From Our Blog
National Standards Nonsense
The national standards train-wreck is pulling into the station, again. This time it is a completely voluntary set of national standards in the same way that complying with a 21-year-old drinking age is completely voluntary for states to receive federal highway money. States had to commit to a rushed and largely secretive national standard setting process as part of the Race to the Top application.
Is Arne Duncan’s new civil rights crusade unconstitutional?
On Monday, Secretary of Education Arne Duncan announced that his department will expand its efforts in civil rights enforcement. Like everything this sounds fantastic in the abstract. Who after all publicly declares that they oppose protecting civil rights? The details, though, paint a more troublesome picture.
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On Top of the News
District Tackles Woes Money Didn't Fix
3/12/10 | The Wall Street Journal
Behind the Headline
from the EdNext Archives
Education Next
The Kansas City School Board has voted to close 26 of the district’s 61 schools to “shore up the district's finances and free resources to revamp the district's academic offerings.” In 2009, Ed Next published a review (by Nathan Glazer) of a book (Complex Justice, by Josh Dunn) about Missouri v. Jenkins, the case in which the court ordered that enormous amounts of money be spent on the Kansas City schools in order to desegregate the school district by attracting white students from the suburbs.
Federal agency to investigate L.A. schools
3/10/10 | Los Angeles Times
Behind the Headline
from the EdNext Archives
Education Next
The U.S. Department of Education's Office for Civil Rights will be investigating whether the LA Unified School District provides adequate services to students learning English. An article by Christine Rossell that was published in Ed Next in 2003 looked at California's implementation of Prop 227, which was meant to end bilingual instruction in the state and move students more quickly into English-language classrooms.
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By Paul E. Peterson
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Video: Paul E. Peterson talks with Nathan Glazer
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Benefits were small and only reached white children
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- The Unknown World of Charter High Schools
New evidence suggests they are boosting high school graduation and college attendance rates
By Kevin Booker, Tim R. Sass, Brian Gill and Ron Zimmer
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Video: Brian Gill talks with Education Next
- Toothless Reform?
If the feds get tough, Race to the Top might work
By Andy Smarick
- Tale of Two Cities
Review of Gerald Grant’s Hope and Despair in the American City
By Nathan Glazer
- High School 2.0
Can Philadelphia’s School of the Future live up to its name?
By Dale Mezzacappa
The legacy of James Coleman
—
Video: Paul E. Peterson talks with Nathan Glazer
New evidence suggests they are boosting high school graduation and college attendance rates
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Video: Brian Gill talks with Education Next
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Videos
Video: Education Next’s Paul E. Peterson talks about his new book, Saving Schools, and about the advantages of virtual schooling, with Nathan Glazer.
Podcast
Podcast: Education Next’s Paul Peterson and Chester E. Finn, Jr. talk this week about whether the federal share of education spending is likely to remain at 15 percent and whether the $1 billion bonus for reauthorizing ESEA this year is likely to be awarded.
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EdNext in the News
Firings Unlikely At Worst County School
March 11, 2010 | RhinoTimes.com Greensboro
Study: kindergarten does not help
March 8, 2010 | The Dartmouth
15 states, D.C. make first cut in Race to the Top school reform contest
March 4, 2010 | The Washington Post
Testimony of Caprice Young
February 24, 2010 | House Committee on Education and Labor
Uproar is coming over test scores
February 24, 2010 | The Paris Post-Intelligencer
Most TN schools could fail under tougher standards
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Students at Charter High Schools More to Likely to Graduate College
February 22, 2010 | The Huffington Post
Minneapolis district poised to create two schools outside the bureacuracy
February 18, 2010 | MinnPost.com
Looking South at Education – What Can Canadians Learn?
February 18, 2010 | Our Kids Blog
Study says students from charter high schools more likely to graduate, go to college
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Study Gives Charters an Edge
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School turnarounds
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Featured Comment
The new standards are an important step in the right direction, but they represent the first mile of a marathon race to the classroom and students. The next mile will be developing quality, clearly aligned assessments, which is a jog compared to the task of ensuring that our 15,000 school districts provide their four million classroom teachers with high-quality and precisely aligned curriculum and that their instruction is of equal high quality and aligned to the curriculum.
in: comments on “Will the Common Core Standards Prove Safe and Effective?”