Breaking up is hard to do
The relationship between Philadelphia's former superintendent, Paul Vallas, and the district's School Reform Commission (SRC) survived a bit of a rough patch about this time last year.
The relationship between Philadelphia's former superintendent, Paul Vallas, and the district's School Reform Commission (SRC) survived a bit of a rough patch about this time last year.
Bill TuckerEducation SectorJune 2007
Gary Barnes, Edward Crowe, Benjamin SchaeferNational Commission on Teaching and America's Future2007
America is a youth-worshipping nation. Except, it seems, in the field of education, where gray hair and experience are frequently valued above all else. Hence the backlash against Michelle Rhee, who, at age 37, is seen by some as too young and green to head Washington's 55,000-student district.
Is it some new form of abstinence education? Or does the principal of Kilmer Middle School have a Howard Hughes-like aversion to touch? No one knows for sure, because no one can get close enough to Deborah Hernandez to find out why she won't permit physical contact of any kind on school grounds.
Can states fund religious charter schools without stepping all over the Constitution's anti-establishment clause? We think it's possible. And in the current issue of Education Week, Lawrence Weinberg and Bruce Cooper show how it's happening near Minneapolis.
The United States isn't the only land where primary-secondary schooling was traditionally the responsibility of the states or provinces, while the national government played a minor, even peripheral role.