5,700 school district contracts in dispute | Education | Wichita Eagle

5,700 school district contracts in dispute Education Wichita Eagle:

"The negotiated base salaries for the 2008-09 school year ranged from $37,998 for a starting salary and bachelor's degree, to $47,603 for midlevel experience and master's degree, to $59,677 for the highest experience level and doctoral degree.

At issue is whether teachers should work fewer professional development hours to offset the loss of additional pay for experience, said Larry Landwehr, president of the United Teachers of Wichita.

'We discussed all the pros and cons, and we saw professional concerns not acted upon,' he said.
In the school board's view, it could have monetary impact, Fuller said. If weekly training time is moved into official school hours, the school district would have to pay more substitutes or other adults to supervise the students, she said"

A parent’s right to choose : thenewdominion.com

A parent’s right to choose : thenewdominion.com:

"“And any way you slice this, the funding for any voucher program ends up in the coffers of primarily private religious schools,” said Barry Lynn, the executive director of the Washington, D.C.,-based Americans United for the Separation of Church and State. “The idea that this is constitutional is that because the parents get the funds, they become kind of a stopgap, and that therefore the money somehow doesn’t benefit religion. But of course since the money goes in the form of a voucher to the parent, the parent essentially cashes in the voucher and the money ends up primarily in religious schools.”

Lynn was alluding there to a controversial 5-4 United States Supreme Court decision in a 2002 case in Ohio that provided a constitutional foot in the door for a voucher program there. The Court was divided along clear ideological lines in the decision, and it isn’t hard to figure that a change in the makeup of the Court in the future could lead to a reversal should another similar case arise down the road."

Parents make the difference in education more than teachers do.

Parents make the difference in education more than teachers do.:


"At the end of the day, the question becomes one of parenting. Are the parents ensuring all homework is complete? Do the parents check their children's grades on-line to impose a reward/consequence system at home? Do the parents make sure schoolwork gets done before soccer practice? Do the parents contact the teachers with concerns? Did the parents raise their children to honor their position and the position of the teachers so that their children do not question directives such as, 'Do your homework?' The answer is good parenting and keeping parents accountable for their children's academic progress"

Nonreligious Private Schools Spend More Per Student Than Others, Study Shows - washingtonpost.com

Nonreligious Private Schools Spend More Per Student Than Others, Study Shows - washingtonpost.com:

"The secular private schools analyzed in the study spent $20,100 on each student in the 2007-08 school year vs. $10,100 in public schools. Nonparochial Catholic schools tended to spend roughly the same as public schools. (Parochial schools were not included in the study because their tax data are not publicly available and because their finances are so tied to those of the Catholic Church.) Members of two of the largest associations of Christian schools spent $7,100 -- several thousand dollars less per student than their public peers.

Per-student spending in the Washington region's public schools ranged from $10,400 to $19,300 that year, according to a Washington Area Boards of Education report, although public schools account for their spending differently from private schools, and numbers are difficult to compare directly."

BeyondChron: San Francisco's Alternative Online Daily News » SF Labor Council Backs UNITE HERE Local 2, Rejects SEIU’s Threats

BeyondChron: San Francisco's Alternative Online Daily News » SF Labor Council Backs UNITE HERE Local 2, Rejects SEIU’s Threats:

"As the epicenter of labor’s internal wars shifts to San Francisco, SEIU now finds itself in deep trouble with the powerful San Francisco Labor Council. Labor officials were angered by SEIU’s threat to withdraw its Council funding, and did not respond well to what Teachers Union President Dennis Kelly described as “the two faced-ness of (Dave) Regan’s presentation and by the threats and bullying.”"

STRIKE UPDATE: Teachers rally at ShoWare and strike continues - Covington Reporter

STRIKE UPDATE: Teachers rally at ShoWare and strike continues - Covington Reporter:

"Kent Education Association President Lisa Brackin-Johnson said after the rally, “The teachers are staying resolute to what they believe and what is good for the students.”
Dale Folkerts, spokesman for the union, said at about 11 a.m. Sunday if an agreement was not reached by noon, there would not be time to get the information out to parents and teachers for school to start Monday.

“We are saddened the district has not taken these issues seriously enough to bring a compromise,” Folkerts said by phone Sunday. “The issues are the classes are too crowded and too many administrative meetings. It robs the teachers’ time with the students.”

Pay has also been an issue, but according to Folkerts it did not spark the strike.

Folkerts said he believes if the other two issues had been dealt with the union and district could have come to an agreement over wages."

LA's charter school giveaway | SocialistWorker.org

LA's charter school giveaway SocialistWorker.org:

"Though the union as a whole did not commit fully to the kind of alliances with parents that we should have in the first round of this fight, the potential to organize around the issue of equal access to excellent education is very strong.

If we attempt to include parents and students in the fight for access for all to quality public schools, we could stop the mayor and his charter school allies from privatizing our schools, and fight to shape those schools according to the visions of parents, teachers and students. We now have to counter their agenda with ours, school by school."

SCHOOL MATTERS: California STAR Results Show Achievement Gap Persists - NAM

SCHOOL MATTERS: California STAR Results Show Achievement Gap Persists - NAM:

"What is clear is the racial and socioeconomic achievement gap hasn’t shrunk substantially.

'The gap is getting bigger and bigger,' said Linda Murray, acting executive director of Ed Trust West and former superintendent of San Jose Unified School District from 1993-2004. 'Poor students and students of color attend schools where teachers are less experienced, classrooms are under-resourced, and academic expectations are lower. These students are taught less, so they under-perform.'

The proportion of white 8th graders who achieved proficiency was 32 percentage points higher than Latino and African American 8th graders, according to a 2009 STAR program report released by Education-Trust West.

With some 1.6 billion proposed budget cuts to California education, high-level academic achievement is only going to become more of a challenge for low-income and minority students who attend under-funded schools.

'The devastation of funding cuts is very real,' said Murray. 'Class sizes are going up, resources are dwindling, teacher quality will suffer; there are kinds of ramifications of the cuts which will hurt kids attending under-resourced schools the most.'"

Parent University: Involving parents in a child's education | NECN

Parent University: Involving parents in a child's education NECN:

"Parent University: Involving parents in a child's education

Play video

(NECN: Michelle Brown, Boston, Mass.) - As a parent and former New York City school teacher, Saralyn Rice knows the importance of a parent's involvement in their child's education.
An enhanced form of communication and involvement is a sentiment shared by Boston school officials. When the new school year gets underway on September 10th, they will be reaching out not just to students, but to their parents, as well.

It is all part of a new program called Parent University.

The first of three all-day learning sessions begin in October at UMass Boston, followed by two more sessions in January and May. The program is free to all Boston public school families.
Boston public schools had a similar program to Parent University in the late 1990's called Parent Leadership Academy. That program fell victim to budget cuts."

California’s Response for Federal Stimulus Funding - California Progress Report

California’s Response for Federal Stimulus Funding - California Progress Report:

"This hearing and The Race to the Top is about understanding Education as a civil rights issue. When the Governor announced the Special Session last week, one of those who stood with him was Alice Huffman, the president of the state NAACP. This is the same NAACP that celebrates its 100th year anniversary this year, and which, half a century ago filed Brown v. Board of Education demanding that America stop school segregation because separate is not equal.

Today, decades after the Brown decision, we still have a form of segregation in our public school system. Nearly 80 percent of students in our lowest performing schools are African American or Latino. Poor students and students of color are four times more likely to have under-prepared teachers. We have an achievement gap for African Americans, Latinos, and English learners that has been both persistent and pernicious – confirmed again with new test scores released just last week.

Over the years, many of us in this Senate and in this room have advanced innovative legislation to find new ways to reform and transform public education. Impressive efforts have happened at the local level—oftentimes in spite of Sacramento or Washington. – use of student data to improve instruction and reward teachers in Long Beach and Fresno; an alternative compensation program in San Francisco that resulted from collaboration with the teachers union; a focus on better, not just more, high-quality charter schools throughout the state; a parents’ revolution that is captivating Los Angeles."

Legislators eye grants for schools - San Bernardino County Sun

Legislators eye grants for schools - San Bernardino County Sun:

"While the state could benefit from the federal dollars given its current fiscal crisis, San Bernardino County Superintendent of Schools Gary Thomas said he believes the teachers association should be involved in the conversation pertaining to data.

'If you're going to move in that direction, you're going to have to sit with the California Teachers Association and have thoughtful conversations and discussion about it,' he said.
'It's going to involve their members and the future of the teaching professions, so I think they're going to need to have a voice in that. And as I understand it, the teachers associations have been involved in those conversations.'"

As schools tighten belts, costs of supplies are passed to parents and teachers - Sacramento Living - Sacramento Food and Wine, Home, Health | Sacramento Bee

As schools tighten belts, costs of supplies are passed to parents and teachers - Sacramento Living - Sacramento Food and Wine, Home, Health Sacramento Bee:

"It takes a lot of supplies to run the average public school classroom, and one might assume that school's budget to cover the costs. But in an era of cost-cutting and economizing, the ex pense is increasingly shouldered by parents and teachers, rather than just taxpayers. Teachers spend an average of $500 of their own money each year on school materials, according to a National Education Association survey, while the typical student-supplies list now includes everything from hand sanitizer to safety pins, sandwich bags to batteries."

Northwest Voices | Education: merit pay, teachers' strikes, raises and alternative schools | Seattle Times Newspaper

Northwest Voices Education: merit pay, teachers' strikes, raises and alternative schools Seattle Times Newspaper:

"In the so-called failing schools, a teacher using all effort and resources may move a student only one bump on a progress chart. This hardly measurable step represents the best and deserves recognition.

In these poor achieving schools:

Income issues dominate family life, and one parent, grandparent or foster family are all too often the home life of many students. Parent involvement is minimal and adults at home are frequently victims of school failure while serious language and cultural issues run deep.

Class sizes can't be reduced but school aids are. Volunteers are few and far between. Discipline is complicated and daily disruptions rob children of learning."

Joel Klein vs. New York City teachers : The New Yorker

Joel Klein vs. New York City teachers : The New Yorker

The United Federation of Teachers, the U.F.T., was founded in 1960. Before that, teachers endured meagre salaries, tyrannical principals, witch hunts for Communists, and gender discrimination against a mostly female workforce (at one point, there was a rule requiring any woman who got pregnant to take a two-year unpaid leave). Drawing its members from a number of smaller and ineffective teachers’ groups, the U.F.T. coalesced into a tough trade union that used strikes and political organizing to fight back. By the time Bloomberg took office, forty-two years later, many education reformers believed that the U.F.T. and its political allies had gained so much clout that it had become impossible for the city’s Board of Education, which already shared a lot of power with local boards, to maintain effective school oversight. In 2002, with the city’s public schools clearly failing, the State Legislature granted control of a new Department of Education to the new mayor, who had become a billionaire by building an immense media company, Bloomberg L.P., that is renowned for firing employees at will and not giving contracts even to senior executives.

Education News & Comment

Education News & Comment:

"New SCUSD WEB SITE!"

Wash. latest state to be sued for school dollars

Wash. latest state to be sued for school dollars Seattle Times Newspaper

The timing wasn't planned, but that doesn't make it any less auspicious.

Right in the middle of a recession that has created the worst atmosphere for school budgeting in decades, a coalition of Washington school districts, parents, teachers and community groups is going to court Monday to demand that the state start paying the full cost of education.

Attorneys for both sides say the economy will have little or no influence on the outcome of the non-jury trail, scheduled to begin on the first day of the school year for many district and to continue for six weeks of testimony in King County Superior Court before Judge John Erlick.

School districts have been struggling economically for decades, so while the recession makes things worse it doesn't make them different, said Mike Blair, chair of the group calling itself Network for Excellence in Washington Schools.

School funding adequacy has been the subject of lawsuits around the country during the past decade. The Columbia University-based National Access Network, which advocates for school funding fairness and maintains a database of current litigation, reports that 45 of the 50 states have been sued over their methods of paying for public schools.

State and federal dollars pay most, but not all the cost to educate Washington's students. The rest of the money comes from local tax levies, donations and PTA fundraisers. Meanwhile, the Washington Constitution makes education the state's highest priority.

Time for lunch - for kids' health

Time for lunch - for kids' health:


"On Labor Day, Sept. 7, every American is invited to take a stand for kids' health and send the message to Congress that our children deserve real food in their school meals. Slow Food USA has organized 'Time for Lunch,' a nationwide potluck to bring people together to share food and take action in support of better school lunches.

More than 250 potluck Eat Ins have been organized around the country to draw attention to the need for healthier food for the more than 30 million children who participate in the National School Lunch Program. The program is part of the Child Nutrition Act that Congress will reauthorize later this year.
In addition to the shared meal, each Labor Day Eat In will have tables set up for guests to send petitions and postcards to Congress. The goal is to increase funding in the Child Nutrition Act reauthorization so schools can afford to serve fresh local produce, lean meats and whole grains, all of which cost more than current school lunches."

Slow Food CNY
Growing our food economy, one salt potato at a time!

http://slowfoodcny.org/index.php/2009/08/public-potluck-picnic/

Fight Over Payment for Tutoring Fairfax Special-Ed Student Marks Growing Trend - washingtonpost.com

Fight Over Payment for Tutoring Fairfax Special-Ed Student Marks Growing Trend - washingtonpost.com:

"Schools are required by federal law to provide a free and appropriate education for the country's more than 6 million special education students. But parents are not entitled to 'write a prescription for an ideal education and to have the prescription filled at the public expense,' the Fairfax school system argued in legal documents in 2004.

Fairfax officials said they try to be proactive so they can avoid costly, protracted disputes. The school system reorganized this year to create 25 positions to develop partnerships with parents and build education plans for its 24,000 special education students."

Views: Camps disagree on way to fix public schools

Views: Camps disagree on way to fix public schools

Privatization will help just a few, hurt overall system

True school reform
is based on well-researched and well-organized changes in the classroom that would help all students in all public schools perform better. Instead, America has pursued school-choice reforms that help a few students and ultimately degrade the public system as a whole, those on one side of the argument say.

School choice is a political movement disguised as school reform that gives high-frequency, middle-class voters access to free private-school quality education, said Gene Glass, an Arizona State University
education professor. Glass said the choice movement is spurred by exaggerating the problems within America's schools.

If not stopped, this privatization of the public system will leave behind a generation of Americans to intellectually wither in underfunded neighborhood schools, short on supplies and qualified teachers, said Glass, who examines this debate in his latest book "Fertilizers, Pills and Magnetic Strips: The Fate of Public Education in America."

School choice is cheaper for states than raising the entire public-school system to achieve higher standards, and that appeases a growing number of voters, Glass said. Among them are older voters who are retiring deeply in debt and are less willing to pay the taxes needed to fund true reform, and families who want private-style education but can't afford to pay tuition. School choice allows politicians to promise lower taxes while delivering quality education to the important few. In the competition to keep the best and brightest students in public schools, districts are creating their own elite "boutique" schools for gifted and accelerated students, where students get better technology and teaching and more attention than typical neighborhood schools.

Little Red Schoolhouse: gone, but unforgettable

Little Red Schoolhouse: gone, but unforgettable

School days, school days,

Dear old golden rule days

Readin' and 'ritin' and 'rithmetic

Taught to the tune of the hickory stick

You were my queen in calico

I was your bashful, barefoot beau

And you wrote on my slate, "I love you, Joe"

When we were a couple of kids.