Tuesday, December 21, 2010

Nearly a Third of Working Families Considered 'Low-Income' | The Atlantic Wire

Nearly a Third of Working Families Considered 'Low-Income'

By ALEX EICHLER | December 21, 2010 11:06am

According to a report released this week, nearly a third of American working families are now considered low-income, earning less than twice the poverty threshold. The report [PDF], released by the Working Poor Families Project, shows that 30.1 percent of working families--about 45 million people, including 22 million children--"are struggling to meet basic needs." The report also notes that the percentage of low-income working families "with at least one minority parent" is nearly twice as high as the percentage of low-income white working families. These findings are reminiscent of last month's report that 15 percent of households struggle to put food on the table. Here's how bloggers and journalists are

The Answer Sheet - A sobering look at Florida school reform

A sobering look at Florida school reform

Florida is increasingly being looked to as a national model of education reform. The state began to overhaul its public education system after Jeb Bush became governor in 1999, and it has been a leader in reforms centered around standardized tests and the expansion of charter schools and virtual education. To separate fact from fiction about Florida’s reforms, I had an e-mail conversation with Professor Sherman Dorn of the University of South Florida, who has spent years researching and writing about public education in the Sunshine State. He maintains a blog about public education at www.shermandorn.com. Please describe the package of reforms launched when Jeb Bush became governor and the philosophy behind them. When Jeb Bush was governor, there were changes in education policy in the state that were initiated by him and his allies in the legislature and also some changes he either did not start or actively opposed.

John Lennon Happy Xmas (War is Over)

The Death of the CIA “Honeypot” Theory of the Julian Assange Rape Allegations « Student Activism

The Death of the CIA “Honeypot” Theory of the Julian Assange Rape Allegations

by Angus Johnston

The “honeypot” explanation for the rape allegations against Wikileaks founder Julian Assange — the theory that his accusers had been CIA plants, recruited for the purpose of seducing him and crying rape — was always a weird one.

The whole thing had a bit of an Ian Fleming vibe, for starters. The one accuser’s supposed links to the CIA turned out to be embarrassingly tenuous. And then there was the problem of the scripting — if these women had been sent to lie, why wouldn’t they have been sent with a simpler, cleaner lie? Why not claim rape that would be immediately understood by all as rapes, rather than assaults that would themselves become the subject of

Promise Academy teaching staffs overwhelmingly new, inexperienced | Philadelphia Public School Notebook

Promise Academy teaching staffs overwhelmingly new, inexperienced

by Benjamin Herold

The School District of Philadelphia has met its goal of radically overhauling the teaching staffs at six newRenaissance Promise Academies.

According to District data obtained by the Notebook, almost 75 percent of the 280 teachers working in Promise Academies are new to their schools. Forty-three percent are in their first year teaching in the District. Although unable to provide exact data, District officials said the majority of those are in their first teaching position anywhere.

Public Education’s Silver Bullet - Reason Magazine

Public Education’s Silver Bullet

School reformer Terry Moe argues that technology will finally accomplish what vouchers never could.

Shikha Dalmia from the January 2011 issue

With the public-school documentary tearjerker Waiting for Superman stunning audiences from coast to coast, D.C. Mayor Adrian Fenty losing his re-election bid largely because of his support for education reform, and NBC devoting an entire week of prime-time coverage to the nation’s ongoing K–12 crisis, many Americans are newly focused on the negative impact teachers unions are having on student performance. Terry M. Moe has been considering the problem for more than two decades now.

Moe, a professor of political science at Stanford University, has been one the most intrepid critics of the unions ever since his first book, Politics, Markets, and American Schools, came out in 1990. Co-authored with John Chubb, the book offered a devastating account of how unions thwart reform and trap children in a dysfunctional education system. Chubb and Moe made an emphatic early plea for school vouchers and parental choice. “We believe existing institutions cannot solve the problem because they are the problem,” they wrote.

The book “rocked the education world,” as the Chicago Tribune put it in 1990. The conservative

Mike DeBonis on Local Politics - Brown keeps education oversight, hires Board of Education member

Brown keeps education oversight, hires Board of Education member

By Mike DeBonis

D.C. Council Chairman-elect Kwame R. Brown has made his first organizational move, announcing that he will retain oversight of the city's public schools in the next term rather than hand the responsibility to a committee run by one of his colleagues.

Until 2007, the council oversight of education generally fell to a standing committee, but that year Chairman Vincent C. Gray, with newly elected Mayor Adrian M. Fenty chomping at the bit to disband the school board and take direct control of the schools, chose to keep the issue under his direct purview. In the following years, Gray used sometimes marathon hearings to question the course of education reform under

My PLN Blueprint in 5 parts « My Island View

My PLN Blueprint in 5 parts

by tomwhitby

Shelly Terrell and Ken Royal are two friends who encouraged me to blog. Both are bloggers and saw something in me and my ability to communicate that I didn’t recognize. Through their encouragement, coaxing and hand holding, I did guest blogs for each of them. I was the Reluctant Blogger. This was one of my early posts explaining how I became involved in Social Media and the idea of a Personal Learning Network.It seems to be a topic that needs to be continually explained because of the growing number of educators who continue to enter the world of social media for educators.

Part 1

One of today’s educational buzzwords, or fad terms is the PLN. For my purposes it stands for Personal Learning Network. Others call it a Professional Learning Network or Community or even Environment. That would be PLN, PLN, PLC, or PLE. Many educators today are involved understanding and developing their own PLN’s.

John Affeldt: Congress Lowering Standards for Teachers; Hiding Truth from Poor, Minority Parents

Congress Lowering Standards for Teachers; Hiding Truth from Poor, Minority Parents

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As I reported on this blog last Thursday and updated since, Congress seems ready to lower the standard of teacher owed every child in the country--particularly impacting children in poor and minority communities--and to hide that fact while they're at it.

Slipped at the 11th hour into the Continuing Resolution to fund the government, the provision at issue proposes to call novice teachers still learning how to teach in alternative preparation programs on nights and weekends "highly qualified" under No Child Left Behind (NCLB). That designation relieves districts of having to tell parents of the teachers' sub-par preparation and allows their continued concentration in poor and minority schools.

Pushed by Teach for America so that they can continue to operate business as usual, it appear

Union scheduled to defend Central Falls teachers - Projo 7 to 7 News Blog | Rhode Island news | The Providence Journal

Union scheduled to defend Central Falls teachers

10:12 AM Tue, Dec 21, 2010 | Permalink
Jennifer D. Jordan

CENTRAL FALLS, R.I. -- The city's teachers' union has scheduled an 11 a.m. news conference on the steps of troubled Central Falls High School this morning, with Randi Weingarten, president of the American Federation of Teachers, and Frank Flynn, president of the Rhode Island chapter.

The news conference follows reports that significant numbers of teachers at the high school are not showing up for work for various reasons, including six teachers who resigned since the school year began, and many others calling in sick, taking long-term leave and personal days.

Jane Sessums, president of the Central Falls Teachers' Union local, says there are "many

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Tuesday, December 21, 2010