The Answer Sheet: bill gates


Posted at 04:02 AM ET, 05/13/2013

Why video cameras and teacher evaluation do not mix
By Valerie Strauss
Here's why one veteran educator thinks Bill Gates' plan to videotape teachers in their classrooms makes no sense.

By Valerie Strauss  |  04:02 AM ET, 05/13/2013 |  Permalink  |  Comments ( 0)
Tags:  Bill Gates, Bill Gates' Big New Idea, Teacher Evaluation

Posted at 05:00 AM ET, 03/03/2011

The Diane Ravitch myth
By Valerie Strauss
Anybody reading much of the commentary written on education policy could be forgiven for thinking that education historian Diane Ravitch is somehow the Wizardess of Ed, the woman behind the curtain secretly pulling the strings.

By Valerie Strauss  |  05:00 AM ET, 03/03/2011 |  Permalink  |  Comments ( 0)
Categories:  Diane Ravitch | Tags:  arne duncan, bill gates, charter schools, colbert report, diane ravitch, jon stewart, president obama, school reform, whitney tilson

Posted at 08:00 AM ET, 03/02/2011

The Bill Gates problem in school reform
By Valerie Strauss
How our celebrity-obsessed culture affects school reform: If Bill Gates had no money, would anybody care what he has to say about how to fix public schools (especially since he lacks strong evidence to back his positions)?

By Valerie Strauss  |  08:00 AM ET, 03/02/2011 |  Permalink  |  Comments ( 0)
Categories:  Guest Bloggers, School turnarounds/reform | Tags:  bill gates, gates foundation, gates interview, school reform, teacher evaluation teacher effectiveness

Posted at 12:00 PM ET, 01/14/2011

The biggest flaw in Gates value-added study
By Valerie Strauss
Were the conclusions of a major Gates Foundation study on value-added measures to evaluate teachers predetermined?

By Valerie Strauss  |  12:00 PM ET, 01/14/2011 |  Permalink  |  Comments ( 0)
Categories:  Guest Bloggers, Guest Bloggers, Guest Bloggers, Guest Bloggers | Tags:  MET project, MET study, assessing teachers, bill gates, bill gates foundation, gates foundation, teacher assessment, teacher evaluation, value-added, value-added measures

Posted at 11:01 AM ET, 01/13/2011

New analysis challenges Gates study on value-added measures
By Valerie Strauss
A new analysis challenges a Gates Foundation study said to support the validity of value-added measures to evaluate teachers by using students' standardized test scores.

By Valerie Strauss  |  11:01 AM ET, 01/13/2011 |  Permalink  |  Comments ( 0)
Categories:  Research, Research | Tags:  bill gates, gates foundation, gates foundation study, gates-funded research, how to evaluate teachers, teacher assessment, value-added, value-added measures

Posted at 10:30 AM ET, 01/09/2011

How to be taken seriously as a reformer (don't be an educator)
By Valerie Strauss
In the current upside-down world of education policy, there's one foolproof strategy for being taken seriously as a reformer: Make sure you're not an educator. Here, an educator writes about what counts -- and what SHOULD count -- in the school reform debate.

By Valerie Strauss  |  10:30 AM ET, 01/09/2011 |  Permalink  |  Comments ( 0)
Categories:  Guest Bloggers, Guest Bloggers, Guest Bloggers, Guest Bloggers | Tags:  Illiinois schools, Performance Counts, bill gates, eli broad, jeb bush, mark zuckerberg, obama and schools, obama daughters and school, oprah, performance counts, president obama and daughters, school reform, sidwell and obama, standardized tests, teacher assessment, teachers

Posted at 02:00 PM ET, 01/03/2011

A response to Arne Duncan
By Valerie Strauss
Here's a response to a piece Education Secretary Arne Duncan wrote in The Washington Post today.

By Valerie Strauss  |  02:00 PM ET, 01/03/2011 |  Permalink  |  Comments ( 0)
Categories:  Education Secretary Duncan, Education Secretary Duncan | Tags:  arne duncan, bill gates, education secretary arne duncan, esea, nclb, no child left behind, school reform, testing industry

Posted at 12:00 PM ET, 12/18/2010

Will firing 5-10 percent of teachers make us Finland?
By Valerie Strauss
Michelle Rhee and Bill Gates like to say that our public schools would become high-performing if we only fired the bottom 5-10 percent of teachers. Here's an examination of that notion.

By Valerie Strauss  |  12:00 PM ET, 12/18/2010 |  Permalink  |  Comments ( 0)
Categories:  Research, Research, Research, Research | Tags:  assessing teachers, bill gates, eric hanushek, evaluating teachers, finland, michelle rhee, shankar blog, teachers

Posted at 11:39 AM ET, 12/07/2010

Ravitch to Gates: Let's talk
By Valerie Strauss
Education historian Diane Ravitch invites Bill Gates to a public discussion on education reform, and explains why public schools must remain public.

By Valerie Strauss  |  11:39 AM ET, 12/07/2010 |  Permalink  |  Comments ( 0)
Categories:  Guest Bloggers, Guest Bloggers | Tags:  bill gates, checker finn, diane ravitch, education policy, federal control of schools, local control of schools, obama and school reform, republicans in congress, school reform, school reform policies, wall street journal

Posted at 05:00 AM ET, 11/30/2010

Ravitch answers Gates
By Valerie Strauss
Bill Gates, in an article by Jonathan Alter of Newsweek, poses some questions to education historian Diane Ravitch, who Alter inexplicably calls the Microsoft founder's "chief adversary." Here she answers Gates' questions.

By Valerie Strauss  |  05:00 AM ET, 11/30/2010 |  Permalink  |  Comments ( 0)
Categories:  Diane Ravitch, Diane Ravitch | Tags:  bill gates, charter schools, diane ravitch, jonathan alter, microsoft, newsweek, school reform, teachers

Posted at 12:46 PM ET, 11/20/2010

Why teaching experience really matters
By Valerie Strauss
Bill Gates just urged school districts and states to stop rewarding teachers for their experience in the classroom and/or advanced education degrees. Arne Duncan makes the same argument. But evidence shows that teaching experience DOES matter.

By Valerie Strauss  |  12:46 PM ET, 11/20/2010 |  Permalink  |  Comments ( 0)
Categories:  Guest Bloggers, Guest Bloggers, Guest Bloggers, Guest Bloggers | Tags:  arne duncan, bill gates, class size, does experience matter, education department, education secretary duncan, lowering class size, raising class size, research on class size, research on teaching experience, school reform, schools, shankar blog, standardized tests, teacher experience, teacher pay, teacher quality, teacher salaries, teachers, teaching experience, value added

Posted at 06:00 AM ET, 11/11/2010

De-legitimizing public education
By Valerie Strauss
The quality of American education is going to get worse. Count on it. And contrary to the conventional wisdom, the main reason isn’t going to be the loss of funding accompanying economic hard times. Educator Marion Brady explains why.

By Valerie Strauss  |  06:00 AM ET, 11/11/2010 |  Permalink  |  Comments ( 0)
Categories:  Guest Bloggers, Guest Bloggers, Guest Bloggers | Tags:  bill gates, marion brady, public education, school reform

Posted at 06:00 AM ET, 10/19/2010

How billionaire donors harm public education
By Valerie Strauss
Today the foundation set up by billionaires Eli and Edythe Broad is giving $2 million to an urban school district that has pursued education reform that they like. On Friday a Florida teacher is going to run 50 miles to raise money so that he and his fellow teachers don’t have to spend their own money to buy paper and pencils, binders (1- and 2-inch), spiral notebooks, composition books, printer ink. Together the two events show the perverted way schools are funded.

By Valerie Strauss  |  06:00 AM ET, 10/19/2010 |  Permalink  |  Comments ( 0)
Categories:  School turnarounds/reform, School turnarounds/reform | Tags:  bill gates, broad prize, charter schools, eli broad, facebook, mark zuckerberg, newark schools, school reform

Posted at 01:02 PM ET, 09/21/2010

Oprah and her warrior woman, Michelle Rhee
By Valerie Strauss
When Oprah Winfrey aired “Waiting For Superman - The Movie That Can Transform America’s Schools,” on her television show, viewers should have realized that they were watching an entertainment show with a show woman -- not an educator -- as host. Guests Michelle Rhee, Bill Gates and Davis Guggenheim all played their parts, not letting facts get in the way.

By Valerie Strauss  |  01:02 PM ET, 09/21/2010 |  Permalink  |  Comments ( 0)
Categories:  D.C. Schools | Tags:  bill gates, bill gates and oprah, d.c. schools, davis guggenheim, guggenheim film, michelle rhee, michelle rhee and oprah winfrey, oprah, oprah and gates and rhee, oprah and rhee, oprah show, oprah winfrey, rhee on oprah, school reform and rhee, waiting for superman, waiting for superman and rhee, will rhee go?, will rhee stay?

Posted at 06:00 AM ET, 09/20/2010

Has education reform jumped the shark? A teacher says 'yes'
By Valerie Strauss
A veteran teacher looks at recent events in the education world and concludes that yes, indeed, education reform has jumped the shark, and the signs of its collapse are everywhere.

By Valerie Strauss  |  06:00 AM ET, 09/20/2010 |  Permalink  |  Comments ( 0)
Categories:  Guest Bloggers, Guest Bloggers, Guest Bloggers, Guest Bloggers | Tags:  anthony cody, arne duncan, bill gates, education nation, gates on oprah, michelle rhee, nbc education nation, oprah, race to the top, rhee on oprah, teachers and reform, teachers town hall

Posted at 11:15 AM ET, 07/12/2010

How Gates is spending money on school reform
By Valerie Strauss
My colleague Nick Anderson's story about Bill Gates explains how Gates is spending hundreds of millions of dollars in public education.

By Valerie Strauss  |  11:15 AM ET, 07/12/2010 |  Permalink  |  Comments ( 0)
Tags:  bill & melinda gates foundation, bill gates, gates foundation and public education, gates foundation and schools, nick anderson

Posted at 06:30 AM ET, 07/12/2010

Bill Gates' troubling involvement in school reform
By Valerie Strauss
Bill Gates is surely smart and rich, but his involvement in public education is highly troubling for a number of reasons. Here's why.

By Valerie Strauss  |  06:30 AM ET, 07/12/2010 |  Permalink  |  Comments ( 0)
Categories:  Teachers | Tags:  bill gates, bill gates and teachers, bill gates at aft convention, gates foundation and education, gates foundation and race to the top, gates speech to teachers, teachers

Posted at 06:30 AM ET, 04/22/2010

Bill Gates's college tour
By Valerie Strauss
Bill Gates just finished his three-day 2010 College Tour, during which he went five of the country's most elite schools and urged the brightest minds to work on overcoming the world's biggest problems. In the United States, urban education is one of those problems, but Gates's own record on school reform is hardly stellar.

By Valerie Strauss  |  06:30 AM ET, 04/22/2010 |  Permalink  |  Comments ( 0)
Tags:  Bill Gates, Bill Gates and college tour, gates foundation, gates foundation and education reform