A Public Education Primer: Basic (and Sometimes Surprising) Facts about the U.S. Education System
Center on Education Policy2006
Center on Education Policy2006
Predictably, Diana Jean Schemo and the New York Times found front-page, above-the-fold space to cover a new National Center for Education Statistics report, drawn from 2003 National Assessment of Educational Progress data, that finds private schools only slightly more effective than public when anal
On Tuesday, four GOP lawmakers--two from the Senate (Lamar Alexander and John Ensign) and two from the House (Howard McKeon and Sam Johnson)--proposed legislation to spend $100 million on vouchers for low-income students in chronically failing schools across the nation.
Superman has flown into Pittsburgh's public schools--and this time his name isn't Ben Roethlisberger. It's Kaplan, Inc, the $1.4 billion (with a "b") education company hired to produce curriculum for the Steel City's middle- and high-school students.
To compete with more lucrative private sector job options and address critical shortages, the Los Angeles Unified School District dangled a new (smallish) carrot in hopes of attracting and retaining math and science teachers. The City of Angels will bestow one-time $5,000 "incentives" on certified math and science teachers who opt for classroom over corporate positions.
The Wall Street Journal reported last week that Harvard may forfeit nearly $400 million in alumni gifts this year as a consequence of ex-president Lawrence H. Summers' abrupt exit. Even for mega-bucks Harvard, that begins to qualify as real money, a palpable hit in the pocketbook--a "significant setback" in Journalese.
Phyllis McClure, Dianne Piché, William L. TaylorCitizens' Commission on Civil RightsJuly 2006
James S. Leming, Lucien Ellington, and Mark SchugCenter for Survey Research and Analysis, University of ConnecticutMay 2006
Remember the mid-1990s, when pruning regulations and focusing on results was all the rage? Like so many education-reform movements, it's skipped town like a Texas twister.
Look around you--everywhere, even on the front page of the New York Times, boys are failing. Young men are in trouble. And everyone's trying to figure out why.
Mexico's presidential election brought a rare consensus in the U.S. press.
Who was Captain Cook, and what did he discover? Prime Minister John Howard wants young Aussies to know this and much more, and is calling for a "root-and-branch renewal of the teaching of Australian history... and the way it is taught." Education Minister Julie Bishop tacks with him, complaining that history is currently presented in vague themes, and "squashed...
Will the marriage of Paul Vallas and Philadelphia's School Reform Commission (SRC) soon end in divorce?
Having recently returned from a conference in North Africa, I found your State of State World History Standards awaiting me.
Your characterization of the Education Week methodology (see here) as analyzing "the percentage of 9th graders who completed high school four years later" isn't quite correct. The formula on page 12 of the Ed Week report does, indeed, make use of dropout rates from grade
School buses have never been particularly comfortable, efficient, or hip. So how would Mickey Velilla make the morning commute easier on students? Let them take limos.
We'll try to hide our grin as we note the end of Michael Winerip's education columns in the New York Times. Over the past four years, he somehow managed to travel the country reporting about K-12 education and never deviate from his initial, illogical perceptions (see here).
In the latest adaptation of a familiar argument, Ohio Board of Education members recently discussed a proposal to create "templates" for teaching scientific topics such as evolution, stem-cell research, and cloning. Strongsville's Colleen D.
Schools routinely blame socio-economic factors when their charges under-perform. And too many critics nod in agreement. Not those at The Education Trust, whose new study Teaching Inequality points the finger at districts that routinely pair economically disadvantaged students with inexperienced or out-of-field teachers.
The Graduation Project 2006Education Week/ Editorial Projects in EducationJune 22, 2006
The Secretary of Education's Commission on the Future of Higher EducationJune 22, 2006
While chattering education reformers bicker about standards, accountability, and how to spend Warren Buffet's billions, Japanologist Boyé Lafayette De Mente is busy attacking the achievement gap the old fashioned way: by cutting off its head with a Samurai sword.
New York has seen much mud-slinging and blame-shifting this week as the charter crowd seeks to explain why the legislature had the chutzpah to complete work on the state budget without raising the statewide charter-school cap from 100 to 150 schools, as urged by both Mayor Bloomberg and Governor Pataki.
When buying fireworks this weekend, don't forget to throw a box of birthday candles into your shopping basket. It's the 40th anniversary of the Coleman Report, which was released Fourth of July weekend 1966 to "deafening silence." Why the tepid initial response?
Once upon a time, Jonathan Kozol played a formative and constructive role in my career.
Dumb liberal ideas in education are a dime a dozen, and during my time as superintendent of Houston's schools and as the United States secretary of education I battled against all sorts of progressivist lunacy, from whole-language reading to fuzzy math to lifetime teacher tenure.
Thank you for your thoughts on Al Gore's film and the lack of multimedia tools in education.