Thursday, March 18, 2010
Look For Your Census Form In Mid-March 2010 Census
LAUSD board member looks to modify transfer policy after outcry - The Daily Breeze
LAUSD board member looks to modify transfer policy after outcry
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After an outcry from parents, a Los Angeles school board member said Monday he would push to partially overturn a new policy on transfer permits that could force thousands of students now attending South Bay schools to return to LAUSD campuses.
LAUSD board member Steve Zimmer, who represents Westchester, said through a representative that he would seek to let 10th- and 11th-grade permit students attend through graduation at their non-LAUSD campuses.
"Steve's concern is that students who are already in high school should be able to finish high school," said Zimmer's chief of staff, Sharon Delugach. "It's not really so much the emotional turmoil, but how it's going to affect them into college. It would be too disruptive."
Zimmer was traveling in Washington and could not be reached for comment.
His move comes after a Feb. 9 vote in which the board gave Superintendent Ramon Cortines authority to end inter-district transfer agreements in a bid to save money by keeping students in Los Angeles Unified. The item was discussed briefly and generated almost no attention.
Cortines later reported to board members in an internal memo that the move would raise
$51 million in enrollment-related state funding for the district, which is facing a $640 million budget gap. The superintendent estimatedRemainders: In the UFT election, still campaigning against Randi | GothamSchools
Remainders: In the UFT election, still campaigning against Randi
- One of those Central Falls, RI, teachers hung an effigy of Obama in school — and is sorry.
- Working with a university on standards, rather than using Common Core, won’t satisfy the RTTT judges.
- Hawaii’s RTTT app includes an admission that teachers get evaluated once every five years.
- The KIPP charter network and the AFT have settled their dispute over working hours at a Baltimore school.
- Everybody’s mother and daughter and son and some dads, too, were at the bake-sale ban rally today.
- Inside the UFT election: Chaz explains why he’s voting down the ICE ticket with one exception.
- That exception teacher makes his case, invoking his opposition to Randi Weingarten as a plus.
- Michelle Rhee’s hunt for master educators to evaluate D.C. teachers has launched. Apply here.
- Students against the MTA are “the most promising transit advocacy campaign going,” says Streetsblog.
- Community contributor Dana Lawit says her best teacher-evaluators are her students.
Sacramento Press / SCUSD to create ‘Superintendent’s Priority Schools’ for six most academically troubled schools
Parents and children defend homemade treats at City Hall rally | GothamSchools
Parents and children defend homemade treats at City Hall rally
by Philissa CramerTheir Future Is Now! http://www.savecupertinoschools.org/
Sacto 9-1-1: Sacramento police union backs Hammond, Kennedy in local races - Capitol and California - fresnobee.com
Read more: http://www.fresnobee.com/2010/03/18/1863979/sacto-9-1-1-sacramento-police.html#ixzz0iZVQkVZP
Education Research Report: ESEA Reauthorization: The Feds Leverage Their 7.5 Percent;
ESEA Reauthorization: The Feds Leverage Their 7.5 Percent;
The U.S. Department of Education's "Blueprint for Reform of Education" makes the case for a dramatic rewriting of national policy. In a new issue brief from The Century Foundation, Gordon MacInnes concludes that the Blueprint features some worthwhile and needed changes to the current law, but that it contains some serious problems that Congress should correct before it reauthorizes the Elementary and Secondary Act (ESEA), formerly known as No Child Left Behind (NCLB).
In "ESEA Reauthorization: The Feds Leverage Their 7.5 Percent" (the entire brief canalso be found at the end of this summary) MacInnes, a fellow at The Century Foundation, supports the U.S. Department of Education's (USDE) efforts to redress some of the most notable problems with NCLB. They include:
- A proposal that states agree on a new set of clear, strong, and relatively fewer standards, followed by cooperatively developed assessments that go beyond multiple choice;
Edu-Job: Master Educators The Quick and the Ed
Edu-Job: Master Educators
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TV debate places union friends and foes in a blame game | GothamSchools
TV debate places union friends and foes in a blame game
Called Intelligence Squared, the program airs on NPR and Bloomberg TV next week, but the transcript (a full 45 pages) of Tuesday’s teachers union-themed debate is online now. The program had six panelists debate the power of teachers unions to influence what goes on in classrooms and how much responsibility they should have for the outcomes. Going by the audience votes at the end of the show, the anti-union panelists swung undecided voters to their side — at the beginning of the program, 43 percent of the audience thought unions were to blame for failing schools and by the end 68 percent did.
Among the three pro-union panelists, there was a California superintendent, a Massachusetts elementary school teacher, and Randi Weingarten, the head of the American Federation of Teachers. The opposition included a Lo
Schools Matter: NJ's Bully Governor Will Not Be "Bullied:" Declares War on Teachers
NJ's Bully Governor Will Not Be "Bullied:" Declares War on Teachers
Having just announced slashes of over $800 million to the state education budget as a way to force concessions from the teachers (see video), Governor Christie has left untouched the budget lines for the cheap non-union charter chain gangs that provide an increasing amount of the penal pedagogy used in containing and segregating children of the urban poor:
In his address to the annual conference of the New Jersey Charter Schools Association in Long Branch, Christie said he largely left the funding for charter schools untouched when he introduced his controversial budget on Tuesday.
"We will do many good things for charters schools. In fact, I’ve held charter schools harmless in this budget because you already pay enough,’’ he said, "There are going to be more charter schools a year from now than there are today."
Who are the 6 Democratic senators poised to kill student loan reform?
Reforming the for-profit student loan system, which allows finance giants like Virginia-based Sallie Mae to make virtually risk-free returns thanks to government subsidies, was a top priority of President Obama. His idea, supported by most Democrats, was to take out the middle-man: Instead of subsidizing private lenders, the feds would completely take over origination of student loans.
The result: The Student Aid and Fiscal Responsibility Act, which the Office of Management and Budget estimated would save over $80 billion over 10 years (critics point out the number is inflated, because it didn't include money lost from defaults; but that's neither here nor there, because the government currently absorbs private losses anyway). Savings would be plowed back into Pell Grants -- much easier on students on the long-term -- and other higher education initiatives.
But as The New York Times writes today, this week six senate Democrats have threatened to derail the Act, writing in a letter to senate majority leader Harry Reid that "provisions of contemplated student lending reform that could put jobs at risk."
Obama effigy hung at RI school with fired teachers | Raw Story
Obama effigy hung at RI school with fired teachers
CENTRAL FALLS, R.I. -- A teacher at a failing Rhode Island school where he and all his colleagues were fired hung an effigy of President Barack Obama in his classroom, apparently in reaction to Obama's support of extreme measures to ensure accountability in schools.
The teachers union on Thursday condemned the effigy, discovered Monday in the teacher's third-floor classroom at Central Falls High School, saying it was wrong and cannot be condoned under any circumstances.
The effigy was found in the unidentified teacher's classroom by Superintendent Frances Gallo, Nicole Shaffer of the Rhode Island Department of Education told The Associated Press. Shaffer said the department would not have any further comment.
Gallo did not immediately respond to calls from the AP seeking comment, but she told CNN that the foot-tall Obama doll that she saw Monday was found hung from its feet from a white board and was holding a sign that said "Fire Central Falls teachers."
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