Afternoon Announcements: July 3, 2012

Happy 3^rd of July! We know, we know, it’s baffling that there’s a midweek holiday. Just go with the flow, it’ll be okay. Enjoy your day of grilling and fireworks tomorrow while you celebrate Independence Day! Before you head out the door, here are some afternoon announcements for you! We’ll be back with Stats That Stick and more announcements on Thursday.

Education Week notes that the public largely unaware of the Common Core State Standards. Although new polling data shows that nine in ten teachers are aware of the Common Core and are largely supportive of it, 60 percent of the public notes that they have seen “nothing at all” in any medium about the new standards in the past six month. This is troubling given that the Common Core State Standards will affect so many teachers, students, and schools across the country when they’re implemented.

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Afternoon Annoucements: December 2, 2011

Happy Friday!  If you haven’t headed to happy hour already, kick back and enjoy as we ease you into the weekend with today’s education news.

The editorial board at the Washington Post applauds Secretary of Education Arne Duncan’s call to tackle the spiraling cost of college education by actually addressing the cost side of the equation as opposed to government solely focusing efforts on increasing federal aid and reducing interest costs on loans. Although acknowledging Secretary Duncan’s initiatives will not be a complete resolution to the enormous problem, the Washington Post calls it a “welcome dose of straight talk.”

 

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Morning Announcements: October 6, 2011

Education Week reports that if high schools are going to better prepare students for college and careers, experts say they need to track graduates enrolling in higher education, whether they take remedial courses to get up to speed, and whether they earn a degree. At a meeting in Washington Wednesday, politicians from both sides of the aisle, along with educators and nonprofit leaders, discussed the importance of using data to support the college- and career-ready agenda.

Black and Hispanic students are far more likely to be kicked out of school when they break the rules, including some that often have nothing to do with keeping students safe, according to a new report from a civil rights research and advocacy group. Education Week reported school discipline records are too often seen as a measure of how safe a school is and not often enough as a gauge of how healthy a school is academically.

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Afternoon Announcements: August 24, 2011

The nation’s third largest school district has announced plans to increase the length of time its kids spend in school. Chicago Public Schools officials announced yesterday the school day will be 90 minutes longer and the school year will extend by two weeks. Earlier in the summer, Gov. Pat Quinn signed a law giving Chicago Public Schools the power lengthen its school day and year, according to the Associated Press. Roughly 405,000 students attend Chicago schools. The Chicago Tribune reported this afternoon that schools CEO Jean Claude Brizard offered the Chicago Teachers Union a counter-proposal of a 2 percent raise for elementary teachers should the union agree to longer school days in kindergarten through eighth grade.

As rural school populations continue to grow, the success of students in these areas become more important to the nation’s education goals, Education Week reports. Between 2004 and 2009, rural schools grew by 11 percent, from 10.5 million students to 11.7 million. The student populations in rural areas are also becoming more diverse. Today, students of color constitute 28 percent of rural students.

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Report Round-Up

Here is a round-up of this week’s education-related reports one day early!

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Stats That Stick: August 17, 2011

Americans who believe their public school system has a hard time getting good teachers: 52 percent

According to the Phi Delta Kappa/Gallup Poll on the public's attitude toward the public schools, of the roughly 1,000 people surveyed, over half of Americans believe their local school district has a difficult time recruiting quality teachers. However, the vast majority of Americans appreciate and trust public school teachers in general.

ACT test takers who will need at least one remedial course in college: 75 percent

ACT’s annual report released this week shows three in four students who took the ACT test did not achieve all of the company’s preparedness benchmarks and therefore will likely need to take a remedial course to brush up on high-school material while in college. Bob Wise, president of the Alliance and former West Virginia governor, says this type of remedial course taking is dangerous because students are more likely to drop out of college if they feel like they repeated high school material.

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Afternoon Announcements: August 17, 2011

Phi Delta Kappa and Gallup Poll released findings today from their study investigating the public's attitude toward the public schools. Researchers asked about 1,000 people questions about education issues including quality of teachers, charter schools, voucher programs and more. The study found Americans have great appreciation for and trust in public school teachers, but less so for teacher unions at our nation’s schools in general. Some of the key findings include:

- Nearly three in four Americans have trust and confidence in public school teachers and believe theyshould have flexibility in how they teach curriculum.

- Two of three Americans would like a child of theirs to become a public school teacher.

- Nearly 70 percent of Americans said they generally hear negative, rather than positive, stories about schools in the media.

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Report Round-Up

Here's a sampling of some education-related reports that were released this week. Did your organization release a report this week that we missed? Feel free to post information on it with a link to your website in the comments.

The College Board, The Educational Experience of Young Men of Color Capturing the Student Voice: The report finds that nearly half of young men of color age 15-24 who earn their high school diploma will end up unemployed, incarcerated or dead. The study also finds that minority men fall behind their peers in educational attainment and many fail to attend college or earn a degree.

RAND Corporation, Making Summer Count: The report notes that students' skills and knowledge often deteriorate during the summer months, with low-income students facing the largest losses. It finds that instruction during the summer has the potential to stop these losses and propel students toward higher achievement. The report provides a review of the literature on summer learning loss and summer learning programs, coupled with data from ongoing programs offered by districts and private providers across the United States, to demonstrate the potential of summer programs to improve achievement as well as the challenges in creating and maintaining such programs.

The National Bureau of Economic Research, Improving College Performance and Retention the Easy Way: Unpacking the ACT Exam: The report finds that two of the four subtests of the ACT, English and Mathematics, are highly predictive of positive college outcomes.

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Straight A's Covers NCLB, High School Graduation Rates, Common Standards, State Budgets and More

Here's a quick summary of the articles in the June 13 issue of Straight A's, the Alliance's biweekly newsletter.

Click on a title below to access the complete article or download a printer-friendly version of the entire newsletter at: http://www.all4ed.org/files/Volume11No12.pdf.

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Morning Announcements: May 12, 2011

In his School of Thought blog with TIME magazine, Andrew Rotherham answers the question, "Why the Hispanic Student Crisis Is Going Ignored".

The National Education Association officials announced that they would put a policy statement before the union's governing body for approval that, among other changes, would open the door to the use of "valid, reliable, high-quality standardized tests," in combination with multiple other measures, for evaluating teachers, Education Week reports.

The Christian Science Monitor reports that President Obama will deliver a commencement address to Students at Booker T. Washington High School in Memphis, Tennessee as part of the Race to the Top Commencement Challenge.

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