April 4, 2011
Debra Walker, a part-time home health aide, feels squeezed from all directions. The property taxes on her southeast Houston home keep going up, she spends more money to fill up her gas tank and she’s paying more at the grocery store but coming home with fewer items. She and her retired husband’s annual household income […]
April 4, 2011
To underscore his concern about proposed cuts to public schools statewide, a Schertz Clemens High School freshman spoke of his coursework toward a dream of being a genetic engineer and studying at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. A father choked back tears about the possible fate of a beloved Northside school district program that has […]
April 1, 2011
For years, Warren Fletcher was regarded by his peers as one of the brightest people in the room, but not someone who someday would head one of the nation’s powerful teacher unions, United Teachers Los Angeles. That assessment had to be revised as of Tuesday night. Fletcher emerged with nearly 53% of the vote in […]
April 1, 2011
Amid battles over teacher quality and school restructuring, there’s one thing everyone seems to want in the next version of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act: an accountability system that measures student growth. Yet the results of the U.S. Department of Education’s growth-model pilot program, whose final evaluation was released earlier this year, suggest lawmakers […]
April 1, 2011
Former District of Columbia Public Schools chancellor Michelle Rhee says she is “100% supportive” of a broader investigation into standardized test scores in the school district she used to oversee, just days after she dismissed a USA TODAY investigation that showed high rates of corrected answers on student test sheets. In a taped interview to […]
April 1, 2011
COLUMBUS, Ohio — Ohio Gov. John Kasich plans to sign a bill to limit the collective bargaining rights of 350,000 public worke rs. Kasich plans to sign it Thursday. The Republican announced his plan in an email to supporters. A spokesman confirmed the bill-signing. The bill was approved Wednesday by the GOP-led state House and […]
April 1, 2011
Fifty-one buses from Falcon District 49 in El Paso County drove north to the state Capitol today in an effort to send a message to state legislators about education cuts. Buses came adorned with messages on windows that read “no cuts” and “fund our future” in response to Gov. John Hickenlooper’s proposed $332 million budget […]
April 1, 2011
Valley Park Superintendent David Knes says district employees may get no raise in the 2011-12 budget but there also probably will not be any involuntary reductions in personnel. Any reductions would be covered by attrition. Knes will present a preliminary budget to the Board of Education on April 20. “At this time, everything is on […]
April 1, 2011
A bill that would freeze special ed funding, eliminate other funds for Twin Cities school districts and change the way teachers are evaluated passed the Minnesota House in the early morning hours Wednesday, after a nightlong debate. The legislation allocates $14 billion for Minnesota’s K-12 education system over the next two years, amounting to about […]
March 30, 2011
Responding to criticism that tenure gives even poor teachers a job for life, Randi Weingarten, the president of the American Federation of Teachers, announced a plan Thursday to overhaul how teachers are evaluated and dismissed. It would give tenured teachers who are rated unsatisfactory by their principals a maximum of one school year to improve. […]