Tuesday, September 28, 2010

Christie Said to Seek Pay, Tenure Changes in New Jersey Education Overhaul - Bloomberg

Christie Said to Seek Pay, Tenure Changes in New Jersey Education Overhaul

By Terrence Dopp - Sep 28, 2010 11:40 AM PT

New Jersey Governor Chris Christie will propose tying teacher pay and tenure to student performance and making it easier for school districts to fire their worst educators, said a person with knowledge of the measures.

The proposals will be unveiled today by Christie at a town hall meeting in Old Bridge, said the person, who declined to be identified because he isn’t authorized to speak ahead of the governor’s announcement. Kevin Roberts, a spokesman for Christie, declined to comment.

Christie’s initiatives were outlined in a June application for $400 million in federal education funds that the state lost due to a clerical error. The governor, 48, is seeking changes to

Big, bad Brockton High turns around — Joanne Jacobs

Big, bad Brockton High turns around

by Joanne

Shocked by horrible test scores on Massachusetts’ state exam, teachers at Brockton High began meeting on Saturdays to discuss how to improve the school. Brockton High, with 4,100 mostly low-income, mostly black and Hispanic students, is a success story, reports the New York Times. For the last two years, the school outperformed 90 percent of Massachusetts high schools in improving English Language Arts scores.

Shamed by low scores in 1999, the teachers’ committee asked every educator in the building to teach reading, writing, speaking and reasoning skills. The administration stood aside and let the committee take the lead. Eventually, Susan Szachowicz, one of the teachers who led the committee, took over as principal.

Writing exercises took many forms, but encouraged students to think methodically. A science

Education Week: Obama: Education Key to Economic Success

Obama: Education Key to Economic Success

More Iowa Schools Considering Merging Districts

Lincoln, Neb., Schools Get Tougher on Texting

Police: Gunman Kills Himself At University Of Texas : NPR

September 28, 2010

A gunman opened fire Tuesday inside a University of Texas campus library and then fatally shot himself, and police are searching for a possible second suspect, university police said.

A man fired an automatic weapon on the sixth floor of the Perry-Castaneda Library in Austin early Tuesday, UT police spokeswoman Rhonda Weldon said.

"He subsequently shot himself. He is deceased,'' she said, adding that no one else was reported injured.

Austin Police Chief Art Acevedo told a news conference that police also are investigating what he described as a second crime scene outside the library where shots also were fired.

Randall Wilhite, an adjunct law professor at the university, said he was driving to class when he saw "students start scrambling behind wastebaskets, trees and monuments,'' and then a young man carrying an assault rifle sprinting along the street.

"He was running right in front of me ... and he shot what I thought were three more shots ... not atPolice: Gunman Kills Himself At University Of Texas

by THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

This Week In Education: Reform: Is "Superman" Moving Us Backwards?

Reform: Is "Superman" Moving Us Backwards?

by Alexander Russo

I must admit having given up wading through all the Waiting For Superman / Education Nation stuff over the last couple of days. Far as I can tell, the benefits of all this coverage and commentary (a temporary uptick in public concerns about education) have been matched or perhaps even outweighed by the internal strife that's been generated among various stakeholders and kind of reformers. Waiting For Supermen in particular has prompted the release of a lot of pent-up anger among educators who voted for Obama bu

Thompson: Cutting Wages Makes Teaching More Attractive

by john thompson

At Dove Academy, the McCharter school near my house, teachers' starting pay is down to $27,300 per year. The deprofessionalization of charter school teachers puts downward pressure on the wages of all. And it is not just the quality of life of educators that is damaged

Schools Matter: Pittsburgh Superintendent Bashes Imagine Schools

Pittsburgh Superintendent Bashes Imagine Schools

by Kenneth Libby

Some unkind words from Pittsburgh's Superintendent about Imagine's real estate practices. An Imagine spokesperson willing to talk about how the money will be spent only AFTER the charter is granted. Will Imagine win the appeal?

From the Pittsburgh Channel:

Team 4: Pittsburgh Public Schools Rejects Charter School Company

Local Group Partners With Imagine Schools To Charter Burgwin Elementary

PITTSBURGH -- A controversial out-of-state charter school company that stands to collect millions

CHARTER SCHOOL SCANDALS: ICEF Public Schools

ICEF Public Schools

by The Perimeter Primate

As you read this, keep in mind that financial decisions for ICEF are made by its high-powered, supposedly financially-savvy, and experienced board of trustees led by a chairman who is an well-known investment banker.

The board of trustees consists of the following:

a former investment banker / financial analyst,
an actress,
the Co-Director of the Urban Leadership Program at Claremont Graduate University,
the CEO and President of Challengers Boys & Girls Club,
the managing director of the investment firm of Cabera Capital,
the owner of a vineyard and former banker,

Benji’s Charter School

by The Perimeter Primate

QUESTIONS RAISED OVER CHARTER SCHOOL'S FINANCES, September 25, 2010, KTRK TV (Houston, TX)

Where is taxpayer money going and how is a taxpayer-owned building being used? Those are the new questions complicating the battle over Benji's Charter School in northeast Houston.
Benji's Academy has had its charter suspended because of concerns about money mismanagement and out of a concern over the health and safety of its students. Now the city of Houston is investigating the school's use of its city-owned building on in northeast Houston.

Calitics:: Teacher Rated Poorly by LA Times Commits Suicide

Calitics:: Teacher Rated Poorly by LA Times Commits Suicide:

Teacher Rated Poorly by LA Times Commits Suicide

by: Robert Cruickshank

Mon Sep 27, 2010 at 15:00:00 PM PDT

Even though education experts slammed the LA Times for ranking LA Unified teachers based on a flawed metric emphasizing test scores above other factors, the Times went ahead and published the article anyway. Last week we learned that the lowest rated teacher was, in fact, a successful and beloved teacher who eschewed the tests in order to ensure her students had the English language skills they needed for a lifetime of success.

Today comes a much more dark and tragic story of another teacher who was given a low ranking in the flawed LA Times article. Rigoberto Ruelas, a teacher at a school in South LA who had been missing, was found dead of an apparent suicide in the Angeles National Forest above LA:

"Based upon the entirety of the investigation, the evidence indicates he took his own life in this tragedy," Los Angeles County Sheriff's Capt. Mike Parker said....
KABC-TV Channel 7 quoted family members as saying that Ruelas was distraught about scoring low in a teacher-rating database recently made public by The Times. He had been missing since Sept. 22. South Gate Police Officer Tony Mendez told KCAL-TV Channel 9 that Ruelas was unhappy at his database ranking....

ASCD Inservice: In Case You Missed It

ASCD Scholars Call for Discussion Topics

Last year, ASCD launched a group discussion series led by a cohort of educators from around the world and with varying job titles. We're excited to announce that the ASCD Conference Scholars are back, with a new group of educators joining last year's team.

We're looking forward to another year of deep, and likely disquieting, dialogue. To get the ball rolling, the request lines are open:

Secretary Duncan to Address Committee for Education Funding's 2010 Gala in Washington, D.C. | U.S. Department of Education

Secretary Duncan to Address Committee for Education Funding's 2010 Gala in Washington, D.C.

Contact:

Jim Bradshaw, (202) 401-1576 , jim.bradshaw@ed.gov

Event Date 1 : September 29, 2010 07:30 pm

U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan will address the Committee for Education Funding's 2010 Gala Wednesday evening at the Hyatt Regency Washington on Capitol Hill. Secretary Duncan will discuss the historic opportunity to save education jobs and support reform with the federal investment in education over the past two years. The banquet begins at 6 p.m., and Secretary Duncan will speak at around 7:30 p.m.

Event 1

Who :	U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan
What :	Address to Committee for Education Funding 2010 Gala
When :	7:30 p.m. Wednesday, Sept. 29, 2020
Where :	Hyatt Regency Washington on Capitol Hill, 400 New Jersey Ave., N.W., Washington, D.C.

Queens Teacher: Oprah & NBC: By Not Having Ravitch, You Are Keeping Public Uninformed

Oprah & NBC: By Not Having Ravitch, You Are Keeping Public Uninformed

by Queens Teacher

Popout

Shame on you!!! The truth will eventually come out.

How I’m Powered by Orange at Eric Stoller's Blog

How I’m Powered by Orange

with 5 comments

Eric Stoller is Powered by Orange

My last day at Oregon State University (OSU) is September 30th. I think it’s fitting as my first day at OSU was also in September. Six years ago I moved out to Oregon from Chicago, IL. It was a tremendous life transition. I had been working at the University of Illinois at Chicago (UIC) and the decision to leave UIC/Chicago was a big one for a young professional from the Midwest.

When I first started looking at graduate programs in higher education/student affairs I had no idea that I would end up moving to Oregon. I remember checking up on about 5 or 6 programs. I kept coming back to OSU as my first choice. Eventually, I decided to apply for the College Student Services Administration (CSSA) programat OSU. It was the only grad program that I submitted an application to. In hindsight, I probably should have applied to more than one school just in case OSU didn’t accept me. However, sometimes you have to put all of your eggs in a single basket and hope for the best. Concentrating on a single application made my process

Colleges boost security, consider limits following series of attacks - The Boston Globe

After attacks, area colleges try to balance security, access

Officials to reevaluate their safety strategies

By Peter Schworm and Milton Valencia

Globe Staff / September 28, 2010

Text size – +

As authorities searched for the assailants in recent stabbings at two area colleges, college officials and security specialists said the attacks underlined the uneasy reality that even secluded campuses are susceptible to violence from outsiders and can reasonably do only so much to prevent it.

At Regis College in Weston, where an 18-year-old was stabbed to death Friday morning, campus police kept an around-the-clock watch on student dormitories and screened all visitors at the main entrance. Gates at two other entrances to the campus are being locked overnight. At Boston College, police stepped up

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Tuesday, September 28, 2010