April 17, 1985

Education Week, Vol. 04, Issue 30
Education Religion Less Central to Lay Teachers, Study Shows
Teachers in Roman Catholic high schools today are "less religious" and more reluctant to impart religious values to students than were their counterparts of 20 years ago, according to a new study discussed here last week at the annual convention of the National Catholic Educational Association.
Blake Rodman, April 17, 1985
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4 min read
Education Campus Tensions Flare Up Amid Charges of Racism
A group of more than 50 black students at the University of Pennsylvania in February occupied the office of the university president to protest "racial harassment" by other students and what they said were racist remarks by a faculty member.
Sheppard Ranbom & J.R. Sirkin, April 17, 1985
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9 min read
Education Moynihan, Citing Poverty Rate, Calls for New Family Policies
Senator Daniel P. Moynihan, whose 1965 report on the plight of black families stirred a national debate but was criticized by some as racist, said last week that the nation must develop a bipartisan family-oriented policy to tackle growing poverty that "is now inextricably linked with the family structure."
James Hertling, April 17, 1985
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3 min read
Education Maryland District Loses Desegregation Appeal
A federal appeals court has upheld a U.S. district judge's 1981 decision to reopen a 13-year-old desegregation case in a suburban Washington school district.

Acting on appeals by the school board of Prince George's County, Md., 'a group of black parents, and the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit ruled on March 29 that the school district had failed to remedy chronic racial imbalance in its schools.

April 17, 1985
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2 min read
Education Report Calls for Government Guidance To Aid Schools in Asbestos Removal
School-district officials need more federal and state guidance to help them cope with potentially dangerous asbestos in their schools, says the General Accounting Office in a new report on the problem.
Lynn Olson, April 17, 1985
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6 min read
Education Teacher-Pay Average: $23,546
The average salary earned by America's teachers rose by an estimated 7.3 percent this year, the National Education Association reports, to $23,546.

The nea's annual survey of salaries, enrollments, and spending in public education also indicates that overall public-school enrollment this year continued the long-term decline that began in 1973-74, decreasing by 0.3 percent--from 39,420,694 last year to 39,373,476. The number of public-school teachers decreased by 0.1 percent, the nea estimates.

April 17, 1985
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1 min read
Education Federal News Roundup
President Reagan has issued a call for the development of a new child-protection partnership between the federal government and the private sector.

The Presidential initiative, to be announced by the end of April, would involve the Justice Department, the Education Department, and the Department of Health and Human Services, as well as schools, law-enforcement agencies, and social-service groups.

April 17, 1985
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3 min read
Education Research and Reports
Only three states have regulations for licensed day-care centers that meet proposed federal standards for infant-to-staff ratios, according to a recent Yale University study.

The study, completed last month and to be published in the American Journal of Ortho Psychiatry next fall, found that 47 states--all but Kansas, Massachusetts, and Wisconsin--fail to meet the ratio of one adult for three infants required under the proposed federal guidelines.

April 17, 1985
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1 min read
Education People News
First Lady Nancy Reagan has agreed to serve as the honorary chairman for a new campaign to find missing children that was kicked off this month by the American Gas Association. During the "National Child Watch Campaign," the association will send to participating local companies two pictures of missing children each month. The companies, a spokesman said, are planning either to send out the pictures in their monthly customer bills or to display them on posters on repair trucks and in their offices.

April 17, 1985
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4 min read
Education Parents Allegedly 'Stole' Educational Services
Three residents of Hartford, Conn., have been arrested on felony charges for sending their children to school in a nearby suburb across district lines--in effect "stealing an education," authorities allege.
Sheppard Ranbom, April 17, 1985
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3 min read
Education Books: New In Print
Myths of Coeducation: Selected Essays, 1964-1983, by Florence Howe, (Indiana University Press, 10th and Morton Sts., Bloomington, Ind. 47405; 306 pages, cloth $35.00, paper $12.95).

April 17, 1985
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6 min read
Education Tracking the Situation: 'We Just Don't Have Adequate Data'
Many of the recent studies on the status of minorities in higher education contain a caveat about the incomplete, incompatible, or simply inadequate data available on the subject.

From the 1982 final report of the Ford Foundation's Commission on the Higher Education of Minorities: "Most sources of data used in this project were seriously flawed; in certain instances, data pertaining to a given issue were simply not available."

April 17, 1985
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4 min read
Education Bennett Presses 'Choice' Issue
Secretary of Education William J. Bennett has stepped up his campaign for tuition tax credits and education vouchers, voicing his support in a speech to Catholic educators and appointing an aide specifically to handle issues of "parental choice."
James Hertling, April 17, 1985
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1 min read
Education Memphis Schools Could Lose Millions In Firm's Failure
The collapse last month of a Florida securities firm, which triggered the banking crisis in Ohio, could cost one of the nation's largest school systems as much as $8 million.
J.R. Sirkin, April 17, 1985
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4 min read
Education NCATE Urges Tough New Standards for Education Schools
Colleges of education will be required to adopt strict admissions and exit standards for prospective teachers in order to comply with a new policy statement that is headed for adoption by the dominant national accrediting organization for education schools.
Cindy Currence, April 17, 1985
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5 min read
Education State News Roundup
Saul Cooperman, commissioner of education in New Jersey, this month provided the state board of education with details of a new program that would provide grants of up to $15,000 to teachers who develop effective teaching methods.

The New Jersey Governor's Teacher Grant Program, currently under consideration in the legislature, would cost about $500,000, according to state officials.

April 17, 1985
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4 min read
Education Massachusetts Students Would Rather Flunk Than Dunk
About 20 percent of the juniors and seniors at Milford High School in Massachusetts recently opted to bunk and flunk rather than dunk to protest a situation they thought was all wet: the lack of blow-dryers in the locker rooms.

The 187 girls and 93 boys who chose to sit out a required 45-minute swimming class told school officials that without dryers and an adequate amount of time to prepare for other classes, the requirement was not realistic, according to Thomas Cimino, superintendent of the district.

April 17, 1985
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1 min read
Education District News Roundup
When voters failed this month to adopt a tax increase that would save the extracurricular programs at Prophetstown, Ill., public schools, more than 200 students in the rural district staged a "walk-out" to protest the vote.

"I don't condone it," said Jim Fouts, superintendent of the 814-student school system, "but I understand it."

April 17, 1985
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5 min read
Education News Updates
Indiana's superintendent of public instruction, Harold H. Negley, resigned last week in the wake of a grand-jury investigation of his alleged misuse of campaign funds. (See Education Week, March 20, 1985.)

In an April 10 letter to Gov. Robert D. Orr announcing his immediate resignation, Mr. Negley wrote: "My personal difficulties have overshadowed the critical educational issues which face us today."

April 17, 1985
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1 min read
Education Hard-Won Enrollment Gains Are Quietly Deteriorating
One California higher-education official calls it "sitting on a time bomb." A University of Chicago professor says its implications for the future are "frightening." And the country's largest association of colleges and universities believes it may portend "a crisis ... devastating to the country's continued prosperity and well-being."
M. Sandra Reeves, April 17, 1985
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21 min read
Education Civil-Rights Panel Urges Rejection of Comparable-Worth Theory
The U.S. Commission on Civil Rights recommended last week that federal civil-rights enforcement agencies and the Congress reject the use of comparable worth as a means to close the gap in wages between male and female workers.
Lynn Olson, April 17, 1985
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3 min read
Education Legislatures in Four States Approve Hikes in School Aid as Sessions End
Following are summaries of how education measures fared in states that have concluded their current legislative sessions.

April 17, 1985
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7 min read
Education Perpich, Teachers Feud Over Vouchers' Progress
Gov. Rudy Perpich of Minnesota last week blamed the state's two major teachers' unions for the legislative problems his education projects are encountering, and announced that he will neither seek nor accept the unions' endorsement for his 1986 re-election bid.
Austin Wehrwein, April 17, 1985
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2 min read
Education Governors Urge Expansion of Day-Care Services
Day-care authorities and business leaders meeting last week under the auspices of the National Governors' Association called on state governments to encourage private industry to provide programs for their employees' children and to expand services available through public schools.
Anne Bridgman, April 17, 1985
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3 min read
Education Massachusetts Lawmakers Consider Revised School-Reform Bill
Less than six months after failing to move a multimillion-dollar school-reform bill through the legislature, Massachusetts lawmakers are considering legislation with a decidedly different look.
J.R. Sirkin, April 17, 1985
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4 min read
Education Opinion What Will Recalibrated Standards Hold For Dropout-Prone Students?
American public education has begun to change. Schools are challenging students with ever more difficult subject matter and expecting mastery at increasing levels of sophistication. While necessary and appealing, this drive toward higher standards raises justifiable concern: Are schools promoting academic excellence for those who already have a competitive advantage, while turning away from the far more difficult task of fostering achievement among those who do not?
Eileen Foley, April 17, 1985
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9 min read
Education Letter to the Editor Letters to the Editor
To the Editor:

In reviewing a recent issue of Education Week, I was pleased to see a Commentary by Judith D. Singer on the history of P.L. 94-142 ("10th Anniversary of P.L. 94-142: A 'Visionary' Law That Has Worked," Education Week, Feb. 27, 1985). At the same time, I was extremely disappointed by the reference she made to "special schools" as places where students are "hidden away."

April 17, 1985
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9 min read