Commentary
Of babies and bathwater
Mike, I agree that holding superintendents accountable for the performance of their schools is entirely appropriate, but as with any new law, the devil will prove to be in the details.
Topics
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Tenure, the movie
According to Inside Higher Ed, Luke Wilson will star in an upcoming film that producer Brendan McDonald says will "lampoon the tenure process" in colleges and universities. Tenure 2: Back to K-12 would make a great sequel.
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This Week's Fordham Factor: Spellings's latest NCLB overhaul
U.S. Secretary of Education Margaret Spellings has announced a pilot plan to let some states "differentiate" between really bad schools and mediocre ones--i.e., those that fail just one or two of their subgroups instead of all of them.
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House of McCain
Peggy Noonan turns in another characteristically perceptive "Declaration" for Saturday's Wall Street Journal--though one with uncharacteristically hokey imagery about a new house (Obama) and an old house (McCain).
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Catholic education's savior?
I'm still not wholly convinced that the decline of k-12 Catholic schools in this country merits the sort of "save them!" mobilization that many are calling for (see Mike's post, below). If urban Catholic schools can't compete with charter schools, why do they deserve special help?
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Curriculum & Instruction
Obama's education solution in search of a problem
Over at The Corner, Victor Davis Hanson wonders why Barack Obama is so worried about teaching students about oppression. He quotes a recent "news source":
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Charter Schools
Pray for an even playing field
Liam asks "if urban Catholic schools can't compete with charter schools, why do they deserve special help?"
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Charter Schools
Genuflecting before choice
Mike, I may agree with your point that Catholic schools should receive public funding.
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Skittlesgate
News update: School officials have decided to go easy on an eighth-grader caught purchasing contraband goods. Was it guns, drugs, or tobacco? Actually, none of the above. It was candy--and not even the hard-core kind like Snickers or M&M's, which if consumed in large quantities can really pack on the pounds (trust me, I know). It was a bag of Skittles.
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Getting religion on Catholic schools
One of the most anticipated events of Pope Benedict's upcoming trip to Washington is his address to 200 Catholic educators at Catholic University, scheduled for April 17.
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AP-palooza
There are sound ways to encourage more students to enroll in AP classes. But the tack of Seattle's Roosevelt High School, which will require all its sophomores to take at least one AP course next year, is not one of them.
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Five school reformers walk into a bar...
Okay--it was a restaurant, not a bar, where Green Dot's Steve Barr, AEI's Rick Hess, venture philanthropist Vanessa Kirsch, New York City Schools Chancellor Joel Klein, and Gates Foundation alumnus Tom Vander Ark sat down with writer Paul Tough for a New York Times Magazine "roundtable" on education philanthropy.
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Prozac pupils
A creeping malaise exists amongst British children, it seems. In February 2007, the United Nations Children Fund labeled U.K. youths the most unhappy in the western world. And why? The Association of Teachers and Lecturers, a national teachers' union, lays the blame at homework's feet.
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Chesapeake watershed
The central offices of the Baltimore and Washington, D.C., school districts are slimming. Baltimore schools chief Andres Alonso this week proposed to cut more than 300 central-office jobs, which will allow him to plug a $40 million budget shortfall and reroute another $70 million directly to schools.
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Most wanted
An anti-union group hopes to expose how difficult it is to fire the most dreadful teachers. The Center for Union Facts is asking educators, parents, and students to nominate the "worst unionized teacher in America"; the group will choose ten winners (losers, really) and offer each $10,000 to exit the classroom posthaste.
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Support, in brief
I'll be brief. I want to applaud your efforts regarding the Reading First scandal ("The true story of Reading First"). Reading First was perhaps education's best attempt at supporting the implementation of truly effective programs for struggling readers.
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The patron saint of busy
St. Anthony School in Milwaukee exists today only because of the city's voucher program. In 1998, before the state supreme court allowed public money to fund religious schools, St. Anthony enrolled under 300 students. Now it has over 1,000 pupils (all but about a dozen attend on vouchers) and is thriving.
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Instructional Time in Elementary Schools: A Closer Look at Changes for Specific Subjects
Center on Education PolicyFebruary 2008
Report
School Finance
Fund The Child: Bringing Equity, Autonomy, and Portability to Ohio School Finance
Ohio can boast of praiseworthy gains over the past decade in making school funding more equitable across districts, but there is more work to be done. To mitigate the school-finance inequities that remain within districts and gear school funding toward the realities of student mobility, school choice and effective school-based management, this report recommends that Ohio embrace Weighted Student Funding (WSF), which allocates resources based on the needs of individual students and by sending dollars directly to schools rather than lodging most spending decisions at the district level.
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The Price We Pay: Economic and Social Consequences of Inadequate Education
Clive R. Belfield and Henry Levin, EditorsThe Brookings Institution Press2007
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State sets requirements for STEM instructors
Currently, at least 20 Ohio public schools are seeking high school math and science teachers (see here).
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In search of the next great Gadfly
Do you have a passion for improving education and a sense of humor? Are you hard-working yet cheerful? Are you able to flex with changing circumstances and work in a fast-paced, demanding environment? If so, the Thomas B. Fordham Institute might be just the place for you.
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Inside ODE's budget cuts
After being dragged over the coals by Governor Ted Strickland in his State of the State Address, the Ohio Department of Education (ODE) has identified $101.2 million worth of budget cuts (see here) to help the governor pare $733 million from state government spending.
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Comprehensive Longitudinal Evaluation of the Milwaukee Parental Choice Program
School Choice Demonstration ProjectDepartment of Education Reform, University of Arkansas2008
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Reading First press conference
On March 10, the Thomas B. Fordham Institute demanded an inquiry into scandalous efforts by the executive and legislative branches to sabotage the Reading First program. httpv://youtube.com/watch?v=xSrUEHjwt1I
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Too little, too late?
Margaret Spellings addressed the Reading First state directors on Thursday and complained about Congress's "devastating" budget cut of the program. It's about time.