- An interesting discussion of the importance of education in the Black community comes to us from Lima. Local entrepreneur Jeffrey Kirkman reiterates that Black families want and deserve the best for their children but data show that traditional district schools are not working for many Black youth. He is a fan of the EdChoice Scholarship Program for this reason. Neither Mr. Kirkman’s strong support nor his reasoning therefor are allowed to stand by themselves, as you no doubt guessed, because this is Ohio journalism. I’ll leave it to you to see who pops up to counter his statements and the somewhat novel argument used. (Lima News, 1/15/22)
- Speaking of Ohio journalistic no-brainers, both the reason for creation of Academic Distress Commissions (years, sometimes decades, of unrelenting academic suckitude) and the hard-fought resistance to ADC improvement efforts by entrenched local interests have been nearly entirely erased in this piece. It’s almost too cliché to bother remarking on, really. However, this discussion of what East Cleveland City Schools and Lorain City Schools have planned to help them finally shake off that “unfair” and “unsuccessful” ADC control. (Youngstown City Schools is likely still a bit too radioactive to fit into this story and is thus also shunted to the side.) Kudos, I suppose, to current East Cleveland CEO Henry Pettiegrew for at least admitting that his students’ test scores—and reading levels—have been wretched over many many years. But now that state oversight is waning and he and his elected board at last have a chance to fix those long-standing failures to educate students, what’s the big plan? A giant hunk of a remote, asynchronous learning. Yes, you read that right. “Pettiegrew is calling this next semester before that July start date their ‘preseason’,” the article tells us. “As a part of that, every Monday — they're calling it Mindful Monday — the students are learning remotely. They’re meeting virtually with groups, learning asynchronously, meeting with school counselors and psychologists.” Nope. I don’t get it either. (Ideastream Public Media, Cleveland, 1/18/22)
- Meanwhile, out in suburbia, high school junior Mohammad Zoraiz hacked an existing math app and built his own variation designed to help his fellow students boost their skills on their own. (He was regularly asked by teachers to help tutor others.) He also won a first place award in the 2021 Congressional App Challenge and provided all the photos used in this article. Is there nothing this young man can’t accomplish? I think not. Kudos! (WKYC-TV, Cleveland, 1/13/22)
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