Commentary
Commentary
Who Controls Teachers' Work? Power and Accountability in America's Schools
Richard Ingersoll, Harvard University PressFebruary 2003
Commentary
Financial Impact of the No Child Left Behind Act on the State of New Hampshire
The Josiah Bartlett Center for Public Policy, The Business Roundtable, AccountabilityWorksFebruary 2003
Commentary
New England states to develop shared standards and tests
Four New England states - Rhode Island, Maine, New Hampshire, and Vermont - will be working together to develop common standards and tests in English and math for grades 3-8 in order to comply with the No Child Left Behind Act. Test development is a costly undertaking and, by joining forces, these states will be able to cut costs.
Commentary
Culture clash between philanthropists and public school systems
Following the lead of three major foundations in Pittsburgh, which suspended funding to the school system in July 2002 because of a decline in district leadership, governance and fiscal discipline [for more see "Foundations withdraw grants to Pittsburgh school district," a private foundation in Memphis has vowed not to dona
Commentary
High-stakes testing in Massachusetts is proving critics wrong
exam presents an impossibly high barrier, yet more than 80 percent of 12th graders have already passed it and many more are expected to pass later this year. Further, the evidence suggests that many students who failed the test did so for simple reasons: they missed many days of school and did not attend any of the tutoring sessions that have been offered to help them clear the bar.
Commentary
The Civic Mission of Schools
Carnegie Corporation of New York and the Center for Information & Research on Civic Learning & EngagementFebruary 2003
Commentary
Are Advanced Placement (AP) courses still the gold standard?
A long article in this month's American School Board Journal examines whether the tremendous growth in students taking AP courses has been accompanied by slackening of that program's lofty academic standards. Today nearly 950,000 students worldwide take AP courses, more than double the number a decade ago.
Commentary
Breaking News: Ed School Profs Endorse Phonics and Mandated Curricula!
How well I recall a day in 1987 when Teachers College, Columbia University, was celebrating its centennial as our nation's premier school of pedagogy. One of the events marking this grand occasion was a panel discussion of the topic: "Do we need a national curriculum?" On one side, arguing the affirmative, was Checker Finn and a Teachers College faculty member.
Commentary
Our Schools & Our Future: Are We Still at Risk?
Two decades after the National Commission on Excellence in Education issued its celebrated "A Nation at Risk" report, how much progress has the U.S. made in averting that risk and bringing excellence to its schools? Not much, says the Hoover Institution's Koret Task Force on K-12 Education, one of whose eleven members I am.
Commentary
Should homework be abolished or expanded?
Intrigued by a report on CBS suggesting that today's kids are burdened with too much homework, ace Washington Post reporter Jay Mathews did some digging.
Commentary
Special ed reauthorization heating up
As Congress begins work on updating the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA) this spring, expect funding, vouchers, and discipline issues to emerge as major sticking points, according to a neat summary of the special ed debate appearing at Stateline.org.
Commentary
National Teacher Certification: Advancing Quality or Perpetuating Mediocrity?
Robert Holland, The Lexington InstituteDecember 2002
Commentary
What Works in Schools: Translating Research into Action
Robert J. Marzano, The Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development2003
Commentary
Commentary
New SAT measures creative and practical skills, boosts minority scores
A revised SAT being developed by the College Board and psychologist Robert Sternberg produces smaller test score gaps across racial groups and can help colleges achieve diversity without using affirmative action, its developers claim.
Commentary
New York's Finest (?) and the Perils of Determinism
Last week, New York City chancellor Joel I. Klein released the list of 208 schools that will be exempt from the new citywide math and reading curricula that go into effect next year in the rest of the country's largest school system.Ignore for now the issue of whether a uniform citywide curriculum is a good idea.
Commentary
The Invisible Dyslexics: How Public School Systems in Baltimore and Elsewhere Discriminate Against Poor Children in the Diagnosis and Treatment of Early Reading Difficulties
Kalman R. Hettleman, Abell FoundationFebruary 2003
Commentary
The education establishment's assault on school reform
Breaking up a popular, high-achieving neighborhood elementary school because it doesn't have enough white students, even though the suburban black parents who send their children there are pleased with the school. Trying to shut down charter schools, though they cost less to run than traditional public schools, their students' performance may be superior, and they have long waiting lists.
Commentary
Abandoning vocational education has its costs
Having read Chester Finn's commentary last week ("Part II: Rethinking Vocational Education"), I wonder if perhaps Mr. Finn, in his effort to review federal education policy, simply overlooked current special education law. IDEA specifically calls for transition services to be provided while disabled children are still in public school.
Commentary
Unions behind the push to hire more teachers without reducing class size
Over the past thirty years, per-pupil spending on education has doubled. Almost half of this increase was caused by the hiring of many more teachers. As a result, the number of students per U.S. teacher has shrunk from 22 to 15 since the early 1970s. Oddly, this hasn't led to a reduction in class size; instead, the average teacher simply faces fewer classes per day.
Commentary
Private schools more likely to dismiss teachers for poor performance
In a recent Gadfly, Chester Finn reviewed All Else Equal by Benveniste, Carnoy, and Rothstein. Those authors claim that private schools are very similar to public schools. They base their findings on case studies of sixteen private schools, only some of which are Catholic.
Commentary
Snowmen, huts, yachts banned from textbooks by language police
You won't see any references to bookworms, busybodies, craftsmanship, cults, dialects, dogma, extremists, fairies, heroines, huts, jungles, lumberjacks, limping, Navajos, one-man bands, slaves, snowmen, straw men, or yachts in today's textbooks.
Commentary
Commentary
Addressing Racial Disparities in High Achieving Suburban Schools
Ronald D. Ferguson, NCREL Policy Issue 13December 2002
Commentary
Are We There Yet? Accountability for the Performance of Students with Disabilities
Sara Bolt, Jane Krentz, Matha Thurlow, University of Minnesota, National Center on Educational Outcomes. November 2002
Commentary
When Schools Stay Open Late: The National Evaluation of the 21st-Century Community Learning Centers Program, First Year Findings
U.S. Department of Education, Office of the Under SecretaryPrepared by Mathematica Policy Research, Inc. and Decision Information Resources, Inc.February 2003
Commentary
Latest developments in teacher pay
If you missed the national conference on teacher compensation and evaluation sponsored by CPRE (Consortium for Policy Research in Education) in November 2002, you can now access most of its presentations online.
Commentary
Commentary
Districts promote misinformation on transfer provisions of the No Child Left Behind Act
Parents who call school district offices in New York City to try to transfer their children out of failing schools have a nearly 1 in 2 chance of getting the wrong information, two reporters from the New York Daily News found.