Today’s Top Picks:

Utah and four other states get ESEA waivers.
http://goo.gl/LjZ3Q (SLT)
and http://goo.gl/Cf2k9 (DN)
and http://goo.gl/ygq4K (OSE)
and http://goo.gl/fjVq5 (PDH)
and http://goo.gl/S5gpA (CVD)
and http://goo.gl/RsWa3 (KTVX)
and http://goo.gl/p2IUF (KSL)
and http://goo.gl/S2u2m (WaPo)
and http://goo.gl/4sdnk (Wash Times)
and http://goo.gl/qLGVL (Ed Week)
and http://goo.gl/eafZ9 (ED)
and http://goo.gl/dWfmK (USOE)
or what went into making this sausage in the media
http://goo.gl/ULBzy (Alexander Russo)

The health care ruling: What does expanding Medicaid mean for school funding?
http://goo.gl/JHJrv (SLT)
and http://goo.gl/L0GOy (KSL)
and http://goo.gl/FzZoE (Ed Week)

The Root interviews Mitt Romney’s education advisor, Rod Paige.
http://goo.gl/8JL5E (The Root)

It’s a sad day in IT and psychometric worlds. The inventor of the Scantron has died. What’s a Scantron? Anyone here ever use a No. 2 pencil to fill in a bubble or a box? Yep. That’s the Scantron.
http://goo.gl/ACnYj (TPM)
and http://goo.gl/mg4xm (The Lookout)

Looking to unload all those copies of Jane Eyre? Try to make their covers look more like Twilight or The Hunger Games. That oughtta do the trick.
http://goo.gl/16i3N (NYT)

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TODAY’S HEADLINES
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UTAH

Utah granted waiver to No Child Left Behind law
Education » State will implement its own, new accountability system.

Utah governor to abide by health law mandates, for now
Courts » Ruling puts states in hot seat: Expand Medicaid?

Agriculture opportunities come to Landmark High

Charter high for performing arts comes to Thanksgiving Point

‘Sexting’ prevalence surprises researchers, not students

Utah Co. has 11 of state’s fastest-growing cities

New donor policy ends the Scott Cate Era at Cottonwood

Lincoln Elementary celebrates Olympics Day with competition

Assistance League aims to help area kids in need

OPINION & COMMENTARY

Too few ed bucks

How GERM is infecting schools around the world

Health-Care Ruling Has Implications for Education Spending

Report: Make Improving Teacher Working Conditions a Priority

Draft of Common Science Standards Draws Friendly Fire

George W. Bush Institute Examines NCLB Waivers

Media: Behind The Scenes Of Campaign Season Press Announcement

The Making of the Principal
Five Lesson in Leadership Training

NATION

Meet Romney’s Top Education Adviser
Former Education Secretary Rod Paige takes on federal spending, teachers unions and school-voucher critics.

Professors condemn New York’s ‘overreliance’ on standardized tests

New Companies Seek Competitive Edge in LMS Market
Companies old and new are jockeying for position in the unsettled market for learning-management systems, seeking to innovate and fulfill districts’ evolving needs

Abdul-Jabbar: More Opportunities to Turn Pro in Science Than in the NBA

Texas GOP’s 2012 Platform Opposes Teaching Of ‘Critical Thinking Skills’

Scantron Inventor Dies
[R] [I] [P]

To Lure ‘Twilight’ Teenagers, Classic Books Get Bold Looks

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UTAH NEWS
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Utah granted waiver to No Child Left Behind law
Education » State will implement its own, new accountability system.

Utah is leaving behind the controversial federal education law No Child Left Behind.
The U.S. Department of Education announced Friday that it has granted Utah’s request for a waiver to the decade-old law. That means no more Adequate Yearly Progress (AYP) measurements for Utah schools and no more Program Improvement sanctions for certain schools that fail to make AYP.
It also means no more expectation that 100 percent of students score proficient in reading and math by 2014 — which was the ultimate goal of NCLB. It was a goal that many long decried as unrealistic.
But that doesn’t mean schools won’t continue to be held accountable in Utah. In doing away with NCLB, Utah will implement a new accountability system.
In exchange for the waiver, Utah had to promise to implement a plan to address college and career readiness for all students, school accountability, teacher evaluation and administrative burdens on schools.
http://goo.gl/LjZ3Q (SLT)

http://goo.gl/Cf2k9 (DN)

http://goo.gl/ygq4K (OSE)

http://goo.gl/fjVq5 (PDH)

http://goo.gl/S5gpA (CVD)

http://goo.gl/RsWa3 (KTVX)

http://goo.gl/p2IUF (KSL)

http://goo.gl/S2u2m (WaPo)

http://goo.gl/4sdnk (Wash Times)

http://goo.gl/qLGVL (Ed Week)

http://goo.gl/eafZ9 (ED)

http://goo.gl/dWfmK (USOE)

Utah governor to abide by health law mandates, for now
Courts » Ruling puts states in hot seat: Expand Medicaid?

Gov. Gary Herbert said Utah will abide by the mandates of federal health reform, for now, but vowed to do what he can “to replace bad policy on health care with good.”
Unless Congress succeeds at amending or repealing the law, Herbert may not have much wiggle room. The U.S. Supreme Court upheld the entire law on Thursday, an opinion state attorneys are still digesting.
“There’s a lot of uncertainty. We had uncertainty before the decision and we have even more uncertainty after,” Herbert said at a monthly news conference at KUED.
But one big decision now facing the Republican governor — and governors across the country — is what to do with Medicaid.
The ruling upheld the law’s call for a massive expansion of who qualifies, along with millions in federal funding to support it. But the court said the federal government can’t yank existing Medicaid funding from states that say no to the expansion.
To grow Medicaid or not: it’s a question Herbert won’t have long to answer, given that the health law goes into full effect in 2014. And it won’t be an easy one, given Medicaid’s politically fraught history.
…
But Utah’s share of the expansion price tag, between $174 million and $227 million by 2019, threatens to squeeze its ability to pay for other priorities, such as schools and roads.
http://goo.gl/JHJrv (SLT)

http://goo.gl/L0GOy (KSL)

Agriculture opportunities come to Landmark High

SPANISH FORK — After a successful school year and summer program involving students and the greenhouse at Landmark High School, a special garden party was held on Thursday evening to celebrate the installation and planting of a grow-box garden that will serve the needs of the community, and eventually the students and families at the school who might need help with food.
Landmark High School serves as the alternative high school for students in the Nebo School District area. This past year, students had the opportunity to enroll in a floriculture and greenhouse management class and help with the setup of the new school greenhouse. Students helped to grow vegetable starts and bedding plants to sell to the public.
http://goo.gl/KBHPU (PDH)

Charter high for performing arts comes to Thanksgiving Point

If your teen is artistically inclined and looking for a vastly different high school experience, Pioneer High might be your answer.
A charter high school for the performing arts is now accepting enrollment. The school is looking for teens with a passion for performance. Pioneer High aims to answer one of the most challenging problems for any teen who is serious about performance — how to fit high school academics around a performance schedule.
http://goo.gl/PeXsA (PDH)

‘Sexting’ prevalence surprises researchers, not students

A U professor has found that sending sexually explicit messages through text messages ­— also known as “sexting” ­— is more prevalent than previously thought.
After three years of research, professor of psychology Donald Strassberg published his findings earlier this month in the Archives of Sexual Behavior. The study included a 10-minute questionnaire and surveyed 606 students from a private high school in the southwestern United States. Nearly 20 percent of high school students surveyed said they have sent a sexually explicit picture of themselves via cell phone. Fifty percent of boys and 30 percent of girls say they have received a ‘sext.’ Among those that had received a sext, more than one in four forwarded the picture.
“I was very interested in learning more about [sexting],” Strassberg said. “I decided that I could address some of the problems that other surveys had by doing my own study.”
Strassberg had difficulty finding a school that would let him survey students about such a sensitive topic.
http://goo.gl/BtCyU (Chrony)

Utah Co. has 11 of state’s fastest-growing cities

New census numbers show Utah County is home to 11 of Utah’s 12 fastest-growing cities, and the one exception is a city nearby.
University of Utah research economist Pam Perlich calls Utah County the epicenter of the state’s growth.
While Utah’s fastest-growing municipality is Heber City in Wasatch County, Utah County includes the next 11 cities on the list. Those are Saratoga Springs, Spanish Fork, Highland, Eagle Mountain, Springville, Pleasant Grove, Lehi, Lindon, Payson, American Fork and Orem.
Provo ranks 15th on the list.
http://goo.gl/6lZaR (PDH)

New donor policy ends the Scott Cate Era at Cottonwood

MURRAY — Cooper Bateman has listened to Scott Cate preach about how football is actually teaching the 17-year-old how to succeed in business more times than he can count.
Now the Cottonwood High quarterback is relying on the lessons he learned from those discussions as he navigates losing Cate as a coach.
The Granite School District’s decision to amend a rule governing donations from private citizens ended Cate’s 13 years as the Colts’ offensive coordinator on Monday. The policy, which the Granite School Board will vote on in final form at their next meeting July 10, precludes donors who give more than $499 over the course of a season or year from serving in a coaching, supervising or organizing capacity or “exerting any other direct or indirect influence over students, teams or any other school program or function.”
http://goo.gl/hxZFq (DN)

http://goo.gl/a8U4P (KSL)

Lincoln Elementary celebrates Olympics Day with competition

LAYTON — As Lincoln Elementary School sixth-grader Manny Benitez ran down the track during the 100-meter event Thursday as part of the school’s annual Olympics Day, he couldn’t help but run faster hearing the cheers coming from the finish line.
“Hearing my friends and teachers cheering helped me to not be that nervous,” Manny said.
More than 600 students at Lincoln Elementary, a year-round school in Layton, participated in the school’s 11th annual Olympics. With the 2012 Olympics in London just weeks away, the students were excited to share in the Olympic spirit.
http://goo.gl/2eAm5 (OSE)

Assistance League aims to help area kids in need

ST. GEORGE — Although there aren’t any meetings scheduled until fall for the Assistance League of Southern Utah, its members are still working on fundraising ideas and hoping to bring aboard new members to assist with the organi zation’s goal of helping Washington County children in financial need.
Formed in 2008, the Assistance League of Southern Utah aims to help financially disad vantaged school- age children throughout Washington County, with thousands of volunteer hours logged and about 50 members, said Jackie Brown, Assistance League member and public relations director.
The primary goal of the Assistance League of Southern Utah is to raise money and purchase new school clothes for elementary-age children in Washington County through a program called Operation School Bell, Brown said.
http://goo.gl/gjJgO (SGS)

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OPINION & COMMENTARY
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Too few ed bucks
Salt Lake Tribune letter from Jennifer DeVries

Perhaps The Salt Lake Tribune hid in the depths of the Utah section the story “Utah still ranks last in per student spending” (Tribune, June 22) because it is embarrassing. We’re $1,000 per student below the next lowest spender. Even more embarrassing is Utah’s F for effort, “for the percentage of the state’s Gross Domestic Product given to education.”
It’s only fair to bury this story, since the state seems to have given up on improving the state of public education.
http://goo.gl/QAiqa

How GERM is infecting schools around the world
Washington Post commentary by Pasi Sahlberg, author of “Finnish Lessons: What Can the World Learn About Educational Change in Finland?” and director general of Finland’s Center for International Mobility and Cooperation

Ten years ago — against all odds — Finland was ranked as the world’s top education nation. It was strange because in Finland education is seen as a public good accessible to all free of charge without standardized testing or competitive private schools. When I look around the world, I see competition, choice, and measuring of students and teachers as the main means to improve education. This market-based global movement has put many public schools at risk in the United States and many other countries, as well. But not in Finland.
You may ask what has made Finland’s schools so extraordinary. The answer has taken many by surprise. First, the Finns have never aimed to be the best in education but rather to have good schools for all of children. In other words, equity in education comes before a ‘race to the top’ mentality in national school reforms.
Second, Finns have taken teachers and teaching seriously by requiring that all teachers must be well trained in academic universities. All teachers should enjoy professional autonomy and public trust in their work. As a consequence, teaching has been a popular career choice among young Finns for three decades now. Today the Finnish government invests 30 times more in professional development of its teachers and administrators than testing its students’ performance in schools.
Third, Finnish educators have learned systematically from other countries how to reform education and improve teaching in schools. The United States has been a special source of inspiration to Finland since John Dewey a century ago.
http://goo.gl/S8y0b

Health-Care Ruling Has Implications for Education Spending
Education Week commentary by columnist Mark Walsh

The part of the U.S. Supreme Court’s historic decision upholding the new federal health-care law which also held that its Medicaid expansion was unduly coercive on the states likely has implications for federal education spending programs.
In fact, just as they did at oral arguments in March over the Affordable Care Act, the justices in their opinions on Thursday raised several education laws and cases, making comparisons between the federal health insurance program for the poor and the Elementary and Secondary Education Act, for example. Some of the justices most critical of the health law also appeared concerned about an ever-expanding federal role in education.
On the central question in the health-care case, the court ruled 5-4 that the individual health insurance mandate that is a linchpin of the law could be upheld under Congress’ taxing power.
On the Medicaid issue, the court effectively ruled 7-2 that the Medicaid expansion violates the U.S. Constitution by threatening the states with the loss of their existing Medicaid funding if they decline to comply with the expansion.
Congress put “a gun to the head” of the states to force them to to add a much larger pool of the poor to the Medicaid rolls, Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. said in his main opinion in National Federation of Independent Business v. Sebelius (Case No. 11-393). Medicaid funding accounts for over 20 percent of the average state’s total budget, with federal funds covering anywhere from 50 to 83 percent of those costs, he noted.
http://goo.gl/FzZoE

Report: Make Improving Teacher Working Conditions a Priority
Education Week commentary by columnist Liana Heitin

To boost teacher retention and student achievement at high-poverty schools, states and districts must first look to improve working conditions for teachers, concludes a new report by The Education Trust, a Washington-based nonprofit group. The report profiles five school districts that have focused efforts on bettering teacher support and development—specifically by strengthening leadership and encouraging professional collaboration—and have shown promising or positive gains as a result.
The report follows on the heels of the recent annual MetLife Survey of the American Teacher, which found that teacher satisfaction has dipped to its lowest point since 1989. That annual survey suggested that education budget cuts were to cause, at least in part, for declining morale. It also stated that teachers with high job satisfaction were more likely to say that their school or district provided adequate time for professional development and collaboration than were those with low satisfaction.
The Ed Trust report, entitled “Building and Sustaining Talent: Creating Conditions in High-Poverty Schools That Support Effective Teaching and Learning,” looks at three districts that implemented long-term programs in high-poverty schools to improve support for teachers and have seen gains in student achievement.
http://goo.gl/ZUnWO

A copy of the report
http://goo.gl/rEHFF

Draft of Common Science Standards Draws Friendly Fire
Education Week commentary by columnist Erik Robelen

The first public draft of common science standards is encountering some criticism from a prominent teachers’ organization and a Washington-based think tank, with the former complaining of a “lack of clarity and coherence” in the performance expectations, and the latter saying the draft serves up an overdose on scientific “practices” while omitting some key content knowledge that it argues needs to be explicitly included.
In both instances, the feedback is essentially a “critical friend” approach, as the National Science Teachers Association is a partner involved in the development of the standards (and as such, has been privy to earlier, private drafts), and the Thomas B. Fordham Institute is a strong advocate for producing common science standards.
http://goo.gl/UHZht

George W. Bush Institute Examines NCLB Waivers
Education Week commentary by columnist Alyson Klein

The U.S. Department of Education is slated to announce another round of waivers from mandates of the No Child Left Behind Act any day now. While you’re waiting to find out if your state got the coveted flexibility, check out this analysis of the first 11 already-approved batch of waivers, done by the folks at the George W. Bush Institute.
Bush, of course, is super-closely associated with NCLB. And most Politics K-12 readers probably already know some of those who work at the Institute. The analysis was done in part by Kerri Briggs, who is now the director for education reform at the Institute. She served in the U.S. Department of Education under President Bush, including as assistant secretary of elementary and secondary education. She also served as the state superintendent for Washington, D.C.
So what’s the analysis? The Institute came up with a list of 10 principles of a strong accountability system, including concrete goals, rigorous standards, valid assessments, and testing in science in at least one grade span.
http://goo.gl/bSh7g

Media: Behind The Scenes Of Campaign Season Press Announcement
Scholastic commentary by columnist Alexander Russo

Curious about how your education news gets shaped and delivered to you these hazy days of summer? The process isn’t quite as convoluted as Congressional sausage-making but it’s not straightforward, either. There’s lots of schmoozing and advantage-seeking involved, some pecking order stuff, and a certain amount of wailing and gnashing of teeth.
If I’ve got the story right about today’s mini-story on the new NCLB waivers, the White House decides last night to announce another five states getting NCLB waivers — including Virginia. (They’ve got potential items like this lined up from around the various cabinet agencies to keep a flow of good news going in general and on the education front hope to erase the memory of Iowa getting rejected.)
The White House press office takes the lead. The story gets offered to the AP for a 6 am embargo. The other national education reporters get left out and have to “follow,” which papers hate to do with competitors. That’s at least partly why, so far at least, we haven’t seen anything from the NYT, WSJ, Washington Post, or USA Today. The other reason being it’s not that big a story.
By 9, EdWeek gets a story up — just about the same time as the official release comes out — from the White House. As of 11, there’s still no press release from the USDE press office.
Nefarious? Not at all? Unusual? Not the least (for campaign season). Important? Probably not. But still good to know what’s going on behind the scenes, why stories appear in some places and not others, etc. And it’s probably quite annoying to education reporters and USDE folks who are used to doing things their own way.
http://goo.gl/ULBzy

The Making of the Principal
Five Lesson in Leadership Training
Wallace Foundation analysis

For more than a decade, The Wallace Foundation has worked with states and districts to develop and test ways to improve school leadership in order to promote better teaching and learning. Improving the often-weak training of principals has been central to that work. Drawing on new research and lessons from the field, this report updates a 2008 Wallace report, Becoming A Leader: Preparing Principals for Today’s Schools. It takes a fresh look at the continuing progress and lingering challenges of providing every school with leaders who have the necessary preparation to help all children succeed
as learners.
http://goo.gl/fJkUk

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NATIONAL NEWS
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Meet Romney’s Top Education Adviser
Former Education Secretary Rod Paige takes on federal spending, teachers unions and school-voucher critics.
The Root

Before we start our interview, Rod Paige wants to be clear. “I’m not speaking for the Romney campaign,” he said. “I’m speaking for me.”
As Mitt Romney’s special adviser on education, Paige nonetheless offers, in addition to his own views, insights on the presidential candidate’s education agenda. The former secretary of education under President George W. Bush, born in 1933 in segregated Mississippi, Paige was named to the Romney campaign last month. He has also served as a teacher, dean of the College of Education at Texas Southern University and superintendent of the Houston Independent School District.
His disclaimer, perhaps, comes on account of his reputation for being plainspoken. In 2004, for example, Paige likened the National Education Association, one of the nation’s largest labor unions, to “a terrorist organization” (he later recanted). He was also mired in a scandal when officials of Houston’s school system were found to have underreported dropout numbers during his tenure as superintendent.
In Paige’s new role in the Romney campaign, he is helping the former Massachusetts governor shape a national education policy.
http://goo.gl/8JL5E

Professors condemn New York’s ‘overreliance’ on standardized tests
Syracuse (NY) Post-Standard

Syracuse University Dean of Education Douglas Biklen joined with other education experts across New York today to condemn the state’s “overreliance” on standardized testing to decide the fate of students, teachers and schools.
Panel members, who held a news conference at New York Civil Liberties Union headquarters in New York City, announced they were sending a petition to the Board of Regents containing 1,100 signatures of professors across the state urging an about-face in education policy.
“High-stakes testing — and educators know this — is bad for children, bad for teachers, bad for schools,” said Diane Ravitch, an education professor at New York University and senior fellow at the Brookings Institution. “We’re now using tests as a one-size-fits-all measure for everything — to close schools, fire teachers, decide which kids will be held back and which will be promoted.”
http://goo.gl/QzQQr

New Companies Seek Competitive Edge in LMS Market
Companies old and new are jockeying for position in the unsettled market for learning-management systems, seeking to innovate and fulfill districts’ evolving needs
Education Week

Don McIntosh has been cataloging the learning-management-system industry for nearly two decades.
And since creating “Vendors of Learning Management and E-Learning Products,” an evolving document that logs creations and changes in the K-12, postsecondary, and corporate LMS markets, it’s grown from the size of a book report to that of a decent-sized novel.
“It’s getting to be such a huge list that it’s beginning to lose its usefulness,” laments McIntosh, the president of Trimeritus eLearning Solutions, an education consulting group based in Burnaby, British Columbia. “The idea was that it would provide a tool for people to select an LMS. But the list is so long now that it doesn’t help them. You can’t issue requests for proposal to everyone on the list.”
Industry followers say the continuing entrance of new LMS creators may signal transition, and not stability, and it may mean the sector is becoming one in which new entrants have real opportunities to leap ahead of established players.
http://goo.gl/nlatm

Abdul-Jabbar: More Opportunities to Turn Pro in Science Than in the NBA
U.S. News & World Report

American students lack the skills needed to compete globally in science, technology, engineering, and math. But the cause of that skills gap isn’t our education system; it’s our culture, inventor and entrepreneur Dean Kamen said Tuesday at the U.S. News 2012 STEM Summit.
“To think that it’s a supply problem or that it’s an education problem is ridiculous,” Kamen said.
Undermining efforts to promote interest in STEM education is a culture that places sports stars and celebrities on pedestals, but makes scientists and engineers the butt of jokes, he added.
This is especially true in underserved minority communities, said basketball superstar Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, a sports legend in his own right.
http://goo.gl/X0T0g

Texas GOP’s 2012 Platform Opposes Teaching Of ‘Critical Thinking Skills’
Talking Points Memo

The Republican Party of Texas’ recently adopted 2012 platform contains a plank that opposes the teaching of “critical thinking skills” in schools. The party says it was a mistake, but is now stuck with the plank until the next state convention in 2014.
The plank in question, on “Knowledge-Based Education,” reads as follows:
“We oppose the teaching of Higher Order Thinking Skills (HOTS) (values clarification), critical thinking skills and similar programs that are simply a relabeling of Outcome-Based Education (OBE) (mastery learning) which focus on behavior modification and have the purpose of challenging the student’s fixed beliefs and undermining parental authority.”
Elsewhere in the document, the platform stipulates that “[e]very Republican is responsible for implementing this platform.”
Contacted by TPM on Thursday, Republican Party of Texas (RPT) Communications Director Chris Elam said the “critical thinking skills” language made it into the platform by mistake.
http://goo.gl/YiA0I

Scantron Inventor Dies
[R] [I] [P]
Talking Points Memo

Sad day in the world of standardized testing … the genius who invented Scantron has passed away.
Michael Sokolski — who co-founded Scantron in 1972 — died June 13 at the age of 85 … after suffering from congestive heart failure.
Sokolski didn’t just change the world of education … after WW2, he fought with Polish Forces under the British Eighth Army Command from 1945 to 1947 … and was honored with the Italy Star and War Medal for his service.
Pencils down.
http://goo.gl/ACnYj

http://goo.gl/mg4xm (The Lookout)

To Lure ‘Twilight’ Teenagers, Classic Books Get Bold Looks
New York Times

Teenagers are still reading the classics. They just don’t want them to look so, well, classic.
That is the theory of publishers who are wrapping books like “Emma” and “Jane Eyre” in new covers: provocative, modern jackets in bold shades of scarlet and lime green that are explicitly aimed at teenagers raised on “Twilight” and “The Hunger Games.”
The new versions are cutting edge replacements for the traditional (read: stuffy, boring) covers that have been a trademark of the classics for decades, those familiar, dour depictions of women wearing frilly clothing. In their place are images like the one of Romeo in stubble and a tight white tank top on a new Penguin edition of “Romeo and Juliet.”
The covers are intended to tap into the soaring popularity of the young-adult genre, the most robustly growing category in publishing. In the last decade, publishers have poured energy and resources into books for teenagers, releasing more titles each year. Bookstores have followed suit, creating and expanding special sections devoted to them.
http://goo.gl/16i3N

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