Who is refusing Common Core tests for 3rd-8th graders?

[undertheradar]

There is a theory going around (I personally don't believe it) about the Sport Turf fields possibly causing cancer because of the carcinogens in the chopped up rubber.

Certainly possible, they heat up much higher than natural grass.

 

[sam_gordon]

Certainly possible, they heat up much higher than natural grass.

As I understand it, it's not the temperature, it's that people think athletes are inhaling the pellets.

 

[Colleen27]

Yet these fields have a general life expectation of 10-15 years. That is if the district follows all of the care guidelines and performs the manufacturer required maintenance. Since so many of these fields are in constant use(school teams, youth teams, adult leagues), they have a much shorter use life. The skin burns that participants experience from falling on the turf is a constant reminder that there is a bigger risk of injury on these fields. Our California district has these fields at all 3 high schools and every field has been replaced well before 15 years.

Yeah, I think the popularity of turf fields are a big part of the reason UnderArmor's warm-weather line is so successful. DS wears long sleeves to practice year-round, just switching out the insulating for the sweat-wicking as weather demands. Between the pellets and the burns I'm not a huge fan of turf, though DS says it is a softer landing when he takes a hard hit so it does have that going for it. But our field here has held up well. It is 12 years old and they're replacing it this summer. The warranty on the new one is 10 years, so I assume that will be the bare minimum useable life to expect from it. And we have two high schools and two middle schools all sharing a field, so it does see heavy use. It probably helps that each high school has its own (grass, not maintained to game-quality) practice field, though - the only time the stadium is in use is for games.

In California, wouldn't the watering demands alone make natural grass difficult and expensive to maintain? Or are you not in a drought-prone part of the state?

 

[undertheradar]

Yeah, I think the popularity of turf fields are a big part of the reason UnderArmor's warm-weather line is so successful. DS wears long sleeves to practice year-round, just switching out the insulating for the sweat-wicking as weather demands. Between the pellets and the burns I'm not a huge fan of turf, though DS says it is a softer landing when he takes a hard hit so it does have that going for it. But our field here has held up well. It is 12 years old and they're replacing it this summer. The warranty on the new one is 10 years, so I assume that will be the bare minimum useable life to expect from it. And we have two high schools and two middle schools all sharing a field, so it does see heavy use. It probably helps that each high school has its own (grass, not maintained to game-quality) practice field, though - the only time the stadium is in use is for games.

In California, wouldn't the watering demands alone make natural grass difficult and expensive to maintain? Or are you not in a drought-prone part of the state?

The fields were replaced with field turf under the theory of water conservation. There are still natural grass practice fields that have to be watered and mowed, so the savings is minimal. Just looks great on film. My son's high school field has been used for numerous sports commercials, feature films, and tv shows. The high school gym is rented out weekly for celebrity basketball games.

 

[JanaDee]

Those that are getting these new fields need to prepare by buying as much sleeved gear as possible, along with keeping gear bags or bins in your vehicles that the participants using these fields will be riding in(marching band and drill team, besides athletes and coaches), as you will have little black pellets from the shredded tires that are part of the field base in all shoes, socks, gear, that comes into contact with the field. Schools getting these fields for the first time need to invest in eye rinse, as the pellets fly during activity on the turf.

Not to mention in their lungs.

 

[Happy Snowman]

Way to much is spent on sports as far as I am concerned. We are getting all new turf fields at two schools in my districts at the cost of millions of dollars yet the kids have outdated or no textbooks.

Facilities and maintenance are separate budget line-items vs operating costs (books, salaries, etc.) and in most districts, those are separate bond or levy items on ballots as well. Our district is putting in turf, however, the funds raised to do that came directly from the booster clubs using those fields...and it wasn't the football team that kicked in the most money....it was the band. Most of our kids' classes have online textbooks now (or did when they were in high school).

 

[undertheradar]

Don't forget the dust, you are filthy after leaving those fields.

 

[aprilgail]

I guess the next question to ask though is where is the money coming from? Sports can bring in big bucks to schools.

I don't see how that would be- uniforms and equipment cost money, coaches cost money, busing them to games cost money and no money is brought in- high school football is not a big deal here, for the games you are lucky if parents of the kids come to see the games never mind anyone without a child on the team!

 

[undertheradar]

I don't see how that would be- uniforms and equipment cost money, coaches cost money, busing them to games cost money and no money is brought in- high school football is not a big deal here, for the games you are lucky if parents of the kids come to see the games never mind anyone without a child on the team!

When our son played high school football, our costs were an easy $2000 per year. Multiply that by the number of players in large programs. Our freshman team would start out with around 115 kids BEFORE all of the required Summer participation began. It would drop to smaller group of 50-60. The game isn't as easy as it is when you are playing it on Madden!

 

[Happy Snowman]

I don't see how that would be- uniforms and equipment cost money, coaches cost money, busing them to games cost money and no money is brought in- high school football is not a big deal here, for the games you are lucky if parents of the kids come to see the games never mind anyone without a child on the team!

Gate and concession fees help support programs but at least around here, the booster clubs end up paying for a lot of the costs. The schools have a certain number of coaches they pay, 3 I think for football. The rest of the staff is either volunteer or gets paid from the booster clubs. Uniforms are purchased via booster clubs as is most equipment. The team gets a small budget for equipment and transportation, everything above that, fundraising pays for. Overall, however, it is still a very, very small portion of a school's budget. One textbook costs WAY more than a football jersey.

 

[Colleen27]

I don't see how that would be- uniforms and equipment cost money, coaches cost money, busing them to games cost money and no money is brought in- high school football is not a big deal here, for the games you are lucky if parents of the kids come to see the games never mind anyone without a child on the team!

It depends on how the program is handled and how popular a given sport is in the area. Boosters provide most of the uniforms and equipment here, and the school makes a fair sum on football admissions ($5 per person with hundreds of people at every game, as many as a couple thousand during the playoffs). But like with college sports, that sort of marquee program is an exception - all the other sports, even the more popular ones like baseball or basketball and especially the costly ones like swimming and the ones that attract almost no audience like cross country, do cost the district money. Not a ton (well, except swim/dive - maintaining the pool is a big expense that is only partially offset by renting it out for rec dept. use), but most teams are expenses.

 

[nugov2]

When our son played high school football, our costs were an easy $2000 per year. Multiply that by the number of players in large programs. Our freshman team would start out with around 115 kids BEFORE all of the required Summer participation began. It would drop to smaller group of 50-60. The game isn't as easy as it is when you are playing it on Madden!

That's how it is here too. Our costs to play sports in HS are very expensive.

 

[IDoDis]

Great article.

http://amomssparetime.blogspot.com/2015/03/sowhy-is-everyone-so-upset-its-just.html

 

[Happy Snowman]

Great article.

http://amomssparetime.blogspot.com/2015/03/sowhy-is-everyone-so-upset-its-just.html

She needs to get into the real world. In most schools these days, kids in 3rd grade are not 8, they start keyboarding in kindergarten and by 3rd grade can type very well. Our kids had essay questions like that way back when. Not ALL of the questions on the test are that involved either. See, standardized testing tests many levels, from the very basic up to the very difficult. Most kids won't be able to answer them all, and that is the point. Some kids will, and again, that is the point--the are a measure of where your child stands at that point and time. She's also looking at the results wrong. The tests are not there to garner material for her lesson plans, they are there to see if the students are working at grade level. If every student in her class performed below grade level, well, that would tell her something wouldn't it. It doesn't tell her that the material in section 3 on page 12 is something she should teach, it tells her that her students aren't grasping what she is teaching. I bet if someone came to her and complained that students in 4th grade couldn't read, she would fall back on her standardized tests and say "see, they were fine here...".

This is not a great blog.

 

[jodifla]

http://www.plunderbund.com/2015/02/22/do-parcc-reading-passages-exceed-tested-grade-levels/

Setting up kids to fail:

Do PARCC Reading Passages Exceed Tested Grade Levels?

Using an online tool — Readability-Score.com — we followed-up on readers’ tips and have independently analyzed the reading levels of every single passage on all of the PARCC practice reading tests. Our analysis reveals that the majority of the passages are above the grade level for which the test is designed. With the actual PARCC assessments hidden from public view, this analysis is all that can be performed objectively and we must assume that these tests are an accurate representation of the those that students will be taking that will determine their “ability” and be used to assign grades to Ohio’s teachers, schools, and districts.

Each grade level (3-8) has two practice tests available. The first is the Performance-Based Assessment (PBA) that is to be given in February, and an End Of Year (EOY) test that is given in April. The results you’ll see are reported by a number where the whole number represents the grade and the decimal represents the month. For example, a reading level of 5.4 means that the reading selection is appropriate for the fifth grade, fourth month (i.e., approximately December of Grade 5).


It’s one thing to provide enough “stretch” on the assessments to allow advanced students to demonstrate higher ability, but when more than half of the test questions are based on these higher-level passages, even the “average” student is likely going to obtain a result that is not reflective of his/her true knowledge or ability (specifically see EOY assessments for grades 4-7).

 

[AnAmericanInDisney]

Facilities and maintenance are separate budget line-items vs operating costs (books, salaries, etc.) and in most districts, those are separate bond or levy items on ballots as well. Our district is putting in turf, however, the funds raised to do that came directly from the booster clubs using those fields...and it wasn't the football team that kicked in the most money....it was the band. Most of our kids' classes have online textbooks now (or did when they were in high school).

Voters have to pay for bond issues as well as operating costs. In our state, those aren't voted on by the public but just approved by the school board. Not enough businesses to support all the high school sports fields in this area.

Football stadiums, equipment, trainers, uniforms are the biggest sports expenses here. Maybe 9 paid coaches and many volunteers, with dwindling participation. What was once an elite program, just isn't anymore. These upper middle class kids just don't want the concussion risk, so they all play soccer and golf, which could be easily done with clubs. Gate at football games is probably $3000 each for 6 or 7 games, so not enough to pay off a stadium that costs millions. Even if they share it with other sports, a stadium would never generate enough revenue to pay for itself. Then, we have the teaching positions just created for the football coaches to fill.

It's a thousand times worse at the college level, of course.

 

[Happy Snowman]

Voters have to pay for bond issues as well as operating costs. In our state, those aren't voted on by the public but just approved by the school board. Not enough businesses to support all the high school sports fields in this area.

Football stadiums, equipment, trainers, uniforms are the biggest sports expenses here. Maybe 9 paid coaches and many volunteers, with dwindling participation. What was once an elite program, just isn't anymore. These upper middle class kids just don't want the concussion risk, so they all play soccer and golf, which could be easily done with clubs. Gate at football games is probably $3000 each for 6 or 7 games, so not enough to pay off a stadium that costs millions. Even if they share it with other sports, a stadium would never generate enough revenue to pay for itself. Then, we have the teaching positions just created for the football coaches to fill.

It's a thousand times worse at the college level, of course.

Most college facilities are paid for via private donations. Most football programs are at minimum, self-sustaining. The lesser sports, not so much. I think it would be worth your time to really examine how the school budgets work...both at the high school and college level. I'd also be very suspect of a school district that gives 100% control to the school board over which taxes they levy to pay for the schools.

 

[IndyRnRfan]

On the subject of schools, testing, and funding. The U.S. is not at the top of the list but in a reasonable spot for first world countries when it comes to per capita student spending, but other countries do not spend money on sports like we do. There are no high school football stadiums, no giant high school basketball gyms, no uniforms, no coaches' salaries, etc. Their sports are community and club based. I wonder if we took out all of the high school spending on sports, whether our per capita spending would be in the middle of the list or more toward the bottom.

It's a thousand times worse at the college level, of course.

In Indiana and quite a few other states, not one penny of collected tax payer dollars goes to funding high school sports or sports in any grade level. All sports money is funded by the athletic department which gets its money from tickets, concessions, fund raisers, and donations. Many school districts even require each specific sport to cover its own bus transportation. That includes stadiums, fields, equipment, etc... Many high schools in our state are going to all turf fields. Cost vary from $200,00-$400,000. All that money is donated or raised and cannot come from tax collected funds.

Now, if you want to build a new stadium or field they can ask for a referendum which must be voted on by the public in the next election. Then, that money can be used for such things.

 

[AnAmericanInDisney]

Most college facilities are paid for via private donations. Most football programs are at minimum, self-sustaining. The lesser sports, not so much. I think it would be worth your time to really examine how the school budgets work...both at the high school and college level. I'd also be very suspect of a school district that gives 100% control to the school board over which taxes they levy to pay for the schools.

It's not the school district decision, who has power over taxes levied is decided legislatively at the state level.

You are thinking of major D1 football programs, which are supported by major donors and self-sustaining. Smaller state schools' programs and their stadiums are paid for with tax dollars, as are natatoriums, travel for sports programs, etc. These are a drain on education dollars, and let's face it, how many of those kids are going to play football professionally or swim in the Olympics? If you aren't D1, what's the point in the program? I suggest you look into this subject a little further.

 

[undertheradar]

http://www.plunderbund.com/2015/02/22/do-parcc-reading-passages-exceed-tested-grade-levels/

Setting up kids to fail:

Do PARCC Reading Passages Exceed Tested Grade Levels?

Using an online tool — Readability-Score.com — we followed-up on readers’ tips and have independently analyzed the reading levels of every single passage on all of the PARCC practice reading tests. Our analysis reveals that the majority of the passages are above the grade level for which the test is designed. With the actual PARCC assessments hidden from public view, this analysis is all that can be performed objectively and we must assume that these tests are an accurate representation of the those that students will be taking that will determine their “ability” and be used to assign grades to Ohio’s teachers, schools, and districts.

Each grade level (3-8) has two practice tests available. The first is the Performance-Based Assessment (PBA) that is to be given in February, and an End Of Year (EOY) test that is given in April. The results you’ll see are reported by a number where the whole number represents the grade and the decimal represents the month. For example, a reading level of 5.4 means that the reading selection is appropriate for the fifth grade, fourth month (i.e., approximately December of Grade 5).


It’s one thing to provide enough “stretch” on the assessments to allow advanced students to demonstrate higher ability, but when more than half of the test questions are based on these higher-level passages, even the “average” student is likely going to obtain a result that is not reflective of his/her true knowledge or ability (specifically see EOY assessments for grades 4-7).

This is a UK based website. Averages 5000 hits per day and is rated as poor performing by numerous websites. Any credible sources or still just grass roots stuff?