Morning Announcements: May 10, 2011

In an op-ed in the Wall Street Journal, Joel Klein, the CEO of News Corporation's educational division and former chancellor of New York City public schools, writes, “When I demanded reform as chancellor, I was regularly told by friends and foes alike that impatience is immature, challenging the educational establishment is a losing strategy, collaboration is necessary, and controversy is bad. It was bad advice, typical of the status-quo thinking that dominates American education.”

Education Week reports on a new study finding that students' achievement and relationships with educators may play more of a role in school safety than the neighborhood crime rate.

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Morning Announcements: March 14, 2011

In an op-ed in the Washington Post, former chancellor of NYC public schools Joel Klein writes, “Any reform worth its name must start by recognizing that teachers are our most important educational asset. That's why we need to treat teaching as a profession, by supporting excellence, striving for constant improvement and ridding the system of poor performers.”
 
Budget Cuts Raise Questions About Federal Commitment to Literacy, Education Week writes. On the Curriculum Matters blog, Catherine Gewertz writes about the ‘career’ part of college readiness.

A guest columnist in the Magic City Morning Star explains how high school dropouts are effecting Maine’s economy.

Morning Announcements: December 6, 2010

The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel focuses on how to best educate future educators and profiles a student at Alverno College, a small women's college on Milwaukee's south side that has been widely cited as a national model for training teachers.

The Associated Press writes about the states that lost the Race to the Top competition and how they are left wondering what to do with ambitious reform plans they planned to fund with the money.

Today Michelle Rhee announced she is starting Students First, an advocacy group that will draw on the grassroots power of teachers, parents, and pupils. Rhee also published an op-ed in Newsweek explaining what she learned during her tenure as chancellor of DC public schools. On a related note, the Wall Street Journal published a piece by Joel Klein explaining what he learned as chancellor of New York public schools.

Joel Klein’s Report Card

Lots of coverage today on Joel Klein’s resignation as school chancellor of New York City public schools and the appointment of Cathleen Black as his successor. The Wall Street Journal ran an editorial praising Klein’s progress in improving the city’s schools:

Education reformers tend to react to the ferocious opposition of the status quo in one of two ways: Either they fade away in resignation, or they become even more radical. Joel Klein did the latter, which is why he leaves New York City's 1,600 public schools and 1.1 million students better than he found them…Mr. Klein leaves with much of that work uncompleted, but with reformers on offense and the public more engaged. Mayor Mike Bloomberg has chosen former media executive Cathie Black, another education rookie, as the next chancellor. Lack of experience in this failed system can be an advantage, so long as Ms. Black has the toughness to take on the teachers unions and their political retainers on the city council, the state board of regents and in Albany. She should worry when they start to praise her.

The New York Times ran two stories, the first focusing on Mayor Michael Bloomberg’s secretive path to finding Klein’s replacement and the second on the state’s decision over granting Ms. Black the permission to take the job. The Times editorial board chimed in writing:

School reform is, by definition, an incremental process in which school leaders build on the accomplishments of those who came before them. Future schools chancellors in New York City will benefit from several important reforms put in place during the tenure of Joel Klein, who resigned this week after eight years as chancellor under Michael Bloomberg, the first mayor to have direct control of the nation’s largest school system…Mr. Klein’s resignation comes at a challenging time for the city’s school system. With layoffs likely, union negotiations stalled and new state standards on the way, his successor will need to be a quick study. Given all this, David Steiner, the state education commissioner, needs to thoroughly vet Mayor Bloomberg’s proposed successor, the media executive Cathleen Black, to determine if she is up to the job.

Morning Announcements: November 10, 2010

The New York Times reports on Joel Klein’s resignation as school chancellor of the New York City school system and the appointment of Cathleen Black to be his successor.

Education Week releases a special report examining teacher professional development.

The Wall Street Journal covers a new report from the Brookings Institute that finds workers with less than a high school diploma were more likely to keep their jobs during the recession if they lived in a handful of metro areas with the highest concentrations of employees with college degrees.

Inside Higher Ed examines data analytics, the method of warehousing, organizing and interpreting data accrued through student information systems in hopes of learning more about what makes students successful, then giving instructors the chance to nudge those students accordingly.

Morning Announcements: October 13, 2010

The big news today in Washington: DC School Chancellor Michelle Rhee is resigning at the end of this month. The Washington Post covered this story extensively with a cover story on her resignation, another story on Rhee’s unfinished business, a column by Robert McCartney on presumptive mayor-elect Vincent C. Gray’s next moves in education, and a live chat on the issue moderated by education reporter Bill Turque.

In the Letters to the Editor section, a number of Washington Post readers also responded to the manifesto by Rhee, Klein and other education leaders published on Sunday.

The future of charter schools in Georgia rests in the hands of the state Supreme Court as it considers a case that could affect choice for parents and unravel a network of schools, the Atlanta Journal Constitution reports.

In Kansas, reading and math scores have improved drastically in the past decade. According to test results released yesterday in Topeka, overall reading scores have gone from 59.2 percent proficient or better in 2000 to 86.3 percent this year.

According to the Providence Journal, about 15 percent of the teachers at Central Falls High School have been absent in recent weeks, a negative trend that threatens the ambitious transformation plan of the struggling school.

Morning Announcements: October 12, 2010

On Sunday, 16 school district chiefs, including New York’s Joel Klein and Washington’s Michelle Rhee published a manifesto entitled how to fix our schools in the Washington Post.

The Associated Press reports on a new analysis that finds states appropriated almost $6.2 billion for four-year colleges and universities between 2003 and 2008 to help pay for the education of students who didn't return for year two.

In an op-ed in the Charlotte Observer, Erskine Bowles, outgoing president of the University of North Carolina system, writes, “Ineffective teaching hurts our students - and ultimately, it hurts all of us” and points to the Charlotte-Mecklenburg Schools as an example of best practices.

On Monday, the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation announced the creation of a program that will provide grants to organizations to expand the reach of their education technology initiatives. Education Week blogger Ian Quillen reports that the Next Generation Learning Challenges program is releasing its first in a series of requests to solicit funding proposals for technology initiatives, with the first round focused specifically on postsecondary education.

Morning Announcements: October 5, 2010

In the Science section of the New York Times, reporter Natalie Angier picks a bone with “the odious and increasingly pervasive term ‘STEM education.’”

In the New Yorker, Joel Klein responds to a story written last week by Nicholas Lemann on how things aren’t so bad in American public education. Robert Rothman, policy fellow at the Alliance, also thought Lemann’s story required a response and posted his thoughts on Lemann’s story here last week.

A special report in eSchoolNews discusses the student learning possibilities available in an interactive math classroom, writing, “technology can breathe life into abstract concepts.”

Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger has vetoed legislation that would allow school districts to water down requirements for foreign language and art education in high schools, according to the San Jose Mercury News.

In Indiana, the state Department of Education is touting a new "parents pledge" it hopes will increase parent involvement in schools.