Thursday, July 15, 2010

Parents blast school board’s plan to explain intercourse, gay love to students - The Boston Globe

Parents blast school board’s plan to explain intercourse, gay love to students

Associated Press / July 15, 2010

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HELENA, Mont. — A proposed sex education program that teaches fifth-graders the different ways people have intercourse and first-graders about gay love has infuriated parents and forced the school board to take a closer look at the issue.

Helena school trustees were swamped Tuesday at a hearing that left many of the hundreds of parents in attendance standing outside a packed boardroom. They urged the school board to take the sex education program back to the drawing board.

The proposed 62-page document covers a broad health and nutrition education program and took two years to draft. But it is the small portion dealing with sexual education that has drawn criticism.

Parents appeared most worried about pieces of the plan that teach first-graders about same-gender relationships, fifth-graders that sexual intercourse includes “vaginal, oral, or anal penetration,’’ and high school students about erotic art.

Cool Cat Teacher Blog: The Champion Within

The Champion Within

by coolcatteacher@gmail.com (Victoria A Davis, Cool Cat Teacher)

Image via Wikipedia

It is with great shame that I tell you the story behind this poem. Shame because it shows I made a horrible mistake and judged someone. In 1989, I was an intern for Senator Sam Nunn in Washington D.C. One of the greatest statesmen of our generation! What a great man.

I worked in domestic affairs and often answer the phone when they were ringing off the hook (as they often did.) I remember this one day that I had just gotten off the phone with a man from California who was convinced that the Senator was funding research to create laser beams that would put out the eyes of everyone on earth. (Senator Nunn was Chairman of the armed services committee.) I listened with respect as any caller to the US Senate deserves and noted his concerned to be put in the daily log files. I say this not to excuse what happened next but just to give a context that it had been quite a day.

My next caller sounded almost like a child. The voice was quiet and the words were stilted. It was Muhammad Ali - at least he said he was. I listened to him and it was difficult. At first I pushed my pad of paper aside - it had been a long day. I'd just listen this one out. But then, as I listened, I thought to myself 'What if this is

AFT Convention in Seattle – Day 4 � JD2718

AFT Convention in Seattle – Day 4

JULY 14, 2010 AM31 3:05 AM

tags: AFT, AFT Convention, American Federation of Teachers

by jd2718

Day 4 of the Convention was the shortest. The morning session started a little after 9:30, and wrapped up near 1, and that was it.

Credentials were updated (I think?) and election results announced. The Progressive Caucus swept. The opposition from Detroit got about 5%. Barbara Bowen (PSC) was the leading vote getter, followed by Karen Lewis (CTU Local 1), well ahead of the rest.

International relations was first group of resolutions on the agenda. And Afghanistan was prioritized #1 out of the committee. The NYSUT resolution had been recommended, and all the debate was about two amendments.

The first amendment said that this is, for the United States, a war of choice, not a war of defense. The second amendment removed from the resolved section language that muddied when we wanted the war to end, and further removed a full resolved advising the armed forces on how to conduct the war on terror. Three PSC leaders spoke powerfully for the amendments. Leo Casey moved to a mike in front of a mike with a UFT delegate. He defended the weaker version of the resolution, and the next speaker dutifully ended debate. Even the weakened resolution was an anti-war resolution, of a sort. We’ll have to strengthen it in two years.

The second resolution was on Iran. A delegate from New Jersey who had spoken on this resolution in committee again spoke to it, offering an amendment that would seek a peaceful approach to Iran. A UFT delegate answered that this was not a foreign policy resolution, but a

Teacher unions: Don’t talk about my mama like that. � Fred Klonsky's blog

Teacher unions: Don’t talk about my mama like that.

JULY 15, 2010

tags: Whitney Tilson

by preaprez

There’s nothing that would make the hedge fund education entrepreneurs like Whitney Tilson happier than for people to buy into the teacher union/teacher dichotomy.

There are our million educators in the two teacher unions, but the Whitney Tilsons and Bill Gates of this world think they can talk stuff about teacher unions and we’re not supposed to think they talking stuff about us. Right.

On Twitter some guy named Erik Syring who heads some private enterprise called Global Education proposes this very hypothesis. Erik points out that he is an alum of McKinsey (the consulting firm of Enron fame) and Harvard Business School.

Syring Tweets:

@teacherken @mikeklonsky @fklonsky Tilson predominately writes/talks about teacher unions, not teachers. Very different categories #edreform

Tea Party Should Hail NAACP Resolution on Racism | California Progress Report

Tea Party Should Hail NAACP Resolution on Racism

by kaldveer

By Earl Ofari Hutchinson

The NAACP’s resolution calling on Tea Party activists to repudiate “racist elements” in their ranks has met with predictable outrage from Sarah Palin and others on the right. The truth is, the NAACP pulled its punches. It backed away from a blanket condemnation of the party as racist—a tactful and crucial distinction that the national convention was right to make.

It’s also true that Tea Party leaders admit that people at their events have spouted racist slurs—slurs the same leaders claim to have denounced. That’s an arguable point. Meanwhile, the question remains: Is the Tea Party racist or not? And what kind of a threat does it represent?

Eduflack: Is ESEA a Voting Issue?

Is ESEA a Voting Issue?

by Eduflack

For years now, we have heard how "education" is a top-five political issue for most Americans, usually falling behind the economy, jobs, and healthcare in terms of importance. Despite its standing, though, most election results have shown that K-12 education issues simply are not deciding factors when one steps into the voter booth, particularly when we are casting votes for offices like U.S. Representative and U.S. Senator (and, of course, President).

As much as we may want education to be a voting issue on the national level, it simply is not (and the good folks at Ed in '08 can back us up here). Education is perceived by many to be a local issue, a topic best controlled by local school boards, city councils, and mayors. We may need some state legislatures and governors to weigh in, particularly with the checkbook, but education simply is not seen as a national issue. Even during the height of No Child Left Behind, we simply didn't see national elections decided, or even

Around the Edu-Horn, July 14, 2010

by Eduflack

RT @ewrobelen As of today, half the states have OK'd the new common standards. S.C. is the latest to sign on:http://bit.ly/9MabsW

Teaching principals to save schools -- http://tinyurl.com/285ba7n

For-profits, e-learning, and K12 schools, oh my! http://tinyurl.com/2amxxez

DC elementary school test scores decline; middle, high schools rise -- http://tinyurl.com/2a6olr8

Are Latino students being shortchanged? http://tinyurl.com/2fonv8r

Notes from the news, July 15 | Philadelphia Public School Notebook

Notes from the news, July 15

by Erika Owens

What do parents want from schools? Daily News (opinion)
Response to the Pew study on school options claims the study shows, "Parents don't like district public schools."
State tells child services provider to compensate families YoungPhillyPolitics
The state department of education investigated a complaint about Elwyn, Inc., by the Education Law Center and Disability Rights Network and warned that delays in compensating families for special education services are not acceptable.
competition" href="http://www.thenotebook.org/blog/102701/notebook-blogger-and-students-win-let-freedom-ring-competition" target="_blank" style="color: rgb(34, 68, 187); ">Notebook blogger and students win "Let Freedom Ring" competition The Notebook blog
Teacher blogger Samuel Reed and his students from Beeber won the "Best Concept" award for their Liberty Bell design. Congrats to Samuel and his students!
Daily Digression: Reconstruction Reconsidered Office of Teaching and Unlearning
Philly teacher Mr. Smith alerted us to his blog, where he's writing about his experiences at a summer institute focused on African American political history.
Cursos de español para niños Al Día
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Lawsuit: California school funding system is unconstitutional - Inside Bay Area

Lawsuit: California school funding system is unconstitutional

Second case in two months filed Monday in Alameda Superior Court

By Katy Murphy
Oakland Tribune

Posted: 07/12/2010 04:18:17 PM PDT

Updated: 07/12/2010 09:32:46 PM PDT

Click photo to enlarge

Attorney John T. Affeldt holds up a copy of a lawsuit against the State of California for...

OAKLAND — California's substandard school system is depriving students of the opportunity to receive a meaningful education and to meet the standards the state has set for them, a coalition of parents, students and civil rights advocacy groups argued in a lawsuit filed Monday in Alameda Superior Court against the state and the governor.

The plaintiffs argue that education is a fundamental right under California's constitution, and far too many students are failing to read and write at grade level or graduate from high school.

To remedy the problem, the coalition is demanding equal access to preschools, increased school funding, better data systems and an efficient, coherent school finance system that

provides more resources to children with greater need.

The Campaign for Quality Education suit was filed less than two months after a similar case, Robles-Wong v. California, began to make its way through the court system. Attorneys involved with the second suit said the two cases are complementary, but that Monday's complaint gives voice to the needs of the state's low-income students.

Both cases were initiated in the context of ongoing school budget cuts, which have led to teacher layoffs, shortened school years and elementary school class sizes of 30 students or more in some districts. Per-student funding, already below the national average, dropped 14 percent from 2007-08 through 2009-10 during the state budget crisis,

according to the nonpartisan Legislative Analyst's Office.

1,500 mourners expected at Locatelli funeral at Santa Clara University
At least 1,500 mourners are expected to attend the outdoor funeral service Friday evening for the Rev. Paul Locatelli, Santa Clara University's chancellor and former president who guided the university through tremendous change and revitalization.

Day care programs suspended at Hayward schools

No spring admission to SJSU

Education Report: California's school funding system and report of an ACT inequity

Save Fremont Students hoping for late surge in donations

Judge will reconsider previous ruling that kept Peralta colleges document secret

Rev. Paul Locatelli, former Santa Clara University president, dies at 71

Stanford University confronts the graying of academia