August - 2022

Thinking and Linking

Conservatives focus on school board races

Aug 31
1 min

Conservatives focus on school board races

California Republicans are focusing on running candidates for school board seats, reports Sameea Kamal in CalMatters. The GOP's “Parent Revolt” program "includes virtual training sessions that detail how and where to run for office, plus tips for digital campaigns and going door-to-door." Democrats have a 2 to 1 edge in party registrations in California. There's little chance State Superintendent Tony Thurmond, a former Democratic legislator, will be defeated for re-election

'The child is not the creature of the state'

Aug 31
2 min

'The child is not the creature of the state'

Parents aren't perfect. Some are very imperfect indeed. But they have the right to "direct the upbringing and education" of their children, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in 1925, in overruling a law banning religious schools. “The child is not the mere creature of the State,” wrote Justice James C. McReynolds. Teachers and school administrators seem to think they know best how to raise other people's children, writes Robert Pondiscio in Commentary. There have been myriad recen

National teacher shortage is a myth, not a crisis

Aug 30
1 min

National teacher shortage is a myth, not a crisis

Teachers are stressed, exhausted and frustrated. But there has been "no mass exodus" of teachers, writes Kevin Mahnken on The 74. "Teacher turnover rates are actually about the same as they were before the pandemic," according to a working paper by Brown's Annenberg Institute. There is no national teacher shortage, writes Derek Thompson in The Atlantic. Some high-poverty districts and rural areas have trouble hiring teachers, but that's not new. Special-ed teachers are in sho

Students go farther when they have a plan

Aug 29
2 min

Students go farther when they have a plan

Connor Opdahl began planning his future in eighth grade, writes David Tobenkin on The 74. Wisconsin requires students to develop an "academic career plan" in middle and high school. While he graduated with a 4.12 GPA, he balks at the cost of a four-year college he views as unnecessary to his career objectives and a likely source of massive debt. He’s also a highly athletic, outdoors kind of guy who does not fancy being chained to a desk. So this month he starts a nine month t

The Big Blur: Rethink high school, job training, college

Aug 29
2 min

The Big Blur: Rethink high school, job training, college

Linking high school, work-based learning and college is an idea whose time may have come, writes Javeria Salman in the Hechinger Report. Jobs for the Future proposes combining the last two years of high school with the first two years of college in a "Big Blur." The new institutions would be "co-designed with regional employers so that all students get work-based learning experiences and graduate — without tuition costs — with a post-secondary credential that has labor market

College is an 'expensive gamble' for the artsy and the unprepared

Aug 29
2 min

College is an 'expensive gamble' for the artsy and the unprepared

College is seen as an "expensive gamble" by many Americans, concludes a recent Public Agenda survey. Half say college "is a questionable investment because of high student loans and limited job opportunities." Skeptics include half of young people with degrees. Furthermore, two-thirds of Americans "view higher education as stuck in the past and unable to meet the needs of today’s students." Postsecondary education is required for most jobs that provide a path to the middle cl

Aug 28
2 min

Masked preschoolers -- still

A California district that sent a four-year-old boy home for not wearing a mask rescinded the policy a few days later, saying that the Covid risk level had fallen from "high" to "medium." The boy's father videotaped the incident, which included a conversation with the police officer assigned to the school. But, across the country, as older students start school without masks, the youngest children at the lowest risk are the mostly likely to be wearing masks. Head Start center

Kids just want to be 'influencers'

Aug 27
1 min

Kids just want to be 'influencers'

Generation Z, which means 16- to 25-year-olds, don't want to grow up to be doctors, lawyers, astronauts or cowboys, according to a new Censuswide survey, reports Adam Heitzman. Twenty-seven percent plan to be social-media influencers: 20 percent of males and 13 percent of females say it is the "only" career for them. The benefits of being an influencer are "free products," earnings, meeting other influencers, gaining followers, traveling and holidays, and being a “celebrity.

Public trusts teachers, but not so much on racism or gender

Aug 26
1 min

Public trusts teachers, but not so much on racism or gender

Sixty-three percent of people trust local public-school teachers according to a new poll by PDK, an educators' group, reports Libby Stanford in Education Week. That rises to 72 percent of public-school parents. But trust varies by topic, she writes. While 56 percent of those polled have trust and confidence in public school teachers ability “to appropriately handle” U.S. history, only 44 percent trust teachers to handle “how the history of racism affects America today,” she

Parents want choices

Aug 26
2 min

Parents want choices

Parents want education options, concludes Never Going Back, based on a Mary 22 Harris Poll for the National Alliance for Public Charter Schools. Ninety three percent of parents said "one size doesn't fit all" in education, and 86 percent want choices other than their assigned district school. The pandemic forced parents to pay more attention to their children's education: 78 percent became more involved as a result, especially lower-income and non-white parents. Eighty-three

Blue-collar workers don't want to pay college loans: 'Hell no!'

Aug 25
2 min

Blue-collar workers don't want to pay college loans: 'Hell no!'

Linking student loan forgiveness to jobs and skills training would have been politically savvy, writes Andrew J. Rotherham on Eduwonk. Otherwise, it's just "a straight-up wealth transfer from Americans who didn’t attend higher education, or did and paid off their debts, onto others." Americans think people should pay their debts, and resent those who don't. Some Democratic politicians are criticizing the debt-relief plan, writes Allahpundit. Tim Ryan, a Democratic congressman

Biden: $10,000 break on college loans

Aug 24
2 min

Biden: $10,000 break on college loans

President Joe Biden will cancel $10,000 in student loans for those earning less than $125,000 a year and extend "the pandemic-era pause on loan payments through the end of the year," reports the New York Times. "In addition, those with undergraduate loans would be able to cap their payments at 5 percent of their monthly income, a change that could significantly reduce bills for millions of borrowers." Ninety percent of the relief will go to households earning $75,000 a year o

As 'college for all' fades, schools build career pathways

Aug 24
2 min

As 'college for all' fades, schools build career pathways

"College for all" meant degrees for some, disappointment for others and $1.75 trillion in debt for 48 million borrowers. Urban school districts are expanding career technical education (CTE) to provide "direct, debt-free routes to in-demand careers," reports Chalkbeat's Mila Koumpilova in the Washington Post. Chicago Public schools CEO Janice Jackson, who stepped down last year, "focused on building a college-going culture," writes Koumpilova. Several CTE programs closed. But

AI doesn't write well, but it's better than some students

Aug 23
2 min

AI doesn't write well, but it's better than some students

Shakespeare it's not. However, a new artificial-intelligence technology called GPT-3, which understands and generates text, could help students write essays -- or help them avoid writing essays, writes Williamena Kwapo on Education Week. . . . if you input “write a tagline for a car company,” it will return a completion like “a car for every budget” or “the best way to get around.” Prompt it to “summarize a complex text for a 1st grader” and it generates a summarized text in

Is technology the future of early literacy?

Aug 23
2 min

Is technology the future of early literacy?

Speech-recognition technology could analyze young children's reading, rate their pronunciation of each sound and word, track their ability to sound out words, check their fluency and give the teacher detailed information on what each child needs to progress. Or, at least, that's the ed-tech industry's dream, writes Sara Randazzo in the Wall Street Journal. It sounds as though it would be useful, but teachers have seen a lot of tech fail to live up to promises. “Technology is

Guess and pass: No math required

Aug 22
1 min

Guess and pass: No math required

Guessing C on every multiple-choice question was enough to pass New York's Regents exam for Algebra I this year, writes math teacher Ed Knight. Pre-pandemic, students who answered 30 percent of multiple-choice questions could pass, even if they didn't try to answer the "constructed response" questions. This year, 19.6 percent on the four-answer multiple-choice section and 0 on "constructed response" was good enough. His student "River," rarely in class and knowing no algebra,

When grades don't match test scores, who do you trust?

Aug 22
2 min

When grades don't match test scores, who do you trust?

New York's graduation rate shot up during the pandemic when Regents exams were on hold, writes Alina Adams on The 74. What will happen when these students try to pass college classes or launch a career? Her daughter earned straight A’s in her first year of high school in New York City and passed two of the five Regents exams required to earn a diploma. But, in one subject, she only earned a "pass," which requires a 65, not the "mastery" score of 85 required by some city and s

Thank you, Ms. Lung

Aug 21
2 min

Thank you, Ms. Lung

Born in an Afghan refugee camp in Pakistan, Jamil Jan Kochai started second grade in Sacramento speaking Pashto and Farsi, but very little English. His teacher, Susannah Lung, worked with him most days after school, teaching him to read and write in English. By third grade, he won a reading award. Now the author of two books and several essays, Kochai met his old teacher again to say "thank you." To promote his first novel — 99 Nights in Logar — Kochai wrote an article for a

Why she quit

Aug 21
1 min

Why she quit

After 10 mostly good years of teaching kindergarten in North Carolina, Natalie Parmenter quit her job, she writes on EdSurge. When her school returned to in-person teaching in 2021-22, there was more testing, more surveys, "endless" training sessions and meetings -- and "inspirational videos" to get her to buy into it all, she writes. There was the NCELI (N.C. early learning inventory), an entirely new grading system for my students — but only for kindergarten and not aligne

School meals are free in California, Maine, Vermont

Aug 20
1 min

School meals are free in California, Maine, Vermont

TANSTAAFL -- "there ain't no such thing as a free lunch" -- still applies, if you remember the taxpayers, but schools in some states will provide free breakfast and lunch to all students, regardless of financial need, reports Marina Pitofsky in USA Today. California, Maine and Vermont have approved "universal meals," and other states may follow suit. Last year's cutoff for a family of four was $34,000 in income for free meals and $48,000 for reduced-price meals. The new polic