March 2, 1983

Education Week, Vol. 02, Issue 23
Education Jesuit Schools' Curricula Undergoing Revision
Jesuit high schools, long noted for the rigor and breadth of their approach to education, have begun experimenting with a lengthy and complex curriculum-improvement process designed to enhance--along with academic excellence--the type of Christian values that Jesuit educators believe are an indispensable part of their mission.
Alex Heard, March 2, 1983
•
5 min read
Education Regulating Private Schools Is Subject of Maine Lawsuit
Testimony began last week and continues this week in a federal trial testing the constitutionality of Maine's education laws as they apply to private fundamentalist Christian schools.
Maureen Williams , March 2, 1983
•
1 min read
English Learners 'European-Style' School Is Model of Bilingual Teaching
When the kindergartners at Oyster Elementary School held their Thanksgiving party last fall, it was much like any other--with Indians in headbands and feathers, Pilgrims in long aprons and typing-paper caps, and a low table loaded with party food served up by the Pilgrims' and the Indians' mothers.
Patricia Ohmans, March 2, 1983
•
9 min read
Education For The Record
Senator Gary Hart, from a speech at a high school in Jackson, Miss., on Feb. 18, after announcing he would seek the Democratic Party's nomination for President:

We should be preparing now, by investing more heavily than ever in the education of our children. Your action in passing the Mississippi Education Reform Act of 1982 underscores the importance of education as a priority of our society and as a crucial link to real economic growth and progress.

March 2, 1983
•
1 min read
Education House Science Panel Clears Science-Mathematics Education Bill
The House Science and Technology Committee last week unanimously approved a $425-million bill to improve science and mathematics education in schools and colleges, clearing the way for a vote on the measure by the full House, possibly this week.
Eileen White, March 2, 1983
•
3 min read
Education Strike by Phila. Workers Ends; Rescinded Raises Still at Issue
The Philadelphia School Board and 4,000 maintenance workers and bus drivers last week agreed to a contract that will give the workers a 5.75-percent raise over 10 months.

But one of the three-week strike's biggest issues--an earlier contract agreement that was rescinded by the board--awaited court action.

March 2, 1983
•
2 min read
Education States News Roundup
Gov. Robert Graham's proposed budget for the fiscal year 1983 would provide a substantial increase in funding for education. In his proposal, presented to the Florida legislature last week, the Governor recommended $3.4 billion for education--up $350 million from the current budget.

The increased spending would be paid for through a series of proposed tax increases, including an increased tax on alcoholic beverages, a rise in taxes on stocks and bonds, and an increase in the "required local effort"--that is, property taxes for public education. The property-tax provision would bring in an estimated $241 million in fiscal 1983, and $194 million the following year.

March 2, 1983
•
8 min read
Education Associations Column
The National Association of Independent Schools has set as a "current priority" the task of helping its member schools to recruit and retain able teachers.

Since independent schools vary widely in their salary programs, the organization plans this spring to publish two reports that should provide administrators with useful comparative information. One is a manual on "nonsalary compensation alternatives." The other is a report by John Littleford, head of the Breck School in Minneapolis, on salary systems at a variety of independent schools.

March 2, 1983
•
4 min read
Education Educational Remedies: Tuition Credits, Prayer
Until "consumer sovereignty" predominates in American education--through tuition tax credits and education vouchers--elementary and secondary schools will do a poor job of preparing students to enter a competitive society.
Charlie Euchner, March 2, 1983
•
3 min read
Education Many Prospective Teachers Fail Colorado Test
A majority of prospective Colorado teachers failed the mathematics portion of a new competency test that was administered for the first time in January.
John Chaffee Jr., March 2, 1983
•
3 min read
Special Education 'Mainstreaming' Still A Problem in Special Education
Many of the tensions that have arisen for students, teachers, and parents as a result of "mainstreaming" and other changes brought about by the Education for All Handicapped Children Act of 1975 remain to be addressed, according to participants at a recent conference here on the subject.
Susan G. Foster, March 2, 1983
•
4 min read
Education Administration Considers New E.D. Proposal
Reagan Administration officials, whose 1981 proposal to reduce the Cabinet-level Education Department to a small foundation was rebuffed by the Congress, have designed a new proposal for reorganizing the department, sources said last week.
Eileen White, March 2, 1983
•
1 min read
English Learners Language 'Immersion' Method Tested To Replace Bilingual Ed.
The board of education for the Dade County public schools, the nation's fourth-largest school system and prominent in bilingual education because of its large population of Spanish-speaking students, has voted to try a new pilot program that could lead to a shift away from the ''transitional" bilingual method.
Hope Aldrich, March 2, 1983
•
5 min read
Education Science Instructors Learn Physics Teaching Via Telephone Course
Once every two weeks or so, Roy Unruh places a conference call to five science teachers in southern Iowa. The teachers, all of whom work in small, rural systems, have already received written physics lessons from Mr. Unruh, a college teacher who is one of 10 people on the task force that writes the lessons.
Susan Walton, March 2, 1983
•
5 min read
Education Vocational Education
Although many economic experts are pointing to minorities and women as the answer to the nation's shortage of skilled workers, Wisconsin officials have initiated a teacher-training program to make sure that handicapped students will also be able to compete.

For nearly two years, the state's Department of Public Instruction has been offering special-education teachers a six-week course on assessing occupational interests and aptitudes of handicapped students. By learning vocational skills, the teachers can provide instructional support services for handicapped vocational students.

March 2, 1983
•
2 min read
Education News Update
A Reagan Administration proposal to require family-planning clinics that receive federal funds to notify parents when the clinics prescribe contraceptives for minor children has been rebuffed for the second time by a federal district judge.

In a case brought by the Planned Parenthood Federation of America and other organizations representing the federally funded clinics, Judge Thomas A. Flannery of the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia temporarily enjoined the Department of Health and Human Services from implementing its parental-notification rule.

March 2, 1983
•
2 min read
Education National News Roundup
The Agriculture Department released a report last week that it claims proves that the new school-lunch application forms schools began using last year "are helping to curb fraud and abuse" in the $438-million program.

Beginning in the fall of 1981, applications for free and reduced-price lunches were required to include the Social Security numbers of all adult household members and a listing of their current incomes. Previously, the forms had asked only for names, household size, total income, and the signature of the child's parent or guardian.

March 2, 1983
•
19 min read
Education Federal File
Two senators, taking their cue from Representative George Miller's recent successful attempt to establish a Select Committee on Children, Youth, and Families, are advocating the creation of a Senate caucus to monitor the problems of children and youth.

Senators Christopher J. Dodd, Democrat of Connecticut, and Arlen Specter, Republican of Pennsylvania, began contacting their colleagues last month to see if they were interested in forming the caucus, according to a spokesman.

March 2, 1983
•
2 min read
Ed-Tech Policy 'Equal' Access to Computers in Education Could Become Major Issue, Experts Warn
Access to computers, both sides of a 20-year-old desegregation controversy in San Francisco agreed in a recent voluntary settlement, is becoming an integral part of elementary and secondary education—and one in which poorer students are usually left behind.
Charlie Euchner, March 2, 1983
•
6 min read
Education Q&A:No More 'Permissive' Schools, Vows California Superintendent
California's new state superintendent of public instruction, William Honig, 45, waged an expensive campaign (the campaign cost nearly $2 million) to take control last November of the country's largest state system of public schools from the incumbent, Wilson C. Riles.

In his campaign, Mr. Honig emphasized the need for discipline, tougher academic standards, and changes in the educational bureaucracy, and the importance of citizen participation in education--particularly at the school-district level.

March 2, 1983
•
11 min read
Education Better Proposal Said To Win Assessment Project for E.T.S.
The federal government will transfer responsibility for administering the National Assessment of Educational Progress from a state-supported consortium to the Educational Testing Service (ets) because the ets has promised to implement a wide range of improvements in the assessment, a government spokesman said last week.
Eileen White, March 2, 1983
•
4 min read
Education E.D. Officials Argue for Tax Credits, Vouchers Before Gathering of Skeptical P.T.A. Members
Undersecretary of Education Gary L. Jones faced a difficult challenge last week.
Tom Mirga, March 2, 1983
•
3 min read
Education N.J. Commissioner Hits School Systems' Inservice Policies
Saul Cooperman, New Jersey commissioner of education, has sent a letter to each of the state's approximately 600 school superintendents asserting that they are awarding salary increases to teachers on the basis of unsound staff-development activities.
Thomas Toch, March 2, 1983
•
3 min read
Education Court Settles Teacher Unions' Conflict Over Mailing
The U.S. Supreme Court, in a split decision, overturned a federal appeals-court ruling last week and held that a local school board has the authority to give an exclusive bargaining agent for teachers the right to use the school system's inter-school mail system while denying that right to a rival teachers' union.
Tom Mirga, March 2, 1983
•
4 min read
Education Educators Seek Solutions to 'Crises' in Teachers
Chief state school officers met with college presidents to cooperate on getting more academically able teachers while keeping the best of those already teaching.
Sheppard Ranbom, March 2, 1983
•
9 min read
Education Districts News Roundup
A suburban Denver school district has added a full year of computer science as a graduation requirement, beginning with students who enter either of two three-year high schools in the fall.

Ali Joseph, superintendent of the 12,000-pupil Westminster School District, said that as a result of the local school board's action, he believes his will be "one of the first--if not the first"--school districts in the country to require computer training for high-school graduation.

March 2, 1983
•
4 min read
Education Arts Column
"Music Is Everybody's Language" is the theme of this year's Music in our Schools Week (March 7-13), a national effort of the Music Educators National Conference to emphasize the importance of music in the education of schoolchildren.

Affiliated state organizations of menc are now organizing committees for the public-awareness projects of the week.

March 2, 1983
•
2 min read
Education Accord Reached on Desegregation Plan for St. Louis, 22 Suburbs
All but one of 23 school districts in suburban St. Louis last week came to an agreement with the city's school board on a voluntary cross-district school-desegregation plan that, if approved by a federal judge, could become the largest such effort in the nation.
Tom Mirga, March 2, 1983
•
2 min read
Education Letter to the Editor Letters to the Editor
Editor's note: The above photograph, taken in an elementary school, was one of a series we commissioned last year. It had been filed as unusable because of the spelling error, but was inadvertently confused with another photograph in the series and used as an illustration for the budget breakdown in the Feb. 9, 1983 issue of Education Week. The classroom depicted is not a Head Start classroom. We regret the unintended association of Head Start with the photo.

March 2, 1983
•
1 min read
Load More ▼