Education Program
This Week in Education
September 4- September 10, 2008
Highlighted Bills of the Week
(Powered by State Net)
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New York- (SB 7051)- Enacted |
Requires the Commissioner of Education to develop resources and technical assistance for schools and to provide to children information concerning the safe and responsible use of the internet; requires the resources to include information regarding child predators, protecting personal information, internet scams, and cyber-bullying. |
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California -(AB 2115)- Enrolled |
Requires charter schools to adopt and comply with a conflict-of-interest policy to include specified requirements set forth in existing law. Sets the eligibility qualifications to be elected or appointed to a charter school governing board. Prohibits a school employee from serving unless they resign employment. Relates to board term limits and board member voting requirements. Requires charter schools to comply with specified acts relating to open meetings. |
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This Week in Education
September 4 - September 10, 2008
K-12
For the Georgia Schools Chief, Geography and History Pay Off
The Georgia state school superintendent, Kathy Cox, won $1 million last Friday on the Fox game show “Are You Smarter Than a Fifth Grader?” and said Monday that “the primary beneficiary of the money” would be two state schools for the deaf and one for the blind.
Dropout bill passed
State Reps. Stephen R. Canessa, D-New Bedford, and John F. Quinn, D-Dartmouth, have praised the passage of the high school Drop-out Prevention & Intervention bill. The legislation is a combination of various bills that were filed this legislative session regarding dropout prevention.
Many Principals Remain at Schools Graded ‘F’
When New York City’s public schools received their first report cards last fall, given a blunt A through F letter grade, Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg warned of consequences for those with low marks, saying with a flourish: “Is this a wake-up call for the people who work there? You betcha.” But nearly a year after the report cards were issued, the majority of the principals who ran the 52 schools labeled as failing remain in place.
Dropouts get a 2nd chance
Superintendent David Anthony said Cypress-Fairbanks, the state's third-largest school system with 100,500 students, has an 89 percent graduation rate, the highest of the 50 largest districts across the nation. So why all the effort? "It's our moral obligation to educate our children," Anthony said. "If we know there are students who dropped out and don't do anything to get them back, shame on us."
Bay State Governor Presses Education Plan
With his own new education chief in place, Gov. Deval Patrick of Massachusetts is moving forward with an ambitious education agenda for the state’s students that would include free access to community college for all state residents, a statewide teacher contract, and an aggressive dropout-prevention program.
Few taking state up on free college
More than 56,000 Washington middle-schoolers qualify for a new scholarship that would give them a free ride at a state college -- but only a fraction of them have signed up, officials said Wednesday.
Test Scores Show a Racial Divide: White students are the only subgroup that met federal standards this year
As students head back to the classroom for a new school year this week, administrators are grappling with an age-old question: how to solve the achievement gap in Alexandria. School Board members campaigned on closing it, and a generation of city leadership has advocated its importance. Yet statistics released by the Virginia Department of Education last week show that the divide between those making the cut and those falling behind is increasingly drawn along racial lines.
School Choice
Local charters oppose new bill
Charter schools statewide are fighting a proposed bill that would subject charters to many of the same restrictions as traditional school district boards, including the prohibition of allowing charter school employees from serving on its board. The bill introduced by Assemblyman Gene Mullin, proposes an act to add two sections to the Education Code, relating to charter schools.
STEM
K12 Inc. Scraps India Outsourcing (EdWeek.org)
A company that runs one of the nation’s largest networks of online schools recently decided to discontinue a program that arranged for high school teachers in the United States to send their students’ English essays to India for evaluations by reviewers there.
Online textbooks: Hope or hype? : Students, publishers spar over potential of eTextbooks to reduce costs
Online textbooks have been touted in recent months as a way to bring relief to college students beleaguered by soaring textbook prices. Now, a study from the Student Public Interest Research Groups raises questions about whether online texts really are better than their printed counterparts--and publishers of online textbooks are firing back in turn.
Teacher
Rhee's 'Plan B' Targets Teacher Quality
Schools Chancellor Michelle A. Rhee is preparing to bypass the Washington Teachers' Union in pursuit of the objective she considers essential to overhauling the District's public schools: the power to fire at will teachers she deems ineffective.
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