LaJollaLight.com | Board of Education calls on state to solve its budget woes

LaJollaLight.com Board of Education calls on state to solve its budget woes:

"The San Diego Unified School District's Board of Education Tuesday night unanimously passed a resolution calling for the state government to solve its budget woes without placing further financial burdens on education.

The resolution, sponsored by board member Richard Barrera, calls for Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger and the Legislature to take 'a balanced approach' to solving fiscal problems 'that includes both new revenues and budget cuts to reduce the negative impacts of excessive cuts to education.'

The resolution promises the district will advocate 'progressive tax policies,' and for simple majorities for the Legislature to raise taxes and pass an annual budget. The Assembly and Senate require two-thirds majorities to do both."

Houston sixth-graders' heart screenings shock researchers | Houston & Texas News | Chron.com - Houston Chronicle

Houston sixth-graders' heart screenings shock researchers Houston & Texas News Chron.com - Houston Chronicle:

"Heart screenings offered to sixth-graders at a Houston middle school revealed seven with undiagnosed heart conditions — two of which required surgery — and the results shocked researchers who want to see such tests offered at every campus.

Those 94 students at Key Middle School were the first tested in a study led by Houston cardiologist Dr. John Higgins. On Wednesday, his group began screening 150 students at Houston's Fleming Middle School.

Higgins is hoping the findings will win support for his crusade to make heart exams routine for all U.S. sixth-graders.

“Usually, the first time these kids have symptoms is during cardiac arrest,” said Higgins. “We had at least two cases in Houston last year where it was the first episode and they died.”
While other studies have focused on athletes, this project includes all students."

Sticking with magnet schools to strengthen poor kids' scores - washingtonpost.com

Sticking with magnet schools to strengthen poor kids' scores - washingtonpost.com:

"Aleader in the national effort to raise the achievement of low-income children once told me how she became, to her amused surprise, one of those rare suburban Washington parents who pay tuition to send their children to D.C. public schools.

She grew up in a white, blue-collar family far from Washington. Her children attended economically diverse schools, but when she got a big job in the District, the people at her new office, despite their shared commitment to improving urban education, told her she would be nuts to put her kids in the D.C. system. Uncertain what to do in a strange new city, she bowed to this unanimous view and bought a house in Montgomery County, never anticipating what would happen next."

Texas students struggle on early versions of end-of-course tests | News for Dallas, Texas | Dallas Morning News | Latest News

Texas students struggle on early versions of end-of-course tests News for Dallas, Texas Dallas Morning News Latest News:

"AUSTIN – As hundreds of Texas school districts get a jump on the end-of-course tests that will debut statewide in two years, preliminary results indicate a large number of students will have trouble passing the exams."

High school students will be required to pass the battery of 12 end-of-course tests beginning with freshmen entering high school in the 2011-12 school year. But many districts are already giving early versions of the tests to their students, and some are even using them as final exams in Algebra I and four other courses.

The Algebra I test was administered to nearly 79,000 students earlier this year, and just 57 percent of those students passed the 50-question exam. About 11 percent achieved "commended performance" for answering most of the items correctly.

Results were similar on four other tests measuring knowledge and skills in biology, chemistry, geometry and U.S. history. In biology, the 58,000 who took the exam answered about 60 percent of the questions correctly.

Harvard Law School Suspends Program Giving Students Free Tuition - NYTimes.com

Harvard Law School Suspends Program Giving Students Free Tuition - NYTimes.com:

"Less than two years after announcing that it would waive tuition for third-year students who pledge to spend five years working for nonprofit organizations or for the government, Harvard Law School is suspending the program — in part because almost twice as many students as expected signed up."

“This was always an experiment and just one of many ways we were trying to encourage students to explore public interest careers,” said Martha Minow, the dean of the law school, adding, “What we found is that we had less trouble than we thought encouraging that.”

But the recession was also a factor. “It’s really a function of the endowment going down drastically,” said Robb London, the law school’s assistant dean for communications.

Harvard’s endowment declined 27 percent between June 2008 and June 2009, falling to $26 billion, and the university has adopted a number of cost-cutting moves. In fact, on Tuesday, Harvard’s largest division, the Faculty of Arts and Sciences, announced a voluntary retirement plan for professors. Other schools will offer similar packages in the near future.

The Answer Sheet - A teachable moment for and about the Secret Service

The Answer Sheet - A teachable moment for and about the Secret Service:

"Every second of every day its agents put their lives on the line to protect our federal officials and, out of nowhere, up comes a super tall, super thin, super blond woman to a White House state dinner and is allowed in by Secret Service agents even though she and her husband aren’t on the official guest list.

Scandal ensues. Michaele and Tareq Salahi become household names (actually I had to look them up; I know them only as “the gate crashers”). The reputation of the Secret Service is sullied."

Teaching mildly autistic kids the ABC's of key social skills - washingtonpost.com

Teaching mildly autistic kids the ABC's of key social skills - washingtonpost.com:

"The middle school years, when nothing seems more important or more impossible than fitting in, are rough for nearly everyone. But they are particularly brutal for preteens such as Will Gilbertsen, whose mild autism makes him stand out."

Less than two months into sixth grade at Arlington County's Kenmore Middle School this fall, the freckle-faced 11-year-old with a passion for skateboarding had gained a reputation for racewalking through the halls between classes. "That's so I can't hear the teasing," he told his mother.

As the number of children with autism has ballooned nationwide, so has the population of children who, like Will, are capable of grade-level academics but bewildered by the social code that governs every interaction from the classroom to the cafeteria. Not so profoundly disabled that they belong in a self-contained classroom but lacking the social and emotional skills they need to negotiate school on their own, they often spend the bulk of their day in mainstream classes supported with a suite of special education services including life-skills groups and one-on-one aides.

District urging state to rethink ed funding - Education - SignOnSanDiego.com

District urging state to rethink ed funding - Education - SignOnSanDiego.com:

"SAN DIEGO — Rather than cut $200 million from its $1.2 billion operating budget to offset massive funding reductions that are anticipated from the state, the San Diego school board wants the Legislature to rethink how it funds education.

Otherwise, trustees might just take drastic measures of their own.

The San Diego school board passed a resolution last night that calls on the state to avoid making “draconian cuts … that will decimate the quality of education for all students.” Proposed by trustee Richard Barrera, the resolution goes on to state that the cuts could be avoided, “if the governor and state legislators make decisions to reform tax benefits for corporations or consider other new revenue options … .”"

Survey: Oakland principals like to control their own budgets | The Education Report

Survey: Oakland principals like to control their own budgets The Education Report:

"A survey of Oakland principals by a local advocacy group found support for the district’s unorthodox, largely decentralized school budgeting system, known as RBB; it also found that one-third of the principals surveyed didn’t feel prepared or equipped to run their entire school budget, as they’re expected to do."

Here is a summary of the findings, straight from the memo:

• 93.3% of principals surveyed value having decision-making authority over their school site’s budget

• 93.1% of principals surveyed responded that if budget cuts have to be made, the principal with the school community should have the primary responsibility for making these decisions

• 86.4% of principals surveyed prefer to have control over the number and type of positions at their schools (principal with community decides staffing instead of according to central office formulas)

• 82% of principals surveyed believe that changes to OUSD’s budgeting system are necessary

• 77.8% of principals surveyed believe that General Purpose dollars should be equitably distributed among all OUSD students

• 67.3% of principals surveyed feel that they have the ability, or are prepared, to completely run their entire site budget, including personnel decisions

Invisible: 1.4 Percent Coverage for Education is Not Enough - Brookings Institution

Invisible: 1.4 Percent Coverage for Education is Not Enough - Brookings Institution:

"News coverage is important to every policy area. While some people have personal knowledge of certain topics, many rely on mass media for direct, up-to-date, and in-depth reporting. This is especially the case with education because only a third of American adults currently have a child in elementary or secondary school. What most people know about schools comes from newspapers, radio, television, the Internet, or blogs – or from memories of their own experiences, often from long ago."

Yet despite the importance of media coverage for public understanding of education, news reporting on schools is scant. As we note in this report, there is virtually no national coverage of education. During the first nine months of 2009, only 1.4 percent of national news coverage from television, newspapers, news Web sites, and radio dealt with education.1 This paucity of coverage is not unique to 2009. In 2008, only 0.7 percent of national news coverage involved education, while 1.0 percent did so in 2007. This makes it difficult for the public to follow the issues at stake in our education debates and to understand how to improve school performance. Community colleges fare especially poorly in the constellation of news coverage. Of all the education reporting, only 2.9 percent is devoted to two-year institutions of higher learning, compared to 12.5 percent for colleges and 14.5 percent for universities (the rest goes to elementary and secondary schools). The lack of attention devoted to community colleges is noteworthy because even though they enroll 6.7 million students compared to 11.2 million for colleges and universities, two-year schools attract only one-tenth the news coverage of four-year institutions. From the standpoint of national media coverage, community colleges barely exist.

Restructuring the CSU or Wrecking it? What Proposed Changes mean and What We Can Do About Them | California Progress Report

Restructuring the CSU or Wrecking it? What Proposed Changes mean and What We Can Do About Them California Progress Report:

"Like so many other public institutions these days, the California State University is under attack. Not just from the deep and persistent budget cuts, but also from a radical change in the way university administrators want to deliver higher education.

Today, the California faculty Association has released a white paper detailing this disturbing trend entitled, “Restructuring” the CSU or Wrecking It?”

To view the white paper, go to: http://restructuringcsu.wordpress.com/

This authoritative report seeks to address the top down call for “restructuring” occurring throughout the CSU and UC systems and offers insight into the political agendas that may be driving the trend."

Budget Blogs Keep Tabs on UC Meltdown | California Progress Report

Budget Blogs Keep Tabs on UC Meltdown California Progress Report:

"Mainstream media have covered protests in response to the massive budget cuts at the University of California, including the confrontation at UCLA when tuition was raised Nov. 19, but few reporters have the time or resources to delve deeply into the crisis of public higher education.

But where newspaper coverage is dying, blogs are blooming, helping fill the reporting gap on what the cuts mean for students, faculty, workers and administrators.

One notable blog is http://www.utotherescue.blogspot.com, a comprehensive blog maintained by UC Santa Barbara professor Christopher Newfield, author of Unmaking the Public University, Harvard University Press. Newfield’s theory, as captured in his book description is the following:"

SCUSD Observer: Short for "status quo ante bellum"

SCUSD Observer: Short for "status quo ante bellum"

Short for "status quo ante bellum"

Baby Barack Mayor Kevin Johnson sent out a mailer touting his strong mayor initiative this week, challenging Sacramentans to question business-as-usual politics.

Status quo is short for "status quo ante bellum" meaning "the state before the war." And that's what this local argument is turning in to...KJ uses Obama references whenever he can make a sophomoric connection that is meant to fire our synapses, because we (the unwashed electorate) are apparently not going to grasp the nuance that we are being played.

So the comparison of Kevin Johnson's fight to change the city's charter is equal to Obama's fight to convince an entire world on how to execute a war?

Right.

The News and Review claims that.... continue reading at SCUSD Observer

SDUSD Calls For State To Fix Budget - San Diego News Story - KGTV San Diego

SDUSD Calls For State To Fix Budget - San Diego News Story - KGTV San Diego:

"SAN DIEGO -- The San Diego Unified School District's Board of Education Tuesday night unanimously passed a resolution calling for the state government to solve its budget woes without placing further financial burdens on education.

The resolution, sponsored by board member Richard Barrera, calls for Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger and the Legislature to take 'a balanced approach' to solving fiscal problems 'that includes both new revenues and budget cuts to reduce the negative impacts of excessive cuts to education.'"

Mayor to host forum on entertainment complex

Mayor to host forum on entertainment complex - Sacramento News - Local and Breaking Sacramento News | Sacramento Bee

Sacramento Mayor Kevin Johnson will host a community meeting at the downtown library Thursday evening to solicit questions and comments about a sports and entertainment complex for Sacramento.

The forum is scheduled from 7 to 8:30 p.m. at the library, 828 I St.

Johnson is in the process of soliciting developer proposals for entertainment complex, centered on an arena to house the Sacramento Kings basketball team. Kings and NBA officials have said Arco Arena is outdated.

Johnson set Dec. 24 as the deadline for development teams to submit arena proposals, including where to build it and how to finance it. A 12-person citizens' task force, picked by Johnson, will review proposals for consideration next spring by the mayor and possibly the City Council.

Johnson will introduce his task force at the Thursday forum.

Sacramento Press / Union leaders back lawsuit against strong mayor

Sacramento Press / Union leaders back lawsuit against strong mayor:

"In a sign that the opposing camp to the “strong mayor” initiative has significant union support, three local union leaders turned out for a Tuesday press conference to support a new lawsuit against the initiative.

The group SAVE Sacramento, which is chaired by local union leader Matt Kelly, is publicizing a lawsuit that aims to take the strong mayor initiative off the June 2010 ballot.

The plaintiff in the lawsuit is Bill Camp, the executive secretary of the Sacramento Central Labor Council. Camp filed the lawsuit as a private citizen — he is not representing the labor council in the legal battle. The defendants named in the lawsuit are the city of Sacramento, the Sacramento City Council and Thomas Hiltachk, the attorney who wrote the strong mayor initiative."

SAC CHARTERGATE

SAC CHARTERGATE

Michelle Rhee and St. Hope: What Didn't She Do?
Washington DC blogger lodesterre has been reading the Inspector General's referral to the U.S. Attorney; he/she's been asking many good questions--some of the same ones on our mind too.

Such as the issue of Michelle Rhee holding "conflicting positions" at St. Hope.According to the IG interview with former St. Hope employee Jacqueline Wong-Hernandez, the same time Rhee was listed as a St. Hope board member, she was identified as the consultant for the New Teacher Project (which recruited teachers for St. Hope schools), the consultant for the reconstruction bridge span and the consultant for the reconstruction of the HR department.

On a memo she was listed she as the Chief Operating Officer for St. Hope Academy. On an organization chart she was identified as president. As lodesterre writes:

Patrick Kennedy Picks Up Key Endorsement

Patrick Kennedy Picks Up Key Endorsement

I am proud to announce the endorsement of former Sacramento Mayor Anne Rudin for my campaign for City Council. Mayor Rudin is one of our city's longest serving leaders, having served on the City Council and as Mayor for 21 years.


Among many notable accomplishments during her tenure, Mayor Rudin set the stage for Sacramento to successfully move forward economically after three area military bases closed and privatized. She also played a leadership role in seeing that Sacramento was one of the first cities in the nation to recognize same-sex couples.

On the Council and as Mayor, she led with uncommon balance of grace and resolve. It is an honor to have her support and confidence.

Sincerely,

Patrick Kennedy
Kennedy for Sacramento’s 5th City Council District Web Site

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UC extends application deadline after computer glitch -- latimes.com

UC extends application deadline after computer glitch -- latimes.com: "University of California officials have extended the application period for undergraduate admissions after a computer slowdown kept some students from filing their online applications in time for Monday night's deadline. The new deadline is 11:59 p.m. tonight.

Susan Wilbur, UC's director of undergraduate admissions, said her office is investigating the cause of the computerized malfunction that at least temporarily blocked some panicked last-minute filers from submitting applications on Sunday and Monday nights. She said she did not know how many students were affected but said that about two-thirds of applicants wait to file until a week or less before the deadline. Many others delay until the day the application is due."