Education

The Absolute Best School Climate Blogging (This Week)

By Evie Blad — March 28, 2014 1 min read
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Happy Friday, Rules readers. I’ve spent my Friday afternoon reading school climate data, constantly refreshing the weekend weather forecast in hopes of a hint of spring, and looking at these great photos of kids around the world with their most valued possessions.

This week, we learn about preschool expulsions, teenage pregnancy in the Choctaw Nation, teaching in New Orleans, and what it’s like to be Malala’s dad.

On expelling 4-year-olds:

“The pattern of exclusion suggests that schools are giving up on these children when they are barely out of diapers. It runs counter to the very mission of early education, which is to promote school readiness.”
The New York Times editorializes on new data on preschool expulsions. Ed Week blogger Christina Samuels talked to some researchers about solutions here.

On teen pregnancy and poverty:

“This isn’t what her life is supposed to look like. She’d imagined herself a college co-ed, partying somewhere with a drink in her hand, giggling with girlfriends, or pulling an all-nighter for an exam she didn’t study for. Instead she’s an underemployed 19-year-old mother and wife, struggling to keep her young marriage together and raise a kid in a small rural town where opportunities are few and disappointments are many.”
MSNBC reports on pregnant teens living in the Choctaw Nation.

On school climate:

“I have heard the following things speciously defended or excused by New Orleans culture: truancy, low test scores, drug and alcohol addiction, extended families showing up within the hour to settle minor school-boy scuffles, inept bureaucracy, lazy teachers, students showing up hungover the day after Mother’s Day.”
—David Ramsey writes in the Oxford American about teaching in New Orleans’ Recovery District and listening to Lil Wayne (I’m told this was published a few years ago, but they republished it this week).

For an international perspective:

“Why is my daughter so strong? Because I didn’t clip her wings.”
—Pakistani educator Ziauddin Yousafzai gives a TED Talk about his daughter, activist Malala Yousafzai.

A version of this news article first appeared in the Rules for Engagement blog.