California To Submit New Race To The Top Application.
The San Francisco Chronicle (5/1, Tucker) reports California will “throw its hat into the ring for the chance to win $700 million in the second round of federal Race to the Top funds despite the state’s arguably long odds and dismal showing in the last round, state officials said Friday.” State Secretary of Education Bonnie Reiss said the state “would need to vault from 27th place – out of 40 applicants – in round one to a spot among serious contenders – something that will require a complete revamp of the application.” This time, “six district superintendents, representing more than 1 million students in California, will craft the application rather than Sacramento policy wonks,” and it will “shine a spotlight on what those districts are already doing to turn around struggling schools, evaluate and support teachers and principals and measure student performance.”

The Los Angeles Times (5/1, Blume) reports the “names of the three largest districts, including L.A. Unified, had been disclosed in an article this week in The Times,” and Long Beach Unified and Fresno Unified “also were taking part.” But officials “revealed Friday that three other districts wanted to be involved as well: San Francisco Unified and two Fresno-area districts: Clovis Unified and Sanger Unified.” The state “developed a new strategy: A few districts would pursue reforms more specific and more aggressive than in the original state submission.”

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In the Classroom
DC’s Wilson High School Shows Academic Improvement.
The Washington Post (5/3, Mathews) reports Woodrow Wilson High School in Northwest Washington, “still struggles with the effects of poverty on student achievement,” but the “number of tardy students has dropped, attendance is up to a school record 86 percent, the percentage of black and Hispanic students on the honor roll is rising and on some academic measures, Wilson is leaving affluent suburban schools behind.” On “the Challenge Index that I use in The Washington Post and Newsweek to rate high schools by college-level test participation, Wilson ranks 15th among 172 local high schools. It does significantly better than almost all suburban schools with smaller percentages of low-income students, such as the excellent Severna Park in Anne Arundel County (3 percent) or Briar Woods in Loudoun County (6 percent).”

NYTimes Praises New Haven’s Teacher Evaluation System.
The New York Times (5/3, A24, 1.09M) editorializes, “To improve the quality of schools, districts need a rigorous system for evaluating the quality of teaching — rewarding teachers who do their jobs best and retraining or removing those who fail their students. The city of New Haven and the American Federation of Teachers deserve high praise for the new teacher training and evaluation system they unveiled earlier this week,” which “what can go right when school districts and unions work together. … New Haven moves ahead, it could quickly find itself at the forefront of the national effort to improve the caliber of instruction in the public schools.”

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On the Job
Indiana Educators Protest Letter Grades For Schools.
The Indianapolis Star (4/30, Gammill) reported, “Dozens of teachers and administrators from Indiana schools packed an Indiana State Board of Education hearing today to object to a state plan that would give each of the state’s schools letter grades from A through F.” Such schemes have been implemented in states such as Florida and New York. One teacher testified, “The proposed labels do not…give a complete and honest picture of school improvement and performance.”

Maryland Measure Would Tie Teacher Evaluations To Student Performance.
The Delmarva Daily Times (5/2, McKinney) reported, “In an effort to attract more federal dollars, a new state regulation basing half of teacher and principal evaluations on student performance is being crafted.” The regulation is part of Maryland’s pursuit of Race to the Top funding. State Superintendent of Schools Nancy S. Grasmick said, “Adding growth in student achievement to our evaluation system is a sensible approach to strengthen learning. It places children and their learning exactly where they should be, at the center of what we do in Maryland public schools.” However, “teacher representatives say the regulation could facilitate the unfair removal of teachers for circumstances beyond their control.”

Law & Policy
Secretary Duncan Touts Race To The Top Program.
The Denver Post (5/3) runs an op-ed by Secretary Duncan, who highlights the “theory behind the Race to the Top competition,” that “with the right financial incentives and sensible goals, states, districts and other stakeholders will forge new partnerships, revise outmoded laws and practices, and fashion far-reaching reforms. Despite the fact that the $4 billion Race to the Top program represents less than 1 percent of overall K-12 funding in America, it has been working.”

Florida Group To Apply For Success Zone Grant.
The Florida Times-Union (5/3, Sanders) reports an Arlington nonprofit “will apply for a coveted federal planning grant on behalf of the city’s New Town Success Zone project, officials said Thursday.” The Department of Education’s Promise Neighborhood program “is scheduled to be announced today and will award up to $500,000 in year-long planning grants to 20 organizations.” Promise Neighborhood is “based on the Harlem Children’s Zone, which uses a conveyer-belt system of programs to help children living in a 97-block area go from ‘cradle to college.’”

Kansas Extends Deadline For High School Grant Applications.
The Topeka Capital-Journal (5/3, Bush) reports Douglass Austin, “a representative from Cross & Joftus who is writing the grant for Highland Park High School, told Topeka Unified School board members at a special meeting the deadline has been moved back a few days.” The state “had established a date of May 1 as the deadline for turning in grant applications,” but “date has been extended to May 6. Kansas is anticipating receiving more than $22 million in Title 1 School Improvement Grants.”

Detroit Schools Official Says Teach For America Returning To Detroit.
The Detroit Free Press (5/2, Dawsey) reported that, while speaking at the graduation ceremony for the University of Michigan’s School of Education, “Detroit Public Schools emergency financial manager Robert Bobb announced that he will sign a contract next week to bring the well-known Teach for America program back to the city in the fall.” The article noted, “In recent years, U-M graduates have led the nation in TFA recruits, but they have not worked in Detroit for several years because of budget cuts.” However, “Keith Johnson, Detroit Federation of Teachers president, said Bobb’s announcement was premature because about 2,000 DPS teachers got layoff notices in April.”

Special Needs
Experts: Align Testing For Special Ed, At-Risk Students.
Education Daily (5/3, Riley) reports, “Federal education policies that are closely aligned can more effectively promote how at-risk students and those with disabilities are assessed in the future, several experts suggest in comments on reauthorizing ESEA.” Judith Moening, executive director for special education for the North East Independent School District in San Antonio, said that “Congress should ‘end the separate parallel educational system created by the IDEA’” even as the Education Department develops growth models that hold schools accountable for students progress but not penalize them in the short term. “Aimee Guidera, executive director of the Data Quality Campaign, points to the need for federal policies to include requirements related to longitudinal data,” which, besides tracking students’ performance, “helps determine the efficiencies of specific schools, policies and programs while it identifies best practices from consistently high-performing teachers and schools.”

Safety & Security
Manchester, New Hampshire, Addressing Student-On-Faculty Violence.
The New Hampshire Union Leader (5/3, Brooks) reports from Manchester that the city is looking to address student-on-faculty violence, noting that “more than half” of the roughly “450 claims for worker’s compensation in 2008 and 2009″ were tied to such incidents. “About a decade ago, the district made a push to teach faculty members what to do when a student becomes aggressive,” but funding for such training was discontinued “several years ago,” and “since then, the number of instructors certified to teach violence prevention methods has dwindled.” However, the training has been reintroduced at one school, where according to one administrator, “the kids are responding.”

Investigation Of Pennsylvania School District’s Use Of Laptop Webcams Expands.
USA Today (5/3, Moore) reports as “the result of a student lawsuit, Lower Merion School District has admitted theft-tracking software for the district’s 2,600 student laptops activated webcams and automatically snapped photos of kids in school and at home. Over two years, the district captured 56,000 images, including shots of students and the images on their computers.” USA adds that in addition to the student lawsuit, there is a Federal investigation underway. The “unusual case of school-sanctioned spying – and the national and international publicity it has caused – has roiled the leafy precincts of Bryn Mawr, Gladwyne and other communities in Lower Merion Township, a well-heeled area of Philadelphia’s Main Line suburbs.”

School Finance
DC CFO Won’t Certify Teachers Deal.
The Washington Post (5/1, Turque) reported that DC CFO Natwar M. Gandhi “told the D.C. Council on Friday that the city remains short of the money needed to pay for raises in a proposed new teachers’ contract and that he is not ready to declare the deal fiscally sound,” so “uncertainty about the pact, hailed nationally as a groundbreaking plan that rewards teachers for performance rather than seniority, will continue at least for the near future.” He said that $21 million available from four private foundations cannot be used to pay teacher salaries due to the conditions on the money. Chancellor Michelle A. Rhee said the District is attempting to “persuade the private funders…to modify their requirements.” She added that “her staff was working on a package of reductions that would fill the gaps in the contract and the current budget but did not offer much detail.”

Also in the News
Education Department Changes Hold Music To “Schoolhouse Rock.”
ABC News (4/30, Bruce) reported, “The Education Department is rocking the hold line — entertaining and educating callers one call at a time.” It replaced its hold music with “the tunes of ‘Schoolhouse Rock’.” Deputy Chief of Staff Matthew Yale said, “We’re doing everything we can to enhance the culture of the Department of Education, it needs to be a place of innovation and where we’re constantly reminded of our work for students.” Other “measures it has taken to liven the spirit of the agency and make it more inclusive” includes “a reading series last summer that invited local students to the department to hear stories read by government officials.” In “The Answer Sheet” blog of the Washington Post (5/2), Valarie Strauss also covers this story.

NEA in the News
Salt Lake City Teacher Wins NEA Award.
The AP (5/3) reports, “A second grade Salt Lake City teacher has won the National Education Association’s top honor. Sharon Gallagher-Fishbaugh was awarded a $25,000 NEA Member Benefits Award for Teaching Excellence on Friday.” She teaches at Dilworth Elementary School and “was nominated for the award by the Utah Education Association.”

WPost Blasts Teachers Union Opposition To Louisiana Reforms.
The Washington Post (5/1, 684K), in an editorial, wrote, “Having thwarted efforts to revamp teacher evaluations in Florida, teachers unions are now aiming to block reform in Louisiana. An intense lobbying campaign is underway to defeat Republican Gov. Bobby Jindal’s ambitious education reform agenda. State lawmakers should follow his lead in standing up for student interests.”

First Lady Reads Bonus Questions For National Science Bowl Finals.
The AP (5/4, Metzler) reports that first lady Michelle Obama “visited the Energy Department’s National Science Bowl” on Monday “and read bonus questions during the middle school championship match.” Mrs. Obama asked the two finalist teams 17 bonus questions covering “multiple areas of science, including potential functions of the appendix, what the letters and numbers stand for in the H1N1 flu virus, the protein content of blood and studies on the San Andreas fault in California.”

Domenico Montanaro wrote in the msnbc.com (5/3) “First Read” blog that “in her speech following the awarding of trophies,” Mrs. Obama “said that science and math are key factors in the nation’s prosperity and that she hopes that the high-school and middle-school students at the bowl will help reaffirm the country’s role in scientific discovery. Americans discovered air-conditioning and band-aids, she noted.” Montanaro notes that “the Science Bowl is made up of 105 middle-school and high-school teams from around the country, competing in the Department of Energy’s 20th event in Washington, D.C.”

North Carolina Middle Schoolers Win National Science Bowl. North Carolina’s Herald-Sun (5/4, Milliken) reports that “a team from the N.C. School of Science and Mathematics won the National Science Bowl Monday morning,” beating “two competitors from California in the championship round: Mira Loma High School of Sacramento, the runners-up, and North Hollywood High School, the third-place team.” The winning team received a trophy, “Texas Instruments gear,” and “a trip to Central America, where they will get to study ecosystems in Belize.” The Los Angeles Times (5/4, Ni) also covers the story.

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In the Classroom
States Expanding Early Childhood Programs Despite Recession.
The New York Times (5/4, Dillon) reports, “Despite the recession, states continued to expand early childhood programs in the 2008-9 school year, according to an annual survey by the National Institute for Early Education Research at Rutgers University. Nationwide enrollment in state-financed prekindergarten programs grew by 82,000, to more than 1.2 million children, the institute said.” According to the Times, “Oklahoma has the best early childhood program, based on the percentage of children enrolled, program quality and other factors, the institute said,” and other “states in the institute’s top 10 ranking were Arkansas, West Virginia, New Jersey, Maryland, Georgia, North Carolina, Illinois, Louisiana and Tennessee.”

Baltimore Schools CEO Says Suspending School Bullies “Does Not Work.”
The Baltimore Sun (5/4, Green) reports that on Monday, Baltimore schools CEO Andres Alonso “addressed several high-profile harassment incidents” in city schools “by urging parents and community leaders to step up their involvement.” He said however, that “students who bully their peers should” not be suspended from school. “We believe that to punish children by excluding them and pushing them outside of school classrooms is something that does not work, will not work,” said Alonso. Instead, he urged school leaders to “evaluate the system’s protocol of responding to reports of bullying. While he stressed that no reports have been ignored, he said the actions taken by school leaders might be appropriate but are not always effective.”

Utah Students’ Financial Literacy Test Scores Exceed National Average.
The Salt Lake Tribune (5/4, Schencker) reports, “Utah [high school] students scored fifth-highest in the country on this year’s National Financial Capability Challenge, a test that measures financial knowledge.” The average score among the “more than 750 Utah students who took the optional test” was “76.8 percent — higher than the national average of 70 percent.” The challenge was sponsored by the U.S. Department of Education and the U.S. Department of the Treasury. The Salt Lake Tribune notes that “Utah is one of only 13 states that requires students to take a financial literacy or personal finance course to graduate” high school.

Study Shows Increased Racial Segregation In Wake County, North Carolina, Schools.
North Carolina’s News & Observer (5/4, Hui) reports that a study conducted by professors at the University of Georgia shows that Wake County public schools have “became more racially segregated over the past decade as the number of high-poverty schools increased despite the school district’s nationally recognized diversity policy.” For the study presented at a national conference on Sunday, the professors found that “the number of schools not meeting the district’s diversity goal…more than tripled” between 1999 and 2007, due to a “lack of political will and explosive growth” for the district. Still, according to one of the study’s authors, Sheneka Williams, “the level of racial segregation in Wake is still much less than in other large school districts.”

Research Links TV Watching To Decrease In Math Achievement.
The Toronto Star (5/3, Rushowy) reported, “TV doesn’t just turn kids into couch potatoes – it also makes them poorer math students, less interested in school and more likely to be bullied, says a long-term study on the toll of the tube on children.” According to the Star, the study, “funded by the Social Science and Humanities Research Council of Canada,” tracked “1,134 Quebec children, looked at their viewing habits at 29 and 53 months, and then their academic and physical development by age 10. For every hour above the average for television viewing in the early years – which in the study was modest, at slightly more than one hour a day – there was a 6 per cent drop in math success, 7 per cent in classroom engagement as well as a 10 per cent increase in being victimized at school.” The Wall Street Journal (5/4, Singer-Vine) also covers this report.

Study Says Latino Kindergartners Have Strong Social Skills.
Education Week (5/3, Zehr) reported, “A majority of Latino children enter kindergarten with the same social skills as middle-class white children, while low-income Latinos demonstrate stronger social skills than low-income African-American kindergartners at the start of school, says a study published in the May issue of Developmental Psychology. The article is one of seven focusing on factors leading to the success or lack of success of Latinos in school published this month in both the print and online editions of the journal.” According to Education Week, “The studies show that, overall, Latino children tend to start school with some strong assets, but those early gains are likely to soon disappear if they attend low-quality schools and live in low-income neighborhoods.”

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On the Job
Districts Poised To Implement Mass Teacher Layoffs.
USA Today (5/4, Toppo) reports, “Facing a recession and the coming end of billions of dollars in federal stimulus funding, school districts nationwide are handing teachers pink slips for the upcoming school year. … Teachers in several states have rallied to keep school funding, and across the USA, teachers today will wear pink hearts as part of a national ‘Pink Hearts, Not Pink Slips’ campaign organized by the American Federation of Teachers, the nation’s second-largest teachers union.” Secretary of Education Arne Duncan said Monday in an interview that he is “‘very, very concerned,’” about looming teacher layoffs and has said that Congress should “act soon” to prevent teacher layoffs.

Law & Policy
Duncan Using Federal Dollars To Push Education Reform Agenda.
The New York Times (5/4, Dillon, Lewin) reports that Secretary of Education Arne Duncan “has far more money to dole out than any previous secretary of education, and he is using it in ways that extend the federal government’s reach into virtually every area of education, from pre-kindergarten to college.” Though Duncan “has encountered some resistance” as lobbyists “for the private lenders howled at the restructuring of the college lending program” and teacher unions “protested when President Obama responded to the dismissal of all teachers at a failing Rhode Island high school,” on the whole, Duncan “has not seen much pushback as he has pressed his case.” According to the Times, “Education experts say Mr. Duncan’s boundless energy, his background as chief executive of the Chicago Public Schools, and his close relationship with the president have helped him expand the department’s role.”

New York State Senate Approves Bill To Boost Number Of Charter Schools.
The New York Times (5/4, Medina) reports, “The New York Senate passed a contentious bill Monday evening that would more than double the number of charter schools in the state, a move seen as key to helping the state win up to $700 million in federal grant money, although the legislation is unlikely to pass in its current form in the Assembly.” According to the Times, the bill “would also require that charter schools – privately run, but publicly financed – enroll more special education students and those still learning English. But the legislation, which was backed by charter school advocates, did not contain some provisions that were part of an earlier bill to increase the cap, like imposing restrictions on New York City’s ability to decide where to place new charter schools and giving the state comptroller the power to audit the schools.”

Panel To Release Revised Race To The Top Agreement For Florida School Districts.
Leslie Postal wrote in the Orlando Sentinel (5/4, Postal) “Sentinel School Zone” blog, “School districts are slated to get revised Race to the Top paperwork soon.” The “new Memorandum of Understanding (or MOU)” would specify “what districts need to do to get a share of any money Florida might win in the national competition.” A version of the MOU “worked out by a panel appointed by Gov. Charlie Crist (I) includes teacher merit-pay provisions, but they are less strict than those in Florida’s first application (or in the teacher performance bill Crist vetoed).” School districts have “less than a month to decide whether to sign, as the state must turn in its complete application to the feds by June 1.” Postal lists “the key changes” to Florida’s Race to the Top application “suggested by Crist’s panel.”

Minnesota Governor Promotes Local School Control.
The AP (5/4) reports, “A likely 2012 Republican presidential candidate, Minnesota Gov. Tim Pawlenty, on Monday cautioned business executives that the United States cannot succeed if its education policy leaves children unprepared for the work force. … Pawlenty took a critical tact on Washington-centered education policies, arguing that they prescribe solutions without taking into account regional differences for costs and values.” According to the AP, “With emphasis on local control, free markets and tough-on-Washington rhetoric, the 49-year-old governor earned quiet nods during his 10-minute remarks from business leaders at the US Chamber of Commerce’s headquarters across from the White House.”

School Finance
Montgomery County, Maryland, School District To Challenge Proposed Budget Cuts.
The Washington Post (5/4, Laris, Birnbaum) reports that Montgomery County MD’s “biggest spender — the public school system — has been conspicuously quiet in the weeks since County Executive Isiah Leggett (D) proposed giving the expanding system $137 million less than school officials requested. The silence has now ended, with an exclamation point — and a threat.” According to the Post, “The schools have sent county officials a draft of a lawsuit they say would be filed against the county to seek an injunction if the school budget is cut any further,” a development that “represents an aggressive challenge to the way government operates in Montgomery and to the power of the County Council, which has long set the spending levels for the public schools and other county agencies.”

NEA in the News
Elementary School Teacher Earns NEA Honor.
Utah’s Deseret Morning News (5/4, Bassett) reports that Sarah Gallagher-Fishbaugh, a second-grade teachers at Dilworth Elementary School in Utah, “recently earned…the top honor at the Academy Awards for public educators — the National Education Association Foundation’s Salute to Excellence in Education Gala.” Each year, according to the NEA website, “the foundation presents approximately 40 awards to the nation’s top public school educators, most notably the $25,000 NEA Member Benefits Award for Teaching Excellence.” Utah Education Association President Kim Campbell said Gallagher-Fishbaugh received the honor this year because she “represents the very best of the good things happening in Utah’s public schools.”

Teacher Appreciation Week Noted.
The Huffington Post (5/4) reports that national “Teacher Appreciation Week” started on Monday, May 3, and National Appreciation Day takes place today, “though activities will take place all week.” The Huffington Post notes some ways students and their parents can show teachers their appreciation and directs students to the PTA Web site for “gift ideas and resources for Teacher Appreciation Week.”

Obama Recognizes Teacher Of The Year.
The AP (4/30, Werner) reports that President Barack Obama recognized Sarah Brown Wessling, a high school English teacher from Iowa, “as the nation’s top teacher.” Wessling “said she was accepting the annual honor on behalf of her students and other teachers.” The was selected for the award by the Council of Chief State School Officers who “cited [her] passion and innovative approaches” to classroom instruction. The President “used the ceremony to speak about the importance of education to a strong democracy, and also called on parents to do their part to support students at home.”

“The Answer Sheet” blog of the Washington Post (4/29, Strauss) reports that Obama “publicly encouraged legislative efforts spearheaded by Sen. Tom Harkin (D-Iowa) to provide funds to keep teachers in classrooms.” USA Today (4/30, Jackson) reports, “Teachers of the year from all 50 states attended the ceremony in the White House Rose Garden.”

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In the Classroom
Garden Business Helps Special Needs Students Learn Practical Skills.
The St. Petersburg Times (4/30, Miller) reports that “exceptional education students at Moore-Mickens Education Center created [a] small garden business to teach practical and social skills to students with special needs.” The garden activities give “students a better understanding of how things grow, and” allow them to develop “skills that might help them land paying jobs.” About 25 students participate in the program, which provides on-the-job training at local businesses and two other school-based businesses as well.

Advocate Says Parents, Schools Have Different Roles In Sex Education.
The Toronto Star (4/29, Gordon) reported in a story related to the controversial sex-education curriculum proposed for Ontario primary and secondary schools, that “while some opponents argue that schools should stay out of” sex education, “Alex McKay, research coordinator with the Sex Information and Education Council of Canada, says schools and parents have critical, but different roles.” According to McKay, parents should “teach children values related to sexuality, expectations about behavior, and provide guidance.” Schools, he says, “need to deliver up-to-date facts that most parents don’t have at their fingertips on topics such as sexually-transmitted infections or contraception.” McKay pointed out that “factual information provided in school can be ‘a corrective to the false and distorted information they pick up from the outside world.’”

Inaugural Nevada Moves Day Emphasizes Walking, Biking Safety.
The Las Vegas Sun (4/30, Hansen) reported on the first annual Nevada Moves Day, which was observed “in seven Nevada counties” on Wednesday to teach children how to be safe while “walking or biking to school.” Las Vegas City Councilwoman Lois Tarkanian and Councilman Ricki Barlow visited Andre Agassi College Preparatory Academy in Las Vegas “to demonstrate safe bike riding and to give away six bicycles donated to the elementary school students.” Nevada’s Safe Routes to School coordinator, Rebecca Kapuler, said, “Ultimately we’d like to have people leave their cars at home and have kids walk or take a bicycle to school, because we want to reduce the congestion of cars in the vicinity of schools.”

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On the Job
Texas School District Requiring Teachers To Pay Back Mistaken Bonuses.
The Dallas Morning News (4/29, Reaves) reports that 42 Dallas Independent School District “teachers who got bonuses for a job well done are being asked to pay the money back because of a paperwork mistake by administrators.” The News adds, “it’s not clear” how the mistake in incentive pay from the District Awards for Teacher Excellence came about.

Report Says Data Show No Difference In Teacher-Preparation Pathways.
According to Education Week (4/29, Viadero), a report by the National Research Council “concluded that there’s not enough evidence to suggest that teachers who take alternative pathways into the classroom are any worse — or any better — than those who finish traditional college-based preparation programs.” To deal with this, “the panel calls on federal education officials to take the lead in coordinating and linking states’ longitudinal databases on education so researchers can better track who enters teacher-preparation programs, where they end up, and how effective they are on the job.” The report also suggests that “a more fruitful line of research…is to compare particular aspects of such programs, such as the timing of students’ field experiences, the level of teachers’ content knowledge, or program selectivity, and how they affect K-12 students’ learning.”

Law & Policy
Law Expands Wisconsin State Superintendent’s Authority Over Struggling Schools.
The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel (4/30, Hetzner) reports that Wisconsin Gov. Jim Doyle (D) “signed into law Thursday a measure that will give the state’s schools superintendent more authority to intervene in struggling school districts and their schools.” Under the new law, the state superintendent of public instruction will have “the authority to direct school boards in failing districts to adopt new curriculum, provide early intervention services for children, extend student learning time and implement professional development programs for teachers and principals.” In addition, he or she will have to “enact rules for how school districts and schools will be identified for this intervention.” Moreover, Milwaukee Public Schools (MPS) is singled out in the bill to develop “a master plan to analyze aging facilities and buildings, collaborate with non-profit organizations to provide social services and develop alternative routes to high school diplomas for at-risk students.” And, the law “removes tenure for MPS principals.”

Florida School Board To Consider Change In Approach To Black Student Discipline.
The St. Petersburg Times (4/30, Matus) reports, “The Pinellas County School Board is poised to consider a new legal agreement that supporters say will change how it deals with black student discipline.” The “memorandum of understanding” proposed last week “will compel the district to chip away at behaviors and practices that have led it to suspend black students at far higher rates than students of any other race.” It also will aid in developing “more uniform arrest policies among the” various “law enforcement agencies that oversee school resource officers.” The memorandum does not include specific details, allowing each school to create its own behavior plan. Still, the proposal “emphasizes that improving behavior” also requires “efforts from the district, students, parents, and the community.”

Texas Kindergartner Suspended Over Hair Design.
The San Antonio Express-News (4/30, LaCoste-Caputo) reports that a five-year-old at Walzem Elementary School “was suspended this week because of a swirl design cut into his closely cropped hair.” Principal Laura Huggins “noticed the design” as kindergartner Tyran Miller “was getting out of his mom’s car Monday morning.” The school gave Tyran’s mother “the option of shaving [the child's] head or keeping him home until his hair grew out. If she sent him to school, she was told, he’d be in in-school suspension until the symbol was gone.” The Express News notes that the North East Independent School District’s policy does not “specifically address hairstyles for elementary students other than to say parents are strongly urged to enforce moderate hairstyles and high standards of dress.” But Huggins said that Walzam administrators have “been cracking down” on “unusual hairstyles.”

Iowa Lawmakers Seeking More Studies On Merit Pay.
The Des Moines (IA) Register (4/30, Hupp) reports, “Iowa has courted merit pay for about a decade, largely through studies involving school districts.” However, the state “is no closer to paying teachers” according to student achievement, according to the Register. “State leaders remain reluctant to take the plunge with a statewide program,” because, Iowa Department of Education Director Judy Jeffrey said, “There are still a lot of questions.” Jeffrey added, “I wouldn’t say that we would never be on board, but I think our results so far have demonstrated that teachers are more comfortable with a team-based approach. … It’s a group effort to improve student achievement. It’s not just laid at the door of one teacher.” According to a spokesman for Gov. Chet Culver (R), “the governor supports more study of merit pay.”

In Response To Immigration Law, Denver School District Bans Work Travel To Arizona.
The AP (4/30, Tsai) reports that Denver public school Superintendent Tom Boasberg “announced a ban Thursday on employees taking district-sponsored work trips to Arizona, saying the community was ‘outraged’ by the state’s new immigration law.” According to Boasberg, “the Arizona law attacks the district’s core values, which recognize diversity, and is an assault on human dignity,’ and he “has formed an advisory committee to see if the district should take other measures to respond to Arizona’s law and to make sure a similar law is not enacted in Colorado.”

Special Needs
Minnesota District Looking To Decrease Special Education Costs To Prepare For Funding Cuts.
The Minneapolis Star Tribune (4/30, Shah) reports, “Efforts are underway to reduce special education costs in the Hopkins public schools to prepare for less state aid and the loss of one-time federal stimulus funding in years to come.” District leaders have proposed cutting “$300,000 from the special education budget.” The cuts “include six fewer paraprofessionals along with transportation changes.” Like Hopkins, “school districts across the metro area are taking a cautious approach to budget planning this spring,” as they are “expecting little or no state aid, given Minnesota’s projected budget deficit.”

Safety & Security
Baltimore School Criticized Over Bullying Response.
In its “Second Opinion” blog the Baltimore Sun (4/29) editorializes that at Gilmor Elementary School in West Baltimore, “a third-grader was bullied and assaulted so severely by some classmates that she spoke of committing suicide.” While School officials dispute that the girl “was ever in any danger of acting on her suicidal thought, or that Gilmor’s teachers and principal tolerate a culture of violence at the school that makes such incidents more likely,” the Sun argues that “the blame…falls squarely on Gilmor’s school administrators and teachers,” who “had every reason to know of the abusive atmosphere.” The Sun concludes, “Their response to what appears to have been a massive systemic failure is essentially just to continue with more of the same.:

School Finance
Plan To Fund DC Teachers Contract Said To Be Making Progress.
The Washington Post (4/30, Turque) reports that David Umansky, spokesman for DC CFO Natwar M. Gandhi said that “District officials have made ‘significant progress’ in closing a funding gap in the proposed new teachers contract and hope to have a plan” on Friday. Gandhi’s rejecting a plan to use about $21 million in private foundation money to pay teacher salaries left the city “scrambling for more money.” According to “a key figure in coordinating the foundation funding,” the money would be given to the city in the current fiscal year, meaning that “the city would have to provide interim public financing for just a few months before the foundation money would be in hand.”

Teachers Agree To Pay Freeze, Benefits Cut To Save Jobs.
The Indianapolis Star (4/30, Reason) reports that teachers in the Westfield Washington school district “have agreed to a freeze in their salaries and a cut in benefits for the 2010-11 school year, concessions that officials say will save their jobs by saving about $1.2 million.” The teachers “will retain the same salary schedule as this school year” by forgoing a 3.5 percent pay increase. However, they “will retain their educational increment for year of experience.” In addition, the teachers “agreed to the suspension of the district’s contributions to both their retirement savings accounts and their matching fund retirement accounts.”

Elimination Of Teaching Jobs Accounts For 85 Percent Of North Carolina District’s Budget Cuts.
North Carolina’s News & Observer (4/30, Chambers) reports, “Just about everybody loses in the Durham Public Schools’ proposed 2010-11 budget,” but none more than teachers. Teaching positions account for “263 of the 323 positions” that would be cut. In all, “the district’s proposed $383.4 million budget” includes more than $20 million in “reductions in state and county funding.” Eliminated positions “represent $18.9 million, or 85 percent, of that $20 million.” In addition, “State funding for new textbooks, technology, staff development, literacy coaches and remediation tutors have been eliminated.”

Also in the News
New Jersey Middle School Principal Seeks To Keep Students Off Social Networking Sites.
On its website, ABC News (4/29) reports that New Jersey middle school principal Anthony Orsini “is on a campaign to get his students off social networking sites like Facebook,” arguing that they “do more harm than good — facilitating bullying and putting kids at risk to online predators.” Therefore, “Orsini has sent a letter to his school’s parents, calling on them to monitor their kids’ Internet use more closely and discourage use of social networks.”

NEA in the News
Tenure A “Guarantee Of Due Process” For Teachers.
NPR (4/29, Greenblatt) reports in a story titled, “Is Teacher Tenure Still Necessary?,” that “the century-old system of protecting experienced teachers from arbitrary dismissal — long viewed as sacred — has triggered hot political debates in several states.” For instance, “a bill in Colorado that would” link teacher tenure rules to “student performance passed out of a Senate committee last week and has the support of Democratic Gov. Bill Ritter (D).” Meanwhile, in DC, “a proposal to eliminate tenure and seniority rules in exchange for higher pay led to protracted arguments over the local teachers’ contract.” According to NPR, K-12 teacher tenure is “simply a guarantee of due process — that if a teacher is fired, it will be for cause.” NEA President Dennis Van Roekel is quoted with saying, “These laws were passed in state after state to protect good teachers from arbitrary actions. … It’s very upsetting that in 2010, under the guise of improving schools, we suddenly get rid of protections from firing teachers for inadequate or wrong reasons.”

Foundations Offering $506,000 Matching Grants For Education.
The New York Times /AP (4/29, A21) reports, “A coalition of foundations is offering up to half a billion dollars to match federal grants meant to encourage education reform.” The grants take “pressure off schools scrambling to find the matching dollars they need to get the money from” the Department of Education’s “Investing in Innovation” (i3) program. The AP (4/29, Blankinship), in another version of the article, adds that the group of foundations, which includes the Carnegie Corporation of New York and the John D. & Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation, have “set up an Internet portal for applying for matching funds from all the foundations in one step, streamlining the task of seeking money from multiple sources.” Interested “school districts, schools, and other nonprofits have until May 12 to apply for the money, which will be paid out by the end of September.”

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In the Classroom
Parent Volunteers Help Teachers At Florida Elementary School Fuse Art Into Core Curriculum.
The Miami Herald (4/29, Brown) reports that like many “schools in South Florida,” Hollywood Central Elementary School “fell victim to the Broward County school district’s budget ax. And one of the programs eliminated was art.” However, “instead of organizing protests,” parent Therese Costa organized “a parent-volunteer program called ‘Meet the Masters,’” for which “parent volunteers” and classroom teachers “collaborated…to incorporate art lessons into” the teachers’ “reading, math, and history curriculums.” The Miami Herald explains that “Costa began by taking advantage of a school district training program that teaches volunteers how to present an art-appreciation curriculum to elementary students.” With that training, she taught the “parent volunteers how to introduce selected artists and art styles to the youngsters.”

Students Plan Activities To Show What It Means To “Go Green.”
The St. Petersburg Times (4/29, Ritchie) reports that “for Earth Day 2010, second-graders and teachers at Challenger K-8 School of Science and Mathematics” coordinated “activities and invited guests to explain just what it means to ‘go green.’” Activities included stations for making “animal track rubbings” and creating models for “‘pizzas’ that raccoons, coyotes, deer and hogs might like to eat.” A local car dealership “lent the school a hybrid Escape” for the students and guests to explore, and “Solar Fusion and Solar Kings, companies that produce and install solar panels, brought a panel and had representatives explain how it works.”

Annual Café Provides Middle School Students In Florida With Forum To Recite Poetry.
The St. Petersburg Times (4/29) reports on the annual poetry café event at Parrott Middle School in Brooksville, Florida. The two-day event featured “students — mostly eighth-graders” — who “took turns sitting on the stool, facing a microphone,” and reciting “favorite poems or those they had written themselves.” Students sat in the audience with their classes and “were served beverages” as they listened.

Blacksmith Demonstrates Craft For Students At Kentucky Elementary School.
Kentucky’s Courier-Journal (4/29, Hershberg) reports that blacksmith Tim Byrne demonstrated his craft for students at Parkwood Elementary School Wednesday. During the demonstration, he “cut a length from a steel rod, heating it and bending it into shape on an anvil with sharp blows from his hammer” to create a horseshoe. Byrne’s demonstration “at the Clarksville school was part of a unit on the Kentucky Derby that teaches students about such things as horses, their foals and Churchill Downs.” Today, “the students will demonstrate what they’ve learned by staging their own derby.”

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On the Job
New Jersey Governor Criticizes Teachers, Administrators For Student Walk-Out.
New Jersey’s Star-Ledger (4/29, Fleisher) reports, “In his first public comments since a massive student walk-out, Gov. Chris Christie (R) today criticized” school “administrators for not stopping protests during the school day and said he believed the teachers unions were behind the demonstrations.” Said Christie, “The schools did a lousy job in really permitting all these students to walk out in the middle of the school day. Their parents send them there not to protest. They send them there to learn.” While noting that he has “no problem with students protesting,” Christie added that “they should exercise their first amendment rights either before school or right after school.” Thousands of students walked out of class on Tuesday “to protest the nearly $820 million in cuts to total state spending on education.”

Punishments Vary For New Jersey Students Involved In Budget-Cut Protest. The Star Ledger (4/29, Heyboer) reports, “Thousands of New Jersey students who returned to class today to face the consequences of Tuesday’s school budget protests learned their punishments will range from weekend detention to nothing at all.” The penalties “were handed out by dozens of individual districts based on school regulations and the discretion of administrators. Some districts…gave Saturday detention to students who participated in the walkouts.” Meanwhile, “others, including Newark and Montclair, waved their usual rules and chose not to punish students.” The Governor’s “office questioned whether some districts bent the rules and gave students a free pass for rallying in favor of a cause many teachers and administrators support.”

Rhodes Island Teachers Union Sues Over Mass Firing.
The AP (4/28) reports, “A Rhode Island teachers union has sued a troubled school district that fired all its high school teachers and staff,” challenging the requirement that all the teachers reapply for their jobs. “No more than half can be rehired under a federal turnaround model selected for the school district.” According to the union, “it thought Superintendent Frances Gallo was committed to working with them on an alternative to the firings.” Gallo says the firing occurred after “talks with the union broke down.”

Law & Policy
Three California Districts Applying For Race To The Top Funds.
The AP (4/29) reports that in California,the Los Angeles Unified School District, the Long Beach district, and Fresno school districts are applying for the second round of the Race to the Top competition. The Los Angeles Times (4/28, Blume) reported that the applications by the state’s “three large districts” is the state’s “new strategy to win.” State education secretary Bonnie Reiss has “also suggested that California hire a consulting firm that earned high marks for helping other states with their applications.”

Georgia Lawmaker Says Merit Pay Framework Bill Lacks Votes.
In the “Get Schooled” blog of the Atlanta Journal-Constitution (4/28), Maureen Downey writes that the vice chairman of the state House Education Committee, state Rep. Fran Millar, said that there aren’t the votes to pass a bill that would have teachers “evaluated in part of how well their students perform,” although it wouldn’t directly affect their pay. Through the bill, Gov. Sonny Perdue “wanted to show the federal government that Georgia was at least warming to a system that used student performance/scores to assess and pay teachers” as part of the state’s efforts to gain Race to the Top funds. However, teachers saw the measure “as a conduit to merit pay down the line and protested the measure.” However, as part of the RTTT application, “merit pay is part of the state’s reform model,” and Downey argues “Georgia teachers ought to grab a seat at the table, even if they have to elbow their way into the discussion.”

Nevada District Eliminates Year-Round Schedule For 55 Elementary Schools.
The Las Vegas Sun (4/29) reports that the Clark County School District announced Wednesday that all “55 elementary schools…operating on year-round calendars will transition to nine-month calendars” for the 2010-11 school year. “The change is expected to save the School District about $21.3 million in personnel and operating expenses.” In addition, “the move could make it easier for the district to schedule professional development for staff.” To make the shift possible, class sizes for grades one through three will be increased. The class-size increase was “approved by the [state] Legislature during the special session as a cost-saving measure.”

Special Needs
New York City To Move Special Education Students Into Normal Schools.
In a front-page article the New York Times (4/29, A1, Medina) reports that New York City, “struggling to address the needs of a growing number of students with learning disabilities, is overhauling special education by asking every principal to take in more of the students,” with only the most severely disabled remaining in schools with specific programs for special education. “The shift echoes one of the central philosophies of the administration, giving principals more responsibility and control over their schools.” However, the move has raised concerns with some special education advocates and principals, who “worry that the changes could be too difficult for principals with little knowledge of special education, who are already strained by day-to-day issues and impending budget cuts.”

Safety & Security
Baltimore School Officials Focus On Anti-Bullying Efforts.
The Baltimore Sun (4/29, Green) reports that Baltimore “school officials have stepped up education efforts and are stressing proper reporting methods after a third-grader who was a victim of chronic bullying at a West Baltimore elementary school said she wanted to kill herself.” Meanwhile, the city’s teachers union plans to work with the Baltimore branch of the NAACP “to hold a bullying-prevention program at Gilmor Elementary School, the site of the incidents.” While “Maryland has tried to encourage parents to report bullying…it is unclear how fully the efforts have been embraced in Baltimore.” Although city school officials say they followed the system’s code of conduct, Dennis Moulden, chair of the school system’s Parent and Community Advisory Board, says that the outcome of bullying complaints “ultimately depends on how seriously school leaders handle the situations.”

School Finance
Official Says DC CFO Has Rejected Plan To Fund Teacher Pay Raises.
In an article on its front page, the Washington Post (4/29, A1, Turque) reports that a top District official with knowledge of the issue said that DC chief financial officer Natwar M. Gandhi “rejected an unusual plan to fund a portion of pay raises for teachers with” $21 million in private foundation money, due to the conditions on the money that Schools Chancellor Michelle A. Rhee remain at her post and that test scores improve. “The clash between two of the city’s most powerful officials puts at risk pay raises that took more than two years to negotiate as well as Rhee’s long-held plans to improve the quality of instruction by offering teachers incentive pay and holding them more accountable for student performance.” Now, the city and Rhee “must find an estimated $50 million in new financing to make the contract acceptable to Gandhi in advance of his appearance Friday before the D.C. Council.”

Blogger Argues Parent Control Of School Funding Would Lead To Improvement.
On the “Adam Smith Institution Blog” of the Christian Science Monitor (4/28), Mikhil Arora writes, in an entry aimed at the government of Britain but citing US conditions and statistics, “There is simply no correlation between school spending from government…and student achievement.” He adds, “we really need…for the money to be channeled through consumers,” adding that “if parents controlled this money, and schools had to compete for their share, outcomes could be improved dramatically.”

Also in the News
Teachers Cross Party Lines To Support Florida Governor After Teacher-Tenure Bill Veto.
The St. Petersburg Times (4/29, Catalanello) reports that Florida Gov. Charlie Crist’s (R) “politically risky move bucking his party’s staunch support of Senate Bill 6 mobilized teachers, and some pledged to switch parties to support him in his US Senate primary bid against Marco Rubio.” While it is unknown “exactly how many teachers have switched parties,” data from election offices “in Hillsborough, Pinellas, Pasco and Hernando counties indicate that since Crist’s April 15 veto, the majority of the 1,144 voters in those counties who changed parties through April 26 became Republicans.” The St. Petersburg Times profiles several teachers who, since he vetoed the “teacher tenure” bill, have resolved to vote for Crist in the upcoming state Senate election.

Thousands Of New Jersey Students Walk Out Of Class To Protest State Budget Cuts.
The New York Times (4/28, A19, Hu) reports that on Tuesday, thousands of students “walked out of class in one of the largest grass-roots demonstrations to hit New Jersey in years.” The walk-out “disrupted classroom routines and standardized testing in some of the state’s biggest and best-known school districts, offering a real-life civics lesson that unfolded on lawns, sidewalks, parking lots and football fields.” The demonstration was spurred by a Facebook campaign started by 18-year-old Michelle Ryan Lautto last month. According to the Times, “some 18,000 students accepted” Lautto’s invitation to protest state “budget cuts that threaten class sizes and choices as well as after-school activities.”

New Jersey’s Star-Ledger (4/28, Giambusso) reports that “the walkout was scheduled to start at 1 p.m., but when students at Weequahic High School walked out early, word spread like wildfire that the protest had begun.” Newark Police director Garry McCarthy, “who was at the scene,” said that he received “no reports of vandalism or violence as a result of the protest.” The Star-Ledger (4/28) also provides a video of the student protest in Newark.

The Philadelphia Inquirer (4/27, Osborne) reported that in response to the statewide student demonstration, “Gov. Christie issued a statement saying, ‘students belong in the classroom, and we hope all efforts were made to curtail student walkouts.’” The statement continued, “It is also our firm hope that the students were motivated by youthful rebellion or spring fever – and not by encouragement from any one-sided view of the current budget crisis in New Jersey.”

The AP (4/27) noted that “the protest comes one week after voters in 59 percent of the state’s school districts rejected property tax levies to pay for schools, leaving municipal governing bodies to make cuts.” It adds that the New Jersey Education Association said that students were “engaging in civil disobedience,” but advised them not to “walk out of classes.”

The Wall Street Journal (4/28, Grossman, Herring), New Jersey’s Star-Ledger (4/28, Hutchins), WPIX-TV New York (4/28, Ramos, Mateo), the Technorati (4/27) blog also covered the story.

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In the Classroom
Teacher Advocates Movement To Increase Cognitive Brain Activity During Class.
Virginia’s Daily Press (4/27, Humphrey) reported that according to movement education teacher Martha Swirzinski, “it’s all about keeping children moving in their classrooms.” She says that “lateral movements, hopping, skipping and jumping are” all “linked to specific cognitive activity in the brain.” In addition, research has shown that “incorporating movement into education leads to better morale for students and their ability to function at a higher level in school.” And, it “helps combat the growing problem of childhood obesity.” Swirzinski, who has a “master’s degree in kinesiology” from the University of Maryland at College Park, “has written three books” that all “offer ways for children to engage in the story and move.”

Elementary Students Learn Science Concepts By Solving “Indiana Jones” Mystery.
The Joplin (MO) Globe (4/27, Robinson) reported that “200 students from West Central Elementary School in Joplin got the chance Tuesday to ride along with Indiana Jones on his latest adventures.” Through a joint venture between the “elementary school and technology education students from Pittsburg (Kan.) State University,” kindergartners through fifth-graders “were tasked with solving the mystery of the Golden Gorilla,” which included “hands-on sessions with scenes from various Indiana Jones movies.” Clues were given based on the science lessons “learned at each station.” Those “clues were used at the final Mystery Maze to solve the mystery of the Golden Gorilla.”

Reverse Job Shadow Day Celebrated At Michigan School.
The Grand Rapids (MI) Press (4/28, Cammel) reports on “Reverse Job Shadow Day” at Northview High School in Grand Rapids, MI on which 14 “business leaders demonstrated to students that manufacturing is alive and well in West Michigan — and that they need the education, training and skills to find good jobs in the field.” Junior Achievement of the Michigan Great Lakes, “with assistance from The Right Place and a grant from Michigan Works, helped organize the event, the second to focus on manufacturing. … Principal Mark Thomas said the event helps make a connection between what students learn in school and how that is used in the workplace.”

Elementary Student Complains Over Teacher’s Alleged Campaigning.
The AP (4/27) reported that a Billings (MT) “elementary student is complaining that a teacher was campaigning in favor of a mill levy during class time. Sixth-grader Austin Aisenbrey plans to file a complaint with the state commissioner of political practices.” Aisenbrey “says the teacher handed out stickers asking parents to vote, while at the same time telling the students to ask parents to vote in favor of the mill levy in an upcoming election.”

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On the Job
California District, Teachers Reach Contract Agreement, Ending Strike.
The AP (4/28) reports, “Teachers have returned to classrooms in Orange County’s second-largest school district after a settlement ended a three-day strike. District operations returned to normal on Tuesday after negotiators for the Capistrano Unified School District and teachers union Capistrano Education Association reached a settlement late Monday night.” According to the AP, “Under the terms of the three-year contract, a 10 percent pay cut and furlough days will be restored as revenues increase and an increase in teachers’ contributions to health care will be rolled back.”

Law & Policy
Georgia Lawmaker Sends Teacher Evaluation Bill Back To Committee For Review.
The Atlanta Journal Constitution (4/28, Torres) reports that Georgia Gov. Sonny Perdue (R) “scrambled Tuesday to summon a last-minute push to require student performance as part of teachers’ job evaluations after” Rep. Brooks Coleman (R), chairman of the House Education Committee, sent the bill “back to committee.” The House Rules Committee on Tuesday changed the language of the bill, HB 521 “to require teacher and public input as new, statewide evaluation rules are developed. According to the new language, such a common evaluation method for educators may still include student performance.”

The AP (2/28) adds that “The measure could still be revived later this week.” Gov. Perdue is pushing for the new evaluation “system to help Georgia win up to $400 million in federal funds in the second round of the ‘Race to the Top’ federal grant competition.”

Maureen Downey writes in the Atlanta Journal Constitution (4/27) “Get Schooled” blog that Coleman’s move “seems to take the controversial measure to judge teachers on their students’ performance off the agenda for the time being.” She also speculates that the move could either be “a time delay to garner support” or “a concession that there is no support.”

Blogger Decries Proposal For Study Of Pledge Of Allegiance To US, Georgia Flags. Maureen Downey writes in the Atlanta Journal Constitution (4/27) “Get Schooled” blog that Tuesday’s General Assembly meeting included “a lot of posturing and establishment of political cred, most notably the bill mandating that Georgia students study the pledge of allegiance to the flag of the United States and the Georgia flag.” Downey asserts that if students in Georgia are taught “the history of the pledge and the flag,” they should also learn “the politics around both of them. Georgia’s flag history is not a pretty story, although I suspect that’s how legislators want it presented in class.”

E-Learning Advocates Say School Districts See Virtual Education As A Threat.
Education Week (4/27, Gustke) reported, “Online education enrollment is growing” at the elementary and secondary levels at a rate of “about 30 percent a year.” Consequently, “some states have tempered that growth with caps on student enrollment, a legislative move that is now facing increasing scrutiny.” The Education Department “touts virtual education as one of the key approaches for how schools should use technology to improve learning.” And, experts often cite “the rapid growth of online coursetaking in higher education…as a model for the precollegiate world.” As such, E-learning advocates say that enrollment caps at the K-12 level “limit student choice and can have a detrimental effect on learning.” They also contend that school districts, concerned with losing money, seek caps on online enrollment because they “are threatened by the growing popularity of virtual schools.”

Maryland Schools Chief Proposes Making “Student Growth” 50 Percent Of Teacher Evaluations.
The Baltimore Sun (4/28, Bowie) reports that Maryland “state schools Superintendent Nancy S. Grasmick proposed Tuesday a regulation that would require that” student growth “make up at least half of teacher and principal evaluations.” It does not “define student growth as test scores. So a school district could use portfolios of student work instead of scores.” The measure was approved by the state school board and will be sent to “a joint committee of the legislature” fro review “before being published. The public would have 30 days to comment.” The Sun notes that last month, state legislators “passed a bill that would link student achievement and evaluations for the first time but did not include specific criteria.”

Florida Legislature Criticized Over Class Size Amendment.
The Palm Beach Post (FL) (4/28) editorializes that the Florida Legislature “has set up a November 2010 public vote” on whether a “class-size amendment should go into full effect in August 2010. … Since their tardiness means that schools can’t know until too late whether to spend the $350 million necessary to hire teachers to meet class-size requirements, legislators obviously should postpone penalties until after the November vote.” The Post adds, “The Legislature never wanted class-size limits, didn’t fully pay for them and delayed way too long on a fix.”

Facilities

Texas School Opens New Environmental Science Center.
The Dallas Morning News (4/27, Visser) reported on Lakehill Preparatory School’s (Dallas, TX) new $2.2 million Alice and Erle Nye Family Environmental Science Center which “has three science labs, a large meeting room and a retention pond. But the bonus is the adjacent 43 acres of untouched urban forest owned by the city along White Rock Creek” which allows students to “explore the flood plain and follow up with lessons and experiments inside the science labs.” Also, the building “was designed to meet LEED silver certification – meaning construction materials came from within 500 miles; furniture, carpet and other features were made from recycled materials; and rain is captured to irrigate the campus, among a host of other requirements.”

School Finance
Lingle Agrees To Partially Fund Deal To Restore Shortened School Calendar Next Year.
The AP (4/27, Niesse) reported, “Hawaii Gov. Linda Lingle (R) has agreed to partially fund a deal that would restore next year’s shortened school year, falling short of the amount needed to get kids back in class.” Lingle “she would release $57 million of the $67 million…of an agreement between the teachers union and Board of Education” for next school year. The deal, she said, “was too expensive because it brought back all education employees, including those she considered nonessential.” The amount she agreed to “reflects the per day spending amount she finds acceptable.” The AP adds, “The partial funding leaves the state with no consensus to end the nation’s shortest public school year, which was reduced by 17 days this school year and next due to budget cuts.”

Also in the News
White House Asks Public To Choose Winner Of High School Commencement Competition.
The AP (4/27) reported that six high schools throughout the nation have been chosen as finalists in a competition to have President Barack Obama speak at their graduation ceremonies. “The White House is asking the public to help narrow the six down to three by rating videos and essays submitted by the high schools at http://www.whitehouse.gov/Commencement.” Voting began on Monday and continues through 11:59 EDT on Thursday. The winner, chosen by the President, will be announced May 4.

Toronto Teens Named Top Debaters At World Championship Competition.
The Toronto Star (4/27, Swainson) reported that “this month, three Canadian teens swept the rankings at the World Individual Debating and Public Speaking Championships in Lithuania.” Students from Toronto finished first and second in the competition, and a British Columbia high schooler won “third place among 100 competitors from 14 countries.” The Toronto Star notes that “the Canadian trio even out-talked the Brits, who couldn’t crack the top 10.”

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