Education News: July 24, 2009

Following are some of the top headlines from the world of education for the week ending July 24, 2009.

Obama Uses $4 Billion in “Race to the Top” to Influence Schools
(Washington Post, July 23, 2009)  President Obama is using $4 billion in federal aid to pressure the education establishment into accepting more charter schools and performance pay for teachers.  The drive is nothing new, as Education Secretary Arne Duncan has been traveling across the country for months warning officials that they will have to embrace reform if they want to receive federal funds.  He has even gone so far as to send warnings to individual states by calling them out in speeches.  On Friday, Obama will officially announce “Race to the Top,” a competition for $4.35 billion in grants.  The funds will be distributed to states that can demonstrate results backed by data that show improvement in student scores and teacher performance. Applications for the competition will be accepted beginning late this year and again next spring.  The president’s goal is for states to use the funds to ease limits on charter schools, tie teacher pay to student achievement and move for the first time toward common academic standards.  Obama must be careful, however, as the teachers unions are a key Democratic constituency.  So far they have praised the president's goals but remain wary of how his policies will affect their paychecks and tenure. 
Click here for a related article from the New York Times

New Study Suggests Charter Schools Underperform Traditional Counterparts
(Baltimore Sun, July 22, 2009) The first comprehensive study of the nation's charter schools was published recently and claims that students who attend traditional public schools do as well or better than students who attend charter schools.  The study, conducted by the Center for Research and Educational Outcomes at Stanford University, showed that 37% of charter school students scored significantly lower in reading and math than similar students in traditional public schools.  Some reasons that the report offers for this poor showing include the first year effect, the impact of multiple chartering agencies and legislative caps on charters.  While the study is a setback for the immensely popular trend, many of the problems the schools face seem to have available remedies, such as national standards.  There are currently 4,700 charter schools in the US, and that number is expected to increase drastically with President Obama planning to double the dollars available to charters and Education Secretary Duncan asking all states to be open to them.  Charter schools' did show a greater ability than traditional schools to develop specialized programs targeting specific populations, specifically at reaching English language learners and students in poverty.

Transit Hurdles Effect School Choice
(Denver Post, July 18, 2009)  A recent study found that school choice is often limited when parents would like to send their children to better schools but don't because of transportation hurdles.  The study, performed by the Center on Reinventing Public Education, surveyed 600 low- to moderate-income families in Denver and Washington, D.C. One-third of respondents said that they considered enrolling their children in another school but chose the closest one due to transportation challenges.  One problem is that while more than half of the children who attend out-of-neighborhood schools are driven by their parents, 45% of families who earn less than $20,000 a year don't own a car. Under federal No Child Left Behind rules more than 1,000 Denver Public Schools students are eligible to be transported around the city, but critics say the city does not properly utilize the resources it has available.

Fifty School Districts Under Federal Investigation for Sex Discrimination
(Washington Post, July 20, 2009)  C.D. Hylton High School in Woodbridge, VA has recently come under investigation by federal officials for sex discrimination.  The investigation arose because the school has a baseball field with a $50,000 press box, a locker room and a concession stand and a softball with a faded wood shed and a port-a-potty.  C.D. Hylton joins forty-nine other districts nationwide that are under similar investigations for disparities in their facilities.  The schools are being investigated to see whether they have violated Title IX, the federal rules governing equity between the sexes.  The law seeks to ensure that any educational program that receives federal funding provides equal opportunities and facilities for boys and girls.  Most sports have boys' and girls' equivalents that use the same fields, pools and equipment.  Baseball fields and softball fields are not interchangeable because they are different sizes, however, which can lead to inequalities.  A complaint by a softball player’s parent has caused the Office for Civil Rights of the U.S. Department of Education to look into possible violations.

Insights from Many Fields Converge to Form New “Science of Learning”
(USA Today, July 21, 2009)  A review in the Science journal makes the case that psychologists, neuroscientists, roboticists and teachers should join together to create a new kind of learning research.  The union should help create a new field which utilizes everything from how brains grow to how classrooms work.  The report was led by Andrew Meltzoff, co-director of the University of Washington's Institute for Learning and Brain Sciences in Seattle.  For example, a companion study shows how neuroscience and education researchers have teamed up to tackle dyslexia.  By utilizing behavioral and brain measures that can identify dyslexic tendencies in infants, teachers could "prevent dyslexia from occurring in the majority of children who would otherwise develop dyslexia."  The proposal advocates that learning is computational, learning is social, and learning is driven by brain circuitry.  The goal, according to the researchers, is to create new teaching tools - such as robots or computer programs – which mimic one-to-one tutoring, often considered the most effective learning environment.

Swine Flu Likely to Return When Schools Reopen
(New York Times, July 17, 2009) Federal health officials are predicting that swine flu is likely to return in force as soon as schools reopen.  This is earlier than seasonal flu, which usually does not return until October or November.  The prediction is based on the fact that swine flu continues circulating throughout the country, with many cases reported in summer camps.  While there is no definitive information on the number of doses of a swine flu vaccine will be available by then, officials expect tens of millions of doses rather than hundreds of millions.   The vaccinations will be triaged to people who are the most vulnerable, such as pregnant women and people who are the most likely to encounter the flu.  The number of doses will depend on how fast seed strains grow, how much protection a small dose provides, and whether immune-system boosters called adjuvants are needed and prove safe.   The swine flu vaccinations will be completely voluntary once begun.  Pregnant women, however, will be “strongly encouraged” to get both the seasonal and swine flu shots when available.

NYC School Board Will Check Mayor’s Power Over Schools
(NY Times, July 23, 2009)  On Thursday, three New York City borough presidents suggested that the power of the Board of Education should be expanded by giving it oversight over contracts.  Though Mayor Michael Bloomberg was originally given nearly unanimous support by the board when it came back into existence on July 1, 2009, borough presidents of Manhattan, Brooklyn and the Bronx now say the group should serve as a check to Mr. Bloomberg’s authority until the confusion is resolved.  This could take until September or later, as a political stalemate in Albany has precluded attempts to renew mayoral control of the schools.  The three leaders also suggested to temporarily reappoint the thirty-two local school boards that were a linchpin of the education system before mayoral control.  According to critics, however, these boards often became dens of corruption and back-room deals.  Another borough leader would need to support the proposal for it to gain traction, but there is no indication that either of the Queens or Staten Island presidents will do so.