Today we talk exclusively about money. I know we’re usually talking about money when we talk about education in Ohio, but these clips are all a bit more…overt than usual. Plus, they are all talking about additional money for education—over and above the billions already flowing endlessly to schools from the state and other sources.
- East Cleveland City Schools will receive $350,000 from players and owners of the Cleveland Browns, dedicated to helping close the “digital divide” in the district. Devices, WiFi hotspots, and “improved Internet bandwidth” are on the shopping list. East Cleveland is just one of the districts benefitting from the team’s philanthropic efforts. (Cleveland.com, 10/30/20) Meanwhile, Fairless Local Schools was recently awarded $30,000 via a “public/private partnership” between the Ohio Department of Education and Philanthropy Ohio. It is part of an overall $3.1 million awarded to 28 “educational organizations” across the state through what is termed the Collaborative Fund for Educating Remotely and Transforming Schools. What will Fairless do with their $30K? Purchase a site license for their online learning platform (which, we are told, “provides high-quality videos and other tools to supplement instruction”) and provide professional development for their teachers to either “record instructional videos” or to “deliver digital instruction”. The story tells us both things will be done. Turns out that Fairless has been using this platform for several years already and that it’s something of a Swiss Army Knife of educational tools: Not only for digital learning, but also “an enrichment tool for gifted students and helping to close the learning gap for students who need additional instruction or credit recovery.” There’s more in there, but I think I may have made my point so I’ll just stop here. (Massillon Independent, 11/2/20)
- While it doesn’t say how much of the $50 million pot of CARES Act money the South Central Ohio Educational Service Center in Scioto County received, whatever it has it is going to use to boost the WiFi signals at its two buildings in the tiny town of New Boston. This way, students and families can park outside them and use the WiFi to “get online to check-in with their teachers, submit homework and more”. (Portsmouth Daily Times, 11/1/20)
- Given all of the foregoing, it is somewhat sad to include this piece among them because it does have some definite merit. First up, this is not “new” money flowing in to Dayton City Schools on top of all that they get and the millions upon millions of surplus they had trouble spending not long ago, but rather some actual new use of extra funding provided to schools in the last state budget. Additionally, we finally have a district using that state-provided “student wellness funding” on something very specifically pointed toward helping boost student wellness. (You will recall, no doubt, that concerns over the possible one-time nature of this funding led a number of school districts to build unstaffed “wellness areas”—a.k.a. empty rooms—for what sounded to me like pure spite. Sounds like ancient history, though, doesn’t it?) Anywho, Dayton City Schools is offloading $2.5 million in state wellness funding to Dayton Children’s Hospital to hire 25 “student resiliency coordinators” to connect with kids identified by teachers as likely in need of assistance. The coordinators are to be the conduits to whatever services kids may need and report back to the district on what’s being done. This does all sound a bit Big Brother-y to me, but I could also see where it might help a child and his family. The education part is where I think it really needs some scrutiny because it sort of sounds like the hospital is now going to be held accountable for whatever academic goals are set for any child under the auspices of a resiliency coordinator. And don’t get me started on how much “resiliency” it is obvious that Dayton’s children already have. (Dayton Daily News, 10/31/20)
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