SIG Grants and the Charter School Bargain
Continuing our week-long look at who is getting federal School Improvement Grants and what they’re doing with the money, the map below shows all of the charter schools across the country that are receiving federal SIG grants:
Dashboard 3
Hold on a minute…charter schools are receiving SIG dollars? Indeed.
Of the 843 schools currently chosen to receive federal School Improvement Grants, 58—almost 7 percent—are charter schools.* And the vast majority, 76 percent, are using the ‘transformation’ model, which requires changes that one would hope to see these charter schools (given their operational flexibility) doing anyway, such as extending the school day or instituting rigorous staff evaluations. Only three of the charter school SIG grants
Quick Hits (4.28.2011)
Michael Agger of Slate asks: “Does a player’s speech predict how he’ll perform in the NFL?” (Slate)
Jay P. Greene on Diane Ravitch’s scholarship as an education historian: “All of this raises the same question that I raised before about whether Ravitch is really a great scholar. She hardly seems like a serious person. And it seems perfectly possible to me that her current horde of devoted followers are just as delusional as were her previous horde. They just like her for saying things that they want to hear and have no ability to judge the substance behind her various claims.” (Jay P. Greene’s Blog)
Professor Mark Biggs’ reaction to faculty members objecting to online journalism courses at Missouri State University: “It digs down to the real issue, which is, as a department, are you going to be student-centric