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Home > Blogs > Get on the Bus > Archives > 2006 > September > 06 > Entry

The “Village People” Education Carnival

By selliott | Wednesday, September 6, 2006, 12:01 AM

The Village People really should have had a teacher in there too, don’t you think? Welcome to the 83rd Carnival of Education — the “Village People” edition.

Ever wonder who’s out there blogging about education? I’ve always sort of thought of us edubloggers as a motley crew of education “macho men” and “macho women” shooting the breeze about all things school-related down at the YMCA.

For this carnival, I tried to imagine which role each of us would play if the edusphere were a late-1970’s, arm-spelling pop music sensation. Make it all the way to the end and I’ll try to explain my rationale.

But first some housekeeping. View last week’s edition, here and the Carnival’s archives over there.

Next week’s carnival will be hosted by Andy Pass at Pass-Ed. E-mail your entries to him by 5 p.m. (Eastern) next Tuesday at “ap AT Pass-Ed.com” or use this handy submission form.

Now on to the midway!

The Cop (Journalists)

I recently looked around the edusphere and realized there are now nine MSM edublogs up from just three a year ago. And I think they are quite good. Here’s a taste:

At Get on the Bus, I write for the Dayton (Ohio) Daily News about something crazy I did on the first day of school — I walked to school with my kids. Now here’s an even crazier idea — is it safe to let them walk the half mile route themselves? Be sure to read the comments and Mrs. Cornelius’ terrifying cautionary tale in response.

In a great post called Fish gotta swim, birds gotta fly, education reporter Lanning Taliaferro discusses a college president’s plea for parents to back off. Lanning is one of the Hall Monitor bloggers at the White Plains (N.Y.) Journal News. And here Lanning sinks in a sea of SAT press materials.

My good pal and corporate sister Patti Ghezzi writes Get Schooled for the Atlanta Journal Constitution. And I admit I get “blog envy” when I see a post like she had last week about how Georgia moved, um, “up” to 46th in the nation for the percent of kids who pass the SAT. Check out some of the interesting arguments about the value of the SAT and the need for college among the 214 comments!!

At School Zone, Houston Chronicle Education Editor Jason Spencer calls out Superintendent Abelardo Saavedra for using a phone system the city schools purchased to relay vital information as a PR tool. Oh, and Jason notes Saaverdra pretty selectively chose the statistics he relayed while touting Houston’s SAT performance.

The L.A. Times’ School Me! edubloggers Bob Sipchen and Janine Kahn have been tracking Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa’s effort to take over the city schools with their Predict-O-Meter. But finally, Villaraigosa got his wish last week with a legislative victory.

So let me ask you this, teachers — does being a school board member make you an “educator?” At the Miami Herald’s Gradebook, education reporter and blogger Matt Pinzur writes about a candidate for state senator who’s salsa-esque, spanish-language campaign jingle calls this phone book salesman an “educator.”

The Roanoke (Va.) Times’ excellent website includes a very good edublog called Campus Watch that covers colleges. Last week they used the blog to keep readers updated about a dangerous fugitive who eventually was captured on a local college campus. Pointing to a provocative column by a local graduate student, education reporter and blogger Amy Kovac asks should students be allowed to carry guns for self protection?

Former MSMer Joanne Jacobs cites a Boston Globe column that exposes textbook companies that use fake handicapped kids and pass off hispanics as Native Americans in photos. Textbook Evaluator read the same story and has an idea — how about taking pictures out of textbooks altogether?

This Week in Education’s Alexander Russo may not be an MSM journalist, but he sure keeps an eye on us. Recently he critiqued how different papers covered the SAT score release differently.

The Construction Worker (Teachers)

It’s football season and like millions of other male (and even some female) sports fans I have just completed my fantasy football draft. I like fantasy football and baseball, but some of these leagues are a little nutty. I know people who have played fantasy golf, fantasy NASCAR and even fantasy bass fishing!

Anonymous educator takes this a step farther with “fantasy academics” — he and some other teacher friends picked top students in five subjects and the teacher who’s “team” does the best academically wins. Sound fun? At least one other teacher thinks the whole thing is unethical.

Dealing with pushy parents and other problems on the first day of school? Well it could be worse. Me-ander says you could be in Israel, where parents are in a class of their own. Oh, and some teachers have other small problems, like classrooms that have been bombed.

Dr. Homeslice asks if administrators should be able to go into a teacher’s gradebook without notification and change student grades based on state test results in a post titled What (or who) is in your gradebook?

Thespis Journal is in a celebratory mood on his one-year blogoversary! Congrats! Like me, he’s been tracking a teacher’s strike near Dayton and gets in the last word.

NYC Educator offers some great practical advice for new teachers, such as how to talk to parents. He also provides good links to other great advice they don’t teach in ed school.

Mamacita of Weekly Scheiss has been warning her students away from My Space for ages. Guess who just got her own My Space account and had somewhat of a change of heart? Still kids, behave yourself while you’re there.

So is John Stossel right in his criticisms of education in America? Now that Coach Brown has seen the show, he answers Stossel’s questions.

Merit pay is a always a contentious issue and in Iowa, they’re still trying to figure it out. The Education Wonks recap the latest and offer their reservations about such a system.

At The Colossus of Rhodey Hube points to a common sense study that finds those who eat breakfast do better in school. Everybody knows that, right? So how come only about half his students report doing so?

In California, La Maestra of California Live Wire plays off a Bob Sipchen column to highlight a program that effectively gets kids into college and what it takes to really make a difference.

Thinking of new ways to use the Web in your classroom? So is the Discourse about Discource blog. In fact, they’re thinking up the web tools of the future.

Do schools prepare kids for real life? Ramblings of an Australian Teacher takes on some recent snarky blog posts about how schools allegedly fail in this area.

Kelly Vaughan, once known as Mrs. Frizzle, is now teaching in Turkey. She writes about getting some of her burning questions answered at her new school.

Kids these days! No, Get Lost, Mr. Chips isn’t talking about his students. He tells the story of a fresh-out-of-college teacher applicant who was offended to be offered a long term sub position.

Hmmm. Is the Ames, Iowa, school district trying to collect a few extra bucks with its proposed textbook fees? At Textsavvy they do the math.

Lots of textbook posts this week! In his, Polski3 asks if there wasn’t a better use for old texts than throwing them in the dumpster.

At Three Standard Deviations to the Left they found an old children’s book by a famous illustrator that is, um, not exactly what we think of as suitable for children these days.

Right on the Left Coast gives us an update on his battle against illegal school fees.

Mike in Texas better be careful. Trust me, pulling pranks on the IT people can come back to haunt you!

Historyiselementary finds a Bible verse instructive for the classroom.

Ms. Q presents Teaching Autobiography posted at Ms. Q.

Tired of all the negativity about teenagers? Take a look at what Graycie’s class came up with for a poem about what teenagers can do. That’s pretty good work this early in the school year!

The Sailor (Parents)

Here’s an idea, parent edubloggers! Rory of Parentalcation solves the problems of education in seven simple steps. Something tells me not all teachers are going to like Rory’s plan.

Gretchen at Girls can’t what?, now a mother of two, explores how her early school experiences fostered issues with authority.

At Babbleogue, the neighborhood kids already are hitting her up for school donations.

Education Matters says a BBC story shows how we can help poor students.

At A Blog Around the Clock, Courtnix gives his son’s new science book rave reviews.

The Native American (Home Schoolers)

At Triviumpursuit, they imagine a conversation between Mr. Taxpayer and Ms. Voucher.

Texas Ed has a warning for Southern Baptists who plan to follow their church’s advice and home school — it’s not as safe as you think.

Playing off another Joanne Jacobs post, Spunkyhomeschool takes on the four types of state testing programs and puts the possibility of a national test into perspective for us.

The Cowboy (Interest Groups, Consultants and Publishers)

Michelle at AFT’s NCLB Blog asks, “Can you be a cynical optimist?” In other words, can you believe poverty has a strong impact on student learning and still believe teachers should keep trying to make a difference for these kids?

Ryan at Edspresso responds to a post at the AFT blog with a commentary on dueling studies.

Next week’s host, Andrew Pass, turns a $10,000 tip left for a waitress into a multi-faceted classroom lesson.

Which is the best way to spend $200,000 — on signing bonuses for teachers or to reduce class size? Going to the Mat explores the question. Maybe he should get together with D-edreckoning who claims to have written the definitive post on class size reduction.

Swimming Kangaroo recently asked if standardized testing really has made education better in Texas.

The Biker (Personal Finance Gurus)

At Pocket Change, it’s back to school week and the big question is, would you put food in a $975 lunch box?

And Jeff at Personal Finance Advice has a tip about a new service that could save students hundreds of dollars on textbooks.

Finally, thanks to everyone who submitted, to the Education Wonks for keeping this thing going each week, to those who pass the word about the carnival and, of course, our weekly readers!

Now my explanation for the Village People roles:

The Cop — We journalists are supposed to be “watchdogs.”

The Construction Worker — Teachers are the ones who do the hard work of “building” our kids academic skills.

The Sailor — Parents are supposed to be role models, just as our military officers are taught to always be on best behavior (in both cases, they still sometimes misbehave).

The Native American — Home schoolers are sort of out there on the frontier and often misunderstood.

The Cowboy — Shootouts from groups like AFT and the Alliance for School Choice turn the Web into their own personal Old West saloon.

The Biker — All I know is the guy who does my taxes used to have hair down to his knees and wore nothing but sandals. I suspect other finance-minded types have similar skeletons in their closets.

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