Photo by jeremy.wilburn/flickr
Today’s Top Picks
Ogden teachers rally.
http://bit.ly/pjwfqj (SLT)
and http://bit.ly/okwsEk (DN)
and http://bit.ly/qEOSYR (OSE)
and http://connect2utah.com/news-story/?nxd_id=156187
and http://bit.ly/r1bHwM (KTVX)
and http://www.ksl.com/?nid=148&sid=16372403
or List of Ogden Education Association questions http://bit.ly/olfYjC
KSL looks at inner-city Ogden schools.
http://www.ksl.com/?nid=148&sid=16383176
Does holding a student back a grade help or hinder a school system generally?
http://bit.ly/o0Z3XO (Ed Week)
or a copy of the analysis
http://www.oecd.org/dataoecd/35/58/48363440.pdf
STEM is where the money is.
http://usat.ly/mOHkcy (USAT)
or a copy of the report
OK. STEM isn’t where all the money is. Some of it is finally flowing into state coffers.
http://on.ft.com/nwb7s2 (Financial Times) or a copy of the report http://conta.cc/peGqfK
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TODAY’S HEADLINES
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UTAH
Ogden teachers, other unions rally for collective bargaining
Protest: District refused to negotiate 2011-12 contract; other unions offer support.
Ogden schools face tough issues
Online program is asset to education
Local schools saving green by being green
Technology being used to build bridges with autistic children
High school janitor sells car, taps savings to buy football team helmets
Taking sugary, fat treats off the public school menu
Scholarship Winner
United Way hosts drive for school supplies
OPINION & COMMENTARY
Ogden rally raw footage, empowering parents, NCLB
Teachers need to understand this economy
State boosts school reforms
Let Granite High go
Culture of cheating breeding in schools across U.S.
Poor test scores risk teachers’ jobs
OECD: Holding Back, Expelling Students Weakens Ed. Systems
Unlocking the Secrets of High-Performing Charters Tight management and “no excuses”
NATION
Science, tech jobs see better pay, government study finds
US state tax revenues rise
Gov. Brown signs law requiring teaching of gay history
Catholic schools lead rush for voucher approvals in Indiana
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UTAH NEWS
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Ogden teachers, other unions rally for collective bargaining
Protest: District refused to negotiate 2011-12 contract; other unions offer support.
Ogden – Wearing red T-shirts and waving black-and-white signs, an estimated 800 people rallied in Ogden’s Liberty Park on Thursday to protest the city school district’s decision to not negotiate a contract with its teachers union.
Those joining the crowd were not just members of the Ogden Education Association (OEA). Standing alongside Ogden teachers were educators from Washington County to Logan and a range of union members, including teamsters, machinists, federal government employees, plumbers and the AFL-CIO. They rallied around a common cry: Preserve collective-bargaining rights.
“Some of these politicians want to silence the voice of teachers. In fact, they want to silence the voice of all workers,” said Greg Johnson, an executive committee member of the National Education Association who flew in from Oklahoma to speak at the rally. “If they’re successful, there will be no strong voice to stand up and fight for the middle class. … And there will be no one to stand strong for the students in our classrooms.”
Earlier this month, the Ogden School District notified teachers that they must sign individual contracts by 4 p.m. Wednesday — or forfeit their jobs. Classes in Ogden are scheduled to begin on Aug. 24.
http://bit.ly/pjwfqj (SLT)
http://bit.ly/okwsEk (DN)
http://bit.ly/qEOSYR (OSE)
http://connect2utah.com/news-story/?nxd_id=156187
http://bit.ly/r1bHwM (KTVX)
http://www.ksl.com/?nid=148&sid=16372403
List of Ogden Education Association questions http://bit.ly/olfYjC
Ogden schools face tough issues
SALT LAKE CITY — A KSL analysis of test scores from all of Utah’s 600-plus elementary schools shows of the 10 schools that perform at the bottom, five are in the Ogden School District.
Dee Elementary scored dead last. No one is more aware of that ranking than the new principal, Sondra Jolovich-Motes.
“I took it as a huge challenge,” she said.
She’s in the job because Dee received a Federal Improvement grant — roughly half a million dollars each year for three years to help raise test scores. But to qualify, the district had to bring in a new principal or risk closing the school.
http://www.ksl.com/?nid=148&sid=16383176
Online program is asset to education
Today, with the advances in technology, there are many ways in which students can receive a full education. The Washington Online School Utah program is one of those additions to public education that can enhance and expand a students’ learning experience.
Washington Online School Utah (also known as WOSU or Wash Online) provides two free public online schools: WOSU-K8 (K-eighth grades) and WOSU-HS (ninth -twelfth grades) that are part of the Washington County School District. WOSU is open to all students in grades K-12 living anywhere in the state of Utah.
“We think it is a wonderful option for students who need to have flexibility in their opportunities. We are especially positive about how it can help students who need credit recovery (make-up credits that have been missed), said Supt. Max Rose. “Laura Belnap is a dynamic leader of our online program and I feel that she provides the highest quality program available. Our district has been providing online education for several years while many other districts are quite recent adherents to this concept.”
http://bit.ly/q0WptZ (SGS)
Local schools saving green by being green
ST. GEORGE – Building green is better for the environment and for the checkbook, according to recent research and a group in Congress trying to promote more green schools.
Twenty percent of the U.S. population spends its days in school, between students, teachers, staff and administrators, and groups like the Center for Green Schools at the U.S. Green Building Council have been promoting environmentally-friendly green building practices to improve student performance and health and create more sustainable energy practices.
Some members of Congress are on board as well, and U.S. Rep. Jim Matheson, D-Utah, who co-chairs the Green School Caucus, said the group’s kickoff meeting this week would help create dialogue about how to better promote green school construction. He said green building isn’t just good for the environment, but kind to the taxpayers’ wallets.
http://bit.ly/q3jSPt (SGS)
Technology being used to build bridges with autistic children
SALT LAKE CITY — Digger has a tough time breaking out of his world and expressing what’s on his mind.
As a 9-year-old with autism, the desire to socialize with his classmates, or even give a book report becomes excruciatingly awkward.
“He just wants to fit in, and wants to be a part of what’s going on with kids his age, but he’s just different enough that he’s not sure what to do,” Digger’s mother, Lynn Frick-Dolan, said.
Digger is not alone. It is estimated that 1 in 110 children, and 1 in 70 boys in the U.S. are effected by autism. In Utah, it is estimated that 1 in 49 boys has some form of autism as of 2008. Experts say the autism rate in Utah has doubled since 2002.
Now researchers, including some from the University of Utah, have developed an education system that uses computer programs— and soon iPhone/iPad apps — that will help children with special needs not only learn, but bridge those communication gaps that keep many children stuck inside their minds.
http://bit.ly/prb39v (DN)
High school janitor sells car, taps savings to buy football team helmets
SANDY, Utah — A good team gets support from coaches, parents and fans. But at Jordan High they also get help from an unlikely school employee.
It’s the school’s custodian. Brad Keene is the Beetdigger’s biggest fan.
“I’m not one of the coaches or anything, but I’m there at the games,” he says.
Keene is such a big supporter of his team that he bought top-of-the line helmets for the upcoming season.
“I wanted to get these new Riddell Revolutions [helmets] fors the kids, so I ordered 20 of them,” said Keene. “I ordered these eye shields from Oakley. All the linebackers got eye shields.
The head protection comes at a hefty cost, nearly $300 a piece. The school janitor says he came up with the money by selling his car. Yet the amount was still not enough.
“I had some extra money in my savings account,” he added.
http://bit.ly/qH88OF (KSTU)
Taking sugary, fat treats off the public school menu
Kids looking for a sugary, salty or soda-y pick-me-up in Massachusetts won’t be finding it in school vending machines or a la carte cafeteria lines starting in 2012-13. State health regulators this week took a hard line in setting standards for school nutrition. They’re also emphasizing low-fat snacks, whole-grain baked items and fruits and vegetables.
They left the menus in the main cafeteria alone, since those are governed by federal standards. And that is changing, too, with plans by the U.S. Department of Agriculture to require more fruits and vegetables while reducing salt and fat.
School lunch has been a hot topic for a number of years now. Utah is one of the states that has wrestled hard with questions of how to get students to eat the “good” foods that have been placed on the school menus. But it has, like many other states, also largely opted to keep vending machines that sell nutritionally challenged fare in order to hang onto needed revenue.
http://bit.ly/n5bRBc (DN)
Scholarship Winner
Davis County student Amileah DeMille of Davis High School in Kaysville recently was awarded the Horatio Alger Scholarship.
Scholars receive $5,000 toward their college education. Students are selected for the scholarship because they persevered in overcoming adversity while succeeding academically, contributing to the community and exhibiting exemplary character. Utah scholarships are made possible by the Rocky Mountain Power Foundation.
http://bit.ly/oO104K (OSE)
United Way hosts drive for school supplies
This school year, many children will lack supplies they need for the classroom. To help them, United Way of Salt Lake is sponsoring the Stuff The Bus campaign for children served through its Community Learning Centers. Supplies collected will be stuffed into backpacks and delivered to more than 15 schools on United Way of Salt Lake’s annual Day of Caring, Sept. 8. To learn how you can help, visit http://bit.ly/nePMWo.
http://bit.ly/r1AbnL (SLT)
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OPINION & COMMENTARY
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Ogden rally raw footage, empowering parents, NCLB Sutherland Institute commentary by Matthew Piccolo, policy analyst
Today in Ogden, an estimated 400 people protested the Ogden School District’s decision to forgo collective bargaining in favor of a contract made on its own terms. You can see footage of the protest here, taken by Alexis Young, Sutherland’s multimedia reporter:
Notice the signs that read “Teachers Are Not The Problem.” We agree. The problem in Ogden is not the teachers. The problem, at least one of them, is that the teachers union as an organization has not been able to reach an agreement with the district for several years running and is now concerned about losing more power.
Teachers – individual teachers – should have the ability to form their own employment contract with the district, just like 90 percent or more of Utah workers currently do with their employers.
Teachers need to understand this economy
(Ogden) Standard-Examiner letter from Dorothea A. Masur
Noel Zabriskie is nothing less than a hero (July 2, “Ogden teachers get take-it-or- leave-it contract deal”). I had given up ever having a board that handles our largest budget to use common sense and of all things, courage. He should be supported. It has become commonplace to watch this powerful board conceding constantly to the teachers’ union instead of the taxpayers. How else could they get elected? The weber board should take notice.
Meanwhile, teachers continue to be unrealistic (June 17 letter, “Teachers just want only contractually agreed paid rate”). The letter writer wants teachers’ contracts to continue. Sounds reasonable. But the contracts for lane change and steps are impossible in this economy, when the people who pay their salaries are losing their jobs. I would expect teachers to sympathize with them.
State boosts school reforms
(Provo) Daily Herald letter from Daniel Lyle
I commend Utah’s educational reform for a sustainable future. Ogden’s Pay for Performance initiatives eliminate guaranteed pay raises that only reward seniority and are intractable with economic downturns.
Dan Liljenquist enacted legislation last year providing new retirement plans commensurate with private sector 401(k) plans. Utah teachers’ jobs and benefits are a lot healthier than in states where unfunded liabilities have skyrocketed.
Recent online school offerings empower parents, mitigate growing classroom sizes and provide better resource management in fostering teachers towards their true role as educators rather than as baby sitters. This also encourages more private contribution, and competition is healthy for this restaurant-industry-sized market over-monopolized by government.
Let Granite High go
Salt Lake Tribune letter from Robert LeMone
South Salt Lake City is presenting a bond to the taxpayers to buy and renovate into a community center the old Granite High School and its 27 acres. Preserving high school memories should not cost taxpayers millions of dollars that they cannot afford.
Property taxes have doubled in the past six years and the mayor and City Council, who just gave themselves a 4 percent pay increase, are promoting a project with no clear end to its cost. When Larry Miller tried to rebuild his old high school into Jordan Commons, he could not preserve it as it was and make it economically feasible.
Granite High should be torn down and the right type of commercial development built on it.
Culture of cheating breeding in schools across U.S.
Poor test scores risk teachers’ jobs
Washington Times commentary by columnist Ben Wolfgang
Those sneaky students in the back of the classroom aren’t the only cheaters.
Teachers and school leaders are getting in on the scams by boosting test scores not through better instruction, but by erasing wrong answers, replacing them with the right ones and hoodwinking parents in the process.
Nowhere was the corruption more widespread than in Atlanta, where a recent probe found that 44 schools and 178 teachers and principals had been falsifying student test scores for the past decade. Suspected cheating also is under review in the District, and the Department of Education’s inspector general is assisting with the investigation.
In Pennsylvania, reports that surfaced this week show suspected cheating in at least three dozen school districts. State Education Secretary Ronald Tomalis on Thursday ordered those districts to investigate the suspicious scores and report back within 30 days. He also asked a data company to analyze 2010 scores, according to the Associated Press.
Similar charges of cheating have been discovered in Baltimore, Houston and elsewhere.
Although the details differ, education specialists think each scandal has a common denominator.
“There’s a very simple cause: consequences,” said Gregory Cizek, a professor of educational measurement and evaluation in the School of Education at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.
OECD: Holding Back, Expelling Students Weakens Ed. Systems Education Week commentary by columnist Sarah D. Sparks
Countries in which schools frequently hold back or kick out students with low academic performance tend to have weaker, more expensive, and more socially inequitable education systems overall according to a new analysis by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development.
In comparing the results of the Program for International Student Assessment in 65 member and partner countries, OECD researchers found that differences among countries’ grade-retention trends could explain as much as 15 percent of the difference among their average scores on the 2009 PISA.
While fewer than 3 percent of students in 13 countries—including Japan, Norway, and the United Kingdom—reported ever repeating a grade, more than 25 percent of students repeated at least once in France, Spain, Brazil, and a dozen others studied. The United States reported more than one in 10 students repeating a grade, higher than the OECD average, while the top-performing countries, Finland and Korea, do not allow grade retention.
A copy of the analysis
http://www.oecd.org/dataoecd/35/58/48363440.pdf
Unlocking the Secrets of High-Performing Charters Tight management and “no excuses”
Education Next analysis by James A. Peyser, managing partner for city funds at NewSchools Venture Fund
Charter schools are approaching the ripe old age of 20. Although more work remains if we are to fully understand this complex education reform “movement,” a growing body of data and research is being compiled about its strengths, weaknesses, and impact. An important subset of the charter school sector is just now receiving a similar level of scrutiny. Charter management organizations (CMOs) are integrated networks of charter schools that came on the scene around the turn of the century, a little less than 10 years after the first charter school opened its doors. According to a recent study by the Center on Reinventing Public Education, by 2008 CMOs accounted for more than 10 percent of the charter school market and had been the beneficiaries of at least $500 million in private philanthropy. At this scale, CMOs warrant a close look to improve our understanding of what they are, how they operate and perform, and whether they offer an adequate return on public and private investment.
NewSchools Venture Fund, a nonprofit grant-making organization, has been for more than a decade one of the leading private funders of CMOs serving low-income urban neighborhoods. Along the way, we have amassed data and direct experience that provide a window into this world. Our analysis suggests that most of the CMOs in our “portfolio” are outperforming the local districts, especially for low-income students. Nevertheless, there is significant variation across our sample. The highest-performing CMOs in the NewSchools portfolio tend to be those that have embraced a “no excuses” approach to teaching and learning. These CMOs have created organizational and school cultures based on explicit expectations for both academic achievement and behavior, with meaningful consequences when those high expectations are not met.
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NATIONAL NEWS
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Science, tech jobs see better pay, government study finds USA Today
Jobs in science, technology, engineering and math fields pay an average 26% more than other occupations and grew three times faster the past decade, according to a Commerce Department study to be released today.
The Obama administration is citing the report partly to put numbers behind its push to invest more to increase jobs in so-called STEM fields. Many employers lament a dire shortage of highly skilled workers despite 9.2% unemployment.
From 2000 to 2010, STEM jobs grew 7.9% to 7.6 million, three times the rate of other fields, the study by Commerce’s Economics and Statistics Administration says.
They’re expected to swell 17% from 2008 to 2018, vs. 9.8% for other jobs.
The study is partly an effort to bolster the case for federal investments in training for these occupations even as Republicans in Congress seek big spending cuts to pare the massive U.S. deficit. Commerce officials say STEM skills also are vital for the U.S. to compete in a global marketplace that places a growing premium on innovation.
“Folks that have these skills are going to prosper — they’re going to be creating the jobs and opportunities of the future,” Education Secretary Arne Duncan said in an interview.
A copy of the report
US state tax revenues rise
Financial Times
US state tax revenues grew by 12.5 per cent in April and May versus the same months in 2010, preliminary data for 45 states compiled by the Rockefeller Institute of Government shows.
The recent pace of growth has raised hopes that state revenues, which were decimated by the US recession, are heading toward pre-recession levels, the research group said. But it warned that uncertain economic conditions raised doubts about whether such robust gains could continue.
“Strong gains in state tax collections since late 2010 have been driven by both economic growth and legislated tax increases,” said Lucy Dadayan, a senior policy analyst at the Rockefeller Institute. “If the economy continues to show weakness during the second half of 2011, revenue growth will likely soften as well.”
A copy of the report
Gov. Brown signs law requiring teaching of gay history Sacramento (CA) Bee
Gov. Jerry Brown has signed legislation requiring public schools to teach students about the contributions of gay and lesbian people, making California the first state to adopt such a measure.
The bill was cheered by gay rights advocates, and Brown said in a written statement Thursday that it “represents an important step forward for our state.”
The legislation requires instruction in the social sciences to include the role and contributions of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender Americans, as well as people with disabilities and members of other cultural groups.
It would prohibit teaching from textbooks or other instructional materials that reflect adversely on people because of their sexual orientation.
http://bit.ly/qykNUI (S.F. Chronicle)
http://lat.ms/q5AiaB (LAT)
http://bit.ly/qpCExL (CSM)
Catholic schools lead rush for voucher approvals in Indiana Louisville (KY) Courier-Journal
Catholic educators raised a strong voice for a school voucher program – and now that the state is starting one, schools in the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Indianapolis are quickly signing up.
Most of the 80 schools approved so far by the Indiana Department of Education to receive public money to help families pay private-school tuition are faith-based schools, and most of them are Catholic schools, including six in Southern Indiana.
Two Christian Academy schools also have received approval to participate, according to a list released this week by the state.
The approval of schools and the response from parents is being closely watched because of the novelty — and controversy — surrounding the program, considered one of the nation’s most sweeping voucher plans.
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