- I don’t usually clip blog posts, but the Ohio-centric nature of this piece from Citizen Ed was too much to resist. It describes a panel event called “The Faces of Education Reform,” held at the recent Excellence in Education annual conference. Two of those faces belonged to Ohioans—Kelley Williams-Bolar, who was prosecuted (and persecuted, it seems) for residency fraud in Akron, and Walter Blanks, a current college student who credits the EdChoice Scholarship Program for getting him where he (impressively) is today. (Citizen Ed blog, 12/5/17)
- Seasoned veteran reporter Cathy Candisky from The D seems to have been present for some reason when a lawyer from the Ohio Department of Education reported to a hearing officer some of its recent attendance audit findings for ECOT. Or maybe she just read the notes. Anywho, some questions are raised. (Columbus Dispatch, 12/5/17) Meanwhile, a cub reporter for The D drew the short straw and had to attend ECOT’s board meeting yesterday, in which it was revealed that water is wet. By which I mean, ODE’s clawback of previous funding due to prior attendance audit findings is affecting the school’s bottom line. As promised. (Columbus Dispatch, 12/5/17)
- Columbus Schools supe Dan Good is heading into retirement, but it seems he wants to go out swinging. Case in point, his report at last night’s board meeting which blasted city council and the Columbus community at large for, it appears, abandoning the district and “unfairly saddling” it with “total responsibility” for kids. He sounded pretty scathing to me when he said that community partners’ promises of in-school assistance are often not kept and that out-of-school problems create traumatic situations that, he seems to indicate, can undo the work of district staff. (Columbus Dispatch, 12/5/17)
- Totally unrelated to the above, the number of security cameras in Kettering’s middle schools is scheduled to go up by more than 800 percent soon. Um… yay? (WHIO-TV, Dayton, 12/5/17)
- Changes in federal school lunch requirements are in the works and the comment period is open at regulations.gov. The PD, intrigued by comments posted by a fourth grade class in Willard, Ohio, took a look. (Cleveland Plain Dealer, 12/6/17)
