In a piece for NPR’s (7/10, Westervelt) “Ed” blog, Eric Westervelt wrote that since a California judge overturned the state’s teacher tenure system, much of the rhetoric from both sides of the issue has been of the “give no ground” variety and “risks drowning out educators in the middle.” Westervelt added that many teachers and administrators take a “more nuanced” view and support “tenure protections for teachers — especially against dismissals that could be political or capricious,” but believe “problems with tenure and dismissal need to be addressed” so that administrators are able to “get rid of really bad teachers.”
Teachers Using Digital Games To Enhance Classroom Learning
KQED-FM San Francisco (7/10, Shapiro) reports another installment of “MindShift’s Guide to Games and Learning” on its website, focusing on how teachers are using digital games in their classrooms. It assesses how “short-form games” are used with existing curricula and how “long-form games” can sometimes become part of the curricula and “replace textbooks by offering an interactive experience that seamlessly blends content, practice, and assessment into a contextualized learning experience.” The report adds that effective games “how to understand academic concepts in relationship to the world around them.”
California Report Calls On State To Tighten Common Core Oversight
EdSource Today (7/11, Freedberg) reports that according to a report from researchers at Stanford University’s Graduate School of Education, increased local control under California’s new education budget law “has given school districts much leeway in adopting the Common Core State Standards,” bringing “the potential to create disparities in implementation the state should reduce.” The study’s authors found that “most districts lacked a comprehensive, coherent plan for the Common Core and that most didn’t have a unifying curriculum tying grades together.”
California Tenure Ruling Leads To “Copycat” Efforts In Other States
US News & World Report (7/9) reports that in the wake of the Vergara ruling, which overturned California’s teacher tenure laws, “parents, students and legislators are challenging teacher tenure laws in an increasing number of states.” The article describes “copycat lawsuits” in some states, though the American Federation of Teachers and the National Education Association state affiliate have “vowed to fight the decision.”
New Law Will Require California Teachers To Acknowledge Child Abuse Reporting Requirements
The AP (7/9) reports that under a new California law, teachers “will be required to acknowledge that they understand their responsibility to report suspected child abuse to law enforcement or county welfare officials, and not just school administrators,” as a condition of employment. The AP notes that the law came after “troubling cases” in which teachers reported cases to a principal, who “never contacted law enforcement authorities, and the abuse wasn’t discovered until later.”
Study Highlights Hows Mother’s Education Influences Children’s Outcome
The Washington Post (7/10, Chandler) reports that a report released on Wednesday enumerates how a mother’s education influences generational economic, social, and health outcomes. The article give several highlights from the report, such as: 84 percent of children who are born to a mother with no high school diploma live in low-income families, compared to 13 percent of children whose mothers have a college diploma.
Report Examines Link Between School Spending, Achievement
The Washington Post (7/10, Layton) reports that the Center for American Progress on Wednesday released an analysis of “how much ‘bang for the buck’ taxpayers are getting from public schools.” The report analyzed budgets from 7,000 school districts in 40 states, and found that some districts with high spending rates often had high achievement, although similar achievement rates were found in other districts with smaller budgets. The Post details the other findings of the study, and notes that the study’s author, Ulrich Boser, emphasized that school districts “should spend more strategically.”
Fewer States Meeting ED’s New Special Education Standards
Education Week (7/9) reports that under ED’s new standards for assessing states’ special education programs, “fewer states are fully meeting federal requirements.” The piece explains that under the new system, ED “is focusing less on state compliance with voluminous special education rules and more on how well those students are being taught.” The piece notes that the number of states in the “meets requirements” category fell from 38 in 2013 to 15 this year. When the findings were announced in June, Education Secretary Arne Duncan said that the move “is an important shift away from ‘complacency,’” and the article quotes him saying, “That complacency is not in our students’ best interest. In too many states, the outcomes for students with disabilities are simply too low.”
US Students Demonstrate Limited Financial Literacy On International Test
The AP (7/10, Kerr) reports that according to a new report from the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, “only 9.4 percent of 15-year-olds were able to answer the most difficult questions on an international test of their financial knowledge and skills,” while over one in six US students failed to demonstrate even basic financial literacy. Noting that US students scored in the middle of the pact of other countries, the AP reports that Education Secretary Arne Duncan said “American schools can do better.” The piece quotes Duncan saying, “Our economy is changing so much and the idea of young people going into the world of work, staying with one job for 40 years, having secure pension and retirement, those jobs are basically gone.”
TIME (7/10) reports that the OECD report painted US students as “distinctly average,” and quotes Duncan saying, “Young people, to be successful, to secure retirement, to take care of their families, and to not be in poverty, have to have a level of financial literacy that 30, 40, 50 years ago maybe wasn’t required. Today it’s an absolute necessity.” Time reports that Duncan called for “improved mathematics education, which the study found, along with reading, is very closely linked to financial literacy.” Diverse Education (7/10) also covers this story.
California Education Case Held Up As Model For Other States
Joshua Lipshutz, one of the principal trial attorneys representing the nine student plaintiffs challenging California education laws dealing with tenure, dismissal and seniority in Vergara v. California, writes in the Wall Street Journal (7/9, Lipshutz, Subscription Publication), that US courts have often defended students’ educational rights under state constitutions, but, he argues, they have in defending educational equality generally focused on easily measurable inputs. Instead, he thinks they should focus on those aspects of education that have a greater effect on students such as teacher quality. He believes that the Vergara v. California case did just that, and provides an example for other state courts to follow.
Effectiveness Of Summer School Investigated
NPR (7/8, Seidel) reports in its “Ed” blog that “we have no idea” whether summer school programs for students are effective. One expert interviewed pointed out that there’s never been a push to collect data on the effectiveness of summer school because so little attention gets paid to it. Some summer school programs are for students who failed remedial work to bring them up to grade level, while other students attend summer school to make up for credits lost due to absences during the school year. These students attend with the goal of remaining on grade level with their peers. Efforts in the Los Angeles Unified School District and at schools in Illinois have kept students on track during the summer months and helped prevent the summer slide in progress.
Test-Optional Trend In College Admissions Examined
USA Today (7/7, Peligri) reports in depth on the growing trend of “test-optional” admission in higher education, in which colleges eliminate requirements for standardized test scores. The article focuses especially on Hampshire College in Massachusetts; the school’s dean of admissions, Meredith Twombly, said the requirement for ACT or SAT scores was eliminated because they were a “very poor predictor of success.” USA Today also examines the positive and negative aspects of test-optional policies; while it deprioritizes one test’s effect on a student’s future, it can also increase workloads for admissions officers and damage the school’s ranking with US News.
NEA Delegates Take Aim At Corporate Partnerships
Liana Heitin writes at the Education Week (7/7) “Teacher Beat” blog about a package of New Business Items addressed by National Education Association delegates at the union’s annual conference in Denver which appear to be designed to examine partnerships with such corporate entities as the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. Though the items were eventually “taken off the table,” they indicate “a more strident tone on partnerships, and will be a theme to watch.”
New NEA President Must Deal With Critics Of Tenure And Common Core
Politico (7/6, Emma) reports that new National Education Association president Eskelsen García “faces court cases challenging teacher tenure and job protections, the defection of historically loyal Democrats, growing apprehension over the Common Core, diminishing ranks” and “public relations campaigns painting her union as greedy.” According to Politico, García “wants to further shift the union away from its longstanding and reflexive support of Democrats,” and “to lead a campaign against high-stakes decision-making based on test scores at the same time she firms up her union’s support of the Common Core.”
Cost Of Testing Contracts Is New Front In Common Core Fight
Politico (7/2, Simon, Emma) reported that the cost of testing contracts is the latest battleground in the fight over Common Core education standards. While about 40 states initially backed the idea of using shared tests, “at least 17 already have backed away from using them this spring, including several of the most populous states,” and “even some Obama allies,” including the National Education Association, “are angry at the administration’s decision to pour money into developing new exams years before most teachers began introducing the academic standards into their classrooms.”
School Officials Doubtful About Technological Infrastructure For Online Testing
Sean Cavanagh writes at the Education Week (7/1) “Digital Education” blog that a new survey sponsored by the Software & Information Industry Association and released at the 2014 conference of the International Society for Technology in Education indicates that roughly 60% of school officials “do not feel their schools have the bandwidth or devices to make them ready for summative, online testing.” Noting some significant methodological deficiencies of the survey, Cavanagh says that nonetheless, the results “seem to speak to school officials’ anxiety about administering computer-based tests aligned with the common-core standards.”
NEA Delegates Expected To Focus On Standardized Testing
The Cache Valley (UT) Daily (7/1) reports that delegates at the National Education Association’s annual meeting in Denver are expected to focus on the overuse of standardized testing, according to Utah Education Association President Sharon Gallagher-Fishbaugh. Gallagher-Fishbaugh says that “standardized testing in reading and writing, math and science is so frequent that it’s stressing students out” and that “there seems to be frustration from educators around the nation over the increased standardized testing which has cut way down on instructional time.”
Hoover Fellow: Common Core Controversy Obscures Broader Education Policy Debate
In an op-ed for the Wall Street Journal (7/1, Subscription Publication) titled, “How Teachers Unions Use ‘Common Core’ To Undermine Reform,” Eric Hanushek, a senior fellow at the Hoover Institution, says the growing controversy over Common Core has benefited the teachers unions by taking attention away from other education policy battles, including those involving merit pay and tenure reform.
California Teachers Will See Paycheck Impact Soon Of Pension Shortfall Plan
The Los Angeles Times (6/28, Megerian) reports that California teachers are about to receive paychecks that “a bit lighter,” as the state’s plan to address a $74-billion shortfall in its teacher retirement system goes into effect Tuesday. It “phases in higher contributions from employees, schools and the state over the next several years,” and could be a model for other states if it helps solve “one of the state’s most difficult financial problems.” The plan is designed to erase the shortfall over 30 years. The Times notes that “Texas and New Mexico have already taken similar steps, requiring higher contributions into their teacher pension funds. Both states also reduced retirement benefits, something California did two years ago for newly hired educators.”
Bilingual Education Gaining Popularity
The AP (6/29, Wozniacka) reports many states “are recognizing and rewarding bilingual education,” as “dual-language programs have gained in popularity across the country.” The AP attributes the programs’ growth to “employers seek[ing] bilingual...workers, and more parents view[ing] bilingualism as necessary for their children’s success.” Santiago Wood, of the National Association for Bilingual Education, said, “American parents are coming to the conclusion that the lives and the economic opportunities of their children are tied to being bilingual.”