Saturday, March 13, 2010

Maldonado to Newsom: Bring it on - San Jose Mercury News

Maldonado to Newsom: Bring it on

By Kurtis Alexander -- Santa Cruz Sentinel

Posted: 03/12/2010 01:58:51 PM PST

Updated: 03/12/2010 06:04:40 PM PST

State Sen. Abel Maldonado, recently tapped by the governor to replace outgoing Lt. Gov. John Garamendi, said Friday he's not fazed by his latest rival for the lieutenant governor seat: San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom.

"I feel I can beat Gavin Newsom," said Maldonado, who represents part of Santa Cruz County and is considered a moderate Republican. "I've been reasonable, pragmatic, and I think the voters of California want someone who has been bipartisan."

Newsom, who dropped out of the governor's race last year, announced Friday morning that he will compete for the state's No. 2 job in the upcoming Democratic primary. Maldonado, meanwhile, is running in the Republican primary and hopes, before the June contest, to seal his nomination to the vacant post, giving him the advantage of incumbency come the election.

"I don't know much about Gavin. I just know what I read," Maldonado said. "Obviously the people of San Francisco think he's a good representative, and they've elected him twice.... I welcome him to the race."

The office of lieutenant governor is largely ceremonial, with the exception of filling in when the governor's absent and casting votes on a number of key committees. Some have used the seat as a springboard to higher office. Garamendi left last year after being elected to Congress.

Newsom, 42, will face Los Angeles City Councilwoman Janice Hahn in the lieutenant governor primary, a challenge many say won't be easy for a San

Francisco politician known to the rest of the state as the mayor who allowed gay marriage at City Hall.

"We tend to live in a bubble in Northern California. We extrapolate from that that he has statewide popularity and he's yet to prove that," said Larry Gerston, a professor of politics at San Jose State University.

Student Loan Bill Opposed by Group Packed With Ex-Clinton Aides - The Caucus Blog - NYTimes.com

Student Loan Bill Opposed by Group Packed With Ex-Clinton Aides

By DAVID M. HERSZENHORN

“This wasteful spending was first identified by President Bill Clinton,” Representative George Miller, Democrat of California and chairman of the Education and Labor Committee, declared on Thursday at a news conference in the Capitol.

Mr. Miller was explaining why he believed there was an urgent need for anoverhaul of federal financial programs that have long enriched private, for-profit student lending companies.

The government pays the private banks a fee to make risk-free loans using taxpayer money. The loans – already guaranteed by the federal government – are then sold back to the government. President Obama has put forward a proposal to end the program, and to instead rely on the existing government direct lending program that accomplishes the same but eliminates the profit for the middlemen. The savings would be used to increase Pell grant scholarships for low-income students.

But just a few minutes after Representative Miller had invoked Mr. Clinton’s name, the Glover Park Group, a powerhouse consulting firm founded by a cadre of former Clinton aides, was aggressively at work fighting the president’s proposal on behalf of an unnamed client.

The firm quickly attacked the effort by Mr. Miller and Senator Tom Harkin, the Democrat from Iowa and chairman of the Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee, to include the financial aid legislation in an expedited budget package along with final revisions to the Democrats’ big health care legislation.

A step down: Federal education standards - The Boston Globe

A step down: Federal education standards

By Ze’ev Wurman and Sandra Stotsky

March 13, 2010

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THE OBAMA administration plans to make states adopt proposed national academic standards as a condition for receipt of federal education grants. The problem is what the administration has proposed is not near the quality of what the Commonwealth already has.

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High academic standards are the foundation of Massachusetts’s landmark education reform success. They set goals for students to reach in each year of elementary, middle, and secondary school. The standards are rigorous, but Massachusetts students have proven year after year that they are up to the challenge.

The latest draft of national English language arts and math standards looks very different. The prestigious National Math Advisory Panel identified algebra as the key to higher-level math study and recommended that more students should be ready to enroll in Algebra I by eighth grade. But it is unlikely that these standards could even support the teaching of such a course in ninth grade.

Rather than relying on English teachers to determine the relative complexity of the texts they would assign, the draft also recommends use of a formula that would be unusable by the average teacher. Indeed, the formula shows “The Grapes of Wrath’’ to be at a second- or third-grade level of complexity.

Some argue that subsequent drafts of the national standards will be better. However, they are based on a fundamentally different foundation than those in place in Massachusetts.

While the Commonwealth’s standards steadily move to higher levels of academic

Latino conference explores role in higher education | Richmond Times-Dispatch

Latino conference explores role in higher education

JUAN ANTONIO LIZAMA TIMES-DISPATCH STAFF WRITER

Published: March 13, 2010

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Many people inaccurately believe that Hispanic students are new to public schools and higher education, state Secretary of Education Gerard Robinson said yesterday.

In 1931, he pointed out, Mexican-American parents in Southern California fought a court battle to end separate-but-equal education for their children -- two decades before the landmark 1954 Brown v. Board of Education decision banning segregation in public schools.

He made his remarks at the fourth annual Virginia Latino Higher Education Network's Encuentro at Virginia State University, which drew about 60 people, mostly Hispanic college faculty and administrators from across the state.

That history "shows that Hispanic parents have been involved in their children's education for a very long time," said Robinson, who grew up in California.

Today, more Hispanic students are taking Advanced Placement courses and the ACT college entrance exams than ever, he said.

"We're moving in the right direction," he said.

The Latino Higher Education Network is nonprofit statewide organization made up of Hispanic and non-Hispanic college and university faculty and administrators.

The two-day conference, which ends today, focused on Hispanic leadership and students in higher education. Sessions included Hispanic women leading the way, planning and access for students, and challenges of illegal immigrants wanting to attend college.

While California has one of the largest Hispanic populations among the states, Virginia has experienced tremendous growth in the past decade, according to the U.S. census.

Census figures show the Hispanic population is now about 460,000, or about 6.8 percent of the Virginia population. Last fall, 4.3 percent of the college students were Hispanic, compared with 2.8 percent 10 years ago, according to the State Council of Higher Education.

Deborah Santiago, vice-president for policy and research from the Washington-based Excelencia in

State sifting through college transfer requirements - Sacramento News - Local and Breaking Sacramento News | Sacramento Bee

State sifting through college transfer requirements

By Laurel Rosenhall
lrosenhall@sacbee.com

Published: Saturday, Mar. 13, 2010 - 12:00 am | Page 1A

It's supposed to be the path to an affordable, high-quality education: attend a California community college for two years, then transfer to one of the state's public universities.

In reality, though, few community collegestudents who set out to transfer actually make it to the university gates – and those who do often take more than two years to get there. They are mired by dozens of bureaucratic roadblocks, from conflicting academic calendars, to an outdated computer program that doesn't accurately track which classes count toward transferring, to entrance requirements that vary from one university to the next – even within the same major.

And that's despite numerous attempts over the years to smooth the transfer process for students moving from community college to theUniversity of California or the California State University.

Student Loan Provisions May Ease Passage of Health Care Bill - Prescriptions Blog - NYTimes.com

Student Loan Provisions May Ease Passage of Health Care Bill

By DAVID M. HERSZENHORN

Many House Democrats reacted enthusiastically on Friday to the word that a proposed overhaul of student loan programs would be included with major health care legislation in an expedited budget package to be offered in Congress.

The student loan overhaul would end government subsidies to private, commercial student lenders that have profited handsomely by making virtually risk-free loans using taxpayer money. The education bill would also redirect billions of dollars in savings from ending the payments to an array of popular education programs, including expanded Pell grants for low-income students.

As a result, some supporters of the health care bill said they were confident the financial aid measure would help generate votes for the overall package.

A look at the vote tallies for the education and health care bills illustrates their point.

The House adopted its health care bill on Nov. 7 by a vote of 220 to 215, with 39 Democrats in opposition. The education bill, however, won even more

Education foundation hosts forum on teacher pay - San Jose Mercury News

Education foundation hosts forum on teacher pay

by Shannon Barry

Posted: 03/12/2010 10:37:02 AM PST

Updated: 03/12/2010 10:37:02 AM PST

Click photo to enlarge

Silicon Valley professionals were evaluating the issue of alternative pay concepts in relation to Race to the Top funding just hours before Jack O'Connell, state superintendent of public instruction, found out California was no longer in the running for phase one of the $4.35 billion in funds, which is the single largest pool of discretionary funding for education reform in U.S. history.

Silicon Valley Education Foundation held an education forum last Wednesday at Synopsys Inc. in Sunnyvale to discuss whether changing the current pay system for educators would play a factor in helping accelerate student achievement and improve public education. Former journalist John Fensterwald moderated the two-hour discussion that drew in widely different viewpoints from administrative, business, teaching, local and statewide angles.

"Our goal today is to explore alternative pay concepts and see what are the disadvantages, advantages and obstacles," Fensterwald said. "We have an excellent panel to do that."

Panelists included Thomas Ezrin, vice president of global compensation, benefits and mobility of Flextronics; Marc Liebman, superintendent of the Berryessa Union School District; Jim Russell, principal of Del Mar High School; Dean Vogel, vice president of the California Teachers Association; and Jeff Camp, chairman of the Full Circle Fund's Education Impact Circle.

Camp opened the educational forum with a 12-minute presentation summarizing the importance of teaching and the

weight of compensation.

"I wanted to start this whole conversation with a picture of an important indicator of success. The completion of a huge important milestone for students graduating from high school," he began. "The way they get there is with the support of effective teachers."

He continued, asking those in the audience: "Why would teachers say this is a rewarding profession?"

Answers varied but circled around a similar theme of helping students grow. He then asked what pay is for, getting

FT.com / US & Canada - Funding squeeze spurs student backlash

Funding squeeze spurs student backlash

By Matthew Garrahan in Los Angeles

Published: March 12 2010 22:17 | Last updated: March 12 2010 22:17

After a 40-year absence, revolution is again in the air in California, with university students taking to the streets to mount noisy and increasingly angry protests directed against steep rises in tuition fees.

The campuses of UCLA and Berkeley were once the setting for passionate demonstrations against the draft and the Vietnam war. The anger this time is directed at state legislators and university administrators who have imposed swingeing fee increases of as much as 30 per cent to plug a funding gap of $1.2bn (£790m, €872m).

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California learns to trim the cost of education - Oct-12

Merrill delivered bonuses before BofA deal - Jan-21

California’s fiscal woes and a projected deficit of $20bn are threatening one of the state’s jewels, the University of California system, which was given a public mandate in 1960 to provide world-class education to deserving students regardless of their ability to pay.

But the annual cost of tuition at some of the universities within the network has jumped to more than $10,000, and that is higher than some of America’s private universities. At the same time and in a bid to cut costs teaching staff have had their hours reduced and the number of classes and study modules available to students is shrinking, sparking a furious reaction.

“We’re paying much more and not getting the classes we want,” said Judy Lee, a 20-year-old psychology student, at a noisy UCLA demonstration where protesters shouted “Who’s got the power? We’ve got the power!” and “The future belongs to

Education symposium takes pragmatic look at state schools crisis - San Jose Mercury News

Education symposium takes pragmatic look at state schools crisis

By Katy Murphy
Oakland Tribune

Posted: 03/12/2010 07:41:47 PM PST

Updated: 03/13/2010 05:23:14 AM PST

OAKLAND — As of Friday morning, 21,397 pink slips had been issued to teachers throughout California, by the state Education Department's count — just one more symptom of the state's ever mounting, multibillion-dollar budget deficit.

But researchers who spoke at an all-day symposium Friday at UC Berkeley went beyond the startling figures as they assessed the state of California's public schools. They discussed whether taxpayers are willing to pay more for public education. They reviewed state laws that allow Californians to shape complex, far-reaching laws in the ballot box and explored the diminishing authority of government institutions after decades of public cynicism and scarce resources.

Graduate students from the Berkeley Review of Education organized the event in response to the funding cuts and political activism on campus. While some of the speakers bemoaned the crisis facing public schools, community colleges and universities, the tone of the event was more pragmatic than rhetorical.

"If you're going to come up during the question-and-answer session and make strident statements about how California needs to fund its higher education system," UC Berkeley professor Norton Grubb admonished the audience, "you also have to say where we're going to get that money from, because there's no loose pots of money out there anywhere."

Earlier in the day, state Superintendent Jack O'Connell had given an optimistic view of public

opinion on education funding. "When you look at polls, people want to invest," he said, pointing to the support of local tax measures in November 2008.

But Grubb and his colleague Bruce Fuller, a professor of education and public policy, presented a different picture. "We have a population that's deeply skeptical of new taxes to even return to the level of public finance we had just a

Coastal Voices Guest Opinion: Don’t punish students, teachers | Crescent City California News, Sports, & Weather | The Triplicate

Don’t punish students, teachers

Written by Mike Mealue March 12, 2010 02:01 pm

Funding for education has been decimated by the current state leadership. At a time when lawmakers mouth the importance of improved test scores and quality education, they are firing young teachers and increasing class sizes!

Locally, school district leaders are choosing to “balance the budget” on the backs of students, teachers, and support staff by laying off school site employees. In our county, 10 percent of the Del Norte Unified School District teaching positions have been eliminated in the past three years. At the same time, administrative costs have increased with only a few reductions in days and no reductions in administrative positions.

The district will contend that many of the decreases in teaching positions are due to reduced enrollment, yet teacher cuts go far beyond the loss of revenue caused by changes in enrollment. Furthermore, if declining enrollment has caused teacher layoffs, why haven’t we seen a reduction in administration? Shouldn’t enrollment numbers be used to determine administrative staffing also?

We can think statewide, but we must act locally. It is time for our local educational leaders to demonstrate true leadership by cutting administrative costs and eliminating medical benefits for school board members.

Teacher layoffs mean larger classes. This should be evident in the increases already seen. Imagine teaching a class of 35 or more sixth-graders! What really happens? It’s simple. More time is spent disciplining students, administering tests, planning and grading; less time is devoted to individual instruction, enrichment activities, or important interpersonal interactions.

The future will be measured by today. It is time our School Board members, school superintendent, deputy superintendent, assistant superintendent, director of human resources

What State’s 188 Low-Performing Schools Can Expect: Challenges, $$s and Longer School Days – Mission Loc@l -- San Francisco Mission District's News, Food, Art and Events

What State’s 188 Low-Performing Schools Can Expect: Challenges, $$s and Longer School Days

By: Lydia ChávezMarch 13, 2010 – 5:43 am

In what appears to be the most dramatic set of challenges in decades, five of the 10 San Francisco schools eligible for millions of dollars in new funding must close, replace half their staffs or convert to charter schools by late August, according to U.S. Department of Education guidelines.

California officials this week announced the three options and an initial list of 188 state schools eligible for the intervention grants. A fourth and less disruptive option is the so-called transformation model. It requires reforming instruction and replacing a principal that has been on the job for more than two years.

While a school’s fate will be determined at the district level, Washington’s rules prevent districts from taking the easiest route.

Districts such as San Francisco with nine or more Tier I or Tier II schools may opt for the milder transformation model in no more “than 50 percent of those schools. “ (Tier I, II and III are designations that refer to poverty, funding and performance levels. If you want tier details, click here. )

“We’re trying to respond to the new information and the new requirements in the most meaningful way,” said Dee Dee Desmond, the executive director for Reform & Accountability for the San Francisco Unified School District.

Desmond said that in the past, San Francisco has developed a reform strategy that encouraged stability. “In helping these schools to be the best that they can be” the changes needed “are not the things that are most draconian,” she said. A shift in principals, and teacher turnover already happens frequently at struggling schools and creates instability that is part of the problem, she

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Saturday, March 13, 2010