While I was reading this Iowa story about the 29-year-old grandmother, I wanted to tear my hair out in clumps:Quad-City area teenagers are still having babies. But the good news is that fewer teens are doing so across the region — and in Iowa, Illinois and the United States as a whole — than 10 [...]
Banning ‘Lil Ghosts And Goblins At The School House Door
Halloween is still weeks away. But already in Colorado the PC crowd has begun its campaign to suppress yet another harmless childhood rite of passage: BROOMFIELD – There won’t be little ghosts and goblins at Kohl Elementary School this Halloween. In a newsletter sent home to parents, Principal Cindy Kaier wrote that the traditional Halloween [...]
The Spellings Report: Pushing NCLB
The nation’s report card has just come out and Queen of All Testing U.S. Education Secretary Margaret Spellings is positively giddy over the news: “Student achievement is on the rise,” said Secretary Spellings. “No Child Left Behind is working. It’s doable, reasonable and necessary. Any efforts to weaken accountability would fly in the face of [...]
The Free-Radical Approach To EduReform
The editorial board of the Atlanta Journal-Constitution is saying that what’s needed in order to overhaul public education is to actually go ahead and really overhaul public education:End high school at age 16. Take schools away from school districts and school boards and give them to hired private contractors, most likely liability corporations owned and [...]
Our Troubled High Schools: Gang-Banging The Indy Way
The plague of student juvenile gangs continues to infest many of our public schools, with the latest incident occurring in, of all places, an Indianapolis high school: Seven North Central High School students face gang-related charges after a fight in the school cafeteria resulted in their arrests Thursday. According to police reports, Special Deputy Thaddeus [...]
Teach Like Your Hair’s On Fire: A “Gotta Have?”
A book with a title like that is just begging to be bought. Australian educator Murray Bourne liked it while Teacher Magazine’s Rafe Esquith didn’t. Heh. Maybe some kind-hearted soul will buy a couple of copies and leave them in our teacher’s lounge. I won’t hold my breath.
Our Falling Reading Scores: What’s To Be Done?
This is some troubling news: Reading skills among U.S. students graduating from high school this year fell to the lowest since 1994 as measured by the most widely taken college-entrance exam. Reading scores on the SAT declined 1 point to 502 after a 5- point drop last year, the test’s operator, the College Board, reported [...]
The Elephant In The EduReform Room
When it comes to successfully reforming our chronically under performing public education system, the factor that nobody in the MSM seems to want to talk about is the fact that many of our classroom teachers are under qualified for the jobs in which they are assigned. Well… almost nobody. In a recent op-ed piece that [...]
Is This How To Build A Better NCLB?
The federal No Child Left Behind Act is up for reauthorization, and among the interested parties the jockeying for position has begun:Rep. George Miller, D-Calif., the chairman of the House education committee, says he hopes to steer a bill renewing the federal No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB) through the House this fall, and one [...]
The Carnival Of Education: Week 128
Welcome to the midway of the 128th Carnival of Education! Here’s the very latest roundup of entries from around the EduSphere. Unless clearly labeled otherwise, all entries this week were submitted by the writers themselves. Folks interested in hosting an edition of the C.O.E. should please let us know via this email address: owlshome [at] [...]