Friday’s news roundup:
1. What’s next for school reform?
2. The U.S. Supreme Court will hear allegations that affirmative action destroys equal protection under the law for white students.
3. Hawaii’s teachers union has broken off talks with the federal government despite federal threats to withhold state grant money for noncooperation.
4. Florida students are joining national protests over new federal lunch rules.
5. Parent Trigger legislation makes for strange enemies.
6. A minority of Oklahoma superintendents are in uproar over a new state grading system for schools.
7. New data gives Virginia’s college-bound information to help them decide their major.
8. Minnesota implements its new teacher evaluation law.
9. Indiana Republicans surprisingly intend to adopt statewide preschool in the next legislative session.
10. A Vermont district is going to court to avoid answering an open records request.
Thursday’s news roundup:
1. Education came up consistently in last night’s presidential debate.
2. Democrats and Republicans have both historically supported vouchers.
3. Does the Common Core promote fuzzy math?
4. A Democratic lawmaker in Pennsylvania introduced a bill to reduce charter school funds.
5. A sell-out debate yesterday pit Idaho’s reform superintendent against a fierce critic.
6. How character contributes to academic success.
7. New Mexico’s governor still wants to end social promotion in third grade.
8. Eighty percent of Chicago teachers voted to approve their new contract.
9. Minnesota considers revamping its school funding formula.
10. Taxpayers cannot and should not bail out college students, write Charleston Daily Mail editors.
Wednesday’s news roundup:
1. In today’s debate, Mitt Romney should press President Obama on the Parent Trigger, says David Feith.
2. Why the Chicago strike settlement is a loser for everyone but big-government unions (paywall).
3. New Jersey’s first count of school bullying incidents yields approximately 12,000 over the past year.
4. Common Core supporters have started trying to win over parents.
5. Nearly half of South Carolina students taking a statewide U.S. history and Constitution exam flunked it.
6. EdLibertyWatch grades states on school choice, and flunks Indiana for requiring private schools to administer state tests.
7. West Virginia’s school board is scared of unions, says the Charleston Daily Mail.
8. North Carolina legislators debate performance pay across the state’s education system.
9. Texas Gov. Rick Perry focuses on better results for lower costs inside state universities.
10. Surprise: California school finance is a mess. But the governor has signed a bill allowing school gardens to sell their produce for profit!
Tuesday’s news roundup:
1. School choice proponents support tests as a substitute for giving parents true control.
2. Here’s a look at the education-related issues on states’ November ballot.
3. Ten years after No Child Left Behind made testing central in U.S. education policy, the federal government has yet to issue standards, guidelines, or even recommendations on how to prevent and detect cheating.
4. How to stymie teachers unions? Introduce charter schools.
5. Common Core education standards face a gathering storm, opines the Fort Wayne Journal-Gazette.
6. An interview with the vice president of Parent-Trigger movie Won’t Back Down‘s studio.
7. Texas public schools are tapping parents for more money than their taxes bring in. An Idaho lawsuit challenges the numerous fees public schools charge for supplies, registration, and classes.
8. How to discover public pension waste, fraud, and abuse.
9. A higher number of Idaho teachers left and are entering the profession under streamlined certification requirements.
10. High numbers of English language learners in Oregon are not, well, learning English.
Monday’s news roundup:
1. Vouchers are becoming a central issue in Tennessee campaigns.
2. Pennsylvania needs a Parent Trigger law, opines Jay Ostrich.
3. The federal government will directly monitor Oakland schools for three years because it accused the district of disciplining more black students than white students.
4. Denver has replaced leftist activism criteria in its teacher evaluation.
5. South Carolina could regret requiring Common Core tests, writes state Sen. Mike Fair.
6. Replacing school property taxes with sales and income tax increases wouldn’t raise enough revenue, reported a Pennsylvania fiscal analysis.
7. The public pension death spiral is locking in, says Frank Keegan.
8. How U.S. and foreign universities stack up in a global competition for the best minds.
9. Moody’s has downgraded Chicago schools’ debt rating, citing its $1 billion budget gap for 2014 and new, more expensive teacher contract. Students and teachers must also make up strike days.
10. Virginia spends less than 60 percent of its K-12 funds inside classrooms.
For last week’s School Reform News roundup, click here.
For other top-notch school reform news selections, visit:
Image by Mo Riza.