century, the USA annexed one third of Mexico's territory. The Treaty of Guadalupe effectively converted the territory of millions of speakers of Spanish and various indigenous languages into American soil with the stroke of a pen.

There are over 300 languages that are spoken as a first language in the United States. And more than 60 million people in the USA speak a language other than English in the home.

Nonetheless, often only those who speak English (with American accents) are assumed to be American.

Consequently, those Americans who speak other languages are frequently told to "go back home." They are often excluded from the spaces, institutions, and rights to which they are entitled.

2. Your Language Affords You Easy Access to Information

Go to the doctor's office. Go to a school. Go to a restaurant. Go to a realtor. Go to a courthouse. Go on the Internet. In how many of those settings is English the only available spoken or written language?

How are non-English speakers supposed to navigate these spaces? How are they to gain equivalent access to education, healthcare and criminal justice?

Of course, legally, translation services are available in certain contexts - in public schools, hospitals, courthouses, police stations, and so on.

However, not everyone is aware that such services are available, or that when absent, they can legally request them.

Further, as a former courtroom Spanish-English interpreter, translation is an imperfect enterprise . Some words and phrases don't translate that well. And many English speakers view the interpreter as burdensome and annoying.

I remember many interactions, for example, when the presiding judge refused to slow down when speaking so that I could adequately interpret what they were saying.

In other occasions, lawyers demanded that I speak so quietly that my client could barely hear me.

And the barriers to access don't end there.

Most classrooms are English only. Schools are required to provide English as a Secondary Language (ESL) services, and some - the vast minority - offer bilingual or dual language classes.

Nevertheless, non-English speaking students often struggle academically and socially when placed in schools that demand English proficiency from the get go. Further, most standardized tests are available in English and only a limited number of other languages.

3. You're Assumed to Be Intelligent, Educated, and Non-Violent

No language or accent is inherently superior to another!

Nevertheless, expressive of pervasive classism and racism, in the USA certain accents and languages are associated with intelligence whereas others are associated with violence.

I've noticed this based on my own multilingualism.

When speaking in English, people's body language towards me is usually more welcoming. They smile more. They stand a little closer. They make few negative presumptions about my profession.

However, after talking to someone in Spanish, I sometimes notice a change in how nearby non-Spanish speakers orient themselves towards me. Sometimes their smiles disappear, and they take a step back. Or sometimes they ask certain classist and racist questions about my job or my "immigration status."

The same could be said of other languages and non-SAE accents, particularly of African American Vernacular English (AAVE), for which there remain incredibly problematic and negative prejudices concerning its speakers' supposed lack of education or gang affiliation.

This reflects a huge double standard, though:

Anglo native-English speakers who learn a second language are applauded for their intelligence and hard work. They're told how many professional doors are going to open as a result of their bilingualism.

The same isn't true for non-Anglo, non-native-English speakers who learn English as a second language. Rather than celebrating their intellect and perseverance, this kind of bilingualism is regularly treated as expected, and even the most minor mispronunciations and grammatical errors are criticized.

4. Your Accent Is Positively Represented on TV and in Film

On screen, how often does a CEO, a politician, a principal, a professor, a lawyer - any profession that we aggrandize in the USA - have a Spanish accent? an AAVE accent? a rural accent? an Arabic accent? a "Valley Girl" accent? a lisp?

Not too often.

Most "elite" characters have supposedly "safe" and "intelligent"-sounding SAE accents.

And when it comes to non-SAE accents?

Those roles go to some of our most harmful tropes: the dangerous undocumented immigrant; the undereducated, supposedly violent gang member; the unkempt "hillbilly" or "redneck"; the Islamic terrorist; the "ditsy" blond; the simpleton; or the overly feminine gay man.

Because non-SAE accents are narrowly and negatively portrayed in popular media, we are taught to think ill of the speakers of those accents.

5. Your Accent Is Not Satirized or Exaggerated

I've overheard many folks non-SAE languages and accents.

An acquaintance of mine pretended to mimic a coworker of Asian descent, saying, "Ching, chong. Ching, chong."

On TV or just outside walking my dog, I've overheard groups of predominantly white people making fun of African American Vernacular English, appropriating phrases and pronunciations affiliated with urban Black culture.

Upon telling someone that my mother is an American Sign Language interpreter, they respond, "Oh, I know sign language!" and crudely sign the word "bullshit."

When checking out at the grocery store, I've heard customers pretend to speak Spanish with the cashier with the Latinx last name by adding "o" to the end of each word.
Wrong. Because "mock languages" are insulting, a type of covert racism that vulgarizes non-privileged languages and accents.
Mock languages also reveal a glaring double standard: While non-SAE speakers are expected to perfect their mastery of English grammar and pronunciation, the same is not expected of native English speakers learning, say, Spanish.

6. Your Accent Is Not Treated As 'Exotic'

Hey, American English speakers, how many times have you gone out in the USA and been asked to "say something in American?"

Never happened, right?

Well, I remember a few years back when I was invited to a party. One of the other attendees was originally from Nairobi, Kenya. When some of the others learned this, they excitedly circled in and said, "Oh, say something in Kenyan."

Clearly this partygoer was uncomfortable and reluctant to respond. But, ignoring her embarrassment, the group insisted. Finally, she sighed and, in Swahili, asked, "What do you want me to say?"
The group awed and laughed, commenting upon how "different" the language sounded.
And then they posed more ignorant and prejudicial questions: "How do you say 'giraffe' in Kenyan?" "How do you say 'baboon?'" One also claimed to know the answer to these questions by citing The Lion King.

7. You're Not 'Misheard' or Purposefully Ignored Because of Your Accent

There was a meme going around a while back. It was Will Smith as Captain Hiller in Independence Day. In the film, just after knocking out the crash-landed alien, Smith very clearly says, "Welcome to Earth."

The meme, however, transcribed the line differently:

Many assumed that Smith had pronounced the "th" sound as an "eff," as is more common of AAVE accents.

Now, if he had said "earf," that clearly would've been fine. Certain accents are not inherently better or worse than others.

However, when perceiving a non-SAE accent, many of us direct negative associations toward the speaker.

We also often stop listening, suggesting that it is the speaker's responsibility to improve their accent and cater to our auditory prejudice and laziness.

Want more proof?

Years back, there was an experiment that compared comprehension and bias related to language.

Two groups of students took an exam, listened to a tape-recorded lecture and then took another exam. Investigators told Group A that the recording was an American, native-English speaking lecturer and told Group B that the recording was an Asian, non-native-English speaking lecturer.

But, they played the exact same recording - of a native English speaker - for both groups!

Comparing the scores and comments following the second exam, Group A scored significantly higher and responded more positively to the recording. Group B, however, scored lower and complained that they couldn't understand the lecturer, that the lecturer needed to learn English and so on.

8. You're Not Forced to Codeswitch

Ever notice how every national news broadcaster speaks the same?

No? Watch any episode of ESPN News and pay attention to when they turn the analysis over to the three sports - soccer, hockey and NASCAR - that ESPN has deemed more "regional?" Do you notice the switch to a Spanish, Canadian, or southern accent?

Unless purposefully trying to sound "folksy," though - and it's only folksy from an outsider's perspective - most broadcasters train in SAE because (as described above) we are taught that speakers of this accent are safe and intelligent.

Of course, very few of us are national broadcast journalists.

But that doesn't matter because the same privilege applies everywhere.

Because most people perceive my SAE accent as intelligent and non-violent, for instance, I'm not forced to change the way that I speak when at work, in the classroom, in court, and so on.

The same, though, does not apply to non-SAE speakers.

Now, I know what some of you might be thinking: "That's not privilege. Everyone has to speak professionally when in the workplace."

Well, let's interrogate this. What does it mean to "speak professionally?"

Sure, it means that - unless I'm the boss, at least - I probably can't swear while at work.

But it also means that a specific accent and specific phrases are expected, whereas other accents and phrases are deemed unacceptable.

This is not the same thing as saying that there can be no slang in the workplace, for example. Because certain informal sayings are definitely common in, say, an office.

"Make hay" means being productive in the short term. Getting your "ducks in a row" means being prepared and organized. To "boil the ocean" means wasting time. As most of these phrases - and there are many more - are associated with SAE, they privilege SAE speakers and those who can access SAE pronunciation and lingo.

Further, some common business jargon is just flat out racist (for instance, "Open the kimono" means to reveal information).

Those with non-SAE accents are forced to speak differently, otherwise they risk being labeled such racist, classist and sexist terms as "urban," "country," "girly," and so on.

Subsequently, such perceptions negatively affect professional and academic advancement, criminal guilt and so on.

Speakers of Standard American English are formally and informally rewarded for their accents.

Alternatively, speakers of non-SAE accents and languages are often met with distain, negative perceptions and exclusion.

And, no, demanding that someone "just learn English" isn't the solution.

Because this sentiment is an expression of SAE privilege, which itself is an extension of a system that privileges middle class, heterosexual, able-bodied, cis-gender, white men over everyone else.

Rather than insisting that non-SAE speakers change, therefore, we must stop perceiving non-SAE accents (and their speakers) in the negative.

We must celebrate linguistic diversity because such diversity highlights the vast diversity of experiences, knowledge and abilities that exist in the United States and everywhere else!
Andrew Hernández is a Contributing Writer for Everyday Feminism. He is a public anthropologist and teacher and is completing his PhD in cultural anthropology at the Graduate Center, City University of New York, and he adjuncts at John Jay College of Criminal Justice (CUNY) and Baruch College (CUNY). You can follow him on Twitter @AndrewHernann or at his website www.AndrewHernann.com.

Filed Under: Tagged With: Articles, Race & Ethnicity Posts

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8 Harmful Examples of Standard American English Privilege - Everyday Feminism

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You know, the one where a bunch of bilingual Americans sang the hymn in their native languages, including English, Spanish, Hebrew, Wolof, French, Tagalog, and Keres? Remember how everybody loved it? I don't either. While many applauded the commercial's message of inclusivity and acceptance, social media and conservative news outlets decried the multilingual rendition as ugly, insulting and contrary to the nation's values.

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As I was thinking about the human potential for good or evil that rests with us all and how we need to share culturally relevant material with our students, I thought of this book. It is a great segue into historical indictments of inhumanity.  Are we missing these gems with the CCS emphasis?

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We cannot turn away from what. Is too painful. If it hurts you to see, stand up and do whatever I can to stop it from happening!

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the best against injustice quotes | Fight Against Injustice Quotes | Quote Addicts

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"BLACK EXCELLENCE"  I really appreciated this article. It balanced the equilibrium in my self-searching. I would love to sit down with this wonderful lady and discuss the next step for all of us. For me, I have trouble singling out a "white-privilege" or a "male-privilege." I think we need to drop the leading tag and just say PRIVILEGE. I personally don't believe there are many races...just one...the human race. We all were born from the original pair. But there is dominance, and there is oppression. We could explore the historic cruelty of the Aztecs, Mayans or Incas, or the harsh rampages of the earliest Arab nations. We could argue about the blood thirst of the Vikings or the Mongols. We could contemplate the motives of the native North American peoples or African tribes that turned on each other to gain possession of land or resources. I recently saw a documentary about early Asian and Australian people groups that were completely annihilated (whole people groups!) by what they think were new dominate cultures that moved into their areas. And we all know the current history on European colonization. But we haven't learned from our human history.  Whether we are talking about national suppression, regional injustice or domestic violence, it comes down to power. The skin color and the traditions don't guarantee a peaceful world. Those that have the power have the privilege. Those that have the privilege have a choice to live responsibly and charitably or oppressively and carelessly. When you remove one dominant force, you leave a vacuum for another to assume power...and privilege. As Lord Acton said, "absolute power corrupts absolutely."  This dominance factor is a human condition and a character flaw. If we could sit down and have a real conversation about the injustices and the abuses that we all identify with, we would be able to draw on our individual and collective strengths. We need each other.

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This country is in serious trouble in regards to its race relations and depending on your political ideology, we seem to place blame with either Donald Trump or Barack Obama as being the cause of this discord. However, these issues have been with us long before the elections of 2016 or 2008. In fact, race relations have been an issue of contention since the inception of the country. I can't help but feel that right now however we are in a particularly negative time which is only being made worse by rhetoric on both sides of the political spectrum.

During a time when actual White Supremacists feel emboldened to march around an American city, we should be joining together to fight this evil, but instead our national conversation has become an argument of two extremes where some people on the left claim everyone is a white supremacist and some on the right refuse to acknowledge that anyone is a white supremacist.

Both sides feel wholly justified in their anger, frustration and vitriol but this politicization of race is doing exponentially more harm than good. I think I will scream if I hear anything else about black on black crime, reverse racism or white privilege. Not because I don't think they are important and necessary conversations worth having, but because each side is throwing around these labels as a way of shutting down perceived opponents in a proverbial drop the mike moment. Not only is the intent not to find common ground, unity or equality, it is meant to further separate and divide an already fractured populous.

Of course, racism still exists, and there are challenges that African-Americans face in this country that are purely based on our race. The unfortunate truth is that we do have to work twice as hard to get half as far. There are obstacles that I have to face as an African-American woman that are significantly different than my white counterparts, but does screaming white privilege at every person who you have some type of disagreement with really solve any injustice or in any way fight inequality and prejudice? I'm a lifelong Democrat who voted for Hillary Clinton, but I am tired of seeing my community suffer and not move forward. Whether someone uses politically correct language or not is irrelevant if they also don't work to address our issues.

My objection to how the term "white privilege" is being used is that it is not intended to try and educate white people about real injustices that we have historically faced and continue to face currently, but instead it is intended to shame them for their whiteness which is problematic. The problem isn't whiteness. The problem is racism and racists. People can't help being born white any more than I can help being born black. Judging people based upon their race and assuming negative characteristics because of a person's race is racism, regardless of who is doing the judging. I know there are people who don't believe that black people can be racist and granted, we are not part of a history of racial oppression, but can't we be honest that sometimes the white guy you disagree with on social media or in class isn't a player in the oppression of black Americans, but is just someone who you disagree with?

The term "white privilege" has become a weapon used by too many of us on the Left to shut down those who disagree with us. If you haven't noticed, it is also causing fear even among some of our allies that they are going to do or say the wrong thing which will cause them to be labeled a racist as well. We have made racial perfection the litmus test, and the result is those of good will are seen as the enemy. I know that many blacks in this country are just expressing their fear, anger and trauma related to how we have been treated, but it sometimes comes across as anti-white instead of pro-equality. This is making our movement less credible. If we truly want to see the death of racism as we say we do, we will need the help of the majority of Americans to be invested in solving this issue.

The weaponization of the term has caused us to not be able to have honest conversations about race. We spend so much time policing what people can say about race in this country that we never get to what people really believe and why they believe it. We do not allow a safe space for people who have genuine curiosity and interest in our community and culture to ask questions or take part in our trends because we rise up in anger screaming about cultural appropriation. We get angrier about a Kardashian wearing braids or SheaMoisture using white models in their ads than we do about the fact that too many black and brown children are in failing schools and living in communities that are lacking vital resources that they need to become their best selves.

While we are on the subject, can we be honest that we are not completely consistent in how we react to racially questionable behavior? We're more likely to go full bore into white people that seem to be aligned with Republicans and Conservatives, while giving most White Liberals a pass. Liberalism has become an ideology that blames racism only on White Conservative Republicans while allowing White Liberals to employ the same arguments of privilege when challenged about their commitment to actual equal opportunity.

If you disagree with me about my characterization of Liberalism, then show me where blacks who live in liberal cities live in more integrated neighborhoods, have better educational attainment, lower rates of incarceration, higher net worth or access to better schools than blacks who live in conservative run cities? The political arguments around race are a red herring that haven't led to improvements in our communities that can be attributed to either party.

I'm just unwilling to give my side of the aisle a pass anymore on how we talk about race. All the sympathetic social media posts and Hate Has No Home Here signs don't fix the issues related to racism. People who apologize for their "white privilege or being born white" without any corresponding behavior change are just virtue signaling. The problem isn't just hate, but apathy and silence from too many Americans regardless of their political affiliation. We can't change what we don't acknowledge. Our party speaks of tearing down statues, but are silent about tearing down the educational, institutional and cultural barriers that continue to keep too many in Black America trapped in a cycle of poverty unable to care for themselves in the same way you are able to care for your family. The news media and Hollywood speak about the racism of Donald Trump and his supporters while ignoring the decades of negative portrayals of African-Americans that they themselves promoted which have fed the narrative of us being lazy, uneducated and violent to those very same people.

My last objection to the "white privilege" conversation is that it teaches the message to our young people that we need white people to give up something for black people to achieve. That if we work hard and make good life decisions it still won't matter because we are black. I wholeheartedly disagree with this characterization which is incredibly patronizing and harmful. My grandmother used to tell me that I wouldn't always get what I deserved, but I would get what I earned. She told me that life wasn't fair and she acknowledged that it would be more difficult as a poor black girl in America. She also told me that if I worked hard and got a good education that I could have a life that was beyond my imagination. She told me this after I got off the bus at age ten after having lived on the streets with my mother and younger brother for several months. I am now a lawyer in Philadelphia. There are millions of kids in the community who are smart, talented and gifted, but instead of focusing on improving their lives and nurturing them to exceed expectations and achieve, we spend too much time worrying about every real or imagined slight made against us by white Americans.

I genuinely believe that we are a country that is full of well-meaning people who attempt to treat everyone with respect, but the bulk of the challenge is that we do not genuinely understand each other. We have much work to do on race to break down those barriers. However, that work is not being done when we merely spew racial rhetoric against each other. So while everyone else is focusing on talking about "white privilege", I will be focusing on helping the young people I know to achieve "black excellence".

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Why This Black Woman is Done Talking about White Privilege

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This country is in serious trouble in regards to its race relations and depending on your political ideology, we seem to place blame with either Donald Trump or Barack Obama as being the cause of this discord. However, these issues have been with us long before the elections of 2016 or 2008.

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If we can allow our teachers and school administrators to teach creatively and practically, I think we would have more opportunity to find those organic moments to make connections for real life understanding and responsiveness that our reading talked about.

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California Gov. Jerry Brown wrote a tough indictment of data-based school reform in a message he wrote vetoing a bill that would have changed the state's accountability system for public schools.

The legislation, SB547, would have reduced reliance on standardized test scores to evaluate students and schools, but Brown called the legislation "yet another siren song of school reform" and would do nothing to improve the quality of schools.

"SB547 nowhere mentions good character or love of learning," said the veto message by Brown, who has gone further than any other governor in blasting modern test-based school reform. "It does allude to student excitement and creativity, but does not take these qualities seriously because they can't be placed in a data stream. Lost in the bill's turgid mandates is any recognition that quality is fundamentally different from quantity."

The current California accountability system is based mostly on standardized math and English language arts test scores. The general consensus in the state is that singular focus on test scores had forced schools to narrow their curriculum and that broader measures of quality were needed.

The legislation, similar to laws already passed in other states, would have let standardized test scores account for no more than 40 percent of an evaluation in high school and no less than 40 percent in K-8. Other measures of quality would have been added, including dropout rates and graduation rates.

While the legislation would have made standardized test scores less important than they had been under California's current Academic Performance Index, the replacement system, called the Education Quality Index, still relied too heavily on data that Brown said in his veto message was not acceptable.

Brown's veto leaves in place the more restrictive test-based accountability system, but the governor apparently believes that that is better that pretending a new system based on data is much of an improvement and that now is the time to look at real alternatives.

Here's his letter:

To the members of the California State Senate:

I am returning Senate Bill 547 without my signature.

This bill is yet another siren song for school reform. It renames the Academic Performance Index (API) and reduces its significance by adding three other quantitative measures.

While I applaud the author's desire to improve the API, I don't believe that this bill would make the state's accountability regime either more probing or more fair.

This bill requires a new collection of indices called the "Education Quality Index" (EQI), consisting of "multiple indicators,"many of which are ill-defined and some impossible to design. These "multiple indicators" are to change over time, causing measurement instability and muddling the picture of how schools perform.

SB547 would also add significant costs and confusion to the implementation of the newly-adopted Common Core standards which must be in place by 2014. This bill would require us to introduce a whole new system of accountability at the same time we are required to carry out extensive revisions to school curriculum, teaching materials and tests. That doesn't make sense.

Finally, while SB547 attempts to improve the API, it relies on the same quantitative and standardized paradigm at the heart of the current system. The criticism of the API is that it has led schools to focus too narrowly on tested subjects and ignore other subjects and matters that are vital to a well-rounded education. SB547 certainly would add more things to measure, but it is doubtful that it would actually improve our schools. Adding more speedometers to a broken car won't turn it into a high-performance machine.

Over the last 50 years, academic "experts" have subjected California to unceasing pedagogical change and experimentation. The current fashion is to collect endless quantitative data to populate ever-changing indicators of performance to distinguish the educational "good" from the education "bad." Instead of recognizing that perhaps we have reached testing nirvana, editorialists and academics alike call for ever more measurement "visions and revisions."

A sign hung in Albert Einstein's office read "Not everything that counts can be counted and not everything that can be counted counts."

SB547 nowhere mentions good character or love of learning. It does allude to student excitement and creativity, but does not take these qualities seriously because they can't be placed in a data stream. Lost in the bill's turgid mandates is any recognition that quality is fundamentally different from quantity.

There are other ways to improve our schools - to indeed focus on quality. What about a system that relies on locally convened panels to visit schools, observe teachers, interview students, and examine student work? Such a system wouldn't produce an API number, but it could improve the quality of our schools.

I look forward to working with the author to craft more inspiring ways to encourage our students to do their best.

Sincerely,

Edmund G. Brown Jr.

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Gov. Jerry Brown blasts data-based school reform

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California Gov. Jerry Brown wrote a tough indictment of data-based school reform in a message he wrote vetoing a bill that would have changed the state's accountability system for public schools. The legislation, SB547, would have reduced reliance on standardized test scores to evaluate students and schools, but Brown called the legislation "yet another siren song of school reform" and would do nothing to improve the quality of schools.

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For our kids needing intervention, the testing and standardization has created a hardship. I see a real need for giving the teachers the freedom to address the particular gaps with students without the cumbersome red tape.

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Bill Gates has been one of the world's richest people for decades. To build a legacy beyond Microsoft - and to build a better world - in 2000 he and his wife launched the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, which has spent billions of dollars on numerous good causes.

The world's largest private charity has had some great successes - helping sharply reduce the prevalence of malaria worldwide, for one. But the Gates Foundation's efforts to improve U.S. public education haven't gone as well as hoped, as Gates admitted in remarks last month at an education conference. As a result, he said the foundation is "evolving our education strategy" as it looks to invest close to $1.7 billion in U.S. public schools over five years.

While the Gates Foundation has funded many education initiatives, its biggest splash came with its Common Core campaign, launched in 2009. Forty-two states are in the program, which mandates centralized curriculum standards for student learning in math and language arts in each grades K-12. Test results are used to rate school and teacher effectiveness.

But Common Core has come under fire from teachers unions and their political allies because of its emphasis on testing and teacher accountability. And Common Core faces criticism from conservatives because it seeks to require independent-minded states to use standards mandated at the national level. Bipartisan opposition to top-down education policy-making is why Congress scrapped the No Child Left Behind education law in 2015 and shifted school responsibilities back to the states.

These changing political waters suggest that if the Gates Foundation truly wants to advance public education, the last thing it should do is advocate national standards. Instead, it should urge states to copy what has worked in other states. This approach would be much more difficult to criticize than Common Core.

In liberal, pro-union states like California, an educational campaign that pointed to how much better the public education system is in liberal, pro-union Massachusetts could build momentum for change. The Massachusetts Education Reform Act of 1993, crafted with input from teachers, established standardized basic methods to assess the performance of students, teachers, administrators and superintendents and hold them accountable. While Massachusetts has clusters of struggling students in poor minority communities, its public schools are widely seen as America's best.

In conservative, non-union states wary of national dictates, an educational campaign could emphasize how much better the public education system is in conservative, non-union Texas. Since 1984, the Texas government has passed a series of education reforms that - like those in Massachusetts - set up basic accountability requirements for schools and districts while tracking the performance of four student groups: whites, Hispanics, African-Americans and the economically disadvantaged. A 2015 Urban Institute report ranked Texas behind only Massachusetts and New Jersey in school quality in an evaluation that adjusted for student demographics.

Gates seeming to lose faith that Common Core can succeed will be music to the ears of people like Gov. Jerry Brown, who famously rapped the "siren song" of trendy school reform in 2011. But no critic can explain away the years of comprehensive success seen in Massachusetts and Texas. Whether you live in a red state or a blue state, no one should accept so-so schools. There is a better way.
Twitter: @sdutIdeas Facebook: San Diego Union-Tribune Ideas & Opinion

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The San Diego Union-Tribune Editorial Board

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Here's a better way for Bill Gates to fix schools

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Bill Gates has been one of the world's richest people for decades. To build a legacy beyond Microsoft - and to build a better world - in 2000 he and his wife launched the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, which has spent billions of dollars on numerous good causes.

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I've been walking a "justice" journey for personal reasons for the last couple of years. When you're faced with the reality of crushed dreams and redefined hopes, you tend to re-evaluate everything you ever believed in. With power and influence comes privilege. And that privilege can alter our perceptions.

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Power tends to corrupt and absolute power corrupts absolutely