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Articles by Gary Rubinstein
Gary Rubinstein's Blog: By One Dishonest Measure
A loaded question that education reformers like to ponder is: Exactly how many students in the boroughs of New York City are trapped in failing schools? In November 2014 there was a report put out by Families For Excellent Schools called ‘The Forgotten Fourth’ in which they put the number at 143,000 which is about 15%. This 143,000 number was quoted for months on the news and was featured in a New York Post op-ed by Eva Moskowitz, founder and CEO of the Success Academy charter school network.
Gary Rubinstein's Blog: The74: Students In District That ‘Shed’ Remedial Math Thrived. The Data Suggests Otherwise.
I’ve been teaching Math for 35 years. And if I were to only be able to give a few words of advice to a beginning Math teacher, I would tell them: Don’t teach too much in one period. After all these years I’m pretty good at knowing what is the right amount of material to cover in one day but on a day where things don’t go well for my class, I always think “Next year I’ll split that up into two lessons.” Learning Math is a slow and deliberate process.
Gary Rubinstein's Blog: TFA Touts Some Conclusions of New ‘Meta-Analysis’ But Only the Favorable Ones
According to Teach For America, the average teacher in this country is pretty bad. The main deficiency of the average teacher, they say, is that the average teacher in this country does not believe in kids as much as Teach For America teachers do and therefore have lower expectations which then become a self-fulfilling prophecy. There have been a lot of studies about TFA over the past 25 years.
Gary Rubinstein's Blog: Who Is the New CEO of Teach for America?
From 1990 until 2013, the CEO of TFA was the founder, Wendy Kopp. Under her leadership the program grew from a small organization that struggled to make payroll into a powerful player in the education world. When Wendy left in 2013, Teach For America was at an all time high in popularity. They even had about 5 TFA alumni serving as state commissioners. When she left, there was no reason to believe that TFA would not continue to ascend.
Illustrative Math: The New Curriculum That Nearly Every Algebra Teacher in NYC Has to Start Using This Fall and Why It Is Destined to FlopGary Rubinstein's Blog:
Starting this September, nearly every Algebra teacher in New York City is expected to follow a new curriculum called ‘Illustrative Math.’ This is part of a $34 million investment in a program called ‘NYC Solves’ which aims to improve math instruction and, consequently, math test scores.
Gary Rubinstein's Blog: Should The Success Academy SPRINT Program Be Investigated?
About four months ago I received an unusual DM in my Twitter account. Though over the years several different Success Academy parents have reached out to me, this was from someone who claimed to be either a current employee or a former employee. They used an anonymous name and to this day, I have no idea who this person is. But they reached out to me because they had a story to tell and felt, I guess, that I was the best person to tell it to.
La niña que nunca cometía errores.
Beatriz Nuncafalla es una niña de nueve años que nunca -¡ni una sola vez!- ha cometido un error. Nunca olvida sus deberes de matemáticas, nunca lleva calcetines desaparejados y siempre es la ganadora del espectáculo anual de talentos que hacen en el colegio. De hecho, Beatriz tiene el récord de perfección en su ciudad, donde la conocen como la niña que nunca comete errores. La vida de Beatriz discurre con tranquilidad hasta que pasa lo impensable: comete su primer error.
Gary Rubinstein's Blog: Why Don’t Success Academy High School Students Take Any Advanced Regents Exams?
Success Academy is a charter network with about 40 schools in the New York City area. They are known for their high standardized 3-8 test scores. Though it has been proved that their test scores are somewhat inflated by their practices of shedding their low performing students over the year and also by, at some schools, focusing exclusively on test prep in the months leading up to the tests, they still have these test scores to show their funders and the various charter school cheerleaders.
Gary Rubinstein's Blog: Success Academy Teaching Algebra to 2nd Graders: Rigor or Torture?
Success Academy is the infamous charter network of New York. Founded in 2006, and featured in Waiting For Superman, its growth was fueled by high standardized test scores. But as people, like me, looked more closely at the publicly available datapproa we found that there are some shady ways to achieve high standardized test scores. The biggest factor inflating their test scores is student attrition.
Gary Rubinstein's Blog: Success Academy Games U.S. News & World Report Best High School Ranking
In the latest U.S. News & World Report Best High School Ranking 2023-2024, the Success Academy High School was ranked the 102nd best high school in the country and the 12th best high school in New York State.
Gary Rubinstein's Blog: Will KIPP NYC Be Disqualified (Again) From U.S. News & World Report Best High School Rankings?
There is exactly one KIPP high school in New York City. KIPP NYC College Prep High School was started in 2009 to serve students graduating from KIPP middle schools. In 2013 they moved into a new facility that was part of a $100 million project. While KIPP was once the ‘gold standard’ of charter schools, they do seem to have lost their luster. Once featured in the Waiting For Superman ‘documentary,’ KIPP does seem to have failed to live up to the original expectations.
Gary Rubinstein's Blog: A New Low for TFA: Some Trainees Only Get About 11 Hours of Student Teaching.
Teach For America’s teacher training has always been the weakest spot of an organization that has no shortage of weak spots. Ask any teacher what the most useful part of their training was and they will tell you that it was their student teaching experience. You can read about and discuss the theory of teaching and about how what students do and don’t respond to, but until you are standing in front of an actual class, it is all just theory.
WAYS TO PLAY | Kirkus Reviews
A child’s playtime activities differ from those of other kids—and that’s more than OK. Riley likes to play in ways that “Bossy Older Cousin Emma” says are all wrong. Emma and her little sister, Violet, make a lot of noise when they play, and they hop from one toy to another very quickly. Riley, however, can sit for hours doing one particular thing, like sharpening crayons until they have “the pointiest points,” perfect for drawing beautiful spirals.
Gary Rubinstein's Blog: Success Academy Attrition Worse Than Ever
On April 5th The New York Post published their annual ‘100% of Success Academy students get accepted into four-year colleges’ editorial. The class of 2023 will be the sixth graduating class of the infamous charter chain and according to the first paragraph of the editorial, Success Academy has accomplished this feat six years in a row.
Gary Rubinstein's Blog: Former Success Academy Teacher Speaks Out
For over 10 years I have been observing and writing about the Success Academy charter network. Every time I think that there’s no way that I can learn anything more scandalous about these schools, I’m proven wrong. The latest news comes from a bombshell whistleblower post by a recently fired Success Academy middle school teacher. I’ve lost count, but I’d say I’ve written over 35 posts about Success Academy over the years.
I SEE YOU, SAD BEAR
A kind friend helps by recognizing a friend’s sadness. Bear is a solitary, unhappy, small figure against a backdrop of lively playgrounds, streets, and skylines that suggest a New York setting. An antlered friend notices and asks gently, “Sad Bear, why are you so sad?” Maybe it’s because of a dropped ice cream cone, a lost balloon, cold, wet weather, or a forgotten birthday. Maybe something was broken accidentally or a special tree was chopped down.
Gary Rubinstein's Blog: Steve Perry and P. Diddy Harlem Charter School: Only One 8th Grader Proficient on State Math Test
Dr. Steve Perry is an outspoken education reformer who has billed himself ‘America’s most trusted educator.’ He also once called the teacher’s unions ‘roaches.’ He founded a chain of charter schools called Capital Preparatory which has a few schools in Connecticut and, more recently, three schools in New York. The Capital Preparatory Harlem school was co-founded by performer Sean P. Diddy Combs.
Gary Rubinstein's Blog: New Data Reveals That Success Academy Attrition Is Worse Than Previously Reported
For all my years of blogging about education, the most important part of any post is pursuing the right questions. My first investigative post back in 2011 was inspired by listening to an Arne Duncan keynote speech in which he boasted that as a result of school closing that he authorized, the school that replaced the closed school got 100% of their 107 graduating seniors into college.
Gary Rubinstein's Blog: Trainwreck For America
Between 1990 and 2013, Teach For America grew in size and influence from a tiny inconsequential alternative placement provider to a $300 million a year political powerhouse. But the last ten years have been rough on TFA. In 2016 they fired about 15% of their staff. Then their recruitment figures dropped year after year until 2022 when they had their fewest number in nearly 20 years. And now Chalkbeat reports that TFA is set to fire another 25% of their staff in the coming months.
Het meisje dat nooit fouten maakte
Isabella heeft nog nooit een fout gemaakt. Ze vergeet nooit haar hamster te voeren, ze draagt nooit verschillende sokken en ze vergeet nooit haar huiswerk te maken. Nadat ze bijna een fout maakt, wordt ze bang dat ze tijdens de toneelvoorstelling een fout zal maken. Dit hartverwarmende verhaal zal ieder perfectionistisch kind laten zien dat het juist belangrijk is om fouten te maken als je iets wilt leren. Bij dit boek is ook een lesplan ontwikkeld.
The Don'ts and Don'ts of Teaching
The Don'ts and Don'ts of Teaching I don't buy this. For new teachers, especially, classroom rules need to be rules, and a rule should be stated in the clearest way possible. Many of the most important rules adults have to abide by are written in the negative: No parking. No dogs allowed. Do not disturb. Do not pass go. Do not collect 200 dollars. Thou shalt not kill. One piece of advice that I've seen in numerous books about teaching is to always phrase classroom rules positively.
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