Education News Roundup: Sept. 28, 2012

Today’s Top Picks:

Provo Daily Herald completes its series on school finance.
http://goo.gl/Wdi02 (PDH)

Two takes on school lunch:
1. D-News and KSL.
http://goo.gl/RulTK (DN)
and http://goo.gl/w2lX6 (KSL)
2. Daily Show with John Stewart.
http://goo.gl/VSxRl

Christian Science Monitor looks at a new study on charter schools and how they can help traditional public schools.
http://goo.gl/rhTuw (CSM)

What did political insiders think of education speeches at the conventions?
http://goo.gl/1HNuk (HuffPo)
A copy of the survey
http://goo.gl/tWUPq (Whiteboard Advisors)

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TODAY’S HEADLINES
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UTAH

Where does the buck stop?
Follow the money – if you can

Students, parents, educators displeased with new school lunch standards

Opposition to Mountain View Corridor freeway near Hunter High continues Education » Parents worry about student safety as UDOT considers traffic changes in the area.

Competition names Mueller Park nation’s best junior high School pride » Students, teachers, administrators celebrated their recognition at an assembly.

More than half of Park City adults graduated college

Decision on Eastern Utah’s tar sands mine expected next month Water board » Members to consider final approval for Book Cliffs mine.

Jordan district earns $35k from school bus ads

Trustees: Teachers dismissal will stand

AFJHS students back in class after student lit fire in bathroom

Volunteer service at Kearns Junior sweeps through community Service » At Kearns Junior High, students aren’t the only ones learning or benefiting.

It’s a real smash: Sky View students damage car as part of driving campaign

Antelope Elementary implements fitness program with rewards

Centerville School ‘Treking’ To Raise Money For Technology

First responders teach students about public safety

Utah Teachers Crystal Spackman and Randy Olsen Win the Golden Apple Award

Evaluating schools: Tips for finding the best school for your child

OPINION & COMMENTARY

Conservative confusion continued: the lessons of No Child Left Behind

What else – and whom else – will we leave behind?

The Geography of Nope

Education is civil right

How the Common Core changes everything

Starved by the Bell

NATION

Traditional or charter schools? Actually, they help each other, study says.
A new study suggests that best practices from charter schools can help student achievement at underperforming public schools. The issue is getting the two to cooperate.

Parent-Trigger Laws: A Bold Plan To Save Schools

Romney, Obama Education Speeches Paled In Comparison To Bill Clinton, Jeb Bush At Political Conventions: Insider Survey

State Ballot Measures Include Hot K-12 Issues Funding, teachers, charter school access all on election menu

Q&A: Quest for ‘Digital Wisdom’ Hinges on Brains and Machines

McGraw-Hill exec: tech will make us rethink age-grouping in schools As digital learning platforms continue to personalize education, McGraw-Hill SVP Jeff Livingston believes schools, particularly at the high school level, will need to rethink grouping students by age and instead organize students by competency.

Shift Happens: Junyo Changes Course
High-profile edtech startup Junyo moves ahead in a new direction

Arne Duncan would stay on for second Obama term

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UTAH NEWS
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Where does the buck stop?
Follow the money – if you can

Here’s a challenge for you. Call your local state legislators and ask how your tax dollars make it from your bank account, then to the state, and then into your child’s classroom.
They may laugh. Or they may shrug in frustration. They may attempt to change the conversation and talk to you about how Utah could change education funding for the better.
The truth is they more than likely can’t answer the question. They can guess; they can tell you where the money should have gone; but they have no way of knowing where the money actually goes.
http://goo.gl/Wdi02 (PDH)

Students, parents, educators displeased with new school lunch standards

WEST JORDAN — Copper Hills High School student Jacob Eisert, like millions of his peers nationwide, made his way to the school lunchroom Thursday and stood in line to pick up a tray of food.
After passing the pay station, he looked down at his lunch — a small cup of watermelon and a half-empty to-go container of rice and orange chicken. The food is good, he said, but most of the time he’s hungry before the end of the day.
“It’s good. I like it,” he said, “but there could be more.”
Eisert may not be as critical as some of his peers, but he’s just as hungry.
School lunch has come under fire nationwide, as new federal guidelines aimed at improving student health roll out this year. In Utah, educators have fielded complaints from hungry students and concerned parents, while trash cans at some schools fill with uneaten items.
http://goo.gl/RulTK (DN)

http://goo.gl/w2lX6 (KSL)

Opposition to Mountain View Corridor freeway near Hunter High continues Education » Parents worry about student safety as UDOT considers traffic changes in the area.

The Utah Department of Transportation on Thursday continued to field concerns from worried parents in the Granite School District who fear plans for the future Mountain View Corridor freeway could create a dangerous traffic situation for Hunter High School students.
About 30 parents, students and neighbors showed up at a Thursday meeting at the Hunter High library. The meeting was meant only for Granite School District officials, including Superintendent Martin Bates, and UDOT employees. But parents showed up to the closed meeting anyway, anxious to repeat their concerns about children’s safety as officials discussed the next steps in the project.
http://goo.gl/PxHNK (SLT)

Competition names Mueller Park nation’s best junior high School pride » Students, teachers, administrators celebrated their recognition at an assembly.

Bountiful • From a pool of 3,000 schools in 545 districts spread across 39 states, only one junior high was awarded the National Association of Middle School Principals/Lifetouch School of the Year.
The recipient of this prestigious award is Bountiful’s Mueller Park Junior High.
Students at Mueller Park were presented with a crystal trophy, a huge banner for their foyer and a check for $1,500 at a Back to School Assembly on the morning of Sept. 6. The award made for a festive assembly where the student jazz band performed, cheer leaders cheered and student body officers introduced themselves and performed skits for their fellow students.
http://goo.gl/fBFH8 (SLT)

More than half of Park City adults graduated college

While Park City may be known for indie films and skiing, it is also boasts a large percentage of college graduates.
U.S. Census Bureau data compiled between 2006 and 2010 show that 62.4 percent of adults 25 and older living in the Summit County resort have at least a bachelor’s degree.
Utahsright.com reviewed census data for the communities covered by The Salt Lake Tribune’s Close-Up editions.
Of those cities, Park City came in first, followed by Holladay with 48.4 percent of its adult residents having a college degree, followed by Fruit Heights, with 48.1
Salt Lake City, home to the University of Utah and Westminster College, was in eighth place, with 39.9 percent of its adult residents possessing a college degree.
At the bottom end of the scale, Kearns had the least, with 10.8 percent, followed y Magna, 12.2, and West Valley City, 12.8.
The statewide average is 29.4 percent.
http://goo.gl/kTtEs (SLT)

Decision on Eastern Utah’s tar sands mine expected next month Water board » Members to consider final approval for Book Cliffs mine.

Plans for a Book Cliffs tar sands mine — the nation’s first fuel-producing one — will be up for final approval next month before the state Water Quality Board.
Board members set a brief hearing on the PR Springs project for their next meeting, Oct. 24, when they will hear from the company behind the project, Alberta-based U.S. Oil Sands, and the group that appealed the initial project approval by Water Quality Division Director Walt Baker, Moab-based Living Rivers.
Baker signed off on the proposal last year without requiring a groundwater-pollution permit. His decision was partly based on the contention there is no groundwater to pollute in the project site, around 213 acres in the arid high country between Vernal and Moab.
And, while Living Rivers argued solvents used in the mining process would release cancer-causing petrochemicals by making the natural tars more mobile, US Oil Sands insisted its citrus-based solvent won’t harm the environment.
Judge Sandra Allen last month sided with Baker; her decision hinged on the ground water question.
Located within an area of about 50 square miles leased by the Utah School and Institutional Trust Lands Administration, the mine is expected to produce as much as 2,000 barrels of oil a day. The company hopes to be producing oil by the end of next year.
http://goo.gl/6wNAK (SLT)

Jordan district earns $35k from school bus ads

Jordan School District officials say they’ve earned $35,000 from ads on school buses in the first six months of the program.
http://goo.gl/O23yu (PDH)

http://goo.gl/Qd7ob (KSL)

Trustees: Teachers dismissal will stand

The Board of Trustees of the Fast Forward Charter School on Thursday upheld the decision made by the school’s administration to terminate language arts teacher Angie Johnson.
The decision was reached behind closed doors in an executive session and was announced during open session of the board meeting. A reason for the dismissal was not given by the board, but Johnson said it could have resulted from her performing body piercings for students after school hours.
http://goo.gl/RDjjd (LHJ)

AFJHS students back in class after student lit fire in bathroom

Students at American Fork Jr. High School were evacuated on Thursday morning after a bathroom was set ablaze by a student.
A teacher smelled smoke and put the fire out with an extinguisher, Alpine district spokeswoman Rhonda Bromley said. No one was injured and students returned to class after a fire department investigation ensured the fire had not spread into the ceiling and the walls.
“Students were put outside,” Bromley said. “All were accounted for. Everyone is safe.”
The fire was started by an eighth-grade boy in an upstairs boys bathroom. The student lit a soap dispenser ablaze, and the flames also damaged the wall and ceiling, and produced a lot of smoke, Bromley said.
http://goo.gl/5hOIR (PDH)

Volunteer service at Kearns Junior sweeps through community Service » At Kearns Junior High, students aren’t the only ones learning or benefiting.

All it takes is a single “yes” to build a community, says Kearns Junior High Principal Kandie Barber. After that, everything else follows.
Four years ago, Barber said yes to a grant from United Way that would open her school up as a community center to students and neighbors alike. That decision led to the creation of an after-school program, a mobile health clinic, a community English-speaking and computer class and a student-inspired mural.
Last year, adult volunteers said yes to giving service in United Way’s Day of Caring at Kearns Junior, and the example they set led students to create their own day of caring, which had the junior-high-schoolers planting flowers, washing fire engines and working at the food bank.
http://goo.gl/Nkb9A (SLT)

It’s a real smash: Sky View students damage car as part of driving campaign

As students as Sky View High School pounded a Buick Century with sledgehammers Thursday, the idea of safe driving was also drilled into their minds.
As part of the Homecoming festivities, students bashed the maroon sedan that was spray-painted with their rival Logan High name and mascot in gold. The bashing was also part of the “Don’t Drive Stupid” campaign, a program that promotes safe driving among teenagers.
http://goo.gl/kZ921 (LHJ)

Antelope Elementary implements fitness program with rewards

CLEARFIELD — One of first-grader Luke Harrison’s favorite recess activities is to race his friends around the track that surrounds the playground at Antelope Elementary School.
“I do it because I want the charms,” said Luke, 6, of the new reward system the school has implemented this year to encourage students to use the track during recess.
For each quarter-mile lap the students choose to complete, they receive a star punch on the special cards they are issued. Once they receive 10 punches — the equivalent of about 2 1/2 miles — students are awarded a necklace with a tennis shoe charm.
For each subsequent 15 laps — a bit less than 4 miles — the students are awarded another charm.
http://goo.gl/W2cNz (OSE)

Centerville School ‘Treking’ To Raise Money For Technology

A local school is “treking” to raise money for technology.
Jenny P. Stewart Elementary School in Centerville is holding a walkathon on Thursday to raise money for technology.
http://goo.gl/eNm8K (KUTV)

First responders teach students about public safety

SPANISH FORK — The Utah County Fire Department’s fire engines were in action Thursday, but it wasn’t because of yet another wildfire. Rather, the Utah County Sheriff’s Office hosted its annual safety fair for Nebo School District children at the department’s base in Spanish Fork. Students from Spanish Oaks Elementary School traveled to the base to learn about the functions and equipment of several different departments under the sheriff’s office, including search and rescue, SWAT, K9, wildland fire and the bomb squad.
http://goo.gl/mC9Cm (PDH)

Utah Teachers Crystal Spackman and Randy Olsen Win the Golden Apple Award Christensen & Hymas Gives $100 Gift Card for Classroom Supplies PRWeb

The School Supplies Gift Program, sponsored by Utah-based Christensen & Hymas, is pleased to announce that Mrs. Crystal Spackman, an 11th & 12th grade teacher at Murray High School, and Mr. Randy Olsen, an 11th grade teacher at Jordan High School, are the next recipients of the Golden Apple Award.
Mrs. Spackman has been teaching at Murray High School for the past twenty-three years. Mrs. Spackman’s nominator said that “throughout those twenty-three years, there has been a decline in supply/book budgets and teacher pay. Yet, teachers still need supplies in order to help students succeed.” In order to help students succeed, and to fulfill their Language Arts Curriculum, Mrs. Spackman has implemented a new method for reading comprehension that includes lots and lots of post-it notes!
http://goo.gl/JeHPF

Evaluating schools: Tips for finding the best school for your child

For parents, the chance to provide an excellent education for their children is a key promise of the American Dream. Figuring out whether the school your child attends measures up to that dream can be tricky, though. In areas where parents can choose between public charter schools, traditional public schools and private schools, the complications multiply. Recognizing which schools are succeeding becomes even more important, and more difficult.
Studying data on school performance gives a picture of how students at the school perform on standardized tests. Although such information is valuable, parents should realize it paints only a partial picture of a school’s character.
http://goo.gl/RSW2h (DN)

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OPINION & COMMENTARY
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Conservative confusion continued: the lessons of No Child Left Behind Deseret News commentary by columnist Mary McConnell

As threatened, I wanted to return to Rick Hess’s analysis of conservative divisions – and disarray – on the future path of education reform, focusing this time on his analysis of No Child Left Behind.
Actually, NCLB provokes less conflict and creates less confusion than it probably should. The law is vilified from the far left to the far right of the political spectrum, and almost everywhere in between. But what does NCLB really teach us? That the federal government should get out of the education business? That standards should be jettisoned? That the federal government should loosen its purse strings . . . or tighten them?
http://goo.gl/l1fzv

What else – and whom else – will we leave behind?
Deseret News commentary by columnist Mary McConnell

Last night I posted Rick Hess’s account of how No Child Left Behind managed to anger and disappoint education reformers of almost every stripe. This morning I’d like to suggest that this consensus in favor of scuttling NCLB also poses a threat to education reform.
Okay, I’ve donned my armor. So now I’ll say it. NCLB did a lot of good. Specifically, the law generated and also publicized a great deal of data not only about student performance, but also about “disaggregated” student performance. In plain English, the law forced schools to reveal just how badly some groups of students were lagging behind.
In Utah, where I taught during the stormiest NCLB years, I watched the new law collide with a long and justified tradition of mistrusting federal government intervention.
But some of the nerves it jangled, frankly, deserved the hit.
http://goo.gl/bqNAL

The Geography of Nope
New York Times commentary by columnist TIMOTHY EGAN

SALT LAKE CITY — In a part of Italy where chestnut trees are thick in the Apennine foothills, I once asked a neighbor in the little community where we lived how I might kill a wild boar. This impulse was driven by appetite, mostly — glimpses of those feral beasts on my morning runs that had me dreaming of a blood-red ragu made of local cinghiale.
The answer was, dream on. If you want to hunt in Italy, or most of Europe for that matter, you’d better belong to a private club, with access to a rich man’s estate.
It struck me then, in the kind of epiphany that takes living in another country to appreciate, that the public land endowment of the United States is one of the greatest perks of this democracy. Rich or poor, every citizen of the United States of America has title to an area almost the size of Italy.
This ticket to roam free in the American backyard is no constitutional guarantee. The great, unfenced public domain, much of it forested or hidebound in sage and mesquite, is the envy of the rest of the world only because a few visionary souls bucked the powers of their day.
But now the powers of this day are trying to tear away at that inheritance. The election could determine whether big sections of our shared setting continue to be held by the general public. A radical plan to overhaul a century of sensible balance has been embraced by the Republican presidential ticket.
http://goo.gl/SDswQ

Education is civil right
Salt Lake Tribune letter from Nathan Johnson

With respect to advocates of same-sex marriage (whose cause I support), former Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice was absolutely right when she said at the Republican National Convention that giving every child, especially poor kids, an education is “the civil rights struggle of our day.”
Without a quality education a child’s opportunities are severely diminished. Until we truly believe that every child has a right to a quality education, and we are willing to make that happen through taxes, America will be the less.
Investing in the American people is never a bad bet. Why doesn’t Utah’s Legislature get that? Why aren’t we responding to the fact that two-thirds of our children don’t read or do math at grade level?
http://goo.gl/Opbh9

How the Common Core changes everything
Fordham Institute commentary by Institute President Chester E. Finn, Jr.

It’s well established that the Common Core State Standards (CCSS)—adopted in principle by forty-six states—won’t get any real traction unless they’re comprehensively and faithfully implemented at the state and local levels. (They also have implications for federal policy and programs, of course.)
But what is comprehensive implementation? True, we’ve heard much palaver about what the Common Core portends for assessment, for teachers’ professional development, and for curricular/instructional materials. All true, all crucial, and all probably the most urgent. But these issues are also just the tip of the CCSS iceberg, most of which remains invisible under water. What I haven’t seen yet is clear recognition that the Common Core, taken seriously, eventually changes everything in American education and that implementation, done right, must be comprehensive.
Which means what?
http://goo.gl/DFwpM

Starved by the Bell
Satire from The Daily Show

A federally mandated calorie limit on school lunches causes hungry students to protest smaller, healthier portions and to waste more food than ever.
http://goo.gl/VSxRl

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NATIONAL NEWS
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Traditional or charter schools? Actually, they help each other, study says.
A new study suggests that best practices from charter schools can help student achievement at underperforming public schools. The issue is getting the two to cooperate.
Christian Science Monitor

Charter schools are not a silver bullet for education reform, a new report says, but applying the best practices from some charter schools to low-performing public schools may increase student achievement.
Early data show that the strategy – applied in Houston and Denver pilot programs – yielded “promising” results, according to the report, titled “Learning from the Successes and Failures of Charter Schools” and released Thursday by the Hamilton Project at the Brookings Institution.
The study could help improve cooperation between charter schools and traditional schools, which have often viewed each other as competitors. The debate about whether charter schools or traditional schools are more effective is a false one and misses the central point, said secretary of Education Arne Duncan at the Hamilton Project’s education forum Thursday in Washington.
http://goo.gl/rhTuw

Parent-Trigger Laws: A Bold Plan To Save Schools NPR Talk of the Nation

Several states have passed what are known as parent-trigger laws, which give parents a path to make operational changes in failing schools. Education Week reporter Sean Cavanagh talks about where parent-trigger laws are in place and what we know about whether or not they are working.
http://goo.gl/WVoBM

Romney, Obama Education Speeches Paled In Comparison To Bill Clinton, Jeb Bush At Political Conventions: Insider Survey Huffington Post

Whiteboard Advisors, a consulting firm that specializes in school policy, recently conducted one of its monthly surveys of 50 to 75 anonymous political and policy “insiders,” including current and former senior staff from the U.S. Department of Education, White House, Congress and think tanks. Respondents were asked to weigh in on the Democratic and Republican National conventions, as well as the ongoing presidential campaign.
Although the vast majority of insiders are not convinced the Democratic and Republican platforms will have any real effect on education policy, 78 percent believe the inclusion of the Common Core standards in the Democratic platform will have a negative impact on linking federal policy and state cooperation — something that is necessary in order to enact the standards.
Nearly two-thirds of those surveyed reported that the Smarter Balanced Assessment Consortium is on the wrong track, and nearly one-third had the same thing to say about the PARCC consortium.
http://goo.gl/1HNuk

A copy of the survey
http://goo.gl/tWUPq

State Ballot Measures Include Hot K-12 Issues Funding, teachers, charter school access all on election menu Education Week

Big changes to the way teachers are evaluated and paid, expanded access to charter schools, and increased education funding are major issues on state ballot initiatives and referendums as election season enters its final weeks.
Some of the education-related ballot items, like those in Arizona and California, are part of the perennial effort to obtain more financial support for schools and seek to help K-12 school systems recover in part from the Great Recession and subsequent economic stagnation.
But other proposals—such as ones in Idaho and South Dakota—represent resistance from teachers’ unions and other groups to changes they view as antagonistic to public education, such as reduced collective bargaining rights or a bigger emphasis on standardized testing.
http://goo.gl/TrNUL

Q&A: Quest for ‘Digital Wisdom’ Hinges on Brains and Machines Education Week

Marc Prensky has written a number of books about the integration of technology and education. In his latest, Brain Gain: Technology and the Quest for Digital Wisdom, he argues that technology can be used to enhance the human brain and improve the way people process information. In a recent interview with Editorial Intern Mike Bock for Education Week’s Digital Education blog, Mr. Prensky talked about what teachers and education leaders can do to get more out of technology.
http://goo.gl/Xw8EY

McGraw-Hill exec: tech will make us rethink age-grouping in schools As digital learning platforms continue to personalize education, McGraw-Hill SVP Jeff Livingston believes schools, particularly at the high school level, will need to rethink grouping students by age and instead organize students by competency.
Gigaom

Online platforms like Khan Academy are already starting to flip classrooms across the country so that students can learn at their own pace. But some think it might not be too long before technology pushes schools to personalize education in even more structural ways, so that students are no longer grouped by age, but by competency.
Noting advances in educational technology –- from online platforms that deliver instruction to programs that analyze student learning data -– Jeff Livingston, senior vice president of College and Career Readiness at McGraw-Hill, said Thursday he thinks that in the next five to six years, schools and educators are going to have to rethink age-grouping as the primary organizing principle for K-12 education, especially at the high-school level.
In a virtual roundtable with reporters, he said, “What does it mean to be a 9th grader or 10th grader beyond being a certain age? … It doesn’t make sense that all the 15-year-olds are in this grade and all the 16-year-olds are in that grade. It should be where your interests, your skills and your mastery of certain concepts takes you.”
Mixed-age classrooms, not so unlike those from the days of the one-room schoolhouse, are already espoused by many Montessori and Quaker schools. In those environments, the thinking is that real learning is best accomplished when students are motivated to progress at their own pace and help each other.
But as technology helps teachers guide students through content at their own pace -– and effectively assess their mastery of skills and concepts -– multiage classrooms could become a reality in more traditional classrooms.
http://goo.gl/Uarh2

Shift Happens: Junyo Changes Course
High-profile edtech startup Junyo moves ahead in a new direction edSurge

Edtech startup, Junyo, started off with a flourish about 15 months ago: its chief executive, Steve Schoettler, left the high-flying social game company Zynga to devote his time to education. He was at the beginning of a wave of enthusiasm for applying the tools of “big data” and data analytics to education. He swiftly pulled together a strong team and won seed funding from the likes of NewSchools Venture Fund.
Now comes “the pivot.”
Within the past two weeks, Schoettler has had to make some uncomfortable phone calls to his four blended learning education partners, which together represent 11 schools. Junyo’s changing its plans, Schoettler told them. If they wish, Junyo will continue to support them through the end of the school year (next June) or refund their money. But instead of working directly with schools, Junyo is refocusing its efforts around building tools for analyzing data on student performance.
It’s the kind of change that happens frequently in tech businesses but it rattles schools and with good reason.
http://goo.gl/Scjk7

Arne Duncan would stay on for second Obama term Washington Post

Education Secretary Arne Duncan said Thursday that he intends to remain in the Obama cabinet if there is a second term. “I’m in it for the long haul,” Duncan said. “I’m staying, unless the president gets sick of me.”
Duncan is routinely praised by both Republicans and Democrats on Capitol Hill. He made the remarks after addressing a roomful of education officials and economists gathered for a program about K-12 education that was sponsored by the Hamilton Project, part of the Brookings Institution.
http://goo.gl/3AZrv

http://goo.gl/gT9yw (National Journal)

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CALENDAR
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USOE Calendar
http://tinyurl.com/5x9oh9

UEN News
http://www.uen.org

October 5:
Utah State Board of Education meeting
250 E. 500 South, Salt Lake City
http://www.schools.utah.gov/board/Meetings/Agenda.aspx

October 11:
Utah State Charter School Board meeting
250 E. 500 South, Salt Lake City
http://1.usa.gov/Axtt5K

October 16:
Executive Appropriations Interim Committee meeting
1 p.m., 445 State Capitol
http://le.utah.gov/Interim/2012/html/00001093.htm

October 17:
Education Interim Committee meeting
2 p.m., 30 House Building
http://le.utah.gov/Interim/2012/html/00001174.htm

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