Latest News and Comment from Education

Friday, September 24, 2010

Jasmine Boussem: Is the Wait for 'Superman' Over?

Jasmine Boussem: Is the Wait for 'Superman' Over?
Jasmine Boussem

Jasmine Boussem

Posted: September 24, 2010 01:58 PM

You don't need a cape, a pair of tights, a mask or even a fancy nickname to be a superhero. That's the thought I was left with after seeing Davis Guggenheim's new documentary, "Waiting for 'Superman.' " The superheroes of education -- whether they be tireless parents struggling to give their kids access to a good education, inspired teachers, bold policy makers or visionary charter school founders -- all demonstrate an enormous capacity for hard work, determination and resilience -- and this is not always enough.

This moving and instructive documentary follows the lives of five children in their demanding search for a better education. Though each story is unique, every kid shares an anxious desire to be accepted by a high-performing charter school, in

US Education Dept To Delay Release Of Gainful Employment Rule - WSJ.com

US Education Dept To Delay Release Of Gainful Employment Rule - WSJ.com

US Education Dept To Delay Release Of Gainful Employment Rule

NEW YORK (Dow Jones)--The U.S. Department of Education will delay the publication of a controversial rule that could strip a number of higher education programs of access to federal student aid, though the rule is still scheduled to be implemented "on or around July 1, 2012, as planned."

The department, "on or around Nov. 1," will release 13 of 14 new rules governing a wide array of higher education issues, including compensation for student recruiters, the definition of a credit hour and verifying information on federal student aid forms, and they will go into effect as planned on ...

Sesame Street: A YouTube Interview with Elmo

Beaverton School District's first charter school, Arco Iris Spanish Immersion, opens with 57 students | OregonLive.com

Beaverton School District's first charter school, Arco Iris Spanish Immersion, opens with 57 students | OregonLive.com

Beaverton School District's first charter school, Arco Iris Spanish Immersion, opens with 57 students

Published: Friday, September 24, 2010, 10:00 AM
arcoiris.JPGView full sizeMiguel Lugo, a teacher at Arco Iris Spanish Immersion School, works with his second-grade students. Students at the Beaverton School District’s first charter wear uniforms and learn Singapore math, which focuses on problem solving and in-depth understanding.
BEAVERTON -- This summer, a group of Beaverton parents knocked down cobwebs, scrubbed walls and hoisted desks in five modular classrooms behindMcKinley Elementary to prepare for the opening of Beaverton's first charter school.

Arco Iris Spanish Immersion Schoolstarted the school year with 57 students. It wasn't as many as they'd expected, but it was enough for a class of first-graders, second-graders and a third/fourth grade blend.

It also guarantees them a place inBeaverton School District history.

Arco Iris, which is Spanish for rainbow, offers Spanish immersion, meaning

Teachers union president pans “Waiting for ‘Superman’” – The Education Beat

Teachers union president pans “Waiting for ‘Superman’” – The Education Beat

Teachers union president pans “Waiting for ‘Superman’”

Posted by on September 23, 2010

Michelle Eberlin, president of the Quincy Federation of Teachers, issued a pre-emptive strike prior to the release this weekend of the controversial new movie “Waiting for ‘Superman.’ ”

“It is basically an attack on teachers and teachers unions, and it needs to be addressed in our community,” she told members of the Quincy School Board Wednesday night.

The documentary by Davis Guggenheim, director of “An Inconvenient Truth,” takes aim at the demise of the public education system in America.

The film has been creating a buzz ever since it premiered at the Sundance Film Festival. The clamor got even louder this week after Oprah Winfrey featured the movie on her show.

Here’s how the movie is described on the film’s own Facebook site: “Waiting for Superman examines the crisis of public education in the United States through multiple interlocking stories—from a handful of students and their families whose futures hang in the balance, to the educators and reformers trying to find real and lasting solutions within a dysfunctional system.”

Eberlin said based on what she had read and heard, the film paints an unfair picture of education in America.

“The film itself misses the key points of an effective solution” to the problems facing education, she said.

AP: Pa. Teachers' Union Loses Address Privacy Case - kdka.com

AP: Pa. Teachers' Union Loses Address Privacy Case - kdka.com

AP: Pa. Teachers' Union Loses Address Privacy Case

MARK SCOLFORO, Associated Press Writer
HARRISBURG, Pa. (AP) ― A Pennsylvania appeals court on Friday threw out a lawsuit filed by the state's largest teachers' union that sought to prevent public disclosure of public school employees' home addresses.

Commonwealth Court ruled against the Pennsylvania State Education Association, which sued the state Office of Open Records to keep it from ordering the release of the addresses under the state's Right-to-Know Law.

Five of seven judges joined a majority opinion that said the union did not have the right to sue the agency, but instead would have to sue school districts to pursue the matter. A sixth judge said the addresses should be public, and the seventh would have kept the case alive but wanted additional facts and oral argument.

The decision can be appealed to the state Supreme Court. Union spokeswoman Barb Brady said the ruling was being reviewed and had no immediate comment, but Office of Open

Forget Body Language, Who Is Michelle Rhee Wearing? - Das Krapital - Washington City Paper

Forget Body Language, Who Is Michelle Rhee Wearing? - Das Krapital - Washington City Paper

Forget Body Language, Who Is Michelle Rhee Wearing?

One of the torments of attempting to act in any sort of “aggregative” capacity for a blog is, adding insult to the lost hours sustained executing the injurious task of scanning all the aggregators, opening tabs, taking in the terabytes of wasted effort, the inordinately larger waste involved in the depressing effort to re-locate all the pointless URLs one had grudgingly settled upon referencing and realizing that while all of them are currently open somewhere on one’s screen, consuming valuable RAM and sabotaging the performance of one’s TweetDeck and the whole the rest of it, they are for one’s immediate purposes hopelessly Missing in Action, as stubbornly inconspicuous and hopelessly overlooked as a black Lexus parked next to a fire hydrant on New York Avenue.

Well readers, today is my birthday and realizing yesterday that I did not want to spend my thirty second year searching hopelessly for lost tags, I downloaded

Reaction to "Gathering Storm" U.S. science education report - Science Fair: Science and Space News - USATODAY.com

Reaction to "Gathering Storm" U.S. science education report - Science Fair: Science and Space News - USATODAY.com

Reaction to "Gathering Storm" U.S. science education report

A National Academies report Thursday warned of a crummy economic future unless fixes are made to U.S. science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) education.

Included below are longer reactions to the "Rising Above the Gathering Storm," report:

Steven Newton, Programs and Policy Director, National Center for Science Education, Inc.

The NCSE welcomes this report, and we hope that the call for improving education—particularly in science, math, and technology fields—is heard by many. When the 2005 Gathering Storm report was released, the New York Times' Thomas Friedman wrote that the urgency of its findings required a bold "new New Deal" for education.

But meaningful educational reforms have not materialized.

Illinois Schools Not Making the Grade, Report Says | NBC Chicago

Illinois Schools Not Making the Grade, Report Says | NBC Chicago

Illinois Schools Not Making the Grade, Report Says

City gets federal grant for teacher bonuses

By JENNIFER SCHWARZ
Updated 10:00 AM CDT, Fri, Sep 24, 2010

Chicago's Public Schools aren't making the grade, says a bipartisan education reform group.

Advance Illinois released a report card for Illinois schools, and gave the state a D for K-12 education.

The report was presented by former Illinois Gov. Jim Edgar and former U.S. Secretary of Commerce Bill Daley at a City Club of Chicago luncheon Thursday.

It said:

  • 33% of eight grade students are proficient in math
  • 33% of eighth graders are proficient in reading
  • 16% of students take advanced classes
  • 37% of adults have at least an associates degree


Source: http://www.nbcchicago.com/news/local-beat/Illinois-Schools-Failing-Chicago-looking-for-Innovations-103710529.html#ixzz10T4hOpwD