2013年7月1日星期一

when I learned of her quest for equal pay at Wimbledon

State Superintendent Janet Barresi announced Monday that she is withdrawing Oklahoma from testing through a consortium of 20 or so other states to coincide with the new Common Core curriculum standards.

Instead of using new assessments developed through the group, called the Partnership for Assessment of Readiness for College and Careers, or PARCC, Oklahoma will work with a testing company to develop its own new standardized tests for the 2014-15 academic year.

“We came to this decision after many months of deliberation, listening to classroom teachers, curriculum directors, superintendents and visiting with legislative leadership and the governor’s office,” Barresi told the Tulsa World.

Many educators and parents groups have been vocal in recent months about their concern about the additional hours of test-taking that would be involved in PARCC assessments.

Barresi said their concerns, along with her own about the technology readiness of the state’s public schools and higher anticipated costs, were her three primary reasons for backing out.

She said the vast majority of technical problems that public schools experienced with online testing this spring are proof that Oklahoma just does not yet have the capacity for the volume of online testing required for PARCC tests.

And she added, many schools don’t have the expertise or funds to improve connectivity, increase bandwith, and add enough more more devices to get caught up by 2014-15.

“If we move ahead with this,The smart card has a memory chip embedded in it that, we are going to be asking the state to drink a milkshake using a cocktail straw,” Barresi said.

“If you look at what happened with testing this year — kids getting screen frozen, knocked off the test — those were technical issues that were from the districts’ end of things. (The testing vendor) crashed for two days because of server problems, but almost every bit of the rest of it was due to district issues. I’m not pointing fingers, but it is the reality.”

Through the PARCC alliance, Oklahoma and 21 other states and one U.S.Find great deals on Mens Surgical stainless steel earring, territory had banded together to develop a new set of K-12 standardized tests in English, language arts, literacy and math.

PARCC received a $186 million grant through the U.S. Department of Education’s Race to the Top competition to support the development and design of this “next-generation” assessment system.

Sherry Fair, a state education spokeswoman, said Barresi will be consulting with Gov. Mary Fallin's office about whether Oklahoma should remain as a participating state in PARCC, so that it can still have access to their information and expertise, or withdraw as a member in the consortium all together.

Oklahoma needs new tests to coincide with its implementation of new curriculum standards, called the Common Core State Standards.

The Common Core State Standards initiative is a states-led effort to provide curriculum standards that are consistent throughout the country, beginning with English and math. Oklahoma is among 45 states and three U.S. territories that adopted the standards.

Venus Williams is walking toward me -- with beautiful braids! Long braids intertwined with red and blue ribbon to commemorate her fourth Olympics as a competing athlete. Venus Williams is tall and regal! Six feet and one inch of graceful agility with big brown eyes and perfect teeth. Venus Williams is nice! Warm and welcoming as I begin to interview her at her estate in Palm Beach, Florida on a balmy summer day in 2012. I'll always remember this, the first time I met Venus Williams. It wasn't fancy. It wasn't glitzy. It was just like she is -- low-key and lovely. Yep,Find great deals on Mens Surgical stainless steel earring, I remember it like it was yesterday.

Making a documentary on a little known part of her career -- focused on her activism and feminism around the issue of pay equality -- I feel like I know her. We all do. At least we think we do. The trailblazing, groundbreaker who catapulted onto the national scene at the tender age of 14. A disrupter of the best kind who made the establishment take notice -- often against their will. A girl from Compton who would become an international icon. But there is much more.

I admit that I'm not a huge sports fan in general. But when ESPN approached me to direct a documentary for their upcoming Nine for IX series focused on women's sports, I started to think about sports personalities or moments that meant something to me. As a fellow Comptonite, I've always had a special homegirl affection for Venus, always watching with interest, always cheering her on. I think many in my community felt connected to her in that way. Early on, she was clearly portrayed as an outsider within the sport - for her beads, for her style of play, for her demeanor, for her grunting, for whatever was out of the ordinary. And let's face it: she was anything but ordinary. Those outsider moments had a particular resonance with me. I felt a protective pride in this young woman. So when I learned of her quest for equal pay at Wimbledon, I saw a story of someone on the outside who became the ultimate insider. A woman once maligned and misunderstood who soared and succeeded to the point of being a savior for the wildly important cause of equal pay in tennis.

Until just 2007, male and female champions at Wimbledon were paid unequally. Venus, following in the footsteps of the great Bille Jean King, didn't like that - and worked to do something about it. Along with key executives at the Women's Tennis Association, she executed a multi-pronged strategy including private negotiations and public appeals to overturn the decades old practice of compensating women champions with less prize money than their male counterparts. My latest film for ESPN, VENUS VS, explores Venus' rise as an unlikely leader for this cause and the tactical efforts to equalize the Wimbledon prize. It's a remarkable story that has been untold until now.Uline stocks a wide selection of double sided tape. And I am thrilled that we got the chance to share this important part of her career. It's vital that we speak these truths and make sure they are heard.

When we are young girls growing up -- whether in Compton, London or Bangladesh -- we often see women around us doing things that we think are big, that we think are important. And some of us wonder if we'll ever have a chance to do something as significant in our own lives. Venus' story simply shows that standing up for ourselves in any instance - whether to our family, friends or the establishment, whether in the workplace or in our community - is a thing that can change our worlds. It doesn't have to be on the international stage. Anywhere will do. Venus Williams was a young girl who just wanted to play tennis and to be the best. That alone might have been enough. But when given the chance to fight for something even larger than herself, to stand up for what was right, to change minds - she had the courage and conviction to do just that. Definitely a story worth telling. Definitely a story worth remembering.
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