- Outgoing Ohio House Speaker Bill Batchelder seems to blame the Common Core for the defeat of an incumbent representative in last week’s primary, and he wants to do something about it: “That sucker is a problem. I think we probably should have addressed it.” I'm kind of glad to know he’s talking about the Common Core and not something else! (Columbus Dispatch)
- In a surprise to no one at all, delegates to the Ohio Education Association’s Spring Representative Assembly voted in favor of a resolution recommending a three-year “suspension on all high-stakes decisions” tied to new standardized tests in the state. (Columbus Dispatch)
- Gubernatorial candidate Ed FitzGerald was also at the teachers’ Spring Wingding and spoke passionately against the Third Grade Reading Guarantee, standardized testing, the Common Core, and a few other things. To the surpise of no one at all. (Toledo Blade)
- One of those “high-stakes decisions” that the unions would like to suspend is teacher evaluation tied to their students’ test results – part of Ohio’s brand new teacher evaluation protocol. As we’ve noted before, there are ongoing legislative attempts to change the evaluation protocol even before it’s fully rolled out. Here’s some more on that, focusing a lot on the topic of students evaluating teachers. (Columbus Dispatch)
- Two pieces of news from last week – a report showing a diversity gap between students and teachers in America, and the announcement that CMSD could fire as many as 53 teachers and other personnel for poor performance – has led editors in Cleveland to opine on the need for more non-white teachers of high quality to better reflect the diversity of students and to give those students a greater boost toward success. (Cleveland Plain Dealer)
- And finally, editors in Toledo opine in favor of the expansion of single-gender school options in the district. (Toledo Blade)
