Thursday, December 23, 2010

For-Profit Colleges Double Spending, Hire Ex-Congressmen to Beat Aid Rules - Bloomberg

For-Profit Colleges Double Spending, Hire Ex-Congressmen to Beat Aid Rules

By John Lauerman and Jonathan D. Salant - Dec 22, 2010 9:00 PM PT

U.S. For-Profit College Executives Reap Pay Rewards

Nov. 10 (Bloomberg) -- Bloomberg's John Hechinger talks about compensation for top executives at the 15 U.S. publicly traded for-profit colleges, including Strayer Education Inc., Apollo Group Inc. and Education Management Corp. Hechinger speaks with Betty Liu on Bloomberg Television's "In the Loop." (Source: Bloomberg)

Dec. 23 (Bloomberg) --For-profit colleges more than doubled spending on lobbying and hired six former members of the U.S. Congress this year to fight regulations that threaten the industry.

Ten education companies and their trade association spent $3.8 million on lobbying in the first nine months of 2010, up from $1.5 million in the comparable period last year, according to reports filed with Congress.

For-profit colleges are resisting a U.S. Department of Education proposal to restrict funding and objecting to a law that limits their revenue from government sources. The proposed restriction, called “gainful employment,” would tie eligibility for

Private school vouchers return to education agenda - Sacramento Living - Sacramento Food and Wine, Home, Health | Sacramento Bee

Private school vouchers return to education agenda

By DAVID HARRISON
Stateline.org

Published: Thursday, Dec. 23, 2010 - 5:07 am

WASHINGTON -- A decade ago, almost any discussion about reforming the nation's public schools included vouchers. The idea of letting students use taxpayer dollars to attend private schools appealed to conservatives, who liked the notion of subjecting public schools to competition. Some Democratic mayors, frustrated with the slow pace of school improvement, also rallied behind vouchers.

Then, vouchers got overtaken by other ideas about how to shake up public schools. Unions vehemently opposed vouchers, arguing they would starve public schools of funding. Vouchers were left out of the 2002 federal No Child Left Behind law, making it difficult for programs to gain a foothold in school districts. More recently, the Obama administration left vouchers out of its Race to the Top grant program, even as it endorsed other reforms such as charter schools and pay-for-

U.K. Police Chief Proposes Banning Peaceful Student Protests | Education | Change.org

U.K. Police Chief Proposes Banning Peaceful Student Protests

by Megan Cottrell

British students have rallied for weeks, protesting cuts to higher education that would raise tuition beyond what many can afford. College students, high school students andeven elementary school students have gotten involved, standing up for their ability to get an affordable education.

"We are no longer that generation that doesn't care, we are no longer that generation to sit back and take whatever they give us. We are now the generation at the heart of the fight back," said 15 year-old protester Rodney Owen McCarthy.

But because some of the protests have gotten violent, with some police even being accused of assaulting

ASCD Inservice: Who Is This Person We Call Teacher? (1969)

Who Is This Person We Call Teacher? (1969)

Authors George E. Dickson and Samuel L. Creighton argue in the February 1969 issue of Educational Leadership that teachers are increasingly in the contradictory state of being more "militant" for social change, yet still overly conservative.

In "Who Is This Person We Call Teacher?" the authors lay out society's traditional view of teachers ("appreciators of excellence" and "enemies of shoddiness," among other traits) and issue a call for the profession to reconcile these two competing states.

Read the article: "Who Is This Person We Call Teacher?" (PDF)

Dickson and Creighton state that militancy is the "dominant characteristic that differentiates the contemporary teacher from his predecessor" and that this militancy is justified. In the wake of the social change of the 1950s and '60s, teachers were increasingly demanding better working conditions, more responsibility, and higher pay. Yet, the authors also express

The Answer Sheet - Test scores can't prove whether teacher experience matters

Test scores can't prove whether teacher experience matters

This was written by Monty Neill, interim executive director at The National Center for Fair & Open Testing, known as FairTest. By Monty Neill According to Bill Gates and Education Secretary Arne Duncan, teacher experience does not matter very much. Duncan says we should not "pay teachers based on their educational credentials and seniority" -- that is, knowledge and experience. Gates also recently denigrated teacher experience and masters’ degrees. He cited Jennifer R King’s literature review, which shows that experience does matter, but mostly that which they gain in their first five years of teaching. But here’s the rub: They rely entirely on standardized test scores for evidence, even though the tests fail to provide adequate evidence for drawing these conclusions.

Damn Good Education Daily

How Refreshing, Honest, and Courageous It Would Be for Policymakers and Funders To Say Oops!

larrycuban.wordpress.com - The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation and top policymakers have promoted and funded small urban high schools for nearly a decade. Then Bill Gates said in his 2009 Annual Letter that while these sma...

Larryferlazzo

What I Learned in 2010 - Bridging Differences

blogs.edweek.org - Dear Deborah,As 2010 draws to a close, I must tell you that this was probably the most amazing and wonderful year of my life. I spent the previous three years writing a book, and I had no idea how ...

DianeRavitch

Inside The Times

latimes.com - Science teacher Jennifer Burman instructs her class at Edwin Markham Middle School, where test scores have markedly improved. (Christina House, For The Times / December 12, 2010) By Jason Felch, Ja...

leoniehaimson

Federal Education Budget Project | NewAmerica.net

edmoney.newamerica.net - Last week Democratic leaders in the Senate proposed and then retracted an omnibus appropriations bill that would have funded all federal education programs subject to the annual appropriations proc...

DianeRavitch

The Principal Difference: A School Leadership Blog by Mel Riddile: PISA: It's Poverty Not Stupid

nasspblogs.org - "There are three kinds of lies; lies, damn lies, and statistics."--Mark Twain The release of the 2009 PISA results this past week has created quite a stir and has provided ample fodder for public s...

DianeRavitch

My American Story

The My American Story Public Service Campaign features volunteers telling us --in their own words-- how service has changed their lives and strengthened their communities. What's your story? For more information on how to upload a video response, please visit http://www.serve.gov/myamericanstory_...

Why China excels — Joanne Jacobs

Why China excels

DECEMBER 23, 2010 BY JOANNE LEAVE A COMMENT

Shanghai;s 15-year-old students are way better than the rest of the world in reading, science and, especially math, notes Education Gadfly’s Amber M. Winkler, looking at the latest PISA results. “In math, they scored nearly a full standard deviation above the OECD average.” And it’s not just rote learning: PISA asks students to apply knowledge to real-world problems.

As an authoritarian regime, China “can force educational change in ways that are unthinkable in democracies,” Winkler writes. Still, “despite our vastly different governments and cultures, there may yet be a few lessons that America can learn

Latest News and Comment from Education

Thursday, December 23, 2010