July 2010

Senate panel approves Race to Top renewal

• 07-29-2010
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Blog by Alyson Klein/Education Week

The federal Race to the Top program would be renewed for another year under a spending bill approved today by the Senate Appropriations subcommittee that deals with education spending—but wouldn't receive nearly as much money as President Barack Obama has sought. Under the measure, which passed by voice vote with Republicans audibly voting "no," the Obama administration's signature education reform initiative would get $675 million in fiscal 2011 for another round of grants. That's a lot less than the $1.35 billion the administration asked for, and even less than the $800 million provided by a measure approved earlier this month by the Senate subcommittee's House counterpart. (more...)

Least-disruptive turnaround model proving popular

• 07-29-2010
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By Lesli A. Maxwell/Education Week

School districts are now receiving millions of dollars in federal money to turn around their chronically underperforming schools and, in a number of states, local educators overwhelmingly are opting for “transformation,” the least disruptive of four school intervention methods endorsed by U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan. All but eight states have been approved by the U.S. Department of Education to receive their share of the $3.5 billion in Title I School Improvement Grants, the supercharged program aimed at reversing years of academic decline at some of the nation’s most troubled schools. (more...)

Also: Database on schools slated for turnaround coming soon (Education Week)

Smarter world threatens to pass us by

• 07-29-2010
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Blog by John Fensterwald/Educated Guess

In the decades following the Second World War, the Unites States was among world leaders in the percentage of adults with a higher education degree. The GI bill underwrote the brain power that spurred America’s innovation. But particularly in the last decade, other nations have caught up and surpassed us. America now ranks 12th with those between the ages of 25 and 34 with a two- or four-year degree, behind Canada, Korea Russia, Japan, Australia, Israel and others. And that’s not even mentioning the decline in Americans pursuing degrees in science, math and engineering. (more...)

LAUSD athletes may be stranded

• 07-29-2010
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By Melissa Pamer and Connie Llanos/Los Angeles Daily News

The financially challenged Los Angeles Unified School District will for the first time ask parents to help pay for buses to take student athletes to high school sporting events this coming academic year. If enough money isn't raised, games could be canceled – a possibility that poses a dramatic threat to sports-crazed secondary schools. Campus athletic directors will request a $24 per-student contribution at the beginning of fall, winter and spring sports seasons. The goal is to cover $650,000 that was cut from the district's athletics transportation budget. (more...)

West County schools to attempt parcel tax in November

• 07-29-2010
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By Shelly Meron/Contra Costa Times

West Contra Costa voters will decide on a school parcel tax this November. School board members unanimously chose this week to move ahead with a tax of 7.2 cents per square foot of building area, or $7.20 per vacant parcel, each year for five years. "This is to keep the status quo. It's to keep what we have," said board member Audrey Miles. "We're not going to get it from the state." The board reached the decision after a debate over whether the district should pursue a 5 or 7.2 cent tax, after getting updated polling data. (more...)

School district delays paying back bonds

• 07-29-2010
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Blog by Emily Alpert/Voice of San Diego

San Diego Unified is seeking to borrow more money for school renovation and pay it off over a longer period of time. Doing so could help accelerate school fixes and upgrades, which have been delayed because of dropping tax revenues from a bond that voters approved two years ago. But taking longer to pay off the bonds will also mean that San Diego Unified pays more in interest. The question that the school district is wrestling with is whether the added costs of paying off bonds over a longer period of time -- just like taking longer to pay off your credit card -- will be offset by getting money to build and renovate schools sooner while construction prices are low. (more...)

Suit says La. schools fail disabled students

• 07-29-2010
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By Jennifer Van Vrancken/New Orleans Fox 8

Parents, broken hearted about how they say their special needs children were treated at school, shared their stories. Like Robyn Flanery who's honor roll, musically gifted daughter became deeply depressed in the 7th grade.  She says, "Rather than treating her illness, she began being punished for the most minor infractions... they expelled her. That expulsion broke my daughters heart and left a scar on our family forever. This should never happen again."Leskisher Luckett's 9 year old son Darren has ADHD attention issues.  She explains, "Instead of treating his disability, they locked my child in a closet over and over again." She paused fighting back tears, "They physically held him down and eventually mentally broke my child down." (more...)

'Hard truth' on education

• 07-29-2010
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By Barbara Martinez/Wall Street Journal

Erasing years of academic progress, state education officials on Wednesday acknowledged that hundreds of thousands of children had been misled into believing they were proficient in English and math, when in fact they were not. The bar for what it means to be "proficient" has now been set substantially higher. For instance, last year more than 77% of New York state students in grades three through eight reached proficiency in state English exams. Under the new standards, only 53% were considered proficient this year. (more...)

Obama defends education initiative

• 07-30-2010
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By Michael A. Memoli/Los Angeles Times

Calling the status quo "morally inexcusable" and "economically indefensible," President Obama defended his administration's sweeping education initiative Thursday before an audience that has been among the most skeptical of the plan — the National Urban League. "Education is an economic issue — if not the economic issue of our time," Obama said at the organization's centennial gathering in Washington. "We've got an obligation to lift up every child in every school in this country, especially those who are starting out furthest behind." (more...)

 Also: Education Week * Christian Science Monitor

Obama, education, Snooki, civil rights and Bryan Bass

• 07-30-2010
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Blog by Valerie Strauss/Washington Post

It's a little hard to make sense of what happened this week in the world of education, but, let's give it a fast try: *President Obama gave a speech to the Urban League convention in which he joked about the Jersey Shore’s Snooki and also said the following: “Now, over the past 18 months ... I think the single most important thing we’ve done is to launch an initiative called Race to the Top.” Yes, that’s what he said: His terribly misguided $4.35 billion competitive grant program is, apparently, more important than health care reform, the economic recovery program, improving the student loan program, increasing Pell Grant payouts, and, well, anything else he has accomplished since becoming president. (more...)

What would real school reform look like?

• 07-30-2010
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Commentary by James Farwell/Education Week

James Farwell is an educational psychologist and a licensed marriage and family therapist, in San Francisco. He spent 22 years working in inner-city schools in Oakland and Richmond, Calif.

Public school reform seems to boil down to closing schools; sending students to higher-achieving schools; converting a “failing” school to a charter school; replacing the principal, reforming instruction, and increasing learning time; and giving teachers monetary incentives to do better. Such “reform” seems as off the mark and ineffective as placing a Band-Aid on a melanoma. So the question that needs to be asked is what would real reform look like? As a society, we, the “village” that it takes to raise a child, need to make a conscious commitment to ensuring that all children receive a free and high-quality public education. (more...)

The right educational standards for California

• 07-30-2010
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Editorial/San Francisco Chronicle

The California State Board of Education almost certainly will vote on Monday to adopt the new national Common Core Standards. We say almost certainly because there's a lot of federal money at stake. California is in competition to win up to $700 million in Race to the Top funds, and states that adopt the standards receive extra points in the competition. Twenty-eight states have already adopted the common core. But there's still a bit of hesitation - because California's educational standards are widely considered to be stronger and more rigorous than the new national ones. (more...)

Also:  Opinion by Ted Mitchell/San Francisco Chronicle * Blog by John Fensterwald/Educated Guess

Board seeks to shutter failing charter schools

• 07-30-2010
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By Jill Tucker/San Francisco Chronicle

Failing charter schools across California could be shut down by the state Board of Education under a major policy shift aimed at ensuring that the alternative public schools fulfill their role as models of academic innovation. Dozens of the state's 850 or so charter schools, which have significant freedom outside the state Education Code, fall among the lowest-performing schools on standardized tests. That's unacceptable, state Board of Education members say. (more...)

School boards ask federal judges to block employee free speech

• 07-30-2010
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By Corey G. Johnson/California Watch

School boards are trying to reverse a federal court ruling banning administrators from controlling the free-speech rights of teachers and other school employees. According to a brief filed yesterday in 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, the National School Boards Association (NSBA) and the California School Boards Association (CSBA) argue that public K to 12 schools need discretion to regulate their employees’ expressions in the workplace. (more...)

Oakland school board says yes to $20 million parcel tax measure on November ballot

• 07-30-2010
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By Angela Woodall/Oakland Tribune

Oakland school trustees gave the green light to a $20 million parcel tax aimed at boosting salaries for school district staff and teachers — the lowest paid in the Bay Area. Late Thursday, trustees voted 6-1 to put the tax measure on the Nov. 2 ballot. This is the wrong time to try to tax residents more during the recession and near-record unemployment, said Trustee Noel Gallo, who cast the lone no-vote. The board should wait for another year, he said. "It's not going to be an easy sell." Despite voting to move forward with the tax, support was less than enthusiastic among trustees. But rejection by the seven-member school board was unlikely from the start of the nearly three-hour meeting. (more...)

Judge weighs in on establishment of two LAUSD pilot schools

• 07-30-2010
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KPCC

A judge took under submission today a request by Los Angeles Unified teachers for a court order directing the nation's second-largest school district to hold off on establishing two new pilot schools. Los Angeles Superior Court Judge Robert O'Brien did not say when he would rule on the motion by United Teachers Los Angeles for a preliminary injunction. If granted, the order would enjoin the LAUSD from going forward with plans to establish pilot schools at Lincoln High School and San Fernando Middle School until a trial is held on UTLA's claim that the changes require approval of the teachers as well as members of the Pilot Schools Steering Committee. (more...)

Schools chief bars free request for athletes

• 07-30-2010
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By Melissa Pamer and Connie Llanos/Los Angeles Daily News

Los Angeles Unified School District's superintendent vowed Thursday not to impose donation requests on the parents of athletes, overturning a fundraising plan reluctantly advanced by sports administrators. District officials had said earlier this week that LAUSD would for the first time ask parents to contribute $24 per student to bridge a $650,000 gap in the budget for transportation to and from games. If insufficient funds were raised, games could have been canceled, officials said. But Superintendent Ramon Cortines said Thursday that he did not know about the plan, and he ordered the request rescinded. "I was livid this morning. ... I was not aware of this," Cortines said Thursday, the day stories on the request were published in the Los Angeles Daily News and the Daily Breeze, a sister paper. (more...)

Change in testing standards fuels education critics

• 07-30-2010
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Blog by Aaron Rutkoff/Wall Street Journal

It’s been one day since New York state raised its standards for proficiency in reading and math, reversing years of evident progress for New York City students on standardized tests. Response to the news from education observers and pundits has been pretty grim. As Mayor Michael Bloomberg and Schools Chancellor Joel Klein pointed out Wednesday, the performance of city students hasn’t taken a sudden turn for the worse. (more...)