Ed Accountability Debates, Test Opt-Out Pressure, and More: Friday’s Ed News

Published March 12, 2014

Friday’s ed news

COMMON CORE: Business interests are pouring money into convincing lawmakers to keep national education mandates.

OPT OUT: Parents nationwide report being pressured against opting their children out of tests.

FLORIDA: A bill would let schools designate a trained employee to carry a concealed firearm on campus.

KANSAS: Another year of technical difficulties for annual tests invalidates the results. 

CHOICE: Why “accountability” shouldn’t mean making all schools the same.

MATH WARS: How to know if your child’s school is using “fuzzy math,” and why that will damage your child’s learning.

NATIONAL: Teach For America, which places elite college graduates in needy schools, is piloting an extra year of training for recruits

SCHOOL IMPROVEMENT: The feds continue to spend money on a program their own data proves a failure.

 

Thursday’s ed news

ACCOUNTABILITY: Americans face a choice between two paths that will guide education in this nation for generations: self-government and central planning.

MISSISSIPPI: The Senate passed education savings accounts for special-needs kids yesterday.

FLORIDA: Democrats joined Republicans in moving forward a bill that would offer education savings accounts to special-needs kids.

NEW YORK: What’s wrong with the story about Mayor de Blasio attacking charter schools. Three questions for de Blasio about his hypocritical opposition to private money in education. And the real problem: de Blasio hasn’t any better reform ideas.

ILLINOIS: Parents say their kids are being pressured to not opt out of state tests.


Wednesday’s ed news

IDAHO: The House has passed tax-credit scholarship legislation.

NEW YORK: The state should drop student data-collection service inBloom, says a panel the governor appointed. 

WASHINGTON: The state rushes to obey Uncle Sam so it can keep getting federal education money.

SCHOOL LUNCH: A GAO report confirms Michelle Obama’s changes to school lunches are causing higher costs, more waste, and other headaches.

ALABAMA: A bill would let school districts opt out of Common Core.

COLORADO: The state board of education chairman will ask lawmakers to drop national Common Core tests

WISCONSIN: ObamaCare is forcing school districts to pay more for the same employees (using tax dollars) or cut their hours.

TENNESSEE: A new bill would require kids to learn cursive.

TESTING: Writing can only be evaluated properly with time and human interaction, not through machines, says Will Fitzhugh.

 

Monday’s ed news

TENNESSEE: A vouchers compromise narrowly advances in the House. It would give vouchers to low-income children attending the state’s worst 5 percent of schools. 

COLORADO: A mother tries to opt her children out of state tests and gets the full Monte.

COMMON CORE: How states and school districts can opt out of Common Core without federal penalties.

NEW YORK: The Assembly passes a Common Core delay but rejects a repeal.

KANSAS: The state Supreme Court splits hairs in a decision on how much the state needs to spend on K-12 education

MUSIC: Why music training broadens a child’s life and mind.

SOUTH DAKOTA: A student data protection bill passes the legislature unanimously. 

KANSAS: A tiny school district takes up an offer of a free audit and discovers $200,000 in savings.

CALIFORNIA: Why “transitional kindergarten” (government preschool) will cost a lot of money and produce nothing.

HAWAII: An advocacy group pays teachers to attend “tolerance training” sessions that bash Christian groups.

 

For last week’s School Reform News roundup, click here.
For other top-notch school reform news selections, visit: 

Image by Mo Riza.