September 19, 1984
Education Week, Vol. 04, Issue 03
Education
Boston Sues Teachers' Union Over Threat To Strike
The Boston School Committee decided last month to proceed with a lawsuit that labor lawyers say may be the first in the country to seek money damages from a union for threatening to strike.
Education
City Agency Cites Mismanagement in New York Schools
The New York City public-school system's inability and unwillingness to enforce its own rules has resulted in systemwide mismanagement and corruption, city investigators charged in a report last week.
Education
Need for Expanded Federal Child-Care Services Is Great, Panel Told
Funds for the federal social-services block grant should be increased and tax credits for child care should be amended to benefit low-income families, a number of education, health, religious, and business leaders recommended before the Select Committee on Children, Youth, and Families in the Congress earlier this month.
Education
Censors Increasingly Attacking 'Realistic' Books, Author Says
A popular author of books for young people charged last week that the problem of censorship in American society is growing more serious.
Education
Reynolds Asserts the End of Mandatory Busing Is Near
The Reagan Administration's chief civil-rights official predicted last week that "it is just a matter of time, and not much time at that," before all communities will be allowed to accomplish the desegregation of schools without mandatory busing.
Education
Sociologist Ties Poor Student Performance to Lack of Self-Discipline
The problems that many American students have learning such basic skills as reading and writing result mainly from "insufficient self-discipline ... [and] inadequate ability to mobilize self and to commit," said a leading sociologist in a report released at a press conference here last week.
Education
Surveys Examine Students' Use of Alcohol
More than three-quarters of the teen-agers surveyed in a recent Gallup Poll on students' use of alcohol and drugs said they have tried some form of alcohol.
According to the poll, which surveyed 416 students between the ages of 13 and 18, 59 percent of the respondents said they had "occasionally," and an additional 17 percent said they had "at least once," tried some form of alcohol. Twelve percent of the students said they had combined use of alcohol with the use of other drugs.
Education
Major Study Finds Preschool 'Pays Off' for the Disadvantaged
Disadvantaged children who participate in high-quality preschool programs significantly outperform those who have not participated in such programs, according to the final results of the first major longitudinal study to measure the effects of preschool education on the lives of students.
Education
Many Hispanics Nurture Identity, Survey Shows
An estimated 50 percent of Hispanic Americans think of themselves as Hispanic first and American second, and more than eight out of 10 say the Spanish language is "the key to maintaining and fostering their cultural identity," according to Spanish USA 1984, a new study by the polling firm of Yankelovich, Skelly & White Inc.
The firm conducted the survey of the Hispanic "market" for the sin Television Network, a Spanish-language television network with 276 affiliates.
Education
Teacher Column
Teachers in Idaho who object to the "liberal" politics of the National Education Association and its affiliates announced this month that they are forming their own union.
Members of the new union, Independent Educators of Idaho, decided to split from Idaho's nea affiliate after becoming increasingly disenchanted with the union's support of Democratic candidates and various controversial issues, said Dianna Robertson, president of the group and a teacher at Ammon Elementary School in Idaho Falls.
Education
National News Roundup
The incidence of measles in the United States increased sharply to 1,759 reported cases during the first 26 weeks of 1984, compared with 1,095 cases during the comparable period of 1983, according to the national Centers for Disease Control.
Federal health officials, however, were quick to point out that although the number of measles cases had increased 60.6 percent compared with the same period in 1983, the total is still far below that in the prevaccine era, when an average of more than 525,000 cases were reported annually.
Education
Research And Reports
A record 19.5 million women with children under 18, including 8 million with children under 6, were working or looking for work in March 1984, according to a recent report from the U.S. Labor Department's Bureau of Labor Statistics.
The data were compiled from questions on the 1984 "Current Population Survey," which is conducted each year.
Education
Letter to the Editor
Letters To The Editor
In order to respond fully and appropriately to Russell T. Arndts and George T. Wright and their letters in defense of the introduction of creationism into the public schools ("Creationism and Evolution: Clarifying the Issues," Education Week, Aug. 22, 1984), one would have to examine such fundamental questions as: what is meant by education, what is meant by science, and what should be denied admittance to a curriculum in a democratic society, not to mention other complex questions related to these three.
Education
Opinion
The Administrator's Role: 'Still Asking Questions'
I was ambushed by a three-hour educational program. By the end of the evening, what I had expected
to be a typical network blast at public education had turned out to be far superior to anything the networks have offered us over the last three years.
Education
Opinion
The Making of 'To Save Our Schools, To Save Our Children': A Conversation With Marshall Frady
On Tuesday, Sept. 4, the American Broadcasting Company took the unusual step of pre-empting an entire evening of prime-time programming to present a documentary on public education. It was watched by an estimated audience of 25-million.
Education
Opinion
Parental Negligence: 'Can't We Do Better?'
Watching "To Save Our Schools" was, to put it in the fine cadences of my generation, a bummer. The program gave an overview of a very imperfect system, aspiring for the most part to "adequacy," resistant to change, expected to work miracles for society, and all the while undergoing a severe crisis of confidence and respect.