A good read for the ride home

How will stimulus dollars affect union contracts?

SAT Upon

The College Board, as always, hung a smiley face on it, but the latest SAT results are a real bummer.??Overall scores flat or down. Almost every sub-group flat or down. Gaps widening a bit by race, income, parental education.

How should students be prepared for college?

Checker Finn answers this question in the latest National Journal Education Experts blog :

Columbus Collegiate Academy: School's in session

Progressive education reformers: Give the GOP its due

I finally had a chance to take a look at The New Teacher Project's brief overview of the Race to the Top application, which, among other things, handicaps the states' chances at winning the money. (The key analysis is shown below.)

It's Friday you know what that means!

FUN FACT FRIDAY! You wait all week... and you won't be disappointed. In our FINAL Fun Fact Friday video, we use data from a recent Fordham report, The Accountability Illusion, to show you how some states set the bar high for their students--and some don't. Watch our Play-Doh men do the Twizzler high jump in this first ever education track meet.

National Standards: Rush to Judgment?

Writing in the Baltimore Sun earlier this week, the Lexington Institute's Robert Holland and Don Soifer reject the idea of national education standards on three grounds: that they're not truly voluntary, that they'll inevitably lead to a much-feared "national curriculum, and that part of

New Education Next website and blog

We give a warm welcome to Education Next's new website and blog, which already features a post by our own Mike Petrilli. The redesigned EdNext online has archived journal articles, videos and a podcast.

Education history smackdown!

Anyone who's been paying attention knows that Diane Ravitch has taken an increasingly contrarian position on education reform, and sees a lot not to like in George W. Bush's No Child Left Behind and Barack Obama's Race to the Top.

Greg Forster bogeys his "bogus" complaint

Greg Forster has nice things to say on Jaypgreene.com about our Friday Fun Fact video series.

I3

This morning Secretary Duncan and Assistant Deputy Secretary Jim Shelton gave a preview of the $650 million "Investing in Innovation Fund" (or "I3"), the companion to the Race to the Top.

Watch our charter schools & school vouchers event on CSPAN-2

(Above) Susan Zelman of the Corporation for Public Broadcasting

Video: With charter schools ascendant, is there still a future for vouchers?

Locke

Flypaper readers are aware of my stand against the turnaround bandwagon. We instead should close persistently failing schools and open new ones with the DNA for success.

Follow us on Twitter

Can't make our event today, "With charter schools ascendant, is there still a future for vouchers ?" Then follow our live tweets on twitter at twitter.com/educationgadfly .

Photo and essay content on the subject of public school buildings

Critical Exposure , Healthy Schools Campaign and 21st Century School Fund are sponsoring a photo and essay contest on the subject of public school buildings:

Raising Rigor, Getting Results: Lessons Learned from AP Expansion

David Wakelyn from the NGA Center for Best PracticesAugust 2009

Growth of school choice in the suburbs no cause for alarm

When charter schools were introduced in Ohio, they were presented as vital options for students in underperforming urban schools. Eleven years later, charters have broken through the borders of the "Big Eight" urban districts.

Who likes Jerry Weast the least?

I'm starting to think we should have a reader contest by that name. Last week I printed a letter from Joe Hawkins, a former Montgomery County official, explaining the underbelly of Weast's tenure.

Morning brief

My take on the Department's supposed pushiness, the states' need for cash, and the RTTT. MATCH's Goldstein, filling in at Eduwonk, on drafting off TFA.

Retooled - a dispatch from Dayton

Looking for the Liam Julian I once knew

He's not exactly the prodigal son , for he hasn't returned, and, well, he's not my son. But he's lost, gone "rogue" as one colleague put it, off the reservation.

Charter school quality

I'm on Chapter 7 of my book (of 12). ????This one recommends a new way to look at the value of charter schooling (teaser: it's not about looking at the quality of individual schools). ????So I've been swimming in the previous research and writing on this subject. ????If you're interested in this subject, here are a few things you might want to check out:

Proof of the poor state of the U.S. education system

This will make you laugh. And then it will make you cry at the poor state of the U.S. education system.

Fun Fact Friday! - Waiting....

The sixth video in our Fun Fact Friday! video series looks at students and the attention they receive at school. ----- Video fact source:

Jerry Weast and his many detractors

Often it's hard as a writer to know if you are having any impact, in fact to know if anyone is even reading your stuff.

Make up your mind, please, Gov. Strickland

Gov. Strickland needs to make up his mind about what to do with persistently failing schools in Ohio.

A truce in the voucher wars?

There's encouraging news out of Hillsborough County, Florida this morning, the home of Tampa and the eighth largest school district in the country.??The headline from the??St.

The South and gentrification, two key drivers for school reform

So I argue in today's Education Gadfly. Read it here.

Morning news

Not too much breaking news in the education world during these quiet August days. Secretary Duncan has even????decamped to the Last Frontier state.