I heard them all 150 miles down-350 to go

Well 150 miles down, and some 350 to go. Today's walk was tough my feet are tired, and I have 350 miles to go.
Today two simple things inspire me. The first is a week long event I created on Children Are More Than Test Scores asking people to say something good about teachers and children. The posting are food for the teaching soul, and it has only been open for about 12 hours at this time. Take a look at these great post going up from teachers and parents http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=352118040858&v=app_2344061033&ref=ts#!/event.php?eid=196222780424754

The second thing was listening to Old Crow Medicine's "I hear them all" on my walk...There is something about walking, listening, and singing along to :
"I hear the crying of the hungry
In the deserts where they're wandering
Hear them crying out for Heaven's own
Benevolence upon them
Hear destructive power prevailing
I hear fools falsely hailing
To the crooked wits of tyrants when they call"
A person needs music, just like a person needs love, shelter, and hope. The endorsements keep coming into Save Our Schools March, and we have far too many wonderful speakers coming, and all on their own dime. We are marching in the light of god really, and we are marching to DC.

Well, I have my walking shoes on, a pocket full of hope in my pocket, and I can't be stop. So see you in DC,
Jesse

An Save Our Schools Declaration of Independence

Frustrated Educators Aim to Build Grassroots Movement a must read for from Education Week:

http://www.edweek.org/ew/articles/2011/06/15/35activists_ep.h30.html?r=360729170&tkn=QQQFN2lDPQrjoShjlZxECnLo2a5pksQropGv&cmp=clp-edweek#comments 

 Children, parents, and teachers are declaring their independence from NCLB/RTTT this July 30 in Washington.  

Spoken Word Poet Gil Scott-Heron informed America over 40-years ago:

"The revolution will not be televised, will not be televised,
will not be televised, will not be televised.
The revolution will be no re-run brothers;
The revolution will be live."

Let me say it will be live from DC this July 28-31. Revolution is an American right rooted in our nation's independence from the shackles of a Mad King George whose refused to listen to his people.

“But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such government, and to provide new guards for their future security. --Such has been the patient sufferance of these colonies; and such is now the necessity which constrains them to alter their former systems of government.” (1776, Declaration of Independence)

This resistance to NCLB/RTTT is not new it has been going on for a decade at this point. You can find it's foot prints on Susan Ohanian's webage, http://www.susanohanian.org/
For over a decade now the DOE leadership in Washington used it's signature AYP accountability-testing system to push their top down NCLB/RTTT reform model on children, parents, teachers, and schools. After a decade of failed policy the man in the mirror is their policy and leadership not our schools. 
This week even Arne Duncan joins in the NCLB is a failure conversation. "The stakes are high. As it currently exists, NCLB is creating a slow-motion educational train wreck for children, parents and teachers. Under the law, an overwhelming number of schools in the country may soon be labeled as “failing,” eventually triggering impractical and ineffective sanctions." Please someone let Secretary Arne Duncan know he is the engineer driving this train wreck. The missing components in Arne Duncan’s reform policies are the voices of parents and teachers. We have tried, we have begged, and I even walked 400 miles in 40 days from Connecticut to DC last August protesting NCLC/RTTT policies.

“When, in the course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the laws of nature and of nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.” (1776, Declaration of Independence)

For a decade now former Secretaries Ron Page and Margaret Spelling, and current Secretary Arne Duncan have been informing parents, teachers, and legislators that race, poverty, and special needs are excuses for failure. Their golden promise is that school choice and testing-based accountability systems would bring equity to our schools. Nearly a trillion-dollars and a decade later our schools are more segregated than ever, and equity we are told comes in school choice delivered via lotteries and testing. We are told to wait for Superman.  Shame on a United States Department of Education that took federal government eye off the prize access and equity to quality schools for all.

We are marching to DC to take back our schools. Unlike the DOE we don’t have silver bullets, we don’t have simple solutions, or 30 second sound bites.  We are certainly not waiting for Superman, or Bill Gates. However while "NCLB/RTTT" policy is test driven we are driven by a set of guiding principles:

Save our Schools Guiding Principles
For the future of our children, we demand:

Equitable funding for all public school communities

• ·       Equitable funding across all public schools and school systems
• ·       Full public funding of family and community support services
• ·       Full funding for 21^st century school and neighborhood libraries
• ·       An end to economically and racially re-segregated schools

An end to high stakes testing used for the purpose of student, teacher, and school evaluation

• The use of multiple and varied assessments to evaluate students, teachers, and schools
• An end pay per test performance for teachers and administrators
•  An end to public school closures based upon test performance

Teacher, family and community leadership in forming public education policies

• Educator and civic community leadership in drafting new ESEA legislation
• Federal support for local school programs free of punitive and competitive funding
•  An end to political and corporate control of curriculum, instruction and assessment decisions for        teachers and administrators

Curriculum developed for and by local school communities

•  Support for teacher and student access to a wide-range of instructional programs and technologies
• Opportunities for multicultural/multilingual curriculum for all students
• Small class sizes that foster caring, democratic learning communities 

My first 100 miles down, 400 miles to go. See you in DC,
Jesse
Guess what I was listening to day as I reached my first hundred-miles marker? 
It was all Spoken Word Poet and Musician Gil Scott-Heron  "The Revolution will Not Be Televised". I could almost see him smiling down saying march on brother.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rGaRtqrlGy8

S

This is one of those historical lines that makes us who we are!

This is a defining moment. It's one of those historical lines drawn in the sand.  

On one side we have Arne Duncan saying " NCLB/RTTT is a train wreck", and on the other hand we have The Resistance. 

I decided long ago I was joining The Resistance to NCLB/RTTT test em 'till it hurts.  There have been multiple warning signs in Washington that the Department of Education lacks any real credibility in education reform.  In my view, the two  that stand out most  are:

# 1: the First Grade Impact Study Report 2008, this report found Reading First did not produce a statistically significant impact on student reading comprehension test scores in grades one, two or three.  Reading First was the DOE’s silver bullet guarantee to raise the test scores of students in these schools. After spending some $6 billion dollars, there was no "We're sorry parents, teachers, and taxpayers" from the DOE.  Instead they insist we continue to trust them on this, and assure us to stay the course. http://nces.ed.gov/pubsearch/pubsinfo.asp?pubid=NCEE20094038

# 2:  2011 

Recently a Blue-Ribbon Committee of the National Academies of Science concludes there were few learning gains from this testing movement. Say that again ~  "Few learning gains from the testing movement" But, the DOE continues to tell us the testing will save us.   There has been nearly a trillion dollars spent over the last decade on test-based accountability systems, built upon “adequate yearly progress”. What do students, parents, teachers, schools, and taxpayers have to show for it: “little to no positive effect overall on learning and insufficient safeguards against gaming the system” http://www.edweek.org/ew/articles/2011/05/26/33academy.h30.html

If those two major blunders are  not enough for America to start questioning the DOE, Secretary Duncan himself states this week: "The stakes are high. As it currently exists, NCLB is creating a slow-motion educational train wreck for children, parents and teachers. Under the law, an overwhelming number of schools in the country may soon be labeled as “failing,” eventually triggering impractical and ineffective sanctions...."

http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0611/56730.html

Call me crazy, but isn’t Secretary  Arne Duncan the driver of this educational train wreck? His two predecessors, Secretary Ron Page and Secretary Margaret Spellings were no different; we the taxpayers are to believe the problem is everywhere except in the leadership at the Department of Education.   According to Secretary Duncan, it’s congress’s fault for not reauthorizing this oncoming NCLB educational train wreck.

We have a choice, we can ride Arnie’s train, or as Bob Marley sings, we can  “Get up.. Stand up for your rights...Don't give up the fight."  Join me as I march with SOS to Washington DC this July 28-31.  Check out  the article in Education Week by Erick W. Robelen's focusing on Frustrated Educators building a grassroots movement to take control of that educational train wreck ~ the DOE train. http://www.edweek.org/ew/articles/2011/06/15/35activists_ep.h30.html
Educators are drawing the line in Washington DC this July 30 at the Save Our Schools March. 

While CNN, MNBC, and Fox may not yet see our line in DC. The media for the past ten years has not been able to move beyond "can't get enough NCLB" spin.  There are many teachers, parents, and citizens who also can't see beyond that spin.  But this July there will be a few brave souls crossing that line.  Parents and teachers from every state are marching to DC to  fight against the connected, the powerful, and a United States Department of Education that has lost sight of it's mission. 

While CNN, MNBC, and Fox probably won't report our march, make no mistake about it history will remember it.  We will draw our line in the sand fully understanding there will be no victory this July 30th. Instead with hearts full of hope, like Colonel Travis who drew his sword and slowly marked a line in the dirt saying: "I now want every man who is determined to stay here and die with me to come across this line." We are crossing the line hoping to break through the main stream media's spin to awaken a grassroots movement that takes back control of our schools. A grassroots movement that helps children understand there is more to life than test scores. Silence and apathy are not acceptable when it comes to our children. 

Call me crazy, call me naive, call me anything, but don't call me silent and apathetic.

  

Perhaps no one will come.

Perhaps no one will notice.

Perhaps, all we will gain that day is a sun burn.

Maybe CNN will be too busy covering the latest DC sex scandal.

Maybe Secretary Duncan will distract the world with another RTTT spin Press Conference.

Maybe every child in America will reach the 100 percent proficiency mark by July.

So what if parents and teachers march to DC and cross the line from endless spin to action.

What if no one notices, only god?

What if only those who come to DC are the only ones who notice?

Yes, it is so much easier to do nothing.

Yes, it is so much easier to throw up our hands, and remain silent.

Yes indeed,  it is easier to walk away than to walk to DC.

However, what if this is a Shakespearian moment?

What if your High School English teacher was Mrs. Stanfield?

What if you found your very soul in Henry The V, Saint Crispen's speech in her class?

What if when you walk you could hear Henry say:

"He that outlives this day, and comes safe home,  Will stand a tip-toe when this day is nam'd,   And rouse him at the name of Crispian. He that shall live this day, and see old age,   Will yearly on the vigil feast his neighbours,     And say 'To-morrow is Saint Crispian.'     Then will he strip his sleeve and show his scars,   And say 'These wounds I had on Crispian's day.'     Old men forget; yet all shall be forgot,     But he'll remember, with advantages,     What feats he did that day. Then shall our names,     Familiar in his mouth as household words" ?

What if you heard these words, with tears in your eyes as your walk through the rain?

Another 10 miles down, and 410 to go,

Jesse

My walking song of the day:
http://video.search.yahoo.com/video/play?p=bob%20marley%20stand%20up%20utube&tnr=21&vid=996909843622&turl=http%3A%2F%2Fts3.mm.bing.net%2Fvideos%2Fthumbnail.aspx%3Fq%3D996909843622%26id%3Dd1d8913f86d06c5e5e307a2f86b05c8a%26bid%3D3sJug8saOZAOlA%26bn%3DThumb%26url%3Dhttp%253a%252f%252fwww.youtube.com%252fwatch%253fv%253dH5Qda2HS7X0&rurl=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.youtube.com%2Fwatch%3Fv%3DH5Qda2HS7X0&sigr=11aogf26e&newfp=1&tit=Bob+Marley+-+Get+up+%2C+Stand+up