A first look at today's most important education news:
- Kansas’s NCLB waiver was put on “high risk” back in August, due to the delays in implementing a teacher-evaluation system linked to student growth. The state plans to ask for an extension of the May 1st deadline with “wording that is (maybe) more appealing or appeasing.” (Wichita Eagle)
- Today, lawmakers in Wisconsin will introduce a proposal to give private-school vouchers to students with disabilities, a revamped version of a measure that failed in Governor Walker’s 2013–15 budget. (Journal Sentinel)
- In a recent article in Brookings’s Brown Center Chalkboard blog, international-school-assessments expert Tom Loveless disputed PISA’s depiction of Shanghai as a “high-equity” school system. An Education Week column highlights more troubles within China’s education system, such as high income gaps and the people’s loss of faith in educational and governmental institutions. (Brown Center Chalkboard, Washington Post, and Education Week)
- Last week, Louisiana’s appeals court ruled that the New Orleans school board improperly fired 7,500 employees, who are now due two years of back pay and benefits. (Hechinger Report)
- A new report from Maryland’s Education Department finds that most of its schools are not technologically equipped to administer new online Common Core–aligned exams and that the state will need to spend at least $100 million by 2015 to prepare. (Answer Sheet)
- DCPS officials have loosened proportion of principals’ annual evaluations tied to student achievement measures to 50 percent—and, for this year, have canceled a plan to freeze the pay of principals who are rated below effective. (Washington Post)
- The NEA has issued its yearly Legislative Report Card: Senate Republicans have warmed up to its agenda, while House Republicans have cooled. (Washington Post and (Politics K–12)
- A new study finds that students in early-college high schools are more likely to both enroll in and complete college than their traditional-high-school peers. (Hechinger Report)
- New research from Tulane University finds that contrary to popular belief, school choice was pervasive in New Orleans even before Hurricane Katrina. (Times-Picayune)
