From the list serve of the pro-referendum group, Communities and Schools Together (CAST): We have at least three people willing to translate into Spanish (anyone for Hmong?). I think that the “newsletter blurb” and the FAQ are musts. Do we want anything else? I’ll get these started with the volunteers on Wednesday or Thursday. At … Continue reading Pro-referendum leader doesn’t care about parents of TAG students
The National Academies: Improving science education in kindergarten through eighth grade will require major changes in how science is taught in America’s classrooms, as well as shifts in commonly held views of what young children know and how they learn, says a new report from the National Research Council. After decades of education reform efforts … Continue reading Major Changes Needed to Boost K-8 Science Achievement
Mark your calendars! Stage Q is having a benefit performance of Carolyn Gage’s play “Ugly Ducklings” for GSA for Safe Schools. Under the direction of Jan Levine Thal, the benefit performance will be held on Friday, September 29th, at 8:00 p.m. at the Bartell Theater (113 E Mifflin Street). Call 608-661-9696, ext. 3, for tickets. … Continue reading Benefit Performance for GSA for Safe Schools
A small study and I confess I haven’t looked at the study itself, but a reminder that some important aspects of education aren’t measured by standardized tests. TJM Research: School diversity may ease racial prejudice More bias seen in kids in mostly white setting By Shankar Vedantam The Washington Post Published September 19, 2006 White … Continue reading Research: School diversity may ease racial prejudice
Molly Snyder Edler: Artists Working in Education (AWE) presents “A Celebration of Children’s Art,” a collection of work created this summer by kids who participated in AWE’s Truck Studio Program. “A Celebration of Children’s Art” hangs in the Milwaukee City Hall Rotunda, Sept. 19 through Oct. 6. There is an opening reception on Tuesday, Sept. … Continue reading Artists Working in Education
NY Times Editorial: The countries that outperform the United States in math and science education have some things in common. They set national priorities for what public school children should learn and when. They also spend a lot of energy ensuring that every school has a high-quality curriculum that is harnessed to clearly articulated national … Continue reading Teaching Math, Singapore Style
Justin Pope AP Education Writer Though just teenagers, the applicants to the Massachusetts Institute of Technology are a scarily accomplished lot. They have started businesses and published academic research. One built a working nuclear reactor in his garage. In their high schools, they have led every extracurricular club and mastered the SAT. But surprisingly few … Continue reading MIT dean takes aim at admissions anxiety
DEBORAH ZIFF Wisconsin State Journal Sunday, September 17, 2006 dziff@madison.com Madison West High School senior Eliza Zimmerer is a teaching assistant in a bio- technology class. She mentors younger students and leads freshmen through orientation. She’s involved in student government. Captain of the varsity tennis team. Honor roll. French honor society. Her resume goes on … Continue reading Local Students in the Admissions Pressure Cooker
Destroying Public Schools New York Times September 16, 2006 At Odds Over Schools By BRUCE LAMBERT LAWRENCE, N.Y. [This] school district has been changing, house by house, as Orthodox Jewish families have flocked here over the last two decades, gradually at first and then in growing numbers. While not yet a majority, the Orthodox have … Continue reading Private School Parents Control Board
Charles Anderson: A hint of the politicians’ dilemma was buried in a May 10 New York Times-CBS News poll about the performance of U.S. elected officials on a host of policy issues. Not surprisingly, neither President Bush nor Congress earned high marks. What startled me, though, was the response to this question: “Regardless of how … Continue reading Failure to Understand Science is a National Security Issue
Madison Schools Superintendent Art Rainwater: Twenty-two year old Louisa Brayton stepped before her class of 12 students to begin the first day of school. It was not only her first day but also the first day for all of her students and more importantly the first day of school in Madison Wisconsin. It’s March, 1838 … Continue reading Schools Active Year Round
Critics of “Fuzzy” Methods Cheer Educators’ Findings; Drills Without Calculators. Taking Cues from Singapore. John Hechinger: The nation’s math teachers, on the front lines of a 17-year curriculum war, are getting some new marching orders: Make sure students learn the basics. In a report to be released today, the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics, … Continue reading Return to Basics in Teaching Math
Matthew Ladner: In the past, a lack of data enabled stagnation. Armchair observations of real-estate agents were often the most sophisticated opinions regarding the quality of local schools. Today, online services like www.greatschools.net provide a mountain of comparative testing and parental review data in a few short clicks. New technologies and practices, such as self-paced … Continue reading America on the cusp of education renaissance
Maria Sacchetti: One Needham teacher gushed about the time a student worried that Australia would fall off the planet — and how that led to a lesson on gravity. A Brookline teacher banned the word “stuff” from her fourth-graders’ vocabulary. A young teacher, also from Needham, got personal, thanking parents for their support after her … Continue reading Teacher Blogs
The Economist: FEW children, in the developed world, spend their summer holidays bringing in the harvest. Yet the timing of the summer break dates from the days when child labour was too valuable to lose in the vital final weeks of the growing season. The roots of modern education, in Britain and elsewhere, lie in … Continue reading Education in Medieval Britain
Many of you probably read John Stossel’s polemic in the Sunday Wisconsin State Journal (9/3/06). I’d reprint here, but I don’t want to give it a wider readership than it already has. Instead I want to say few words about a central fallacy in the thinking of Stossel (and many others who wish to destroy … Continue reading Fallacy
Voters evaluating the Madison School District’s November referendum (construct a new far west side elementary school, expand Leopold Elementary and refinance District debt) have much to consider. Phil Brinkman added to the mix Sunday noting that “total property taxes paid have grown at a faster pace than income”. A few days later, the US Census … Continue reading Fall Referendum Climate: Local Property Taxes & Income Growth
Chris Whittle: Quiz: Of the 10 largest school systems, which have made the best gains in student scores? Answer: Philadelphia and New York. Between 2002 and 2005 for grades K-8, Philly gained 19.5 points in proficiency on the state assessment system, while NYC schools posted a 13-point increase on state exams. Even if you normalize … Continue reading Making The Grade
Nanci Hellmich: Just increasing the amount of time students are supposed to spend in physical education class is no guarantee they’ll move more, a new study shows. Obesity experts have been calling for children to go to gym class more often to help stop obesity in young people. About one-third of children and teens in … Continue reading More time in PE doesn’t add up
Karen Batka: I puttered around the kitchen as Grace munched on her calcium-added Goldfish and worked on long division. “Mom, what does high fat content mean?” she asked. “Why?” I asked, choosing to answer a question with a question. “Paige said that Lunchables aren’t healthy because they have a high fat content.” Once again, reality … Continue reading Dodging Land Mines at the School Lunch Table
Elissa Gootman: More than a decade after the city created a special institute to prepare black and Hispanic students for the mind-bendingly difficult test that determines who gets into New York’s three most elite specialized high schools, the percentage of such students has not only failed to rise, it has declined. The drop at Stuyvesant … Continue reading In Elite NY Schools, a Dip in Blacks and Hispanics, Plus Letters
Yuki Noguchi: Unlike their parents, today’s youth have grown up in the age of public disclosure. Keeping an Internet diary has become de rigueur; social lives and private thoughts are laid bare. For parents in high-profile positions, however, it means their children can exploit a generational disconnect to espouse their own points of view, or … Continue reading Kids Say the Darndest Things in Their Blogs
NYC Teacher Bruce Winokur: Teaching mathematics has been my profession in New York City public schools since 1969, first at I.S. 201 in District 5, then at J.H.S. 17 in District 2, and since 1983, at Stuyvesant High School. I’m also the father of a 10-year-old daughter who attends District 2 schools and a member … Continue reading Math Disaster
Sarah Carr: “When I first started in education, marketing wasn’t something you even had to do,” said Suzanne Kirby, principal of MPS’ Bell Middle School. Now the south side school has a more strategic effort in place. Kirby cleared her schedule for the summer and invited any prospective family in for a personal tour of … Continue reading In competition for students, schools market selves more
Lisa Belkin: By any health measure, today’s children are in crisis. Seventeen percent of American children are overweight, and increasing numbers of children are developing high blood pressure, high cholesterol and Type 2 diabetes, which, until a few years ago, was a condition seen almost only in adults. The obesity rate of adolescents has tripled … Continue reading Improving School Food
Daniel Golden: The prop room on the fourth floor of Houghton Mifflin Co.’s offices here holds all manner of items, including a blackboard, a globe, an aquarium — and a wheelchair. Able-bodied children selected through modeling agencies pose in the wheelchair for Houghton Mifflin’s elementary and secondary textbooks. If they’re the wrong size for the … Continue reading “Aiming for Diversity, Textbooks Overshoot”
Alan Borsuk: Wisconsin officials take pride in being at the top of at least one list nationally when it comes to putting “highly qualified” teachers in classrooms, but Wednesday they found themselves at the bottom of the list when it comes to meeting federal rules for doing exactly that. U.S. Department of Education officials announced … Continue reading Wisconsin Fails Federal Test for “Qualified Teachers”
From Channel 3000: Fall is right around the corner. That means classes back in session and another school referendum for Madison voters. A group calling itself CAST is gearing up to get voters to say yes to a $23.5 million referendum on Nov. 7. CAST stands for Communities And Schools Together. Rich Rubasch is heading … Continue reading CAST Gearing Up For $23.5 Million Referendum
My daughter is the “Mothering Type”. You know the kind. She still loves dolls beyond her friends, and loves pets, and she took the babysitting class as soon as possible so she could be around small children. She is always the person in the class the helps and socializes with the high needs kids in … Continue reading Curious Social Development
Diana Jean Schemo: WHEN the federal Education Department recently reported that children in private schools generally did no better than comparable students at public schools on national tests of math and reading, the findings were embraced by teachers’ unions and liberals, and dismissed by supporters of school voucher programs. But for many educators and policy … Continue reading It Takes More Than Schools to Close Achievement Gap
University of Florida: However, the trend once known as “mainstreaming”— widely considered the best option for such students – appears to have stalled in some parts of the country, the study’s authors report. And a student’s geographic location, rather than the severity of his disability, often determines how he will spend his school days, the … Continue reading “Mainstreaming of special education students has helped improve their academic peformance”
Engadget: While programs like these have a solid premise, we envision kids making friends for more than just social reasons as middle-school cafeterias turn into fast-paced trading blocks to circumvent the system as connector children smuggle in junk food from the outside world. Or maybe we’re just letting our imaginations get away with ourselves again.
Donna Ford, Ph.D., and Gilman Whiting, Ph.D., both of Vanderbilt University, are two leading African American education scholars who have dedicated their professional lives to the issue of minority achievement. Professor Ford is a nationally recognized expert in gifted education, multicultural education, and the recruitment and retention of diverse students in gifted education. Professor Whiting … Continue reading Acting White
Neal Gleason in a letter to the Isthmus Editor: I have long admired Marc Eisen’s thoughtful prose. But his recent struggle to come to grips with a mutli-ethnic world vvers from xenophobia to hysteria (“Brave New World”, 6/23/06). His “unsettling” contact with “stylish” Chinese and “turbaned Sikhs” at a summer program for gifted children precipitated … Continue reading Not to Worry: Neal Gleason Responds to Marc Eisen’s “Brave New World”
Five years after state legislators released them from state-imposed revenue caps, school districts’ community service tax levies have nearly tripled, reaching $49 million this year. The rampant growth in these property taxes – earmarked for community-based activities – took place as the total levies for schools statewide rose by 22.7%. That has raised concerns about … Continue reading Community service levies climb since cap lifted
US Department of Education: Children in Reading First classrooms receive significantly more reading instruction and schools participating in the program are much more likely to have a reading coach, according to the Reading First Implementation Evaluation: Interim Report, released today by the U.S. Department of Education. The report shows significant differences between what Reading First … Continue reading ED.Gov: New Report Shows Progress in Reading First Implementation and Changes in Reading Instruction
Denis Doyle: If education is funded without measuring results decisions are based on impulse and sentiment, a risky business that. Yet if education is to be funded on results we need a high degree of social consensus on what results are desirable (and measurable). As it happens, this sentiment does not respect party lines. Former … Continue reading Learnings Per Share
NY Times Editorial: The national education reform effort has long suffered from magical thinking about what it takes to improve children’s chances of learning. Instead of homing in on teacher training and high standards, things that distinguish effective schools from poor ones, many reformers have embraced the view that the public schools are irreparably broken … Continue reading Public vs. Private School
Susan Troller: Nancy Greenwald, an attorney and one of the parents involved in the complaint, urged the board to accept Superintendent Art Rainwater’s recommendation that Vazquez be fired and to turn over all relevant files to the Wisconsin Department of Public Instruction, which has begun an investigation that could lead to the revocation of Vazquez’s … Continue reading Parents Want Tougher Policy on Sex Offenses
My 13 year old son was complaining the other day about how “hard” it was he had to get up and swim at 7 a.m. for his local swim club. (7 is a little early when it’s cold but…) He then complained about umpiring a Little League game because a coach yelled at him. As … Continue reading Summer leisure and Drop-out Students
Budget Hangs On Enrollment Middleton Watching Numbers The Capital Times Tuesday, July 11, 2006 By Christopher Michaels Increased enrollment in the weeks preceding the start of the school year could mean more state aid for the Middleton-Cross Plains School District. It also could mean an easing of planned staff reductions of special concern to one … Continue reading Revenue Caps Affect Middleton
Shavar Jeffries: It is well beyond time for people of color to challenge vehemently the educational policies of the Democratic leadership that have failed our children for decades. Too many Democrats would prefer to deny poor folk the opportunity to make educational decisions for themselves – notwithstanding these Democrats wouldn’t permit their own children to … Continue reading “Who’s Standing in the Schoolhouse Door, Now?”
Posted on Edwonk FROM JONATHAN KOZOL: An Update, Bulletin, and Manifesto to the Education Activists who have asked me: Where do we go next? June 16, 2006 Dear This is to report that, at long last, the network of activists in education that I’ve been assembling from the thousands of teachers and advocates for children … Continue reading Education Action
Peter Wood (Provost of New York City’s Kings College): By 2036, the forms of teacher preparation that currently prevail in Western nations will have sunk into oblivion. We will have discarded schools of education, the pedagogies they teach, and the certification apparatus that they serve. Such schools, pedagogies, and certifications have clung to life stubbornly … Continue reading No More Teacher Ed?
Rod Paige: DUMB liberal ideas in education are a dime a dozen, and during my time as superintendent of Houston’s schools and as the United States secretary of education I battled against all sorts of progressivist lunacy, from whole-language reading to fuzzy math to lifetime teacher tenure. Today, however, one of the worst ideas in … Continue reading For School Equality, Try Mobility
Nicholas Kristof follows up Marc Eisen’s recent words on a world of competition for our children: But the investments in China’s modernization that are most impressive of all are in human capital. The blunt fact is that many young Chinese in cities like Shanghai or Beijing get a better elementary and high school education than … Continue reading Chinese Medicine for American Schools
I realize that some of the legal frameworks differ but think that this serves as a good remider that TIFs have an impact on school funding everywhere. From the Chicago Reader See also: Epoch TimesTJM By Ben Joravsky The Schools Scam Under the TIF system millions of dollars in property taxes are being diverted from … Continue reading The Schools Scam
The Economist: That said, government should not be looking for ways to haul the rich down. Rather, it should help others, especially the extremely poor, to climb up—and that must mean education. Parts of the American system are still magnificent, such as its community colleges. But as countless international league tables show, its schools are … Continue reading Inequality and the American Dream
Much good stuff here but I’ll just point to the “Blueberry Story,” which encapsulates how public education differs from business. Click the title link for a version with comments TJM The Yearlykos Education Panel – a review / reflection by teacherken Sat Jun 17, 2006 at 03:19:37 AM PDT NOTE also crossposted at MyLeftWing I … Continue reading YearlyKos Education Panel
Brent Staples: Imagine yourself the parent of an otherwise bright and engaging child who has reached the fourth grade without learning to read. After battling the public school bureaucracy for what seems like a lifetime, you enroll your child in a specialized private school for struggling readers. Over the next few years, you watch in … Continue reading How Schools Pay a (Very High) Price for Failing to Teach Reading Properly
National Center for Education Statistics: This website is an integrated collection of the indicators and analyses published in The Condition of Education 2000–2006. Some indicators may have been updated since they appeared in print Chester Finn has more: –A huge fraction of U.S. school children now attend “schools of choice”: more than half of K-12 … Continue reading 2006 Condition of Education Statistics
Susan Troller: Don’t assume that a school is bad just because it’s not making adequate yearly progress under the federal No Child Left Behind law. That comment came today from Madison School Board member Lucy Mathiak, whose children attend or have attended East High School. East and three other Madison public high schools were cited … Continue reading Making the Grade: Madison High Schools & No Child Left Behind Requirements
Heather G. Peske and Kati Haycock for Edtrust [PDF Report]: Next month, for the first time, leaders in every state must deliver to the Secretary of Education their plans for ensuring that low-income and minority students in their states are not taught disproportionately by inexperienced, out-of-field, or uncertified teachers. For many, this process will be … Continue reading Teaching Inequality
Susan Troller: The parents at Midvale Elementary School have heard it all: It’s a school no ambitious parent wants. The bus rides are long and unpleasant as children are sent far from their homes along the hazardous Beltline. After more than 20 years, the pairing of Midvale and Lincoln elementary schools, developed as part of … Continue reading A Look at the Midvale / Lincoln Elementary Pair
Madison Schools Superintendent Art Rainwater: This fall we will welcome over 2,000 kindergarten children to their first day of school. What an exciting and scary day for them. They will come from many cultures, they will be many colors and they will each begin their thirteen year journey with different skills, attitudes and backgrounds. Our … Continue reading The Challenge of Educating for the Future
APPLETON (AP) – Lunch hour at two local schools became the subject for a film crew as part of a federal agency’s plan to show how the Appleton district is trying to promote healthy lifestyles and fight the epidemic of childhood obesity. The media crew also filmed fitness programs at Edison Elementary School and West … Continue reading Appleton’s schools models for health
Susan Saulny:In what is an elite tweak on home schooling — and a throwback to the gilded days of education by governess or tutor — growing numbers of families are choosing the ultimate in private school: hiring teachers to educate their children in their own homes. Unlike the more familiar home-schoolers of recent years, these … Continue reading Private Tutors & Homeschooling
Tracy Jan: But the experience — eight-hour school days, tiny classes with demanding teachers, and Saturday sessions — was more trying than any of them expected. The students, who delayed high school a year to attend Beacon, have emerged with a sense of how satisfying a tough school can be, but also of how unchallenging … Continue reading Public school students take up a tougher course
Thank you to students, parents and community members who wrote to and spoke before the School Board in support of elementary strings. It may seem, at times, that your letters or statements fall on deaf ears, but that is not the case. Each and every letter and each and every statement of support is critical … Continue reading Kobza, Mathiak, Robarts and Vang Vote Yes to Support Elementary Strings: Carstensen, Silveira and Winston Vote No And Support Cutting Elementary Strings
Bob Sipchen: By the end of this column I will have selected the next superintendent of the Los Angeles Unified School District. Because I believe that the children, parents, teachers and citizens of Los Angeles are entitled to transparency in such deliberations, I invite you to join me as I work my way toward a … Continue reading LA’s Superintendent Selection Process
A letter to the editor Dear Editor: I appreciated Susan Troller’s recent article where she examined the impact of eroding budgets on schools and classrooms throughout Madison. Unfortunately, this situation is not unique to Madison schools. The repeated cutting of school budgets is strongly affecting classrooms, teachers and students in scores of school districts throughout … Continue reading Push for changes in school financing
J.D. Fisher: Here’s a brief list of the research (you can find it here) about parent involvement related to student achievement. Enjoy. Ann Shaver and Richard Walls (1998) looked at the impact of school-based parent workshops on the achievement of 335 Title I students in nine schools in a West Virginia district . . . … Continue reading Links and Notes on Parent Involvement and Student Education
David S. Kahn: Colleges across the country are reporting a drop in SAT scores this year. I’ve been tutoring students in New York City for the SAT since 1989, and I have watched the numbers rise and fall. This year, though, the scores of my best students dropped about 50 points total in the math … Continue reading Notes on SAT Scores
Let the Dialogue Begin Bridging Differences A Dialogue Between Deborah Meier and Diane Ravitch May 24, 2006 By Deborah Meier & Diane Ravitch In the course of the last 30 years, the two of us have been at odds on any number of issues – on our judgments about progressive education, on the relative importance … Continue reading Unlikely Allies (“against” NCLB)
Board member stirs controversy Baraboo News Republic Thursday May 25, 2006 By Christina Beam BARABOO – New Baraboo School Board member Kevin Bartol (kbartol@baraboo.k12.wi.us) stirred up some controversy at his second meeting Monday night when he suggested district policy be amended so that only teachable students be enrolled in Baraboo’s public schools. “There are some … Continue reading Baraboo Board Member Stirs Controversy
In an effort to build community, enhance self-esteem and inspire the spirit of giving among its students, Lapham Elementary School has organized a very special service-learning project. The “Lapham to Lubasi Run-a-thon”, held Wednesday May 10th, was led by one of the school’s second grade classes to raise awareness of poverty in Africa and to … Continue reading Lapham Students Run to Build Library for African Orphans
Christine Maddox Ellerbee: I am committed to my home here in Camden. But that commitment is seriously being tested by the state of Camden’s public schools. As a parent, I have done all I can do. Many of us find ourselves in the same boat. We have agitated for change, made phone calls and visited … Continue reading “Lawmakers must give parents school choice”
The Economist: Plans to improve school meals are causing havoc JUST over a year ago, Jamie Oliver, a camera-friendly chef, called for a revolution in school kitchens. In a television series, he chronicled the decline in school lunches and showed that junk food-addicted children could be taught to tuck into what he calls “pukka nosh”. … Continue reading Let them Eat Kale
by ROLAND G. FRYER “Go into any inner-city neighborhood, and folks will tell you that government alone can’t teach kids to learn. They know that parents have to parent, that children can’t achieve unless we raise their expectations and turn off the television sets and eradicate the slander that says a black youth with a … Continue reading Acting White
…there are lessons we can absorb, and maybe the easiest is that respect for education pays dividends.
I have been an outspoken advocate for elementary strings the past several years, because this course is a highly valued, high demand academic course that is part of the K-12 MMSD music curriculum but has been repeatedly put on the cut list without any meaningful curriculum planning taking place from year to year. However, I … Continue reading Speak Up For Fine Arts Education’s Future
MMSD’s School Board meets tonight to discuss the 2006-2007 school budget. There are no public appearances on tonight’s agenda, but the Madison community can continue to email the School Board in support of elementary strings at: comments@madison.k12.wi.us. Thank you to the parents and community who have attended the public hearing and who have sent emails … Continue reading Speak Up For Strings – Thanks for Emailing the School Board: Keep The Emails Coming
Nicholas Kristof: Why are Asian-Americans so good at school? Or, to put it another way, why is Xuan-Trang Ho so perfect? Trang came to the United States in 1994 as an 11-year-old Vietnamese girl who spoke no English. Her parents, neither having more than a high school education, settled in Nebraska and found jobs as … Continue reading The Model Students
Dear Madison Community, Children and parents are encouraged to speak in support of elementary strings and to bring their instruments to tonight’s School Board public hearing on the budget if they would like to play. My husband, Fred Schrank, who is the principal bassist with the MSO and who teaches orchestra to elementary and middle … Continue reading Speak Up for Strings Tonight: Public Appearances at Board Public Hearing On the Budget – 6:30 p.m. Tuesday, May 9th at Memorial High School
I sent the following letter to the School Board last week after reviewing data and text on elementary strings sent to the School Board by the Fine Arts Coordinator. In late March, I spoke before the School Board about working together on strengthening strings and fine arts education and hoped that we would not see … Continue reading Why Does Elementary Stringed Instrument Instruction Matter? One Reason – Student Demand is Strong
A longtime reader emailed David Brooks most recent column: Around 1970, Walter Mischel launched a classic experiment. He left a succession of 4-year-olds in a room with a bell and a marshmallow. If they rang the bell, he would come back and they could eat the marshmallow. If, however, they didn’t ring the bell and … Continue reading Marshmallows and Public Policy
Wisconsin State Journal editorial Wednesday, May 3, 2006 Madison should take a bow and be proud of its decade-long effort to improve early reading skills and boost school achievement for all racial groups. Yet the hard work isn’t over and may be getting harder. UW-Madison education researchers hailed Madison this week for shrinking its racial … Continue reading Keep fighting for school success
The National School Board Association argues that local school boards exist to translate the community’s educational goals for its children into programs and to hold staff accountable for the quality and effectiveness of the programs: Your school board sets the standard for achievement in your district, incorporating the community’s view of what students should know … Continue reading Better MMSD budget process? Maybe next year.
Please Help Save Elementary Strings!!! How: Ask the New School Board – Work with the Community to Build Fine Arts Education! When: Starting May 9th Other districts facing fiscal and academic achievement challenges have had successes maintaining and growing their fine arts education – through strategic planning, active engagement and real partnerships with their communities. … Continue reading Speak Up For Strings – Starting May 9th
Bob Reber: Governor Doyle recently vetoed Assembly Bill 1060 which would have reaffirmed and clarified the state’s commitment to virtual public schools in Wisconsin. Prior to his decision to veto the bill, WEAC (the teacher’s union) was making noise about the “outsourcing of education” to people who would not be qualified teachers, instructors or presenters … Continue reading Doyle Flunks Test on Virtual Schools
Carol Carstensen: What is Fund 80, and why are people saying such awful things aboutit? Fund 80 is the state accounting code for community services expenditures,the major portion of which is for Madison SchoolCarstensen Community Recreation (MSCR) and the district’s cable channel 10.The current budget for community services is $11 million. Of that $8 millionis … Continue reading Fund 80 Is Worth Our Support
Madison Mayor Dave Cieslewicz spoke at yesterday’s Rotary club meeting. His 3416 word state of the city speech included 159 directly related to our local public schools: 8. We need to work more seamlessly to maintain our excellent public school system. Our public schools have recently been ranked the third best in the nation. Yet, … Continue reading Cieslewicz State of the City speech
Ledyard King: Public school teachers in the nation’s wealthiest communities continue to be more qualified than those in the poorest despite a federal law designed to provide all children equal educational opportunity. Preliminary data released by the Department of Education show that in 39 states, the chance of finding teachers who know their subjects are … Continue reading Gap in teacher quality falls on income lines
The community CAN HELP elementary strings and fine arts education in MMSD. Please write the School Board – comments@madison.k12.wi.us – ask them a) to establish a community fine arts education advisory committee beginning with a small community working group to put together a plan for this, b) develop a multi-year strategic and education plan for … Continue reading The Madison Community – Students, Parents, Professionals, Citizens – Can Help Elementary Strings: Here’s How
Expressions of parent concern over the quality of third-quarter report cards for students in Madison’s elementary schools continue. Parents at Thoreau School joined parents from other schools who have wondered why their children make so little progress in the third quarter of the year in many subject areas that no information on progress can be … Continue reading Concern about quality of 3rd quarter report cards (cont.)
Other districts facing fiscal and academic achievement challenges have had successes maintaining and growing their fine arts education – through strategic planning, active engagement and real partnerships with their communities. In Tuscon, AZ, with a large low income and hispanic population, test scores of this population have climbed measurably (independent evaluations confirmed this). This state … Continue reading Fifth Verse – Same, Sorrowful Tune: Superintendent Proposes to Elminate Elementary Strings
Ben Feller: Teachers are far more pessimistic than parents about getting every student to succeed in reading and math as boldly promised by the No Child Left Behind Act. That’s left a huge expectations gap between the two main sets of adults in children’s lives. An AP-AOL Learning Services Poll found nearly eight in 10 … Continue reading AP Poll: Teachers & Parents on No Child Left Behind
Recently, a parent expressed concern about the quality of third-quarter report cards at Crestwood Elementary School. Can We Talk 3: Third-Quarter Report Cards Today a parent of students at Elvejhem Elementary asked Madison School Board members why the teachers only reported on 10% of content areas. I have asked Superintendent Art Rainwater for a response … Continue reading Another Parent Concerned about Third-Quarter Report Cards
Jay Greene: Accountability is a constructive and increasingly powerful force in the education of New York City schoolchildren. It starts with report cards and runs far deeper. Third-graders have to pass a basic skills test to be promoted to fourth grade. High school seniors cannot earn a Regents diploma without passing a series of exams. … Continue reading The New Push to Rate Schools Will Make Adults Perform and Help Kids Learn
Jessica Blanchard: Rick Burke remembers looking at his elementary-school daughter’s math homework and wondering where the math was. Like many Seattle schools, his daughter’s school was teaching “reform” math, a style that encourages students to discover math principles and derive formulas themselves. Burke, an engineer, worried that his daughter wasn’t learning basic math skills. “It … Continue reading Seattle’s Teaching of Math adds up to Much Confusion
A Strategy to Create Small, High-Performing College-Preparatory Schools in Every Neighborhood of Los Angeles Green Dot Public Schools, Bain & Company [180K PDF]: Public school reform has become the #1 issue for the City of Los Angeles. While most acknowledge the poor state of the public education system, the discussion to date has largely focused … Continue reading The School Transformation Plan
To those concerned about the success of the Madison Schools, I am writing to express my support for the positive changes proposed by the district with respect to food policy. It is exciting that the district has been proactive in including students, parents, health providers, educators, and policy makers. As a pediatrician working with childhood … Continue reading Food Policy and Physical Education
Frank Bass, Nicole Ziegler Dizon and Ben Feller: States are helping public schools escape potential penalties by skirting the No Child Left Behind law’s requirement that students of all races must show annual academic progress. With the federal government’s permission, schools aren’t counting the test scores of nearly 2 million students when they report progress … Continue reading States Help Schools Hide Minority Scores
Sandy Cullen: Some parents say the Madison School District’s spending cuts, combined with its attempts to close the achievement gap, have reduced opportunities for higher-achieving students. Jeff Henriques, a parent of two high-achieving students, said one of the potential consequences he sees is “bright flight” – families pulling students with higher abilities out of the … Continue reading The heterogeneous debate: Some say best students get short shrift
Five years ago we moved to Madison. A big factor in this decision was the expectation that we could rely on Madison public schools to educate our children. Our eldest went through West High School. To our delight the rigorous academic environment at West High transformed him into a better student, and he got accepted … Continue reading Promises Betrayed
Sandy Cullen: Twenty-five years ago, less than 10 percent of the district’s students were minorities and relatively few lived in poverty. Today, there are almost as many minority students as white, and nearly 40 percent of all students are considered poor – many of them minority students. And the number of students who aren’t native … Continue reading Madison Schools, New Population, New Challenges
Maria Glod: Black students in Fairfax County are consistently scoring lower on state standardized tests than African American children in Richmond, Norfolk and other comparatively poor Virginia districts, surprising Fairfax educators and forcing one of the nation’s wealthiest school systems to acknowledge shortcomings that have been masked by its overall success. Even within Fairfax schools, … Continue reading Fairfax Success Masks Gaps for Black Students
Lisa Snell:San Francisco is one of a handful of public school districts across the nation that mimic an education market. In these districts, the money follows the children, parents have the right to choose their children’s public schools and leave underperforming schools, and school principals and communities have the right to spend their school budgets … Continue reading San Francisco Schools: Student Funding Follows Kids
Valerie Ulene: Schools are under an incredible strain to simply educate children — let alone medicate them — so it’s hardly surprising that dispensing drugs at school leads to an alarming number of errors. The surprise is that parents and doctors don’t work harder to prevent them. The laws requiring schools to dispense drugs were … Continue reading Schools Need Our Help in Preventing Medication Errors
Andrew Rotherham: A WISCONSIN court rejected a high-profile lawsuit by the state’s largest teachers’ union last month seeking to close a public charter school that offers all its courses online on the ground that it violated state law by depending on parents rather than on certified teachers to educate children. The case is part of … Continue reading Virtual Schools, Real Innovation