- Last week it was Chad on the spot, but the torch is being passed, so it’s today it’s Aaron’s turn to discuss the putative cost of a universal backpack funding bill in this DDN piece. As you might expect of a data guy, he’s pragmatic on the details despite the rather amped up rhetoric from the other contributors around him. (Dayton Daily News, 3/13/23)
- It feels like the only reason that this piece—which is another assembly of the evidence in favor of the science of reading (woot woot—say it loud!)—is listed as an opinion piece is because the author is a member of the Editorial Board of the Rep. There doesn’t seem to be anything opinion-y about it to me. Just the facts, ma’am. Although, given the wishy-washy PD editorial board piece on the topic from last weekend, perhaps there may be another reason this ended up on the opinion page. (Canton Repository, 3/12/23) Relatedly, here’s an inside look at the struggles of fifth grade students in reading and math at one Cleveland Metropolitan School District building. While I assume the teachers here are discussing their most-challenged students, a) those challenges seem pretty overwhelming at this point, b) there are likely other students with similar severe-but-not-the-very-severest challenges who were not part of the story, c) it feels like some evidence of improvement should have registered by now, even for the most-behind kids, despite the very important point that CMSD students “spent more time learning remotely than in most Ohio school districts”, and d) the teachers quoted here don’t seem all that confident in their abilities to effect any further boost for anyone. Although they at least sound like they’re going to try. (Cleveland.com, 3/13/23)
- Catholic education in Ohio has traditionally been divided into K-8 and 9-12 buildings with little to no variation. (And when those guys say “tradition”, they usually mean 150 years of it). St. Peter’s in Mansfield is, amazingly, changing things up to create a true middle school consisting of grades 6, 7, and 8. Students will move to their own floor of the high school building and will follow a restructured curriculum including early prep for high school honors courses as well as a full suite of “life skills” courses to help focus on “whole child development”. Sounds great to me. There’s no discussion, though, of how school families are receiving news of the change. Sure hope no one decides to sic the health department on ‘em in a fit of...whatever. (Mansfield News-Journal, 3/10/23)
- There are no details here as to what was in the agreement—and indeed the piece was posted before the deal was even ratified—but it seems that a contract agreement was reached in the Morgan Local Schools bus driver strike late on Friday. If everything went OK over the weekend, transportation should have resumed as normal this morning. (10TV News, Columbus, 3/10/23)
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