(New York Times) — For her first assignment of the school year, Verona Gill, a $100,000-a-year special education teacher whom the city is trying to fire, sat around education offices in Lower Manhattan for two weeks, waiting to be told what to do. For her second assignment, she was sent to a district office in […]
(Chicago Sun Times) — Thousands of Chicago Public School students have been unfairly flunked and forced to repeat a grade due to broken promises by CPS officials in implementing a controversial promotion policy, a parent group is expected to charge today. About 100,000 students have repeated a grade since 1996, at an estimated cost of […]
(New American Media) — He was on his way to class. He really was. He wasn’t “ditching” and he had no intentions of leaving campus to engage in illicit or illegal behavior. Rodney Smith said he forgot his backpack in the school cafeteria and went to retrieve it; that’s the reason he was late to […]
(Wall Street Journal) — The Department of Education announced the names of a dozen schools that it intends to shut down for poor performance. More names come Tuesday. New York City stumbled in closing schools last year, and the process is loaded with political land mines for the new schools chancellor, Cathie Black. On average, […]
(Wall Street Journal) — Former Washington, D.C., schools Chancellor Michelle Rhee launched a national advocacy group Monday to support political candidates and school districts that embrace substantial changes in public education. Through the group, StudentsFirst, Ms. Rhee hopes to raise $1 billion to dole out to political candidates who support her policies and to local […]
(Chicago Sun Times) — Chicago’s interim Schools CEO has not yet decided if he will close any city public schools next year — a contentious process that usually kicks off in January. Three days into his new job, Terry Mazany said former Schools CEO Ron Huberman left him no recommended list of closings, something usually […]
While the Bush education policy threatened “the stick”, the Obama policy “dangles the carrot.”