This Week In Education
Written by former Senate education staffer and journalist Alexander Russo, This Week in Education was an opinion blog that covered education news, policymakers, and trends with a distinctly political edge. (For archives prior to January 2007, please click here. For posts after November 2007, please click here.) This blog is no longer being updated.
Education
Opinion
LA Times Revamps, Relaunches Education Blog
The LA TImes has revamped and relaunched its education site, now called HOMEROOM, and brought in a handful of new teachers, students, and others to blog about their school- and classroom-level experiences. I'm all for group blogs, and ones that include real, live educators. And it's good that the LAT has an education blog (unlike the NYT, the Washington Post, USA Today, etc.). So there.
School Climate & Safety
Opinion
Remember When?
Hard to believe it, but the pocket calculator is 40 years old today according to Texas Instruments. I don't remember quite back that far, but I do remember fondly the faux denim case that my middle school calculator came in.
Education
Opinion
Who Knew NCLB Was So Well-Liked?
The run of major newspaper editorial pages supporting the current NCLB over some of the proposed fixes has been a surprisingly long and consistent one, including most recently the Christian Science Monitor (Let NCLB do its work), and the Chicago Tribune (The next NCLB). Of course, dry editorials aren't going to make much difference to the process, which as I've pointed out is in a particularly political phase right now. But who knew that NCLB was so popular among editorial page writers?
Education Funding
Opinion
Deborah Bial: An Education "Genius"
It isn't every year that there's an educator who gets one of these MacArthur "genius" grants ($500k just for being excellent), and so it seems worth noting that this year's awards out today include one for Deborah Bial, who founded the Posse Foundation. Congrats, condolences.
Education
Opinion
Big Releases Of The Day: NAEP & Halo 3
Forget Hillary Clinton's seemingly-insurmountable lead, the collapse of the mortgage industry, the visit of the Iranian president, or the arrival of the video game Halo 3. It's NAEP release day. Woo hoo! Let the spin begin. Copies of The Nation’s Report Card: Mathematics 2007 and The Nation’s Report Card: Reading 2007, plus extensive information from the 2007 NAEP mathematics and reading assessments, will be available online at http://nationsreportcard.gov at 10 a.m. EDT. Click here for all the latest Google News stories.
Education
Opinion
NAEP Scores Vs. Little Rock
It's a tough call, I guess -- stay in town and spin the news about the latest NAEP scores that are out today, or go to Little Rock to commemorate the 50th anniversary of the beginning of school integration? Well, Spellings is staying in town, and Deputy Secretary of Education Ray Simon is going to Arkansas. Not that the EdSec doesn't like herself some travel, of course. Later this fall she's scheduled to go to Shanghai for a Special Olympics shindig.
Federal
Opinion
What NCLB Reauthorize Requires Is Better Politics, Not More Policy
Everyone says they know how to fix NCLB -- what should be done -- but no one seems to know how to get the politics right to get there. Former New York City education guy Robert Gordon's piece in Slate does much the same, unfortunately. Titled with supreme confidence (How to fix the No Child Left Behind Act), the Gordon piece rehashes the obstacles we all know about and then proposes -- yes -- national standards as a solution. Politically speaking, NCLB proponents need to do something along these lines: buy off the teachers by softening the mandatory merit pay language, win back the testing hawks by dumping local assessments, and make the multiple measures language tight enough that Spellings and the business groups can live with it. Give it a new name, let everyone say that it's not NCLB anymore, and declare victory. Pretty? No. Perfect? No. But that's not what this is really all about. Via Eduwonk.
School Climate & Safety
Opinion
The Cupcake Wars
Forget the Jena Six. The anti-0besity push against cupcakes in schools is facing new resistance, according to this NYT story (here), based in part upon the treat's renewed popularity among hipsters and yuppies as well as on the sometimes heavy-handed ways in which pro-health advocates have shaped their message. Plus which, cupcakes are tasty.
Education
Opinion
"Godsend" Journalism In The NYT
Though I'm more familiar with the Chicago story than Philly, I tend to agree with Dana Goldstein's assessment of the NYT story on Paul Vallas (Can Urban Schools Be "Tamed"?) that Vallas' record is mixed in previous districts and that the notion that superstar superintendents can transform districts is a misleading one. They can bring energy and get things organized, to be sure. (Vallas did the textbooks in the warehouse thing in 1995, and DC's Michelle Rhee did the same bit last week.) But they can't always make things change in the classroom, and often get pulled in so many directions and start so many programs that it all gets watered down over time.
Federal
Opinion
Renaming NCLB
If anything is certain, it's that NCLB will get a new name when it's reauthorized points out this Washington Post article. It's been that way in the past, and will all but certainly happen again due to the law and President Bush's current unpopularity (Education Law Could Leave Behind Its Name). Check out some of the names that are being proposed -- it's easier to make fun the current name than make up a catchy new one.
Teaching Profession
Opinion
Critic Explains Internal Union Dynamics
Many may have missed the EIA Communique's analysis of the internal politics surrounding NCLB reauthorization, which came out late last week (EIA Communique). Others may have better explanations (EIA is a union critic), but this one describes some of the history behind the TEACH Act, suggesting that Miller should have known that it would be a problem, reminds us that Miller and the NEA went at it "hammer and tongs" in the runup to NCLB 1.0, and reminds us that the CTA and NEA aren't always on the same page. Most important, it reminds us of the internal dynamics going on within the union (any union) that require rallying the troops on broad issues but holding a smaller set of issues as key "gets."
Federal
Opinion
Edwards Turns To Education To Try And Get Traction
I still don't think he has much chance, but John Edwards looks like he hasn't given up on bashing NCLB and wooing teachers (and others) who might be swayed by that. According to The Caucus, he even pulled out the old "you don't fatten a pig by weighing it" line. Now if that isn't commitment. (Edwards Talks Education and Livestock). A following article points out that Edwards is trying to use NCLB to distract from all the Clinton attention for her health care plan, and that Edwards' education plan focuses on better, not necessarily fewer, tests.
Education
Opinion
If Editorial Boards Were In Charge...
Joe Williams notes that another couple of editorial boards (the Detroit News and Chicago Tribune) have joined the rest in denouncing teacher- and school board-led efforts to bring in multiple measures and local assessments (here). Meanwhile, the AFTies seem to be focusing on the pay for performance issue, not the rest of the bill, which seems relatively reasonable whether you agree with them or not. I still don't know if there's any space between them and the NEA on this, but I'm hoping there might be.