Gadfly Bites 8/21/19 – The good, the bad, and the ugly of the first days of school

1. It’s back to school time across Ohio and the local news media is covering it from lots of angles. First up: the good. The new freshman academy in Reynoldsburg City Schools sounds kind of cool. A year-long prep for determining how best to pursue one’s high school career. I assume they don’t have any precocious prodigies as freshmen this year because I don’t think this…deliberation…would be Hamad-approved somehow. (ThisWeek News, 8/19/19)
   

2. Also good, it seems, is the continued drop in charter school enrollment in Ohio. At least the editors of the Dispatch think it signals some needed stability in the sector. (Columbus Dispatch, 8/20/19)

3. Surprisingly also good, it seems, are Ohio’s new graduation requirements as passed in the state budget. At least according to this piece, which also manages to cover three different sets of requirements in just 500 words. Nice. (Columbus Dispatch, 8/21/19)

4. What’s not good? The surface-y level discussion of—and blatant misinformation on—College Credit Plus in this TV news piece from suburban Toledo. (WTOL-TV, Toledo, 8/20/19)

5. I’ll spare you the real ugliness on offer in Lorain as school gets underway there this year. But this will do instead. As if Lorain doesn’t have enough issues to deal with, the district must send back a sizeable donation of backpacks and school supplies due to the toxic materials warning on both the bags and most of the items within. While this is a strange and potentially demoralizing turn of events, I would suggest that something good could come from it. The donor, Lorain County Prosecutor Dennis Will, was helpfully philosophical: “You’ve always got to take everything with a grain of salt in life.” Would that all of the elected officials in Lorain County could live by—and conduct themselves in accordance with—that motto. (The Chronicle-Telegram, 8/21/19)

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