The New York Times (3/25, Dillon) reports that some experts attribute “the lagging reading scores…to declines in the amount of reading children do for pleasure as they devote more free time to surfing the Internet, texting, on cellphones or watching television. Others blame undemanding curriculums.”

The AP (3/25, Armario) reports that “the nation’s fourth-grade math scores flattened last year and eighth-grade scores improved two points.” It points out, however, that since 1990, “there has been a 27 point increase overall” in math “for fourth-grade students.” Brookings Institution senior fellow, Tom Loveless, noted, “To the extent that there are gains, they’re found amongst the lowest achievers.” This, “he suspects…is related to the enactment of more accountability systems at the state and federal level that focus attention on the lowest achievers and punish or reward schools based on progress with that group.”

Georgia Achievement Gap Narrowing. The AP (3/24) reported, “A new national report shows black and Hispanic eighth-graders in Georgia are gaining on their white counterparts in reading. … Overall, Georgia’s eighth-grade [NAEP] scores did not change significantly from 2007, with 72 percent of students passing. In fourth-grade, scores rose slightly, from 66 percent passing in 2007 to 63 percent last year.”

Florida NAEP Scores Outpace National Average. The Miami Herald (3/24, McGrory) reported, “Florida’s fourth-graders outperformed the national average on the national reading test, according to a new report released Wednesday. The report, which is mandated by Congress, looks at scores on the National Assessment of Educational Progress, a standardized test given to fourth- and eighth-grade students nationwide.” According to the Herald, “Florida’s eighth-graders posted scores that matched the national average.” The Providence (RI) Journal (3/25, Borg) also covers the story on the state level.

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In the Classroom
Seeking To Stem Enrollment Declines, Chicago High School Adopts New Curriculum.
The Chicago Tribune (3/24, Reinwald) reported, “Faced with an enrollment of just 140 students, massive deficits and possible closure, officials of St. Gregory the Great High School” in Chicago “are getting a reprieve with a new technology-based teaching and learning initiative that will start in the fall.” The school’s board “voted last month to pin its hopes on a curriculum based on a national model that emphasizes analytical thinking, problem solving and communication, among other things. Behind the model is the non-profit Partnership for 21st Century Skills, which has programs in place in several states.”

On the Job
Maryland District Testing New Anti-Truancy Program.
The Washington Post (3/25, Birnbaum) reports, “A new anti-truancy program in Montgomery County [MD] is trying to reach out to students before they miss too much school, a month-old effort that advocates say already is yielding results. Educators and county officials lauded the program Wednesday at Francis Scott Key Middle School in Silver Spring.” According to the Post, “Students in a similar five-year-old program in Baltimore have reduced their unexcused absences and lateness by 50 to 75 percent, said Gloria Danziger, a fellow at the University of Baltimore School of Law who is one of the administrators of the program.”

Law & Policy
In Unanimous Vote, Senate Agriculture Committee Passes School Lunch Bill.
USA Today (3/25, Eisler) reports that in a unanimous vote, the Senate Agriculture Committee “cleared the path Wednesday for a final vote” by the full Senate “on legislation to bolster the safety and nutritional value of school lunches, including provisions to improve training for cafeteria workers and to alert schools more quickly about recalls of contaminated food. The Healthy, Hunger-Free Kids Act of 2010 would commit an additional $4.5 billion to child-nutrition programs over the next 10 years and implement the most sweeping changes to those programs in decades.” According to USA Today, “Among other things, the bill directs the U.S. Department of Agriculture to set new nutrition standards for all food served in schools, from lunchrooms to vending machines.”

Florida Governor Eager To Sign Teacher Tenure, Merit Pay Bill.
The St. Petersburg Times (3/25, Silva) reports that Florida Gov. Charlie Crist (R), “who brags about coming from a family of educators, said he’s ready to sign a bill” that will make “it easier to fire teachers and” that “ties pay increases to student test scores.” The bill was passed in the Senate by a 21-17 vote. Said Crist, “This is a bill that really focuses on trying to help children and encouraging better teachers. … It pays better teachers more, and that just seems like the right thing to do to me.” According to the St. Petersburg Times, the legislation was “a big blow…to the Florida Education Association (FEA), whose bargaining power and clout in the Capitol hang in the balance.” The Times adds that other education measures passed Wednesday call for a replacement for the state’s standardized tests and an expansion of “the state’s tax credit scholarship program.”

The Palm Beach (FL) Post (3/25, Kam) reports that state Sen. John Thrasher (R), “crafted the plan” to eliminate teacher tenure “as part of major education reforms he says are necessary to get the state’s 75 percent graduation rate up and raise student performance.” But FEA President Andy Ford has “accused Thrasher of ‘punishing and scapegoating teachers, driving experienced and skilled teachers out of the classroom, and creating more chaos in Florida public schools.” Moreover, “the teachers union called [the legislation] an ‘all-out assault’ on educators.”

The WSVN-TV Miami, FL (3/25) reports that “South Florida teachers, students and parents” plan to hold a rally in Tallahassee on “Thursday to protest against a cut to school funding.” But “a group of teachers from the Bob Graham Education Center began the rally early in Miami Lakes to protest against Senate Bill 6.”

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School Finance
Illinois BOE Identifies 29 School Districts On Financial Watch List.
The Chicago Tribune (3/25, Ahmed-ullah) reports that the Illinois State Board of Education’s “annual report on the financial health of school districts” released Wednesday shows that “twenty-nine school districts…are on the state’s financial watch list,” up from 22 last year. The Tribune notes, “Each year, the education board analyzes school districts’ finances and designates them as financially sound, under review, under warning or – in the worst case – on a financial watch list.” The assessments are based on the districts’ “ratio of expenditures to revenue, the number of days of cash a district has on hand to pay its bills, and its short- and long-term borrowing ability.” According to Illinois ASBO executive director Michael Jacoby, districts will face even more financial difficulty next year. “Not only are districts facing pressures from the economy, but they’re also looking at state payment delays and state budget reductions,” said Jacoby.

Illinois District Cut Nearly 1,100 Teachers, Staff To Close $44 Million Gap. The Chicago Tribune (3/24, Marrazzo) reported that administrators in the “Elgin-based School District U-46…have cut nearly 1,100 jobs, including more than 700 teachers, to help close a $44 million deficit.” Cut positions “include tenured and non-tenured teachers, central office administrators, counselors, nurses, coaches, librarians, clerical workers and transportation staff.” District officials had hoped “to hire some back,” but “there’s little hope of salvation from the state since Gov. Pat Quinn has proposed slashing $1.3 billion in education funding.”

Maryland Senate Approves Shift Of Teacher Pension Payments To Local Governments.
The Baltimore Sun (3/24, Linskey) reported, “The Maryland Senate gave preliminary approval Tuesday night to a plan that would balance future state budgets by shifting hundreds of millions of dollars in teacher pension payments to local governments.” Beginning in 2011, “the new pension plan would require local governments to contribute an added $63 million in the first year,” increasing to $337 million “within two years.” The Baltimore Sun adds that “the Senate voted 28-19 to approve the pension change, but the entire budget is pending approval in the Senate and changes could still occur.”

Texas Senate Education Committee Considers Options For New School Funding System.
The Dallas Morning News (3/25, Stutz) reports that Texas Senate Education Committee Chairwoman Florence Shapiro, who co-chairs “a special legislative committee on school finance,” said that state “lawmakers are working with an ‘antiquated’ system for financing education that has been in and out of legal trouble in the courts for several years.” The panel is seeking “proposals for an entirely new” funding system. The Dallas Morning News notes, “Currently, local school districts levy significant property taxes on homes and businesses, the state provides tens of billions of dollars in funding every year, and districts get a small amount of federal money.

Prince William County, VA School Board Approves Plan To Cut More Than 200 Jobs.
The Washington Post (3/25, Chandler) reports, “The Prince William County [VA] School Board adopted a $760 million operating budget Wednesday that will cut more than 200 jobs, freeze salaries and raise class sizes in many grades. Even deeper cuts were anticipated, but the system’s fiscal forecast brightened over the past month with an increase in state funding.” According to the Post, Prince Williams County Schools Superintendent Steven L. Walts “outlined what he called an ‘unprecedented’ spending plan last month that included eliminating more than 700 jobs, increasing class sizes to the maximum allowed by the state, and introducing new student fees for sports and Advanced Placement and International Baccalaureate tests.”

Also in the News
Students Complain To Chicago BOE About Quality Of School Lunches.
Chicago Public Radio (3/25, Lutton) reports on its website that the Chicago public school district “is re-negotiating its meals contract for the first time in five years.” On Wednesday, the Board of Education heard comments from students about school lunches. Some said that “their lunches are unhealthy and they leave school feeling sick and bloated.” Chicago Public Radio adds, “Many schools don’t have full kitchens. Kids get cellophane-wrapped lunches heated on site,” and one student at the hearing complained that his school serves “the same three choices every day.” The school system “is asking vendors to meet higher nutrition standards in the new contract, worth about $60 million.”

ABC News (3/24, Pinto, Murray) reported on its Website, “A coalition of high school students in Chicago spoke out against their school lunch menu today at a meeting of the Chicago Board of Education. Schools have tended to defend their menus as giving students what they want, but students at the meeting said those foods are sickening.” According to ABC, “Kids have grumbled for years about the salty fries and mystery meats found in many high school lunches, but in Chicago, those complaints have launched a revolution,” which “started in a nutrition class, when the students learned just how little nutrition they were getting in the cafeteria.”

New DC Schools Food Director Tasked With Major Overhaul.
The Washington Post (3/24, Black) reports, “Since Chancellor Michelle Rhee handpicked him” to overhaul food service in D.C. Public Schools in January, former restaurateur Jeff Mills, the new director of food service for DCPS, “has toured the area’s models of school-food reform” in order “to create the best school food service possible.” Currently, Mills “is launching several pilot programs, including one to expand the number of schools that serve breakfast in the classroom.” However, he says that his main goal is to “put more fruits and vegetables, more whole grains and fewer processed foods on school lunch trays.”

Chicago Schools To Phase Out Many Unhealthy Foods From Menus. The Chicago Tribune (3/24, Eng) reports, “Chicago public schools plan to ditch their daily nacho service in high school and get rid of doughnuts and Pop-Tarts for breakfast as part of a major nutritional overhaul of menus, according to interviews and documents examined by the Chicago Tribune. New standards from the Chicago Public Schools Nutrition Support Services address many of the concerns raised in Tribune articles describing the daily serving of nachos, doughnuts and desserts in a district with an inordinate number of overweight and obese children.” The Tribune adds, “According to the district’s current food service operator, starting in June, nacho service will be reduced to once a week in high school and once a month in elementary school; sweet packaged desserts will also be reduced to weekly treats; and doughnuts and Pop-Tarts will be eliminated.”

Push To Serve Healthy Food In School Cafeterias Challenges Districts. The Seattle Times/McClatchy (3/23, Lubrano) reported, “Unlike most” Philadelphia schools, the High School of the Future in West Philadelphia “has a full kitchen where many meals are prepared practically from scratch. … Future is emblematic both of what healthy school eating can look like and of Philadelphia’s place in the forefront of cities seeking to improve school meals.” However, Future “is a relative anomaly” and stakeholders say “much work has to be done to get other schools in the city — as well as across America — up to that same standard.”

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In the Classroom
Google Launching Competition For Ultra-Fast Broadband Test Sites.
The AP (3/24) reports that Google “is giving interested communities until March 26 to apply to be test sites for a broadband network capable of delivering information at speeds of up to 1 gigabit,” up “to 300 times faster than current DSL, cable and fiber-optic networks in use today.” Cabell County, West Virginia, schools Superintendent William Smith “envisions the Google network helping public schools in a variety of ways,” including making “it easier to have online lessons, so a child who gets stuck doing homework can turn to a teacher rather than a parent who’s less familiar with the material.”

On the Job
Teachers Say Leadership, Curriculum Changes Biggest Factors In Rhode Island School’s Failure.
The Providence Journal (3/24, Jordan) reports that “more than a dozen teachers who were fired a month ago spoke Tuesday night about the upheaval in leadership and curriculum the struggling Central Falls High School has experienced for many years.” The school has had “five principals in seven years” on top of “schedule changes” and some effective and ineffective “programs about how to teach low-income, special education, and English language learners how to read and do math.” The teachers argued to “the city’s Board of Trustees” that those factors contributed more to “the school’s poor performance than the effectiveness of the 93 teachers, support staff, and administrators who were terminated on Feb. 23 as part of a dramatic reform effort.”

University Dean Advises Future Teachers To Study Specialized Fields.
WSBT-TV South Bend, Indiana (3/24, Paul) reports, “School budget cuts across the country may eventually create some trouble for those working to become teachers,” according to Dr. Michael Horvath, Dean of the Indiana University South Bend School of Education. “Horvath said professors at the school have encouraged future teachers to study specialized fields like special education, math, and science.” Said Horvath, “If you are looking for a job in one of those shortage areas, you are going to be in good shape.”

Law & Policy
California Seen As Losing Best Teachers Due To Quality-Blind Layoffs Law.
Timothy Daly, president of the New Teacher Project, and Arun Ramanathan, executive director of the Education Trust-West, write in an op-ed for the Los Angeles Times (3/24), “Over the last several weeks, in what has become a dismal rite of spring, nearly 30,000 teachers throughout California received layoff notices. … Unfortunately, the only tool that California schools can use to make these decisions is a calendar,” due to “an outdated state law that prevents schools from considering anything other than how long a teacher has worked in the school system to decide who stays and who goes.” According to Daly and Ramanathan, “Forcing schools to fire some of their best teachers while keeping less effective teachers is just one of many perverse side effects of California’s quality-blind layoffs law.”

Duncan’s List Of Chicago Schools’ Admission-Seekers Under Investigation.
The New York Times (3/24, Lewin, Davey) reports that when Secretary of Education Arne Duncan was Chicago Public Schools CEO, “his office kept a log of nearly 40 pages listing the local politicians and business people and others who sought help getting children into the city’s most selective public schools.” According to a Department of Education spokesperson, “the log was a record of those who asked for help, and…neither Mr. Duncan nor the aide who maintained the list, David Pickens, ever pressured principals to accept a child.” The Chicago Sun-Times (3/23, Rossi) reported that the “list has now come under the scrutiny of both federal officials and the schools inspector general as part of a probe of whether clout played a role in admissions to Chicago’s elite schools, sources said.” Bloomberg News (3/23, Hechinger) also covered the story.

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Florida Senate Pushes Forward With Education Overhaul Legislation.
The St. Petersburg Times (3/24, Solocheck) reports that the Florida Senate “pushed forward a series of…education measures Tuesday that could dramatically alter the landscape of Florida’s public schools.” The measures would make academic requirements tougher, all more money to be directed “toward private, religious schools,” and eliminate teacher tenure. If approved, “Florida would be the first in the nation to so closely link student test scores to teacher salaries, and one of just a handful of states that do not award multiple-year contracts to teachers with classroom experience.” Andy Ford, president of the Florida Education Association, said of the proposed legislation, “It’s a new dynamic we have. We have a new senator who came in during a special election who is also the party chairman. … That does account for some of the increased movement to the right.”

California Proposal Would Lower Amount Of Votes Needed To Pass School Parcel Taxes.
California’s Contra Costa Times (3/24, Jordan) reports, “Schools districts around the state are taking a stand on an initiative that would amend the state constitution to make it much easier to pass new taxes for education.” The Local Control of Local Classrooms Funding Act “would amend the state constitution by lowering the amount of votes required to pass a school parcel tax from two-thirds to 55 percent.” Current law requires “two-thirds of the vote to pass a special tax.” Californians for Improved School Funding are working to “to collect the required 694,354 signatures” by May 1 in order to get the proposal on November’s ballot.

Chicago Public Education Fund Official Says NCLB Should Focus On School Leadership.
Penny Pritzker, chairwoman for the Chicago Public Education Fund, writes in a commentary for BusinessWeek (3/24), “Business leaders, no matter their political persuasion, understand that our nation’s primary and secondary schools face a leadership crisis. She asserts that “business has a vested interest in improving our schools,” because education “is the foundation upon which the workforce and successful commerce are built.” She notes that for businesses, “it is significant that the U.S. Education Dept. is now focusing on school leadership” indicating that “leadership is now recognized as critical to school and student success.” Pritzker concludes, “This focus should be maintained as Congress continues to debate the future of the No Child Left Behind federal education law.”

Special Needs
Court Rules Against Overhaul Of Bilingual, ESL Programs In Texas.
Texas’ Monitor (3/24, Roebuck) reports that the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled “on Monday overturned a decision that promised a complete overhaul of bilingual and English as a second language programs in Texas schools.” The court “found that despite a lower court’s ruling that the state had failed to provide adequate education to non-native English speakers in its secondary schools, insufficient evidence existed to suggest that local school districts had violated the rights of these students.” The appellate court’s decision “is expected to spare Texas’ more than 1,000 school districts a massive reorganization of not only the way the state tracks the performance of underperforming Spanish-speaking students but also the programs used to educate them.”

School Finance
Texas State Committee Says School Funding Formula Should Be Rebuilt.
The San Antonio Express-News (3/23, LaCoste-Caputo) reported that “a joint select committee on school finance met Tuesday and lawmakers, educators, and business leaders agreed” that “the state’s school funding system is complicated, convoluted, and needs” to be rebuilt. The consensus was reached after the committee heard “a two-hour presentation to explain how the current school funding system works.” Said State Sen. Florence Shapiro afterward, “We just spent the better part of two hours trying to figure this out, and I guarantee you we have more questions now than we did when we started. … We’ve got to find a way that makes more sense so we can be more responsive to taxpayers.” The Express News notes that Texas’ “school funding system…has evolved into complex, multi-tiered formulas that are difficult for even education experts to understand.”

Teacher, Staff Positions Saved In Texas District Due To Attrition.
The Cleburne (TX) Times-Review (3/23, Kendall) reports, “Cleburne Superintendent Dr. Ronny Beard would like to be able to guarantee Cleburne ISD won’t experience a reduction in force,” but “he can’t.” He did, however, say the district will not see “a huge multi-person [reduction in force] as” other districts have seen, “because we’ve already eliminated so many positions by attrition,” said Beard. He added, “The determining factor will be whether we have sufficient numbers of employees leave in positions we can absorb. We’re liable not to know that until June.”

Also in the News
Canceling Prom Violated Student’s Rights, Judge Rules.
The AP (3/24) reports that on Tuesday, U.S. District Judge Glen H. Davidson ruled that Mississippi’s Itawamba County school district “did violate the…constitutional rights” of a student when it canceled prom, rather than let the “lesbian student bring her girlfriend.” The judge, however, “refused the American Civil Liberties Union’s demand to force the…district to put on the April 2 prom.” Davidson said that “he would hold a trial on the issue.” Though the trial “would come too late for the prom to be salvaged at Itawamba Agricultural High School,” ACLU Mississippi Legal Director Kristy Bennett “called the decision a victory.”

Community Impact Of School Closures Analyzed.
The AP (3/24) reports, “Superintendents of struggling districts are winning praise for confronting budget woes by shuttering half-empty and underperforming schools, a move often blocked by local politics in the past. … Now school leaders have an argument that trumps any parent outrage: The struggling economy makes these schools a luxury that districts can no longer afford.” According to the AP, “About 6% of districts closed or consolidated schools this year, compared to about 3% in 2008-09, according to a survey conducted by the American Association of School Administrators.”

NEA in the News
Wisconsin Teacher Earns NEA Peace and International Understanding Award.
The Pierce (WI) County Herald (3/24, Schulte) reports that Ellsworth High School teacher Ryan Casper created the school’s “Hearts and Minds Club when he was deployed in both Iraq and Afghanistan” in order to “show his students what it would be like to help someone overseas,” he said. Moreover, he wanted to “show Iraqi and Afghan students US and coalition forces were there to help, not hurt, their country.” Casper’s efforts are being recognized by the NEA. He has been “named the recipient of the” NEA’s Applegate-Dorros Peace and International Understanding Award,” which he will receive in July. “The award is presented to those NEA-affiliated whose activities in education contribute to international understanding and motivate youth to work for world peace.”

NEA Honors Sioux Falls District’s Homeless Liaison With Human and Civil Rights Award.
The KELOLAND TV Sioux Falls, SD (3/23, Janssen) reported that about “1,000 kids in the Sioux Falls School District are homeless, and that number is growing steadily every year.”" In addition to tracking the students, the district also offers “resources and support for families in need” including “supplies and clothing” through its homeless education liaison, Wendy Giebink. “For her work with these families, the National Education Association has given Giebink the Reg Weaver Human and Civil Rights Award,” which it will present to her in July. “The Reg Weaver Human and Civil Rights Award is the first-ever for the National Education Association and is named for the organization’s past president.”

Analyses Show California Ranking Near Bottom On Per-Pupil Funding.
KPBS-TV San Diego (3/23, Taylor) reported that “the last time California spent more money on students than most other states in the country was 45 years ago, according to government and education association statistics.” Since 1965, the state has gone from having the fifth-highest per-pupil spending of all US states “to 43rd in 2009.” KPBS investigates how that state fell “to the bottom of the heap and how much of that decline is directly attributable to Prop 13,” legislation “that capped property taxes at 1 percent of purchase price and limited yearly increases to 2 percent.” It notes that the NEA, “the California Department of Education…and the National Center for Education Statistics (NCES), all keep stats on per pupil funding,” using different calculations. But regardless of “which measure is used, California repeatedly ends up below the national average.”

Arizona Teacher Proposes Mandatory 30 Minute Recess Everyday.
The Arizona Republic (3/23, Gersema) reports, “Parents, students, and educators generally agree that recess is beneficial to students, but over the years, many schools across the country have chosen to reduce recess to spend more time on classroom lessons because of increased academic requirements.” Now retired teacher Steve Gall is asking Arizona lawmakers “to consider a baseline requirement of 30 minutes of recess every day. Arizona has no requirements for recess; times vary from school to school.” Gall is currently “urging school-board officials in Tucson” to back his proposal and will later ask “boards statewide to implement his idea through board policy.”

In the Classroom
Career Program Allows Students To Earn College Credit, Learn About Criminal Justice.
The San Antonio Express-News (3/23, Kastner) reports on the career pathways program at Edison High School in the San Antonio Independent School District. “Trustees in the San Antonio Independent School District voted Monday night to move forward with plans for the program, which will allow students to earn college credits while learning about jobs in the criminal justice arena.” San Antonio fire and police department members “helped create the blueprint for the program after visiting similar programs in Phoenix and Austin.” The school district expects the program to cost “$120,000 in startup costs and an additional $50,000 a year.”

Elementary School Program Merges Science, English Language Development.
The Sonoma (CA) Index-Tribune (3/23, Charrier-Botts) reports that the “a pilot program launched last year at El Verano Elementary School is attempting to kill two birds with one stone by merging science education with English language development through a new partnership between the Sonoma Valley Unified School District, the Exploratorium’s Institute for Inquiry, the Sonoma Valley Education Foundation and the Vadasz Family Foundation.” Through the program, students will be able to “explore scientific concepts on their own without being required to follow predetermined steps.” Then, “after making an educated hypothesis on what the students’ think might happen, they test out their assumption. All steps, including the inquiry, question and discovery, are compiled on a poster that outlines the students’ findings.” Grants will help the district cover the program’s cost of “$398,662 over three years” for “Exploratorium salaries, teacher salaries, materials and evaluations.”

Washington District’s Math Curriculum Review Reveals Teaching Inconsistencies.
The Tacoma (WA) News Tribune (3/23, Cafazzo) reports that last fall, administrators for Tacoma (WA) Public Schools “launched a district-wide review of math teaching” The review, conducted by “a committee of 30 Tacoma administrators and teachers” discovered “that elementary school teachers in the district aren’t consistent in how they use two available sets of lessons:” Investigations, and Saxon Math. In 2006, the district invested “more than $1 million in the Saxon series,” though “Saxon didn’t replace Investigations entirely.” Assistant Superintendent Rosanne Fulton “said that using an inquiry-based math text requires lots of teacher support,” so she supports “more teacher training and the further development of math coaching by teacher peers at the elementary level.”

Study: Math, Reading Scores In Urban Districts On The Rise.
Education Week (3/22, Aarons) reported, “Students in the nation’s urban school districts have improved markedly in mathematics and reading proficiency as measured both on state exams and the National Assessment of Educational Progress, according to a new report by the Washington-based Council of the Great City Schools.” According to Education Week, the “council’s ninth annual ‘Beating the Odds’ report looks at how students in urban districts stack up on state tests compared with students in their respective states as a whole.” The study “examines state assessment data for 4th and 8th graders from 65 school districts in 37 states and the District of Columbia” and the “statewide data come from administrations in the 2005-06 through 2008-09 school years.”

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On the Job
Report Gives US Poor Grades In Fostering STEM Diversity.
Following an article yesterday in the New York Times about a report, from the American Association of University Women, that found continued impediments for women in math and science, Education Week (3/22) reported, “The nation’s K-12 education system gets an average grade of D for the job it does ‘engaging and nurturing’ minorities to pursue careers in the STEM fields of science, technology, engineering, and mathematics, and a D-plus for such performance with girls.” This is according to a survey from the Bayer Corp. of female and minority members of the American Chemical Society. The Education Week article also notes the results of the AAUW study, which “offers a set of recommendations for educators, parents, and others, including a call to ‘spread the word about girls’ and women’s achievements in math and science’ to combat negative stereotypes…and explain to girls that buying into negative stereotypes can diminish academic achievement,” among other things. “The two new reports come amid strong and growing interest in promoting improved STEM education and stronger interest among young people in the subjects.”

eSchool News (3/22, Prabhu) reported on the Bayer Corp. survey, which “identified the three top causes or contributors that respondents thought lead to underrepresentation in STEM fields.” These were “a lack of high-quality science and math education programs in poorer school districts (cited by 75 percent of respondents); persistent stereotypes that STEM isn’t for girls or minorities (66 percent); and financial issues related to the cost of education (53 percent).”

Columnist Says Teachers Need More Training, Not Threats.
Columnist Lawrence Harmon writes in an op-ed for the Boston Globe (3/23), “In the battle for accountability, school superintendents in Boston, Washington, and elsewhere are dragging ineffective educators in front of figurative firing squads. But it’s hard to see how firing or transferring teachers will save schools unless teacher training – both in-service and in schools of education – improves dramatically.” Harmon adds, “If school districts are going to demand so much of teachers, then the least superintendents and schools of education can provide is basic tools” as effective training has more power “than there could ever be in threats.”

Law & Policy
Chicago Students Seek School Lunch Menu Overhaul.
The Chicago Tribune (3/23, Eng) reports, “When school officials defend serving a daily menu of nachos, pizza, burgers and fries, they often say they’re just giving students what they want. But you wouldn’t know it by listening to an angry coalition of high school students who plan to speak out on Chicago Public Schools meals Wednesday at the monthly Chicago Board of Education meeting.” According to the Tribune, “One of those students is Teresa Onstott, a sophomore at Social Justice High School who last week practiced a speech that details the ‘sickening pizza, chicken sandwiches and nachos’ the district serves each day and urges the board not to renew the contract for” Chartwells-Thompson, “the company providing the food.”

Race To The Top To Spur Teacher Merit Pay Pilot Programs In Georgia.
Maureen Downey wrote in a “Get Schooled” blog for the Atlanta Journal-Constitution (3/22) that Georgia Gov. Sonny Perdue’s (R) teacher merit pay bill “was likely off the table” for this legislative “session after its sponsor told educators he was settling for a study committee. But the pay for performance issue still looms as it is a key part of the state’s Race to the Top application and would be mandatory in the 23 participating school districts.” According to Downey, “Those districts, which represent 41 percent of the students in Georgia schools, would, in essence, pilot performance pay for the rest of the state.”

Illinois House Votes To Allow Districts To Set Four-Day School Weeks.
The Chicago Tribune (3/23, Manchir) reports, “In an effort to help strapped school districts save money,” the Illinois House “on Monday approved a bill that would let local school boards set four-day weeks for students,” and the bill now “goes to the Senate for consideration.” According to the Tribune, “Lawmakers said the move could save school districts money on fuel for buses and utility costs for buildings.” However, “the legislation is opposed by some major education groups, including the Chicago Teachers Union.”

Duncan’s Office Maintained List Of Chicago Politicians’ School Admissions Requests.
The Chicago Tribune (3/23, Ahmed) reports, “For several years when U.S. Education Secretary Arne Duncan was Chicago Public Schools chief, his office maintained a list of politicians and others seeking help for applicants to selective schools, former top aide David Pickens told the Tribune today. The list is being investigated as part of a wider inquiry into allegations of back-door admissions practices at the elite schools, now being conducted by the school district inspector general and part of a federal probe.” According to the Tribune, Duncan spokesman Peter Cunningham is quoted saying that admissions decisions were “up to the principal” and any admissions queries that came from Duncan’s office were “part of our process of being responsive to people.”

The Chicago Sun-Times (3/23, Rossi) reports, “For several years during U.S. Education Secretary Arne Duncan’s tenure running Chicago’s public schools, his office kept a list of elected officials and others trying to get children into the city’s elite selective enrollment schools, top CPS official David Pickens told the Chicago Sun-Times today. … The CPS inspector general is investigating the list, Pickens said, adding that they began keeping it at the request of principals who were inundated with calls from parents about gaining a seat in a magnet or selective enrollment college prep school.”

School Finance
Official Says Mismanagement Of Construction Cost Hampton, Virginia, District $2 Million.
The Daily Press (3/23, Shalash) reports, “Since 2008, Charles Roberts has kept an eagle-eye on the pre-K-8 school construction in Hampton to make sure it ran smoothly and taxpayer money wasn’t wasted.” In his position as director of facilities and planning , Roberts “alerted his boss about mismanagement on the $100 million projects that led to the schools opening a year late and costing $2 million in delays,” but those alerts, “were ignored by his boss, Deputy Superintendent for Facilities Victor Hellman and former Superintendent Patrick Russo.” Now, his job “has been eliminated from the proposed 2011 budget that the School Board will finalize March 31.” Hellman said the position is no longer needed.

Bills Would Allow Minnesota Districts To Raise Taxes Without Voter Approval.
The St. Paul (MN) Pioneer-Press (3/23, Boldt) reports that “state aid for schools is frozen … forcing districts to dip into their reserves and take out loans.” Some education officials say that “school districts should have more authority to raise property taxes without voter approval.” State Rep. Mindy Greiling (D) “introduced a bill…that would allow school districts to levy up to $200 per pupil from local taxpayers without voter approval.” Two other bills will also be examined: the first “would allow school boards to renew an expiring levy,” and the second would “let districts increase taxes to help pay for proposed increased contributions to help stabilize the state pension fund for teachers and administrators.”

Also in the News
Teen Juries Hear Cases Of First-Time Offenders In Los Angeles District.
The Los Angeles Times (3/22, Kim) reported that a “teen court, which convened after last bell on a recent Wednesday at Dorsey High in South Los Angeles, is one of 17 in the county where students decide the cases of first-time juvenile offenders accused of misdemeanors including tagging, petty theft, drug possession and prostitution.” According to adults involved in the process, “these teens, who perform their civic duty with part somber responsibility and part gleeful curiosity, often know better than legal professionals why a teen did what he or she did, and what punishment will change his or her behavior.” The Times noted that “the idea behind having teens’ cases heard by peers is that the combination of questioning, sanctions and involvement in the legal process — most defendants are ordered back to serve as a juror on teen court as part of their community service — will steer them away from more serious offenses.”

Teens Help Adults Pass California High School Exit Exam.
The Los Angeles Times (3/22, Cruz) reported that Brandy Rice was “one of 20 Compton Adult School students in a tutoring program for the California High School Exit Examination. The tutors weren’t teachers, but teenagers from Palos Verdes High School,” set in a wealthy “beach community on a hill.” According to the Times, the “adults receiving tutoring…all have the same regret: They didn’t get a high school diploma.”

News 8 Austin (2/16) reported on “Discover Engineering Week” in the Austin area, which will give students “a hands-on and updated view of the engineering industry,” and will include visits from industry professionals who “will talk about the importance of engineers in society and provide interactive features for students and teachers.” Another News 8 Austin (2/16, Iglehart) story reported, “IBM is one of the companies participating in” the initiative. Yesterday, “IBM trained volunteers for the program and taught various activities to get students acquainted with the life of an engineer. … Each activity gives students an idea of how important engineering is to their community and the impact it can have on their daily lives.”

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In the Classroom
US Customs and Border Protection Donates Seized Vehicles To Four Arizona High Schools.
The Yuma (AZ) Sun (2/17, Gilbert) reports that the US Customs and Border Protection’s donation of “eight vehicles to vocational automobile programs at four Yuma-area schools” will give high school students in automotive classes “the opportunity to hone their auto mechanic skills.” Each of the four schools will receive two of the vehicles. The “five sedans and three minivans…had been seized during the commission of crimes over the past six months,” the Yuma Sun adds.

North Carolina Education Officials Come Up With New US History Curriculum Options.
North Carolina’s News & Observer (2/17, Bonner) reports that North Carolina “education officials yielded to critics of a proposal that would have limited the required high school US history course to events of the last 132 years.” On Tuesday, the state Department of Public Instruction’s chief academic officer, Rebecca Garland, “told legislators” that “the agency used…feedback from 7,000 emails on the proposed social studies curriculum to come up with two new options.” Garland added that the options “will be ready in April.”

More Special-Needs Utah Students Learning In Regular Classrooms.
The Salt Lake Tribune (2/16, Stewart) reported, “Today, 52 percent of Utah’s special-needs learners spend most of the school day in regular classrooms, up from 42 percent in 2004. … Technology has driven advances in learning aids and textbook publishers are now producing adaptive instructional materials.” Also, Christine Timothy, severe disabilities specialist at the Utah State Office of Education, “said mounting evidence shows mainstreamed students fare better as adults in terms of employability, wages and independence.”

Students Design Machines To Measure Licks Needed To Reach Center Of Tootsie Roll Pop.
The Ipswich (MA) Chronicle (2/17, Dooley) reports, “Engineering Tech II students at Ipswich High School have undertaken a sweet challenge: They’ve designed machines to measure how many licks it takes to get to the center of a Tootsie Roll pop.” The students’ designs included “donated motors with worm gear drives intended to power automobile seats, scraps of wood, calculators, a laptop computer, gears, axles, and Lego parts.” Teacher Bill Gallant, who found the project in “Technology Teacher” magazine, said, “The project takes students through all the stages of the engineering design process. They have to think like an engineer.” He added, “The Tootsie Roll pop assignment follows the trebuchet catapult project students worked on previously to throw an egg into a frying pan.”

On the Job
Illinois State University Student Group Provides Urban School Instruction Training.
The Chicago Tribune (2/17, Cvetan) reports that Urban Needs in Teacher Education (UNITE), a “student-led organization at Illinois State University,” aims to “change the way education is taught for urban schools, thereby having a greater impact on issues such as high dropout rates. … The group’s most recent effort was Project 43, a 43-hour marathon event for about 40 budding educators focused on how make their instruction relevant to students, excite the desire to learn and help them go on to college.” According to the Tribune, “The weekend featured workshops and seminars on professional development, social justice and school improvement; meetings with Chicago Public Schools teachers; and speakers who addressed issues related to the dropout problem.”

Law & Policy
National School Nutrition Reform Efforts Show Promise.
Education Week (2/16, McNeil, Quillen) reported, in a story outlining the various nutrition efforts planned for schools, that “while states and school districts have tried to promote healthier foods and distribute them to more students, the possibility of national nutrition reform may be starting to show some real teeth.” The current “push to reauthorize the 64-year-old federal school meals program” coincides with “a new anti-obesity campaign headed by the first lady” and proposed changes from the Obama administration “that stretch across both the US Departments of Education and Agriculture.” The Department of Agriculture’s plan focuses on “improving nutrition standards” critics say have remained about the same since 1946. Mrs. Obama’s campaign, “Let’s Move,” aims to “encourage more physical activity for children, healthier foods, and more accurate food labeling,” Education Week adds.

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Special Needs
Criticism Grows Against State, District Home-Language Survey To Identify ELLs.
Education Week (2/16, Zehr) reported, “A growing chorus of people are saying that some school districts are overzealous in categorizing students as English-language learners” and that “information requested on” a home-language survey filled out by parents “can be misleading or misused.” Education Week also points out that in “districts across the country, once a student is designated as an ELL, the label is not readily lifted.” State officials in Arizona, meanwhile, “have changed the home-language survey there to ask only one question rather than three,” in an effort to “cut down on the overidentification of students as ELLs.” However, the move has prompted a complaint — currently being investigated by the US Department of Education’s office of civil rights — that the simplified “home-language form” promotes discrimination “against children who may be dominant in English, but still need extra help to gain proficiency in it.”

Safety & Security
Maryland Districts Taking Precautions As Schools Reopen Today.
The Baltimore Sun (2/17, Fuller) reports that officials in Maryland school systems reopening on “Wednesday after the recent snow storms that blanketed the area with more than 3 feet of snow” are taking precautions to promote safety. For instance, “Anne Arundel County police are deploying a helicopter to assist an increased police presence on major streets during school arrival and dismissal times Wednesday.” Meanwhile, Baltimore County “school officials are calling for students to wear bright clothing for greater visibility.” In many areas “sidewalks still covered with ice and huge piles of snow.” And some school systems plan to start schools “two hours late for the rest of the week.”

School Finance
Florida District May Charge Parents Full Price For Lost Or Damaged Textbooks.
Denise-Marie Balona wrote in a “Sentinel School Zone” blog for the Orlando Sentinel (2/16) that Lake County, FL “school officials are considering charging families the full price of lost or damaged materials, regardless of their age or condition. Right now, principals charge students a replacement cost based on the number of years the item has been in use.” According to Balona, Lake officials “say they can’t afford to keep shouldering the bulk of the financial burden — $90,000 a year, on average.”

Florida District’s Penny Sales Tax Helps Pay For Most Promised School Projects.
The St. Petersburg Times (2/17, Solochek) reports, “The Pasco County School District’s income from the Penny for Pasco sales tax, approved in 2004,” reached its highest “single-month revenue” of $1.48 million in December 2005. In 2006, tax money peaked “at $14.44 million.” But “since then, the annual revenue has declined,” and in October of last year the district received its “single lowest” collection of $717, 626 from Penny for Pasco. Mike Williams, the districts construction manager told the School Board on Tuesday, “The positive point is, we’re still collecting money.” On the other hand, “there’s little money available for any additional construction and maintenance projects.” The Times notes, however that “the majority of the new schools and additions promised with the Penny for Pasco are either complete or in the works.”

Louisiana Governor Proposes “No-Growth” In State Aid To Public Schools.
Louisiana’s Advocate (2/16, A6, Sentell) reported, “Basic state aid to Louisiana public schools would be virtually frozen for the second consecutive year under the budget Gov. Bobby Jindal (R) unveiled last week.” The budget would provide “$3.3 billion in basic aid to public schools, which aside from money for new students is the same as what schools got last year.” Still, state Board of Elementary and Secondary Education (BESE) Chairwoman Penny Dastugue pointed out that “a no-growth budget is better than reductions in state aid.” The BESE will make decisions about the proposal on March 11.

Also in the News
Indiana Foundation In Talks To Preserve Historic Grade School.
The AP (2/16) reported, “The Historic Landmarks Foundation of Indiana says it wants to talk with officials in Lowell about saving an old grade school. The Board of Zoning Appeals could vote Feb. 23 on whether to condemn the Old Lowell Grade School.” According to the AP, “Historic Landmarks’ Central Region Director Mark Dollase says options include a program in which the building could be stabilized and then resold.”

Army General Takes “Second Act” As CEO Of DC Public Schools.
The Washington Post (2/15, Turque) reported on Army Brigadier General Anthony J. Tata, who once served in Afghanistan and is now CEO for DC public schools. In the “newly created post,” Tata overseas “purchasing, food service, technology and other support areas.” The Post explains that while serving in “Afghanistan’s Kunar Province in April 2006…a Taliban rocket slammed into a primary school in Asadabad, killing seven children and wounding 34.” That event and “others like it by the Taliban” inspired Tata’s pursuit of a career in the education sector. Said Tata, “It struck me at the time that if the enemy of my enemy is education, then perhaps that’s a second act for me.” According to the Post, since joining the DC public school system, he has “helped win certification for 77 D.C. public schools to serve free lunch to all children” and revamped the district’s warehouse system.

NEA in the News
Alabama Teacher Accuses Principal Of Harassment.
The Decatur (AL) Daily (2/17, Hughes) reports that the Morgan County, AL school board was asked to intervene after Dawn Davis, “a Danville Middle School teacher who was forced to remove her nose stud, accused her principal of ‘systematic and ongoing harassment.’ Alabama Education Association representative Gloria Johnson said the request to remove the nose stud was just an example of the harassment of Davis by Principal Gary Walker during a 12-year period.” Johnson “accused Walker of being inconsistent in his decisions because, she said, he let some students wear” clear studs, yet the board ultimately “denied Davis’ grievance.”

School System Offering Camp To Expose Students To Nontraditional Careers.
The Newton (GA) Citizen (2/23, Floyd) reports on the Girls in Engineering Camp that Rockdale County Public Schools offered its middle schoolers. Jill Oldham, the camp’s organizer, said the idea was “to expose students to nontraditional careers.” Interest from students was higher than expected, Oldham added. For four days over winter break, “instructor Casey Martin introduced a specific engineering career field to the class, and then a guest speaker talked to the students and answered questions from them; three of the days included a female working in the engineering field or from a engineering organization. Afterward, Martin told them about education requirements in that field, and then the girls completed a project related to the field.” Oldham noted that “RCPS later will try to offer camps or special programs for other nontraditional careers, like boys in health care.”

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In the Classroom
As Student Interest “Ebbs And Flows,” Budget Cuts Seen To Threaten Sewing Classes.
The Evansville (IN) Courier & Press (2/23, Bartels, Owen-Phelps) reports on the decline of sewing classes in Tri-State schools. “While interest in sewing ebbs and flows among the young, budget cuts and increasing academic standards discourage some school systems from offering sewing classes.” At time same time, “television shows such as ‘Project Runway,’ ‘What Not to Wear’ and home improvement programs have piqued the interest of some young people.” The article notes the experiences of students who have participated in programs that include sewing, and the benefits they gleaned from developing those skills. And while some schools have been reducing and eliminating programs, “at North High School in Evansville, sewing is part of a fashion and textiles class,” and the two sessions offered each semester are routinely full. Teacher Alyson McIntyre-Reiger said “she recruits on the middle school level.”

School’s Natural Resources Pathway Adds Course In Environmental Services And Wildlife.
In the seventh of a series of article produced for National Career and Technical Education Month at Winfield High School, the Winfield (KS) Daily Courier (2/23, Hogan) reports on “the Natural Resources pathway in Ag Education,” which “provides students with a unique opportunity to study science and how it applies to their world as well as explore related careers and compete in FFA.” In addition to classes such as horticulture and animal science, the department is now offering a course in environmental services and wildlife. For the “first semester, students studied land conservation and wildlife management and visited with several representatives from colleges and [CTE] schools about job opportunities related to this class.” They also “learned about heavy equipment operation” through a simulator at North Central Tech. College, among other things. Students are currently preparing to compete based on what they have learned.

Study Shows “No Cussing” Clubs Helped Reduce Violence, Profanity In Schools.
KSTU-TV Salt Lake City (2/23) reported on its Website that McKay Hatch, founder of the “No Cussing Club,” spoke to students at Bennion Elementary School in West Jordan on Monday. Hatch “taught students about the power of their words and how to combat bullying and cyber bullying.” KSTU added that “a two year study in Louisiana shows that violence and profanity decreased 64 percent after their school implemented the No Cussing Club chapter in their district.”

Evolution Of Student Assessment Tools Analyzed.
Stanley N. Rabinowitz, director of the Assessment and Standards Development Services Program at WestEd, wrote in an op-ed for Education Week (2/22), “An unprecedented confluence of factors — economic, political, and educational — is causing many states to rethink their student-assessment programs,” however, “careful thought and expert guidance will be needed if they are to avoid the problems of the past and take advantage of promising new developments” like the current NCLB renewal push. According to Rabinowitz, “Our assessment and accountability systems should reflect what we value most for our students, schools, and society, and what we think it means to be a well-prepared student, worker, and citizen. Once these are clear, we should be willing to fight and to pay for their reflection in our system for measuring academic progress.”

On the Job
More Maryland Districts To Become Majority-Minority.
The Baltimore Sun (2/22, Carson) reported that by the start of classes in the fall of 2011 in Maryland, “white students in Howard County are expected to be a minority, joining those in Baltimore County. The two school systems are riding a demographic wave” that is “sparking intensive efforts to shape children from all backgrounds into eager, high-achieving students.” According to experts, school enrollments are a reflection of the growth in diversity that is happening nationwide. Mark Goldstein, “an economist and state planner,” said, “Statewide, the population is clearly becoming more minority. … That is increasingly true as we go through the decade.”

More Georgia Districts Planning Switch To Four-Day Weeks.
The AP (2/22) reported, “With budget cuts looming, more Georgia school systems are considering switching to four-day school weeks. Peach County took the step last fall when officials decided to hold classes Tuesdays through Fridays.” District officials saw the four-day week as “a way to fill a nearly $800,000 budget shortfall.” So far, “Peach County officials have estimated they saved $313,000 in transportation and utilities costs by making the schedule change.”

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Law & Policy
Some Education Stakeholders Want More Federal Recognition, Funding For Magnet Schools.
Education Week (2/22, Zehr) reported that when compared to the attention given to charter schools, “some educators and researchers” say that “magnet schools have been given short shrift by the Obama administration.” Magnet schools, which “typically have a particular academic focus,” increase the “racial or economic diversity” of a school and “deserve more federal funding and support than they are receiving,” some argue. U.S. Department of Education spokesman Justin Hamilton said that “the administration thinks magnet schools play an important role.” He also clarified, “Arne Duncan has consistently said he’s not for all charter schools, just good charter schools.”

DC Schools Chief Submits Teacher Abuse, Misconduct Report To City Council Chairman.
Bill Turque wrote in a “D.C. School Insider” blog for the Washington Post (2/22) that D.C. Public Schools Chancellor Michelle A. Rhee “has fired ten DCPS teachers for administering corporal punishment and two for sexual misconduct since July 2007, according to a report she has submitted to D.C. Council Chairman Vincent C. Gray. Another 28 served suspensions ranging from two to ten days for some form of corporal punishment, defined by District law as the use or attempted use of physical force against a student, ‘either intentionally or with reckless disregard for the student’s safety, as a punishment or discipline.’” According to Turque, the report “was requested by Gray after the uproar Rhee triggered by telling ‘Fast Company’ magazine that an unspecified number of the 266 D.C. public school teachers who were laid off in October had physically or sexually abused students.”

Sex Education Bill Dies In Utah Senate.
The Salt Lake Tribune (2/23, Schencker) reports that “after months of negotiations,” state Senate bill 54 “died with barely a whisper Monday morning after lawmakers chose not to talk about it.” The bill would have changed “language in state law to clarify that Utah teachers are allowed to talk about contraception.” It “also would have directed the State Office of Education to develop materials on contraception for teachers to use and would have made those materials available for parents to review.” The Tribune notes that “state law already allows schools to teach students about contraceptives, but it prohibits ‘advocacy or encouragement’ of their use.”

School Finance
Arts Classes Jeopardized By Michigan Education Cuts.
The Detroit News (2/23, Hodges) reports, “Only 40 percent” of Detroit Public Schools “have an art teacher, down from 80 percent 10 years ago.” And though “Detroit’s public schools have been in crisis mode for far more than a decade,” schools in Detroit’s suburbs “may not be far behind,” as late last year, “all public schools suffered a $165 per pupil cut in state aid — some suburbs lost even more — leaving even wealthy-by-comparison systems contemplating cuts to programs once regarded as indispensable.”

Chicago-Area Districts Blame Recession, State Financial Crisis For “Deep Cuts.”
The Chicago Tribune (2/23, Black) reports that “Chicago-area school districts already struggling with multimillion-dollar budget deficits are warning of mass teacher layoffs and deep program cuts for the coming school year — an impending crisis they blame on the recession and the state’s chronic financial woes.” State Board of Education spokeswoman Mary Fergus called Illinois’ current financial crisis “unprecedented.” Even with $3 billion “in federal stimulus funding provided over the last two years,” the state has not “paid the current school year’s education bills in months,” the Tribune notes. Consequently, many school districts in the state have had to “cut band programs, increase class sizes, reduce field trips and use fewer substitute teachers.” Michael Jacoby, executive director of the” Illinois ASBO pointed out, “Cutting supplies or taking a copy machine out of a school — they are low-hanging fruit but really won’t balance the budget. People are the thing you need to remove to balance the budget.”

Also in the News
“Keep Fit Club” Helps Overweight Texas Youth Get In Shape.
The Houston Chronicle (2/22, George) reported on the Keep Fit Club, “a free program offered to overweight and obese 10- to 18-year-olds in the Texas Children’s Health Plan, which provides medical care for 250,000 area children on Medicaid or CHIP. Keep Fit Club families are taught how to make healthier choices during Saturday exercise and nutrition sessions.” According to the Chronicle, the “program is among several in the Houston area helping youngsters beat childhood obesity through exercise and healthy eating — key goals” of First Lady Michelle Obama’s “‘Let’s Move’ initiative announced this month.”

Amid Spying Lawsuit, Pennsylvania District Asked Not To Delete Evidence From Computers.
The AP (2/23) reported, “A student who accuses his suburban Philadelphia school district in a lawsuit of spying on students via their school-issued webcams will ask district officials not to remove any potential evidence from student computers, his lawyer said Monday. Lawyers for the Lower Merion School District are due in federal court on the issue Monday afternoon, on an emergency petition from student Blake Robbins of Penn Valley.” According to the AP, “Lower Merion officials confirmed last week they had activated the webcams to try to find 42 missing laptops, without the knowledge or permission of students and their families.”

Teachers To Appeal Mass Firings At Rhode Island High School.
The AP (2/26, Henry) reports, “The entire staff of teachers fired in a radical attempt to improve one of the worst performing high schools in Rhode Island will appeal their dismissals to school authorities, the head of the teachers union said Thursday. The board of trustees overseeing the school system in Central Falls, one of the poorest communities in the state, voted Tuesday to fire 88 high school teachers and other support staff by the end of the year.” According to the AP, Jane Sessums, president of the Central Falls Teachers’ Union, says she “still hopes negotiations will resume, although her union has not made any requests to school officials to continue talks.”

The Christian Science Monitor (2/26, Khadaroo) reports, “To the dismay of many local and national union members, all the teachers, the principal, and other staff of Central Falls [RI] High School were fired by the board of trustees this week,” as “part of a dramatic turnaround plan proposed by the superintendent and approved by the state education commissioner.” According to the Monitor, “Secretary of Education Arne Duncan applauded the Rhode Island decision this week. But Randi Weingarten, American Federation of Teachers president, shot back with a statement that ‘firing all of the teachers is a failed approach and will not result in the kinds of changes necessary to improve instruction and learning.’”

In the Classroom
Saturday Science Academy Uses Hands-On Approach To Motivate Students.
The San Gabriel Valley (CA) Tribune (2/25, Irwin) reported that Kwis Elementary School is “trying an experimental Saturday science academy,” and “is using a hands-on approach to science to motivate students.” The academy takes place “one Saturday a month from 9 to 11 a.m.” Instructors “use ‘guided discovery’ to pique the students’ interest.” For example, “the first class gave the students a ‘mystery powder’ to figure out. The kids used microscopes to study the crystalline structure of the mysterious substance.” The Kwis academy is made possible through a federal grant.

Report Analyzes “Best Practices” Among Middle Grades.
Education Week (2/25, Zehr) reported, “Using students’ test scores as one part of evaluations for teachers, principals, and superintendents is associated with better academic performance at schools serving the middle grades, a report released this week has found. Linking students’ test scores with evaluations was one of the ‘best practices’ that high-performing schools serving students in grades 6 to 8 have in common,” the EdSource report found. According to Education Week, “Researchers analyzed the relationship between students’ spring 2009 scores on California’s tests in mathematics and English/language arts and answers to surveys by 303 principals, 3,752 English and math teachers, and 157 superintendents in the state.”

After-School Enrichment Program Introduces Elementary Schoolers To Hobby, Career Skills.
The Jackson (MI) Citizen Patriot (2/26, Wilson) reports on the Challenge U program at Bean Elementary School, and “after-school enrichment program, which has been offered at Bean for almost two decades” and “gives students a chance to learn about a variety of activities” that could be applied to hobbies or careers. The 16 classes offered this year encompass “soccer, wrestling, cake decorating, knitting, sewing, jewelry making and photography,” as well as courses on animals and electronics. ‘”I hope they gain an understanding of engineering and that there are careers in Jackson County related to electrical engineering,’ said Albert Rossner, a digital electronics instructor for Project Lead the Way at the Jackson Area Career Center, who was teaching students how to build a circuit.”

Grant To Help Colorado District Beef Up STEM Programs, Serve As National Model.
The Colorado Springs Gazette (2/26, McGraw) reports, “Falcon School District 49 has received a $100,000 federal grant to beef up its fledgling science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) program” by funding teacher training. It will also be used to “provide programs and buy equipment such as laptops and interactive videos.” A district official said “that over five years Falcon will create a program that will serve as a state and national model. In this effort, the district will partner with the Center for STEM Education at University of Colorado at Colorado Springs, and the Museum of Science and the National Center for Technological Literacy, both in Boston. The district also will consult with industry professionals from around the state.”

On the Job
Orange County, California, Schools Chief Calls For Elimination Of Teacher Tenure.
The Orange County Register (2/26, Leal) reports that Orange County, CA schools Superintendent William Habermehl “proposed eliminating teacher tenure, boosting local control of education funding and reducing federal and state regulations Thursday during his annual State of Education speech.” Habermehl “admitted many of his proposed reforms would face tough challenges from lawmakers, unions and other groups. But the several consecutive years of massive budget cuts have severely damaged the ability of schools to provide an education necessary for students to succeed in the 21st century, he said.”

Law & Policy
Parents Push For Ban On Solitary Confinement In Georgia Schools.
The AP (2/26, Turner) reports that the parents of a 13-year-old student who “hanged himself while in” a seclusion room at school “are pushing state education officials to pass a policy banning the use of solitary confinement in Georgia schools, which they say led directly to their son’s death in 2004.” A “federal report released this week” by the Department of Education says that “19 states, including Georgia, do not regulate” seclusion of students in schools. However, it also shows “that many of the states that have no policy are in the process of developing regulations, and a handful of the states that have policies are reviewing them to ensure they are sufficient.” The AP notes that the report “stems from Education Secretary Arne Duncan’s query to state school chiefs last year on policies for confinement and restraint of misbehaving students.”

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New York City Education Panel Approves Ban On Bake Sales.
The New York Times (2/26, A24, Medina) reports that the New York City Department of Education’s Panel for Education Policy unanimously approved a new policy that “bans most bake sales but allows students to sell premade items including Pop-Tarts and Doritos.” The Times notes that the vote was made after 11:30 pm Wednesday night, and “by then, just one mother…was waiting to speak out against the new policy.”

Los Angeles District Facing Class Action Lawsuit Over School Layoffs.
The Los Angeles Times (2/25, Song) reported that a class-action lawsuit was “filed Wednesday in Los Angeles County Superior Court on behalf of students at three of the city’s worst-performing middle schools. The suit claims those students were denied their legal rights to an education and aims to prevent the Los Angeles Unified School District from laying off more teachers there.” The “student body at the three schools is almost exclusively minority, and campuses in more affluent areas were not hit as hard by teacher layoffs.”

School Changes Policy On Sending Students To Office After Child Walks Off Campus.
The Dallas Morning News (2/26, Mueller) reports that Casa View Elementary School in Dallas “has changed its policy regarding sending students to the principal’s office after a 7-year-old walked off campus.” The student “was missing for about two hours Wednesday after being sent to the office” for “playing in the boys’ bathroom.” Instead of going to the office, the boy walked off campus and “hid behind a nearby house.” The student told a local television station “that he skipped out because he” thought the principal would suspend him. Though school employees did follow “procedures according to Dallas ISD policy, which requires students to be paired up when going to the office,” the school will now require that teachers call “the office to let the principal’s staff know when students are on the way.”

Special Needs
Ontario District Using Online Technology To Support Autistic Students.
T.H.E. Journal (2/25, McCrea) reported that knowing autistic students “need special attention in the learning environment and that the instructors who teach those students require additional support,” Joel Godecki, autism spectrum disorders project director for the 8,000-student Thunder Bay Catholic District School Board in Northwestern Ontario, “looked around for a technology tool that could serve both purposes.” Godecki “decided to try a suite of products developed by AutismPro. ‘I was intrigued by the fact that the system was based on the Web and that it would be easy to implement at different schools,’ said Godecki, whose district is currently using AutismPro’s workshops, resources, and professional and resource management products.”

School Finance
Chicago Public Schools Faces Up To $1 Billion In Debt Next Year.
The Chicago Tribune (2/26, Ahmed) reports, “Chicago Public Schools is facing a deficit of up to $1 billion next year that can be reduced only through a combination of pension reform, union concessions and job cuts, schools chief Ron Huberman said Thursday.” He added that “without all three measures in conjunction…teacher layoffs, increased class sizes and cuts to important programs are distinct possibilities.” The Tribune notes that the “2011 budget forecast takes into account a skyrocketing pension obligation next year and contractual raises for teachers that together increase costs by about $450 million over this year.”

More Funds Could Be Cut From Hawaii Schools’ Budget.
The AP (2/26) reports that the Hawaii Board of Education “has found an additional $37.7 million it could cut from the budget of Hawaii’s public school system. State Sens. Norman Sakamoto [D] and Donna Mercado Kim [D] had asked the Department of Education to prioritize a list of cuts amounting to about $78 million,” about five percent “of the system’s general fund budget.” The AP added, “Island public schools have already absorbed $269 million in cuts over this year and next,” which “have resulted in teacher furloughs that have cost students more than three weeks of class time.”

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Utah Assembly Votes Against Equal Distribution Of Funds Between Split Districts.
The Salt Lake Tribune (2/25, Schencker, Drake) reported that on Wednesday night, Utah’s House Education Committee “shot down HB292, a bill that would have brought property tax revenues per student in” the Canyons and Jordan school districts “back to equal levels by redistributing money,” and would “have applied to splitting districts in the future.” As a result, “Canyons will not be required to send $15 million in property tax revenue to Jordan.” Before the vote, “administrators from both districts presented financial arguments.” Burke Jolley, Jordan deputy superintendent for business services, said that “Jordan now collects only $1,136 in property revenue per student compared with $2,087 collected by Canyons.” But, according to Canyons’ business administrator Keith Bradford, when “taking into account other factors, such as the property tax money Canyons already sends to Jordan under a county-wide equalization law passed two years ago,” the Jordan school district “now collects $1,467 per student and Canyons gets $1,899.”

Also in the News
Television Station Owner Launches Ad Campaign Advocating Diversity In Schools.
North Carolina’s News & Observer (2/26, Goldsmith, Hui) reports, “Capitol Broadcasting Corp., owner of WRAL, is airing an editorial ad campaign on the television station proclaiming that ‘diversity matters.’” The ads “come as a new majority on the county school board has proposed getting rid of Wake’s current diversity policy of trying to balance the numbers of students at each school based on families’ economic backgrounds.” Capital Broadcasting Corp. CEO Jim Goodmon “said today that the spots are not meant as direct endorsement of the current policy, but as an editorial statement in favor of the principle of diversity.”

Duncan To Announce Ramped-Up Civil Rights Enforcement.
The Washington Post (3/8, Anderson) reports, “Education Secretary Arne Duncan plans to announce Monday that his agency is ramping up enforcement of civil rights laws in schools and colleges, a move that seeks to draw a contrast with the policies of his Republican predecessors. In a speech drafted for an appearance” at Edmund Pettus Bridge in Selma, AL, “where civil rights marchers were beaten by state and local police in March 1965,” Duncan “said the department’s Office for Civil Rights expects to issue a series of guidance letters to educators to address ‘issues of fairness and equity.’” Duncan “said the department will also announce in coming weeks and months several enforcement actions to ensure that students have equal access to a college-prep curriculum, advanced courses, and classes in math and science.”

The AP (3/7, Armario) reported that ED “plans to intensify its civil rights enforcement efforts in schools around the country, including a deeper look at issues ranging from programs for immigrant students learning English to equal access to a college preparatory courses. … ‘For us, this is very much about working to meet the president’s goal, that by 2020 we will regain our status in the world as the number one producer of college graduates,’ Russlynn Ali, assistant secretary for civil rights in the Education Department, said.”

The Wall Street Journal (3/8, King) also reports on the story, quoting Ali saying, “We are back in business … Across all of the statutes under our jurisdiction, we will vigorously enforce civil-rights laws.”

Duncan To Participate In Selma Event As Planned. The AP (3/6) reported, “Alabama’s Legislative Black Caucus on Saturday called on U.S. Education Secretary Arne Duncan to cancel a planned appearance at Robert E. Lee High School in Montgomery. State Rep. Alvin Holmes said the school and its principal publicly opposed the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. and the Selma-Montgomery march in 1965.” The AP added that Duncan “is scheduled to meet with teachers and students at the school and march across the Edmund Pettus Bridge to commemorate the 45th anniversary of ‘Bloody Sunday,’ the violent clash between civil rights protesters and state troopers in Selma.”

The AP (3/7) reported that Secretary of Education Arne Duncan “will meet with students as planned at Montgomery’s Robert E. Lee High School, despite a state legislator’s call to cancel the appearance. … Officials in Duncan’s office said the school is now majority black and the current principal was 2 years old at the time of the march.”

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In the Classroom
New Math Curriculum Credited For Improvement of DC Students.
The Washington Post (3/8, Turque) reports that educators say a new emphasis on “deeper conceptual understanding” of Math concepts as opposed to rote memorization in D.C. school is “paying off,” as “December results for the National Assessment of Educational Progress…showed that the District was the only one of 11 urban school systems tested that made significant gains in math in 2007 and 2009.” The “shift is a legacy of Chancellor Michelle A. Rhee’s predecessor, Superintendent Clifford B. Janey, who imported more rigorous math and reading standards to the District from Massachusetts in 2005, along with the DC-CAS, an annual standardized test that resembles the NAEP. That year, he also introduced Everyday Mathematics, a K-6 curriculum developed in the 1990s by the University of Chicago.”

All-Male All African-American Urban Prep Academy Sends Entire Class To College.
The Chicago Tribune (3/5, Eldeib) reported that Urban Prep Academy for Young Men, Chicago’s “only public all-male, all-African-American high school,” has “fulfilled its mission: 100 percent of its first senior class had been accepted to four-year colleges. Mayor Richard Daley and city schools chief Ron Huberman surprised students at the all-school assembly Friday morning with congratulations, and school leaders announced that as a reward, prom would be free.” According to the Tribune, “The achievement might not merit a visit from top brass if it happened at one of the city’s elite, selective enrollment high schools,” but Urban Prep, “a charter school that enrolls all comers in one of Chicago’s most beleaguered neighborhoods, faced much more difficult odds.”

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On the Job
New Report Highlights Challenges Faced By High School Guidance Counselors.
Valerie Strauss wrote in an “Answer Sheet” blog for the Washington Post (3/6) wrote that high school counselors “are overworked,” many are not “well trained” and many students “think their counselors don’t really know them.” According to Strauss, these were among “key conclusions of the study funded by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation…and conducted by the nonpartisan, nonprofit research group Public Agenda. … The report, entitled ‘Can I Get A Little Advice Here: How an Overstretched High School Guidance System Is Undermining Students’ College Aspirations,’ is the second in a Public Agenda series on college completion.”

Law & Policy
US To Step Up Collections Of Delinquent Federal Loans From Social Security Checks.
The Wall Street Journal (3/8, Schultz) reports that the federal government will start “offsetting,” or taking a portion of Social Security or disability benefits of individuals who owe on debts to the Department of Education or other federal departments. The Journal notes that before 2008, the U.S. government could not offset debt more than 10 years old, but a provision in the 2008 Farm Bill lifted that restriction.

More Districts Moving To Four-Day Weeks.
The Wall Street Journal (3/7, Herring) reported that an increasing number of school districts around the U.S. are shifting to four-day weeks amid major budget shortfalls, but critics say education quality will suffer if instruction days are reduced. The Journal noted that more than 100 districts in about 17 states are currently using a four-day week, according to Education Commission of the States data. An ED spokeswoman is quoted saying in an e-mail that “generally, we are concerned about financial constraints leading to a reduction in learning time.”

The Macon Telegraph (3/8) reports Ray Markwalter of the Baldwin County Board of Education “plans to move forward with a proposal for a four-day school week for the district.” He first heard the idea “during the Georgia School Boards Association conference in December after listening to Peach County Superintendent Susan Clark present her school system’s results.” He said that “the drop in disciplinary incidents, as well as fewer teacher absences, were among the appealing aspects of adopting a four-day school week.”

Special Needs
Florida Accommodates Special Needs Students On Testing.
The Miami Herald (3/8, McGrory) reports, “When students sit down this week to be tested on their knowledge of math, reading and science, not all will be putting pen to paper.” That’s because accommodations for students with disabilities mean that “some may be dictating” while “others may use switches, or computers that play back text in a spoken voice.” And “beyond the accommodations outlined by the state, individual school districts can petition the state Department of Education for other adjustments, said Bambi Lockman, the state director of Exceptional Education and Student Services.” Also, “administrators try to assure that special-needs students take the tests with teachers they know. They also have counselors and school psychologists on hand to help students who are frustrated.”

Facilities
Kansas City, Missouri, May Close Nearly Half Of Schools To Reduce Deficit.
The AP (3/8) reports, “Kansas City was held up as a national example of bold thinking when it tried to integrate its schools by making them better than the suburban districts where many kids were moving.” But “now it’s on the brink of bankruptcy and considering another bold move: closing nearly half its schools to stay afloat.” Superintendent John Covington has proposed “closing 29 out of 61 schools to eliminate a projected $50 million budget shortfall.”

School Finance
Louisiana Districts Use Stimulus Funds To Keep Programs Operating.
The Shreveport (LA) Times (3/8, Johnson) reports, “Title I and special education programs and technology upgrades are set to receive the bulk of millions of federal stimulus dollars rolling into northwest Louisiana school districts through the end of next academic year.” The state “will receive more than $377 million in stimulus money this academic year.” Janis Parker, Title I director for Caddo public schools, said that “She is using a portion of her department’s $18.4 million allotment to continue a Reading First Grant.” The funding is reportedly allowing many school districts to keep programs operating that they otherwise might have had to close down.

Des Moines To Cut 60 Percent Of Art, Music And Phys Ed.
The Des Moines Register (3/6, Reynaud) reports, “Des Moines elementary school students would spend less time singing, drawing and running next school year under a proposal that already is drawing criticism from parents.” That’s because “on Friday, district officials unveiled $33 million in spending cuts including eliminating 60 percent of the district’s elementary art, music and physical education jobs.” Superintendent Nancy Sebring “expressed frustration” but explained that “the district also has a commitment to making sure students pass core subjects and meet federal requirements.”

Texas District Superintendent Proposes Merger Of Districts To Get More State Aid.
The San Antonio Express-News (3/8, MacCormack) reports, “School officials in Hunt and Ingram are exploring the feasibility of consolidating their two small districts in western Kerr County as a way to boost state funding.” Ingram Superintendent J. T. Stroder “has concluded that Texas school finance laws disadvantage smaller districts.” In response, “Hunt School Board President Sandra Schmitt said she’s open-minded but noted previous talks on consolidating the neighboring districts didn’t get far.” Meanwhile, “Hunt Superintendent David Kelm said he’s awaiting input from the Texas Education Agency on Stroder’s unusual proposal.”

Houston To Cut Back On Cafeteria Expenses.
The Houston Chronicle (3/8, Mellon) reports, “More than 425 cafeteria workers in the Houston school district will have their wages slashed this month, dozens of other positions will be cut and students likely will pay more for lunch next year to cover a multimillion-dollar budget shortfall. The Houston Independent School District also is expected to take the rare step this year of spending $10.5 million from savings – about 3 percent of the account – to meet cafeteria expenses.” Superintendent Terry Grier “said part of the deficit could have been avoided with better management.” Grier said that “payroll expenses should have been cut sooner, and the district should not have been serving what he dubbed ‘platinum’ meals with pricey fresh fruit daily.”

Also in the News
Analysis Documents College “Grade Inflation” Over Decades.
USA Today /Inside Higher Ed (3/6, Epstein) reported, “Grades awarded to U.S. undergraduates have risen substantially in the last few decades, and grade inflation has become particularly pronounced at selective and private colleges, a new analysis of data on grading practices has found. In ‘Grading in American Colleges and Universities,’ published Thursday in Teachers College Record, Stuart Rojstaczer, a former Duke University professor of geology, and Christopher Healy, an associate professor of computer science at Furman University, illustrate that grade point averages have risen nationally throughout most of the last five decades.” Also, the study “indicates that the mean G.P.A. at an institution is ‘highly dependent’ upon the quality of its students and whether it is public or private.”

Los Angeles Principal Apologizes For Choice Of Black Role Models.
The AP (3/5, Jablon) reported, ‘The principal of a South Los Angeles elementary school has apologized after some children carried photos of O.J. Simpson, RuPaul and Dennis Rodman in a parade celebrating Black History Month. ‘Unfortunately, questionable decisions were made in the selection of noteworthy African-American role models,’ Lorraine Abner wrote Thursday in a letter sent to parents of students at Wadsworth Avenue Elementary School.” According to the AP, “During a Feb. 26 parade in the school playground honoring Black History Month, some youngsters carried photos of Simpson, RuPaul and Rodman while others displayed more conventional role models such as President Barack Obama and the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr.” Alexandra Zavis also covered this story in a “L.A. Now” blog for the Los Angeles Times (3/5).

The Los Angeles Times (3/6) editorialized, “As usual when things go awry in the Los Angeles Unified School District, the fiasco” concerning the choice of Black role models “was a conflation of silly, smaller mishaps and oversights. … None of this serves as an excuse for what looks like a remarkable dearth of common sense or sensitivity among the teachers involved, along with a disregard for parents and the larger community, and scorn for the curriculum they’re supposed to be imparting.”

NEA in the News
Teachers Unions Outraged By Obama’s Support For Mass Layoff.
The New York Times (3/7, Greenhouse, Dillon, 1.09M) reports, “A Rhode Island school board’s decision to fire the entire faculty of a poorly performing school, and President Obama’s endorsement of the action, has stirred a storm of reaction nationwide, with teachers condemning it as an insult and conservatives hailing it as a watershed moment of school accountability.” According to the Times, “Officials at the two unions, the National Education Association and the American Federation of Teachers, were so angry in the hours after Mr. Obama first endorsed the firings that an irreconcilable break with the administration seemed possible,” but “neither the president nor Education Secretary Arne Duncan backed off his support for tough action, including dismissing teachers en masse, to improve learning conditions in chronically failing schools.” NEA president Dennis Van Roekel is quoted as saying that Obama’s “position ‘set us back in how we work together. … I think the worst thing that can happen would be for President Obama to be seen as antiteacher.’”

Duncan Calls For Renewed Civil Rights Enforcement.
The AP (3/8, Johnson) reported that Secretary of Education Arne Duncan “said Monday the federal government will become more vigilant to make sure students have equal access and opportunity to everything ranging from college prep classes to science and engineering programs. ‘We are going to reinvigorate civil rights enforcement,’ Duncan said on a historic Selma bridge to commemorate the 45th anniversary of a bloody confrontation between voting rights demonstrators and state troopers.” Duncan “spoke to a crowd about 400 people on the Edmund Pettus Bridge in observance of ‘Bloody Sunday,’ the day in 1965 when several hundred civil rights protesters were beaten by state troopers as they crossed the span over the Alabama River, bound for Montgomery.”

The Christian Science Monitor (3/9, Paulson) reports that Duncan “signaled Monday the Obama administration’s intention to step up enforcement of civil rights laws that apply to schools and colleges, many of which are often ignored.” According to the Monitor, “In remarks delivered in Selma, Ala, timed to commemorate the 45th anniversary of the marches in which civil rights protesters were brutally attacked by police, Secretary Duncan said, ‘The truth is that, in the last decade, the Office for Civil Rights (OCR) has not been as vigilant as it should have been in combating gender and racial discrimination and protecting the rights of individuals with disabilities. But that is about to change…. We are going to reinvigorate civil rights enforcement.’”

The Selma (AL) Times-Journal (3/9, Fenton) reports, “Secretary of Education Arne Duncan stood in the middle of the Edmund Pettus Bridge, the first leg of the Selma-to-Montgomery March of 1965 for voting rights, and announced the Obama administration’s strengthened commitment to ensure fair opportunities and practices for all students as about 500 students, principals and elected officials listened.” ED’s OCR “will send guidance letters on issues of fairness and equality to schools and colleges, work to have equal access to educational opportunities such as college-preparatory curricula or advanced courses for all students and to ensure discipline in schools is not based on a child’s skin color.” ED “will take a look at 38 school systems this year to see how they measure up.”

The Montgomery (AL) Advertiser (3/9, Ricks) reports, “Despite the controversy that proceeded his visit, U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan’s visit to Montgomery was relatively low-key. After state Rep. Alvin Holmes, D-Montgomery, threatened to picket the secretary’s visit to Robert E. Lee High School, Duncan added an extra stop in Montgomery.” Duncan “participated in a panel discussion with students, a faculty member and parent at Lee High School before heading to Selma where he was to give a major speech about his plans to reinvigorate [ED]‘s Office of Civil Rights.”

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In the Classroom
Class Shows Young Women They Can Be Successful In Traditionally Male Fields.
The York County (ME) Journal-Tribune (3/9, Mendros) reports on the “Independent Woman” class at Biddeford High School, which is now in its second year. “One of the initial subjects the students learned about was electricity,” and more recently, students have been “learning how to work with wood and how to use an electric sander, a table saw and other woodworking tools and equipment.” A lamp-building project is used to pull together their skills in electricity and woodworking. “The girls will also be learning how to work with metal. They will drill into metal sheets to form a design and then the sheets will be formed into lamp shades.” Technical Education teacher Michelle Lane “also plans to teach them about basic automotive maintenance.” Lane “said she wants to show her students that they can be just as successful as their male classmates in traditionally male jobs.”

Mentor Program Introduces Students To Careers In Architecture, Engineering And Construction.
Maryland’s Daily Times (3/9) reports, “Local high school students are discovering careers in architecture, construction and engineering thanks to” the ACE Mentor Program of America, “a new mentoring program that connects them with area professionals in these fields.” Through the program, “11 volunteers from four Salisbury-based companies, and two national contractors involved with construction at Salisbury University, are teaching students about their industry through mock development projects.” Students learn about topics such as “architecture, civil engineering, electrical engineering, structural engineering, construction and cost planning,” and then discuss how these skills are applied.

Publishers Focusing On Technology Supplements To Textbooks.
Inside Higher Ed (3/9, Kolowich) reports on the increased use of software provided by publishers such as Pearson that offers automatic grading and feedback on student understanding, tools which some professors argue has improved their efficiency and their ability to address issues that students are having difficulty with. Now, major publishers “say that as instructors begin to realize the capabilities of e-learning tools, it is not enough to pitch professors — particularly those in the natural sciences — a traditional textbook or even an e-textbook.” William Reiders of Cengage’s Global New Media division said, “It is a fact that we are aggressively trying to add curricular solutions to what traditionally would have been our print textbooks – that’s really driven by what the professors want.” The article goes on to address issues stemming from the “added costs” that come along with the additional tools and content, and how these impact students.

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On the Job
FEA Denounces Merit Pay Plan.
The Orlando Sentinel (3/9, Postal) reports, “Florida’s largest teachers union lashed out Monday at a proposal to overhaul teacher pay-plans, saying it would force experienced teachers out of the classroom and lead to even more standardized tests for the state’s students.” The Florida Education Association also said the measure “would wrench control of schools away from local school boards.” FEA President Andy Ford “said the plan ‘lashes out at the teachers who have made Florida schools a model for the nation.’”

The AP (3/9, Kaczor) reports, “The sponsor calls it a ‘hammer.’ The head of Florida’s statewide teachers union says it’s more like a ‘nuclear weapon.’” The bill would penalize “school districts that fail to adopt merit pay plans by cutting part of their state funding,” and “also would reduce teacher job protection and make it easier for school officials to fire teachers.” Ford “argued state law already allows school districts to suspend or fire ineffective teachers, even those that have completed probationary periods of three or four years.”

The Naples Daily News (3/9, Albers) reports, “In Collier County, the Superintendent is calling it a disaster.” Collier County School District Superintendent Dennis Thompson also, “called the bill a nightmare.” Thompson said, “You will not improve education by paying your best teachers more … You improve education by getting rid of ineffective teachers.”

The Fort Myers News-Press (3/9, Breitenstein) reports, “A teacher-quality bill up for discussion this week by Florida lawmakers has unions in an uproar, strapping on their pads for what’s certain to be a knock-down, drag-out battle.” Under the proposed bill, “at least half of a teacher’s performance evaluation must be based on how well his or her students do on standardized tests.”

Wichita Examines Layoff Procedures.
The Wichita (KS) Eagle (3/9, Yount) reports, “Wichita school board members Monday night reviewed the processes for laying off teachers, administrators and staff as they braced for an estimated $25 million budget shortfall next school year.” Afterwards, “the board approved an updated version of layoff procedures for administrators, including allowing them to continue in the early retirement program if they come back to the district within two years.” So far, “the district has cut about $25 million from its $620 million budget since January 2009. School leaders said an additional shortfall would cut directly into positions and salaries, which make up about 80 percent of the budget.”

East Carolina University Partners With School District To Improve Teacher Quality.
The Greenville Daily Reflector (3/9, Drake) reports, “East Carolina University, Pitt County Schools and other local educational entities have formed a partnership to improve teacher quality through an $8.8 million grant from the U.S. Department of Education. The ECU College of Education, the ECU College of Arts and Sciences, Pitt County Schools and Greene County Schools have joined together for the Teacher Quality Partnership Grant.” The grant “will be distributed over five years.”

Providence, RI Proposing School Changes That Include Teacher Participation.
The Providence (RI) Journal (3/9, Borg) reports that Providence “is poised to embark on an unorthodox method of transforming four of its lowest-performing schools, asking the teachers union, long an adversary of management, to help in an overhaul. Monday night, Supt. Tom Brady presented his plans to the School Board before sending a letter of intent to state Education Commissioner Deborah A. Gist, who has 10 days to approve or deny them.” The “wide-ranging reforms are the result of an order from Gist who, in January, identified the six lowest-performing schools in the state and ordered them to shape up or else.”

Law & Policy
ED Releases I3 Rules, Applications.
Education Daily (3/9, Brodie) reports that ED “released on Monday its long-awaited application for the $650-million Investing in Innovation Fund,…part of the $5 billion overall school reform investment included in the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act.” According to Education Daily, “ED grants will hone in on four areas the Obama administration has targeted in its school reform agenda: supporting effective teachers and principals; improving the use of data to accelerate student achievement; implementing standards and assessments that prepare students for success in college and careers; and turning around persistently low-performing schools.” Secretary of Education Arne Duncan “said the i3 rules outline ED’s definitions of what constitutes strong and moderate evidence” of successful education innovation “as well as a reasonable hypothesis, and use these definitions as a basis for awarding the money.”

Education Week (3/9, McNeil) reports that ED “today unveiled the final rules for its $650 million Investing in Innovation , or i3, grant program, standing fast in the face of criticism that its proposed guidelines demanded too much from applicants in the way of private-sector match and evidence to back up their proposals.”

Safety & Security
Police Kill Man Outside New York City School.
The New York Times (3/9, Henry) reports, “A 22-year-old man was fatally shot by the police outside a Brooklyn elementary school on Monday afternoon after he pointed a fake gun at an officer, the authorities said. The man, identified by a law enforcement official as George D’Amato Jr. of Brooklyn, showed up behind Public School 194, at 3117 Avenue W in the Gerritsen Beach neighborhood, about 3:10 p.m., and someone called 911 to report a man with a gun.” According to the Times, “School had been let out about half an hour earlier, and no children were in danger, the police said.”

WPost Says DC Teacher Pact Must Have Stronger Safeguards Against Sexual Misconduct.
The Washington Post (3/9) editorializes that D.C. law “considers it a crime when doctors betray a trust and have sex with patients,” yet, “for reasons that no one can really explain, this common-sense protection doesn’t apply to teachers and students.” The Post adds that it is “important to stress,” as D.C. Schools Chancellor Michelle Rhee “did in a recent letter to teachers, that the vast majority of those who work with children are hard-working professionals with a dedication to doing what’s best for their students. That makes it no less important, though, that a new contract with teachers — and an agreement is said to be near — contain reforms to deal with this serious issue.”

School Finance
Colorado District Implementing Four-Day Week.
The AP (3/8) reported, “A four-day school week is coming for students in Pueblo County School District 70 next school year, as the district tries to cut its budget by $5.8 million. … The district’s finance officer, Ryan Elarton, has estimated that the change could save between $883,000 and $1.1 million in cuts in utilities expenses, transportation costs and salaries for some workers.”

Also in the News
Officials Investigate Grade-Changing Scheme At Maryland High School.
The Washington Post (3/9, Johnson) reports, “A grade-changing scheme at Winston Churchill High School in Potomac [MD] involved the gradebooks of 35 teachers and was primarily isolated to the junior class, school officials told several hundred parents at a public meeting Monday night. Police and school officials have been investigating the security breach in which at least eight students stole teachers’ computer passwords using USB key loggers, which can be purchased inexpensively online.” The Post adds that Churchill “routinely ranks high among elite schools in the region and nation.”

Ravitch Outlines Why She Changed Mind About Longstanding School Reform Advocacy.
In an op-ed for the Wall Street Journal (3/9), education historian and former Assistant Secretary of Education Diane Ravitch outlines the reasons she has reversed her longstanding support for charter schools and the strict school accountability measures contained within NCLB. Ravitch cites wide variances in charter school quality and criticizes the charter school model for siphoning the highest-performing students from regular public schools. Ravitch is also critical of the strict school accountability standards backed by the Obama administration, calling them excessively punitive and outlining complaints from colleges that many incoming students lack basic knowledge.

NEA in the News
NEA Honors Minnesota Teacher With Human Rights Award.
Coon Rapids (MN) (3/9, Lestrud) reports, “An Eagan teacher who helps students from other countries transition to a new culture is the first in Minnesota to receive a human rights award from the National Education Association. Magaly Miralles, an English language learners teacher at Red Pine Elementary, has been awarded the George I. Sanchez Award for her work with Hispanic children.”

The Houston Chronicle (1/14, Mellon) reports that Perry’s “decision to forgo the money available in the Race to the Top grant competition defied pleas from local school leaders who said their districts could use it.” Terry Grier, superintendent of the Houston Independent School District, asked, “If our standards are that much better, why don’t we get in there and convince everyone else in the nation to rise to our level?” Meanwhile, many state teachers groups praised the decision. The Houston Chronicle adds that “as of last week, Texas Education Agency staff had spent 700 to 800 hours on the application in case the governor gave the green light.”

The San Antonio Express-News (1/14, LaCoste-Caputo) reports, “Perry’s objections seem to center on the fact that the grant rules give preference to states that sign on to a push for national curriculum standards.” The governor and education commissioner “have been critical of the Common Core Standards Initiative, a state-led effort” that aims to “create common standards for math and English in kindergarten through 12th grade across states.” Alicia Thomas, associate superintendent of Texas’ North East Independent School District, “where officials have declared a state of financial exigency,” spoke in favor of the standards, saying, “We are working to prepare our students to be ready to be part of a global economy. … It might be helpful to have some best practices established across the country. Texas has something to add to that conversation.”

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In the Classroom
Experts Push Introductory Science Education For Preschoolers.
Education Week (1/13, Viadero) reported, “Three years ago, when a task force of the congressionally chartered National Research Council issued influential recommendations for improving K-8 science education, it also made a pitch for introducing scientific study” to “children as young as 4.” This call has been highlighted in recent years by educators and policymakers concerned “about American students’ performance on international science tests and the supply of students pursuing” STEM careers. According to some experts, “decades of research in cognitive science and developmental psychology” dispute the idea that young children are “simplistic thinkers” and are unable to “make predictions” and understand science concepts. Still, a study by University of Miami researcher Daryl B. Greenfield concluded that “science is one of the areas in which children show the least learning growth during their preschool years.”

Minnesota Elementary School Piloting Junior FIRST Program.
The Austin (MN) Daily Herald (1/14, Drewelow) reports that Southgate Elementary “is piloting a Junior FIRST Lego League (FLL),” geared toward first- through fifth-graders. The local high school “has had a robotics team for two years, and Southgate is the only other school in the district that is now involved. The program will grow next school year when Southgate fifth graders graduate and move on to Ellis Middle School.” Students participating in the school’s Junior FIRST program “meet twice a month…to reflect on and meet a challenge,” which varies from year to year. “This year’s challenge is to find out what types of transportation are used to get products to Austin.”

Engineering Club Prepares For FIRST, Other Upcoming Competitions. The Frederick (MD) News Post (1/13, Leckie) reported on the Linganore High School engineering club’s preparation for this year’s FIRST Robotics Competition. Just prior to the announcement on this year’s game, the group “gathered for a pep talk from their adviser and mentors.” The News Post noted, “The club operates like a small business. Students set their goals and establish a budget. They obtain grants and sponsors through recruiting and advertising.” The article describes the club’s fundraising efforts, including a “$5,000 grant from NASA”, and notes that its “estimated budget for the 2009-10 school year of $24,500 represents competition fees, materials and travel expenses.” In addition to FIRST, the club’s members “participate in events such as rocketry challenges, electronics projects and robotics.”

On the Job
Education Week Releases Quality Counts Report.
The Hampton Roads Virginian-Pilot (1/14, Roth) reports that Virginia “has ranked fourth in the nation for the second year in Education Week’s annual Quality Counts report, behind Maryland, New York and Massachusetts.” The Education Week report “measures states in six areas: success factors outside school, such as parent income and education; standards, assessments and accountability; transitions between early-childhood, K-12 education, college and the workplace; teaching; school finance; and student achievement.” Virginia’s “lowest rankings were in assessments, college preparation and funding equity.”

Florida Schools Seen As Heading In Right Direction. Ron Matus writes in a column for the St. Petersburg (FL) Times (1/14) that Education Week researchers have ranked Florida schools No. 8 in the nation, cautioning that “it’s dicey to make year-to-year comparisons, because they look at slightly different indicators every year.” The researchers “also did not update what is arguably the most important piece of their analysis: the national test scores and graduation rates that gauge student progress.” However, “as a broad measure, they say their report shows Florida is headed in the right direction.”

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Law & Policy
Bipartisan Group Proposes Changes To Utah’s Sex Education Guidelines.
The Salt Lake Tribune (1/14, Schencker) reports that in Utah, “a Republican senator, a Democratic representative, the Planned Parenthood Action Council (PPAC), and the state PTA [are] working together” to get a sex education bill passed. Current “state law allows educators to teach students about contraceptives, but it prohibits ‘advocacy or encouragement’ of their use, leading some educators to avoid the topic out of fear of accidentally crossing the line.” The legislation proposed by Sen. Stephen Urquhart (R) “would remove that prohibition and instead require teachers to talk about the limitations and benefits of contraceptives and the importance of parental guidance in such matters.” In addition, it would “require the State Board of Education to select instructional materials about contraception for districts to use.”

Special Needs
New Jersey School Aims To Help Special Needs Students Reach Full Potential.
The Advertiser-News (NJ) (1/13, Wilinski) reported, “Unable to attend school in a traditional setting due to disability,” 19 students attend Special Children’s School in Sparta, NJ “to receive the academic, social, cognitive and physical education and therapy they need, according to their Individualized Educational Program, or IEP.” The Special Children’s School “seeks to provide all of its students with a well rounded education that will help each one reach his or her full potential, utilizing individual strengths.”

Missouri Education Department Holds Hearing On Proposed Special Ed Regulation Changes.
The Missourian (1/13, Ziemba) reported that the Missouri Department of Elementary and Secondary Education “held a public hearing on proposed changes in state regulations for special education services in Missouri on Tuesday.” Missouri “is changing its state plan to comply with new federal guidelines that regulate federal funding for special education services, Jim Morris, the department’s spokesperson said. … Most of the changes are for clarification purposes, but there is a new federal regulation that will allow parents to withdraw their child from special education services with written consent, Jackie Bruner, special education services director, said.”

Facilities
Parents Pitch In To Update Elementary School.
The Agoura Hills (CA) Acorn (1/14, Fischer) reports that parents in the Oak Park school system spent time before and during winter break making improvements “to the aging multipurpose room, the central quad area and a prominent wall in the outdoor lunch area” of Brookside Elementary School. “Before the winter break, parents,” including PTA president Toni Caruso and her husband, “removed deteriorating and discolored ceiling tiles and cleaned and prepared the walls for painting.” The Carusos also “removed bulletin boards and an unused trophy case, fixed broken walls, installed new ceiling tiles and painted the entire room beige.” Then, during the break, they spent time “updating the multipurpose room.” Overall, the updates cost less than $40,000.

Also in the News
Group Releases List Of 10 Education Technology Issues Expected To Drive Policy Decisions.
Dave Nagel, “executive editor for 1105 Media’s online education publications,” asks in T.H.E. Journal (1/14, Nagel), “Which issues in education technology should drive policymaking in 2010?” The International Society for Technology in Education has “published a list of its top-10 priorities for decision makers for the coming year.” The list includes: “Increasing federal funding support for technology through Enhancing Education Through Technology (EETT); Keeping educators up to date on the latest technologies to help them be more effective in their teaching environments;” and “Ensuring universal access to broadband services, which ISTE described as ‘critical so that students and parents have access to school assignments, grades, announcements and resources.’”

Denver Public Schools’ Attempt To Honor King Seen By Some As Insensitive.
The Denver Post reported that the Denver public school district’s attempt to “to honor the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr.” was met with disdain from some who found the gesture insensitive. “Friday’s DPS lunch menu, headlined ‘In Honor Of M.L. King,’ offered students ‘Southern Style’ chicken and collard greens — a meal that some say is an offensive caricature of black culture.” On Tuesday, an apologetic statement was posted “on the district’s website,” saying “the meal was ‘highly insensitive in light of certain hurtful cultural stereotypes still harbored in parts of our society.’” The slight was brought to the attention of the school board by teacher Jennifer Holladay, who said “she was instantly upset” when she saw the menu entry. But, School Board President Nate Easley Jr. “said he thinks there are bigger problems facing DPS than what is on the lunch menu.”

NEA in the News
Minnesota School Districts Urged To Settle Teacher Contracts.
The Minneapolis Star Tribune (1/14) editorializes, “The clock is ticking toward a Friday deadline, and dozens of Minnesota school districts have yet to settle teacher contracts.” According to the Star Tribune, the National Education Association “says nationwide teacher salary increases in the past year have averaged 1 to 3 percent. During the same period, teachers’ share of health insurance premiums have risen between 7 and 30 percent.” Gov. Tim Pawlenty (R) “has said he’s rethinking his recent policy of protecting K-12 education from budget cuts because some districts have approved pay increases.” The Tribune asserts, “School boards know their local circumstances best, and they should continue to have flexibility to decide on where to make cuts and increases, and on borrowing.”

Michigan Teachers Union Declines To Endorse Race To The Top Plan.
The AP (1/13) reported that Michigan Education Association “won’t endorse the state’s efforts to win up to $400 million for schools through the federal Race to the Top competition.” MEA President Iris Salters “sent a memo to union members this week calling the state plan flawed and incomplete. … The MEA is concerned that collective bargaining rights could be jeopardized when the state takes over low-performing schools.”

Obama To Call For More Race To The Top Funding.
The Washington Post (1/19, Fletcher) reports that President Obama “plans to go to Graham Road Elementary School in Falls Church [VA], which the White House calls a low-income but high-achieving school, to signal his intention to expand his Race to the Top program” via $1.35 billion in his next budget. According to the Post, though “money from the first year of funding is just now moving toward being awarded to states, Obama administration officials credit it with prompting education policy changes in many parts of the country.”

Race To The Top Competition Spurs Changes But Also Faces Opposition. The New York Times (1/19, A18, Dillon) reports that the Race to the Top education stimulus competition “has spurred education policy changes in states across the nation, but it is meeting with some last-minute resistance as the first deadline for applications arrives Tuesday.” According to the Times, “thousands of school districts in California, Ohio and other states have declined to participate, and teachers’ unions in Michigan, Minnesota and Florida have recommended that their local units not sign on to their states’ applications.” However, since the competition “got under way last summer, with Secretary of Education Arne Duncan bluntly criticizing school policies in many states, legislatures and officials from Rhode Island to California have reworked laws or policies in ways that have advanced President Obama’s vision: more charter schools, better-qualified teachers and a national effort to overhaul failing schools.”

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In the Classroom
New Hampshire High School Students’ Budget Proposal For District Touted As Model.
The Nashua Telegraph (1/19) editorializes that when school board members begin making cuts to the “school budget proposal for 2010-11,” they should “emulate the innovative and analytical approach taken by a group of Nashua High School South students who took on that challenge as part of a class project.” The “accounting and business law students” examined “the district’s financial problems and came up with suggested new revenue and budget cuts that resulted in between $3.3 million and $4 million in savings.” Cuts were made by “scrapping the Phoenix Program for at-risk students ($994,000) laying off five janitors each from the third shifts at the two high schools ($300,000)…and canceling some or all freshman sports ($16,000 to $33,000).” To generate revenue, the students suggested “soliciting gym and stadium advertising ($265,000)…and renting out space to a franchise such as Dunkin’ Donuts ($100,000).” The Nashua Telegraph provides details on the students’ methods for determining what to include in the proposal.

California District Pilots After-School Elementary Music Program.
The Orange County (CA) Register (1/19, James) reports that “when budget cuts forced the closure of the elementary school music programs,” the city of Tustin joined the Tustin Public Schools Foundation and Tustin Unified School District “to create an after-school music” pilot “program for fourth- and fifth-grade students.” The classes, offered through the city Parks and Recreation Department “cost $55 for 12 weeks, and scholarships are available.” One challenge facing the program is “finding transportation for the elementary students to get to the afternoon classes.” The program also needs “music teachers, volunteers, and donations.”

Some Students Honor King’s Memory By Volunteering.
The Chicago Tribune (1/19) reports that about 25 groups from Chicago and suburbs “participated in volunteer events for King Day, said Paula Phillips, civic engagement coordinator for City Year, an AmeriCorps program that works in inner-city public schools and enlists teens and young adults in 10 months of community service.” City Year “bused groups of students throughout the day to about seven locations to help refurbish schools, senior homes, public housing and community centers. At Wadsworth Elementary School, students marched up stairs and ladders to paint murals of King and President Barack Obama on the walls.

Students In Class On Martin Luther King Day Learn About Civil Rights Struggle. WHSV -TV Harrisburg, VA (1/18, Knight) reported on its Web site that Rockingham County, VA students “were some of the only ones who were in class on the Martin Luther King Jr. Holiday. Teachers say they’re using the day in school, along with much of this week, to talk about King and his message.” According to WHSV, “Students in elementary schools have been reading books, as well as coloring pictures and other activities, to help them understand the civil rights struggle.”

Astronaut Visits Middle School In Virginia.
The Washington Post (1/17, Williams) reported that astronaut Robert Satcher visited Potomac (VA) Middle School last week, speaking “to the eighth grade in the Dumfries school’s gymnasium Thursday before moving to the library for a 30-minute question-and-answer session with about 25 science students from sixth, seventh and eighth grades.” Satcher “showed a video” of a mission “and entertained the students with tales of playing weightless football and snoozing in a sleeping bag attached to a wall with Velcro. He compared launches to being on a roller coaster for 8 1/2 minutes.”

On the Job
Blogger Develops Performance-Pay Program For Physical Education Teachers.
Mike Thomas writes in his blog in the Orlando Sentinel (1/19) that he has “come up with a solution” for tying physical education teachers’ “raises to improvements in their students’ test scores.” Each fall, students would “be tested for their Body Mass Index, fat percentage, their time in a mile run, the number of push-ups and sit-ups performed in a two-minute period and, with parental consent, a lipids test.” Then the physical education teachers would develop “exercise programs for each at-risk student, and monitor improvement. … No more simply sending them out to play dodge ball and collecting a paycheck,” he adds. “If more than half the students do not show improvement in all areas, the teacher gets no raise. If more than half the students show regression, the teacher is replaced with a non-union trainer. Obese students will be given YMCA vouchers.”

Special Needs
Teacher Encourages Students With Disabilities To Evaluate Service.
The Whittier (CA) Daily News (1/17, Markus) reports, “Special education instructor Tammy Torres had enough of watching her transitional program students get treated with intolerance while out in their neighborhood.” Torres’s students have disabilities such as “Down syndrome, autism, mental retardation, and cerebral palsy.” Torres “developed a customer service survey” for her students to fill out when they “go out for training” to rate “their experience at local businesses.” Students mostly experience a “lack of communication or lack of eye contact,” said Torres. She added that the transitional program, which includes 18-22 year-olds, is new to the community, but, “as the group makes its way out in the neighborhoods, they will gain more acceptance and above all, respect.”

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Facilities
Texas District Considers Grants To Replace Aging Playground Equipment.
The Dallas Morning News (1/16, Unmuth) reports, “After the principal and parents expressed their concerns to the” Irving Independent School District school board about the poor playground equipment at Farine Elementary School, “the board directed district administrators to create a committee to examine ways to better fund playgrounds at the district’s schools.” The committee “found aging equipment was a problem at elementary and early-childhood schools throughout the district,” with safety a major concern. “Repairs and construction” have been estimated at “between $1.5 million and $3.9 million. Irving ISD plans to use its own funds but also is considering applying for grants and seeking community support.”

School Finance
Grants Will Help Three Schools In Michigan Build Schoolyard Habitats.
The AP (1/17) reported, “The nonprofit group Friends of the Rouge has awarded grants to three Michigan schools to build schoolyard habitats. Each school’s grant includes $500 to purchase native Michigan plants and another $500 in expert assistance with implementing the project. Each school also will get $400 for tools or other garden items.

Firm Aims to Help School Districts Generate Revenue Through Advertising.
The AP (1/19, Workman) reports, “Advertising within school districts has long been a controversial topic. … But a new revenue stream…that could save a few programs or even pay for bus transportation in difficult economic times can certainly look like an attractive option.” Sam Curcuru created the business plan for Alternative Revenue Development with school districts in mind. His “business includes four different media for advertising, none of which are within the classroom.” They include “direct-to-home mailings such as school newsletters;” use of “new media and technology” with tools “such as social networking sites,” and “cell phone texting;” banner ads on “district and school Web sites;” and “on-campus signage” for high schools. Said Curcuru, “We only want areas in the high school where the community comes and attends events, like athletic fields, performing arts centers, media centers and gyms.”

Also in the News
Opinion: Business Model Not Appropriate For Schools.
Former UCLA Graduate School of Education lecturer and 28-year teaching veteran Walt Gardner wrote in an op-ed in the Sacramento Bee (1/17), “If schools were allowed to be truly run like businesses, they (employers) would be able to deny enrollment (hiring) of students (workers) who have neither the ability nor desire (qualifications) to be there. But public schools, unlike private and religious schools, must accept virtually all who show up at the schoolhouse door.” According to Gardner, “This is the antithesis of how business operates. … If taxpayers were to spend time in the classroom, they might gain more respect for the work that public schools do in the face of daunting challenges. At the least, they’d come away realizing the futility of running schools like businesses.

NEA in the News

Repeal Of Gambling Loss Limit Brings Less Revenue Than Expected Into Missouri Districts.
The St. Louis Post-Dispatch (1/19, Logan) reports, “When Missouri casinos asked voters to end the state’s one-of-a-kind gambling loss limit, they wrapped their appeal in education.” A year later, however, the loss-limit repeal “has generated less than a quarter of the school funding that was predicted.” Data from state gambling regulators show that “in 2009…Missouri’s 12 casinos won $1.73 billion from gamblers,” and “with a new, higher tax rate,” Missouri schools received “an additional $22 million…far less than even the lowest estimates that Proposition A’s supporters projected during their campaign.” According to Otto Fagen, legislative director for the Missouri National Education Association, “there are flaws in a system that ties school funding to such an unstable source of revenue.” Suggested Otto, “Maybe we should dictate school funding based on what schools need. … Not, he said, on how much people gamble.”

Rhode Island NEA Will Not Endorse State’s Race To The Top Application.
Jennifer Jordan wrote in the Providence Journal (1/19) Projo 7 to 7 News Blog that the National Education Association of Rhode Island, which represents most of the state’s suburban and rural districts, has declined to endorse” the state’s Race To The Top application. National Education Association of Rhode Island Executive Director Robert A. Walsh Jr. said, “At this time, we see no reason to send a letter and don’t think a letter would be helpful to the cause. … Our list of objections is quite extensive and has not been adequately addressed.” Jordan notes that support for states’ grant applications from teachers unions nationwide has been “mixed.” Meanwhile, “federal education officials [say] that signatures of teachers’ unions, while not required, greatly enhance a state’s competitiveness.”

Oregon Education Association President Explains Support For State’s Federal Grant Bid.
Betsy Hammond reports in The Oregonian (1/19, Hammond) Chalk It Up blog about the reasons why the Oregon Education Association is supporting the state’s Race To The Top application, which includes “a plan to tie student test scores back to the teachers responsible for those students.” Hammond summarizes a letter sent by Oregon Education Association President Gail Rasmussen supporting “Oregon’s application for $200 million of federal Race to the Top money.” Rasmussen points out that “leaders and members of OEA were included on the planning team, were listened to and many of their ideas are reflected in Oregon’s application.” She also notes that “Oregon did not bend to U.S. Education Secretary Arne Duncan’s urgings that it promise to close down low-scoring schools or look to charter schools as a means of educational salvation.” Moreover, the state’s plan “doesn’t mention merit pay and speaks respectfully of collective bargaining.” It also supports “more mentoring, better on-the-job training…and better teacher evaluations.”

Obama Reveals Plan To Expand Race To The Top.
The Washington Post (1/20, Turque) reports that as 40 states and D.C. submitted “Race to the Top” applications by Tuesday’s deadline, President Obama visited Graham Road Elementary School in Falls Church, VA “to announce that he will seek an expansion of the $4.3 billion program that would allow individual school districts to compete for the money.” The Los Angeles Times (1/20, Silva) reports that the President “promised Tuesday to ‘raise the bar’ on what is expected of public school teachers and students.” He “plans to include the additional $1.35 billion for the program in the fiscal 2011 budget, which he is due to propose next month.” According to the White House, “the extra funding would enable more states, as well as individual school districts, to apply for some of the money.”

The AP (1/19, Superville) reported, “With the grant programs, Obama is trying to make federal education spending more of a competitive endeavor to encourage states and school districts to do better, rather than a solely formula-driven effort in which states and districts look forward to receiving a certain amount of money each school year, regardless of how good a job they do educating students.”

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In the Classroom
Study Shows Girls Less Engaged In Science Than Boys.
The AP (1/20, Sutschek) reports that according to “a study by two Northern Illinois University professors…high school girls are bored, disengaged, and stressed in science classes when compared with boys.” Co-principal investigators, Jennifer Schmidt and M. Cecil Smith “looked at 244 high school students and 13 science teachers.” Responding to a pager “students immediately reported what they were doing and thinking, rating their engagement, enjoyment, anxiety and concentration levels.” According to Schmidt, boys and girls put forth equal efforts into lessons, “but for whatever reason the engagement switch is not being flipped for the girls, in spite of the fact that they get similar grades,” said Schmidt. Smith added that girls often rated “lectures and completing work at their seats as the most engaging classroom activities.” The researchers cited “societal expectations and the role of the teacher” as possible “causes for the gender differences.”

Montgomery, Alabama Students Engage In Various Haiti Relief Efforts.
The Montgomery (AL) Advertiser (1/20) reports that since news broke of the destruction and need left by the earthquake in Haiti, student in the Montgomery, AL, Public School (MPS) District have “engaged in a number of relief efforts ranging from canned food and clothing drives, to selling items to purchase bottled water, first aid kits and flashlights.” Some “student groups are also collecting funds that will be given to support agencies like the American Red Cross, Doctors Without Borders, and the Yele Haiti Foundation.” At Goodwyn Jr. High, for instance, the “Student Council and ninth grade homeroom classes are collecting items” for earthquake survivors and “have issued a challenge to all other MPS middle and junior high schools to join their effort.” The Montgomery Advertiser lists various “Haiti relief efforts in MPS schools.”

Some Say New Math Curriculum In Seattle District Could Widen Achievement Gap.
The Seattle Post Intelligencer (1/20, Mongillo) reports, “Last May, the Seattle School Board approved implementing a district-wide high-school math curriculum called Discovering Math. … In June, two parents and a University of Washington professor went to King County Superior Court to overturn the School Board’s decision and force the district to consider other textbook options.” The plaintiffs “fear the new curriculum will only increase an already widening achievement gap between middle-class and disadvantaged students. … Edie Harding, executive director of the State Board of Education, said the board was asked by the state superintendent’s office to evaluate the Discovering Math series last winter and found it wanting.”

On the Job
Massachusetts Elementary School Staff Mistakenly Given Insulin Instead Of Vaccine.
The AP (1/20) reports that school officials in Wellesley, MA, said on Tuesday that “several staff members at” Schofield Elementary School “had to be taken to the hospital after being injected with insulin rather than the swine flu vaccine.” According to Superintendent Bella Wong, “the insulin belonged to students with diabetes and was provided by their parents.” She added that “no students were ever in danger…and all the people who got the wrong shot have recovered.” Meanwhile, “the school nurse who administered the insulin to staff has been placed on paid administrative leave pending an investigation.”

Law & Policy
Federal Complaint Filed Against Philadelphia School District.
The AP (1/20) reports that the Asian American Legal Defense and Education Fund filed complaint with the U.S. Department of Justice “against the Philadelphia school district” on Tuesday. “The complaint says the district acted with “deliberate indifference” toward harassment of Asian students and failed to prevent attacks” at the school in December, “which hurt about 30 Asian students.” According to school officials, “10 students were suspended over the attacks.”

Oregon Education Reforms Viewed As Step In Right Direction.
The Oregonian (1/20) in an editorial writes, “For Oregon’s education leaders, especially its teacher unions, navigating the new politics of education is like walking blind into a room of rearranged furniture and sharp edges. Every move seems risky, every step forward dangerous.” According to the Oregonian, “Yes, Oregon is treading carefully. … But at least Oregon is finally moving forward on school reforms, including using test scores to better judge teacher performance.” Oregon’s education reforms are “surely not all that Obama and his education secretary, Arne Duncan, hoped for when they launched the Race to the Top competition.” But they are “a meaningful step forward.”

Merit Pay Seen As Most Contentious Part Of Oregon’s Race To The Top Bid. Betsy Hammond wrote in a blog for the Oregonian (1/19), “I’ve been wondering what, exactly, would prove to be the most controversial part of Oregon’s mammoth plan to win federal Race to the Top money. … Bottom line: Merit pay — phrased in the application as ‘using evaluations to inform compensation, promotion and retention’ — is hands-down more controversial than any other element.” Only 65 percent of the Oregon school districts that signed on — and these are the districts that like the concepts in the application — checked the box saying they would be willing to use teacher and principal evaluations to help set pay.

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Safety & Security
New York City, EPA To Monitor Contaminated Caulk In Some Schools.
The AP (1/19, Matthews) reported that the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency “and New York City announced a pilot program Tuesday to address the problem of potentially hazardous PCBs in construction materials in some city schools.” According to the AP, “Under the agreement announced Tuesday, New York City will pick five public schools – one in each borough – to monitor for PCB-contaminated caulk. If the caulk is found to contain PCBs, the city will come up with a plan for removing it or covering it up to limit exposure.”

Facilities
Public School In Brooklyn Will Have Year-Round Edible Schoolyard.
The New York Times (1/20, D3, Severson) reports that PS 216 in Brooklyn, NY, is planning the first year-round Edible Schoolyard in the nation. “This summer, supporters will tear up a quarter-acre of asphalt parking lot behind PS 216…and start building the first New York affiliate of the Edible Schoolyard program, developed by the restaurateur Alice Waters of Chez Panisse.” The lot will contain “a kitchen classroom with communal tables where children can share meals they make from food they grow in the garden,” as well as “a chicken coop, a composting system, an outdoor pizza oven and a cistern to collect rainwater.” In addition, “a movable greenhouse will be rolled out each fall.” Students will be taught “lessons in subjects like art, math, history and science” in the $1.6 million schoolyard with a curriculum that “will be designed with help from Teachers College at Columbia and will meet New York State standards.”

School Finance

Most District Officials In Virginia Plan To Increase Student-Teacher Ratios, Survey Says.
The AP (1/20) reports that based on a survey of 133 school districts conducted this month, “Virginia’s public school superintendents are considering increasing class sizes, slashing teacher positions and cutting programs to deal with expected budget cuts.” Nearly 90 percent of responding districts are “considering increasing pupil-to-teacher ratios, 91 percent ” are “considering cutting teaching jobs and half” are “looking at cutting programs such as summer school.” Support Staff are being targeted for many cuts also. According to the AP, “Virginia’s public schools face hundreds of millions in budget cuts over the next two years.” Meanwhile, state lawmakers “have until March to reconcile a $4 billion budget deficit that threatens not only education funding, but money for public safety, health care and other core services.”

Also in the News
Ohio Town Divided Over Teacher Accused Of Teaching Creationism.
The New York Times (1/20, A11, Urbina) reports that in Mount Vernon, OH, eighth-grade public school science teacher John Freshwater “is accused of burning a cross onto the arms of at least two students and teaching creationism, charges he says have been fabricated because he refused an order by his principal to remove a Bible from his desk. After an investigation, school officials notified Mr. Freshwater in June 2008 of their intent to fire him, but he asked for a pre-termination hearing, which has lasted more than a year and cost the school board more than a half-million dollars.” Freshwater’s “hearing is finally scheduled to end Friday,” yet the “the town – home to about 15,000 people, more than 30 churches and an evangelical university – remains split.”

NEA in the News
One NEA Chapter In Rhode Island Supports Proposed School Reform Package.
The Providence Journal (1/20, Borg) reports that the Foster school district in Rhode Island — with just one school and 260 students — has the only local NEA chapter in the state “to support the school-reform package proposed by state Education Commissioner Deborah A. Gist.” Before making the decision, Foster Superintendent Davida Irving “met frequently with small groups of teachers, and each time she stressed that change was coming and this was a great opportunity for Foster to show what it can do – and is already doing.” Said Irving, “It was a very, very difficult decision for the teachers, for myself and for the School Committee.” Still, she added, “Rather than sitting back and watching the larger districts working on reforms, we wanted a seat at the table.”

New Jersey Files Race To The Top Application Without Union Support.
New Jersey’s Star-Ledger (1/20, Alloway, Rundquist) reports that New Jersey “completed its application…for a share of $4.35 billion in federal Race to the Top education funding with 378 of the state’s 591 school districts signing on to the bid – but without the support of most of the state’s teachers unions.” The New Jersey Education Association “had recommended its local unions not sign on, objecting to grant provisions that link teacher pay and evaluations to student performance” and questioning “how programs would be paid for when the grant money ends, as well as the emphasis on charter schools,” the Star Ledger noted.

Recent Graduates Mentor Students In Miami-Dade High-Need Schools.
The Miami Herald (1/22, McGrory) reports that eight schools in Miami-Dade County, FL, are hosting student mentors from City Year corps. The mentors are recruited “from across the country to serve…in high-need public schools. They “are recent high-school and college graduates who commit to serve full time for at least 10 months” and they “receive a stipend to help cover living expenses and basic health insurance during their time in the program.” Corps members are instantly recognizable in their red bomber jacket uniforms.” The mentors “work with students in small groups” during class “to help build their reading skills.” The Miami Herald notes that City Year “is part of AmeriCorps.”

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In the Classroom
Quality Of Common Tests Questioned.
Education Week (1/21, Sawchuk) reported, “Most experts in the testing community have presumed that the $350 million promised by the US Department of Education to support common assessments would promote those that made greater use of open-ended items capable of measuring higher-order critical-thinking skills.” However, as “measurement experts consider the multitude of possibilities for an assessment system based more heavily on such questions, they also are beginning to reflect on practical obstacles to doing so.” According to Education Week, “The issues now on the table include the added expense of those items, as well as sensitive questions about who should be charged with the task of scoring them and whether they will prove reliable enough for high-stakes decisions.”

Curriculum Seen As Having Broadened After Merger Of Pittsburgh-Area Districts.
The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette (1/21, David) reported, “When the merger of Center Area and Monaca school districts was being debated from 2005 until 2008, educators insisted that the consolidation would improve education.” Now, according to Mike Thomas, former Superintendent of Monaca and current superintendent of merger affairs, the school curriculum has broadened and has increased in depth. High school students now have the option of taking “two levels of British literature, speech and ‘Classics and Film,’” as well as “advanced placement calculus and statistics, finite math, logistics and a hands-on problem-solving track that includes forensics” and robotics. For middle schools, “the district is adopting a team-teaching approach that blends the nurturing environment of elementary school with the variety and challenges of high school.”

Middle School Students Design, Create Quilts For Children In Foster Care.
The Fairfax County Times (1/21, Schumitz) reported that Owlin Burke’s consumer sciences class at Longfellow Middle School in Falls Church, VA, is sewing “child-sized quilts” that the class will donate “to children in Fairfax County’s foster care program.” Students in Longfellow’s geometry classes “design quilt patterns, and then students in each eighth-grade family and consumer sciences class pick a design with which they want to work. Each student makes a quilt square for a graded project. Students then volunteer their time after school to help assemble the quilts.”

First US Female Astronaut Addresses Efforts To Boost STEM Education.
Forbes (1/21, Dolan) ran a Q&A with Sally Ride, the first female astronaut from the U.S. Ride “retired from NASA and saw a great need to improve the science curriculum for elementary and middle school students. She started a company, Sally Ride Science, which develops programs for students and teachers.” Ride addressed the need to boost STEM education in the U.S. and is quoted saying, “In the days just following Sputnik, it was cool to be a scientist. It was nationally important that we have scientists and engineers. It was recognized that this was something we needed for the future of our country.” However, according to Ride, “In the last 20 years or so, we’ve lost that focus. Our culture doesn’t put a premium on science and technology. So the kids naturally go into other fields.”

Online Technology High School To Open In Washington State.
Washington’s Kitsap Peninsula Business Journal (1/22) reports on the opening of Giant Campus of Washington by technology education program company Giant Campus, “an accredited, public and tuition-free online school that provides technology courses to Washington state high school students.” Students will be able to work from home as they “gain knowledge and skills in high tech career areas, like game design, flash animation, digital photography and graphics, and more.”

Texas District Showcases Career Technology Education Program.
The Midland (TX) Reporter-Telegram (1/22, Campbell) reports, “Trying to point up that career technology education isn’t just for shop class anymore, officials from Midland Independent School District and Midland College on Thursday gave members of Key Communicators a tour of the Advanced Technology Center.” Officials said that “at least 200 MISD students come through the ATC daily for courses ranging from certified nursing assistant, cosmetology to welding and automotive technology.” An MISD official “said the programs aren’t meant to pigeonhole kids but help them figure out what they might be interested in. They also won’t ‘wreck’ a student’s GPA.” The school also offers “the Bridges program, software that has kids pick a field they may want to pursue and has them answer questions about their interests. It then shows them the education they will need and possible salaries.”

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On the Job
Study Suggests Need For “More Nuanced” Understanding Of Student Engagement.
Inside Higher Ed (1/22, Lederman) reports on a study from the New England Consortium on Assessment and Student Learning that offers “greatly varying portraits of how students ‘engage’ with their academic work and what happens to them as a result.” The researchers said that the findings “suggest the need for a far more nuanced understanding of the ‘student engagement’ theory of learning than has sometimes been the case.” The research also “suggests a ‘complex,’ and unclear, relationship between engagement and student grades, the researchers say,” noting that in some cases, “there appeared to be little or no connection between how enmeshed [students] felt in their work and their grades in those courses.”

AYP Ratings Don’t Tell Full Story About Schools, Some New Jersey Officials Say.
New Jersey’s Today’s Sunbeam (1/22, Davis) reports, “Every year, schools across the country are required to meet [AYP] standards set forth by” NCLB. However, “according to officials, it doesn’t paint a completely accurate picture to just say whether a school passed or failed.” According to Today’s Sunbeam, “If a school misses just one of the 41 indicators,” the New Jersey Department of Education “considers the school to have failed meeting AYP standards. While officials agree with the purpose of the AYP, to show how schools are progressing each year, some officials disagree with the way the criteria is calculated.”

Law & Policy
Missouri Budget Shortfall May Force Education Cuts.
The AP (1/21, Lieb) reported, “Missouri’s public schools may be forced to freeze salaries, expand classes, cut extracurricular activities or seek local tax increases to cope with a funding shortfall, education advocates warned Thursday. K-12 schools – though spared from cuts in their basic state aid – still might have to scale back because of Gov. Jay Nixon’s [D] plan to provide barely one-sixth of the funding increase needed to meet the state’s financing formula, said Brent Ghan, a spokesman for the Missouri School Boards’ Association.” According to the AP, “Until now, Missouri’s 523 public school districts have weathered the state budget woes remarkably well.” However, Nixon’s “budget office confirmed Wednesday that schools would not get the $43 million midyear increase called for under the school funding formula for the 2009-2010 academic year.”

Washington State Legislature Urged To Take Up Cyberbullying Issue.
The Seattle Times (1/22) editorializes, “Bravo to the principal at McClure Middle School in Seattle who suspended 28 students for bullying a classmate on the Internet. … The state Legislature has pondered anti-cyber bullying laws in the past. Online misdeeds from sex texting to harassing students via text messaging underscore the challenges of technology’s growing acceptance and use in and out of school.” According to the Times, “A legislative effort to require districts to collect data on these incidents could be useful in making informed policy down the road.”

Safety & Security

EPA Promises Vigorous Effort To Reduce Toxic Air At Schools Near Marietta, Ohio.
USA Today (1/22, Morrison, Heath) reports that on Thursday, the Environmental Protection Agency said it would “‘use all the tools at our disposal’ to reduce high levels of a toxic chemical that continues to permeate the air outside an elementary school in Marietta, Ohio.” The EPA will “release data today that show high levels of manganese outside a cluster of schools in and near Marietta.” In October, the air samples taken from the schools showed “manganese levels that were” between five and 23 “times above what the EPA considers safe for long-term exposure.” The EPA will also “investigate the source of the manganese in Marietta. According to data” already collected by the agency, “several companies in Marietta reported releasing manganese into the air in 2008, the most recent year for which complete records were available.”

School Safety Progress In Mississippi Analyzed.
Mississippi’s Jackson Clarion Ledger (1/21, Fritscher) reported, “The high school shootings of the late 1990s…created the era of tighter security on campuses nationwide. The Mississippi Department of Education created a school safety division.” Also, schools “added safety personnel, and trained teachers about dealing with bullies and disruptive behavior, said Pete Smith, spokesperson for the Education Department.” However, numerous “factors play a role in whether a child will express violence at school, said Kevin Williams, a Mississippi State University assistant professor specializing in media and violence. Williams said parental attitudes are the No. 1 indicator of a potentially violent child”

School Finance
Denver Public Schools To Receive $10 Million Gates Grant For Teacher Effectiveness.
The Denver Business Journal (1/22, Harden) reports that the Gates Foundation will issue Denver Public Schools a $10 million grant “to support teacher-effectiveness initiatives.” The school district will “release details of the programs the grant will support” today.

Also in the News
Students Facing Hard Times At School, Poll Shows.
The Los Angeles Times (1/21, Blume) reported that California youth “found no escape from harder times last year whether at school, where they endured larger classes, unfamiliar teachers and scarce supplies — or at home, where they faced family stresses from emptier refrigerators, job losses and more frequent dislocation.” This “grim compilation comes in a report,” based on an anonymous poll of principals, from UCLA’s Institute for Democracy, Education and Access and the University of California All Campus Consortium on Research for Diversity. According to the Times, some principals “reported collecting money to help families and told of teachers who bought food and clothes for students, and, in a few cases, took students into their homes.”

Teachers Trained To Help “Average” AP Students.
The St. Petersburg (FL) Times (1/23, Matus) reported that “the new reality facing Advanced Placement teachers” are classrooms of students at varied reading levels. To help AP teachers accommodate all students, the Pinellas school district last week offered “training workshops with a consultant” who preaches the message: “You can reach all kinds of AP kids in the same class.” The consultant, former AP teacher Robyn Jackson, “shared techniques aimed at boosting the ‘soft skills’ that many unprepared AP student don’t have — like how to closely read a text, or focus quickly, or think more critically.” She “outlined specific exercises — like ‘interrupted reading’ and ‘exam stacks’ — that can shore up soft skills in ‘average’ students but can challenge the brightest kids, too.”

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In the Classroom
More School Districts Requiring Public Finance Education.
The AP (1/23, Armario) reported, “The number of states requiring public high schools to offer a personal finance course rose from nine to 15 between 2007 and 2009, according to the Council for Economic Education.” And in some districts, the “lessons…start young.” For instance, in Miami-Dade County, FL, “social studies classes at every grade level have an economics component. … In kindergarten, that starts with discussing needs versus wants.” Because “squeezing a separate personal finance class into the curriculum can still be difficult as schools focus on state and federal testing standards while dealing with budget constraint,” the AP points out, many schools offer personal finance “as part of another subject rather than a separate course.”

Experts Note Resurgence Of Handwriting Lessons In Schools.
The Livingston (MI) Daily Press & Argus (1/24, Rose-Church) reported that the focus on handwriting in teacher training decreased significantly in the 1970s, and “ten years later, the number of students experiencing handwriting difficulties was on the rise.” Tara DiMilia of Handwriting Without Tears explained, “In general, what has happened over the last 25 to 30 years with handwriting, with the onset of computers and technology, is the mind-set we don’t need handwriting anymore.” But, she added, “We can’t eliminate (handwriting) completely — we need it for jobs, and its important to student success.” According to experts, handwriting is currently making a comeback, “but it still takes a backseat to the pressure to teach to tests.” The resurgence of handwriting in schools is due, in part, to standards set by states such as Michigan, which requires that students learn “how to form uppercase and lowercase manuscript letters in kindergarten and first grade” and learn “cursive writing in second grade.”

Students Create Public Blog In Lieu Of School Newspaper.
The Lancaster (OH) Eagle Gazette (1/24, George) reported that instead of resurrecting a school newspaper that “had lain dormant for 15 years,” students in Chad Sinnott’s journalism class at Lancaster High School created “a public blog featuring articles on news, school events, sports, features and opinion pieces”– all written by students — called “Eye of the Gale.” The blog features new articles each week. Said Sinnot of the blog, “We went from being a dinosaur without a newspaper to being one of the few schools in Ohio to deliver the news in a new and technologically advanced way.” Some students “say they like how the blog…makes it easy for them to deliver news to students and community members.” They do not have to “spend time laying out pages and editing stories to make them fit; instead, they write up the news and send it off to Sinnott, who can have it online within a matter of minutes.”

Students Challenged To Create Model For Earthquake-Resistant Buildings.
North Carolina’s News & Observer (1/24, Ranii) reported, “Months before Haiti was devastated by an earthquake, a Ligon Middle School class wrestled with the problem of engineering buildings to withstand seismic shifts.” The students participated in “the statewide Future City Competition on Saturday” at North Carolina State University that was “part of a national competition sponsored by a coalition of engineering groups.” The News & Observer lists some of the “innovations unveiled in Saturday’s competition.”

On the Job
Most North Texas Districts Have Not Developed Policies For Sale Of Lesson Plans.
The Dallas Morning News (1/24, Haag, 350K) reported that “online auction sites and marketplaces” for teachers to sell their lesson plans has allowed some teachers to boost “their incomes by selling thousands of dollars worth of lesson plans a year.” Still, some “legal and ethical questions remain” such as “who owns the education materials, and does a school district deserve all or a cut of the money a teacher makes?” According to the Morning News, there is no clear answer to these and other questions surrounding the practice. “Online lesson plan marketplaces…are so new that some North Texas school districts say they haven’t heard of them.” Consequently, the districts “have no policies or rules that directly apply to teachers buying or selling education materials.” Policies some districts state that “any materials created by employees while at school belong to the district.” However, the Morning News points out, “applying those policies, which likely predate the Internet, might be difficult.”

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Law & Policy
Report: Some Chicago Schools Make Readmission Difficult For “Troubled” Students.
The Chicago Tribune (1/25, Casillas, Mills, 534K) reports, “In spite of Chicago Public Schools chief Ron Huberman’s pledge to help at-risk teenagers, in some instances school officials are undermining that effort, making it difficult for such troubled youths to return to school after they have been incarcerated, according to judges, attorneys, probation officials and others in the juvenile justice system.” According to the Tribune, “In some cases, officials refuse to re-admit students for fear they will disrupt classes or be violent but do not move to formally transfer or expel students as school rules and the law requires. In other cases, parents cannot navigate the school district’s bureaucracy to re-enroll their children after they have been in custody or suspended.”

No Child Left Behind Seen As Boon For Private Tutors.
The Fort Wayne (IN) Journal-Gazette (1/24, Soderlund) reported, “Not meeting federal accountability standards can mean a lot of hard work for school officials. But for private tutoring companies, it means big business.” According to the Journal-Gazette, “If a school fails to meet the standards under No Child Left Behind for two consecutive years, that school must pay for private tutors to help struggling students.” According to the Journal-Gazette, “Indiana public school districts spent more than $13.7 million on private tutoring services for low-income and low-performing students in the 2008-09 school year, according to the state Department of Education.” Before No Child Left Behind, districts “were not required to pay for private tutoring.”

School Finance
Wealthy New York Districts’ Reserves Seen As Buffer For Proposed Education Cuts.
New York Times (1/23, A18, Confessore, 1.09M) reported, “When Gov. David A. Paterson proposed this week cutting more than $1 billion in school aid to help address the state’s financial crisis, the critics quickly pounced.” But, according to the Times, “Mr. Paterson’s cuts…may not be quite as dire as some education advocates make them appear.” This may be especially true in many of “the state’s wealthier and more politically connected school districts…where suburban lawmakers have long flexed their muscle to ensure that their districts receive a disproportionate share of state money.” Moreover, “wealthy districts have also piled up significant cash reserves in so-called undesignated accounts, to be used for emergencies.” Statewide, the “50 richest districts have about $100 million in such reserves.”

Many Ohio Districts Diverting Money From Special Education To Stabilize Budgets.
The Columbus (OH) Dispatch (1/25, Richards) reports, “Ohio school districts are spending money meant for disabled students to stabilize their shaky budgets, and the state has made it easier for them to do so.” Many Ohio districts are receiving double the average amount for special education programs through a $438 million “federal stimulus” reserved for special education. “The federal Individuals with Disabilities Education Act says that, in years where districts receive more special-education funding, they can reduce their local spending by up to 50 percent of the increase.” Last year, however, “the Ohio Department of Education lowered the requirements,” allowing “99 percent of Ohio” districts and charter schools to redirect money. Critics say this provision cheats students with special needs.

Also in the News
Appeals Court Upholds Ruling That Illinois District Is Not Liable In Teacher Sex Abuse Case.
The AP (1/23) reported that the 7th Circuit Court of Appeals in Chicago has “has upheld a lower court’s ruling that a central Illinois school district can’t be held responsible for the behavior [of] a former teacher who was convicted of sexually abusing students.” The appeals court said the Normal, IL-based Unit 5 school district “could not be held liable for White’s behavior, including the injury of one of the students.”

NEA in the News

Reforms Reportedly Taken Out of Alabama’s Grant Application To Appease Teachers Union.
Rena Havner Philips wrote at Alabama’s Press-Register (1/24) Breaking News blog that while “Other states are promising sweeping reforms as they compete for a share of $4.35 billion worth of” race to the Top grants, “Alabama’s application for $181 million basically says that schools here would use the money to expand existing programs.” According to the Press-Register, “more extensive reforms” such as merit pay for teachers and “quarterly standardized tests for all students” were nixed after Deputy Superintendent Tommy Bice received a letter from Alabama Education Association President Paul Hubbert opposing the reforms. The deputy superintendent “said that he wanted many of AEA’s directors in each county to sign off on the” application, but added that “the fact that the items were taken out of the application doesn’t mean the state will stop pursuing them.”

Education Leader Says Additional Cuts To Schools Would Violate Federal Stimulus Rules.
The Arizona Republic (1/24, Gersema, Snyder, 393K) reported, “Child and education advocates are worried about Gov. Jan Brewer’s (R) new round of proposed cuts to Arizona’s education budget, including axing state financial support for all-day kindergarten.” Cuts to all day kindergarten “would save the state $218 million,” according to Brewer. In addition, her budget “calls for cutting $180 million in soft capital used for books, technology, and other teaching tools.” John Wright, president of the Arizona Education Association, has cautioned that “if the state cuts any more money from the schools’ budget this fiscal year, Arizona is in jeopardy of violating a ‘maintenance of effort’ requirement for obtaining and retaining federal-stimulus funds.” Meanwhile, Chuck Essigs of the Arizona Association of School Business Officials said that it is not clear “whether the state can cut more money from education to offset the budget deficit for fiscal year 2011.”

Ames, Iowa, Education Association Seeks Collaborative Approach To District Budgeting.
The Ames (IA) Tribune (1/24, Hanson) reported, “When negotiations for teacher contracts begin Monday, Ames teachers said they want to be part of the solution to the problem of the shrinking school budget.” Ames Education Association chief negotiator Aileen Sullivan said “teachers know there’s a good chance schools will get no new money, and the district may be looking for ways to trim up to $3 million from its budget.” Sullivan “said in the past, the negotiators asked for raises in salary or benefits without knowing the impact on staff or programs. ‘This year, we want to negotiate our impact on the budget,’ she said.” Sullivan “said both sides are rising to the challenge, on the basis of good relationships and mutual goals.”

Girls May Learn Math Anxieties From Female Teachers, Study Finds.
The AP (1/26) reports that, according to a recent study, “female elementary school teachers who are concerned about their own math skills could be passing that along to the little girls they teach.” This insecurity, the researchers say, could be a factor in perpetuating the continuing gap between men and women “in some areas of math achievement.” Sian L. Beilock, a University of Chicago associate professor in psychology and one of the study’s authors, said that “young students tend to model themselves after adults of the same sex, and having a female teacher who is anxious about math may reinforce the stereotype that boys are better at math than girls.” Janet S. Hyde, a professor in the Department of Psychology at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, praised the study. Hyde noted that “girls who grow up believing females lack math skills wind up avoiding harder math classes.”

The Los Angeles Times (1/26, Kaplan) reports, “First- and second-graders whose teachers were anxious about mathematics were more likely to believe that boys are hard-wired for math and that girls are better at reading,” according to the study’s findings. Further, “the girls who bought into that notion scored significantly lower on math tests than their peers who didn’t.” The researchers noted that “the gap in test scores was not apparent in the fall when the kids were first tested, but emerged after spending a school year in the classrooms of teachers with math anxiety. That detail convinced researchers that the teachers — all of them women — were the culprits.”

“Researchers said the next step is to determine what teachers did or said to transfer their anxieties,” the Chicago Tribune (1/26, Mack) reports. Beilock said, “There are lots of questions to be answered about what’s going on in the classroom.” Levine added that “the x-factor did not appear to be teachers’ knowledge of the subject, but rather ‘their feeling about the discipline.’” The study, “Female Teachers’ Math Anxiety Affects Girls’ Math Achievement,” appears in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

Researchers speculated that “increasing math requirements for elementary education programs could help alleviate math anxiety in elementary school teachers, thereby influencing girls’ math achievement,” the USA Today (1/25) “Science Fair” blog reports. The blog notes, “Women make up 90 percent of elementary school teachers in the United States.” HealthDay (12/25, Thomas) also reported the story.

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In the Classroom
Elementary School Pulls Dictionaries From Classrooms Over Sexually “Explicit” Entry.
The Los Angeles Times (1/26, Kelly) reports that after a parent “called the principal of Oak Meadows Elementary School” to complain that an entry in dictionaries available at the school was “too [sexually] explicit,” the dictionaries “were immediately pulled off the shelves and ‘temporarily housed off location’ until a committee could determine their suitability for children.” District Spokeswoman Betti Cadmus emphasized, “The dictionaries have not been banned.” Still, “a panel of parents, teachers and administrators will” determine if the dictionaries are appropriate for the school curriculum. The panel will “meet later this week to comb the dictionary for potentially graphic words or definitions and issue a report within a month.”

Memphis Schools Adding Earlier Introduction To Math, Science.
Tennessee’s Commercial Appeal (1/25, Roberts) reported that Memphis City Schools is increasing emphasis on math and science “in several elementary schools.” Linda Sklar, head of optional schools in the city system, said, “We’re encouraging students to understand the connections between traditional subjects and the real world and making them critical, reflective thinkers.” There will be a STEM “optional [elementary] school” and a K-8 school with a focus on media arts and public service. The programs beginning this fall will begin in middle and high schools and will be open to all students who meet requirements. Meanwhile, the school system also plans to open “an International Baccalaureate program in schools that feed into the Ridgeway High IB program…as early as 2011.”

Colorado District To Open Science And Technology Institute.
The Denver Post (1/26, Nicholson) reports on The Institute of Science and Technology at Overland and Prairie being built by the Cherry Creek School District, which “serve 6th- through 12th-graders, offering them a curriculum in STEM subjects.” Students at the institute will be able to concentrate in engineering, computer science, technical communication, mathematics, and health sciences. “The institute will also offer introductory programs for kindergarten through 5th-grade students to encourage them to pursue STEM courses when they’re eligible to attend.” A ground-breaking event for the school featured Governor Bill Ritter, as well as “representatives from the City of Aurora, Arapahoe County, CH2M Hill, the Colorado School of Mines, DeVry University, and others.”

On the Job
Utah, France Sign Teacher Exchange Agreement.
The Salt Lake Tribune (1/26, Schencker) reports that France is paying three French teachers “to work in Utah schools as part of the state’s dual-immersion program this year.” On Monday, “Utah education leaders signed an agreement with French officials to continue the cooperation in hopes of bringing more French teachers…from France and eventually sending Utah teachers there to teach English.” Utah is the twelfth state to “to sign a memorandum of understanding with a French education system.” The state also has “agreements with Spain, Mexico and China, which help supply some of the state’s Spanish and Mandarin teachers.”

DC Schools Chancellor Expected Today To Explain Claims Against Fired Teachers.
The Washington Post (1/26, Turque) reports that a spokesperson for D.C. Schools Chancellor Michelle A. Rhee said that Rhee will make a statement Tuesday morning regarding comments she made “that appear in the February issue of ‘Fast Company’ magazine.” Rhee “faced mounting pressure Monday to explain her statement…that some of the 266 teachers laid off in last October’s budget cuts ‘had sex with children,’ hit them or were chronically absent without authorization.” D.C. Council Chairman Vincent C. Gray said the claims were “alarming and deeply troubling.” He has “set a Wednesday deadline for Rhee to provide each instance since July 1, 2007 — the beginning of the chancellor’s tenure in the District — in which a teacher who sexually assaulted or hit a child was reported to the D.C. police department or Child and Family Services Agency, as required by law.” And, he wants “to know what actions were ultimately taken.”

In the Washington Post (1/25) the Answer Sheet blog, Valerie Strauss wrote, “What was she thinking,” regarding Rhee’s comments. According to Rhee, the statement she made to “Fast Company magazine was something she had already told the D.C. Council.” Strauss said, “I can’t figure out if Rhee actually likes stirring up controversy or just muddles her way into it — or both — but in this instance, whether it was a hasty remark she didn’t intend to make or an intentional bomb, I don’t see a good way out.”

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Law & Policy
Florida Governor Wants Voters To Reconsider Smaller Classes.
The St. Petersburg Times (1/26, Colavecchio, Solochek) reports that with Florida “having already spent $16 billion to reduce class sizes — and facing a multibillion-dollar budget deficit,” Florida Gov. Charlie Crist (R) is asking “voters to reconsider their 2002 vote in favor of smaller classes. Crist, who in the past has opposed tinkering with the class size amendment, on Monday said he now supports essentially freezing it where it is now — with mandated caps calculated as school-wide averages.” According to the Times, “Superintendents and others say going to the next phase — caps for every classroom, beginning next school year — would cost too much, create problems with student enrollment and do little to improve student achievement.”

The Tampa Tribune (1/25, Peterson) reports that Crist “said today he wants to ask Florida voters to freeze school class sizes where they are now without reducing them further. Voters in 2002 approved a constitutional amendment requiring that by fall 2010, each class be limited to a set number of pupils.” According to the Tribune, “Most schools already have met the schoolwide enrollment-reduction goals, after spending a total of nearly $16 billion on teachers and other resources. Officials feared they would have to spend billions more to meet more focused class-level requirements.”

New York City Steps Up Efforts To Close Underperforming Schools.
The New York Times (1/26, A17, Otterman) reports that in New York City, closing underperforming schools, “especially large high schools, has been one of the most controversial hallmarks of Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg’s control of the school system. And it is taking on a new urgency, both in New York and around the country, with the Obama administration putting a premium on ‘school turnaround’ policies” as a part of the Race to the Top stimulus grant competition. The Times notes that since 2002, New York City “has closed or is in the process of closing 91 schools, replacing them with smaller schools and charter schools. … This year, the city has proposed phasing out 20 schools, the most in any year.”

Proposal Seeks To Address Program Equity, Enrollment Problems.
The Business Gazette (MD) (1/25, McKeever) reported on a proposal from Prince George’s County schools Superintendent William Hite Jr. that “seeks to provide equity in high school programs while addressing enrollment problems.” Under Hite’s proposal, “the county would be split into five areas, with each area offering International Baccalaureate, science and technology programs and career and technical education programs. … There would also be one visual and performing arts, world languages and non-traditional high school alternative program in the northern and southern part of the county.” Hite pointed out that “program availability is closely connected with enrollment at county high schools.” The response from school board members was positive, according to the article, although “they were concerned with the financial impact.”

Facilities

Georgia District Fined $30,000 by State EPA For Water Contamination.
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution (1/26, Matteucci) reports, “DeKalb County schools have been fined $30,000″ by Georgia Department of Natural Resources’ Environmental Protection Division “for draining muddy water into a Dunwoody stream and other environmental violations while building an elementary school.” The Journal-Constitution points out that “The fine comes as the school system is considering a decrease in teachers’ salaries, closing magnet schools and cutting other programs to meet a $56 million deficit.” According to a spokesman for the district, “the fine was paid by the contractor, the architectural firm and the geotechnical firm hired by the district” for the construction.

Also in the News
Study Links Students’ Scores On International Test To Nations’ GDPs.
Education Week (1/27, Robelen) reports that a new study by researchers at the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development suggests that “modest gains in student achievement as measured by” the Program for International Student Assessment (PISA) “could cumulatively boost the country’s gross domestic product by tens of trillions of dollars over the coming decades.” Researchers used “economic modeling to relate cognitive skills… to economic growth.” According to the report, “The international average on PISA is 500.” Researchers predicted that a “‘modest goal’ of having all 30 industrialized countries in the OECD raise their average scores on PISA by 25 points in the next 20 years would provide an aggregate gain of $115 trillion in GDP ‘over the lifetime of the generation born in 2010.’”

NEA in the News
Missouri Lawmakers Introduce Three Improvements To Education.
Missouri’s News Tribune (1/25, Watson) reported that Missouri lawmakers introduced a bill last week that seeks to improve public schools with three policy changes. The first would be to pay teachers on merit, schedule “classes on a year-round basis,” and authorize “kindergarten students to begin school twice a year.” Chris Guinther, president the Missouri National Education Association, said that teacher pay should be based on more than just students’ test scores.

The AP (11/25, Gross) reports that the current financial crisis has made economics “more relevant and immediate to many high school and college students, and they are suddenly paying closer attention in class. … Instructors are delighted by the opportunity to use the dramatic events on Wall Street to explain concepts students might otherwise find dry, such as liquidity and Federal Reserve monetary policy.” The AP adds, “At Plano West Senior High School in a prosperous Dallas suburb, Advanced Placement economics teacher Sally Meek said her students keep veering off into politics and policy, debating the presidential candidates’ plans during the election and grappling with questions of how big a role government should take in trying to turn around the economy.” Also, the “Arizona Council on Economic Education is helping teachers design classes based on the current financial crisis.”

Atlanta District Stands To Lose $27 Million After Accreditation Revoked.

The Atlanta Journal-Constitution (11/25, Diamond) reports, “Clayton County’s schools stand to lose about $27 million in state money next school year after more than 3,200 students fled the district when it lost its accreditation.” Roger Reese, the district’s chief financial officer “warned school board members Monday that the system will have to consider a wide range of cuts, such as layoffs, reducing employee benefits and other measures to compensate for the loss of state money caused by the decline in enrollment.” Currently, Clayton operates under a $617 million budget. “About two-thirds of the $27 million Reese predicted the district will lose is because of the large number of students who left the district” after the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools to revoked “the school system’s accreditation.”

Springfield, Massachusetts, Seeking $60 Million Construction Funding Assistance.

Massachusetts’s The Republican (11/25, Goonan) reports that the City of Springfield “is seeking state funding assistance for a proposed $60 million, three-year capital improvement program for the schools that includes new roofs, windows, and doors and bathroom renovations.” This year, “The state has received statements of interest or renewed statements for close to 200 school projects statewide.” Still, Springfield Mayor Domenic J. Sarno “said he is very optimistic the city will secure state funding assistance, particularly with the age and condition of some of the school buildings and the strong working relationship with state officials.”

Education Advocates Pushing Increased Pay For Teachers Willing To Forgo Tenure.

The Grand Rapids (MI) Press (11/24, Loechler) reported that “nationally, a growing chorus of reformers say what works for teachers isn’t working for students, and they’re pushing something new: huge raises for teachers willing to forgo tenure. The most prominent effort is in Washington, D.C., where schools chief Michelle Rhee is offering pay hikes of up to $40,000 a year for teachers who give up tenure.” In Michigan, teachers “receive tenure after four years in the classroom.” Emily Cohen, policy analyst with the National Council on Teacher Quality, “advocates for more meaningful evaluations, to weed out less-than-stellar teachers before they receive tenure. Most area districts attempt to do just that.” However, Jim Pratt, a representative of the Michigan Education Association, a National Education Association affiliate, said first-year teacher evaluations make “a teacher’s first years among the hardest in his or her career. … ‘You literally are thrown in and you either sink or swim,’ he said.”

 

The Minneapolis Star Tribune (11/26, Johns) reports that the St. Paul School District has “set out to find high-quality people working in other professions to improve the quality of the district’s teaching ranks and fill teaching positions where they’ve often had to rely on teachers without full licenses.” This fall, “more than 630 people applied for the St. Paul Teaching Fellows Program,” which is funded by “a grant from the U.S. Department of Education.” Forty-one applicants were selected to fill positions in “hard-to-fill subject areas such as special education and science.” According to the Star Tribune, “Of the 41 teachers in the Teaching Fellows program, 26 percent hold advanced degrees and 20 percent are people of color.” Over the summer, “The district gave them a five-week crash course…on teaching in urban settings.” In addition, “the teachers are also taking graduate education courses at Hamline University, so they’ll have a full license after two years.”

Software Allows Students To Play Games As They Learn.

The St. Louis (MO) Post-Dispatch (11/26, Craig) reports that “Study X, a software program that allows students to play games as they learn, was recently installed on all student laptops at John F. Kennedy High School in Manchester.” With Study X, students can also “print flash cards and generate sample tests in several different formats. Study X has been used to master vocabulary, to aid in memorization and to learn dates and formulas,” and to help “students in a wide variety of subjects.” According to Dr. Patricia McLeese of the Academic Resource Center at Webster University, “the program is helpful to students who are easily bored by routine activities.”

School Building Becomes Canvas For Budding Student Artists.

The Washington Post (11/26, B6, Vargas) reports that art students at Kenmore Middle School in Arlington, VA, have wrapped “the outside of the school in 150-foot-long colored plastic strips. Visible to thousands who drive along Route 50 past Carlin Springs Road, it will remain up at least two weeks.” According to the Post, “Shauna Dyer, who has worked with art teacher Jeff Wilson to oversee the work, described the project as a ‘great opportunity for kids to see how art can grow and extend outside the classroom and really understand the process that Jeanne-Claude and Christo go through. It connects to whatever they do in life, whether they become an artist or an engineer.’”

Canadian Scientist Gives Florida Fifth-Graders Hands-On Lessons In Biology.

The St. Petersburg (FL) Times (11/26, Albucher) reports that for “an environmental learning project…at” James B. Sanderlin Elementary School, educators “recruited Canadian environmental scientist Dr. Don Waite to teach students about biology and the environment through educational singing, lectures, and experiments over a course of three days.” The scientist “splits his time between working for the Canadian government…and leading educational programs for children.” The 24 fifth-graders who participated in Waite’s program “will re-teach what they learned to other fifth-graders.”

Virginia Elementary School Principal Implements Lecture-Free Days.

The Suffolk (VA) News-Herald (11/25) reported that Nansemond Parkway Elementary School principal Keith Hubbard instituted “lecture- and worksheet-free days this year to help students develop creativity, problem-solving and critical thinking skills.” The goal of “Day Without a Desk” is “to make the students connect what they learn through lectures, books and worksheets to something that relates to them. It takes their learning to a higher level,” Hubbard said. “The students have been doing desk-free Fridays for three months now, and teachers at the school said it’s working.” So far, students have made “piñatas out of paper lunch bags” and paper lanterns, while studying Mexico and China. They have also “built motorized racecars using Legos, created salt maps showing the regions of Virginia.”

First-Graders At Washington Elementary School Taste Pies To Produce Pie Charts.

The Wenatchee (WA) World (11/25, Agnew) reported that John Newbery Elementary School first grade teachers Laurie McLaughlin and Tami Woolsey “have held the pie tasting annually for five years. Students try a small piece of each of the pies — this year they came from Costco and Albertsons — and then vote for the pie they liked best.” The activity “is part of the two classes’ math curriculum. Students count up the results of the taste test and turn them into a graph — a pie chart, so to speak. … After the students [make] their tough decision, they” color “a cutout picture of a pumpkin, apple or pecan pie.” Then, they “glue their choice to a chart on [a] wall” in each classroom.

Students At Montana High School Learn About Career Choices By Shadowing Professionals.

The Helena (MT) Independent Record (11/25) reported that “students from the Project for Alternative Learning (PAL)” spent part “of Monday gaining some real-life experience by job-shadowing professionals at businesses around Helena.” According to the Helena Independent Record “students’ interests varied, as did the participating businesses. Some students worked with professionals at St. Peter’s Hospital, many worked with teachers and administrators throughout Helena schools, and others worked at construction companies and restaurants.” PAL principal Don Wood-Foucar “said the experience is a bit like a short internship.”

On the Job

Nearly Half Of Math Teachers In High Poverty Schools Do Not Have Certification, Report Shows.

The AP (11/26, Quaid) reports that poor students “are about twice as likely to have math teachers who don’t know their subject, according to a report by the Education Trust, a children’s advocacy group.” Based on data from the US Department of Education, the Education Trust found that “in high-poverty schools, two in five math classes have teachers without a college major or certification in math.” Additionally, “in schools with a greater share of African-American and Latino children, nearly one in three math classes is taught by such a teacher.” The report adds that “teachers should not be blamed for out-of-field teaching. … It can happen anywhere there is a teacher shortage in a particular discipline” or “where there is no shortage but where school administrators have planned poorly.”

        According to the Canadian Press (11/26) the report also points out that “The teaching problem is most acute in the middle grades” five through eight. The Riverside (CA) Press-Enterprise (11/26, Parsavand) also covers the story.

Many Highly-Qualified Teachers In Georgia Say They Have Incorrect Certification.

The Atlanta Journal-Constitution (11/26, Diamond) reports, “Georgia teachers differ with the federal government as to how qualified they are, according to a national report released Tuesday.” A study from The Education Trust, a child advocacy group, shows that even though “about 95 percent of Georgia’s middle and high school teachers met the federal requirement of ‘highly qualified,’ only 65 percent of the teachers said in a survey that they had the appropriate certification.” The data “come from different reports completed during the 2003-04 school year, the last time the teacher survey was conducted by the U.S. Department of Education.” The Journal-Constitution explains, “Georgia teachers are ‘highly qualified’ if they have an academic degree in the subject matter they’re teaching; or if their college course work is equivalent to a major in that area; or if they pass a state content test in the subject.”

        Number of “Highly Qualified” Teachers In Hawaii Increases From Last Year. The Honolulu Star-Bulletin (11/25, Da Silva) reports, “Hawaii is making progress toward getting public school teachers qualified, but those instructors are harder to find in high-poverty campuses where students often need the most help, according to the state Department of Education.” Compared to last year, there “are more qualified teachers in Hawaii’s public schools…but the state needs to do a better job placing those instructors in high-poverty campuses where students often struggle most, figures released yesterday” by the state Department of Education show. “The number of isle teachers federally qualified in all their subjects rose to about 10,839 from 8,997 the same time last year, a 20.4 percent jump, according to the state Department of Education.” Meanwhile, “a report released by the children’s advocacy group Education Trust said that nationally, poor children and minority students are about twice as likely to have math teachers who don’t know their subject.”

Florida High School Celebrates International Week.

The St. Petersburg (FL) Times (11/26, Miller) reports, that students at Zephyrhills High School “were given the opportunity to widen their horizons a bit and travel the world” last week as part of the school’s International Education Week. During lunch periods, some students “lined up for henna tattoos penned by students in the Art Honors class or to have their caricatures done in anime form. Others took a chance at making an origami crane or smacking a pinata that was filled with Thai ginger candy and lollipops coated in chili pepper.” And “Each day on the school’s morning news show, students were taught how to say “good morning” in various languages — Vietnamese, Thai, Spanish, and Korean. They also learned to write their names in different script.” Meanwhile, “students in ESOL classes created colorful and informative posters to hang and shared with other students the differences and similarities between the schools here and in their home countries.”

Law & Policy

Education Stakeholders Speculate On Who Will Be The Next ED Secretary.

In a blog posting for Newsweek (11/25), Pat Wingert wrote, “Though presidential candidates often say that education will be one of their top priorities, the job of education secretary is often among the last cabinet seats filled. While Barack Obama’s transition team hasn’t floated any names yet, the education establishment–reformers, teachers’ unions, colleges and universities–has no shortage of candidates.” According to Wingert, “What no one knows is whether Obama is leaning toward someone from the more innovative end of the reform movement…or a candidate with close ties to the teachers’ unions.” The innovators “want one of their own in the top spot. Their favorites include New York City Schools Chancellor Joel Klein” and Michelle Rhee, chancellor of the Washington, D.C. schools and founder of the New Teacher Project. However, the teachers’ unions “prefer someone like Linda Darling-Hammond, a professor of education at Stanford who acted as a surrogate for Obama during the campaign or former Gov. Jim Hunt of North Carolina, both reformers who have a long history of working respectfully with the unions on issues like increased teacher professionalism.”

Safety & Security

California School District Announces Winners Of Internet Safety Video Contest.

The Sacramento (CA) Bee (11/26, Nix) reports, “Twenty-five Elk Grove Unified School District elementary, middle, and high school students have been named winners in the Internet Safety Video Contest, a collaboration between the school district and the U.S. Attorney’s Office.” According to the Sacramento Bee, “The contest is one component of Elk Grove Unified’s Internet Safety Initiative, which involves a three-pronged approach to educate staff, parents and students about cyber bullying, online predators, and other Internet safety issues, according to a district statement.”

Rumors Of Fights Lead Many Students To Skip Class At Kentucky High School.

Kentucky’s News-Democrat (11/25, Cassady) reported, “Over 200 students were absent from Logan County High School Friday after rumors of fights and hit lists circulated through the student body and into the community.” Meanwhile, “school administrators and office staff spent much of the day reassuring parents that everything was fine at the school and dealing with the few students actually involved in the situation.” After what was believed to be “a fight between two students,” students began to spread rumors, mostly via text message, “about things like a hit list of students who were to be jumped and certain groups wearing camouflage clothing on Friday. By Thursday evening…word had spread into the community and people began to panic.” Principal Casey Jaynes said that that “no incidents were reported at the school Friday and…there was no reason for people to keep their children out of school because of safety issues.”

School Finance

Minnesota District Mulls Suggestions For Cutting $10 Million In Spending.

Minnesota’s Post-Bulletin (11/25, Mann) reported, “The committee working toward recommending budget cuts of more than $10 million to Rochester schools met Monday, suggesting, among other items, that maintenance and lawn budgets be reduced.” Other “highly-supported” suggestions included having classrooms cleaned “every other day rather than each day,” which would potentially save the district $1 million, and “reducing electric, water and utility costs by five percent. That includes turning off lights more often when buildings are closed and turning down the heat, now around 70 degrees, in all buildings.” The Post-Bulletin notes, “Before finalizing recommendations in mid-December, the committee will review possible cuts in four more areas — instructional staffing, instructional programming, transportation and human resources.”

Also in the News

Students In California’s Affluent Districts Score Higher On Fitness Tests Than Peers In Other Areas.

California’s North County Times (11/26) reports, “Students in wealthier school districts tend to be in better shape than those in poorer areas, according to state fitness tests released Tuesday.” In addition to performing “better on academic tests,” state data shows that students in “affluent [California] districts such as Poway Unified, Carlsbad, and San Dieguito Union…can also do more sit-ups and push-ups.” This year, “About half of the students in those districts passed state fitness tests…compared with about a third statewide. The series of six physical fitness tests are given each year to all public school students across the state in fifth, seventh, and ninth grade.” They “assess aerobic capability, body composition, strength, flexibility and endurance.”

Parents Protest California Elementary Students’ Thanksgiving Costumes.

In the Los Angeles Times‘s (11/25) L.A. Now blog, Seema Mehta wrote, “Nearly two dozen protesters were stationed this morning in front of Condit Elementary School in Claremont, the site of a decades-old Thanksgiving tradition that is under fire because kindergartners dress up in handmade pilgrim and Native American costumes.” About half of the protesters were “parents who supported the costumes. The other half were “parents who opposed the outfits.” According to Lt. Dennis Smith of the Claremont Police Department, “their discussion grew so heated that school officials called police, who separated the protesters on separate sidewalks.”

In the Classroom

Minnesota District Recruits, Trains 41 Fellows To Teach Hard-To-Fill Subjects.

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In the Classroom
STEMfest Gives Kids Fun Introduction To Sciences.
The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel (11/13, Miller) reports on STEMfest, “a one-day fair Saturday at Discovery World where visitors can enjoy the museum for free and get a fun introduction to the sciences that make their world go.” The fair is being funded by of Time Warner, which earlier this year “announced a nationwide effort to fund a five-year, $100 million philanthropic effort to address America’s decline in STEM.” The company’s Milwaukee office has “lined up several local partners to make their best pitch for youths to explore science, technology, engineering and math as interests and careers, including FIRST Robotics and the FIRST Lego League, Growing Power, Milwaukee Area Technical College and the Engineers & Scientists of Milwaukee.” In addition, “Marcus Center for the Performing Arts, the Great Lakes WATER Council, the Badger State Science & Engineering Fair, Marquette’s College of Engineering, Lakeshore State Park, WAUK-AM (540) ESPN radio and the Urban Ecology Center also will have exhibits, information and experts on hand.”

Study Of Harlem Children’s Zone Finds Achievement Gaps Closing.
Education Week (11/12, Robelen) reported that the Harlem Children’s Zone, “a high-profile New York City initiative that combines charter schools with wraparound community services for minority students and their low-income families,” is “showing dramatic academic gains that effectively close the black-white achievement gap in most categories examined, a new study finds.” However, the National Bureau of Economic Research study also finds that what it is “less clear” is “whether the improved student performance can be explained by the quality of the schools alone, or by the combination of the schooling with the web of community supports, such as early-childhood programs, parenting workshops, and asthma and anti-obesity initiatives.”

On the Job
Detroit Academy For Boys Held Up As National Model.
Editorialist Jeff Gerritt writes in the Detroit Free Press (11/13) that “the school-to-prison pipeline, especially in poverty-plagued cities like Detroit, has become a national disgrace.” Each year, “nearly eight in 10 African-American males drop out of Detroit public schools.” As community leaders search for a solution to the problem, Garrett suggests that they look to Detroit’s Frederick Douglass Academy, “an all-male middle and high school that’s changing lives and switching the statistics.” The academy was “formerly an alternative school for bad boys,” but in the last five years has transformed into “a high-achieving college preparatory academy. All 32 of this year’s graduating class were accepted to college, clocking $1.2 million in scholarships and financial aid.” Garrett profiles several students at the school. He concludes that “schools like Frederic Douglass Academy show how Detroit, and the nation,” can reverse the high school dropout trend.

Maryland District To Continue Use Of Troubled Computer System.
The Washington Post (11/13, Hernandez) reports that the Prince George’s County, MD school system “will continue using the $4.1 million computer system that left 8,000 high school students stranded without schedules at the start of the school year, Superintendent William R. Hite Jr. said Thursday after an investigation of the debacle was completed.” Hite “said that many of the problems with SchoolMax, a new computer system chosen in 2005 to help Prince George’s comply with federal requirements for keeping track of data, had been ironed out and that it would be easier to get SchoolMax working correctly than to build a system from scratch.”

In Survey, DC Principals Report Having Improved Resources.
The Washington Post (11/13, Wilson) reports, “Five years ago, some principals from D.C. public schools took part in a survey that revealed their disappointment with the lack of support and resources they received from the school system. Some principals were so unprepared that they began the school year without adequate staffing, textbooks, supplies or security officers.” However, findings from the Ready Schools survey “show that principals are receiving more support and resources from the school system since the initial report in 2004.”

Law & Policy
Texas’ Failure To Adopt Education Reforms Could Cost State Millions.
The Houston Chronicle (11/13, Mellon) reports that Texas “is in the running for hundreds of millions of federal dollars to spur school improvement, but the state’s reluctance to embrace some of President Barack Obama’s education reform ideas could hurt its chances. Guidelines released Thursday show Texas is eligible for $350 million to $700 million, but it must beat out other states to get it.” Texas “could lose points in the grant contest because it is one of four states that has not joined an effort to develop national standards that spell out what all U.S. students should learn.”

Michigan Schools Chief Urges Education Stakeholders To Compromise.
The Detroit News (11/13, Bouffard) reports that on Thursday, Michigan Superintendent of Public Instruction Mike Flanagan “urged lawmakers and the state’s largest teachers union to compromise on education reforms required within 60 days to qualify Michigan for up to $400 million through President Barak Obama’s Race to the Top education initiative.” The Detroit News notes that “the House and the Senate each have proposed their own package of education reform bills.” But Michigan Education Association “lobbyist Dave Stafford told the committee that some of the proposed reforms would hurt education in the state. He said if teachers are evaluated on the basis of their students scores, some teachers will be reluctant to take on hard-to-educate students.”

Bloomberg News (11/12, Peterson) reported that the Department of Education’s “final rules in a competition for $4.35 billion in education stimulus grants include union-backed changes to teacher- assessment requirements.” According to Bloomberg, the Obama administration “wants public schools to tie teacher evaluations and pay to student performance, and unions have sought to ensure that test scores aren’t the sole measure.” The AP (11/12, Martin) also covered this story.

Safety & Security
California District Revamping System To Alert Teachers Of Students With History Of Violence.
California’s Press Democrat (11/13, Benefield) reports that the Santa Rosa, CA, school district “is revamping its system for alerting teachers if a student with a history of violence is enrolled in their class.” The move is being made upon the insistence of “teachers after a string of assaults prompted the district to seek restraining orders against students in four incidents within four weeks this year.” Currently, schools keep “a binder in the main office in which student suspension notices for the current school year are kept. But teachers said that system is too passive and instructors aren’t alerted when a student with a violent history is on their roster.” At Santa Rosa High School “this year instituted an e-mail alert system that provides student information through the computerized attendance and grading system.” Now, “the district is trying to create a uniform policy.”

Georgia District Urged To Shift Resources To Ensure Safe School Environment.
Charles Richardson writes for the editorial board of the Macon (GA) Telegraph (11/13, Richardson) that this week, “Bibb County schools Superintendent Sharon Patterson told the Bibb County legislative delegation…that the school system didn’t have the resources to keep students, teachers and administrators safe, and that the state needed to provide those resources.” However, Richardson asserts, “Children with behavioral issues need to be taught in an environment where they can be successful.” The problem, she adds, is that “Bibb County hasn’t created that environment — and it can’t wait for the state to act.” Instead, “the Bibb system must shift resources to deal with children who cannot adapt to a normal school setting before somebody gets seriously injured.” And these steps, Richardson concludes, must be taken “now, not later.”

School Finance
Michigan School District Chief Seeks To Quell Rumors Surrounding Budget Shortfall.
The Kalamazoo Gazette (11/12, Haroldson) reported that Portage, MI Public Schools Superintendent Marsha Wells “on Wednesday said rumors are rife but facts are scarce about where the school district will make millions of dollars in budget cuts. Wells presented the district’s budget outlook to the Portage Rotary Club, saying rumors of privatizing bus transportation, massive layoffs and eliminating programs and services are just that — rumors.” Nevertheless, millions “will have to be cut from the school budget this year and next year because of losses in per-student funding. Portage schools is projecting a loss of $2.5 million to $3 million this year because of per-student funding cuts of $165 and $127 this year.”

New Jersey Governor-Elect Pledges To Maintain Support For K-12 Funding.
Education Week (11/12, Gewertz) reported that the “election of Republican Chris Christie as New Jersey’s next governor has drawn cheers from the state’s charter school and voucher advocates, even as it sparks worry that his promise to reduce taxes and spending in the face of a massive budget shortfall could result in cuts to precollegiate education.” Christie “wasted no time sending signals of support for urban education and for charter schools. … The day after his election, he visited a charter school in his hometown of Newark.” Also, five days later, Christie “appeared at a high school in suburban Hamilton, where he pledged to maintain support for K-12 education despite a looming $8 billion deficit in the state’s $29 billion budget.”

Also in the News
Former President George W. Bush Outlines Vision For His Institute.
The AP (11/12, Ball) reported that education “will be the first of four areas former President George W. Bush said his Dallas-based think tank will address. Global health, human freedom and economic growth are the other focus areas, Bush said during a Thursday speech at Southern Methodist University.” The George W. Bush Institute will also “include an ongoing women’s initiative that his wife” Laura will lead.

NEA in the News
Labor Union Membership In US Has Declined Since Early 1980′s.
The Salt Lake Tribune (11/13, Stewart) reports that “the Utah Education Association (UEA) won’t release membership data. But union spokesman Michael Kelley acknowledged numbers are down ‘slightly.’” Kelly added that teachers have not been “dropping out,” but that the UEA “didn’t get as many new members this year, because fewer teachers were hired due to the economy.” Last year, however, the association saw a “considerable” increase in membership, Kelley confirmed. The Salt Lake Tribune points out that UEA membership “parallels a national trend. Union membership in the United States rose last year by the largest amount in a quarter-century, up 428,000 people, according to U.S. Census Data published by the Bureau of Labor Statistics.” Still, “the percentage of the labor force in unions” has declined “since the early ’80s.”

Former Television Actor Wins Florida Education Association Teaching Excellence Award.
The Miami Herald (11/13, McGrory) reports on Joe Underwood, a former television actor who appeared on the show Miami Vice. “But when the series went off the air, Underwood took on a new role: He became an educator.” Now, a 25-year teaching veteran, Underwood runs Miami High School’s “TV and film production academy — a program he created.” This year, Underwood “won the prestigious Award for Teaching Excellence from the Florida Education Association,” and “he will represent the Sunshine State in the National Education Association’s competition in February.”

Obama Administration Releases Final Race To The Top Guidelines.
Education Week (11/11, McNeil) reported that to win a portion of the $4 billion “in grants from the federal Race to the Top Fund, states will need to make a persuasive case for their education reform agenda, demonstrate significant buy-in from local school districts, and develop plans to evaluate teachers and principals based on student performance, according to final regulations set for release Thursday” by the US Department of Education.

The New York Times (11/12, A20, Dillon) reports, “Three months after provoking an outpouring of criticism with preliminary plans for” Race to the Top, “the nation’s largest competitive education grant program, the Obama administration has added flexibility in the program’s final rules, released Wednesday, drawing praise” from North Carolina Gov. Bev Perdue (D), “who was initially critical and from leaders of the national teachers’ unions.” For instance, NEA president Dennis Van Roekel said that “the draft rules had seemed to encourage states to evaluate teachers and principals largely ‘based on a single standardized test score.’” The new rules, Van Roekel said, “put more emphasis on student growth, teacher practice and improving instruction. So I’m really pleased that they listened.”

The Washington Post (11/12, Anderson) adds that Race to the Top bids “will be rated on the point system,” with “improving teacher and principal effectiveness based on performance…worth more than any specific improvement: 58 points.” Other criteria include “making education funding a priority,” and “demonstrating significant progress in raising achievement and closing gaps.” The highest number of points possible — a perfect score — is 500 points. The Post adds that the “call to action on teacher-principal improvement, which means factoring student test score growth into job evaluations, is likely to draw intense scrutiny from unions.” Van Roekel “said…the continuing focus on tying test scores to job evaluations” is one area in which the administration “missed the mark.”

The AP (11/11, Quaid) reported that unions “had argued that student achievement is much more than a score on a standardized test, in part because only about one-third of teachers teach subjects and grades that are actually tested. In response, the Department of Education changed the rules to say that teachers and principals must be judged on several different measures of student achievement.” But even though some unions “feel better about the competition, plenty of criticism remains,” according to the AP. The Los Angeles Times (11/12, Song) reports that states “now have 60 days to apply for federal funding. … The deadline to apply for the first round of federal dollars is in mid-January.”

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In the Classroom
All-Girls Engineering Club Part Of Middle School’s STEM Initiative.
The Washington Post (11/12, Buck) reports on the “all-girls engineering club” at Calvert Middle School in Prince Frederick, Maryland, which was recently visited by Karin Hill, the director of education and public programs for the National Museum of the United States Navy, who taught the students “how to make a barometer out of a soup can, a balloon, a sewing needle and a straw.” The group is “part of a school system initiative to get students interested in careers in science, technology, engineering and mathematics,” which “is in turn part of a national initiative launched by the Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM) Education Coalition.” Officials said they “try to have female engineers as weekly guests to show the girls ‘that they have families and that engineering can be a great career for a woman,’” and note that “so far the club, which has about 30 members, has been a success.”

On the Job
Teachers Younger Than 33 More Open To Merit Pay, Study Shows.
The Orlando Sentinel (11/12, Balona) reports that a study by “two nonprofit research groups called ‘Supporting Teacher Talent: The View from Generation Y’” shows that “younger teachers are open to the idea of merit pay. … According to a national survey of teachers ages 32 and younger, 71 percent think teachers who work harder and put in more time should be paid more. Sixty-three percent of older teachers felt the same.” Furthermore, 70 percent “of younger educators also think they should earn more if they receive a prestigious certification from the National Board for Professional Teaching Standards,” while “only 58 percent of older teachers agreed.” Still, “few teachers from any of the age groups surveyed thought that tying teacher pay to student performance would be a ‘very effective’ way to improve teaching.”

North Carolina District Halts Middle School’s Grades-For-Cash Fundraiser.
The AP (11/12) reports that “Wayne County school administrators have halted” a fundraiser “at Rosewood Middle School in Goldsboro,” NC, that offered “20 test points to students in exchange for a $20 donation.” North Carolina’s News & Observer (11/12, Bonner) reports that “the fundraiser came to an abrupt halt” Wednesday “after a story in The News & Observer raised concerns about the practice of selling grades.” On Wednesday morning the district said in a statement that administrators met with Rosewood principal Susie Shepherd “and directed the following actions be taken: (1) the fundraiser will be immediately stopped; (2) no extra grade credit will be issued that may have resulted from donations; and (3) beginning November 12, all donations will be returned.”

Audit Finds Lack Of Teacher-Union Leave Guidelines In Utah Districts.
The Salt Lake Tribune (11/12, Schencker) reports that some Utah school districts “need to better track how teachers on paid association leave spend their time, according to a legislative audit released Wednesday. In Utah and other states, school districts sometimes give teachers leave from their jobs when they’re elected to serve as local union leaders.” And some districts “pay part of those leaders’ salaries, even when they’re on leave from teaching, saying their work still benefits the district.” However, auditors “found that none of the six districts they examined had guidelines defining which activities benefit the district versus the union.”

Law & Policy
Hawaii’s Furlough Friday Policy Generates International Media Coverage.
The Honolulu Star-Bulletin (11/12, Essoyan) reports on the media coverage that has been generated by Hawaii’s “decision to shut public schools for 17 Furlough Fridays.” In addition to coverage by “national television networks” and periodicals, international media outlets such as The Guardian of London, the BBC, and Radio Australia have also covered the story. Comedian Frank De Lima has even written a song about Furlough Fridays, “written to the tune of Day-O (The Banana Boat Song),” with the refrain, “Friday come and we gotta stay home.” School Board Chairman Garrett Toguchi “said the news coverage tends to sensationalize the issue,” but added, “if the negative press encourages our leaders to put education at the top of our priority list, I’m more than happy to accept it.” The Star-Bulletin points out that “part of the reason for the widespread media coverage is that closing schools seems like a drastic measure compared with cutting salaries or laying off teachers and boosting classroom size.”

Furlough Fridays Jeopardize Hawaii’s Prospects For Additional Stimulus. The Honolulu Star-Bulletin (11/11) reports that Hawaii “has prevailed in federal court in fighting off a challenge to school Furlough Fridays, but the system is far from stable. The schools desperately need federal assistance that they are not likely to receive without changing direction.” According to the Star-Bulletin, the court rulings follow “blistering criticism by U.S. Education Secretary Arne Duncan warning that cutting the number of school days “‘is a step in the wrong direction.’” States “have received more than $67 billion in federal stimulus and an additional $11.5 billion soon will become available to those deserving of it.” Duncan’s “criticism is compounded by Hawaii’s poor grades in a new report by the Center for American Progress, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and American Enterprise Institute.”

Baltimore School Board Approves Policy Allowing For Permanent Expulsions.
The Baltimore Sun (11/11, Bowie) reported that Baltimore’s school board “voted 5-2 Tuesday night to adopt a policy that allows students to be permanently expelled for setting fires or other violent acts that threaten the safety of staff and students.” The vote “came after months of public comment and haggling over the details of the policy. In the end, the board and schools CEO Andres Alonso compromised.” Alonso “retained his authority to permanently expel students, but under more narrow circumstances and with a greater weight given to the student’s home life and experiences, and right to due process.”

Special Needs
Children Seen As Being “Hidden Casualties” Of Economic Recession.
The New York Times (11/12, Luo) reports that for “many families across the country, the greatest damage inflicted by this recession has not necessarily been financial but emotional and psychological.” According to the Times, children “have become hidden casualties, often absorbing more than their parents are fully aware of. Several academic studies have linked parental job loss – especially that of fathers – to adverse impacts in areas like school performance and self-esteem.”

Facilities
Clark County School District’s Maintenance Backlog Nearly Triples From 2008.
The Las Vegas Sun (11/12, Richmond) reports that “as of July 31,” the Clark County school district’s “backlog of maintenance work orders had nearly tripled to 12,937 from 4,327 at the end of July 2008.” While the exteriors of district buildings “appear clean and crisp,” a report presented to the school board on Thursday shows that the “buildings generally are not in ‘showpiece’ condition.” Moreover, the Nevada district’s “schools are at risk of looking downright shabby with building systems — heating, air conditioning, even fire alarms — in constant need of repair, according to the district staff’s assessment.” Paul Gerner, Clark County schools’ associate superintendent of facilities, said, “Current levels of maintenance services are unsustainable and not in the long-term interests of the district.” The Las Vegans Sun points out that “most campuses are not in obvious neglect. But some of the chores that were once part of the daily routine are being put off, increasing the risk for larger and more expensive problems.” The maintenance shortage stems from recent budget cuts to an already understaffed facilities division.

School Finance

Detroit District Cuts Budget Deficit By Nearly $87 Million.
The AP (11/11) reported that an audit “shows Detroit Public Schools has cut its budget deficit by nearly $87 million. The deficit was projected at $305.9 million.” The district’s Comprehensive Annual Financial Report and Annual Single Audit “reveal the accumulated general fund deficit was down to $219 million as of June 30. … Emergency financial manager Robert Bobb credits the decrease to personnel cuts, weeding out of fraud and waste, and cancellations of unnecessary and costly contracts.”

Also in the News
Chicago School Defends Student Arrests For Participation In Food Fight.
ABC News (11/12, Pinto, Dwyer) reports on its website on the arrest of “two dozen children” after a food fight last week at Chicago’s Perspectives Charter Middle School. The students, “ages 11 to 15, were rounded up by police, arrested and charged with misdemeanor reckless conduct. One 13-year-old student recalled, “[The police] took us to jail, fingerprinted us, mugshotted us, or whatever, all because of a food fight…I was arrested. Handcuffs on.” In a statement, the school defended the officers’ action, saying, “The Chicago police officers who help protect our school, concerned about potential injuries resulting from the fight, felt it was necessary to arrest those responsible.”

Children Seen As Being “Hidden Casualties” Of Economic Recession.
The New York Times (11/12, Luo) reports that for “many families across the country, the greatest damage inflicted by this recession has not necessarily been financial but emotional and psychological.” According to the Times, children “have become hidden casualties, often absorbing more than their parents are fully aware of. Several academic studies have linked parental job loss – especially that of fathers – to adverse impacts in areas like school performance and self-esteem

Students, Parents, School Officials In Michigan Rally Against State Budget Cuts.
The AP (11/11) reports that Michigan Gov. Jennifer Granholm (D) on Tuesday said that “school officials and parents must persuade lawmakers more needs to be done to shore up education funding in Michigan.” She “ordered a $127 per student cut in school funding to take effect in December unless the legislature votes for additional revenue within the next two weeks.”

The AP (11/11, Martin) reports in a separate story that “hundreds of students, parents and school officials rallied Tuesday at the state Capitol,” calling “on the Legislature to avoid budget cuts that could trim school programs across the state.” Seventeen-year-old Zane Thomas said that he participated in the rally to show lawmakers that the state budget cuts are “hurting [students] more than they think it is. … I don’t think they understand how deep these cuts really are,” he added. “Granholm called on the Senate to immediately act to avoid cuts that she recently ordered because of falling tax revenues” and suggested that lawmakers “avoid the cuts by eliminating a scheduled inflationary increase in the state income tax personal exemption or scaling back some exemptions on taxes affecting oil, gas and tobacco companies.” Meanwhile, “Republicans counter that Granholm is making unnecessary cuts to try and force them into approving a tax increase.”

Michigan Radio (11/10, Pluta) reported that according to Senate Majority Leader Mike Bishop, “Senate Republicans want to see cost-saving measures such as benefits pooling and bigger co-pays instead of more revenue. He also says the governor can reverse some of the cuts being made to schools.” The Lansing (MI) State Journal (11/11, Martin) and the Detroit News (11/11, Bouffard, Hornbeck) also cover the story.

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In the Classroom
High School Students In California Produce Solar Suitcases To Help Power Medical Clinics.
The Sacramento Bee (11/10, B1, Lambert) reported that “engineering students at Cosumnes Oaks High School in Elk Grove,” CA, “are producing solar suitcases that will help power medical clinics in impoverished villages around the world.” The suitcases contain “charging stations for police radios and electrical outlets for lights or medical equipment.” They “will be plugged into a large solar cell that will offer immediate power and charge a 12-volt battery that can offer power after dark.” So far, “students have completed two of the suitcases, with one bound for the Tarahumara Indians in Mexico at the end of this week.”

North Carolina Middle School Offers Students Test Points In Exchange For Donations.
North Carolina’s News & Observer (11/11, Bonner) reports that Rosewood Middle School in Goldsboro, NC, “is selling grades” to raise funds. “A $20 donation…will get a student 20 test points — 10 extra points on two tests of the student’s choosing.” Principal Susie Shepherd said that “a parent advisory council came up with the idea” as a way to raise money. ‘Last year they did chocolates, and it didn’t generate anything,’ Shepherd said.” So far, “no donations have been collected.” But Shepherd “rejected the suggestion that the school is selling grades,” because, she said, “extra points on two tests won’t make a difference in a student’s final grade.” But Rebecca Garland, the chief academic officer for the state Department of Public Instruction, said that “exchanging grades for money teaches children the wrong lessons. She also said it is bad testing practice and is unfair to students whose parents can’t pay.”

Museum Loans Teachers History Kits With Interactive Lessons About Florida.
The St. Petersburg Times (11/11, Miller) reports on History to Go, a program by the Tampa Bay History Center “that allows educators to bring” history kits “to their school for three weeks at no charge.” Each kit has “artifact reproductions and classroom activities concerning Tampa Bay area history such as the Rough Riders — the first American volunteer cavalry that camped in Tampa before heading to Cuba during the Spanish-American War.” They also include “reproductions of some handmade tools of the first Florida natives and the Seminole Indians.” Some teachers say that with little time to cover Florida history in class, the kits offer memorable, interactive lessons.

Elementary School Adds Engineering To Math, Science Curriculum.
The Lynchburg (VA) News and Advance (11/10, Pounds) reported that T.C. Miller Elementary School this year “added engineering to its science and math curriculum,” which “means a new emphasis on making, building and designing, whether it is kindergarteners engineering Big Bad Wolf-proof houses or fifth graders experimenting with electrical circuits.” The elementary school “became a School for Innovation in 1993, with a focus on math, science, technology and the performing arts,” and the “addition of engineering makes it one of two Science, Technology, Engineering and Math schools in Virginia.” Younger students craft “math tool boxes” while fifth-graders work on chemical engineering projects like making bouncy balls out of water and polymer. For teacher Tawanda Johnson, “it is supremely important that her students understand not just the lesson of the day, but also how the hands-on activities could relate to future careers,” and “she works to make sure” students understand what professions utilizing that day’s lessons entail.

Middle School Students Paint Periodic Table Of Elements On Teacher’s Car.
The Miami Herald (11/10, Pagliery) reported that Rohr Middle School science teacher Daniel Dreyfuss last week gave his students acrylic latex paint for them to “paint blue, green, yellow, orange and red squares all over his 1999 Plymouth Voyager.” The purpose of the exercise was to help them remember the periodic table of elements. The Miami Herald adds that “of the 117 elements that currently make up the periodic table,” Dreyfuss’ class “managed to squeeze in 75.”

On the Job
Killeen Schools Foster Atmosphere of Normalcy After Ft Hood Shootings.
The Dallas Morning News (11/10, Meyers) reported that “the shock and uncertainty caused by last week’s bloodshed” in Fort Hood, TX, “is giving way to a semblance of routine in Killeen classrooms.” Killeen Independent School District (KISD) “officials here are hoping to hasten the return to normalcy by sticking to regular lessons while encouraging students to seek support if they need it,” the Dallas Morning News added. The district’s guidance and counseling coordinator, Bob Criswell, said that “the district is emphasizing counselor services without peddling them. Teachers are told to monitor students’ attendance and outbursts but to discuss the shooting only if the subject arises.” KISD has readied “a 42-member crisis team” to help students cope, if needed. Meanwhile, “individual schools and teachers are responding differently. One teacher on the base wrote a letter to all her students’ parents. Another teacher pasted newspaper clippings from the Killeen Daily Herald onto a hallway bulletin board. They discussed community support.”

Opinion: Students Benefit When Teachers Shown Respect.
The Charleston (SC) Post Courier (11/10) editorialized that “when teachers have low morale, an entire school district feels the pain,” because “unhappy teachers with low energy can mean that scores drop.” According to “a new survey by the Charleston Teacher Alliance…60 percent of Charleston County teachers don’t feel valued by the district.” The majority of those surveyed also said that “district leaders aren’t responsive to them, haven’t treated them fairly regarding their pay, and waste money.” Superintendent Nancy McGinley “responded to the survey by reiterating that teachers are the most important people in the district and by vowing not to take the survey lightly.” McGinley plans “to make a video to outline for teachers her decisions and her reasons for making them.” The Post Courier concludes that “when teachers are shown that respect, students likely will benefit and teachers will be better able to soldier on in difficult times.”

Law & Policy
Report Recommends Multi-Tiered Teacher Licensing System For States.
Education Week (11/11, Maxwell) reports that a study by “a high-powered education task force called last week for states and school districts to overhaul how they recruit, prepare, evaluate, and compensate teachers.” The Consortium for Policy Research in Education released a “series of 20 policy recommendations for state and district policymakers” in its report Strategic Management of Human Capital. The recommendations are “aimed primarily at improving the teaching corps in the nation’s 100 largest school districts, although some recommendations are geared toward improving the effectiveness of principals.” The task force “recommends that states adopt a multi-tiered licensing system; require evidence of effectiveness before granting tenure; and use performance-based evaluation systems to drive professional development and help reset teachers’ salary schedules.” Its “final recommendation to states is to create performance-based evaluation and pay systems for principals.”

Colorado Seen As Mounting One Of The Most “Energetic” Race To The Top Campaigns.
The New York Times (11/11, A18, Dillon) reports that “Colorado’s lieutenant governor, Barbara O’Brien (D), has been parsing every public statement by Education Secretary Arne Duncan for nuances that could help her position the state as a winner in the $4 billion” Race To The Top competition for. And, according to Gene Wilhoit, executive director of the Council of Chief State School Officers, “officials in dozens of other states have been doing the same.” Wilhoit said, “Whenever we have a conversation about any issue these days, Race to the Top is the gorilla in the room.” Some experts compare the excitement over Washington’s largest ever school grant initiative to “watching dozens of states bid for the Olympics.” According to the Times, “Colorado has mounted one of the most energetic campaigns. Gov. Bill Ritter Jr., a Democrat, has directed $7 million in federal stimulus money to programs he hopes will improve Colorado’s chances.” And, according to Ms. O’Brien, “Colorado’s effort…has consumed 5,000 hours of staff and volunteer time.”

Hawaii’s Lt. Governor Suggests Teacher Pay Cuts In Lieu Of Furlough Fridays.
The AP (11/11, Sample) reports that in letters sent to on Monday, Hawaii Lt. Gov. James ‘Duke’ Aiona (R) asked “representatives of the parties involved in Hawaii’s controversial teacher furlough program to meet with him immediately to work out a settlement.” Aioa wants “to state Schools Superintendent Patricia Hamamoto, Board of Education chairman Garrett Toguchi and Hawaii State Teachers Association President Wil Okabe” to consider “amendments to a new teacher contract that would allow pay cuts or a shifting of some furlough days to existing non-instructional days.”

Also in the News
Middle School Students In Chicago Are Arrested After Food Fight.
The New York Times (11/11, A18, Saulny) reports that last Thursday at the Calumet middle-school campus of Perspectives Charter Schools in Chicago’s South Side, 25 students, “ages 11 to 15,” were “rounded up, arrested, taken from school and put in jail” for engaging in a food fight in the school cafeteria. “A spokesman for the Chicago police said the charges were reckless conduct, a misdemeanor.” Experts said that “if the charges are not thrown out when the students go before a judge this month, criminal justice experts said, the accused will most likely be sentenced to community service or probation.” Parents are now “questioning what seem to them like the criminalization of age-old adolescent pranks, and the lasting legal and psychological impact of the arrests.” On Tuesday, “school officials met with parents…to explain the events from their point of view.”

NEA in the News
NEA Suggests NAEP Test Items Be Written In “Plain English” For Students With Disabilities.
Education Week (11/11, Zehr) reports, “Representatives of education organizations who appeared at a Nov. 9 public hearing” in DC “agreed with the governing board for the National Assessment of Educational Progress that the ‘nation’s report card” should be as inclusive as possible of English-language learners and students with disabilities.” However, they disagreed with all of the board’s proposals for how to do that.” One of the most contentious issues discussed “at the hearing was the board’s proposal that students with disabilities be permitted to receive only accommodations approved by NAGB and not all of those that may appear in their individual education programs, or IEPs.” NEA representatives said that “it would be frustrating for students with disabilities not to be able to use on NAEP the accommodations that they are normally permitted to use on state tests.” Patricia K. Ralabate, ‘a senior policy analyst for the NEA,” suggested that “the board should consider creating test items based on universal-design principles, such as using very straightforward language,” also called “Plain English.”

Educators In Springfield, Missouri, Choose Single-Union Representation.
The Springfield (MO) News Leader (11/11, Livengood) reports that “a majority of Springfield educators who voted Tuesday want a single labor union to represent them at the bargaining table.” The 574-404 vote “was seen as a major victory for the Springfield National Education Association (SNEA), which has been fighting for the right to be the sole labor union.” SNEA president Ray Smith called the outcome “a step in the right direction.” Currently, both the SNEA and the Missouri State Teachers Association “represent teachers, although their bargaining power is limited.” The News Leader adds that “second election will likely be held early next year in which teachers will officially choose between SNEA and MSTA for exclusive representation. The 574 votes were for exclusive or single union representation,” while “the 404 votes were cast for” representation by both unions.

Report Grades States On Educational Innovation.
Education Week (11/9, McNeil) reported that a “report card issued Monday on state-level innovation in education found what a trio of ideologically varied groups sees as deeply disturbing results, with most states earning C’s, D’s, or even F’s in such key areas as technology, high school quality, and removal of ineffective teachers.” The report, titled “Leaders and Laggards,” uses “state data and existing and original research to assign letter grades to states, based on seven indicators of innovation.” It was sponsored by the Chamber of Commerce, the American Enterprise Institute, and the Center for American Progress. Although Center for American Progress President/CEO John Podesta called the results “deeply disturbing,” there were some hopeful findings. For instance, “Massachusetts, Colorado, and Rhode Island got gold stars for their policies to promote extended learning time in schools, while” Hawaii was recognized “as the only state with a school-based funding policy.”

The Washington Post (11/10, Anderson) reports that the report card “contends that principals in Maryland and the District of Columbia face too many barriers to ousting bad teachers.” Barriers cited by principals in Maryland and DC included “personnel policies, paperwork and teachers unions.” Maryland state education spokesman William Reinhard points out that “teacher termination is primarily a function of locally negotiated contracts. He also noted that Maryland, like the District and Virginia, received a B for hiring and evaluation policies.”

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In the Classroom
Agricultural Science Thriving In City, Suburban Schools.
The Dallas Morning News (11/9, Peterson) reports, “Agricultural science education is thriving in unexpected places: the state’s urban and suburban school districts.” Gerald Young, executive director of the Vocational Agriculture Teachers Association of Texas said, “Our program is probably going stronger in the urban areas than it is in the rural areas,” explaining that “much of that trend marks a population shift from rural areas.” Yet “agricultural education has also broadened to encompass a wide range of city-based careers from veterinary science to biomedical research,” and officials say they are working to change students’ perceptions about the industry. Many of the classes feature applied learning, such as labs, which “is invaluable to students, and that’s why certification and licensure programs are being emphasized like never before, said Ron Whitson, director of agriculture, food and natural resources for the Texas Education Agency.”

Federal Grant Will Fund Arabic Program In Chicago Schools.
The Chicago Sun-Times (11/9, Spielman) reported that that the Chicago public schools system “will expand its Arabic-language program to three more high schools, thanks to a three-year, $888,000 federal grant announced this morning. Mayor Daley accepted the grant at Durkin Park Elementary School…as he rejected suggestions that the Fort Hood, Texas, massacre could lead to an outbreak of anti-Muslim sentiment.” The “new federal grant, on top of $1.6 million in state and federal funds the schools already have gotten, will fund the expansion to three additional high schools that have yet to be identified.”

Elementary IB School In Texas Publishes Student-Written Book.
Texas’s News-Journal (11/9, Lane) reports, “Dozens of elementary school students became authors Monday as J.L. Everhart Magnet Academy of Cultural Studies released its first book written by kids, for kids.” Publication of the book, titled Who Cares? I Do!, “also made Longview the first school in the state’s International Baccalaureate program to publish an elementary-aged student-written book, according to Karen Phillips, executive director of Texas IB schools.” Students began writing the book a year ago.

New York City Students Get Elevator Safety Lesson.
The New York Times (11/10, A26, Fernandez) reports that following a presentation on elevator safety by New York City officials, students at Public School 19 in New York City “were given handouts to take home, reminding them to ring the alarm and wait for help if they get trapped in an elevator.” Elevators “are the real mass transit of New York City: There are 60,000 of them in residential and commercial buildings, giving millions of New Yorkers millions of rides each day at home and at work, and while the majority of these rides end uneventfully, a few occasionally end tragically.”

On the Job
Fitness Competition Motivates Compton, California Teachers To Focus On Health.
The Los Angeles Times (11/10, Kennedy) reports that “more than 300 staff members from the Compton Unified School District” are “competing to lose weight. Nearly $9,000 in cash prizes — provided by the district’s insurance broker — is at stake.” Sixty-one five-member teams throughout the district “have been attending weekly weigh-ins where they are given recipe cards and diet tips from the district’s nutritionist” since the competition began in October. For exercise, “most of them walk and do cardio at nearby El Camino College Compton Center.” The team that wins the competition, ending in early December, receives $4,000. The Times notes that “the competition is a local version of the 50 Million Pound Challenge, a nationwide initiative started by Dr. Ian Smith, known for his appearances on ‘Celebrity Fit Club.’”

Opinion: Georgia Public Schools Need Same Strong Support As Charters.
Maureen Downey wrote in a “Get Schooled” blog for the Atlanta Journal-Constitution (11/9) that as she watched “at least 1,500 students, parents and politicians celebrate charter schools and demand more of them” at the Georgia Capitol on Friday,” her response to lawmakers at the rally was what are they “doing to improve the education of the 1.6 million Georgia children who are not in charter schools? Why aren’t we talking about improving teacher quality, expanding early childhood education and enhancing math and science performance for students, whether they attend charters or traditional schools?” Ultimately, top charter schools “succeed for the same reasons that top traditional public schools do: Visionary principals, committed and competent teachers, adequate funding, relevant curriculum and involved parents.”

Law & Policy
Louisiana Schools Turning To Career Diploma To Cut Dropout Rate.
The AP (11/10, Simpson) reports on the response among Louisiana’s public schools “to a 2009 law passed by the Legislature that encourages teaching skills that students will need in the work force.” Under the new law, the state will offer a “career diploma” that can be awarded “to students who opt for lower academic standards in math and English, while taking classes such as welding, woodworking and small engine repair.” The law, and the diploma, are part of “an effort to reduce the dropout rate” in Louisiana, where nearly a third of students “drop out or otherwise don’t graduate.” While “the new curriculum hasn’t been fully formed,” educators “expect skills classes will be popular with parents and students who aren’t academically inclined and expect to attend community or technical college after high school.” Critics, however, say the new curriculum and diploma are “it’s just a way to lower academic standards.”

Next Round Of Education Stimulus Will Come With Reform Mandate.
The AP (11/10, Quaid) reports that the Obama administration “is ready to hand out more stimulus dollars for schools, but this time, strings are attached.” Secretary of Education Arne Duncan “said another $11.5 billion is available to states, which have already received more than $67 billion.” Duncan “said the administration wanted to distribute most of the money quickly to bolster state budgets that have been ravaged by the recession. Now Duncan is making it tougher to get the rest of the dollars because the administration wants states to adopt” President Obama’s reform agenda. States “will have to fill out a far more detailed application that demands information on Obama’s broad goals – tougher academic standards, better ways to recruit and keep effective teachers, a method of tracking student performance and a plan of action to turn around failing schools.”

Federal Judge Turns Down Motion For Injunction Against Hawaii’s Furlough Fridays.
The Honolulu Star-Bulletin (11/10, Essoyan) reports, “A federal judge turned down a request” on Monday “to reopen schools on Furlough Fridays, saying that although some students may be suffering ‘irreparable harm,’ he thought that the plaintiffs were not likely to succeed in their lawsuits.” The “three cases were filed against the state in US District Court in Honolulu on behalf of public school children.” But even though Judge Wallace Tashima, “of the 9th US Circuit Court of Appeals, declined the motion for a preliminary injunction against the recently enacted plan,” that will not stop the plaintiff’s case from continuing. “Tashima urged the parties to continue to working with special master Judge David Ezra in trying to settle the case. Otherwise it will go to trial.”

Lawmaker Calls For Safeguards To Protect Schoolchildren From E Coli. Outbreak.
The AP (11/9) reported that House Education and Labor Committee Chairman Rep. George Miller (D) “is worried about a recent outbreak that killed at least two people and sickened about two dozen others in 11 states. The E. coli outbreak was linked to ground beef produced by Fairbank Farms of Ashville, N.Y.” Though no schools “were involved in the outbreak,” Miller “said he’s worried that tainted food might be purchased for school meal programs. Miller asked the Government Accountability Office, the investigative arm of Congress, to see whether there are adequate protections for school meals at the local, state and federal level.”

Safety & Security
Safety Expert Calls For Education About Consequences Of School Bomb Threats.
The New Haven (CT) Register (11/10, Smith) reports, “Thankfully, school bomb threats usually turn out to be hoaxes, but the mere possibility of deadly consequences force school administrators and police to treat each and every threat like the real thing.” Recently, West Haven High School in Connecticut “had two bomb threats in one week, and parents became upset when evacuated students were made to sit outside in the cold for several hours in response to the first threat.” A third bomb threat was received later. According to the New Haven Register, “administrators worry that the commonality of bomb threats might mislead students into underestimating the severity of punishment for the prank.” This concern is why “retired fire chief and former city emergency management director James T. Burns Jr. is calling for more education about the repercussions of making a bomb threat.” Burns stressed, “A class D felony doesn’t go away after 30 days. It stays with you.”

School Finance
Pinellas County, Florida, School District Decreases Administrative Spending By 40 Percent.
The St. Petersburg Times (11/10, Matus) reports that although “the Pinellas school district is no longer No. 1 when it comes to spending the most on administration,” it still, “despite a major effort to cut and reclassify costs…spends more per pupil on general administration than just about every other large district in Florida, according to a St. Petersburg Times analysis.” The district “ranked No. 2 or No. 3 among the 12 biggest districts” for expenditures during the 2008-09 school year, “depending on how broadly general administration costs are defined.” For its analysis, the St. Petersburg Times “focused most on general administration costs in the general fund, the primary pot of money for day-to-day operations.” Pinellas started “scrutinizing its administrative expenses last January, after an earlier Times analysis noted how top heavy Pinellas was compared to peer districts. By the end of the fiscal year in June, it had reduced spending in the main general administration category from $6.58 million to $3.94 million — a whopping 40 percent.”

Stimulus Helps Save Thousands Of Oregon Teaching Jobs.
The AP (11/9) reported that the “biggest share of spending from the federal economic stimulus package has gone to pay teachers, in Oregon and elsewhere.” Yet while “stabilization fund” stimulus spending “has kept a couple thousand Oregon teachers in the public elementary and secondary classrooms, it hasn’t brought stability to the school districts and probably couldn’t.” The “hit Oregon state government took in revenue during the Great Recession was, proportionally, one of the largest in the country, and the largest single part of the state government’s budget is school aid.”

Also in the News
PBS Teacherline Wins Grant To Develop Climate Change Curriculum.
T.H.E. Journal (11/10, Aronowitz) reports that “PBS Teacherline, the online preK-12 professional development resource of the Public Broadcasting Service, has announced it has received a NASA Global Climate Change Education (GCCE) Grant to provide professional development courses and teaching resources to encourage the teaching of climate change topics in conjunction with science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) education.” The grant, worth $600,000, “is aimed at ensuring that teachers are adequately trained to educate students to the point at which they’ll understand the issues and dangers, ask the necessary questions, set realistic priorities, and possibly become either politically or occupationally active in dealing with the ongoing problem.”

Texas Districts Considering More Comprehensive Sex Education.
The Dallas Morning News (11/9, Meyers) reports that North Texas school “districts are rethinking what they can and should be teaching” in sex education classes “because of cuts in federal funding, a new state law that requires more parental involvement in sex-education decisions, and increasing reports about Texas’ high teenage pregnancy rate.” One idea is “‘abstinence-plus,’ a curriculum that warns of the perils of early sexual activity while also discussing more comprehensive methods of prevention.” A similar curriculum is Big Decisions, which “discusses birth control options.” The Dallas Morning News notes that “Texas is regularly singled out for its clashing statistics. More government money is spent on abstinence education here than any other state, but Texas leads the country in the percentage of teen mothers who’ve given birth more than once.” And, “it has the country’s third-highest teen birth rate.”

Report: Effectiveness Of Abstinence Teaching Unclear. The Washington Post (11/7, Stein) reported that sex-education programs “that encourage teens to delay sexual activity and teach them about contraception cut risky sexual behavior, increase condom use and lower the chances of getting the AIDS virus and other infections, a panel of independent experts concluded in a report released Friday.” However, there “is insufficient evidence to know whether programs that focus on encouraging teens to remain sexually abstinent until marriage are effective, the panel concluded.” The “conclusions came after the Task Force on Community Preventive Services, an independent 15-member panel that issues public-health recommendations, reviewed an analysis of 83 studies of sexual-education programs conducted between 1980 and 2007.”

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In the Classroom
Educators At Florida School Aim To Improve Math Scores By Increasing Classroom Interactivity.
The St. Petersburg Times (11/8, Solocheck) reported that at Bayonet Point Middle School in Bayonet Point, Florida, “math results on the latest” state “exam dropped dramatically from a year earlier, costing Bayonet Point Middle its A rating.” After that, school administrators and teachers “set a goal of improving the number of students achieving proficiency on the FCAT by 10 percent, and they were to do it through something other than the well-worn drill and kill.” To do this, educators aimed to “improve student interactivity in the classroom. … They got students to become peer tutors for classmates who are further behind” and “they added computer labs in some classrooms to give children more time for individualized skill building.” The St. Petersburg Times notes that “most of the activities have the kids racing to complete math problems in order to finish a puzzle. There are matching games, memory games and games that force students to work out word problems.”

Some School Leaders Say Inquiry-Based Science Curriculum Does Not Improve Test Scores.
The South Bend (IN) Tribune (11/9, Lowe) reports that “third-graders at Beiger Elementary School [have been] studying under an inquiry-based or project-based science curriculum,” which “means they do experiments themselves.” Many educators say that “students remember things better if they’re actually doing something rather than being talked to.” But even though local school administrators like the “inquiry-based curriculum,” they say that it “doesn’t always produce higher standardized test scores.” Such is the case at South Bend public schools, according to the curriculum facilitator, Jesse Warren, who added that “teachers are feeling pressure to have some sort of textbook work to supplement the inquiry-based curriculum.”

Grant Helping High School Participate In NASA Meteorite Program.
The Florence (AL) Times Daily (11/8, Singleton-Rickman) reported, “In January, earth science students at Muscle Shoals High School will have a new telescope to use for a special NASA-endorsed research project.” The school district is using a Science and Math Improvement Grant from the Toshiba America Foundation for a “major upgrade” to its telescope, allowing it to participate in a NASA program to study lunar meteorite impacts. “The project involves juniors and seniors who’ll be looking for strikes and determining their detriment to astronauts.” Teacher Kathy Eldridge “said the opportunity to conduct research on a NASA project is a wonderful opportunity for her students.”

On the Job
Few Elementary, Middle School Students In New York City Getting H1N1 From School Clinics.
The New York Times (11/9, A20, Konigsberg) reports that seven h1N1 clinics operating out of New York City schools “had the staff and enough vaccine to accommodate about 500 middle- and high-school students per clinic per hour — or as many as 31,500 vaccinations a day,” said “the city’s health commissioner, Dr. Thomas A. Farley.” However, on Saturday, only 1,701 vaccinations were administered, according to a spokesperson for the department. “So on Sunday, the clinics…began offering the vaccine to pregnant women and increased the age limit for others to 24 from high school age. Still, the turnout was low: 1,749.” Meanwhile, about 23 present of the consent forms sent out to elementary students for in-school H1N1 vaccines were returned.

Many Districts Coping With Conflict Between Gender Expression, Dress Codes.
The New York Times (11/8, ST1, Hoffman) reported that in “recent years, a growing number of teenagers have been dressing to articulate – or confound – gender identity and sexual orientation. … Last week, a cross-dressing Houston senior was sent home because his wig violated” his school’s dress code rule. In October, “officials at a high school in Cobb County, Ga., sent home a boy who favored wigs, makeup and skinny jeans. In August, a Mississippi student’s senior portrait was barred from her yearbook because she had posed in a tuxedo.” Yet, other schools “are more accepting of unconventional gender expression. … Dress code conflicts often reflect a generational divide, with students coming of age in a culture that is more accepting of ambiguity and difference than that of the adults who make the rules.”

Law & Policy
Texas Poised To Revamp College Of Education Standards.
The Houston Chronicle (11/7, Mellon) reported that Texas “is among the first states to toughen its standards for colleges of education and other teacher-training programs amid criticism that too many are ‘cash cows’ that produce weak instructors.” According to the Chronicle, “Under a proposed new rating system, the programs would be held accountable for their graduates’ effectiveness on the job especially regarding student achievement. Teacher programs that repeatedly fall short of the standards could lose their state accreditation.” The “changes to Texas’ accrediting system come as U.S. Education Secretary Arne Duncan is reiterating long-standing criticisms of teacher training.”

School Finance
Stimulus Funds Speed Up Renovation Of Baltimore-Area Schools.
The Baltimore Sun (11/7, Bowie) reported that stimulus dollars are allowing school districts in Baltimore City and Baltimore County to speed up construction projects “that have been on hold for years for lack of funding, including the possible construction of the first new city school in a decade.” Though “most of the money – $300 million to be spent statewide over four years – will go toward essentials such as new boilers, chillers, roofs, doors and windows – the city hopes to use some of its dollars to build a new Lexington Terrace school on the west side and an athletic facility on the east side.” Also, dozens “of schools would get new media centers.”

Minnesota Poised To Receive Race To The Top Funds, Experts Say.
The Minneapolis Star Tribune (11/9, Johns) reports that Minnesota educators “think the state has a good chance to receive a chunk of some $4.35 billion” in Race to the Top grants “the Obama administration plans to give to states to promote school innovation.” States “compete against each other for the money, and experts say Minnesota’s history as an education reformer that gets results means the state could win part of the pot of money.” Though ED “has not given any indication of how many states might receive the money, experts predict that anywhere from 10 to 15 might get funding.”

Also in the News

UK Lawmakers Plan Evolution Curriculum For Primary School Students.
The UK’s Guardian (11/9, Curtis) reports, “The government is ready to put evolution on the primary curriculum for the first time after years of lobbying by senior scientists.” According to schools minister, Diana Johnson, “the plans will be included in a blueprint for a new curriculum to be published in the next few weeks.” The Guardian notes that the action “follows a letter signed by scientists and science educators calling on the government to make the change after draft versions of the new curriculum failed to mention evolution explicitly.” In an “open letter sent in July to Ed Balls, the children’s secretary…25 leading figures from science and education” pressed “the government to rewrite the curriculum before it was finalized. Among the signatories were the Oxford University evolutionary biologist Richard Dawkins, three Nobel laureates, and Reverend Professor Michael Reiss, the professor of science education at the Institute of Education in London.”

Pension Checks Of Retired New York City Teachers Canceled.
The New York Times (11/7, A19, Lee) reported that the pension checks “of tens of thousands of retired New York City teachers and school staff members were electronically canceled as of Friday morning, just days after they had been deposited, according to city and union officials.” According to the Times, the officials “laid blame on the Bank of New York Mellon, which oversees electronic transfers for the Teachers Retirement System of the City of New York.” The “checks, totaling $185 million, were part of the monthly pension payments made by New York City through the city comptroller’s office.” Ron Gruendl, a spokesman for the bank said BNY Mellon “is taking a number of actions” to re-deposit the funds and compensate retirees for any overdraft fees resulting from the incident.

NEA in the News
Van Roekel Says Hawaii Politicians Need To Restore School Days.
NEA President Dennis Van Roekel wrote in a letter to the editor of the New York Times (11/7) that “Hawaii’s Children, Left Behind,” a Times editorial published Oct. 31, “castigated the public school teachers in Hawaii for agreeing to statewide furloughs to help balance the state’s budget and implied that furlough days were in some way a desired outcome that Hawaii’s teachers actively sought.” However, according to Van Roekel, “the editorial did not mention the more draconian options Hawaii’s teachers were forced to consider and the personal and professional toll that these furloughs are taking on the state’s educators.” He adds that instead of using federal stimulus dollars to save public school jobs, “Hawaii’s politicians used the state’s stimulus dollars to offset general revenue shortfalls,” which is why they were “singled out by Secretary of Education Arne Duncan.” Van Roekel concludes that Hawaii’s elected officials should “find the right mix of taxes and cuts to restore the schools to a full year of class days.”

Hawaii State Board Member Says State Shortchanges Education. Hawaii State Board of Education member, Kim Coco Iwamoto, also wrote in a letter to the editor of the New York Times (11/7) that “compared with the rest of the country, Hawaii does not tax enough, and with what little revenue it raises, it shortchanges public education.” Furthermore, she says that “almost 10 percent of Hawaii’s public school students are from migrant military families, most of whom do not remit income taxes to Hawaii.” And, “after deducting the nominal Department of Defense Impact Aid Funds, the uncompensated expenses to the Hawaii public school system remains in the hundreds of millions of dollars every year.” Iwamoto concludes that because public school system in one of the most expensive states in America” is inadequately financed, “it’s no accident when Hawaii’s children get left behind.”

Louisiana To Replace High School Exit Exam With End-Of-Course Tests.
Louisiana’s Advocate (11/6, A1, Sentell) reports on its front page that Louisiana “is about to replace its high school exit exam, which came under scrutiny today in a national report.” Current rules require that “high school student…pass the Graduation Exit Exam and meet other course requirements to earn a high school diploma.” The exit exam includes “tests on math, English,” science, and social studies. “But that system, which won praise for narrowing the achievement gap, is about to be scrapped in favor of end-of-course tests.” The Advocate notes that “about one in three ninth-graders failed the Algebra I end-of-course test in a trial run in May and December. One in four 10th-graders missed the mark on English 2.” Nevertheless, “state educators say they are confident the results will improve when students have to pass those and other tests to get a high school diploma.”

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In the Classroom
School Districts Nationwide Increasingly Going Paperless With Report Cards.
USA Today (11/6, Carey, Wallace) reports that “a growing number of districts nationwide are” going paperless with report cards, opting instead to deliver them to families online. “Districts in Louisiana, Colorado, South Carolina and Texas are among those that have gone paperless since 2008.” And, according to Ann Flynn, director of education technology with the National School Boards Association, districts “making the change ‘are no longer the exception. They are becoming the rule.’”

Dallas School Officials Propose Repealing Minimum Grade Rule.
The Dallas Morning News (11/6, Rado) reports that “In the latest flap over grades, Dallas school officials are proposing that teachers no longer be required to give students a grade of at least 50 on report cards.” However, the proposal would still allow teachers to “use their discretion to give higher grades than students actually earned.” But at a meeting on Thursday, “some school board members questioned whether it could violate a new state law on grades and create uneven grading practices across the district.” The Dallas Morning News notes that “no decisions on the proposal were made Thursday,” but “a vote could happen as early as the Nov. 19 board meeting.”

New Hampshire District To Fund Curriculum Development, Special Ed With Donation.
Seacoastonline (NH) (11/6, Feals) reports that the East Kingston (NH) Elementary School Board “has allocated $115,000 of a $300,000 donation earmarked to the town for education purposes. The money will be put towards curriculum development, special education and recreation initiatives.” Board members “decided to appropriate $80,000 from the donation over the next three years to further develop the school’s science curriculum. Principal Jim Eaves will organize a committee of science faculty and others to examine how to do so within the cost guidelines and report back to the board.” Also, $25,000 of the donation “will be placed into a special education trust fund to be used after the school’s budgeted special education funds are exhausted.”

NASA, PBS Helping Teachers With Climate Change Lessons.
School Library Journal (11/6) reports, “If you’re looking for a way to teach a lesson on climate change that includes science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) concepts, you’re in luck. PBS TeacherLine has partnered with the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) to create a series of professional development courses and teaching resources on the subject.” PBS TeacherLine will be using a $600,000 NASA Global Climate Change Education to “help pre-K-12 educators engage students in critical lessons on climate change, while also incorporating crucial STEM concepts.” The money will be used to develop courses for teachers and produce a series of “online self-paced lessons” using PBS and NASA resources. “The online professional development courses and resources will be available by the summer of 2012.”

On the Job
Alabama Education Officials Say Stimulus Saved More Jobs Than Shown In White House Report.
Alabama’s Press-Register (11/5, Philips) reported, “Though White House officials are boasting that the stimulus package has created or saved 325,000 education jobs nationwide, that only amounts to 841 in Alabama, according to a newly released report.” However, Alabama Department of Education spokesman, Michael Sibley, “said the state’s tally on the federal report is lower because officials have not finished the calculations,” adding that “the final number should ‘show significant increases.’” According to Paul Hubbert, executive secretary of the Alabama Education Association, the final number will be “at least 4,000 jobs, about 2,500 of which are teaching positions.”

Hawaii Seen As Needing To “Rebound” From Furlough Friday Criticism.
The Honolulu Star-Bulletin (11/5) editorializes, “Embattled by Furlough Friday furor, a jab by the federal education secretary and national humiliation, Hawaii’s school system must find a way to rebound. More important, it should devise a method of keeping up with other schools across the country in the years ahead despite circumstances that will remain uniquely difficult.” Recently U.S. Education Secretary Arne Duncan “said that instructional time in public schools should increase, and he scolded Hawaii for its ‘step in the wrong direction.’” According to the Star-Bulletin, “the right direction is demonstrated by the Boston-based National Center on Time & Learning, which has engaged in a pilot program that resulted in an addition of 300 hours to the curricula of 26 schools in Massachusetts.”

Law & Policy
Michigan Governor Says She Supports Measure To Use Stimulus Funds For Education.
The Detroit Free Press (11/6, Higgins) reports that Michigan Gov. Jennifer Granholm (D) “said she’ll support a measure passed by the [state] House today that would use remaining stimulus money to avoid deep cuts to school districts. But she said it’s only a temporary solution.” Signing the bill, she said, would help “avoid the nearly $300 per students school districts would absorb this school year.” At a “private meeting she held with Macomb parents and educators” on Thursday, however, Granholm likened the bill to “kicking the can down the road. … We will be back at it again in a couple more months,” she said. After the meeting, “she called on the Legislature to come up with a solution in the week that remains for them to act.”

ACLU Files Lawsuit Against Florida Over Palm Beach County Graduation Rates.
The AP (11/6, A17) reports that “the American Civil Liberties Union filed a lawsuit on Thursday accusing state officials in Florida of failing to ensure that students in Palm Beach County receive a high quality education, as evidenced by their poor graduation rates.” The lawsuit “filed in West Palm Beach names Gov. Charlie Crist, the Board of Education, and several political leaders,” saying that “they are violating a requirement in the Florida Constitution to provide a ‘uniform, efficient, safe, secure and high quality’ education.” Specifically, “The suit contends that one-third to one-half of the county’s students do not graduate on time with a regular diploma, well below state and national averages, and that graduation rates varied from 56 percent to 71 percent in 2006, depending on the method used to calculate them.”

Special Needs

Texas Report: Physical Restraint Used More Than 18,000 Times Last School Year.
The Texas Tribune (11/6, Ramshaw) reports that Texas educators “forcibly pinned down students with disabilities more than 18,000 times in the last school year, sometimes injuring them in the process.” A Texas Tribune “review of state data shows public school educators used so-called ‘physical restraints’ – a tool to control or discipline students with disabilities – roughly 100 times a day during the 2007-08 school year.” According to the Tribune, “Educators say restraints are sometimes the only way to prevent disasters. … But disability rights advocates say the numbers point to a crisis in Texas special education,” as teachers “are resorting to physical restraints because they aren’t properly trained to manage their students’ disabilities – posing a threat to vulnerable children and to themselves.”

Safety & Security
Report Says Safe Schools/Healthy Students Program Helps Improve School Safety.
Health Day (11/6) reports that “a program called Safe Schools/Healthy Students greatly increases the safety of students, says a U.S. government report.” School districts participating in the Safe Schools/Healthy Students program, according to the report, “had a 15 percent decrease in the number of students involved in violent incidents, from 17,800 to 15,163. … The number of students who reported experiencing or witnessing violence fell 12 percent.” Also, “among school staff, 84 percent said the program improved school safety, 77 percent said it reduced violence on campus, and 75 percent said it reduced violence in the community.” Health Day notes that the Safe Schools/Healthy Students program is “a comprehensive, community-wide plan that” offers mental health services, aims to improve “the safety of school environments and providing violence prevention activities,” implements “alcohol-, tobacco- and drug-prevention activities,” focuses “on student behavioral, social, and emotional supports,” and offers “more access to early childhood social and emotional learning programs.”

School Finance
Officials In Maryland County Threaten To Sue State Over School Funding Ruling.
The Washington Post (11/6, Hernandez) reports that “top Montgomery County officials threatened Thursday to sue the state and ‘aggressively pursue’ legislation that would change state law after Maryland’s attorney general found that the county had failed to meet the state’s minimum level of funding for education,” and opinion that renders the district “potentially liable for millions of dollars in penalties.” In a joint statement County Executive Isaiah Leggett (D) and County Council President Phil Andrews (D) said that the attorney general’s opinion “‘second-guesses’ the efforts of county and school officials to balance their budgets during economically troubled times.”

Colorado Vigorously Plotting Strategy For Race To The Top Competition.
Education Week (11/6, Klein) reports, “If the competition for a slice of $4 billion in federal Race to the Top Fund money were a school class, Colorado would be one of the kids sitting up front, furiously taking notes, and leaping up to answer every one of the teacher’s questions.” The state “began plotting their strategy for receiving one of the coveted grants nearly as soon as the Race to the Top program was created in February.” Since then, “officials have been crisscrossing the state, letting district officials know how they will benefit if Colorado gets a grant.” Education Week points out that “the vigorous outreach campaign is partly to gain an advantage” in the competition, which will judge states, “in part, on the extent to which they have buy-in from various stakeholders for their proposals.” As such, “the meetings have also provided a forum for considerable state collaboration with” the Colorado Education Association,” which “is sending representatives to each of the working groups to make sure the union’s voice is heard.”

Los Angeles Public School Enrollment Decline Exacerbates Budget Crisis.
The Los Angeles Times (11/5, Blume) reported that “an apparent exodus of students to charter schools, combined with an overall enrollment decline, is disrupting Los Angeles-area schools and exacerbating an ongoing budget crisis.” This fall, “local independently run charter schools added more than 9,500 students…a surge of almost 19 percent to more than 60,000.” Meanwhile, the Los Angeles Unified School District has lost “more than 19,000 students, about 3 percent” of its previous enrollment. Because public school funding is “based on student attendance … schools simply cannot afford to employ more teachers than their student enrollment will pay for. The result is that many schools had to release teachers and distribute students into other classes a month or more into the school year.”

North Las Vegas Utilities Department Donates Sports Equipment To Elementary School.
The Las Vegas Sun (11/6, Gibson) reports that “the North Las Vegas Utilities Department refused to let money woes cripple Cahlan-Edison Elementary School’s physical education classes.” The department has, over the past two weeks, collected donations for “new sports equipment and two large bins” to give to Cahlan-Edison, an Edison Learning Institute school in North Las Vegas. “Amanda Dillard of the Utilities Department said employees set a goal to raise $1,000 worth of equipment but have exceeded that amount,” raising about $1,500.

Also in the News
Comedian Encourages Hispanic Students To Stay In School, Attend College.
The Washington Post (11/6, Chandler) reports that Los Angeles comedian Ernie G “is the spokesman for the Washington-based Hispanic College Fund.” He “is moving from the nightclub circuit to the high school circuit so he can encourage the country’s fastest-growing group of high school students to stay in school and go to college.” U.S. Education Department statistics show that “one in five Hispanic teens drops out of high school,” nearly “twice the rate for black students and more than three times the rate among white students.” Furthermore, “only 12 percent of Hispanics ages 25 to 29 have a bachelor’s degree or higher.” The Post adds that “as the compositions of the nation’s high schools change, educators have sought out Ernie G” because “he makes kids laugh while they hear an important message.”

NEA in the News
Union Representatives Say Teacher Improvement Report Disrespects Profession.
Education Week (11/5, Maxwell) reported that a member of NEA, along with 3 other teachers union representatives, was part of “the 30-member task force that helped shape a series of 20 policy recommendations to improve the teaching corps in the nation’s 100 largest school districts” that was included in a report released Tuesday by Strategic Management of Human Capital. Although “some recommendations are aimed at improving the effectiveness of principals…teachers are the overwhelming focus of the report.” According to Minnesota Gov. Tim Pawlenty, “who chaired the task force over the course of the past year…the panel had a ‘consensus on much of what’s in the report,’” but he “explained that there had been no formal vote of its members to endorse the report because of some disagreements.” But some teachers union representative are saying that the task force had too few members speaking on the behalf of teachers and that the report is “disrespectful of the [teaching] profession.”

African-American Male Teachers Seen As Key To Reducing Achievement Gaps, Dropout Rates. In a separate story, the AP (10/10, Matheson) reported, “Only about two percent of teachers nationwide are African-American men. But experts say that needs to change if educators expect to reduce minority achievement gaps and dropout rates.” Data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics show that the majority of “American teachers are…white (87 percent) and female (77 percent), despite minority student populations of about 44 percent.” But Greg Johnson, a policy analyst for the National Education Association, said that having “minority teachers is important because of ‘the role model factor.’ … ‘These students need to see successful adults of color in front of them,’” Johnson added. To that end, Cheyney University sophomores Lenny Macklin and Gregory Georges founded the Call Me MISTER (Mentors Instructing Students Toward Effective Role Models) teaching program, which “offers scholarships in exchange for teaching in public schools.

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In the Classroom
Teachers Aiming To Present “Balanced View” In Lessons On Christopher Columbus.
The AP (10/12, Armario) reports that Christopher Columbus’ “stature in U.S. classrooms has declined somewhat through the years,” as “many teachers [try] to present a more balanced perspective of what happened after Columbus reached the Caribbean and the suffering of indigenous populations.” According to James Kracht of the A&M College of Education and Human Development, the term “discovery” is not being used much any more to describe Columbus’ voyage to America. And “in Texas, students start learning in the fifth grade about the Columbian Exchange — which consisted not only of gold, crops and goods shipped back and forth across the Atlantic Ocean, but diseases carried by settlers that decimated native populations.”

The Providence Journal (10/12, Borg) reports that “from elementary schools to college campuses, a new narrative is being written about the once-storied first contact between [Christopher] Columbus and the indigenous people of the West Indies.” Now, Columbus is not often “portrayed as an intrepid adventurer whose accidental arrival in the Bahamas ushered in wave after wave of civilizing European influence in North and South America.” Instead, students today “are taught that Columbus didn’t discover America, the Vikings did; that Columbus didn’t demonstrate that the Earth was round, that it was widely known during the late 15th century.” However, “some historians…say that the public schools haven’t gone far enough in providing a full picture of the devastation wreaked by the European explorers on the Americas.”

Teacher Turns Science Lab Into Whodunit Caper.
Texas’ Star-Telegram (10/9, Jinkins) reported that “third-, fourth- and fifth-graders” at Vandagriff Elementary School in Aledo, Texas, “have been busy since August, studying clues in their own whodunit caper that was masterminded by science lab teacher Charlotte Schweitzer.” The classroom lesson began “with an assembly where a ‘crime scene’ was staged.” Afterward, students “experimented on some white powder found at the scene — it turned out to be flour — and a dirty footprint. It was matched to soil samples around the Aledo area, in vicinities where suspect teachers lived.” On Friday, the lesson “ended…with the shocking revelation of the culprit’s identity.”

Students Learn From Working Scientists During Trip To Johns Hopkins University.
The Washington Post (10/10, Hernandez) reported, “Montgomery County [MD] has hit on the formula for getting young people interested in science: Unleash 190 seventh-graders in a building full of robots, prosthetic limbs, microscopes, remote-controlled surgical arms and bacteria-filled flasks, and watch what happens.” Last week, students from Shady Grove Middle School went “on a field trip to the Shady Grove Life Sciences Center. During the “field trip, dubbed Frontiers in Science and Medicine Day, the students walked into the Montgomery County campus of Johns Hopkins University and were handed a white lab coat and a pair of latex gloves, then set loose to check out exhibits by working scientists. When they got through a lab, they were awarded a sticker for their troubles.”

On the Job
Elementary School In DC Uses Staff Development Technique From Japan.
The Washington Post (10/9, Brown) reports that Marie Reed Elementary in DC is employing “a model of professional development for teachers that was developed in Japan” called “lesson study.” In lesson study, “teachers work together on a ‘research lesson,’” for which they “identify an objective, come up with a way to teach it and then script students’ anticipated misunderstandings and the teacher’s response to those misunderstandings.” Then, “one member of the group teaches the lesson in front of observers, who are instructed to record students’ responses and reactions.” But the individual teacher is not evaluated, because “the purpose is to discover how” well the lesson “is received by students.” After “teachers began practicing lesson study,” the math scores for Reed students “on the District’s Comprehensive Assessment System (DC-CAS) standardized test have risen substantially,” the Post notes.

Law & Policy
Debate Grows Over Zero Tolerance Policies In Schools.
The New York Times (10/12, A1, Urbina) reports on its front page that after “the Columbine and Virginia Tech shootings, many school districts around the country adopted zero-tolerance policies on the possession of weapons on school grounds.” But a debate has “been growing” recently “over whether the policies have gone too far.” According to “some school administrators…it is difficult to distinguish innocent pranks and mistakes from more serious threats, and” disciplinary “policies must be strict to protect students.” But critics say “that zero-tolerance policies…have led to sharp increases in suspensions and expulsions, often putting children on the streets or in other places where their behavior only worsens, and that the policies undermine the ability of school officials to use common sense in handling minor infractions.”

Rhode Island Raises Cut Score For Potential Teachers.
The Providence Journal (10/12, Jordan) reports that Rhode Island “Education Commissioner Deborah A. Gist, who has made teacher quality the cornerstone of her three-month-old administration, is raising the score that aspiring teachers must achieve on a basic skills test required for admission to all of the state’s teacher training programs.” The state’s current “‘cut score’ ranks among the lowest in the nation, alongside Mississippi and Guam.” Because Virginia’s cut score is “the highest in reading, math and writing,” Gist raised “Rhode Island’s score one point higher than Virginia’s in each subject, saying she wants to make Rhode Island’s education system the envy of the nation.” In addition, “Gist says she intends to transform ‘the entire career span of a teacher,’ including who is allowed to train to become a teacher, the rigor of the programs, mentoring of new teachers, support and training for veteran teachers, and the reward of higher pay for high performance.”

California Lifts Ban On Tying Student Achievement To Teachers’ Pay.
The AP (10/12, Thompson) reports, “California is removing a legal ban on using the results of student achievement tests to evaluate teachers, under a bill signed into law by Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger (R).” The new legislation “lifts a barrier that prevented California from applying for $4.5 billion under the federal Race to the Top program.”

Pennsylvania Governor Signs Bill Increasing Public School Funding By $300 Million.
The Philadelphia Inquirer (10/10, Cattabiani, Worden) reported, that last week, Pennsylvania Gov. Ed Rendell (D) “signed into law a $27.8 billion state budget 101 days in the making,” thus ending “the nation’s longest state budget impasse.” The new budget “cuts overall spending by more than one percent from last year while increasing public school funding by $300 million. Rendell had set the added education money as his precondition to any budget deal.”

New York City Mayor Says Parents Do Not Need Voice In All School-Related Decisions.
New York’s Downtown Express (10/12, Shapiro) reports that according to New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg (I), “parents do not need a role in decisions like new school sites or school zoning.” They “need only be involved in the micro issues of their child’s education, like the child’s attendance, behavior and grades.” However, when he was “asked about parental involvement in larger decisions, Bloomberg said parents could have influence through the city councilmembers and mayor they elect.”

Facilities
Outdated Billing Information Hinders California District’s Energy-Saving Efforts.
The Orange County (CA) Register (10/12, Emery) reports that “the idea for a friendly competition among students to see who can reduce energy use at their respective schools is the latest in an ambitious” campaign by the Irvine Unified School District to “go green.” District officials, however, say they “still need Southern California Edison’s help to get the up-to-date energy usage info needed to get the effort under way.” The district has “already asked teachers and staffers to cut back on their energy usage at work, last year directing them to remove personal appliances from their offices and classrooms.” Next, it plans to time “district activities to avoid the peak hour expenditures that can quickly run up an electricity bill.” But “the move to smart usage and friendly energy conservation competition is hampered by billing info that is several months old and isn’t specific about each school and district facility.”

Also in the News
Education Expert Debunks Merit Pay “Myths.”
In an opinion piece for the Washington Post (10/12). Thomas Toch, executive director of the Association of Independent Schools of Greater Washington, lists five myths about teacher performance pay. The Toch points out that merit pay does not have “a strong track record,” adding, “over the years, there have been few long-term performance pay experiments in public education.” Regarding the idea that “teachers unions are the biggest barrier to merit pay,” the Post says that performance pay experiments in several states in the early 1980s failed in part because they gave “teachers the possibility of” bonuses that were too small “to mean much to those who got it, but enough to irk those who didn’t.” Moreover, “the number of teachers receiving the rewards shifted with annual appropriations, regardless of how many teachers” earned them.

NEA in the News
One-Time Federal Money Seen As Insufficient For Fixing Nevada Schools.
The Reno (NV) Gazette-Journal (10/11, Damon) reported that “because Nevada law prohibits student achievement data from being used in teacher evaluations, the state can’t enter the Obama administration’s Race to the Top, a $4.3 billion competition for states willing to take sweeping action to turn around failing schools.” And some critics say that “the state…should do everything it can to win the money.” The Gazette-Journal points out that “Nevada consistently ranks near the bottom nationally in education funding and suffers from one of the highest dropout rates.” But Nevada State Education Association President Lynn Warne contends that the federal money will not “help what ails Nevada schools,” adding that she is not “in favor of changing state statute for one-shot, one-time, maybe money.” Meanwhile, Dan Burns, a spokesman for Gov. Jim Gibbons said that changes to the education law “would likely be part of the agenda if a special session must be called for other reasons.”

Successful Schools Seen As Sidestepping Common Education Debates.
Education Trust Senior Writer Karin Chenoweth wrote in an op-ed for Education Week (10/12) that education “tends to get whipsawed between what seem like incompatible alternatives: We can teach phonics or surround children with literature; we can teach skills or content;” the “examples are endless.” Chenoweth added, “For the past five years, I have been examining schools that have, for the most part, sidestepped these battles. … Ultimately, there’s no magic to how these schools achieve success.” In “visiting these schools,” Chenoweth notes he has been “struck by how free they are from the frustrating controversies other schools get mired in” such as the phonics-vs.-whole-language debate.

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In the Classroom
Career School In Indiana To Add Technology-Intensive High School Curriculum.
The Evansville (IN) Courier Press (10/13, Martin) reports that next school year, a “technology-intensive high school curriculum” will be in place at the Evansville Vanderburgh School Corp’s Southern Indiana Career & Technical Center. “Unlike other programs at the center — which are half-day and for juniors and seniors only — the technology curriculum will be all day and will be for students at all high school grade levels.” Students in the program will engage in “project-based learning.”

Gates Foundation To Test Method For Predicting New Teachers’ Success.
The Oregonian (10/12, Hammond) reported, “Leading thinkers and researchers” often disagree about “how a principal or a school district that needs to hire a teacher is supposed to tell if an applicant is a future star or a dud.” Over the next two years, a Gates Foundation study will test a method for predicting which new teachers “will go on to greatness.” Researchers will study “early career teachers in Washington state…over the next two years. Beginning next year, Washington teachers who are in their first few years of teaching will have to compile a portfolio of lesson plans, tests and other work they’ve done,” and “show they’re competent in 12 areas.” Researchers will look at “the reading, math, and writing scores of those teachers’ students for the next two years to see whether a teacher’s getting high marks on certain of those 12 areas correlates with high achievement among his or her students.”

Minnesota Districts Using Computer-Driven Data To Aid In Improving Student Performance.
The Minneapolis Star Tribune (10/13, Patterson) reports, “St. Paul Public Schools set an unprecedented goal this year to boost achievement by 10 percentage points for every demographic group on all-important state tests, following a year in which barely half its students scored proficient in math and fewer than that in reading.” In an effort to reach that goal, “district leaders…have given the schools data on how every student has performed in reading and math over the past year, online tools to diagnose individual weaknesses, suggestions for solutions, and a cache of resources to apply them.” The Star-Tribune points out that “St. Paul is just one of many” Minnesota “districts harnessing computer-driven data to advance student performance. Minneapolis Public Schools and other districts are doing so as well.”

On the Job
Regional Centers To Provide Massachusetts Teachers With Support, Professional Development.
The Republican (10/13, Goonan) reports that Massachusetts Gov. Deval L. Patrick (D) “has announced plans for six regional ‘readiness centers’ across the state…designed to provide increased support and professional development for area teachers under education reform.” According to State Education Secretary S. Paul Reville, “the centers will focus on enhancing the quality of teaching from the early childhood years through higher education.” Although few details have been released about the centers, Timothy T. Collins, president of the Springfield Education Association, said he hopes the program will help teachers. Collins noted, “The problem with education reform is that teachers are the object of the reform rather than the architect of the reform.”

Law & Policy
House Bill Would Increase Tax Deduction For Classroom Supplies.
Tennessee’s Messenger (10/13) reports, “Teachers purchasing classroom supplies — often with their own money — stand to benefit from legislation introduced in Congress of late.” The Teacher Tax Relief Act, “submitted as House Resolution 3758, would increase and make permanent the maximum tax deduction available for teachers purchasing classroom supplies,” and it would “expand the deduction to include expenses associated with qualified professional development pursuits, such as continuing education.”

Missouri Adjusting Swine Flu-Related School Policy.
The St. Louis Post-Dispatch (10/13) reports that “with student absences piling up at some schools during the swine flu outbreak, education leaders are asking districts to rethink policies and procedures that were designed with healthy students in mind.” But even though “the U.S. Department of Education has recommended that school districts develop illness action plans, which include putting materials online…and creating take-home packets for up to 12 weeks of classroom material,” many St. Louis- area districts have made only minor changes to their existing illness action plans. Meanwhile, “policy adjustments tied to the H1N1 virus are popping up” in Missouri at the state level. For instance, “Missouri Education Commissioner Chris Nicastro asked school administrators to suspend any rules that require a doctor’s note for readmission. … The department also sent a memo to districts outlining how to get meals to low-income students in the event of school closures due to a flu outbreak.”

Politics Seen As Factor In New York City School Reform Debate.
Jennifer Medina wrote in a “City Room” blog for the New York Times (10/12) that supporters of mayoral control of New York City schools “like to say that having one person in charge of the schools eliminates the old politics of the Board of Education.” However, “it’s simply been replaced by a different kind of politics, centered on just how well Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg and his schools chancellor, Joel I. Klein, have done in the battle to improve city schools.” Thus, it “was hard to put aside politics Monday at an hour-long presentation Mr. Klein gave to business leaders on the 50th floor of the J.P. Morgan Chase building on Park Avenue.” Klein “went over a dozen graphs charting out what he called tremendous progress of the city’s schools.” The “positive analysis comes less than a month before Election Day as Mr. Bloomberg tries to ride his education credentials to a third term.”

Safety & Security
Six Year-Old Suspended For Carrying Camping Utensil With Knife Attached To School.
Fox News (10/12) reported on its website on six-year-old Zachary Christie, who brought a Cub Scout “camping utensil to school” and was suspended for it, because the knife attached to the utensil “violated his school’s zero-tolerance policy on weapons.” In addition to suspending the student, the Christina School District in Newark, Delaware also “ordered him to attend the district’s reform school for 45 days.” Now, Zachary’s parents “are fighting to overturn the ruling.”

NYT: “Common Sense” Should Guide Delaware’s School Disciplinary Code. The New York Times (10/13, A30) editorializes that school officials “are understandably concerned about preventing violence and safeguarding the children in their care. But over the last 10 years or so, this legitimate concern has too often led to poorly thought out, rigidly implemented policies that stigmatize or even criminalize children rather than protect them.” The Times adds that a task force appointed by the Delaware State Legislature “has been reviewing Delaware’s statewide disciplinary code. … The task force is scheduled to deliver its recommendations in January. ‘Use Common Sense’ should be at the top of the list for the state.”

School Finance

Op-Ed: Private Capital Should Be Leveraged To Improve Public Schools.
Former Virginia Gov. George Allen (R) and former Virginia Democratic Party Chairman Paul Goldman write in a op-ed for the New York Times (10/13) that given President Obama’s call for all US students to have access to world-class educations, “we have come together – one Republican, one Democrat – to develop a common-sense solution to fix the problem of crumbling schools in a manner that doesn’t require the federal government to tax, borrow or spend one dime.” Allen and Goldman add, “Our School Modernization and Revitalization Tax Credit – Smart Credit,” which facilitates selling crumbling schools to private investors and modernizing them and leasing them back to school authorities, is “guaranteed to create hundreds of thousands of private-sector jobs.” Critics “may scream that our approach ‘sells our schools’ to the private sector.” However, “what national interest is served by denying local officials access to private capital to provide schoolchildren the opportunities they deserve?”

Louisiana District Assures Parents Gifted Programs Will Not Lose Funding.
Louisiana’s Advocate (10/13, B1, Sills) reports that “State and local officials assured more than 120 parents Monday that gifted and talented programs are not in danger of losing funding, and the parish school system has no plans to revamp its program.” Parents of gifted students raised concerns about “a state task force considering revisions of the state bulletin for special education… after the Louisiana Association of Special Education Professionals recommended that gifted and talented education be removed from the special education designation.” But Madelyn Maragos, the gifted and talented program supervisor for the Lafayette Parish School System, explained that “the proposed revisions…are routine to keep the state mandates in line with the reauthorization of the federal Individuals with Disabilities in Education Act,” noting that the school system “is not planning on changing anything about gifted education.”

Also in the News
Kindergartner Dropped Off At Wrong Bus Stop, Returned To Parents Unharmed.
The Washington Post (10/13, Strauss) reports that Gavin Salinas, a kindergartner at Mount Vernon Community School in Alexandria, VA, was mistakenly put on a school bus “and dropped off at an unfamiliar stop, where he wandered the streets crying before he was returned to his parents unharmed.” School officials “have apologized for the mistake and said they have overhauled the dismissal system at Mount Vernon Community School,” which Taryn Salinas, Gavin’s mother, “described as ‘chaotic.’” Also, the Salinases “said that while inquiring about their son, they discovered that other mistakes were made the same day. A young girl was put on the wrong bus, but the error was caught in time, they said.”

NYTimes: New York State Should Invest In Efforts To Boost GED Pass Rates.
The New York Times (10/13, A30) editorializes, “Millions of Americans are trapped at the margins of the economy because they lack the basic skills that come with a high-school education. This year, more than 600,000 of these people will try to improve their prospects by studying for the rigorous, seven-hour examination known as” the G.E.D., a credential “that employers and colleges recognize as the equivalent” of a high school diploma. States like Delaware, Kansas and Iowa “have well-managed programs in which 90 percent or more of the test-takers pass.” However, New York State “has the lowest pass rate in the nation, just behind Mississippi.” New York “drives up its failure rate on this costly test and wastes precious resources by allowing people to take it without first taking preparation courses.” New York “will need to invest a great deal more than it spends at the moment. But the costs of doing nothing clearly outweigh those of remaking a chaotic and ineffectual system.”

Delaware District Revises Code Of Conduct To Add Leniency For Youngest Students.
The New York Times (10/14, A18, Urbina) reports that school board members in Newark, Delaware, said yesterday that “they would revise the district’s code of conduct to exempt kindergarteners and first graders from some of its automatic and harsher punishments.” The amendment creates “a separate category of rules for students in kindergarten and first grade.” Under the amendment, these students will “face three to five days out-of-school suspension and referral to school-based counseling” if they “engage in what is known as a Level III offense for the first time.” Under current policy such students are “sent to the local reform school.” The Times notes that “level III offenses include possession of a ‘dangerous instrument,’ including knives under three inches in length, and more serious offenses like assault, arson or drug possession.”

USA Today (10/14, Price, Kenney) reports that the school board’s decision came in response to the reaction of the public to the suspension of 6-year-old Zachary Christie last week after he brought “camping utensil with a knife, fork and spoon to his elementary school.” USA Today adds that “Zachary’s case has brought loads of national media attention to Delaware in part because the district told the first-grader he is required to complete at least 45 days at an alternative school before returning to Downes Elementary School.”

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In the Classroom
Graduation Rates On The Rise In Southern States, Study Finds.
Education Week (10/14) reports that a new Southern Regional Education Board report, titled Ground on High School Graduation Rates in SREB States: Milestones and Guideposts, finds that “high school graduation rates in most Southern states have climbed this decade, with Tennessee leading the pack in growth.” However, the report also finds that “more than one in four 9th graders in the region still are not graduating on time, and the recent gains only bring the South close to the same level it saw in the early 1990s, says the SREB.”

Teachers Develop Integrated Physical Education Course.
The Columbus Local News (10/14, Willis) reports, “Keeping kids fit for life is the aim of a new physical education graded course of study in the Worthington City School District.” The Wellness4Life curriculum focuses “on helping students learn a lifetime of fitness techniques.” Liberty Elementary School teacher Rob Smith said that “teachers identified four ‘pillars’ that make up the structure of the new course: lifetime fitness, sport skills and strategies, character development, and wellness integration.” The program also gives students more choices for “physical education activities.” Smith noted that “if the new course is approved by the school board, it will be implemented across the district.”

German Language Programs Less Popular Than Spanish, Mandarin.
The Dallas Morning News (10/14, Meyers) reports that in districts nationwide, German language programs are far less prevalent than Spanish, “and now Mandarin is grabbing the spotlight.” In Texas, “a state once known for its meat-and-potatoes heritage and annual polka festivals, German’s lost the love.” Several school systems in the state have “dropped their German programs and taken up Mandarin instead.” The Dallas Morning News points out the “overall, foreign languages “remain a low priority among American students, who start later and study fewer years than counterparts in many other countries. Teachers blame this language loss on budget constraints and a heavier focus on core subjects such as science and math.”

Elementary School Combines First, Second Grade Class Due To Low Enrollment.
The Gainesville (FL) Sun (10/13, Daniels) reports that “Shell Elementary School officials have combined the first- and second-grade classes after too few students enrolled within the first week of school.” Principal Denise Schultz “she knew small class size would be an issue this year, since the school’s enrollment numbers were down,” and initially, she had “anticipated that second- and third-grade classes would need to be combined.” She noted that the challenge with creating a multi-age class was to “build one class rather than it feel like two classes.” According to Sandy Hollinger, deputy superintendent for curriculum for the district, “multi-age classrooms often end up being a two-way advantage for students — those in the higher grade who need extra help with a skill and those in the lower grade who are advanced academically.”

On the Job
Survey Of Oregon Districts Shows Average Staff Reduction Of 5.6 To 6.2 Percent.
The Eugene (OR) Register-Guard (10/14, Williams) reports, “A recent statewide survey confirms what was already abundantly clear to school employees but perhaps less so to students and parents: Class sizes are larger, course offerings fewer, and school calendars shorter in many districts across the state.” The survey, conducted online during “the last week of September by” the Oregon Association of School Business Officials and other Oregon education organizations, found that on average, school systems “reported reducing staff positions by between 5.6 percent and 6.2 percent…a decline that largely explains why course offerings, both electives and core subjects, have shrunk at many districts.”

Law & Policy
Duncan Reiterates Reform Goals For “Race To The Top.”
The AP (10/13, Quaid) reported that in an interview, Secretary of Education Arne Duncan reminded states that the goal of the “Race to the Top” competition “is to help kids do better. … ‘It’s really not about the money — it’s about pushing a strong reform agenda that’s going to improve student achievement,’ Duncan said.” The AP noted that “nine states have changed their laws or made budget decisions to improve their standing. The latest is California, where a bill was signed Sunday allowing student test scores to be used to evaluate teachers.” Duncan “said the moves are encouraging. Still, he said states will have to do more than make promises. … ‘If folks are doing this to chase money, it’s for the wrong reasons.’”

Parents Of Special Needs Students In Hawaii May Sue Over Teacher Furloughs.
The Honolulu Advertiser (10/14, Moreno) reports that “an attorney representing parents of special needs students may ask the court to stop public school teacher furloughs that are to begin Oct. 23″ in Hawaii. Attorney Eric Seitz said that “is representing an unspecified number of parents of special needs students and regular education students.” In a letter, Seitz outlines explanations for why parents may file the lawsuit. The parents say that “in addition to their concern about special education cutbacks,” they also are concerned that “loss of learning time would affect a child’s standardized test scores and “adversely affect their future educational opportunities,” among other things. “Seitz said he would prefer to resolve the issue through negotiations but only if the state agrees to postpone the ‘most imminent furlough days.’”

School Board In New York Lifts Ban On 9/11 Moment Of Silence For Elementary Students.
New York’s Newsday (10/14) reports that elementary students in East Islip “will observe a moment of silence on 9/11 next year, putting to rest a protest that erupted after the district superintendent banned the observance for younger students this year.” Superintendent Wendell Chu was concerned that the “more ‘fragile’ youngsters might have been emotionally harmed” by a moment of silence, because, “he feared it would have sparked discussions about terrorism.” But last week, the school board “approved the recommendations of a committee of staff and residents,” who also suggested that 9/11 be referred to as Patriot Day.”

Special Needs

Children With Autism Gain More Educational Options In South Florida.
The Miami Herald (10/13, McGrory) reported that “school district data” indicate that “more than 4,400 children enrolled in the Miami-Dade and Broward school districts have been diagnosed with” autism. To serve those children, “the South Florida Autism Charter School in Hialeah opened in August with 81 students from Miami-Dade and Broward counties,” and “the Miami-Dade school district recently launched South Florida’s first choice program for” students with autism in a “program…housed at Blue Lakes Elementary, a traditional school in Southwest Miami-Dade.” According to the Herald, “nationwide, only about a dozen public schools are geared exclusively toward autistic children, including two in Palm Beach County,” despite expert estimates that “one in every 150 children born in the” US may have an autism spectrum disorder.

Safety & Security
Detroit Public Schools Steps Up Anti-Violence Efforts.
The Detroit News (10/14, Esparza) reports that by cracking down on truants, “school officials throughout Detroit Public Schools are trying to head off the violence that has plagued the district’s estimated 84,000 to 88,000 students.” Other anti-violence measures “range from fixing broken security cameras to staggering patrol shifts to embracing volunteer patrol groups.” And the district is working closely with police as well. “Detroit Police and district officials vowed an increased presence through more efficient deployment following the shooting of seven teens in June as they stood at a bus stop.” Moreover, “the Police Department is working on a uniform standard for recording various incidents” in order to better understand the scope of the problem of school violence. Currently, “there is no clear district-wide standard for determining when an incident is a crime rather than a violation of school policy.”

Detroit Police Chief, School District Police Chief Aim To Cooperate In Promoting Safer Schools. The Detroit News (10/14, Hunter) reports in a separate story that last year, Detroit Police Chief Warren Evans said that “a school safety plan…had been rejected ‘because DPS security was concerned about protecting their turf.’” Recently, “students and educators” have been calling “for the city and DPS officers to put aside their differences to better respond to school emergencies,” noting that “the lack of coordination between agencies resulted in slow response time — or no response at all.” In response, “Evans and Detroit Public Schools Police Chief Roderick Grimes [have] pledged to try to heal the rift, which they said existed before they took over.”

Evidence-Based Programs Seen As Necessary In Preventing Youth Violence.
University of Virginia professor of education Dewey Cornell wrote in an op-ed for CNN (10/13) responding to the beating death of Chicago teenager Derrion Albert that “it is critical that schools implement evidence-based” violence prevention “programs with fidelity in order for them to work.” He notes that a 2003 Vanderbilt University “analysis of 221 controlled studies of school-based programs designed to reduce student aggression” found that “when programs were fully implemented and carefully monitored, they reduced aggressive behavior such as fighting by about 50 percent.” However, when the “programs were not so carefully implemented,” they “demonstrated smaller or no effect.” Cornell points to state funding cuts as an obstacle that may hinder efforts to “instill evidence-based programs in schools.” Furthermore, he acknowledged that “some schools lack the capacity for mental health and safety programs because their resources are stretched to the limit and prevention is regarded as a lower priority.”

Also in the News
Students Caught In Middle Of Political Battle Over DC Teacher Layoffs.
The Washington Post (10/14, Turque) reports that seniors at D.C.’s McKinley Technology High School who marched to protest teacher layoffs “have found themselves in the midst of a bitter adult struggle that involves politicians, educators and labor leaders.” Schools Chancellor Michelle A. Rhee “met with them for 90 minutes. One of them was invited to speak at last week’s teacher rally in Freedom Plaza. For the most part, they are not inspired by what they have seen.” The Post adds that looking back, the students “said they still do not understand why Rhee would introduce a new teacher evaluation system and then fail to use it in deciding who would be dismissed.” They are also “convinced that their principal, David Pinder, pursued a personal agenda in laying off some McKinley teachers, including two popular guidance counselors.”

Epcot Attraction Teaches Math As It Lets Children Design Their Own Rides.
The New York Times (10/14, Miller) “Bits” blog reports on “a new initiative from Disney and Raytheon,” a game called Sum of All Thrills will “let children design their own theme-park ride using math tools and then hop in a robotic simulator to try it out.” The game will be available to both visitors to the park, and online. “Visitors to Disney’s Epcot theme park in Orlando, Fla., will be able to use a touch screen to choose whether to design a roller coaster, bobsled or jet ride,” and will be able to “use engineering tools like rulers and speed dials to add hills and corkscrews to the rides, while mathematical formulas for things like velocity and acceleration flash across the screen.” They will also be able to use “a robotic simulator designed by Raytheon and Disney engineers [to] experience the ride.” Meanwhile, “Raytheon will offer a version of the program at MathMovesU.com” in which “visitors will have to answer math questions in order to get new pieces for the ride.”

The AP (10/14, Reed) reports, “‘Sum of All Thrills’ is the first ride in Epcot’s Innoventions pavilion, where businesses sponsor educational attractions and hawk their brands.” While unlike some other sponsors, “Raytheon has nothing to offer the average consumer,” it “does have jobs for those passionate about engineering, and would like to broaden the field.” Eric Goodman, a “Disney Imagineer and ‘Sum of All Thrills’ project manager,” said that during preliminary discussions with kids he found that they “didn’t understand how [math] applied in their lives.” Goodman added, “They always felt there was one answer, and that’s what you’ve got to do – find that one answer. What this does is show kids and adults the possibilities. If you have a math-controlling view, you get to control it.”

Jay Mathews wrote in a “Class Struggle” blog for the Washington Post (9/30), “Data show that schools in poor neighborhoods tend to have a disproportionate number of unqualified, inexperienced or out-of-field teachers. That compounds the schools’ many academic challenges.” Thus, NEA President Dennis Van Roekel “said in prepared testimony that the union would ask ‘every local NEA affiliate to enter into a compact or memorandum of understanding with its local school district to waive any contract language that prohibits staffing high-needs schools with great teachers.’”

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In the Classroom
Florida District Sees Some Gains With “Inquiry Math”.
The Orlando Sentinel (10/1, Weber) reports, “Gains in student test scores offer evidence that a controversial approach to teaching math is working in Seminole County public schools, district officials said Tuesday night. Since Seminole began using ‘inquiry math’ in middle schools three years ago, they said, the number of students scoring at the proficiency level in math on the Florida Comprehensive Assessment Test has risen from just over 67 percent to nearly 73 percent.” In the program, “teachers don’t explain formulas or ways of solving problems. Instead, they encourage students to work in small groups and discover solutions on their own.” That “has brought complaints from some parents and even some teachers, who question the effectiveness of the new instructional method and call it ‘fuzzy math.’” Yet at Tuesday’s school board meeting, “most of the approximately 130 people who showed up were teachers and principals supporting the new program.”

Kentucky School Uses Literacy Program, Weekly Tracking To Address AYP Shortfall.
The Louisville Courier-Journal (10/1, Cunningham) reports, “Principal Rob Clayton said he wasn’t surprised that his South Oldham Middle School didn’t make enough progress on state reading tests to meet one of its No Child Left Behind goals. But that didn’t make it an easy thing to hear.” Principal Clayton said, “We’re already putting a few things in place to help us address what’s going on.” Among the things being put in place are “a literacy program that provides one-on-one and small-group interventions for students,” and “a new program that will help teachers track progress on a weekly basis.”

Nevada District Developing Aligned Reading Curriculum For Whole District.
The Nevada Appeal (10/1, Vance) reports, “Each school in the Carson City School District has milestones in reading that students are expected to meet.” Now “teachers are beginning a three-year process to align the reading curriculum throughout the district.” So “reading specialists at each of the schools met last week with teachers to introduce the process, called ‘curriculum mapping,’ where individual elements of learning are broken down and analyzed.” Then “teachers will collaborate to assign specific goals, from the big ideas they want students to think about to what each student should be able to do to demonstrate proficiency in the particular area.”

Law & Policy
Indiana Legislators Hear Arguments For Later School Starting Date.
The AP (10/1, Smith) reports, “Having a uniform starting date for schools in late August or early September would save schools money and give families and kids more prime vacation time, several parents told an interim legislative committee Wednesday.” And “some tourism industry lobbyists also said a later, uniform starting date statewide would boost the tourism industry, but some education lobbyists said the issue should be decided locally.” Some districts had started earlier in August “because statewide standardized tests were given in the fall,” but “tests are now given in the spring.” Supporters of a later starting date, “Save Indiana Summers…say it would save schools cooling costs in the dog days of August — money that could be used instead on education. They also say a later date would allow high school students to work longer in the summer and earn money for college.”

Michigan District Uses Truancy Court To Combat Absenteeism.
The Lansing (MI) State Journal (10/1, Lavey) reports, “Almost 20 percent of students in the Lansing School District missed more than 21 days of class last year,” and “the problem is most acute in high schools,” as “almost 47 percent of Eastern High School’s 1,604 students … A third of Sexton High School’s 992 students,” and “about a quarter of Everett High School’s 1,835 students missed 21 or more days.” Supt. T.C. Wallace Jr. said, “It’s unacceptable.” Lansing is said to be having some success with a truancy court, where “Kids who are ticketed for skipping school appear in after-school sessions with Ingham County Probate Judge Richard Garcia to explain why they haven’t been coming to school.” Julie Lemond, chief academic officer in Lansing, said that “the district will be able to use Title I money…to help boost attendance rates. But she said getting kids to show up more often for school requires creativity from administrators and teachers in each school.”

Facilities
Geneva, Illinois, Completes Long Period Of Construction.
The Geneva (IL) Sun (10/1, Norgaard) reports, “Last month’s official opening of Geneva’s Fabyan Elementary School finally gave residents of South Mill Creek their own neighborhood school,” as “construction on the 103,000-square-foot building was completed over the summer.” And “the completion of Fabyan marks the end of a long period of construction within the Geneva School District, which was intended to accommodate the rapid growth in the community in recent years. However, the slowdown in the housing industry has curbed that growth for the time being, and no further construction is planned in the immediate future.”

New Orleans Has Yet To Create Oversight Panel For $2 Billion In School Facilities Projects.
The New Orleans Times-Picayune (10/1, Carr) reports, “Nearly a year after the state and the Orleans Parish School Board approved a nearly $2 billion facilities spending blueprint for New Orleans schools, the panel charged with overseeing the projects and spending has yet to meet. In fact, it doesn’t even exist.” Yet “school officials have already spent or committed to spend more than one-third of the $700 million designated for the projects in the first phase of the plan.” But “state officials said the process of collecting nominations for the panel has gone more slowly than anticipated, but that it’s now a priority. They anticipate the panel will be formed in the next month.” Recovery School District Superintendent Paul Vallas said that “he’s not opposed to the oversight committee, but doesn’t think it’s as vital as some do.”

Massachusetts School Building Authority Approves $660 Million In Construction Projects.
The Boston Globe (10/1, Parker) reports, “State officials moved ahead with $660 million in school construction projects in 15 districts throughout the state yesterday in a move that State Treasurer Tim Cahill said would provide a boost to the state’s economy.” The projects “approved by the Massachusetts School Building Authority will combine state and local funding to build or renovate three high schools, three middle schools and nine elementary schools, said MSBA Executive Director Katherine Craven,” and “serve about 1 percent of the state’s total student population.”

School Finance

DC Schools Chancellor Launches New Teacher Evaluation System.
The Washington Post (10/1, B1, Turque) reports that D.C. Schools Chancellor Michelle A. Rhee “has launched a rigorous evaluation system that will make some District teachers among the first in the nation to have their job security tied to standardized test scores.” The effort “is a cornerstone of Rhee’s agenda and a goal for education reformers nationwide.” Rhee “is investing $4 million in the system, called IMPACT, which will also assess teachers against an elaborate new framework of requirements and guidelines that cover a range of factors, including classroom presence.” However, IMPACT “is likely to be another flash point in Rhee’s turbulent relationship with local and national teachers union leaders. They say that growth statistics are too unreliable to include in performance evaluations and that the new assessment system…is an instrument to identify and remove struggling teachers, not a means to help them improve.”

Oregon May Adopt Performance Pay To Be Eligible For Race To The Top Funds.
The Salem (OR) Statesman Journal (10/1, Loew) reports, “Oregon school districts soon may evaluate teachers and principals based on their students’ performance. The state is gearing up to compete for federal ‘Race to the Top’ funds,” and “‘pay for performance’ is among the reforms required to win a share of the federal stimulus money.” While, “Oregon’s education unions traditionally have opposed the concept,” yet “Margie Lowe, education policy adviser for Gov. Ted Kulongoski, said the potential amount of grant money — $43 million or more — has prompted a new level of cooperation.” Still, “Becca Uherbelau, a spokeswoman for the Oregon Education Association, said the group remains opposed to tying teacher pay to student test scores.” Instead, “OEA and the National Education Association are lobbying U.S. Education Secretary Arne Duncan to revise the rules.”

Arizona Charter Advocates Warned Against Seeking Funding Equity Through Courts.
The Arizona Republic (10/1) in an editorial notes that “a group of parents and a student supported by the Arizona Charter Schools Association have filed a pair of lawsuits to force the Legislature to spend more on public education,” to attain “funding equity among traditional, district schools,” and “for charter-school students.” Yet, “If there is an education-funding cause the Arizona Legislature might consider favorably, it would be more money for these public-school hybrids.” Also, “Charters came into being here in 1994 based, in part, on the premise they could do more for students with less money.” While “there is no doubt both traditional and charter schools in Arizona operate on skin-and-bones budgets,” and “many of the most successful national charter organizations will not open shop here because per-student funding just won’t cut the bottom line,” yet “pursuing that equity through the courts is a dodgy proposition.”

Also in the News
Brookings Estimates Cost Of Closing Schools At Nearly $50 Billion.
The AP (10/1) reports, “Closing schools and day care centers because of swine flu could cost between $10 billion and $47 billion, a report by the Brookings Institution think tank found.” Brookings “called that a conservative estimate.” Closing schools would require “parents to stay home from work too, and some of those parents are health care workers, the report said.”

On its “Booster Shots” blog, the Los Angeles Times (10/1, Maugh) reports the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has advised that schools only close in “exceptional circumstances,” since the swine flu virus is already widespread. Brookings figured that “as much as 12% of the workforce would be absent from the job” if schools were to close, and that “up to 17% of healthcare personnel would also be absent, severely impeding the ability of authorities to deal with the pandemic.”

Police Increase Security At Chicago High School Plagued By Violence.
The Chicago Tribune (9/29, Mack) reports that “Chicago police geared up to provide extra security at Fenger High School” in Chicago “on Monday as they reviewed a graphic amateur video showing a student beaten to death with wooden two-by-fours.” After the incident, some families “expressed reservations about” their children “returning to Fenger on Monday.” The school has been closed since last Thursday, “when brewing gang rivalries that started at school spilled onto the streets of the Roseland neighborhood on Chicago’s Far South Side.” Police presence around the school is expected to be increased in order to “ease fears students and their parents may have about safety, Morgan Park District Cmdr. Mike Kuemmeth said. The beefed-up security will remain until the public perception that the school is dangerous decreases, he said.”

The AP (9/29, Hawkins) reports that “for Chicago, a sharp rise in violent student deaths during the past three school years — most from shootings off school property — have been a tragedy and an embarrassment.” Between “10-15 students were fatally shot each year” before 2006. Then, “in the 2006-07 school year,” the number rose to 24. Last Year, “and 34 deaths and 290 shootings” occurred. To address the problem, the city of Chicago this month “announced a $30 million project that targets 1,200 high school pupils identified as most at risk to become victims of gun violence, giving them full-time mentors and part-time jobs to keep them off the streets.”

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In the Classroom
Top-Performing New York City High School Teeming With Students.
The New York Times (9/29, A1, Medina) reports on its front page that Francis Lewis High School in Queens, NY has “nearly twice as many students as the 2,400 it was designed for,” forcing administrators to “look for every possible nook and cranny of space – and time – to cram in more bodies.” Francis Lewis “is just one of a number of New York City public school buildings teeming with students despite an overall drop in enrollment in the past few years.” Students “extol the benefits of Lewis, as students call the school – their electives have included forensics, psychology, bioethics and aerobics.” Francis Lewis’ “graduation rate, 81 percent, far exceeds the citywide rate of 56 percent.”

Teacher Eliminates Desks From Classroom To Allow Free Movement.
Indiana’s Journal and Courier (9/28, Watling) reported that “instead of rows of desks in fifth-grade teacher Rebecca Schpero’s Murdock Elementary classroom, there are piles of colorful pillows for students to grab and create their own seats.” Schpero created “the nontraditional setting” in her classroom “after attending training through the Kennedy Center for the Arts” to make the room more conducive for integrating art into lessons. Schpero said “the desks were in the way.” However, a few desks are available in the class “for children who aren’t comfortable with the freedom of movement. And there are a few tables on the side in both rooms where kids can use a solid surface, if they want.”

On the Job

Expert Says Reduced “Total Student Load” Is Key To Improving Test Scores.
Education Week (9/30, Viadero) reports that according to “management expert William G. Ouchi…the key to improving student achievement is lightening teaching loads.” Mr. Ouchi studied “442 schools in eight large urban districts that have devolved power to local principals” and found “that schools that have reduced” total student load (TSL) “in measurable ways also tend to have higher passing rates on state exams.” Ouchi explained, “When you reduce TSL, you increase by far the likelihood that a student will encounter a teacher in a hallway or an office and have a one-on-one conversation that will motivate the student to keep going.”

Law & Policy
Texas Students Face October 1 Deadline For Vaccinations.
The Dallas Morning News (9/29, Farwell) reports that Thursday “is the deadline for kindergartners and seventh-graders in Texas to meet new vaccination requirements.” After the deadline, students “who have not received the necessary shots — or a waiver” will not be allowed to attend school. The Dallas Morning News notes that earlier this month, Dallas County health officials “expressed concern that thousands of children had not been properly vaccinated,” and a last-minute vaccination rush would lead to “long lines at clinics.”

School “Thoroughly Cleaned” Following Possible Swine Flu-Related Student Death. The Dallas Morning News (9/29) reports that the Fort Worth, TX, school district said “it has thoroughly cleaned” Leonard Middle School in southwest Fort Worth after a student “died at Cook Children’s Medical Center on Sunday night, four days after showing signs of illness.” Sandra Parker, medical director for the Tarrant County Health Department, “would not say whether or not the swine flu was a possibility in the death. Further test results are due Tuesday.”

State Laws Seen As Likely To Spur Resurgence In Public School Driver’s Education.
USA Today (9/29, Copeland) reports that “driver’s education in public schools, which virtually disappeared a generation ago, could be staging a comeback.” Currently, only “about 15 percent of eligible students take high school driver’s ed compared with 95 percent in the 1970s, says Allen Robinson, CEO of the American Driver and Traffic Safety Education Association.” But the trend is moving upward in some areas nationwide. In Georgia, for instance, “the number of high school driver’s ed programs…has increased 22 percent to 150 since the state required that any 16-year-old seeking a driver’s license after Jan. 1, 2007, complete a state-approved driver’s ed course.” And this month, Texas “enacted a law…requiring police investigating crashes involving new drivers to determine whether they took driver’s ed in a public or commercial school or learned from their parents.”

Special Needs
Chicago Public School District Refutes State’s Special Education Review.
The Chicago Tribune (9/29, Ahmed, Huppke) reports that an Illinois State Board of Education report on special education in Chicago Public Schools found that “40 percent of the 96 schools” observed “were not properly implementing Individualized Education Plans (IEPs). Another one of the report’s 11 findings says that “about half the schools reviewed failed to give enough services to kids with disabilities, stifling their ability to make appropriate progress from year to year.” The report is “part of a 17-year-old federal case in which the district was accused of illegally segregating special education students.” Part of the settlement for that case “requires routine monitoring of the district’s special education program.” The Chicago Tribune adds that the school district “is challenging the report,” arguing that “there are only six areas that need more work, and” blaming “the state’s findings on flawed methodology.”

Safety & Security
Most Complaints Sent Through Florida District’s Online Bullying Hotline Are Unfounded.
The Tampa Tribune (9/29, Ackerman) reports that by the end of last week, Hillsborough County, FL, school officials received 45 incident reports “under a new anonymous online reporting system designed to make it easier for victims of bullying to step forward.” Judith Rainone, Hillsborough’s director of administration, said that “most complaints came from parents and most were unfounded. … Some of the complaints started with bullying allegations but escalated into complaints from parents about other parents.” Another complaint “involved charges of one teacher bullying another,” but “only a handful of incidents fit the state’s definition of bullying.” Through the system, each complaint is “automatically…sent to four people — the school principal, the school’s area director, Rainone, and Tracy Schatzberg, supervisor of the district’s psychological services. The district has three days to respond and then must work to resolve complaints or forward them to the proper authorities.” None of the complaints, so far, “have resulted in law enforcement involvement.”

School Finance
Federal, State Funds Do Not Cover Expense Of Autism Education In Some California Districts.
California’s Press Enterprise (9/28, Perrault) reported that “five years ago, the Riverside County office of education created a class for one preschooler with autism.” Now, “there are 28 classrooms for students ages 3 to 22 and another 120 students attending in-home programs.” Although “students with mild autism often can be blended into general classroom environments,” those with “more severe cases” often must be in smaller classes with “a teacher and two education assistants…to provide intense, one-on-one instruction.” Such “classes required to teach autistic children cost an average of $36,000 per student, compared to just under $8,600 for mainstream students,” but “federal and state funding hasn’t kept pace, forcing districts to be creative about staffing classrooms, finding additional resources for more services and tapping innovative programs that have worked elsewhere.”

Also in the News

EPA Advises Schools To Test Caulk For Toxins.
The AP (9/29, Quaid) reports that “hundreds of school buildings across the United States have caulk around windows and doors containing potentially cancer-causing PCBs,” according to the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). The agency is not sure how dangerous the situation is for students or “how many schools could be affected.” However, it is advising schools officials to “test old caulk and remove it if PCBs turn up in significant amounts.” Meanwhile, the EPA plans to “conduct new research into the link between PCBs in caulk and in the air, which it said is not well understood.” In addition, it will “conduct its own tests on PCBs in schools.” Currently, the agency “recommends testing for PCBs in peeling, brittle, cracking, or deteriorating caulk in schools and other buildings that were built or renovated between 1950 and 1978. The caulk should be removed if PCBs are found at significant levels, the agency said.”

NEA in the News
Duncan Seen As Revitalizing School Reform.
The New York Times (9/28, A22) editorialized, “With sound ideas and a commitment to rigorously monitor the states’ progress, Education Secretary Arne Duncan has revitalized the school-reform effort that had lost most of its momentum by the closing days of the Bush administration.” The NEA also “seems to understand that the time for defending the status quo has passed.” Still, the Times added, “the difficult part is yet to come. Mr. Duncan must be prepared to reject” Race to the Top fund applications from states “that do not meet the eligibility requirements, but he also must be willing to encourage states to innovate.” Furthermore, Mr. Duncan must resist “pressure from politicians demanding that he finance all of their states’ programs and from community purists demanding that he reject projects that don’t comply with their views.”

Oregon Officials Formally Announce Race To The Top Effort.
The Oregonian (9/29, Hammond) reports that on Monday Oregon “Gov. Ted Kulongoski (D) and Oregon schools superintendent Susan Castillo made their first formal joint pronouncement today that Oregon is going to mount a serious effort to win part of the $4 billion in ‘Race to the Top’ money that U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan plans to award next spring.” The officials named “22 people, mostly educators and education advocates, who are the ‘design team’ for Oregon’s bid for the money,” and “unveiled a web site where the public can learn more about the Race to the Top and Oregon’s plans to try to win.” According to the Oregonian, “officials at the Oregon Education Association say they support high-quality performance evaluations of teachers” — a preliminary guideline for states hoping to win the grant — and hope that “the final rules on Race to the Top” will not require states to “promise performance pay for teachers.”

Rhode Island Working “Closely” With Teachers Unions On Education Reforms.
The Providence Journal (9/29, Jordan) reports, “Rhode Island Education Commissioner Deborah A. Gist says the state is well-positioned to institute the reforms” necessary to win a portion of the federal Race To The Top grant “and will aggressively compete for the unprecedented infusion of federal education money.” Gist “has assembled a 23-member steering committee” made up of “lawmakers, parents, students, K-12 and higher education leaders, union officials and representatives from principal, superintendent and school committee organizations.” The Providence Journal notes that the NEA “has criticized the Race to the Top Fund,” but Gist said that the state is “working very closely with” the NEA in Rhode Island and other state teachers unions, and “is hopeful [they]…will support the state’s application.”

Hawaii Teachers, State Agree To Schedule Furlough Days On Fridays.
The Honolulu Advertiser (9/27, Moreno) reported that “to the dismay of thousands of public school parents,” Hawaii State Teachers Association (HSTA) “officials stood by their decision last week to schedule 17 teacher furlough days on Fridays.” Last week, “teachers approved a new two-year contract…that, starting Oct. 23, will close schools on 17 Fridays — equal to a 7.9 percent pay cut.” Although the lost instruction days could have been avoided if the union and state “had scheduled furloughs on holidays and teacher planning days,” HSTA president Wil Okabe “said that opting for furloughs on Fridays” is “consistent with potential furlough days chosen by other state worker unions.” He added that Friday “was the day Gov. Linda Lingle (R) initially planned to furlough state workers.”

In a separate story, the Honolulu Star-Bulletin (9/27, Kubota) also reported that “as Hawaii education officials and teachers revise public school schedules, parents are beginning to ask questions about the effects of a shortened instructional year on students.” And some critics say that “the elimination of 17 days of instruction lowers the state in the standings” in national rankings. Critics also “critics point out that students in special education will have more difficulty adjusting to the 17-day furlough.” Meanwhile, some parents “with children in special education are considering litigation” over the deal.

NEA Opposes Furloughs, Layoffs In Response To School Budget Crisis. In a separate story, the Honolulu Advertiser (9/25, Wilson) noted that “other cash-strapped school districts in the nation that have implemented furloughs are scheduling them to take place on teacher preparation and training days, though most are dealing with far fewer furlough days than Hawai’i's public schools.” However, the NEA, “of which the HSTA is an affiliate, opposes furloughs and layoffs as a means of responding to budget shortfalls.” NEA spokeswoman Cynthia Kain explained, “Our position is still that there are other ways we can deal with this crisis other than furloughing teachers or laying off educators. Even in an economic crisis, we should be finding money to invest in education.”

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In the Classroom
President Obama Seeks To Lengthen Time In Class, School Year.
The AP (9/27) reported, “Students beware: The summer vacation you just enjoyed could be sharply curtailed if President Barack Obama gets his way.” Obama “says American kids spend too little time in school, putting them at a disadvantage with other students around the globe.” As such, he “wants schools to add time to classes, to stay open late, and to let kids in on weekends so they have a safe place to go.” The AP points out, however, that “while it is true that kids in many other countries have more school days, it’s not true they all spend more time in school.” In the US, children “spend more hours in school (1,146 instructional hours per year) than do kids in the Asian countries that persistently outscore the U.S. on math and science tests — Singapore (903), Taiwan (1,050), Japan (1,005) and Hong Kong (1,013).”

“Executive Function” Seen As Strong Predictor Of Academic Success For Preschoolers.
The New York Times Magazine (9/27, MM31, Tough) reported that in recent years, executive function is “a new buzz phrase” that “has emerged among scholars and scientists who study early-childhood development.” Though executive function was “originally a neuroscience term, it refers to the ability to think straight: to order your thoughts, to process information in a coherent way, to hold relevant details in your short-term memory, to avoid distractions and mental traps and focus on the task in front of you.” According to the Times, recently, cognitive psychologists “have come to believe that executive function, and specifically the skill of self-regulation, might hold the answers to some of the most vexing questions in education today. The ability of young children to control their emotional and cognitive impulses, it turns out, is a remarkably strong indicator of both short-term and long-term success, academic and otherwise.”

On the Job

Georgia Cuts Bonuses For National Board Certified Teachers.
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution (9/28, Salzer, Badertscher) reports, “More than 2,000 of Georgia’s most highly certified teachers are getting hit with the biggest pay cuts in the profession this fall as the state trims spending.” The state has decided “to slash the 10 percent bonuses they have received for earning national board certification.” As a result, “many teachers who hold the certification from the National Board for Professional Teaching Standards will likely see their pay drop a minimum of $3,000 to $4,000 this year. And for some, that’s on top of local salary cuts or furloughs.” And, some Georgia districts “have been slow to pass on even the smaller bonuses, fearing the state will not reimburse them next spring because of continued spending cuts.”

Florida District Revamps Incentive Pay At Low-Income Schools To Retain Certified Teachers.
The St. Petersburg Times (9/27, Marshall) reported that “money really does draw qualified teachers to high-poverty schools where they’re needed the most.” A “new evaluation of an incentive pay program in Hillsborough schools” shows that “twice as many teachers have applied to teach in the district’s low-income Renaissance schools since 2003, when Hillsborough began offering a 5 to 10 percent bonus.” When it first began, “the Renaissance program made a difference in recruiting good teachers, but they weren’t always staying long-term and making a clear difference in their schools.” This year, “experienced teachers who are certified in their subject areas will qualify for a 5 percent bonus to teach in a Renaissance school.” The “teachers will have to stay at their schools or transfer to another Renaissance school the following year to qualify for an additional bonus of 5 percent or more, which is tied in most cases to schoolwide performance gains.”

Teaching Profession Seen As Difficult To Improve.
NPR (9/26, Abramson) reported, “Everyone from President Obama on down seems to agree: a good teacher can make a huge difference in the life of a child.” However, “teaching performance is difficult to improve in part because the profession is so large.” Some blame the teacher “certification process,” saying that state requirements help “create a hiring market that is very localized.” And although “alternative routes to certification” aim “to make it easier for mid-career professionals to jump into teaching,” many such programs “are run by teacher colleges and tend to require unnecessary coursework that discourages career changers from making the switch.” NPR points to “teaching fellowships and…Teach for America” as programs that “are helping to raise the standard for all teachers.”

Special Needs
Group Says Gifted And Talented Education Takes Money Away From Disabled Students.
Louisiana’s Times-Picayune (9/27, Bronston) reported that “the Louisiana Association of Special Education Administrators has recommended that gifted and talented education no longer be part of special education.” The organization is “concerned that money dedicated for disabled children is being used for gifted and talented services.” In a letter to the Louisiana Department of Education dated March 4, Susan Vaugn, then president of the organization, wrote, “We question the ability of anyone to prove that a student with a 4.0 GPA needs special education services because his educational performance is significantly affected.” This month, “the issue appeared on the agenda of a state Board of Elementary and Secondary Education committee,” but was deferred, “and a task force was appointed to discuss ways of keeping the gifted and talented program in special education without affecting services for disabled children.”

Facilities
New Jersey Districts Seek More Than $157 Million In Energy-Saving School Renovations.
New Jersey’s Star-Ledger (9/28, McCarron) reports, “School districts across New Jersey will ask residents on Tuesday to spend $440 million on construction projects, many them energy-saving initiatives.” Of those projects, “more than $157 million would qualify for state aid, either through one-time grants, annual ‘debt service aid’ payments or rebates through the state’s Clean Energy Program.” They include “the addition of solar panels” at six schools in Rahway, “a state-of-the-art building that includes a geothermal well and energy-saving materials” in East Brunswick, “ten referendums specifically citing new windows, doors, boilers or HVAC systems, and another eight including solar panels projects,”

Insurance Dispute Delaying Rebuilding Of Fire-Damaged Los Angeles High School.
The Los Angeles Times (9/28, Rivera) reports that Garfield High School in Los Angeles “has not hosted a play, a musical performance or an assembly in its historic auditorium since an arson fire gutted it nearly 2 1/2 years ago. … After pledges to rebuild the facility, a benefit concert by Los Lobos and donations from boxer Oscar De La Hoya, among others,” the Los Angeles district “is mired in an insurance dispute that could create additional delays and leave the school system footing more of the bill.” According to the Times, community members and alumni, “who long relied on the auditorium for neighborhood meetings and events, are frustrated — as are school administrators and students.”

Also in the News

PTA Membership On The Decline Across The US.
The Washington Post (9/28, Chandler) reports, “From a high mark of 12 million in the 1960s, national PTA membership has dropped to a little more than 5 million.” Though school enrollments “have ballooned, the PTA lost a million members in the past decade alone. Through the years, Washington’s inner suburbs have been high-profile exceptions to the general decline.” However, more than 90 percent of the schools in some districts in the D.C. metropolitan region “have PTAs, for instance, compared with about 25 percent nationally.” Yet, some signs point to a future decline in PTA membership in the D.C. area.

WPost Says Teachers Unions Blocking Successful Charter Schools.
The Washington Post (9/27) editorialized, “Opponents of charter schools are going to have to come up with a new excuse: They can’t claim any longer that these non-traditional public schools don’t succeed. A rigorous new study of charter schools in New York City demolishes the argument that charter schools outperform traditional public schools only because they get the ‘best students.’” The Post adds that this “evidence should spur states to change policies that inhibit charter-school growth.” Also, when teachers unions score “another lobbying success” to “hold charters back, more poor children will pay a price.”

NEA in the News
Nebraska State Education Association Recommends Teachers Seek $1,000 Salary Increase.
The AP (9/28, Beck) reports, “With an infusion of $234 million in federal stimulus dollars headed to Nebraska’s public schools and words of support from the governor, state teachers might finally realize their long-running push to raise their pay rank from among the lowest in the country.” According to the Nebraska State Education Association (NSEA), which “represents the state’s nearly 23,000 public school teachers…148 of the state’s 250-plus school districts have settled negotiations for teachers’ pay, with all of them seeing a raise in base pay despite the nation’s troubled economy.” NSEA “has been recommending teachers seek a $1,000 increase in base salary.” So far, according to Larry Scherer, director of bargaining and research with the NSEA, “teachers in more than four dozen districts have done…that,” with teachers in Giltner Public Schools managing “to secure a $2,000 raise this year and another $1,500 next year.”

List Of Suggested Common Math, English Standards Is Extensive.
U.S. News and World Report (9/25) notes that “in recent months, an alliance of the nation’s governors and state education officials has led an initiative to develop common academic standards to which all public K-12 students would be held.” Although “feedback from national organizations representing teachers, such as the National Education Association Last… has been part of the standards development process,” officials from various standardized testing agencies and Achieve Inc., “a standards reform group,” have done the “the actual writing and determination of what goes into” the standards. Last week, the officials “released a set of math and English skills they say students should master before high school graduation.” The standards “range from core practices such as constructing viable arguments…to modeling quantitative relationships and mastering probability and statistics” in math. In English, they incorporate “reading and writing skills as well as speaking and listening proficiencies, including…responding constructively to advance a discussion.”

School Of The Future Seen As Falling Short Of Goals.
Education Week (9/25, Manzo) reports, “The promise of technology and change, so far, has fallen short at Philadelphia’s School of the Future.” The school “opened in 2006 with a relatively small student population, a computer-based curriculum delivered with the latest technology tools, and a unique partnership with corporate giant Microsoft.” Its aim was “to upend a secondary school model that had changed little since the industrial era.” However, the school has had to contend with “leadership instability, wavering commitment from the central office to its mission, swings in curricular approaches, technological glitches, and challenges in meeting the academic needs of a disadvantaged student population.” And, in its fourth year, Education Week points out that “a visitor would be hard-pressed to decipher how the school is fundamentally different from a typical high school, aside from the superiority of the facility.”

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In the Classroom
Critics Question Validity Of New York City Public School Grades.
Education Week (9/23, Robelen) reported, “The recent news that 97 percent of New York City public schools got an A or B under the district’s grading system might be seen as reason for celebration, but critics suggest the grades hold little value and highlight the need to rethink the state assessment system.” In 2008, 38 percent “of the city’s 1,058 public elementary and middle schools received an A on the city’s report cards.” This year, however, 84 percent earned an A, “while 13 percent received a B, city officials announced this month.” Aaron M. Pallas, “a professor of sociology and education at Teachers College, Columbia University,” said the grades tell “virtually nothing about the actual performance of schools.” Meanwhile, New York University education historian, Diane Ravitch, called the grades “bogus.” Education Week explains that the main factors affecting school grades are “results from statewide assessments in reading and mathematics, which themselves have encountered considerable skepticism lately.”

Arts Education Seen As Key To Providing A “Complete” Education.
Arts Education Partnership Director Sandra S. Ruppert wrote in an op-ed for Education Week (9/23) that “arts learning experiences play a vital role in developing students’ capacities for critical thinking, creativity, imagination, and innovation.” Increasingly, “these capacities are” being “recognized as core skills and competencies all students need as part of a high-quality and complete 21st-century education,” Ruppert added. She lists “five strategies, drawn from” the National Assessment of Educational Progress’ arts assessment, released in June 2009, “that can help arts education leaders, policymakers, and educators improve performance in the arts and narrow achievement gaps.”

On the Job

School Administrators Nationwide Increasingly Seeking Out Male Teachers.
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution (9/25, Staples) reports that at Martin Luther King Elementary School in Clayton County, GA, “female teachers outnumber males by almost three to one.” However, “Principal Machelle Matthews has made a conscious effort to recruit and retain black male teachers.” Currently, 14 of the school’s 60 teachers are male. The Atlanta Journal-Constitution points out that “although the percentage of male teachers across the state is growing — from 17.9 percent in 2002 to 19.3 percent in 2008 — officials say there is no concerted effort to increase the number of men — black or white — in classrooms.” Nationwide, however, “efforts to increase the presence of male teachers, and black men in particular, are growing.” Programs such as “MenTeach and Clemson University’s Call Me MISTER” are encouraging “males to consider education as early as middle school.”

DC Teachers Hold Rally To Protest Pending Layoffs.
The Washington Post (9/25, Turque) reports that a “small but vocal band” of about 60 D.C. teachers, “angry about impending layoffs, rallied against Chancellor Michelle A. Rhee and their own union president in front of the school system’s central offices early Thursday evening.” Washington Teachers Union President George Parker “did not attend the rally, which was organized in part by two of his most outspoken critics, union board of trustees member Candi Peterson and its general vice president, Nathan Saunders.” Teachers “protested Rhee’s Sept. 16 announcement of a still-unspecified number of layoffs,” following the D.C. Council’s decision to cut $20.7 million from the 2010 D.C. Public Schools budget.

Rhee Intends To Target Underperforming Teachers In Layoffs. The Washington Post (9/23) reports in its D.C. Wire blog that Washington Teachers’ Union President George Parker, “among others, has wondered out loud why Rhee waited three weeks into the school year — and nearly seven weeks after the D.C. Council sliced $20.7 million from the 2010 DCPS budget — to announce the still-unspecified number of job cuts.” Parker “called it mismanagement at best, and at worst a cynical backdoor effort to replace established teachers with freshly-minted young graduates of Teach For America and other increasingly popular alternative training programs.” Though Rhee said the budget cuts were unexpected, she “acknowledges that she also intends to use the cuts as an added opportunity to weed out” teachers “she regards as under-performers.”

Law & Policy
Education Secretary Discusses Reform Vision.
The Christian Science Monitor (9/25, Kehe) reports that in an interview following a forum on President Obama’s Fatherhood Initiative in New Hampshire on Wednesday, Secretary of Education Arne Duncan “talked about plans for reform of America’s education system. One thing he stressed: The leadership may come from Washington, but the best ideas on which steps to take will probably be found somewhere else.” Concerning NCLB, Duncan “was generous in his assessment of what the Bush administration did well when it crafted the legislation,” applauding the decision to disaggregate data to clearly show achievement gaps when present. Duncan “did not have many other kind words about NCLB, however, saying that he hopes to essentially turn the law on its head. The Bush administration’s legislation, he says, kept the ‘goals loose but the steps tight.’” Duncan “hopes instead to see a law that keeps the ‘goals tight but the steps loose.’”

Duncan Outlines NCLB Reauthorization Views. Education Week (9/25, Klein) reports that Secretary of Education Arne “signaled this week” that the Department of Education “is poised to launch reauthorization efforts” for NCLB and he outlined his views of how NCLB should be changed during a “packed” meeting in Washington with over 200 education stakeholders. Duncan “said the new version of the law will need to ensure effective teachers and principals for underperforming schools, expand learning time, and devise an accountability system that measures individual student progress and uses data to inform instruction and teacher evaluation.” Duncan said DOE officials “will convene a series of meetings” to solicit recommendations from education stakeholders on how NCLB should be adjusted.

School Finance
Education Department Identifies States At “High Risk” For Stimulus Spending Problems.
The Education Week (9/24, McNeil) reported that ED “has identified four states that are at ‘high risk’ for economic-stimulus spending problems, according to a Sept. 23 report by the Government Accountability Office.” California, Illinois, Michigan, and Texas “have been singled out for intensive technical assistance by [ED] to help them implement good practices in using the federal money.” D.C. and Puerto Rico “also made the department’s list.” The latest report from the GAO “offers insight” into how ED and other federal agencies are “trying to minimize the potential for misuse of the approximately $100 billion in such aid it oversees.”

Parents In Some Arizona Districts Leading Efforts To Raise Money For Schools.
Arizona’s East Valley Tribune (9/25, Reese) reports, “With Arizona school districts cutting back on supplies, staffing and budgets, parents at Chandler High School” in Chandler, AZ, “are stepping up to fill in the gaps.” For example, “parents of marching band members” started a “penny war,” in which “the different band instrument groups — winds, brass, percussion — try to outdo each other by collecting pennies.” The East Valley Tribune counts that effort among a growing number of others “in school districts around the East Valley” since January, when “declines in general fund coffers resulted in $133 million cut from school districts. … As a result, at least one school is asking parents or guardians to spend two hours a semester helping on campus. Others are asking parents to buy reams of paper to offset supply cuts.”

Also in the News
Federal Regulators To Consider Banning Cell Phone Use By Bus Drivers While On The Road.
The AP (9/24, Lowy) reported that safety investigators “told federal regulators three years ago that it was dangerous for bus drivers to talk on cell phones while driving, and recommended a ban.” However, the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration “has done little more than study the issue. Now, after several high-profile accidents that focused public attention on using cell phones on the road, the Obama administration has decided to act on the issue.” Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood “will convene a two-day summit next week on distracted driving and plans to announce actions to address cell phone use by bus and truck drivers, said spokeswoman Jill Zuckman.”

NEA in the News

NEA Calls Race To The Top An “Intrusion.”
The Washington Post (9/25, Anderson) reports, “To the surprise of many educators who campaigned last year for change in the White House, the Obama administration’s first recipe for school reform relies heavily on Bush-era ingredients and adds others that make unions gag.” For instance, “standardized testing, school accountability, performance pay, charter schools” are all significant parts of “President Obama’s $4.35 billion ‘Race to the Top’ grant competition to spur innovation.” The NEA called the proposal “‘disturbing’ federal intrusion.” In a written statement, the NEA said it “cannot support yet another layer of federal mandates that have little or no research base of success and that usurp state and local government’s responsibilities for public education.”

NEA-Alaska Shows Support For Hotel Employees Union Members.
Barb Angaiak, President of NEA-Alaska, writes in the Alaska Dispatch (9/25, Angaiak), “The Alaska chapter of the National Education Association has been monitoring the lack of progress in contract negotiations between the Anchorage Hilton Hotel and its bellmen, housekeepers, food servers, and other employee groups for some months.” For over a year, the local Unite HERE members “have been attempting to bargain a new contract,” but “hotel management shows no signs that it is willing to settle.” According to Angaiak, “This is part of a national pattern of union-breaking tactics and unfair treatment of employees by the Columbia Sussex Corporation.” Consequently, NEA-Alaska has decided “to cancel its multi-year contract with the Hilton,” severing “all business ties with the hotel.” This included canceling “six conferences, all scheduled outside the tourist season” and asking NEA-Alaska “members not to eat, sleep, or meet at the Hilton until the hotel settles a fair contract.”

California Teachers Unions File Complaints Over Increased Class Sizes.
California’s Union-Tribune (9/24, Writer) reports that the Sweetwater Union High School District’s union and the San Diego Education Association “have filed unfair-labor-practice complaints with the state, insisting that class-size changes must be negotiated.” In October, “a state panel will hear both sides in the South County dispute in October and will issue a nonbinding opinion.” One complaint by the Sweetwater union is that “the school board failed to negotiate with educators as required before changing last year’s 28-to-1 student-teacher ratio to 30-to-1 this year.” Other teachers’ unions are also filing complaints over class size. According to the California Teachers Association, “the teachers union for the Travis Unified School District in Fairfield filed an unfair-labor-practice complaint over increased class sizes.” Still, “in most other districts that moved toward bigger classes this year…there has been no legal action.”

Some Students In Chicago Afraid To Return To School After Classmate’s Violent Death.
Following a story that has made national and international headlines this week, the Chicago Tribune (9/30, Mack, Banchero, Sweeney) reports that days after the beating death of sixteen-year-old Chicago high school student Derrion Albert, “the leisurely walk to school — once a tradition in American education — took on an air of fear and anxiety Monday as some Christian Fenger High School students returned to campus for the first time since” their classmate’s death. Other students, however, “were so afraid, they simply stayed home.” This week, police officers were stationed throughout the Fenger campus as “squad cars positioned in the neighborhood” announced, “by their mere presence, that they would guarantee safe passage to and from school.” Still, many “students and residents” say that Chicago Public Schools officials and police should have acted sooner, “especially in the hours before Albert died when someone fired a gun outside Fenger.”

CNN (9/30) reports that the fighting that led to Albert’s death started after “school let out at 2:50 p.m. [last] Thursday,” when “two groups of students converged on the street” and “began fighting.” Albert was first attacked by members of one group. Then, “after being knocked unconscious briefly, Albert regained consciousness and tried to move from the fight but was…attacked by” members of the opposing group. CBS News (9/30) reports on its website that “authorities in Chicago are offering $6,000 for information that leads to more arrests in the fatal beating.”

In a separate story, CNN (9/30, Fantz) reports that four boys between the ages of 16 and 19 “have been charged” in the murder. CNN also notes that according to mediator Ameena Matthews, who “works with Cease Fire, a Chicago, Illinois, grassroots organization” that seeks to “curb gang violence,” Albert told her last year “that some boys were threatening him and that his leather jacket and shoes had been stolen from his locker.” Matthews also said that “Albert, like many kids, hung out with some of the same boys who were known to menace other children in the neighborhood.” She pointed out that generally, children “want to be friends with the kid who lives next door or in their project,” even if that person is involved with a gang. The UK’s Guardian (9/30, Camera) also covers the story.

Dismissal Said To Be Most Dangerous Part Of School Day. Mark Brown writes in his column for the Chicago Sun-Times (9/30) that most people “who view the grisly video” of “Derrion Albert’s beating death near Fenger High School” are shocked. “But for anyone familiar with the after-school scene outside many of the city’s high schools, the fighting was” similar to “what they deal with on a regular basis.” According to Brown, “school dismissal is one of the most dangerous times of any day.” Brown recounts his experience observing the Bowen High School campus in South Chicago last spring “to see how students and staff were trying to maintain a safe setting following earlier incidents of violence in the neighborhood.” He notes that “as dismissal time approached, a large group of gang members emerged” from a park near the school and positioned themselves “outside the school.” Brown adds, “It was explained to me that they were mainly there to protect their own members who attend the school,” though the potential for conflict was evident.

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In the Classroom
Maryland Districts’ AYP Results Mixed.
The Washington Post (9/30, Hernandez) reports that the Montgomery County and Prince George’s County districts “failed to meet Maryland’s standards for elementary, middle and high school students, according to state data on standardized tests taken in the past school year. The results amount to a warning for Montgomery, which will be designated a ‘system in improvement’ if it fails again next time.” In Prince George’s, educators “were set back two years in their quest to escape the state’s ‘corrective action’ watch list.” However, the Baltimore school system, “long considered the worst in Maryland, was removed from the watch list after showing two consecutive years” of AYP, leaving Prince George’s “as the state’s only system in corrective action.”

California Schools See Test Improvements After Using Interactive Math Software.
California’s Mercury News (9/30, Fernandez) reports that in 2007, “nine percent [of] fourth graders at LeRoy Anderson Elementary School in San Jose “scored ‘proficient’ in math in 2007.” But after students at the school began using a software program called JiJi, proficiency “jumped to 39 percent in 2008, and 70 percent in 2009.” JiJi was developed by “three University of California scientists came up with a visual math program to teach complicated ‘spacial temporal’ concepts.” The program is interactive, thus students are able to find out immediately if they choose the correct answer. Currently, “30 schools in San Mateo and Santa Clara counties are using” Jiji.

Astronaut Shares Hubble Telescope Repair Mission Experience With Elementary Students.
The Seattle Post Intelligencer (9/30, Stevick) reports that NASA astronaut Greg Johnson spoke with “hundreds [of] students from Horizon Elementary School in south Everett during a visit to the Mukilteo School District campus last week.” Johnson also answered students’ questions and “shared a computer slide show with family photos of his childhood and aviation and aerospace career that literally reached new heights last spring when he piloted a NASA shuttle mission to make repairs to the Hubble Space Telescope.” And he “showed video footage of the mission.”

On the Job
Middle School’s Zero-Tolerance Policy Results In Improved Discipline, Test Scores.
The Sacramento Bee (9/30, B1, Lambert, Reese) reports on the front of its regional section that “Samuel Jackman Middle School in south Sacramento had 507 suspensions last year for drugs and violence — more than any other school in Northern California.” The school, however, is not “a typically troubled school.” Its “high suspension rate is due to a zero-tolerance policy designed to put an early lid on trouble, according to school officials.” The majority “of the school’s violent offenses last year” were “pre-fighting” incidents such as a student “taking a fighting stance or threatening to fight.” The zero-tolerance policy was enacted after Principal William Del Bonta “counted 35 fights in his first 10 days on the job in 2004.” Each year since the policy began, discipline at Jackman Middle has improved, Del Bonta said. “There were 64 percent fewer fights last year than in 2004″ and “the school also has increased its API score 64 points and its graduation rate by 34 percent.”

Seattle Area Schools Use Federal Grant To Develop Distance Learning.
The Seattle Times (9/30, Thompson) reports that “while many private schools in the” Seattle, WA, “region have been practicing distance learning in the event of a natural disaster or pandemic for several years, many public schools are only now beginning to ask how they might continue their students’ education during an extended school closure.” According to many public school officials, “they face challenges that their private counterparts don’t: Some students may not have computers at home or Internet access. Not all students or their families speak English. And public-school teachers may have limited tech support.” Meanwhile, Seattle Public Schools “received a federal grant last year that included money to develop an emergency distance-learning plan.” The district wants “to provide classroom teachers with two weeks’ worth of lessons that could be delivered through a variety of means, including paper packets and Web-based technologies.” It “is now tackling how to translate those materials into nine languages so parents can help their children at home.”

Law and Policy
Finance committee approves measure restoring abstinence-only education funding.
The AP (9/30) reports that the Senate Finance Committee on Tuesday voted 12-11 to “restore $50 million a year in federal funding for abstinence-only education that President Barack Obama has pushed to eliminate.” The amendment, proposed by Sen. Orrin Hatch (R-UT), “would still have to pass the full House and Senate.”

Facilities
LAUSD Chief Urged To Maintain High Efficiency Standards In Construction Efforts.
The Los Angeles Times (9/30) editorializes, “The Los Angeles Unified School District does few things efficiently and competently. The big exception has been its construction effort of the last several years, guided by Guy Mehula.” However, Mehula’s “resignation on Monday, and the loss of a measure of that independence, are discouraging signs not only for the future of school construction but for the district as a whole.” Schools Superintendent Ramon C. Cortines “may have felt compelled to act after a 2008 audit revealed that many of the consultants working for the facilities division were paid much more than district staff. … But Cortines must make sure that he isn’t being penny-wise and pound-foolish if he restricts consultant pay and moves more of that work under the district, as he reportedly intends to do.” LAUSD “is seldom at its best when it micromanages — a lesson worth remembering.”

Also in the News
Few New York City Schools Serve Freshly-Cooked Meals.
The New York Times (9/30, D1, Severson) reports on the front of its Style section that many advocates for healthier school food “have begun to believe that the only way to improve what students eat is to stop reheating processed food and start cooking real, fresh food.” However, “little actual cooking goes on in the nation’s largest public school system, largely because little of it can,” as only about “half of New York’s 1,385 school kitchens have enough cooking and fire-suppression equipment so cooks” can prepare food over an open flame. New York “is not that unusual. More than 80 percent of the nation’s districts cook fewer than half their entrees from scratch, according to a 2009 survey by the School Nutrition Association.”

NEA in the News

NEA Supports Local, State-Established Learning Schedules.
FOX News (9/30, Starr) reports that “the Obama administration wants to extend classroom time to boost retention rates and test scores, but the president will have to convince teachers to give up their vacations to do it.” According to Aaron M. Pallas of Columbia University’s Teachers College, “it’s hard to isolate the effect of year-round schooling.” He added that it is “important” to clarify “whether year-round schooling means more schooling, or simply redistributing the traditional 180 days in a different way.” Under Obama’s plan, which calls “for a longer school year as well as a shortened summer…the length of the school year may in fact be more important.” In a statement, NEA President Dennis Van Roekel said, “NEA believes that the learning schedule should be decided at the local and state levels, but will work with the Obama administration to help set guidelines that ensure each of our students gets the quality education he or she deserves.”

Critics Say Year-Round Schooling Would Be Detrimental To Economy. In a separate story, FOX News (9/29, Corbin) reports that “while Obama’s proposal is meant to improve education, critics say a curtailed summer vacation will have a dire economic impact on school systems, which could be forced to retrofit their schools for air conditioning, pay overtime to teachers, and incur higher utility costs.” Furthermore, they warn that “the leisure industry, which relies on family vacation travel, could take a major hit.”

Lawmaker Resigns To Become Utah Education Association Government Relations Director.
The Salt Lake Tribune (9/30, Gehrke) reports, “Kory Holdaway, a moderate Republican legislator” in Utah since 1999, “is resigning his seat in the Legislature to become government relations director of the Utah Education Association.” Holdaway is “a special education teacher at Taylorsville High School” and “has been a leading proponent for public and higher education, including serving most recently as co-chairman of the Higher Education Appropriations Committee.” In November, he will begin working with the UEA.

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In the Classroom
Nearly All Maryland Students Pass High School Exit Exam.
The Baltimore Sun (9/22, Bowie) reports, “State education officials reported Monday that after a decade-long attempt to raise high school graduation standards by instituting high-stakes tests only 11 students of about 63,000 in the Class of 2009 did not graduate because they failed to meet the new requirement.” According to the state, thousands of other students did not graduate because they “failed to pass the courses they needed to collect enough credits. Overall, the dropout rate for last year’s seniors fell to 2.6 percent.”

The Washington Post (9/22, B8Hernandez) reports The class of 2009 was the first in Maryland required to pass the High School Assessments, a battery of English, algebra, biology and government tests. Though test results “are encouraging, some are asking how tough the tests could be if only a tiny percentage of the students fail.” According to the Post, proponents of tougher academic standards, led by State Superintendent of Schools Nancy S. Grasmick “successfully pushed through the testing plan, arguing that it would hold schools accountable for educating children who had been allowed to slide through in the past.” However, these proponents “made compromises that effectively allowed nearly a third of the Class of 2009 to graduate without passing all four exams.”

High School’s New Engineering Class Attracts Home School, Out-Of-District Students.
The St. Petersburg Times (9/22, Solochek) reports on a new engineering class at East River Ridge High School in Pasco County, FL, in which students can “mess with robots” and “experiment with 3-D design software,” among other activities. “River Ridge showed off its new career academy to the public on Monday, taking the time to highlight the team effort among educators, business partners and community leaders who made it happen.” The class is a hit with students, with 67 students signing up for the class, “including 10 from outside the attendance zone and one homeschooled teen who comes to River Ridge just for engineering.” School administrators had expected only 30 enrollees the first year. School Board member Kathryn Starkey said “that county leaders are working to extend the River Ridge program’s ties to college courses,” noting that “They’re in talks to bring courses from Kettering University, rated one of the nation’s top undergraduate engineering schools, to Pasco County.”

More Dallas-Area Students Using Netbooks In Class.
The Dallas Morning News (9/21, Unmuth) reported that more Dallas-area students “are using ‘netbooks’ at school,” small computers that “are much lighter and cheaper than traditional laptop computers.” Netbooks “are more closely related to cellphones, which many students are familiar with.” However, netbooks are “not the best option for advanced video production capabilities.” Yet, educators “say they are ideal for basic functions as more schools get wireless access and move textbooks and lessons online.”

Students Explore Agriculture During Field Trip To Oklahoma State Fair Park.
The Oklahoman (9/22, Brown) reports that several Spencer Elementary School teachers took “nearly 80 third-, fourth- and fifth-grade students to State Fair Park” to learn about agriculture. “Students walked through the Barnyard Birthing Center where they experienced newly born piglets and goats nuzzling close to their mothers,” and “learned farming and ranching vocabulary.” Meanwhile, the “AGtropolis exhibit, a make-believe city…that is centered on teaching youth interesting facts about present-day agriculture,” gave students the opportunity to “plant seeds, pick apples, pumpkins and potatoes and gather eggs.”

Law & Policy
Opinion: Michigan Lawmakers Should Look To Detroit Public Schools For Reform Ideas.
Editor Amber Arellano wrote in an opinion piece for the Detroit News (9/21), “To the surprise of many, Detroit could be held back by the state when it comes to educational progress, or at least the strategic policymaking needed to make that happen.” She asserts that “the Detroit Public Schools’ emergency financial manager Robert Bobb and his impressive administration appear to be well-prepared to compete for President Barack Obama’s Race to the Top competitive education stimulus money.” State lawmakers, however, are “stuck in an ideological battle, threatening to risk Michigan’s application to win hundreds of millions for Michigan schools.” Arellano pointed out that “Bobb has made such sweeping changes” in the district since taking over in March that “even his critics have had to pause in awe.” She urged readers to pressure lawmakers “to do what’s best for students — not for special interests. Michigan needs to do that — and for once, follow Detroit’s lead.”

Education Funding “Race” Seen As Fueling Teacher Evaluation Reform Efforts In Colorado.
The Colorado Independent (9/21, Redding) reported, “If Colorado doesn’t win Education Secretary Arne Duncan’s Race to the Top, it won’t be for lack of studies. Last week, yet another ‘How Colorado Can Win the Race to the Top’ study was released by the Colorado Legacy Foundation, the nonprofit arm of the Colorado Department of Education.” Two other similar studies were published this summer. The Legacy foundation’s report argues “that the most important topic in education reform right now is the concept of ‘teacher effectiveness.’” The Colorado Independent points out that although “a new teacher evaluation still looks like it’s still in the brainstorming phase,” it seems inevitable that, “given the state’s enthusiasm for the Race to the Top contest, Colorado teachers shouldn’t expect the current evaluation system to last much longer.”

Border District Chief Moves To Prevent Students From Illegally Attending Schools.
The AP (9/21, Roberts) reported that Mexican students living close to the U.S. border “have skirted residency requirements to attend U.S. public schools for generations,” but when Kelt Cooper, superintendent of the San Felipe Del Rio (TX) Consolidated Independent School District “got word that about 400 school-age children were crossing the international bridge each day with backpacks but no student visas, he figured he had to do something.” Cooper “directed district officials to stake out the bridge and warn students they could face expulsion if they don’t prove they live in the district – a move that’s brought complaints from civil rights groups and support from anti-immigrant proponents.”

Students Speak Out Against High School’s Backpack Ban.
The Jackson (MI) Citizen-Patriot (9/22, Cummings) reports, “A new policy that bans backpacks from being used during the school day at Jackson High School drew criticism from several students and parents Monday who urged the board to rethink the policy it approved in August.” According to Principal Barbara Baird-Pauli, “the policy was enacted as part of the school’s student handbook to improve safety, stem congestion caused by backpacks left in aisles and between lunch tables, and eliminate a way for students to easily steal things.” But students argued that the five minutes between classes “make it difficult to run back and forth to store and retrieve books, and get to class on time.” The school board left the decision on whether or not to change the backpack policy “up to Baird-Pauli, who said she would take a few days to consider the options.”

Safety & Security

Audit Finds Deficiencies In Federal Food-Safety Notification System For Schools.
USA Today (9/22, Eisler, Morrison) reports, “Federal agencies that supply food for 31 million schoolchildren fail to ensure that tainted products are pulled quickly from cafeterias, a federal audit obtained by USA Today finds.” The audit reviewed recent recalls of food, “including one this year in which salmonella-infected peanut butter sickened almost 700 people.” It focused “on the Food and Nutrition Service, or FNS, an arm of the Department of Agriculture that provides states and school systems with federally purchased commodities for school lunch and breakfast programs.” According to the audit, FNS “lacks systems to ensure that it is notified when the Food and Drug Administration begins a food-safety investigation that may lead to a recall.”

Administrators To Undergo Sensitivity Training To Address High School’s Hazing “Tradition.”
The New York Times (9/22, A26, Kelley) reports, “The president of the Millburn Board of Education said on Monday night that district administrators would have to undergo sensitivity training and ordered them to come up with a plan within the next two months to address the longstanding tradition of hazing at Millburn High School.” The board decision came after “parents reported that their freshman daughters were pushed into lockers, that senior girls blew whistles in their faces and that girls were made to wear camouflage shirts” on the first day of school Sept. 8.

Also in the News
Students Can Interact With College Counselors Through Virtual College Fair.
The San Francisco Chronicle (9/22, Asimov) reports on the website CollegeWeekLive.com, which gives students the opportunity to “correspond with college counselors about everything from her SATs to college sports.” The site, “billed as ‘the world’s biggest virtual college fair,’” features “a virtual trade show, with booths for about 200 colleges. More than 100 additional colleges are due to join in the next few weeks, said spokeswoman Martha Collins.” Students can also log onto the site for “interactive seminars on numerous topics, including writing college essays and interviews with experts on student aid and admissions strategies.”

NEA in the News
Linking Teacher Performance To Tests Causes Contention Between Unions, “Democratic Allies.”
McClatchy (9/21, Hotakainen) reported that “the nation’s public school teachers are feeling the squeeze from all sides these days, and some of the heat is coming from unlikely sources: minorities and longtime Democratic allies.” For instance, President Barack Obama is “suggesting that student test scores be used to judge the success of educators.” David Sanchez, “president of the 340,000-member California Teachers Association,” an NEA affiliate, “said teachers had high hopes for Obama but that so far there has been little change.” In a speech to the NEA this summer, Education Secretary Arne Duncan said “teachers unions are ‘at a crossroads’ and” urged union members “to think differently about the role of unions in public education.” Sanchez, however, argues that “teachers are being unfairly picked on in the current education debate. And he said teachers know much more about teaching than Duncan.”

High Erasure Rates On DC Standardized Tests Cast Scores In Suspicious Light.
The Washington Post (9/23, B1, Turque) reports on the front of its Metro section that Bowen Elementary School was part of what D.C. officials “hailed as the success story of their 2008 standardized test results.” The reading proficiency rate at Bowen “jumped 27 points, to 63 percent of the student population. The math score surged 17 points, to 41 percent.” However, Bowen “also had four classrooms where children erased wrong answers and replaced them with correct ones at abnormally high rates.” According to the Post, 45 of D.C.’s 150 public schools “had at least one classroom with an elevated erasure level in 2008,” according to an analysis by CTB McGraw-Hill, publisher of the District of Columbia Comprehensive Assessment System (DC-CAS).

Opinion: Cheating Undermines NCLB Accountability Approach. Diane Ravitch wrote in a “Bridging Differences” blog for Education Week (9/22) that the problem with NCLB’s “incentives and sanctions approach” to prodding teachers and schools to produce higher test scores “is that it works. … We see scores going up in many states, sometimes at rates that defy belief.” However, the “problem is that schools, principals, teachers, and students will reach the goal by hook or by crook. Some states, like New York and Illinois, will play statistical games.” Also, some states “will dumb down their tests, carefully field-testing the tests and removing any questions that are too difficult.”

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In the Classroom
Program At High School In Massachusetts Pays Students, Teachers For Passing AP Test Scores.
The Salem (MA) News (9/22, Galang) reported that “a controversial grant program that pays both teachers and students at Peabody High School for success on Advanced Placement tests kicked off yesterday with triple the student enrollment.” With the “$640,000, five-year grant from Boston-based nonprofit Mass Insight,” up to 345 juniors and seniors at the school will be able “to participate in the classes,” up from 99 students who “took Advanced Placement courses in math, science and English at Peabody” last year. “Mass Insight’s grant will provide $100 to students who earn a 3, 4 or 5 on the Advanced Placement exams in math, science and English. Teachers” meanwhile, “receive a $500 stipend to participate plus a potential of another $1,000, $2,000 or $3,000 depending on the numbers of their students in who pass.”

Schools Urged To Expand Literacy Testing To New Media Forms.
Paul Barnwell, a middle school language arts teacher in Shelbyville, KY, writes in a commentary for Education Week (9/23), “The federal No Child Left Behind Act and standardized state curricula and assessments are stuck on a notion of literacy that does not reflect the reality of our time.” He asserts that schools are testing students’ literacy based “on print media only. It’s time,” he adds, “for the accountability movement to demand that schools teach and foster responsible student use of new literacy forms” such as assessing “the validity of a Web site” or understanding “the point of view and potential bias of” a YouTube clip. Barnwell points out that “some may argue that it’s a waste of time to assess other forms of literacy if students aren’t ‘proficient’ at more traditional forms of reading and writing.” However, he argues, “If we develop critical literacy skills with new forms of media, the skills can transfer to the written word.”

Schools Urged To Grant Greater Authority To Students.
Joan F. Goodman, “a professor at the University of Pennsylvania’s graduate school of education,” writes in a commentary for Education Week (9/23, Goodman), “The requirement that schools meet state standards, or else, is in conflict with the notion of student autonomy. How this plays out in classrooms is all too familiar to teachers.” For instance, “a child may want to do research on turtles, but mastery of turtles is not a state objective.” As a result, the child’s teacher would insist “that [the] child adhere to the required curriculum.” Goodman suggests that, “given the existing constraints of imposed instruction,” teachers can include “students in the authority structure” by reviewing “all the controls exercised by adults in a school day” to “determine which might gradually be shifted to students, in part or in their entirety.” She concludes that “increasing students’ authority in schools is likely to reduce problems that currently create the demand for so much adult authority.”

Renaissance Festival Character Teaches Elementary Students Elizabethan Customs.
The Shawnee Dispatch (9/23, Kieler) reports, “Sixth-graders at Blue Jacket-Flint Elementary School went back in time Friday afternoon with a visit from a Renaissance Festival character” for a lesson about “Elizabethan times.” Linda Boyce, “who performs during at the Kansas City Renaissance Festival in Bonner Springs, was dressed in full period gear” during the classroom presentation. “She told students about the lives they would have led during the time of Queen Elizabeth I, who ruled England in the late 1500s.” Boyce also “taught the students how” they would have greeted “each other during the period.”

Principal Credits Research-Based Literacy Initiative For Students’ Improvement On State Tests.
New York’s Post-Standard (9/23, Potrikus) reports, “Five years ago, about 60 percent of the students at Camden Elementary School passed state literacy assessments.” Now, “90 percent of the students are passing, with some students getting perfect scores.” The school was recently named “a Blue Ribbon School, one of 314 picked nationwide as the best schools.” Principal Nick Pulizzi said school improvement efforts were based “on research that students from low-income homes are less prepared than their more affluent peers when it comes to vocabulary. … The building’s schedule now includes 90 minutes of uninterrupted reading, where students rotate between literacy stations aimed to help them with reading, writing, listening and comprehension.”

On the Job
Georgia District Seen As Leading Data-Driven Decision-Making Trend.
Education Week (9/23, Ash) reports that the Fulton County, GA district “is so well known for its data-management system and data-driven decision-making techniques that it has been named a ‘best practice’ district by both the Washington-based Consortium for School Networking’s Data-Driven Decision Making Initiative and the education division of the Houston-based American Productivity and Quality Center.” Fulton County “is one of various school districts across the country that have made data-driven decision-making a top priority.” According to Education Week, “Part of what helps keep each school, as well as teachers, on track is the Balanced Scorecard, a system implemented in the district in 2001 that defines specific district-wide targets and benchmarks, which are then used to create individualized objectives for each school.”

Law & Policy
Obama’s Education Reform Successes Noted.
Ruth Marcus writes in a column for the Washington Post (9/23, A29) that beneath the “headline turmoil” surrounding President Obama’s efforts to enact overhauls of the healthcare and financial regulatory systems, the President “is overseeing a quiet upheaval in the nation’s approach to education from preschool through college.” Though Marcus says she has “been somewhat skeptical of the president’s ability” to enact education reforms, given resistance from student lenders and teachers unions, so far, “so good,” as numerous states have revoked their caps on charter schools and the House has cleared a bill overhauling the student loan system.

Task Of Finding Impartial “Race To The Top” Judges Seen As Difficult.
Education Week (9/23, McNeil) reports that ED “is seeking 50 to 80 outside judges to help award $4 billion in Race to the Top Fund grants under the economic-stimulus program — job openings that demand both education policy expertise and a detached interest in the high-stakes education reform competition.” According to Education Week, finding these “‘disinterested superstars,’ as U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan has called them, could be difficult, given the scope, scale, and money attached to the competition, observers say.” The potential conflicts of interest remind “many observers of the awards process for President George W. Bush’s $1 billion-a-year Reading First program, which was marred by charges that independent experts who reviewed grant applications had inappropriate interests in the selections.”

Safety & Security

GAO Finds USDA Failed To Tell Schools Of Suspect Food.
The AP (9/23, Quaid) reports, “Federal authorities failed to tell schools about recalls of potentially tainted peanut products and canned vegetables, and cafeterias may have unknowingly served them to children, the Government Accountability Office reported Tuesday. A GAO investigation found the Agriculture Department didn’t always make sure states and schools were notified promptly about recalled food distributed through the federal school lunch and breakfast programs, which serve 30 million students.” According to GAO, it took as much as a week for states to determine which products had been recalled, and schools could have served the suspect food in the meantime. Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack, in a written statement, said that the agency was working to develop a better food safety system; the U.S. Food and Drug Administration also said it was moving to improve notification to schools.

School Finance
Many Districts Have Yet To Use School Modernization Stimulus Funds.
Alyson Klein wrote in a Politics K-12 blog for Education Week (9/22) that only three states, Arkansas, North Dakota, and Wyoming, have “been able to use a portion of their state stabilization money for school modernization and repair, according to a preliminary analysis by the very knowledgeable folks at the 21st Century School Fund.” Also, states are just beginning to spend $22 billion in school construction stimulus bonds, though some advocates “are worried that needy school districts won’t be able to take advantage of the bonds because they can’t even put up the principle.”

Texas District Bracing For Another Round Of Budget-Cutting.
The Houston Chronicle (9/23, Jackson) reports that Cypress-Fairbanks school district (TX) officials “are working on the 2010-11 school year budget, which is projected to have a $10 million deficit.” Superintendent David Anthony “said the district’s inadequate state funding level will not change next year, and the district needs to prepare for another tough budgeting process,” following cuts of $41 million “in the past two budget cycles. … Anthony said state legislators will not meet until 2011 to discuss the school funding formula that has created financial challenges for Cy-Fair ISD.” However, Anthony added that additional funding will likely not be available in light of a projected $5 billion state budget deficit.

NEA in the News
Film Aims To Present Charter Schools “Laboratories Of Innovation.”
Education Week (9/23, Cavanagh) reports on the documentary Two Million Minutes: A 21st Century Solution, the sequel to a 2007 “documentary that presented a critical view of American students’ academic performance and motivation compared with their peers in China and India.” The new film “focuses on a single U.S. school, BASIS Tucson, which the filmmakers hold up as a model for how the American education system can meet the challenges of international competition.” BASIS “is a high-performing charter school serving grades 5-12 in Tucson, Ariz.” Filmmaker Robert A. Compton “said he hopes the new documentary will present charter schools as ‘laboratories of innovation,’ and persuade policymakers to lift restrictions on their growth.” Education Week notes that NEA Executive Director John Wilson, who has “seen only a trailer for the film,” acknowledged that the US “should consider international models in teacher development,” but “pointed to high-scoring Finland, where educators are required to receive extensive educational training yet are also given significant classroom autonomy.”

Concurrent Enrollment Becoming Mainstream For Colorado High School Students.
The Denver Post (9/24, Simpson) reports that under a new Colorado law, concurrent enrollment, which allows high school students to take college courses, has become mainstream in Colorado, in an effort to expand “the pool of potential college students and offering those who might drop out a reason to stay in school.” Students use “their share of K-12 tax dollars for postsecondary courses” and “reap economic benefits of paid-for college credit hours while getting an academic jump-start.” The Denver Post explains that “the process begins with a high school striking a concurrent enrollment agreement with a postsecondary institution. With the help of counselors, students explore class options that move them toward career goals.” In the last several years, “the number of 11th- and 12th-graders statewide who take college courses has risen…to a little more than 5,000.”

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In the Classroom
Principals In Clark County, Nevada, Aim To Preserve Music Programs Amid Budget Cuts.
The Las Vegas Sun (9/24, Richmond) reports that in the Clark County School District, “principals have some discretion in deciding which programs to cut and which to protect as the district reacts to the first drop in student enrollment in more than 25 years.” Most “are working hard to preserve the district’s much-lauded music program.” The Las Vegas Sun notes that “research has long shown that students who are involved in fine arts programs typically do better in their academic classes than their peers who don’t take part.” Alpin Hong, a professional pianist and artist-in-residence at Clark County’s Basic High School who has “seen firsthand the impact of the economic downturn on the nation’s public schools,” said that ‘there’s no question Clark County’s commitment to its fine arts program sets it apart from other districts.”

Educators Weigh Social Effects Of Online Learning.
The Wall Street Journal (9/24, Glader) reports that as more students enroll in online high schools, educators are intensifying efforts to prevent the social isolation that sometimes accompanies online learning. Also, sociologists and child psychologists are conducting research on how online schooling may or may not help students develop social skills.

On the Job

District Will Require Teachers To Follow Professional Growth Plan Tied To Student Performance.
The Richmond Times-Dispatch (9/24, Lizama) reports, “Starting in the fall of 2010, the Chesterfield County school system will require all teachers to follow a professional development growth plan that will be tied to student academic performance and job evaluations.” Goals for “professional growth development” will be set by teachers “based on student academic progress, the school improvement plan and the teacher’s evaluation results.” Based on the evaluations, school officials will decide whether “to keep or dismiss teachers.” The plan was piloted in 16 schools last year. “This year, those same schools are continuing with the initiative. In the 2010-11 school year, it will be implemented in all schools.”

Law & Policy
Maryland Education Officials Consider Raising Standards On High School Exit Exam.
The Baltimore Sun (9/24, Bowie) reports, “Members of the education community questioned Tuesday whether Maryland should raise its standards, a day after the state released data showing that only a handful of seniors did not graduate because they could not pass newly required tests.” Only 11 of 62,000 students in the class of 2009 “were denied a diploma because they had not met the High School Assessment requirement.” School officials “engineered a system that included projects and waivers to ease the state into the high-stakes tests so that thousands would not fail the first year.” And “in most schools in the state, the data show that nearly all the students can pass the tests.” Still, “the discussion of how high to set the mark is” expected to “bubble up in the next year throughout the U.S. as a coalition of states, including Maryland, works on adopting common-core standards.”

Graduation Rate In Maryland County Falls To 13-Year Low. The Washington Post (9/24, Hernandez) reports that the high school graduation rate in Montgomery County, MD “has fallen to its lowest level in more than a decade, according to state data, continuing a trend of declines that county officials said they will investigate.” According to the Post, from a “high of about 93 percent in 2003, the graduation rate had fallen to 87 percent for the class that graduated in the spring, according to state data released this week.” The county’s graduation rate “fell from 89 percent last year to 87 percent for the Class of 2009. That is the lowest graduation rate recorded since 1996, when the state changed the way it measured the statistic.”

Superintendent’s Tweet Sparks Dialogue About Utah Math Standards.
The Salt Lake Tribune (9/24, Stewart) reports, “Weeks ago from his seat at a statewide meeting of educational chieftans,” Canyons School District Superintendent David Doty “logged onto Twitter and posted a tweet challenging Utah State Superintendent Larry Shumway’s philosophy on math standards.” During the meeting, Shumway said that “Utah’s ‘math curriculum shouldn’t automatically end in calculus for every student.’” In a matter of “minutes, Doty’s tweet surfaced in a popular education listserv, resulting in a reportedly ‘cordial’ conversation between the two superintendents.” Doty said that his remarks were meant to be “provocative,” but not “critical.” The Salt Lake Tribune points out that Doty and Shumway both “support upping graduation requirements from three years of math to four,” but “differ…on the type of math that should be taught.” Shumway prefers “a dual track that requires some level of Algebra, and then lets students choose between calculus and quantitative reasoning or statistics.” But Doty supports “a single track geared to preparing all students for college.”

Safety & Security
Safe Schools Czar Criticized For Referencing Personal Drug Use.
FOX News (9/24, Lott) reports that the Obama administration’s “safe schools czar,” Kevin Jennings “is a former schoolteacher who has advocated promoting homosexuality in schools, written about his past drug abuse, expressed his contempt for religion, and detailed an incident in which he did not report an underage student who told him he was having sex with older men.” According to Fox News, “Jennings was appointed to the position largely because of his longtime record of working to end bullying and discrimination in schools.” But Peter Sprigg, a senior fellow at the Family Research Council, said that while Jennings’ progress in making schools “safe for homosexuality,” is apparent, there is no evidence “about what qualifications Jennings has for promoting drug-free schools.” Sprigg points to quotes in Jennings 2007 autobiography, Mama’s Boy, Preacher’s Son: A Memoir, that refer to “his personal drug abuse.” Supporters, however, argue Jennings “is fully qualified for his position and is the victim of a right-wing smear campaign.”

Also in the News
Education Secretary Encourages Fathers To Be More Involved In Children’s Education.
The AP (9/23) reports that during a “National Conversation on Fatherhood” event in Manchester, NH yesterday sponsored by the White House Office of Faith-Based and Neighborhood Partnerships, Secretary of Education Arne Duncan said getting fathers “involved in their children’s education will take turning off the TV at home and opening the school doors to them.” Duncan is quoted saying, “Educators desperately need parents to be more involved, particularly fathers, and fathers desperately need to be involved in their children’s education. … When fathers step up, students don’t drop out.” Duncan “said lengthening the school day, week and year also would allow nonprofit groups to get more involved in schools.”

NEA in the News
Teachers Accused Of Ongoing Harassment Of High School Student.
Newsweek (9/24, Dokoupil) reports, “Teachers are supposed to prevent harassment of students. But in a controversial case, they were allegedly the harassers.” Last month, “a report issued by the Minnesota Department of Human Rights” was made public, which detailed verbal attacks including “homophobic slurs” against then-16-year-old student Alex Marritt in 2007 that “were perpetrated by social-studies instructor Diane Cleveland and Walter Filson, a former cop who taught a course on law enforcement” at Secondary Technical Education Program (STEP) in Anoka, MN. But both teachers “deny Merritt’s allegations, and maintain that they have been miscast as homophobes.” Meanwhile, “the school district, despite its own findings, has not acknowledged wrongdoing.” The NEA suggests in a 2009 report that schools “provide programs that promote tolerance among students, provide training for educators, and include policies that specifically prohibit harassment and bullying on the basis of sexual orientation.”

Gay Middle School Students Often Face Hostile Climates. The New York Times Magazine (9/24, MM36, Denizet-Lewis) reports that for many “gay youth, middle school is more survival than learning.” A national 2007 survey of 626 gay, bisexual and transgender middle-school students by the Gay, Lesbian, and Straight Education Network, found that 81 percent of respondents “reported being regularly harassed on campus because of their sexual orientation. Another 39 percent reported physical assaults.” Also, “of the students who told teachers or administrators about the bullying, only 29 percent said it resulted in effective intervention.” The Times adds, “As a response to anti-gay bullying and harassment, at least 120 middle schools across the country have formed gay-straight alliance groups, where gay and lesbian students — and their straight peers — meet to brainstorm strategies for making their campus safer.”

Duncan To Challenge Education Stakeholders To Focus On Underperforming Schools.
USA Today (9/24, Toppo) reports that in a speech on Thursday in DC, “U.S. Education Secretary Arne Duncan plans to challenge educators, civil rights groups and others to put aside ‘tired arguments’ about education reform to help him craft a sweeping reauthorization of federal education legislation by early 2010.” Duncan plans to “challenge the groups to focus on getting ‘great teachers and principals into underperforming schools’ and giving schools a testing system that ‘accurately and fairly measures student growth and uses data to drive instruction and teacher evaluation,’ among other measures.” The speech will be delivered to a “stakeholders’ forum” that includes the NEA, “as well the NAACP, National Governors’ Association, United Way of America, the Children’s Defense Fund and the Business Roundtable, among others.”

The AP (9/23, Quaid) added that in his speech, Duncan will point out that the Obama administration “is committed to the testing and school accountability at the heart” of NCLB, and will acknowledge that the law has put “a spotlight on kids who need the most help.” According to the AP, the education secretary has said, however, that “there is plenty he wants to change about the law,” agreeing with critics that standardized tests “are not ideal measures of student achievement.” But, he has also pointed out that standardized tests “are the best” gauges of student achievement “we have at the moment.”

iPods Used To Help ESOL Students Improve English Skills. The Hilton Head Island (SC) Packet (9/14, Cerve) reports that “at Hilton Head Island Middle School and others with high numbers of students with limited English skills, teachers use” iPods “to help students learn to read.” Sarah Owen, the district’s ESOL coordinator, said that “the school district paid about $200 for each” of the 30 iPod Touch units it purchased last year “using federal money earmarked for ESOL students.” In Nancy Davis’ ESOL class, “students use the iPods about twice a week” to “listen to stories as part of a fluency program designed to develop vocabulary, improve pronunciation and emphasize important words and concepts taught in core subjects.” In addition to Island middle school, five other “county schools will use iPods in their English for Speakers of Other Languages (ESOL) classes this year to tailor instruction to students with different levels of English proficiency.”

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In the Classroom
Dallas Magnets Among Highest-Performing Schools In Texas, New Rankings Show.
The Dallas Morning News (9/13, Hacker) reported that several Dallas Independent School District magnet campuses “are among the best public schools in Texas, based on a new set of rankings that considers everything from test scores to class sizes to graduation rates.” Though many organizations “try to pinpoint top campuses,” the Children at Risk study “ranks Texas elementary, middle and high school campuses based on more measures than most. … The Children at Risk study uses 14 categories to measure high schools, which gives parents a different lens through which to view their schools.”

Educators See Up To 21 Percent Gains On Writing Tests For Students Who Used Online Tool.
The Richmond Times-Dispatch (9/13, Lizama) reported, “Last school year, five Chesterfield County middle schools piloted an online essay-grading tool and saw as much as 21 percent gains on eighth-graders’ Standards of Learning writing test scores.” The MyAccess online writing tool is intended to “supplement writing instruction.” It “offers students more than 200 writing topics,” then “the system scores and grades student essays instantly on grammar, content and focus, and gives feedback on their strengths and weaknesses.” The Chesterfield county school board last week “authorized the school system to spend about $45,000 to buy licenses for all eighth-graders to use the MyAccess online writing tool to supplement writing instruction, and an additional $5,000 to train teachers.”

Elementary School Offers Gifted, Performing Arts Programs.
The Arizona Republic (9/14, Javier) reports on the Renaissance Gifted Academy and Music Academy at Esperanza Elementary School in north Phoenix, which “offers a program for students who have a passion and talent for music.” Electives include “choir, band, and” handbells. In addition, “the school is set to receive pianos for a piano lab and violins for third-graders. Students also will have the opportunity to take part in three music classes every week.” The school is “operated by the Deer Valley Unified School District, one of several school districts offering performing-arts magnets and gifted programs.” According to Lynn Tuttle, director of arts education and comprehensive curriculum for the Arizona Department of Education, “students with an integrated fine-arts education can better recall important facts and topics during a test and retain what they’ve learned longer.”

Oregon’s Lack Of Spanish-Language Standardized Tests Seen As Disadvantage For Schools.
The Oregonian (9/14, Owen) reports that “The federal No Child Left Behind Act allows students to be tested in their native languages, but the U.S. Department of Education decided the commercial Spanish test that Oregon used — Aprenda — did not meet federal requirements. So the state cut it last winter.” Consequently, “the number of third-graders meeting or exceeding state benchmarks for reading dipped at some schools in Forest Grove, Woodburn and Beaverton, making it appear as if fewer students met ‘adequate yearly progress.’” Forest Grove Superintendent Yvonne Curtis said the unavailability of tests written in Spanish is “a disadvantage for…children whose first language is Spanish.” However, the Oregon Department of Education “is developing a Spanish language test that meets federal requirements, said spokesman Jake Weigler. The test is expected to be available next spring.”

Some Arizona Valley Schools Opt Not To Hold 9/11 Commemoration Activities.
The Arizona Republic (9/11, Gersema) reported, “Ever since the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, teachers and schools have grappled with talking to kids about the impact and significance of that day in American life.” This year, some schools in the Arizona valley had “special events commemorating the day, such as a flag ceremony or an extended moment of silence.” Other schools, however, did not hold “any events or special classroom activities to honor the victims of 9/11, and their teachers” did not discuss “the topic in class.” For instance, San Tan Elementary, “in the Higley Unified School District…held a Patriot Day but didn’t talk about 9/11.” Maureen Migacz, principal at San Tan, said she “would rather have the students celebrate democracy than focus on 9/11.” Furthermore, officials in the Osborn District and other Valley school districts say that “most students don’t relate to the subject” of 9/11 because many of them “had not been born yet” or were very young “when the attacks happened.”

On the Job
District’s Consultant Links Teacher Absenteeism To Achievement Gap.
Washington’s News Tribune (9/12, Cafazzo) reported that “after receiving a consultant’s report” noting “the gap between white students and many racial and ethnic minorities on test scores, grades and other measures of student achievement,” Tacoma School District officials “pledged this week to” work toward eliminating the gap. According to the consultant, “students who are taught by substitute teachers, or who spend time in the library or gym because no substitute can be found, lose out on learning opportunities.” Furthermore, “the impact can be greater on students who are already struggling.” Each year, “Tacoma teachers earn 12 sick leave…as well as an additional five days of leave that can be used for other reasons.” Tacoma’s assistant superintendent for human resources, Laurie Taylor, “said the district is working to create data that can help principals identify patterns of absenteeism.” Last year, Tacoma schools began studying absenteeism within the district.

Zoo Director Provides Educators With Hands-On Science Ideas For the Classroom.
Julia Steiny, a former member of the Providence School Board, writes in an opinion piece for the Providence Journal (9/14) that “these days, teachers are seeking out real-science experience for themselves, to make science more engaging and a lot less abstract for their students.” Lou Perrotti, “the conservation director of Roger Williams Park Zoo,” provided this experience to a group of teachers “from Westerly, East Providence, West Warwick, and Central Falls” last week by showing them “how to make their own beetle traps.” After constructing the traps, the teachers buried them in a field. “Each day subsequently, teachers took turns pulling out the traps and tallying the yield.” Steiny notes that the training was a collaboration between the zoo and the East Bay Educational Collaborative (EBEC). Furthermore, she adds, “the Web sites of the zoo, EBEC, and Audubon provide a wealth of information about all sorts of professional-development opportunities for teachers,” which she says “will spark kids’ interest in how really cool science can be.”

Teacher Of The Year Says Classroom Management, Fun Are Keys To Learning.
The Ridgefield (CT) Press (9/11, Sanders) reported on the Effective Ridgefield Teacher workshop, a day-long, “annual session put on at the end of each August for teachers joining the Ridgefield Public Schools.” The agenda included topics ranging from effective teaching techniques to “nurturing the self-reflective learner.” The training was made up of “presentations to the whole workshop as well as smaller ‘break-out’ discussions by elementary, middle school, and high school teachers.” In the middle school breakout discussion, Mike Settanni, a former Teacher of the Year, told the teachers, “Kids really want to know the boundaries in the classroom. … If they know the boundaries, they know they’re safe – that’s for any level kid. It doesn’t matter how old they are.” He also noted that in addition to classroom management, “having fun” is also a “key to success in the classroom.”

Sole Teacher Strike In America Nears End.
The AP (9/13) repor