The UnSchool

Did you hear the one about the school where the students are in charge and the parents pay $6000 for the privilege?

The thing about students not taking standardized tests kinda hit me right between the grade books.

Bonus Envy

CNN has a little story about how a variety of people will be spending this year's bonus. Including this clown who's getting somewhere between $50,000 - $70,000.

Meanwhile, your EdWonk, who has spent years in the classroom, received a 1% pay cut and increased state income and sales tax rates.

The result will be that my take-home pay will be about what it was in 2003.

Even though I never knew that I'd get rich serving as a public school teacher, I never would have thought that I'd be earning less take-home money now than I did 7 years ago..

I guess that I should just feel grateful that I even have a job...

Obama Takes An EduTrip

And now President Obama is going to Wisconsin, of all places, to talk-up public education. ABC News has the story:

Tomorrow, on the anniversary of his election, President Barack Obama heads to Madison, Wisconsin to speak at a local middle school. He’ll address education policy, with a focus on the ‘Race to the Top’ initiative. That $4.35 billion dollar program, funded through the Recovery Act, is a national competition among the states, to inspire education reform.

“He’s going to talk about his education reform plan and he’s going to highlight the importance of innovation and excellence in our public education system,” said Melody Barnes, Director of the Domestic Policy Council, on a conference call with reporters, “This competition is not based on politics or ideology or interest group preferences. It’s based on whether or not a state is ready to do what actually works.”

To qualify for the money, states must meet four “assurances”:
-designing and adopting internationally benchmarks and standards
-recruiting, developing, rewarding and retaining effective teachers and principals
-build data systems that measure students’ success
-providing support for turning around low performing schools, in part by expanding the number of charter schools

When the parameters on the funding were first announced, several states were immediately identified as already out of the running because of existing state laws. Among them, California, that state’s legislature quickly acted to change its laws to qualify by allowing teacher pay to be linked to student performance. Barnes said a number of other states, including Illinois, Tennessee, Ohio, Connecticut, Rhode Island have raised their charter caps or defeated proposed cuts to charter school funding, so that they too can compete. Wisconsin’s state legislature will vote on Thursday on legislation similar to that adopted by California, which would allow students performance to impact teacher pay. If the measure does not pass, Wisconsin will not be eligible for Race to the Top dollars.

Education Secretary Arne Duncan told ABC News in July that as in any competition not everyone will win, and thus some states will not receive this funding. He said hopes the competitive spirit will drive reform.

"I think there'll be tremendous pressure on states, state legislatures where things aren't happening, by parents saying exactly that: 'Our children deserve a slice of the pie, and we want that pressure,'" Duncan said, “This isn't about winners and losers…This is about challenging the status quo as a country, getting dramatically better and giving every child in this country a chance they desperately need to have a great, great quality education."

The Department of Education will begin accepting applications in the next few weeks, and awarding the money in January. There will be two rounds of funding, so states that do not qualify or win grants in this first round will be able to apply again later in 2010.

“Ultimately, this idea is really simple,” Barnes said, “We want to support strategies that are working and replicate them all over the country. We will subject every application that we get to a rigorous review. And we will only award grants to those that demonstrate real commitment and real results. That’s the President’s ultimate goal.”

The National Education Association, (NEA) must be furious with Mr. Obama as he has said nothing about rolling back the No Child Left Behind Act.

Interestingly, the President also doesn't seem to have anything to say about the need for classroom teachers (and others who work around children) to be priority recipients for the H1N1 (swine flu) vaccination.

Note To U.S. Dept. Of Ed: Improve Thyself

Heh.

Secretary Arne Duncan of The United States Department of Education says "Colleges of Education must improve for reforms to succeed."

U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan today called for America’s colleges of education to dramatically change how they prepare the next generation of teachers so that they are ready to prepare their future students for success in college and careers.

Noting that America’s schools will need to hire up to 200,000 first-time teachers annually for the next five years, Duncan said that those new teachers need the knowledge and skill to prepare students for success in the global economy.

“By almost any standard, many if not most of the nation’s 1,450 schools, colleges, and departments of education are doing a mediocre job of preparing teachers for the realities of the 21st century classroom,” Duncan said in a major speech at Teachers College, Columbia University. “America’s university-based teacher preparation programs need revolutionary change--not evolutionary tinkering.”

More than half of the nation’s teachers graduate from a school of education. The U.S. Department of Education estimates that 220,000 students graduate from a teacher college every year. In recent years, several alternative certification programs such as High Tech High, The New Teacher Project, Teach for America, and teacher residency programs have emerged. But those programs produce fewer than 10,000 new teachers annually.

“To keep America competitive, and to make the American dream of equal educational opportunity a reality, we need to recruit, reward, train, learn from, and honor a new generation of talented teachers,” Duncan said. “But the bar must be raised for successful teacher preparation programs because we ask much more of teachers today than even a decade ago.”

Colleges of education need to make dramatic changes to prepare today’s children to compete in the global economy. Teacher-preparation programs should ensure that new teachers will master the content of the subjects they’ll teach and they will have well-supported field-based experiences embedded throughout their preparation programs. Their ultimate goal should be to create a generation of teachers who are focused on improving student achievement and ready to deliver on that goal.

Duncan highlighted emerging efforts to improve teacher education that are being led by the National Council for Accreditation of Teacher Education and the American Association of Colleges for Teacher Education, as well as individual colleges of education.

The Teachers College speech was Duncan’s second major address on the subject of teaching. On Oct. 9, he spoke to students at the Curry School of Education at the University of Virginia, telling them that America needs to recruit an army of new teachers to ensure its long-term economic prosperity.

Earlier this week, Secretary Duncan discussed the importance of teaching with close to 100 teachers and fielded questions from additional teachers across the country in a televised town hall meeting.

Sadly, Duncan doesn't say a single word about the need to improve teacher compensation.

In our capitalist system, if one really wants to attract the highest quality people, one needs to pay them.

Isn't that what we're being told when it comes to compensating Wall Street Bankers?

As for myself, I'd be happy if my pay at least kept up with inflation. (Our district doesn't believe in giving its teachers cost-of-living adjustments. And after 7 years of the same take-home pay, inflation has pretty much destroyed my salary's buying power.)

Let Me Guess

A 15-year-old female student leaves a dance at her Richmond, California high school. She apparently drinks some alcohol. Then gets beaten and gang-raped by a bunch of hoods while other students stand-by and do nothing for two hours.

Wanna take a guess who ends up being sued for a huge amount of money?

Yep. Dollars to donuts that it's going to be the school district that ends-up coughing up the cash for this crime.

When are we finally going to hold criminals financially responsible for their criminality?

We'll never know, but I'd be willing to bet that each one of the four "teenagers" who have been arrested already has a disciplinary record at the high school.

And in California, it's extremely difficult to expel students young thugs for repeated violent or disruptive behaviors.

Unless they pull something like this. But for one victim, it's already too late.

Wonkitorial: Cutting To The Front Of The Lunch Line

All of her adult life, Caroline Schlossberg Kennedy emphatically stated that she wanted to be a "private" person, and therefore completely out of the public's eye but free to attend countless social events with her pals from New York City's Social Register.

But now, JFK's deep-blue-blooded daughter has changed her mind and wants to claim what some would believe to be her rightful inheritance by being appointed United States Senator.

And, like any Kennedy, what Caroline wants, Caroline will be given. This in spite of the fact that Schlossberg Kennedy has held no elected office whatsoever.

Cutting to the front of the line; isn't that just like a Kennedy?

Given the nature of senatorial incumbency nowadays, if Schlossberg Kennedy is appointed to the Senate by New York's governor David Paterson, she's practically guaranteed to be a Senator-for-life.

Take a look at this article, (don't miss its attached video) and judge for yourself this socialite's qualifications for membership in the world's most powerful (and exclusive) legislative body.

We think that before Caroline Schlossberg Kennedy asks (and gets) what amounts to a lifetime appointment to the United States Senate, she ought to pay a few political dues first. She might start by actually winning a contested election to an entry-level elected office.

Caroline Schlossberg Kennedy claims to be highly interested in public education.

Maybe she should try getting elected to New York City's school board. She might actually do some good there.

Of course there wouldn't be much of a limelight of publicity to immerse herself in.

And with the Kennedys, isn't it always about the limelight?

L.A.'s Boondoggle High

This is bad, even for California:

LOS ANGELES (AP) - A decade behind schedule, a $350 million downtown high school finally opened on Wednesday after years of environmental, seismic and legal troubles.

"We've been waiting a long time to get this," said Uriel Rivera, an 18-year-old senior at the Edward R. Roybal Learning Center. "A lot of people in the community were supposed to graduate from here, but they didn't. I thought it was going to be the same for me."

Rivera was among more than 2,400 students who streamed into the school on its first day - long after what had been expected to be a late 1990s debut of an education showplace to relieve sorely overcrowded classrooms.

Much of what was then called the Belmont Learning Center was already constructed before fears grew about toxic gases rising from an old oil field upon which it was built.

Construction was halted in 2000, then resumed in 2002 only to be thwarted again, this time by the discovery of an earthquake fault that crosses the site.

Lengthy investigations by the county district attorney's office, the city attorney and the California attorney general found no criminal wrongdoing, but in 2003 District Attorney Steve Cooley labeled the project "a public works disaster of biblical proportions."

The school became a symbol of bureaucratic ineptitude and wasted taxpayer money. The ensuing scandal swept a district superintendent and almost half the school board out of office.

"I feel a little emotional that it took so long. These seniors were in kindergarten when this was being built," Principal Scott Braxton said as he surveyed the sprawling school. "But it's finally here."

The school resembles a college campus, with several classroom buildings surrounding a landscaped courtyard. It boasts a gym with capacity to hold 3,000, a large dance studio with cushioned maple floors, 480 underground parking spaces - and a $17 million toxic gas mitigation system that costs $250,000 a year to operate.

School grounds are dotted with tall light poles topped with mushroom-like caps - vents to let underground methane and hydrogen sulfide gases escape. Sensors monitor subterranean levels of the gases. When a gas buildup is detected, a blower is activated to push out the gases more quickly.

Students at the school choose among six smaller, autonomous "learning communities" that are focused around career themes, including languages, visual arts and humanities, business and finance, computer science and leadership. The Los Angeles Unified School District also is using the curriculum model at some large high schools.

"It's a paradigm shift," Braxton said. "It gives us a chance to personalize high school for the kids."

With runaway idiocy such as this, it's no wonder the state is so short of money that they're looking at another sales tax increase.

Skipping The First Day Of School

Many pupils in Chicago's troubled public school system decided that truancy was the best way to protest alleged unequal funding:

NORTHFIELD, Ill. (AP) — More than 1,000 Chicago public school students skipped the first day of classes Tuesday to protest unequal education funding, a boycott organizers said would continue through the week with help from retired teachers who will turn office lobbies into impromptu classrooms.

The students took church buses 30 miles north to the wealthy suburb of Northfield, where they filled out applications to enroll in the better-funded New Trier district. The move was largely symbolic because students must pay tuition to attend a school outside their home district.

The turnout fell short of the thousands organizers expected, and was a tiny fraction of the more than 400,000 students who attend Chicago public schools, but protesters and their parents said they're willing to keep the boycott going as long as it takes to persuade state officials to give their district more money.

"It's on us kids," said 14-year-old Tracey Stansberry, a student at Corliss High School. "If we don't, we'll be on the bottom."

Gillie Beal said she will keep her 12-year-old grandson involved in the protest as long as it takes. "You must stand for something or you'll fall for anything," she said.

Chicago Public Schools spokesman Mike Vaughn said he did not know how many students boycotted the country's third-largest district Tuesday; attendance figures would not be available for a couple of days. Although district officials agree the system is underfunded, he said, they consider it a mistake for the children to miss any school.

"We want our kids to start the school year strong, and that means the first week of school," he said. "The first week, it is important for the kids to connect with teachers and lay the groundwork for the year. And that can't happen if kids aren't in school."

On Wednesday, boycott organizers will attempt to set up impromptu classrooms at Chicago City Hall and the state's James R. Thompson Center,as well as in the lobbies of more than a dozen Chicago corporations, including Boeing Co. and Aon Corp., that support Chicago's bid to host the 2016 Summer Olympics.

"If we say we're a world-class city, then we shouldn't be content with having second-class schools," said state Sen. James Meeks, who is leading the boycott of the district and is urging Gov. Rod Blagojevich and state lawmakers agreed to address school funding disparities.

Meeks said he had not cleared his plans with the city or officials of corporations where students are expected to gather, but expected they would not be turned away.

Jodi Kawada, a spokeswoman for Mayor Richard M. Daley, said she'd heard that the group might come to City Hall but hadn't gotten any confirmation.

"For protests in general — we allow protesters to express their First Amendment rights at City Hall," she said in a statement. "Our priority is to ensure the safety of the building occupants and the protesters."

Boeing spokesman John Dern said Tuesday that the Chicago-based company had not been contacted by organizers.

"If children arrive we would ensure their safety and our ability to conduct business," Dern said.

In Illinois, property taxes account for about 70 percent of school funding, meaning rural and inner-city schools generally end up with less to spend per student than suburban schools in areas with higher property values.

Chicago Public Schools spent $11,300 per student last year. New Trier High School spent $17,500 per student, near the top in the state.

Meeks is pushing for a pilot program that would distribute $120 million to four clusters of schools — high schools and their feeder schools — on Chicago's West Side, South Side, south suburbs and downstate. The governor and legislative leaders have made no promises.

"I do not believe that a child's education should be based on where they live," Meeks said. He compared the issue to apartheid in South Africa and said the situation makes it difficult for children to rise from poverty.

"We undereducated these kids' parents, we undereducated their grandparents and now we're in the process of undereducating them," Meeks said.

New Trier Superintendent Linda Yonke acknowledged that money played a role in school performance, along with supportive parents and hardworking students.

"There's also no denying the fact that funding allows us to have smaller classes, a deep and rich curriculum and many extracurricular activities," Yonke said. She said 1,100 elementary students and 150 high school students from Chicago filled out enrollment applications Tuesday for New Trier.

New Trier student body president Matt McAmbridge, a senior, told Chicago students at a rally in suburban Skokie on Tuesday afternoon that students there support the boycotters' cause and would help in any way they can.

"We know the sentiment among New Trier students ... is really in favor of getting better school funding for everybody," McAmbridge said.

On the bus ride to the suburban district, volunteers told the children they were taking part in a historic event similar to the bus boycott in Alabama in the 1950s.

Peggy Richmond, who accompanied her 12-year-old granddaughter Skyler Williams on the boycott, said she was forced to enroll Skyler in a private school because of the poor quality of the public schools in her Chicago neighborhood.

"I'm still angry," she said of having to pay $650 a month in tuition to ensure her granddaughter gets a good education.

It would be interesting to know how many parents and students would show-up for a protest rally if that rally were held after school hours or, better still, on a Saturday.

Labor Day 2008: What Was Old May Be New Again

All is quiet; campuses around the country are closed.

Meanwhile, it has been brought to our attention that at least one Arizona school board member is advocating a return to the good old days, when school started after Labor Day:

One member of the Scottsdale School Board claims a lot of money could be saved if schools statewide started after the Labor Day weekend.

Many schools, including those in Scottsdale, now start in mid-August, which Dieter Schaeffer noted is a month of high-energy use.

Schaeffer wants state lawmakers to start looking at a statewide calendar in which all schools would start after Labor Day.

``The reason for that is, I believe, that there are some significant resources available to us by reducing electricity usage."

Schaeffer said he hopes discussions with legislators, educators and others can start this year.

He said it could take a couple of years to put the plan in motion.

"This is a huge issue that involves universities as well as testing institutions, the whole sports arena -- football, soccer -- and, of course, the legislators."

The first steps are getting cost-saving estimates from Salt River Project and Arizona Public Service Co. and opening up a healthy debate, he said.

He wants the entire state to study moving classes out of the peak summer months for electricity use.

Schaeffer said if the state would save money on school power bills, it could put more money into classrooms.

"I don't want to reduce the academic teaching time. But if we can reduce our energy usage, we can put that money in the classroom," he said.

I don't know if starting after Labor Day will make much difference in Arizona, but out here in the blistering hot wasteland that is California's so-called "Imperial" Valley, we always experience a fairly large number of enrollments the day after Labor Day when vacationing families return to town.

And in this post-NCLB world, the fewer number of days missed by students the better.

Administrative Buffoonery Or Crazy Like A Fox?

Oftentimes, stupidity needs no explanation:

Iowa Central Community College President Robert Paxton will collect $400,000 from the school in return for his resignation.

After 13 years as president of the Fort Dodge school, Paxton resigned Wednesday, one day before the school’s board of trustees was scheduled to discuss an undisclosed “personnel matter.”

The special meeting was called after The Des Moines Register published a July 4 photograph of Paxton aboard a boat with a group of young people, holding the spigot of a small beer keg suspended over a young woman’s open mouth.

College trustee Mark Crimmins was aware of the photo before it was published and told the Register that Paxton had done nothing improper and the matter wasn’t deserving of the board’s attention.

When questioned by the Register, Paxton initially denied knowing anything about the photo or any recent boat outings with young people. After being told that Crimmins had already informed the Register that he had seen the photo and the two men had discussed it, Paxton acknowledged the photo’s authenticity. He said he had done nothing illegal or improper.

But the photograph, along with Paxton’s explanation for it, was picked up by other media outlets and sparked a heated debate in Fort Dodge over the personal conduct of public officials.

At today’s board meeting, the trustees met for eight minutes and agreed, without discussion, to accept Paxton’s resignation and approve a compensation package for him. The deal calls for Paxton to receive $200,000 in January 2009 and $200,000 in January 2010.

Since Paxton is getting some $400,000 in order to leave his job, was this man's actions truly stupid? Or is Paxton much wiser than many might think?

Those Pistol-Packing Texas Teachers

Did you hear the one about the School District who wants their teachers to pack heat?

AUSTIN, Texas (AP) — Texas Gov. Rick Perry indicated Monday that he supports a school district's decision to allow teachers and staff to pack guns for protection when classes start this month.

Trustees of the Harrold Independent School District approved a policy change last year to allow employees to carry concealed firearms to deter and protect against school shootings.

"There's a lot of incidents where that would have saved a number of lives," Perry said after a news conference in Austin.

Texas law outlaws firearms on school campuses unless specific institutions allow them.

District policy requires a teacher carrying a gun to school to have a Texas concealed handgun license, authorization by the district to carry the weapon, training in crisis management and hostile situations, and ammunition designed to minimize the risk of ricochet.

The 110-student district is 150 miles northwest of Fort Worth, near the Oklahoma border. It has about 50 teachers and staff members.

Asked whether other districts should take similar measures, Perry said, "It's up to those local school districts."

Superintendent David Thweatt has said the small community is a 30-minute drive from the sheriff's office, leaving students and teachers without protection.

Officials researched the policy and considered other options for about a year before approving the policy change, Thweatt said.

Due to their Exaulted Rank, we can't help but wonder if the school principals will be armed with Tommy Guns.

Los Angeles' Combat High School

Instead of concentrating on their reading, writing, and arithmetic, it seems as though a large number of "students" in one of our publicly-funded high schools have other priorities:

"A fight between rival groups of black and Latino students at Locke High School quickly escalated into a campus-wide melee Friday, with as many as 600 students brawling until police restored calm with billy clubs.

The troubled campus in South Los Angeles was locked down after the fight broke out at 12:55 p.m., as students returned from lunch to their fifth-period classes. Overwhelmed school officials called Los Angeles police for help, but students and faculty said it took about half an hour before dozens of officers, many in riot gear, restored order.

"The kids were crazy, running from place to place, jumping on other kids," said Reggie Smith, the school's band director, who said he ran to pull his students from the melee. "Some of my kids were crying because they were walking to class with friends and they got jumped."

Los Angeles Unified School District police said that there are only two officers assigned to Locke but that the school police force brought in about 60 officers after receiving word of the brawl. The Los Angeles Police Department also dispatched more than a dozen patrol cars and about 50 officers.

Susan Cox, an LAUSD spokeswoman, said police arrested four people -- three students for fighting and one non-student for illegal possession of a knife. Four students were treated in the school nurse's office for minor injuries.

The campus at 111th and San Pedro streets has long been one of the city's most troubled. This school year has been particularly difficult, with near-daily fights -- albeit on a much smaller scale -- during much of the fall and winter. Locke is about to be reorganized as a cluster of charter schools run by Green Dot Public Schools, which will take over in July, and some faculty and staff have accused the district of letting the campus drift in its final year as a traditional public school.

"Morale has really dropped because they don't feel like they have everybody behind them," cheerleading coach Marlo Jenkins said recently. "There are just fights upon fights upon fights now."

Faculty members and Green Dot complained that L.A. Unified nearly halved its funding for non-police security aides at the start of the year. The school has been especially plagued by tagging crews -- the school employs two full-time workers just to paint over graffiti, said Green Dot's Kelly Hurley, who is managing the transition.

Faculty members also complained repeatedly about in-school ditching and a massive tardiness problem. Finally, the district restored some of the trimmed security, faculty said, and also dispatched an additional administrator to help restore order. Until then, the district had relied on Principal Travis Kiel, who'd been brought back from retirement. In recent weeks, students and teachers have reported improved conditions -- less ditching, a little less graffiti.

But then came Friday's melee, which students and teachers said was by far the worst of the year, perhaps the worst in years.

Joseph Sherlock, a senior, 17, who has been at Locke for four years, called it "my first actual encounter with a riot." He added: "I've seen fights, and I've seen fights between black and brown, but I've never seen anything like this."

Sherlock, who said he saw police use pepper spray during the melee, said tensions between African American and Latino students have not been a serious problem at the school. With an enrollment of 2,600, Locke is 65% Latino and 35% African American.

"It's not the way it's portrayed in the media; that's not what it's like at all," said Sherlock, who is black. Another black student, Ronald White, said African American and Latino students commonly divide along ethnic lines but aren't necessarily hostile. "Everybody usually just sticks to themselves," he said.

White, a 17-year-old senior, said he had just stepped from a main building into the school's grassy quad when he was met with a scene of chaos.

Hundreds of students were outside, and from what he could see, "Most people was fighting." Eventually, police began to swarm onto the campus, and White said the students began fighting the officers, who responded with their batons.

"I was in the corner, just watching," he said. "I saw a girl get hit by the police and she went down."

Senior Victor Wong, 18, said the brawl grew out of a fight two days earlier between a Latino student and an African American student. Wong said Latino students who are friends of his asked him to participate in a fight planned for Friday that was to pit 10 Latino students against 10 African American students.

"It was a crew-on-crew thing," he said, referring to graffiti gangs. "They asked for my help, but I'm graduating," he said. "I'm done with all that."

Wong said the two groups of instigators met as planned at the school's handball courts, and "all of them started going at it." Within seconds, he said, the fight escalated beyond the original two groups, and people began running throughout the campus fighting.

"They would finish one place and run to another corner and fight," he said.

"Security didn't know where to go," Wong added. "They'd concentrate in one spot and something would happen somewhere else. This is the worst I've seen."

Minor injuries at the scene were treated by the school nurse and L.A. Fire Department personnel. No one required hospitalization, the school district said. There were, however, some descriptions of students being badly beaten.

Wong said he saw one student beaten unconscious on a handball court. Sherlock said he saw one Latino student walking along Saint Street, the road that bisects the campus, when he was surrounded by a large group of black students who began hitting and kicking him. "He was bleeding real bad," Sherlock said. "When they stood him up, he kind of collapsed back down."

Sherlock, who is a member of the Black Student Union and the school's new House of Representatives, which was formed to help guide the transition from traditional school to charter, added that he had tried to stop the fighting, but to little effect. After securing order, authorities rounded up the students who hadn't returned to class and segregated them by race, holding Latinos in the boys gym and African American students in Hobbs Hall, the school's multipurpose room.

Beginning at 2 p.m., school officials began releasing students in small groups to go home. The school remained on lockdown until the last group had left about 3:15 p.m.

LAUSD's Cox said that there would be an enhanced police presence at Locke during school hours next week and that the district would send human relations staff to the school to talk to students.

In recent years, melees have broken out periodically at many campuses with a black and Latino presence, including in Los Angeles, Lynwood and Compton. There have been fights between Latinos and Armenians in other areas that led to campus lockdowns.

In nearly all cases, no serious injuries have resulted, but the incidents have frightened students and parents, marred the reputation of schools and hindered the learning of students who frequently already face substantial academic challenges.

"How do you build anything here when something happens and adds to the negativity?" asked band leader Smith.

As one who has taught for many years in a California public school system, I continue be puzzled at how our school administrators continue tolerating this type of criminal behavior from certain students who view school as little more than a place to socialize and victimize those youngsters who do attend school in order to make something of themselves.

But until the parents of the good students unite and rise-up in defense of their kids, further incidents of this nature can and will continue to plague our public schools.

Meanwhile, the authorities will continue to take half-hearted measures that do little to actually solve the problem.

Texas Teacher Shortage?

They're crying out for teachers in the Lone Star State:

Each day, students of different races, genders, ethnicities and socioeconomic backgrounds enter the nation's classrooms. Unfortunately, for some, these factors may work against them - especially in urban areas.

According to TCU's [Texas Christian University] Center for Urban Education, urban schools - those schools with low socioeconomic and/or predominantly minority students - have the most critical shortages of qualified teachers and, therefore, the most openings for college graduates.

The center is designed to help meet this need by training future teachers to help them succeed in urban schools.

"Urban communities are in the state of making sure that all children are successful," said Jennifer Brooks, director of TCU's Center for Urban Education. "We must work and make sure they have teachers who are qualified and have experiences to make them successful."

A study by The Education Trust, an advocacy organization based in Washington, D.C., found that in the nation's high-poverty schools, 34 percent of secondary classes in core academic subjects are assigned to teachers who lack a college minor in the subject.

You should consider reading the whole thing.

In a society where one's social status is directly related to one's take-home pay, maybe our best and brightest college graduates will choose to serve in the classroom when and if they can earn half-way decent wages for themselves and their family.

When Girls Go Stupid

What more can be said about this crime? And what can be done to stop the stupidity of this type of made-for-video violence?

Gender Bender Elementary

What were they thinking in Wisconsin?

REEDSBURG, Wis. (AP) - An elementary-school event in which kids were encouraged to dress as members of the opposite gender drew the ire of a Christian radio group, whose angry broadcast prompted outraged calls to the district office.

Students at Pineview Elementary in Reedsburg had been dressing in costume all last week as part of an annual school tradition called Wacky Week. On Friday, students were encouraged to dress either as senior citizens or as members of the opposite sex.

A local resident informed the Voice of Christian Youth America on Friday. The Milwaukee-based radio network responded by interrupting its morning programming for a special broadcast that aired on nine radio stations throughout Wisconsin. The broadcast criticized the dress-up day and accused the district of promoting alternative lifestyles.

"We believe it's the wrong message to send to elementary students," said Jim Schneider, the network's program director. "Our station is one that promotes traditional family values. It concerns us when a school district strikes at the heart and core of the Biblical values. To promote this to elementary-school students is a great error."

Schneider co-hosts "Crosstalk," a nationally syndicated call-in Christian radio show.

After the program aired, both the school and Reedsburg School District office were flooded with calls complaining about the event.

The response surprised Principal Tammy Hayes, who said no one had raised any objections beforehand. She said a flier detailing Wacky Week had been sent home with children the prior week, and an announcement was also included in teacher newsletters.

The dress-up day was not an attempt to promote cross-dressing, homosexuality or alternative gender roles, district administrator Tom Benson said.

"The promotion of transgenderism - that was not our purpose," Benson told the Baraboo News Republic. "Our purpose was to have a Wacky Week, mixing in a bit of silliness with our reading, writing and arithmetic."

The theme for Friday's dress-up day came from students, Hayes said.

"It's different every year. They basically present the ideas, and they vote on what they would like from Monday through Friday," Hayes said. "... They did not mean anything by this day. They were trying to have fun and come up with a fun dress-up day."

About 40 percent of the student body dressed up Friday, Hayes estimated, with half portraying senior citizens and half dressing as the opposite sex.

"I can assure you we will not be having this day (again)," Hayes said.

Reedsburg is in southern Wisconsin, about 60 miles northwest of Madison.

Another example of your taxpayer dollars at "work?"

You be the decider.

D.C.'s Gangster Education

In today's Washington Post, Colbert I. King let's us know how bad it has gotten in many of the public schools in our nation's capital:

"Security at Wilson High to Be Tightened" announced a headline in The Post's March 21 Metro section. More stringent measures were being put in place after 13 students were arrested because of two fights that week, the story said.

I first visited Woodrow Wilson High School 52 years ago as a 155-pound guard on Dunbar High School's football team. We played the Wilson Tigers to a 13-13 tie. Back then, student clashes were largely governed by rules and referees and limited to the athletic field.

Today, they play war in the cafeteria.

To reduce the violence, D.C. Schools Chancellor Michelle Rhee wrote in a letter to parents that when Wilson students return from spring break on Monday, they will stay in their classrooms for lunch. Rhee told me in an interview Wednesday that the "classroom lunch" will last for two days "while the school finalizes plans for a new lunch structure."

How did the District's once premier high school end up like this? It didn't happen overnight. And Wilson's sad state shouldn't surprise the city's powers.

On March 1, Mai Abdul Rahman, the mother of a Wilson student, sent Rhee an e-mail laying bare the problem.

Rahman sent copies to Mayor Adrian Fenty; the deputy mayor for education, Victor Reinoso; the D.C. public school ombudsman, Tonya Kinlow; D.C. Council Chairman Vincent Gray; Mary Cheh, who represents Ward 3, where Wilson is located, on the D.C. Council; as well as The Post and another local paper.

Rahman described an assault on her son that occurred Feb. 26 in Wilson's gym during lunch recess:

He "walked unaccompanied into the gym [and] found himself surrounded by five 9th grade students. . . . For several minutes they proceeded to punch him in the face until two 12th graders broke it up."

"On the same day," Rahman wrote, "a 9th grade student was also 'jumped,' a term used to describe the violent assault action of one group that belong to a gang as they hit and maim their lonely victim. All these violent crimes occurred a day after Wilson security had discovered a gun that was found through the metal detector scanner in a student's bag."

Of her son, Rahman wrote: "The doctor says he was lucky to escape a skull fracture or loss of vision or hearing. He was instructed to recover at home with pain and swelling medication, ointments and a sun lamp to loosen the blood clots and facial trauma he has suffered."

The e-mail continued: "This school year, Wilson has had a rash of violent student assaults and countless number of robberies. I am sure you are aware that our students are often victims of the same crime two or three times. . . . So far in the last three weeks both the Hawk security guards and D.C. police have confirmed to me that they have made 4 arrests of students in the school facilities for a combination of assaults and other criminal activities."

Rahman said that she was concerned that some Wilson students have been subjected to "terror and violence," that teachers and staff weren't present to protect students, that security guards are few and poorly trained, and that security cameras are poorly placed and vandalized.

She pointed to teenagers who roam hallways and the gym, looking for others to prey upon. "Most lack the proper tools to maintain class interest and focus, so they are rarely in class to the delight of most teachers who are tired of the discipline issues."

Things are so out of hand, Rahman wrote in a follow-up e-mail, "that assailants at Wilson often capture their attacks by video and circulate them with little fear of being caught and these videos that offensively chronicle their attacks are being used" to intimidate "all those who dare challenge their assailants."

In her e-mail, Rahman pleaded for more trained staff and services at Wilson.

Rahman, who is active in the PTA, is a doctoral candidate in urban school reform at Howard University. She echoed the worries of other Wilson parents.

Her initial e-mail to Rhee had about as much impact as a mosquito biting an elephant's hide. Sure, there was plenty of huffin' and puffin' -- expressions of sympathy, promises of meetings and committees to do this and that.

But without Rahman's persistence, her son's chief attacker -- an 18-year-old ninth-grader -- would not have been arrested and expelled.

So what? This youth was detained at the D.C. Department of Youth Rehabilitation Services "Youth Services Center" for one night and released to his home the following day.

Perhaps that's a good outcome for him. But it's bad news for the children who want to learn.

Rhee now understands what she's got on her hands.

She is giving Wilson more security officers, closing the school to further enrollment and adopting a zero-tolerance policy that can get disruptive students expelled. She is meeting with staff members from Youth Rehabilitation Services to work out better arrangements for dealing with DYRS-supervised youths who are entering public schools. Some parents believe -- wrongly, Rhee says -- that DYRS youths in public schools are the source of the problem.

News for Rhee: The problem is not confined to Wilson.

Here's some more news for Rhee: the problem of out-of-control students isn't confined to the D.C. public school system.

'Tis The Season For Parents And Kids To Be Scammed

As the parent of a 16-year-old (the TeenWonk) high school junior that has a 4.35 G.P.A., we've been getting a number of so-called "nominations" for inclusion in this or that "national honor roll," "who's-who book," and, of course, the United States Achievement Academy.

The "nominations" were made by her well-intentioned (but unknowing) teachers, who think that they are doing the kids a favor by so "honoring" them with inclusions in these various national honor rolls and "who's-who books."

What the teachers are doing, instead, is a (unintentional) disservice to their students. They aren't just setting the kids' parents up to spend money in order to buy these who's-who books, but worse, far worse, the teachers are setting the kids and parents up to receive a flood of junk mail.

Sadly, many teachers and parents don't know that most (and quite possibly all) of these "honor" outfits are scams.

Go here and read this very illuminating piece by a New York City doctor who did a little homework on these companies. Then read this little eye-opening followup.

And then take a look at how the Better Business Bureau of Kentucky describes the so-called "United States Achievement Academy." Be sure to scroll-down and see the list of "other names" that this business operates under.

Vanity Publisher Indeed.

Virgina Taxpayers Made To Pay For Criminal's Rampage

Remember when Virginia Tech student Seung-Hui Cho went on a murderous rampage and killed 32 innocent students and staff back in April of 2007?

The miscreant went on to video tape a confession, which he then mailed it to NBC. Finally, Cho saved the commonwealth the expense of a trial (and endless appeals) by blowing his own brains out.

Now it seems as though the people of Virginia are about to be made to pay for this man's monster's crime after all:

A proposed multimillion-dollar settlement by Virginia to head off lawsuits over the Virginia Tech mass shooting offers $100,000 to each of the families of those killed; payment and insurance for medical and counseling expenses for families and surviving victims; and repeated opportunities to question the governor and university officials, in person, about the tragedy and its aftermath.

The mediated agreement isn't pleasing everyone, though.

"My people are pretty unhappy with it, and I don't blame them," said Edward Jazlowiecki, one of the lawyers representing the family of Henry Lee, a sophomore from Roanoke who was among the 32 students and professors killed by gunman Seung-Hui Cho in the April 16, 2007, attacks.

Like other families, Jazlowiecki's clients fault Virginia Tech for not better warning or protecting students after the first two students were killed.

"One hundred thousand dollars for a human life is an insult, an absolute insult," Jazlowiecki said.

It's also Virginia's legal maximum when suing the state in cases of simple negligence, as opposed to gross negligence or willful misconduct. Juries could be asked to determine which, if any, of these standards applies to the Virginia Tech tragedy if any families decide to sue.

Families and victims already have received payments ranging from $11,500 to $208,000 from the Hokie Spirit Memorial Fund, created from more than $8 million in donations that poured in for victims and the Blacksburg school after the shootings. Some recipients used part or all of the money to endow memorial scholarships.

The proposed state settlement is still being negotiated and revised, participants said. According to a copy obtained by The Virginian-Pilot and dated March 14, families have until Monday to decide whether to participate. If they do, they agree not to sue the state - including Virginia Tech - the town of Blacksburg, Montgomery County or the local New River Valley Community Services Board, which provides mental-health services.

Roger O'Dell of Roanoke, whose son, Derek, was wounded, said families were asked not to discuss the settlement negotiations. He added that his son has made no decision - he doesn't want to become adversarial toward the school that he loves, but he has been told his lifetime counseling costs could range from $125,000 to $500,000, plus higher health-insurance costs because of his pre-existing conditions.

Post-traumatic stress disorder "could flare up at any time and could be disabling without regular treatment," Roger O'Dell said. "He'll have constant reminders because he'll have the bullet holes."

The proposal seeks to have all agreements signed by April 15 - one day before the first anniversary of the shooting rampage in which disturbed senior Cho killed two students in a dorm and 30 more in Norris Hall classrooms, wounded or injured another 27, and then killed himself.

The proposal also states that "(p)articipation by nearly all claimants is necessary. The Commonwealth may withdraw the proposal if there is insufficient agreement for settling claims on these terms."

Among the terms:

- A Direct Payment Fund that, in addition to paying $100,000 each to representatives of the 32 deceased victims, would provide a total of $800,000 for the injured, with a maximum of $100,000 to any individual.

- A Special Damages Fund to reimburse or advance expenses for medical, psychological and psychiatric care for victims and immediate families that is not covered by insurance.

- An attempt to provide to "seriously injured victims" state employee health insurance at employee rates, which would require changes to the state budget and possibly state law. If that is impossible, negotiations would continue over ways to provide coverage.

- Attempts to provide free or reduced-fee treatment through the University of Virginia or Virginia Commonwealth University health systems, with fees covered by the Special Damages Fund.

- A two-pronged, state-administered $3.5 million Public Purpose Fund. Half of the money would be for charitable purposes, such as campus safety and related grants or remembrance activities, decided on by a board of victims, family members and state officials. The other half would be for payments to victims and family members suffering "severe hardship, injury or loss" from the shootings. A neutral party would evaluate requests, and payments to any individual would be capped at 7.5 percent of the hardship fund. Money left over from the Direct Payment Fund also would go into the Public Purpose Fund.

- The Hokie Spirit Memorial Fund, scheduled to close this past December, would remain open for at least five years for new contributions to its scholarship fund.

- Gov. Timothy M. Kaine would meet personally with victims and family members three more times in the next two years before he leaves office to review legislative and administrative actions taken in response to the shootings and other family concerns.

- Within six months of the settlement, victims and families would meet with senior Virginia Tech officials, including President Charles Steger and police Chief Wendell Flinchum, for an overview of campus changes, to ask questions, and to weigh in on April 16 remembrance activities. Also within that time, Flinchum and Virginia State Police would update victims and families on the shooting investigation and answer questions.

- Families would be able to contribute to and review contents of an electronic document archive relating to April 16.

And, of course, there are some lawyers who are angling to get rich on the crime:

Lawyers from the Washington firm of Bode & Grenier, representing 20 families, would receive $750,000 in fees plus $50,000 for expenses. Others who had filed notices on behalf of families would receive $25,000.

Several of them, as well as a lawyer in the governor's office overseeing the mediation, either declined to comment or didn't return phone calls Monday.

Why on Earth should the people of the Commonwealth of Virginia be made to pay a single penny because of the criminal behavior of anyone, much less that of Seung-Hui Cho?

This is yet another instance of what we see is a disturbing trend in America: Whenever bad things happen to people, someone else is made to pay, even when so doing makes no sense whatsoever.

And just guessing, I'd say that the situation won't improve, but just get worse.

Whatever happened to that rugged American individualism as well as the ideal that an individual should be held accountable for his or her actions?

Helicopter Parents Vs. Stinger Teachers

When are "involved parents" too involved? In one Maryland district, the fur is flying between some parents and a number of teachers:

The Baltimore Sun ran an article on Tuesday about parental involvement taken to the extreme. The trigger was an annual survey by the Howard County Education Association that shows a majority of teachers say they have been subjected to harassment, and most of the harassment is done by parents.

You should really read the whole thing and follow their links.

Please Don't Bite The Students!

It seems as though the employment standards of the Tifton, Georgia's Len Lastinger school could use some revision:

Vivian Hightower, a paraprofessional at the school, was suspended without pay for five days by the school’s principal, Dr. Kim Ezekiel. The board confirmed last week that Hightower bit a child she understood had bit another as punishment on Jan. 10. Unconfirmed reports Monday are that Hightower has been reassigned to another position in the school system after meeting with Superintendent Patrick Atwater Monday.

Julie Lambert, the mother of a Len Lastinger student and a volunteer in the school who takes cupcakes and serves them once a month to students with birthdays, said she became concerned when she heard about the student being bitten. Lambert said she didn’t witness the incident, but decided to talk to Ezekiel concerning the matter.

“After I talked with Dr. Ezekiel and told her I was going to administration, I and several parents wanted to set up an appointment to meet with Mr. Atwater, but his secretary told me that Mr. Patrick couldn’t discuss personnel matters with us,” Lambert said. “I was very upset at being told two times in one day that it didn’t concern me.”

Lambert said she was encouraged when she met with Kevin Dobard, BOE personnel director, in mid-February on a Thursday. She said Dobard told her to get letters together from those concerned. He recommended two letters, she said, and she gathered letters from seven people and took them to Ezekiel and copies to Dobard.

“Mr. Dobard, to his credit, has taken more time with me than anybody,” Lambert said. “I left there with the impression that with the letters, something would be done.”

Lambert said she received a letter from Ezekiel the Saturday following her Thursday meeting with Dobard. The letter, Lambert said, was brief and basically, according to Lambert, stated that Ezekiel appreciated Lambert’s concern, reiterating that the school administration places a high priority on school safety and that policy had been followed, but that the issue was a personnel matter the school administration couldn’t discuss with the public.

“I wouldn’t have any reservations in writing a formal complaint, but I question whether they will do anything,” Lambert said. “If I had been asked at any point to do it, I would have just like I got the seven letters together.”

Ezekiel said during an interview conducted in her office Friday that Lambert came to her on Feb. 13 after making an appointment and told her she wasn’t there concerning her son directly, but had a concern. Ezekiel said Lambert told her “she wanted to know why this woman is still in this school.”

“I told her I was not able to discuss personnel issues,” Ezekiel said. “She said she was going to Mr. Atwater and I told her that was fine because he was fully aware of the situation.”

On Feb. 19, according to Ezekiel, Lambert came to her office while she was in a meeting and asked for her. Ezekiel said she got the word from staff that day that Lambert said Dobard had told her to gather the letters. Ezekiel said she received the letters and responded to each of them.

“I said I would be happy to address the concerns having to do with their own children,” Ezekiel said. Ezekiel said that she has not discouraged Lambert from continuing her volunteer work in the school and welcomed her there.

Kano Goff, Lambert’s father, who read a prepared statement at the March 4 BOE meeting expressing his concern that the punishment Ezekiel imposed on Hightower wasn’t sufficient, said he got involved when Lambert told him about his meeting with Atwater.

“I told her, Julie, you have gone to the principal because you are concerned about your child at the school with a biting paraprofessional, Patrick sent her to the personnel director and then gets a letter back from Ezekiel stating the same thing,” Goff said. “I told her it was now time to go to the board.”

The BOE and administrators explained in a press conference Thursday that formal complaints, according to policy, had to have the person’s name, address and telephone number on them before they would be considered. Goff said the written statement he read to the board during the public comment section at Tuesday’s BOE meeting was only his signature away from fitting the criteria for filing a formal complaint in the case.

“They keep stating that they got upset because we didn’t follow procedures and went to the board, but we had talked to everyone we knew who to talk to about it,” Goff said.

“No one was upset that he spoke to us the other night, but the public forum is not designed for action, it is designed to hear concerns,” Potts said.

Goff said he called BOE Vice Chairman Lester Potts on Feb. 25 and he, Potts and Lambert met on Feb. 26 at Shoney’s to discuss the matter over coffee.

“Potts said he knew very little about the situation,” Goff said. “Lester said he was shocked and the gist of the meeting was that it would get to the board and he would see that there was a vote. He told me and Julie that he was only one vote but he would get back to us on March 4.”

Goff said that Potts called Lambert and told him that BOE attorney John Reinhardt had told him that since Hightower had been reprimanded and punished with a five-day unpaid suspension from her job, there was nothing the board could do. After Goff discussed it with Lambert, he called Potts.

“I told him I couldn’t believe there was nothing that could be done about it by the board and that I thought they were taking the easy way out,” Goff said. “I told him that the people of Tift County needed to know and maybe they’d get upset enough to do something about it and that I was going to read a statement in public at the March 4 board meeting.

“I’ve been in business a long time and maybe things are different in government, but if I had someone in my company who did something drastic and found out someone under me issued discipline that wasn’t severe enough, I would fire them,” Goff said. “This wasn’t something that just popped up on him (Potts).”

Potts confirmed Monday that he had met with Lambert and Goff at Shoney’s that night and said that was the first time he had heard about the biting incident.

“At that particular moment, it was hearsay,” Potts said. “I said I would check into it and see what was going on. Lester Potts, as a member of the board, has one vote and has no power or authority outside of the board as a whole.”

Potts said he began to question what had gone on relative to the case and Dobard told him an investigation had been conducted by Ezekiel and that the five-day suspension without pay had been imposed with Atwater’s blessings.

Potts said Goff called him and told him he needed to speak before the board.

“I told him to call Patrick’s secretary and see what he needed to do to be able to speak,” Potts said.

Potts said that at some point he discussed the biting incident with BOE Chairman Rita Griffin. Potts said the personnel committee, of which he is a member, met Wednesday after the Gazette furnished a copy of the incident report concerning Hightower, who was charged in 2006 with aggravated assault in a case that hasn’t been indicted or otherwise adjudicated through the court.

When asked if someone filed a formal complaint in the case that was in compliance with the BOE’s current policy, would he consider bringing the issue of the punishment imposed before the board for consideration and discussion, Potts said, “If the formal complaint process is followed, it would come before the board itself and at that point, the board would take it under consideration.”

When asked what he hoped comes as a result of the flow of information opening in the case, Potts responded, “I hope personally that everyone in the school system and in the community knows that is that it is our desire for open, clear and positive communication among each other. If fear exists in a school building, you can jump the chain of command to get that rectified, but please first do all that you can at the lowest level possible first. The chain of command is an important structure to me because of my military background and important to maintaining order.”

Where do these districts find these employees?