Head of Class Size Matters, Leonie Haimson, had this to say upon his leaving:
"John King was the most unpopular commissioner in the history of NY State. He showed no respect for parents, teachers or student privacy. Ironically, he was intent on protecting his own privacy, and routinely withheld public documents; our Freedom of Information request of his communications with inBloom and the Gates foundation is more than 1 1/2 years overdue. His resignation is good news for New York state; hopefully he will be unable to do as much damage at the US Department of Education."
Sadly, as the new head of the US Department of Education, Dr. King will be in quite a position to do a lot of damage over the next 15 months.
John King Is Named New York State Education Commissioner: "Their two children, Amina, 7, and Mareya, 4, attend a Montessori school. Over the past two years, he has been courted for several prominent education leadership positions, including the superintendent's seat in Newark, by Mark Zuckerberg, the Facebook executive who has pledged $100 million to that city's troubled schools. But Dr. King said he wanted to stay in New York because of his personal ties and his desire to finish what he started with Dr. Steiner. His salary will be $212,500, up from the $186,500 he earned as deputy, but, at his request, less than the $250,000 given to Dr. Steiner."
"You'll see the rollout of a statewide data system that will give a lot more useful information to teachers and principals about student performance and a lot more useful data for policymakers."
In the above quote, King was referring to the implementation of inBloom, funded and created by the Gates Foundation and the Carnegie Corporation. Its purpose was to amass an extraordinary amount of confidential student data with the intent of sharing it with private software developers to create personalized educational products. Despite public outcry, John King continued to support inBloom until the legislature stepped in and pulled the plug during the spring of 2014. Shortly thereafter, inBloom itself shut down.
Jonathan Marshall was twenty-four, a graduate student in physics from London, working for the summer at the ultra-modern Laboratoire Ondulatoire-the wave mechanics laboratory-of the French Marine Institute in Vissy, just north of Paris. But the suburb was mostly the residence of young families, and it had been a lonely summer for Marshall. Which was why he could not believe his good fortune at meeting this girl. This extraordinarily beautiful and sexy girl.
"Show me what it does, this machine," Marisa said. Her eyes were shining. "Show me what it is you do."
"My pleasure," Marshall said. He moved to the large control panel and began to switch on the pumps and sensors. The thirty panels of the wave machine at the far end of the tank clicked, one after another.
The OJ Simpson Trial: Drama of the Century: I remember watching the gloves in the courtroom and thinking to myself, "He's not going to ask O.J. to put on the glove." That's too much of a risk. You never ask a question in a courtroom, much less do a demonstration where you don't know what the outcomes is. And it was like a slow motion disaster movie for the prosecution as O.J. milk the moment for all it was worth and pretended to try on those gloves.
Funny you should suggest this. From Microsoft "Bait and Switch" Could Mean a Huge Increase in Foreign Tech Workers: "The company proposed a novel workaround: If the federal government would raise the H1-B cap by 20,000 additional visas and make available an equal number of additional green cards, Microsoft said it would be willing to pay nearly four times the usual fees, handing over $10,000 per H-1B visa and $15,000 per green card. It called its proposal the National Talent Strategy because the additional revenue-more than $500 million annually-would be used to fund STEM education programs around the country...With the coalition in its corner, Microsoft approached a bipartisan group of senators to craft what would become the Immigration Innovation, or "I-Squared" Act. And that's where the alleged "lobbying malpractice" came in. The act, as promised, would boost the caps on visas and green cards and use the fees to pay for STEM education. But in a crucial difference that has angered some of Microsoft's would-be allies, the bill would nearly quintuple the number of available visas-raising the cap to 300,000-and charge companies far less for them: as little as $1,825 apiece. Microsoft, which helped draft the bill, appeared pleased with the end result. "Today's introduction in the Senate of the bipartisan Immigration Innovation Act is a major step forward," Brad Smith, the company's general counsel and executive vice president said in a January press release issued by Compete America, a coalition of tech companies such as Microsoft and outsourcing firms such as Deloitte. "Microsoft strongly supports this legislation and urges Congress to send broader immigration reform that includes these solutions to the President's desk this year."
From the article: "Gov. Jay Inslee's office and the Washington State Charter School Association, an advocacy group for the schools [and recipient of $6+ million in Gates Foundation grants], said they were reviewing the ruling."
From the TEALS Volunteer FAQ: Is TEALS a Microsoft program? Yes, TEALS operates as a citizenship project within Microsoft. Microsoft is a huge supporter of computer science education, and provides most of the funding for TEALS.
Like Kingsville, TX (534 signers)? More detail here, which (you're right) should have been linked to in the submission instead of just the static image. My bad.
From Steve Jobs' Passion for Diversity: "Can you help us hire black engineers?" he said. "Do you know how many black engineers we have?" Before I could say anything he shared a shockingly low number and confessed how poorly Apple was doing in finding black candidates. I'll skip the full exchange, but suffice it to say, I got an intimate peek into Steve's passion and energy. He was seriously upset at Apple's efforts in that area. His last words to me that day were, "If you have any ideas on how we can hire more black engineers, send me an email."
Coincidentally, Microsoft in 2008 launched its own Code Trip project, which it described as "a road trip, a bunch of developers cruising around in a tour bus and geeking out. It's also an online TV show (or video podcast, or vodcast, or whatever the kids call it nowadays) chronicling their adventures throughout the western United States." So, the Microsoft-funded, Roadtrip Nation-branded 2015 Code Trip PBS show looks like a remake of sorts of Microsoft's own 2008 Code Trip, albeit with a more diverse cast
From DataKind: A Justice League for Geeks: "By day they work for the Man. But on weekends, these computer whizzes volunteer their services to analyze big data and help nonprofits foster social change. What if a group of data scientists, computer wizards, coding geniuses and statistical savants were able to come together and combine their talents to solve some of the nation's thorniest problems? The result would be a kind of Justice League for geeks, an organization dedicated to assisting nonprofits by crunching the complex data they collect and using the results to help foster environmental, social and economic change." Join 'em, and you could be this century's John Snow!
Taught by Code.org Affiliates who are experienced computer science educators, our free workshops will prepare you to teach the Code Studio courses for grades K-5. Workshop details: The Microsoft Store @ The Domain will host a FREE Code.org workshop. FREE CPEs for educator re-certification will be provided!..Priority: Title I Schools. Waiting List: Non-Title I Schools. THANK YOU GOOGLE & MICROSOFT FOR SPONSORING THIS EVENT!
Steve Jobs's Advice for Obama: Jobs told Mr. Obama that Apple employs 700,000 factory workers in China because it can't find the 30,000 engineers in the U.S. that it needs on site at its plants. "If you could educate these engineers," he said at the dinner, "we could move more manufacturing jobs here."
Slashdot Mirror
From Goodbye, Arne Duncan...Hello, John King:
Head of Class Size Matters, Leonie Haimson, had this to say upon his leaving:
"John King was the most unpopular commissioner in the history of NY State. He showed no respect for parents, teachers or student privacy. Ironically, he was intent on protecting his own privacy, and routinely withheld public documents; our Freedom of Information request of his communications with inBloom and the Gates foundation is more than 1 1/2 years overdue. His resignation is good news for New York state; hopefully he will be unable to do as much damage at the US Department of Education."
Sadly, as the new head of the US Department of Education, Dr. King will be in quite a position to do a lot of damage over the next 15 months.
John King Is Named New York State Education Commissioner: "Their two children, Amina, 7, and Mareya, 4, attend a Montessori school. Over the past two years, he has been courted for several prominent education leadership positions, including the superintendent's seat in Newark, by Mark Zuckerberg, the Facebook executive who has pledged $100 million to that city's troubled schools. But Dr. King said he wanted to stay in New York because of his personal ties and his desire to finish what he started with Dr. Steiner. His salary will be $212,500, up from the $186,500 he earned as deputy, but, at his request, less than the $250,000 given to Dr. Steiner."
What Arne Duncan's new senior adviser did to N.Y. schools:
"You'll see the rollout of a statewide data system that will give a lot more useful information to teachers and principals about student performance and a lot more useful data for policymakers."
In the above quote, King was referring to the implementation of inBloom, funded and created by the Gates Foundation and the Carnegie Corporation. Its purpose was to amass an extraordinary amount of confidential student data with the intent of sharing it with private software developers to create personalized educational products. Despite public outcry, John King continued to support inBloom until the legislature stepped in and pulled the plug during the spring of 2014. Shortly thereafter, inBloom itself shut down.
State of Fear (2004) excerpt:
Jonathan Marshall was twenty-four, a graduate student in physics from London, working for the summer at the ultra-modern Laboratoire Ondulatoire-the wave mechanics laboratory-of the French Marine Institute in Vissy, just north of Paris. But the suburb was mostly the residence of young families, and it had been a lonely summer for Marshall. Which was why he could not believe his good fortune at meeting this girl. This extraordinarily beautiful and sexy girl.
"Show me what it does, this machine," Marisa said. Her eyes were shining. "Show me what it is you do."
"My pleasure," Marshall said. He moved to the large control panel and began to switch on the pumps and sensors. The thirty panels of the wave machine at the far end of the tank clicked, one after another.
Microsoft's announcement coincidentally came a day after New York City announced an $81M public-private K-12 CS mandate, which prompted Microsoft's Smith to join fellow FWD.us PAC backers Ron Conway and Fred Wilson, as well other execs from Google, Facebook, and Goldman Sachs, to explain to the masses "Why Computer Science for All is Good for All" in An Open Letter from the Nation's Tech and Business Leaders. Making an argument worthy of a tantrum-throwing toddler, the execs exclaimed in a pull-quote, "We need talent, we need it now, and we simply cannot find enough."
The OJ Simpson Trial: Drama of the Century: I remember watching the gloves in the courtroom and thinking to myself, "He's not going to ask O.J. to put on the glove." That's too much of a risk. You never ask a question in a courtroom, much less do a demonstration where you don't know what the outcomes is. And it was like a slow motion disaster movie for the prosecution as O.J. milk the moment for all it was worth and pretended to try on those gloves.
Computer Science for All: Fundamentals for Our Future
Funny you should suggest this. From Microsoft "Bait and Switch" Could Mean a Huge Increase in Foreign Tech Workers: "The company proposed a novel workaround: If the federal government would raise the H1-B cap by 20,000 additional visas and make available an equal number of additional green cards, Microsoft said it would be willing to pay nearly four times the usual fees, handing over $10,000 per H-1B visa and $15,000 per green card. It called its proposal the National Talent Strategy because the additional revenue-more than $500 million annually-would be used to fund STEM education programs around the country...With the coalition in its corner, Microsoft approached a bipartisan group of senators to craft what would become the Immigration Innovation, or "I-Squared" Act. And that's where the alleged "lobbying malpractice" came in. The act, as promised, would boost the caps on visas and green cards and use the fees to pay for STEM education. But in a crucial difference that has angered some of Microsoft's would-be allies, the bill would nearly quintuple the number of available visas-raising the cap to 300,000-and charge companies far less for them: as little as $1,825 apiece. Microsoft, which helped draft the bill, appeared pleased with the end result. "Today's introduction in the Senate of the bipartisan Immigration Innovation Act is a major step forward," Brad Smith, the company's general counsel and executive vice president said in a January press release issued by Compete America, a coalition of tech companies such as Microsoft and outsourcing firms such as Deloitte. "Microsoft strongly supports this legislation and urges Congress to send broader immigration reform that includes these solutions to the President's desk this year."
Microsoft Software & Systems Academy: Certificate Cost: $3040.00
From the article: "Gov. Jay Inslee's office and the Washington State Charter School Association, an advocacy group for the schools [and recipient of $6+ million in Gates Foundation grants], said they were reviewing the ruling."
From the TEALS Volunteer FAQ: Is TEALS a Microsoft program? Yes, TEALS operates as a citizenship project within Microsoft. Microsoft is a huge supporter of computer science education, and provides most of the funding for TEALS.
Like Kingsville, TX (534 signers)?
More detail here, which (you're right) should have been linked to in the submission instead of just the static image. My bad.
Earlier on Slashdot: Microsoft Offers Washington a Bargain: More State Taxes, For More [CS] Education
WH visitor records indicate MassCAN Executive Director Jim Stanton was at the White House on the day Code.org 'taught President Obama to code' last December, and that he joined Google, Microsoft, and Code.org execs in a sit-down immediately afterwards with the head of the National Science Foundation. Stanton is also a Sr. Project Manager at Education Development Center (EDC leads MassCAN), which announced in March it had received a $6.5 million NSF grant to bring Berkeley’s Snap!-based The Beauty and Joy of Computing course to New York City high schools.
Infinite monkey theorem in popular culture
From Steve Jobs' Passion for Diversity: "Can you help us hire black engineers?" he said. "Do you know how many black engineers we have?" Before I could say anything he shared a shockingly low number and confessed how poorly Apple was doing in finding black candidates. I'll skip the full exchange, but suffice it to say, I got an intimate peek into Steve's passion and energy. He was seriously upset at Apple's efforts in that area. His last words to me that day were, "If you have any ideas on how we can hire more black engineers, send me an email."
Coincidentally, Microsoft in 2008 launched its own Code Trip project, which it described as "a road trip, a bunch of developers cruising around in a tour bus and geeking out. It's also an online TV show (or video podcast, or vodcast, or whatever the kids call it nowadays) chronicling their adventures throughout the western United States." So, the Microsoft-funded, Roadtrip Nation-branded 2015 Code Trip PBS show looks like a remake of sorts of Microsoft's own 2008 Code Trip, albeit with a more diverse cast
Next album title.
To paraphrase Bobby Hill, "What was YouTube supposed to do? NOT monetize the hospitalized baby?"
...sadly, no 1-up mushrooms in real life.
Just because you're paranoid doesn't mean tech execs aren't trying to use their money and "massive distribution channels" for political messages in support of their efforts. :-)
Kids learning programming is fine. Whether public education should depend on the philanthropy of tech companies and their billionaire leaders whose grants may come attached with conditions for who teachers/schools should educate and how is another matter. Microsoft's reported insistence on CS-education-their-way in return for agreeing to pay taxes is also reason for concern, IMO.
From DataKind: A Justice League for Geeks: "By day they work for the Man. But on weekends, these computer whizzes volunteer their services to analyze big data and help nonprofits foster social change. What if a group of data scientists, computer wizards, coding geniuses and statistical savants were able to come together and combine their talents to solve some of the nation's thorniest problems? The result would be a kind of Justice League for geeks, an organization dedicated to assisting nonprofits by crunching the complex data they collect and using the results to help foster environmental, social and economic change." Join 'em, and you could be this century's John Snow!
Taught by Code.org Affiliates who are experienced computer science educators, our free workshops will prepare you to teach the Code Studio courses for grades K-5. Workshop details: The Microsoft Store @ The Domain will host a FREE Code.org workshop. FREE CPEs for educator re-certification will be provided!..Priority: Title I Schools. Waiting List: Non-Title I Schools. THANK YOU GOOGLE & MICROSOFT FOR SPONSORING THIS EVENT!
Steve Jobs's Advice for Obama: Jobs told Mr. Obama that Apple employs 700,000 factory workers in China because it can't find the 30,000 engineers in the U.S. that it needs on site at its plants. "If you could educate these engineers," he said at the dinner, "we could move more manufacturing jobs here."