Opinion
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And the Winners Are
Opinion -While reform candidates rarely have the upper hand in elections with low voter turnout, that was not the case in Milwaukee’s recent school board election. -
05/1999 State Education Roundup
Opinion -Colorado * Florida * Hawaii * Illinois * Kentucky Nevada * Rhode Island * Utah * Vermont COLORADO Single-Sex Classes Prompt ACLU Probe When the principal of Denver's Mitchell Elementary School last fall suggested assigning the 170 -
Rx for Education: What Works and What Doesn’t
Opinion -Two months before President Clinton's State of the Union address urged lawmakers "to support what works, and to stop supporting what does not work" in education, a group of education leaders and scholars had tackled that very topic during a three-day -
Voters Oust Union-Controlled School Board in Milwaukee
Opinion -In a school board election widely regarded as a referendum on school choice, Milwaukee voters on April 6 rejected all five teacher union-backed candidates and installed a slate that gives a solid 7-2 majority of school board seats to reformers who want -
Expanding Access to Choice in Minnesota
Opinion -Since passage of former Governor Arne H. -
State Ousts Elected School Board in Detroit
Opinion -Delivering on legislative proposals made in his January State of the State Address, Republican Michigan Governor John Engler on March 26 signed into law a school reform bill that removes authority for schools in the City of Detroit from the -
Detroit Takeover Gives CEO Extraordinary Powers
Opinion -Having compared the 1999 Michigan legislation authorizing the takeover of Detroit's schools to Illinois legislation that in 1995 created the popular “Chicago model” for city school takeover, two Michigan researchers have concluded there are significant -
Can Mayors Solve School Problems?
Opinion -Granting Mayor Dennis Archer control of Detroit's failing government schools is unlikely to solve the district's financial and academic problems, according to two education policy researchers who suggest that school choice is a more promising--as well -
Private Schools: The Challenges Ahead
Opinion -As school choice gains ground, much attention has been focused on how the public schools will respond to a new competitive environment. Private schools also face major challenges in that market-based future. 1. -
New Rules for Special Ed Students in Private Schools
Opinion -Under new regulations for the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act Amendments of 1997, it will be more difficult to provide services for special education students in private schools. -
Takeovers Don’t Bring Turnaround in Student Achievement
Opinion -Taking over district leadership from an elected school board is a popular solution to urban public education ills. Mayor Richard M. Daley took over the schools in Chicago in 1995, and now Mayor Dennis W. Archer has taken over the schools in Detroit. -
Changing the Vision for Public Education
Opinion -"We're elected by everyone and yet the attitude has been that we should exclude students who don't go to public schools. Why shouldn't we be serving them? -
The Role of Personality In Choice Programs
Opinion -In a February 14 article, the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel named some of the Milwaukee Public Schools that have accomplished excellent goals in recent years. The author presented these examples of success as exceptions to the rule in MPS. -
Who Is John Gardner?
Opinion -Although Milwaukee Public Schools board member John Gardner is a strong advocate of public education, he calls public schools "juvenile warehousing run by an incompetent monopoly. -
Education Tax Credit Introduced in Congress
Opinion -While Congress struggles with policy decisions about just how much freedom to give states over the spending of billions of dollars in federal education funding, two Members have proposed beginning the process of turning over such decision-making powers -
How Bad Are Detroit’s Schools?
Opinion -Detroit "is not the worst performing district in the State," protested Detroit Public School officials when details of Governor John Engler's takeover plan were announced in February. -
How ‘Super’ Ed-Flex Would Work
Opinion -Under the Super Ed-Flex proposal developed by Heritage Foundation education policy analysts Nina Shokraii Rees and Kirk A. -
School Choice Handbook Advances, State-by-State
Opinion -Although a number of developments made 1998 a banner year for advancing the cause of parental choice in education, one of the more important factors was the continuation of a trend noted in prior years: increasing support from low-income parents and -
School Choice: The Message Gets Through
Opinion -The ongoing debate over school choice continues to advance the idea of parental choice in education, as evidenced by the following: 1999 World Book Year Book Under the Education topic heading in the 1999 World Book Year Book--A Review of the -
Think Tank Calls for Flexibility to Boost Student Achievement
Opinion -While Congress debates extending the 12-state Education Flexibility Partnership Demonstration Act of 1994 to all 50 states, education policy analysts at The Heritage Foundation say the so-called Ed-Flex bill does not go far enough. -
Thinking Outside of the Box
Opinion -Most people make no distinction between public schools and public education. But, as Andrew J. Coulson points out in his book, Market Education: The Unknown History, one is an end, and the other only a means to the end. -
What Makes Better Readers?
Opinion -As part of the National Assessment of Educational Progress, researchers identified school and home factors associated with better reading scores. -
Edgewood Findings Refute Criticisms of School Choice
Opinion -When the Horizon district-wide school choice program was announced in April 1998, critics wasted little time in condemning the initiative, predicting it would draw the best students from the Edgewood public schools in San Antonio, Texas, and drain