Another Brick in the Wall

I brought three "dates" to Pinky and the Floyd last night at the sold out, newly refurbished Wilson Auditorium. Here is a performance by the group a few years back supported by the Bozeman High School choir.




The chorus,

We don't need no education 
We don't need no thought control
No dark sarcasm in the classroom
Teachers leave them kids alone
Hey! teachers! leave the kids alone!
All in all you're just another brick in the wall 
All in all you're just another brick in the wall.

Meanwhile, in other news in Bozeman, another brick was added.

Bozeman schools weigh trying again with Common Core test 

Gail Schontzler, Chronicle Staff Writer

Posted: Friday, April 17, 2015 6:48 pm

Anyone who has ever seen their computer freeze up — and watched as a colorful wheel spins round and round while nothing happens — knows how frustrating it must have been for Bozeman educators when they tried this week to give students the Common Core online tests.

“The wheel of death,” as Robin Miller, the Bozeman schools curriculum and assessment director, called it.

Miller said the new Common Core tests had been given successfully last week and Monday, despite a couple glitches. Monday the test took four minutes to load.

“We were forging ahead,” Miller said.

But on Tuesday morning she was at Chief Joseph Middle School with a test support team and about 120 sixth-graders, when the math performance test wouldn’t run. It took about 20 minutes to load all the tests, and then the teacher’s screen froze, which meant kids couldn’t start.

Montana’s Office of Public Instruction halted testing Wednesday for 77,000 Montana students. OPI offered schools waivers to the mandatory tests, though Denise Juneau, state superintendent of schools, said she expected most schools would move forward with it. She extended the testing “window” to June.