I gave a presentation this morning to some state- and district-level education leaders working on a state committee charged with addressing persistently low-performing schools. They asked a number of thought-provoking questions and made several insightful, real-world implementation comments that are typically missing in the 30,000-foot DC policy debate.
Is there a connection between the raging health care debate and education in America today? You bet, argues Checker in this piece on NRO (which also will run in our weekly Gadfly newsletter).
Senator Tom Harkin (D-IA) has replaced the late Ted Kennedy as chairman of the Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee. Many interest groups are ecstatic, many school reformers wary, seeing Harkin as an old-style Democrat who opposes charter schools and merit pay and works on behalf of the establishment. But there could be a silver lining.
A current proposal from the Philadelphia School Reform Commission (SRC) would force charter schools that want to increase their enrollments or reconfigure their grade levels to do so as part of the contract renewal process (which occurs every five years), instead of through a separate, less-regulated process of amendment. Under the new rules, charters seeking to expand would need to submit
Surprise! TFA is serious about teacher quality. Not only do they recruit and retain the most qualified applicants, but they also boast a professional development program that puts most to shame.
In last week's Recommended Reading Dangerously confusing (September 10, 2009), we blamed the disingenuous school report cards issued by New York City on the poor psychometrics of the state Regents tests.
Many years hence, as the students of Cushing Academy hold their faces close to their electronic book readers, they probably won't even know of those distant days of yore when people discovered literature by browsing shelves.
Marilyn Thomas and Crystal CollinsSouthern Regional Education Board2009
What kind of education would one need to make sense of the current health-care debate? As America rethinks its academic standards and international competitiveness, this is not a bad time to ask what U.S.
Who were Julius Caesar, Leif Ericsson, and Charles Darwin? Know the answer? Well that’s because you, dear reader, are not a recent or current product of British schools—state, independent, or otherwise--where the Romans, Vikings, and Victorians, amongst others, can be skipped in history class so that students have time to learn how to use social networking sites like Twitter.
One of the hottest slogans in education today is "21st Century Skills." Though it certainly sounds compelling--who could be against teaching our students the skills they need in this budding century?--this is much more than a feel-good, everyone-jump-onboard valence issue.
I am in no way keen on the "research" produced by the American Federation of Teachers (AFT) but I have to admit that they have raised an important issue in their latest report that merits attention--that is, if you can stomach the rhetoric it's clothed in.
Just wanted to echo/add to what Andy wrote earlier. Led by Common Core, nearly 30 leaders (including Checker) signed onto a statement today that strongly criticizes the program put forth to states by the Partnership for 21st Century Skills, known as P21.
One frequently hears arguments that redirect blame from failing schools (and their teachers and principals) to ubiquitous social monsters that are bigger and hairier (poverty, broken families, crime) but also impossible to hold accountable. I get this. There are undeniable correlations between student achievement and socioeconomic status.
Over at the Education Next blog, Martha Derthick laments the decline of “stately” schools. Derthick specifically highlights the turn-of-the-twentieth-century school buildings in Ohio’s Queen City (which are also featured in 2001’s An Expression of the Community: Cincinnati Public Schools’ Legacy of Art and Architecture).
Two years ago the Thomas B. Fordham Institute issued a report critical of the financial sustainability of the State Teachers Retirement System (STRS) and the adverse effects the system’s benefits policy has on recruiting young teachers.
Primary-secondary education is obviously not the only realm of increased litigation in American life and intense court involvement in social policy. It's most definitely not the only field in which the fruits of such litigation have sometimes turned out to be mushy if not rotten.
Two recently released studies have the potential to influence policy related to teacher mentoring programs and school staffing. These studies are especially poignant for Ohio as it moves to restructure its new teacher induction programs (see here).
Andy Rotherham is moving on, so reported????Ed Week and now confirmed with this press release..
Diane Ravitch, Mike Petrilli, and others have been raising questions about state test scores for some time, especially in New York.
The latest on the DC teacher contract battle. (I still find it hard to believe that the union doesn't want its teachers to have the chance to make $130,000/year.)
Heal for America? William Healy argues in this weekend's Wall Street Journal that healthcare could benefit from a Teach for America-esque program.
There was some concern (and maybe a few I-told-you-so's) when DCPS counted only 37,000 students on the first day of school. But now, only three weeks later, enrollment has??boomed up to 44,397.
That's the title of a rather bold speech Checker gave at Rice University's Educational Entrepreneurship Program on Sept. 9.
My sister teaches first grade and, like so many students, her class obviously has no firsthand ??knowledge of Sept. 11 or what it meant for our country. For them and so many others, knowledge of that day will come entirely from what people tell them and what they read.
I'm writing quarterly reports for AEI on the implementation and influence of the education provisions of the ARRA (the federal stimulus legislation). The second report was just released; you can find it here and a brief description here. Major takeaways:
NewSchools Venture Fund, consistently a valuable contributor to education reform, is hosting a smallish meeting today in DC on turnarounds (apparently with an appearance by Secretary Duncan). By all accounts, this is an effort to get charter school operators interested and involved in turnarounds.
