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Columbus Collegiate Academy wins prestigious national award for student achievement gains

Solar panels on Ohio schools green for two reasons

Despite a debate among residents and school board members in Worthington, Ohio, over global warming, the district has put itself on the map for install

Today's Ohio Education Gadfly: find out why Ohio might be a trailblazer in charter accountability

This week's edition kicks off with a great piece by Terry discussing the unprecedented move by the Ohio Department of Education to close a charter school sponsor (aka authorizer) for fiscal mismanagement.

Will being a first-round finalist hurt Ohio's chances in the Race to the Top?

When federal education Secretary Arne Duncan unveiled the finalists for his $4.35 billion Race to the Top sweepstakes last week, surprise was a common reaction – surprise both at how many (16 out of 41 applicants) and who made the cut.

Buckeye State holding charter school sponsors accountable

The Ohio Department of Education (ODE) is seeking to close a troubled charter school sponsor (aka authorizer), the Cleveland-based Ashe Culture Center, Inc.

My impromptu education debate with Bill Ayers

Forget accusations of terrorism, it seems wise to shy away from involvement with Bill Ayers if only because his ideas on public education reform are, well ??? pretty awful.

Timing is right in Ohio for smart district consolidation

Spurred by a new report and the looming state financial crisis, the time may be right for school district consolidation for Ohio.??

The latest Ohio Education Gadfly ?????' who knew decreasing class size was so expensive?

It's no surprise that Ohio's economy is in crisis, but you might be amazed at the price tag for some of Gov. Strickland's new education mandates. Terry points out the implications of decreasing class size in grades K-3 alone (to 15:1), which will cost $784 million per year by 2014.

Teach For America's new book offers timely data on teacher effectiveness

???Teacher effectiveness??? has made its way to the top of the education policy agenda, supplanting the focus on ???highly qualified???

It's snow laughing matter

RIP snow days. Viva virtual learning. The mid-Atlantic may have lost electric power, its dignity, and a week of work days when the white fluffy stuff blanketed the region in early February. But it didn’t lose learning time, at least for some students with enterprising teachers. Using internet chats and document uploading websites, teachers across the D.C.

2009 State Policy Yearbook: Ohio

National Council on Teacher QualityJanuary 2010

Move over Charlie Brown, here comes Ohio

This has been a tough winter for Ohio and its cities, and I don’t mean because of the weather… In last week’s Ohio Education Gadfly, we pointed out another rating system that, although not education-specific, is still somewhat disheartening.

Re: Cleveland teachers union: If you can't beat ???????em, join ???????em

???????The overriding question is how will having a teachers union improve on our ability to educate all of our children and make sure they're ready to graduate from college? We respect that they represent the interests of teachers; we represent the interests of students.???????????

Move over Charlie Brown, here comes Ohio

This has been a tough winter for Ohio and its cities, and I don't mean because of the weather. Ever since the December release of math test results from NAEP's Trial Urban District Assessment (TUDA) ???

America's private public schools

Ask Americans if they support “public schools,” and you will get a resounding “yes.” At the heart of our abiding commitment to the idea of public education is Horace Mann’s ideal of the “common school”: a place whose doors are open to everybody, and where all children, regardless of social class, race or eth

Romeo and Juliet have nothing on Ohio charter schools

Since the troubled birth of charter schools here in 1997, school districts have had a love/hate relationship with them. Some district officials have sought to embrace them as part of their larger reform efforts, while others have done everything in their power to kill them off. A few leaders have actually done both simultaneously.

Cincinnati: We'll sell you a school building, just don't use it for a school

Can a school district sell a school building and prohibit the buyer from opening a school in that building?

Let's get physical

In a recent poll of elementary school principals commissioned by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation (RWJF), a majority of principals reported that recess has a positive impact on student achievement.

It's time for value-added 2.0 in Ohio

???????Value-added??????? measures of academic progress are undeniably important, and we've cheered their addition to school assessment and accountability systems.???? At the school level, knowledge about how much progress a child is making can help teachers and school leaders make smart decisions about instruction.????

"Turnaround" by any other name would be just as...sour

Here’s what we know about previous attempts to fix America’s most persistently failing schools. Turnarounds in other fields seldom work. Turnarounds in education have even lower success rates. Despite decades of effort, we still don’t have a reliable playbook for turning a very low-performing school into a good school, much less a great school.

Say good-"Bayou" to the status quo

Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal wants to cut the red tape keeping local schools and districts from achieving greater student success with his new four-year waiver proposal--but he’s attaching one big string. Under his plan, basically any state law or regulation that does not concern federal requirements, student safety, accountability, or graduation rules is on the table. The twist?

What goes up must come down

Here’s a piece of unsurprising news: More students are failing Advanced Placement exams. We could have told you this last spring, when we surveyed AP teachers about the push to offer the program’s rigorous content to more students.

Unsaintly behavior

When 17-year-old Brandon Frost wore his Indianapolis Colts jersey last Friday to support his hometown football team, his school’s principal was less than receptive. See, Frost had moved three years ago from Indiana to rural Louisiana, where Maurepas High School principal Steve Vampran had relaxed the student dress code for Black-and-Gold Day in honor of the New Orleans Saints.

2009 State Teacher Policy Yearbook

This third edition of the NCTQ Yearbook takes another well-deserved look at the teaching profession, boasting a revamped set of goals and indicators even more rigorous than last year’s. The headline? States are floundering in all areas.

Use of Education Data at the Local Level

The pointy-headed analysts over at SRI International, working under the auspices of the Dept of Ed, have released an interesting survey of data systems in twelve nationally-representative school districts.

Bitter Pill, Better Formula: To a Single, Fair and Equitable Formula for ESEA Title I, Part A; Spoonful of Sugar: An Equity Fund to Facilitate a Single, Fair and Equitable ESEA Title I-A

This pair of policy papers tackles the untouchable: the much despised, but politically sacrosanct, Title I formula.

The Ohio Education Gadfly makes for good snow day reading

Be sure to check out the latest edition of the Ohio Education Gadfly for some good snow day reading. With DC experiencing more precipitation than Ohio (a rare event) and the east coast getting hammered- we know some of you out there are buried indoors (and if you venture out, be sure to dress the part).

Every bit counts: Ohio could gain tens of millions under revised Title I formula

Ohio is facing roughly an $8 billion deficit as it heads into a new biennium, so it should come as no surprise that Governor Strickland is lobbying for whatever federal money might be available to help fill the hole.

Finding excellence in Canton, Ohio

Yesterday morning I visited McGregor Elementary, a school in Canton, Ohio, serving students in preschool through sixth-grade, and doing it very well. The building sits practically across the street from the sprawling Timken Co. steel plant, nestled in a neighborhood you might describe as working class.

Is Ohio's value-added system broken?

In 2008, the Ohio Department of Education (ODE) released data showing that more than 80 percent of Ohio schools achieved “below expected growth” in fifth-grade reading. A year later, ODE data showed that 98 percent of schools made “above expected growth” in sixth-grade reading. What’s going on here?