3/12/2014 – De Blasio Is Right About Charters:

3/12/2014 – De Blasio Is Right About Charters

March 12, 2014 Subscribe

THIS WEEK: Schools Need Nearly $200 Billion To Improve Facilities … School Funding Declared Unconstitutional … Education Reform Drives Gentrification … Socialization Technique Helps Academic Achievement … College Aid Benefits The Rich

TOP STORY

Mayor De Blasio Has It Right On Charter Schools

By Jeff Bryant

“Newly elected New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio has become the target of charter school proponents … This is what the debate about education policy – and charter schools in particular – so often comes to: So much sturm and drang about a favored trinket from the ‘education reform’ tool box while matters of way more importance get neglected or even abused.”
Read more …

NEWS AND VIEWS

Public Schools Need Nearly $200 Billion To Improve Facilities, Survey Finds

Education Week

“Upgrading the nation’s public K-12 school buildings to a ‘good overall condition’ would cost about $200 billion … 53% of public schools need to spend money on repairs, renovations, and modernizations … For schools where 75% or more of students are eligible for free and reduced-price meals, the percentage in need of substantial upgrades to reach good condition is 60%. A higher percentage of schools in the Western states (59%) reported a need for major repairs and renovations than in the three other major regions of the country… 31% of public schools use portable buildings for classroom space on their sites, but such temporary buildings are more commonly found in schools that serve large numbers of poor and minority students.”
Read more …

Kansas School Funding Declared Unconstitutional By State Supreme Court

The Huffington Post

“The Kansas Supreme Court on Friday ruled the state’s funding of public schools to be unconstitutional … The opinion sets no legal precedent outside Kansas. But it provides clear language on school funding that may influence courts in New York, Texas and Connecticut that are considering similar cases that argue states are not funding schools adequately and equitably … The court ruled the state must immediately restore two matching funding streams … that had helped poorer school districts compensate for property tax bases significantly smaller than wealthy districts. The legislature had slashed the funds after the recession.”
Read more …

How Education Reform Drives Gentrification

Aljazeera

“Public school teachers in Portland, OR … This is a process playing out nationwide … Middle-class families eye Northeast Portland for its undervalued homes but choose different schools because neighborhood ones are pegged as bad. Declining enrollment bleeds money from already underfunded schools, making them less attractive and creating a downward spiral in which the schools are rated as failing, subsequently closed and eventually replaced by charter schools that can cherry-pick students … As public schools in Northeast Portland shutter, black households are displaced as redevelopment pushes rents upward … The success of Portland teachers in fighting off misguided educational policies could help counter the swelling inequality that is pulverizing the city’s neighborhoods.”
Read more …

Socialization Technique Helps In Academic Achievement, Trial Study Finds

The Washington Post

“In a randomized, controlled trial that examined the technique known as Responsive Classroom, researchers found that children in classrooms where the technique was fully used scored significantly higher in math and reading tests than students in classrooms where it wasn’t applied … The practices that form the backbone of the technique are designed to create positive classroom relationships – between teachers and students and among students. They aim to teach young children to cooperate with each other and feel that they are part of a ‘community’ that cares about them … The academic gains made by children in Responsive Classes were of the same magnitude, regardless of whether they came from poor or affluent families.”
Read more …

College, Federal Financial Aid Increasingly Benefits The Rich

The Hechinger Report

“Tuition tax credits and other tax breaks to offset the cost of higher education … disproportionally benefit more affluent Americans. So do tax-deductible savings plans and the federal work-study program … Even though only one-fifth of American households earn more than $100,000 per year, that group got more than half of the deductions for tuition, fees and exemptions … A new coalition of advocacy organizations … is pushing for the tax credits to be streamlined and redirected to the poor … A bill in the U.S. House … would gradually lower the income eligibility to $86,000 from the current $180,000.”
Read more …