Jose Luis Vilson on teacher professionalism, and why it's critical to the education system.
Arizona's barely-regulated voucher system continues to provide lots of benefits to grifters and fraudsters looking to gather some green. This latest scam involves a whole lot of ghost students. Wayne Schutsky has the story for KJZZ.
In South Carolina, some legislators might be getting a clue and trying to crack down on charter sponsor abuses. Zak Koeske reports for The State.
Ron DeSantis has been trying to redeem his book ban laws by claiming that all the terrible stories that you hear about books in Florida are just hoaxes and baloney, perpetrated by people trying to make the whole book banning thing look bad. Sue Kingery Woltanski explains how his "solution" puts school principals in the cross hairs.
America Neglects to Address the Big Problems for Public Schools
Do Core Democratic Values Belong in Schools? Some Say No.
Literacy bill that would hold back thousands more third graders advances in Indiana
Philadelphia’s ‘Renaissance’ charter schools did not produce what was promised
Oklahoma’s culture wars killed Nex Benedict. They’re also why I quit teaching.
Cyber school costs must be reined in
Whitmer, Michigan Democrats have to fix what Betsy DeVos did
Welcome to the GOP's new education agenda: Loot our public schools for private vouchers
Black male teachers pay tribute to their heroes: 'They're needed so much'
Report: Tax-credit scholarship recipients didn’t outscore public school students
It’s the bullying, not the tech
The Misguided War on Test Optional
Whatever Happened to Mayoral Control of Urban Public Schools?
Larry Cuban with a look at the history and ins and outs of mayoral control of big city school districts. A nice little history lesson.
America’s Need for Immeasurable Outcomes: Valuing the Humanities
Christian Nationalists are furious at reporter Heidi Przybyla for accurately reporting on them
Jan Resseger takes a look at some of the problems that ESSA failed to address.
Nancy Flanagan considers Michigan's unique adoption of Core Democratic Values as a key topic in the state standards.
Yup, it's 2024 and we're still seeing these bills. In fact, in some states folks are doubling down. Isabella Volmert has the story for the AP.
Philadelphia had big plans for a charter-driven turnaround, because of course charter operators know secrets of education that public schools don't. Except that it didn't actually work. I know, shocker! Dale Mezzacappa breaks it down for Chalkbeat.
Tyger Songbird with a first person story for LGBTQ Nation, from the state that has devoted itself to some serious anti-LGBTQ baloney.
Yet another survey shows that support for voucher programs is weak. Even in Georgia.
A letter to the editor in the Tribune-Review lays out the simple case for funding reform in PA
Michael Griffie writes for the Detroit Free Press that Michigan is still dealing with the mess that the DeVos dollars made of public education, and it's time to rebuild.
Governor Roy Cooper and Governor Andy Bashear team up in this USA Today op-ed and they mince no words. If you'd like to see an elected official actually stand up for public education, you'll want to read this.
ABC News did this piece, and it's a nice tribute to people who deserve a nice tribute.
Samantha Smylie at Chalkbeat Chicago with yet another study showing that vouchers don't aid academics. Illinois is the first state to have rolled back its voucher program, and from the looks of this study, they didn't lose anything worth keeping.
Just a short piece from Scott McLeod, but you should check it out for the chart showing where bullying actually happens.
Here's some fun. Akil Bello ran this piece in Inside Higher Ed a few weeks back, and it's well worth a read. But then you can also read this piece, in which he looks at the material that he cut from the IHE piece, which is pretty interesting stuff in its own right.
Larry Cuban with a look at the history and ins and outs of mayoral control of big city school districts. A nice little history lesson.
America’s Need for Immeasurable Outcomes: Valuing the Humanities
A while back, I did a review of Gayle Greene's book about teaching the humanities. Here's another look at this very worthwhile book, this time from Nancy Bailey.
The Friendly Atheist breaks down the flap over the Politico writer whose misquoting has launched a whole lot of high dudgeon on the right. Best breakdown of the story I've read.
Over at Forbes.com this week, I looked at the new NPE report showing how states rank for their support of public education.
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Back in 2021, Dr. Angela Denise Birdwell of the Higley school district in Gilbert, Arizona, was indicted on 18 counts of fraud for accepting kickbacks from building contractors. In that same year, both a superintendent and an employee of the Arizona Department of Education were indicted on felony charges for stealing federal grant money. In 2022, the former superintendent and another employee of the Toltec school district were indicted on a host of charges including falsely inflating their benefits from the state retirement system and fronting unauthorized loans to themselves. And remember, this is just in Arizona and in the past few years.
ReplyDeleteThere are other examples. A superintendent in Mississippi inflated student enrollment numbers to get more state funding. A group of Alabama superintendents were indicted for creating “ghost students” of their own in the state’s public virtual schools program and skimming off the funding that they received. The former CEO of the Chicago Public Schools did serious jail time for directing $22.5 million in no bid deals to friends and associates, hilariously emailing “I have tuition to pay and casinos to visit (:” to describe her motivations. The HBO movie Bad Education dramatizes the embezzlement scandal that rocked the Roslyn Union school district in New York and was uncovered by a student journalist.