This Week In Education
Written by former Senate education staffer and journalist Alexander Russo, This Week in Education was an opinion blog that covered education news, policymakers, and trends with a distinctly political edge. (For archives prior to January 2007, please click here. For posts after November 2007, please click here.) This blog is no longer being updated.
School Climate & Safety
Opinion
School Cupcake Parties Are Killing Our Children
Worried about cupcakes in schools? Dr. Rob Riggle finds out that cupcakes are the "number one killer" of our children:
Education
Opinion
Vivid Writing About Urban Education
Much as I love the New York Times' weekly Sam Freedman column on education, or the Post's Jay Mathews, what I'm really liking right now is Will Okun's weekly posts about teaching high school on Chicago's rough West Side. Published on Nick Kristoff's New York Times blogsite, Okun's posts (and their accompanying pictures) are at their best like little scenes from "The Wire" -- vivid, unsentimental, and complex.
Federal
Opinion
Tensions Within The Universal Preschool Crowd
Another seemingly overlooked article comes from the most recent NYT Sunday Magazine, in which Ann Hulbert charts the growing tide of interest and action towards universal preschool (Universal Prekindergarten). We all know that, of course. But Hulbert points out a couple of worthwhile reminders.
School Climate & Safety
Opinion
Cool Ways To Prepare For Saturday's SAT Exams
The Daily Show's Demetri Martin shows the latest "advances" in standardized test prep (Princeton Review podcast tutorials, Kaplan MySpace pages, comic books with words like "alacrity" in them, bad pop songs with the same):
Education
Opinion
Knocking On Edu-Neighbors' Doors
A quick spin around the block before I head out in my Reading First costume to get as many razor-filled apples as I can find:
Education
Opinion
Dirty Tricks Against NYC Education Critic
When an oped piece came out yesterday criticizing Diane Ravitch for flip-flopping on her criticisms of various Bloomberg school reform ideas, some folks (Whitney, Andy and the performance pay mafia) seemed pretty happy about it. Today, however, Elizabeth Green in the NY Sun reports that the column was actually the result of some good old opposition research done by the NYC Department of Education. That doesn't mean the criticisms of Ravitch are all off, of course. It just shows you how far some people will go to try and swat away an annoyingly persistent and knowledgeable critic. Next thing you know, the NYC DOE will be staging fake press conferences and paying columnists to help them out, not just supplying dirt. Ravitch's response is coming out tomorrow, she says.
School & District Management
Opinion
How Cash Incentives Really Work
Perhaps the most overlooked article of the week is this one from New York magazine (Can Cash Incentives Pull a Poor Family Out of Poverty?) looking into the prospects of success for New York's much-debate cash incentive program. We've heard what everyone thinks about giving incentives (aka bribes) to poor families for health and educational behaviors -- I'm OK with them, most folks aren't. Now take a look at how they work in the real world.
School Climate & Safety
Opinion
Too Many Reports, Says Report
"The Texas State Library and Archives Commission spent 18 months and canvassed more than 170 agencies and public colleges and universities, checking on all the reports they are assigned to do.The commission found more than 1,600, and state records administrator Michael Heskett is pretty sure his team hasn't found them all." (State report: Texas has too many reports)
Education
Opinion
Peas In A Pod? We Wouldn't Last A Minute.
Eduwonkette is at it again -- and I love it. She's got mad Photoshop skills (or at least knows how to cut and paste), and has me and Andywonk dressed up as peas in a pod. It isn't pretty. I'm not sure how that would work, since co-existence is required. I was hoping for me as K-Fed and Andy as Britney. But this will do. Check it out.
School & District Management
Opinion
A "National" Test For Urban Districts
Sick of being told that scores are going up when you think they're really not? Well the cat is soon out of the bag, for 11 big urban districts at least (Atlanta; Austin, Texas; Boston; Charlotte, N.C.; Chicago; Cleveland; Houston; Los Angeles; New York; San Diego; and Washington, D.C.). A couple weeks from now the latest reading and math scores are coming out for some of the country's biggest districts. Called the urban NAEP, or TUDA, the new data will include trend lines going back to 2003, linked to NAEP. Based on NAEP data, not all of the nation's biggest cities are doing as well as their superintendents and mayors claim. MEDIA ADVISORY
Education
Opinion
The Long Goodbye - The Big Thanks
Within the next few hours (or days, as the case may be), this blog is going to move to a new home on another site. I'm going to keep posting here for a little while longer until things are ready over there but just wanted to let you know. An opportunity presented itself and I decided to make the move.