Monday, May 10, 2010

Higher Education Tax Policy is a Bad Deal for Actual Policy Goals � The Quick and the Ed

Higher Education Tax Policy is a Bad Deal for Actual Policy Goals

by Ben Miller

Being a nonprofit institution can be a boon for a college or university. For one, the tax exempt status makes them an attractive target for big donations from wealthy alums and businessmen looking for a writeoff. But it also means that schools can issue tax-exempt bonds, an attractive form of debt that is cheaper to use because the absence of taxes allows them to charge a lower interest rate.
Now those tax-exempt bonds are coming under greater government scrutiny. Last week, the Congressional Budget Office (CBO), released a study on the usage of this det instrument by colleges and universities. Specifically, it looks at whether these institutions are using tax-exempt bonds for arbitrage–taking the proceeds from selling debt a low interest rate and investing it in something that has a higher return. (For example, if I borrowed money through a tax-exempt bond at 2 percent interest and invested it into a bond at 5

The Educated Reporter: Hooray for the Hechinger Report.

The Educated Reporter: Hooray for the Hechinger Report

Hooray for the Hechinger Report.

by Linda Perlstein

I am so swamped getting materials together for EWA’s annual meeting, where I will be running a seminar for new beat reporters, leading a roundtable on the polarization of the education debate, meeting one-on-one with journalists and launching a top-secret, totally awesome resource for education writers. So I have not had the time to read the Hechinger Report,

“I am going to college. Can you pay?”

by Linda Perlstein

1 person liked this

My favorite charity in the last few years has been Donors Choose. It has the shopping-mall allure of those microcredit charities where you get to choose whom you fund—the Congolese tilapia seller? the Ecuadorian photographer?—plus how can you not love the idea of sending money directly to cool classroom projects? I will say that students waste too much time writing thank-you notes to each donor even though I try to say “Don’t bother,” and you should look at each teacher’s request PDF, where you might see that “Fun math

N.Y. can live with fewer teachers :: Frederick M. Hess

N.Y. can live with fewer teachers

by Frederick M. Hess
New York Daily News
May 7, 2010

But not only would the layoffs of thousands of teachers not mean the sky is falling. If the layoffs are done right, it could mean the sun shines even brighter for the city's students. For while parents have a natural affinity for smaller classes, smaller classes generally don't boost achievement - it's teacher quality that does. And smaller classes actually make it tougher to boost teacher quality.

Thinning the teacher ranks, done right, could be a very good thing. Harvard University professor Martin West and his colleague Ludger Woessmann have pointed out that several nations that perform impressively, including South Korea, Hong Kong and Japan, have average middle-school class sizes of more than 35 students per

Student Activist Elena Kagan Nominated to Supreme Court � Student Activism

Student Activist Elena Kagan Nominated to Supreme Court

by Angus Johnston

For the second time in his presidency, Barack Obama has chosen a former student activist to sit on the Supreme Court.
Solicitor General Elena Kagan, like justice Sonia Sotomayor, went from the public high schools of New York City to an undergraduate career on Princeton University’s New Jersey campus. And like Sotomayor, Kagan became involved in student organizing while there.
In her junior and senior years Kagan served as the “editorial chairman” of the Daily Princetonian, in which capacity she oversaw the writing and selection of editorials attacking the military draft, calling for an end to single-sex social clubs on campus, and urging the university to create a women’s studies department. One editorial published during her tenure harshly criticized the university’s policy of limiting students’ freedom to bring controversial speakers and organizations to campus.
Each of these editorials was unsigned, and though Kagan surely wrote many — perhaps most — of them herself, there is no way of knowing which. In the spring of her senior year, however, Kagan lent her name and her energy to a prominent student organizing effort on campus when she became part of the “Coordinating Council of

Schools Matter: It's Lucrative, Baby

It's Lucrative, Baby

by Kenneth Libby

Last Wednesday, Entertainment Properties Trust announced they'd be offering $147.6 of common shares for their ongoing operating expenses, expansion opportunities, and debt repayment. EPT, remember, is really excited about the possibility of expanding into the charter school market (primarily, at least so far, via the entirely benevolent and not-in-it-for-the-money do-gooders at Imagine Schools; full list of Imagine Schools owned by EPT available here). The company's recent shareholder update mentioned they have "two primary asset classes" primed for expansion: movie theaters and charter schools.

Here's a bit from their recent announcement about this new investment opportunity:

Citigroup Global Markets Inc., Goldman, Sachs & Co., J.P. Morgan Securities Inc. and KeyBanc Capital Markets Inc. are acting as joint book running managers for the offering.

Training teachers: Schools of education must embrace new routes to certification - latimes.com

It's time for schools of education to embrace new routes to teacher certification

They should extend an olive branch to competitors such as Teach for America, and offer college graduates a full year of training before they begin their jobs in the classroom.

Jonathan Zimmerman

May 10, 2010 | 9:16 a.m.

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Let's suppose you have spent your career as a professor at an American education school, training future teachers. Then suppose that your state decided that teachers could get certified without attending an education school at all.

That's called "alternative certification," and most of my school of education colleagues are outraged by it.

I take a different view. These new routes into teaching could transform the profession, by attracting the type of student that has eluded education schools for far too long. We should extend an olive branch to our competitors, instead of circling the wagons against them.

The biggest challenger at the moment is Teach for America (TFA), which recruits graduating seniors, mostly from elite colleges, and places them as teachers in public schools following a five-week training course. Last year, a whopping 11% of all Ivy League seniors applied to TFA. It was the No. 1 employer at several other top colleges, including Georgetown and the University of Chicago.

And last month, the New York State Board of Regents voted to let groups like TFA create their own master's degree programs. Until now, in states that require teachers to obtain master's degrees in education, TFA recruits have had to study for the degree at night to become fully certified. But under the new plan, teachers will be able to join the profession without ever setting foot in a school of education.

Other states are sure to follow, spurred in part by the Obama administration. In its recent Race to the Top competition, the federal Department of Education awarded points to states that provide "high-quality pathways for aspiring teachers and principals," including "allowing alternative routes to certification."

So get ready for an explosion of new programs to certify teachers, who will increasingly bypass schools of education. And get ready for another round of breast-beating at American ed schools about how we are being disrespected.

But do we deserve respect? Secretary of Education Arne Duncan noted in a speech last fall that most ed schools are doing a "mediocre job" of preparing teachers. And he was being kind. Of the 1,300 institutions awarding graduate degrees for teaching, Harvard's director of teacher education told a

Senate Education Committee Snags McLaughlin - Politics K-12 - Education Week

Senate Education Committee Snags McLaughlin

by Alyson Klein

Michele McLaughlin, who has worked on teacher quality issues at both the American Federation of Teachers and Teach for America, has recently joined the staff of the Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee where she will work with Bethany Little and others on a variety of K-12 issues, including Title I. While at AFT, McLaughlin worked with John See on a late, great blog on the No Child Left Behind Act.
McLaughlin's background might be an ideal fit for Sen. Tom Harkin, D-Iowa, the chairman of the Senate HELP committee, who would like to move a bill reauthorizing the Elementary and Secondary Act this year that will need to garner support from all corners of the education field. She's worked for two big-name organizations (AFT

Hunger strike presses on, awaits chancellor’s return�|�UWIRE

Hunger strike presses on, awaits chancellor’s return

Posted on10 May 2010.

By Katrina Escudero

Daily Californian, U. California-Berkeley via UWIRE

Instead of securing last-minute graduation tickets and dealing with frantic relatives before graduation like most U. California-Berkeley seniors, Horacio Corona and Alejandro Lara-Briseno are enduring the hunger pangs of going without food for more than 168 hours.

For one week, about 18 hunger strikers from the “Hungry for Justice Coalition” have been camped out in front of California Hall, awaiting the return of Chancellor Robert Birgeneau from Europe.

The strikers are demanding Birgeneau publicly denounce a recent Arizona immigration law, make UC Berkeley a sanctuary campus and provide extended protections for undocumented students, drop all student conduct charges against activists, stop cuts to low-wage employees, suspend conduct procedures and initiate a democratic, student-led process to review the code, as well as commit to using nonviolent means to ensure safety at demonstrations.

Concern for the strikers’ health has caused campus administrators to announce new initiatives as incentives to end the strike, but demonstrators say they are determined to continue despite impacts to their health.

“It’s hard to focus because of a lot of sleep deprivation since we are sleeping outside,” Corona said.

Betty White on 'Saturday Night Live' provides golden hosting

NEW YORK -- Betty Whitedemonstrated how it's done as host of this week's "Saturday Night Live."

Drawing on her six decades in comedy, she was the consummate pro at 88 years old - sweet, sassy, salty, charming and clearly game for anything.
"I'm not new to live TV," she reminded the audience at the top of the show, and recalled that she had starred in a sitcom that aired live back in 1952.
"Of course, back then, we didn't WANT to do it live. We just didn't know how to tape things." A perfectly timed beat. "I don't know what THIS show's excuse is."
Billed by NBC as a special Mother's Day edition, the show had a definitely feminine tone and was a reunion of sorts for "SNL" alumnae, bringing back former regulars including Amy Poehler, Tina Fey, Ana Gasteyer and Molly Shannon. (Jay-Z was musical guest.)
But White was the queen bee, appearing in nearly every bit throughout the 90-minute span - and never failing to punch it up.
As a dotty resident being surveyed by census-taker Fey, White listed other residents in her

An Educated Proposal For Immigration - Perdaily.com

An Educated Proposal For Immigration

from Perdaily.com by Leonard

The color that interests me most is gray. I do not see it anywhere in most of the discussions regarding education or other important issues that are profoundly effecting our society. Since Arizona passed its racial profiling predisposed law to address the presence of undocumented workers in this country, all I have heard is that it is racist -- which it most surely is. Whether a law is ill-conceived or not, I think one must also raise some of the following points if one ever hopes to find a fair solution to immigration that is highly problematic.

Some points to consider:

1. One reason that so many people are crossing our southern border illegally is because the euphemistically named North American Free Trade Association (NAFTA) has bankrupted the Mexican farming sector without providing the alternative high paying manufacturing jobs that were supposed to put many Mexicans into the middle class. Highly mechanized American agra-business can produce a staple crop like corn far more cheaply than Mexican farmers, which has made ghost towns out of the villages where this form of agriculture used to take place in Mexico.

2. Mexican governmental corruption continues to make the very small percentage of Mexicans who own the

This Week In Education Media: Hechinger Report Launches (Sans Kantrowitz)

This Week In Education

Media: Hechinger Report Launches (Sans Kantrowitz)

by Alexander Russo

Last week I wondered aloud whether The Hechinger Report had launched and if it was shaping up to be all that it was touted to be (Has The Hechinger Report Launched?). Today, the folks at Hechinger sent out an email to education journalists (but not me) confirming that the report (THR, they like to call it) was indeed officially launched. Still no news on the whereabouts of former Newsweek writer Barbara Kantrowitz, who was touted as a big hire for Hechinger but hasn't been seen since. So it's not exactly clear who's going to be doing all the great journalism that foundations are paying Hechinger to do. Hechinger's Richard Colvin has

Laissez les bons temps rouler | Intercepts

Laissez les bons temps rouler

by Mike Antonucci

The National Education Association Representative Assembly is in New Orleans this year, and that’s appropriate, because the union and other education employee groups are committed to keeping the hiring party of the last decade rolling.
Today’s question at the National Journal’s education expert blog is whether the $23 billion in Sen. Tom Harkin’s Keep Our Educators Working Act should be tied to tenure reform. The teachers’ unions, unsurprisingly, are

Another NEA-AFT Split on Race to the Top? - Teacher Beat - Education Week

Another NEA-AFT Split on Race to the Top?

by Stephen Sawchuk

As goes Colorado so goes the nation? Right on the heels of the news that the Centennial state's National Education Association and American Federation of Teachers affiliates are on different pages about tenure legislation in that state—which is seen as a key element of its Race to the Top bid—an analogous situation is developing in Maryland.
The state is working on a plan to make student-achievement growth part of a new system of teacher evaluation. In its RTTT application, the state plans to make student growth 50 percent of the teacher

Defining 'Job Embedded' Professional Development

by Stephen Sawchuk

The term "job embedded" professional development is a big one in our field these days. It reflects the common-sense and increasingly influential idea that post-baccalaureate teacher training should be responsive to teachers' day to day practices in school and their own students' needs. The term has also shown up in a lot of recent legislation, including the economic-stimulus bill.
Unfortunately, for journalists like me, it's also a clunky, jargon-y term that doesn't do a very good job of conveying what the practice actually consists of. Fortunately, the National Comprehensive Center for Teacher Quality, which is housed at Learning Point Associates; the Mid-Atlantic Comprehensive Center; and the National

Facts For Working People: UC Berkeley police bust up hinger strike encampment

UC Berkeley police bust up hinger strike encampment

MEDIA ADVISORY
For immediate release,
May 10, 2010

CONTACT:
Marco Amaral (619) 764-8540 marco.amaral6@gmail.com
Tanya Smith (510) 325-6381 tanyagays@yahoo.com
Maricruz Manzanarez (510) 375-0245 balucu@hotmail.com
Horacio Corona (fasting) (559) 789-2381 corona12@berkeley.edu
Katherine Isabel Vega (661) 802-2943 kathyivega@gmail.com

UC Berkeley Police forcefully take down hunger strike encampment as Chancellor returns from trip to Europe
After 170 hours without food, strikers vow to continue until demands met

When: Now, Monday May 10th
Where: California Hall on UC Berkeley Campus
Visuals: dozens of supporters, hunger strikers forced dispersal of encampment.

BERKELEY, CA— At 6am UC Police arrived at the site of the 7 day-old hunger strike with an order to disperse the encampment or face arrest.

This all comes as UC Berkeley Chancellor Robert Birgeneau, who has been traveling in Europe during the duration of the strike, returns today to face the strikers for the first time. Many had criticized the Chancellor for not returning earlier to work to resolve the situation, though it appears the administration’s techniques have taken a more forceful turn as with the Chancellor’s return. Hunger strikers, visibly weak after fasting for over 170 hours, are currently struggling to take down the camp.

“They say they’re doing this for our health and for the good of the students” says Marco Amaral, a freshman who is one of the organizers of the strike. “But if Chancellor Birgeneau really cared about the health of the students he wouldn’t be forcing those on the strike to leave in this manner. If the Chancellor truly cared about the students and workers of this campus he would meet our demands and end the strike.”

Students, workers, and community supporters have been protesting on the front lawn of California Hall since last Monday. The 19 individuals on the hunger strike have demands of denouncing racist legislation in Arizona, creating a sanctuary campus and ending retaliation against student and worker activists (see next page for complete demands).

“Our demands are very reasonable and the Chancellor could meet them at any time”, continued Amaral. “We are not ending this strike until they are all met. The Chancellor needs to decide if he’s going to stand with the students, workers, faculty and supporters at the

Strikers Forced to Move Away From California Hall - The Daily Californian

Strikers Forced to Move Away From California Hall

Hunger Strike Presses on, Awaits Chancellor's Return - 11 hours ago

Hungry for Direction - 13 hours ago

Hunger Strike Will Continue Through Weekend- Fri, May 7, 2010

By JAVIER PANZAR
DAILY CAL STAFF WRITER
Date Added Monday, May 10, 2010 | 7:12 am
Last Updated Monday, May 10, 2010 | 8:27 am
Category: News > University > Student Communities

The 18 hunger strikers who have been camped outside California Hall since last Monday took down their tents and left this morning after being told by campus officials they would be arrested if they stayed.

The strikers and their supporters emptied their jugs of water and loaded their supplies onto UCPD trucks at around 6 A.M. after being told by campus officials they would be arrested if they did not leave the lawn in front of the building.

"This morning the university decided that you know, it's time," said UCPD Lt. Alex Yao.

Yao said the strikers and their supporters had been in violation of campus rules and regulations by lodging and violating campus curfew. Both can be punishable by arrest, he said.

The strikers chose to leave the lawn. Though strikers said they do not know where they will relocate, they will not stop fasting.

"We are going to continue," said senior Horacio Corona, who has gone without food for a week.

Though the strikers' belongings were moved by UCPD to Eshleman Hall, by 8 a.m. the protesters had gathered again in front of California Hall.

Ten more students and staff had joined the strikers in a "Solidarity Strike." Marco Amaral, a freshman striker, said the coalition will hold rallies at 9 a.m. and 3 p.m. in front of the building.

The strikers are demanding Chancellor Robert Birgeneau publicly denounce a recent Arizona immigration law, make UC Berkeley a sanctuary campus and provide extended protections for undocumented students, drop all

Police Roust UC Berkeley Hunger Strikers. Category: Updates from The Berkeley Daily Planet - Friday May 07, 2010

Police Roust UC Berkeley Hunger Strikers. Category: Updates from The Berkeley Daily Planet

Police Roust UC Berkeley Hunger Strikers

From a press release.

Monday May 10, 2010

The hunger strikers on the UC Berkeley campus who are protesting Arizona's new immigration law were ordered to disperse by UC police early this morning.

This press release was sent out by spokesperson Dave Graham-Spires:

"At 6am UC Police arrived at the site of the 7 day-old hunger strike with an order to disperse the encampment or face arrest.
This all comes as UC Berkeley Chancellor Robert Birgeneau, who has been traveling in Europe during the duration of the strike, returns today to face the strikers for the first time. Many had criticized the Chancellor for not returning earlier to work to resolve the situation, though it appears the administration’s techniques have taken a more forceful turn as with the Chancellor’s return. Hunger strikers, visibly weak after fasting for over 170 hours, are currently struggling to take down the camp.
“They say they’re doing this for our health and for the good of the students” says Marco Amaral, a freshman who is one of the organizers of the strike. “But if Chancellor Birgeneau really cared about the health of the students he wouldn’t be forcing those on the strike to leave in this manner. If the Chancellor truly cared about the students and workers of this campus he would meet our demands and end the strike.”
Students, workers, and community supporters have been protesting on the front lawn of California Hall since last Monday. The 19 individuals on the hunger strike have demands of denouncing racist legislation in Arizona, creating a sanctuary campus and ending retaliation against student and worker activists (see next page for complete demands).
“Our demands are very reasonable and the Chancellor could meet them at any time”, continued Amaral. “We are not ending this strike until they are all met. The Chancellor needs to decide if he’s going to stand with the students, workers, faculty and

UC Berkeley hunger strikers resisting pressure from police to leave Education - ContraCostaTimes.com

Education - ContraCostaTimes.com

UC Berkeley hunger strikers resisting pressure from police to leave

By Doug Oakley
Oakland Tribune

Posted: 05/10/2010 07:38:45 AM PDT

Updated: 05/10/2010 08:48:35 AM PDT

BERKELEY — UC Berkeley police this morning tried to disperse a gathering of hunger strikers who have been camped out on campus for a week, but so far the protesters are resisting their efforts.

Students and others have been protesting on the front lawn of California Hall since last Monday. The 19 individuals on the hunger strike have demands of denouncing racist legislation in Arizona, creating a sanctuary on campus and ending retaliation against student and worker activists.
Police at one point got the protesters to move and took some of their belongings, but the group was still there as of 8:30 a.m., huddled under a tarp.
A rally has been planned today at 3:30 p.m. to increase the pressure on the administration. In addition, regularly scheduled demonstrations have been held daily at 11 a.m. and 7 p.m.

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