March 9, 1983
The school's 1,660 students will begin attending split sessions this week at two other schools in the Wappingers Falls School District while the state department of health coordinates efforts of district, county, and national health officials to examine the school.
The appointment of Mr. Gardner, who has been president of the University of Utah for the past 10 years, must be approved by the board of regents of the California system.
Senator Ernest F. Hollings of South Carolina and Representative Timothy E. Wirth of Colorado, both Democrats, accepted the petitions from the Coalition for Public Education.
The university has established an aid program that will offer four-year, full-tuition loans to as many as 20 Iowa students a year who enroll in the school's teacher-training program in the fields of mathematics, chemistry, or physics over the next three years. For every year that the students teach in Iowa following their graduation, 25 percent of their loan will be forgiven.
The coverage of evolution in science textbooks has decreased "dramatically" during the past four years, indicating that "dollars speak louder than Darwin," a spokesman for a national civil-liberties organization told a group of educators at a recent meeting organized by the National Education Association.
The rate of abortion for teen-agers increased 14 to 16 percent between 1977 and 1980, they report. In contrast, rates of abortion for older women--30 to 34 years of age--increased 9 percent.
"During the past 12 years of court-supervised desegregation, the [school district] and the successive trial judges who have presided over this litigation have made sustained good-faith efforts to create a unitary school system," said the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit in its Feb. 17 opinion in Ross v. Houston Independent School District.
Three-quarters of the new money requested would go to establish a statewide consortium on science, computer, and high-technology education. The plan includes inservice training for 10,000 teachers per year and regional clearinghouses for research and development on computer hardware and software.
For fiscal 1983-84, the state board of education has requested $706 million, up $151 million over the current education budget. Gov. William J. O'Neill is proposing $604.5 million. Under the Governor's proposal, the general-purpose education budget would be about $344 million for fiscal 1984 and $357 million for fiscal 1985.
A draft policy proposed by a committee of the organization states: "It is inappropriate for the government to organize, prescribe, direct, or supervise prayer in the public schools."
Fifty-six percent of men and 55 percent of women among 800 people polled said moral instruction is being ignored by the education system.
The Governor is also expected to make some proposals to address the state's shortage of mathematics and science teachers. He has mentioned the possibility of putting $50 into a school district's general fund for every student enrolled in an advanced mathematics, advanced science, or a foreign-language course.
This week, joint legislative committees will begin meeting in the House and Senate to iron out funding proposals for fiscal 1984. Gov. Pierre S. du Pont 4th has proposed a 0.4-percent increase in education expenditures, and the state board of education is calling for a 1.7-percent increase.
The increase notwithstanding, the public-education budget may be cut substantially for the fiscal year 1984. Late last month, a budget bill was introduced pegging education at $195 million--some $20 million below the appropriation for the current fiscal year. The figure represents an across-the-board reduction in state spending, education officials said; schools would continue to receive about 47 percent of a shrinking state budget.
A special session of the legislature, convened in January, passed a law requiring school districts to deduct association dues from teachers' paychecks if teachers request it.