What if Texas cheerleaders wave banners with Koran verses?
In Texas, it is now apparently considered freedom of speech — rather than a violation of the separation of church and state — for cheerleaders at a public high school to display to football game crowds banners with Bible verses written on them.
Kountze High School cheerleaders and children write religious sayings on banners in Texas.(The Beaumont Enterprise, Dave Ryan, File/Associated Press)
A district court judge said that the cheerleaders at Kountze High School in East Texas did not have to put down their banners while the issue is contested in court.
The Kountze Independent School District had said it was forbidden for religious-themed banners to be displayed at a school function, but the cheerleaders couldn’t take the Constitution for an answer, so their families went to court, saying their freedom of speech had been violated.
Billionaires put big bucks in Louisiana school board races
Here is a new case study in our continuing look at how billionaires (and millionaires) are throwing around their money to drive education reform. (Previous posts are here and here.)
It turns out that billionaire school reformers Eli Broad, Michael Bloomberg and other fabulously wealthy individuals who don’t live in Louisiana contributed money to influence the outcome of races for the state board of education.
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Welcome to the blogging world, Superman!
It’s not often that a superhero joins the blogging world, but, apparently, we are getting one — Superman, er, Clark Kent.
According to the BBC, Clark Kent, Superman’s alter ego, is going to leave his position as star reporter at the Daily Planet newspaper — where he has worked since the 1940s — because he thinks the new conglomerate that owns the publication isn’t interested in publishing actual news.
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Caption this cartoon: ‘Who’s got issues?’
Each week, the website of Bill Moyers publishes a cartoon and asks the public to suggest in captions that fit it. Here’s this week’s, by Norman Dapito, with this introduction:
Yes, our political campaigns have issues, but not all issues are treated alike. Some — like climate change, poverty, and education — are routinely ignored as if they don’t merit any attention at all. Well here’s your chance to give some voice to those topics… literally..
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The changing blame game in U.S. education
Teachers have felt under such heavy assault for the past several years by school reformers intent on using assessment methods that experts say are invalid, reducing their collective bargaining rights and other actions that it may be hard to remember that it wasn’t always this way. In the following post, Larry Cuban, a former superintendent of Arlington Public Schools, writes about the changing “blame game” in American education. Cuban was superintendent for seven years, a former high school social studies teacher for 14 years and professor emeritus of education at Stanford University, where he has taught for more than 20 years. This first appeared on his blog.
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