schoolinfosystem.org
David Blaska: One of the candidates will help choose a new superintendent. Pray God it is not another terminally Woke clone of Jennifer Cheatham!Which it will be if Feltham is elected. She’s the one who says “Our schools are products of white supremacy.” Of course, she is endorsed by the teachers union and the Defund the Cops Capital Times. […]
Alex Zimmerman: New York City education officials plan to take a stronger hand in what curriculums educators can use in their classrooms, a move that could represent a major shift in how the nation’s largest school system approaches teaching and learning, Chalkbeat has learned. The education department recently began laying the groundwork for superintendents to […]
Brian Lopez The move is in response to years of poor academic outcomes at a single campus in the district, Phillis Wheatley High School, and allegations of misconduct from school board members. TEA Commissioner Mike Morath said state law requires his agency to either close that campus or appoint a new board to oversee the […]
Scott Girard: The debate also featured discussions about how high-density developments affect Madison Metropolitan School District’s student population and whether it is time to bring police back into schools. Reyes said there is concern among some residents that large housing developments taking place all over the city are pricing some families out of areas and […]
About 25 to 27 minutes into the program. Jeff Mayers: “You want a big hunk of the surplus to go to K-12, you’ve already talked about that along with the state school Superintendent. I want to focus a bit on the reading program. Last session you vetoed a bi-partisan bill to boost reading scores. This […]
Scott Girard: An effort that began in summer 2021 to gauge the Madison Metropolitan School District’s equity work found that students, parents and staff are aware of some district efforts toward diversity, equity and inclusion but want more involvement and more communication with district administration. The district partnered with Jerlando Jackson, now the dean of the College […]
Scott Girard: Wisconsin requires 437 hours of direct instruction to kindergartners, at least 1,050 hours of direct instruction in grades one through six, and at least 1,137 hours of direct instruction in grades seven through 12. In a message to families about the most recent change, Associate Superintendent of Teaching and Learning Cindy Green wrote […]
Kaleem Caire, via email: February 28, 2023 Dear One City Parents, This is an important time for One City Schools and for education across the state of Wisconsin. Over the next several months our legislature and governor will be engaging with one another and individuals and organizations from across the state to inform what will […]
Emma Camp: One California high school has eliminated honors classes for ninth- and 10th-grade students. While school officials claim that the change was necessary to increase “equity,” the move has angered students and parents alike. “We really feel equity means offering opportunities to students of diverse backgrounds, not taking away opportunities for advanced education and […]
Emma Camp: One California high school has eliminated honors classes for ninth- and 10th-grade students. While school officials claim that the change was necessary to increase “equity,” the move has angered students and parents alike. “We really feel equity means offering opportunities to students of diverse backgrounds, not taking away opportunities for advanced education and […]
Wisconsin Senate (and Assembly) Committee on Education: Department of Public Instruction Laura Adams -Policy Initiatives Advisor for the State Superintendent Duy Nguyen – Assistant Superintendent for the Division of Academic Excellence Tom McCarthy – Executive Director for the Office of the State Superintendent ExcelinEd Dr. Kymyona Burk – Senior Policy Fellow University of Wisconsin–Madison Mark […]
David Blaska: Blaska’s Bottom Line: Used to be that some fairly accomplished individuals sought to serve in public office. Think of Mary Burke, former executive with the Trek bicycle company, and James Howard, an economist with the U.S. Forest Products Laboratory, not that long ago. On the other hand, they hired Jennifer Cheatham! More. Scott […]
Dave cieslewicz: Anybody who serves as Madison Schools Superintendent deserves our thanks. I’ve always thought that it’s the toughest job in Madison, even tougher than being mayor. Yesterday Carlton Jenkins announced his retirement effective at the end of July, after only three years on the job. Let’s thank him for his service and wish him […]
Chris Rickert: Citing an exodus of core-class teachers, Madison charter school One City Schools told parents of about 60 students Thursday that it would shut down its first ninth- and 10th-grade classes after only one semester. The school’s vice president of external relations, Gail Wiseman, said the school lost five teachers since the beginning of […]
Jason Dougal: Not one of these districts is growing. Some of them have lost more than 10 percent of their students since the pandemic started. Enrollment losses will be an enormous, ongoing challenge for many school systems across the U.S. post-pandemic. “What we’re trying to do is just stop the bleeding,” said Jerry Almendarez, the superintendent […]
Dylan Brogan: The “time is now” to eliminate standalone honors classes in Madison high schools, according to Superintendent Carlton Jenkins. At a Dec. 5 school board meeting, Jenkins said a “racist attitude” underlies support for keeping separate classes that offer more rigorous coursework to students. “We are no longer going to uphold what is considered […]
Landon Mion: Loudoun County Superintendent Scott Ziegler was fired by the school board Tuesday night in response to a grand jury report on the district’s handling of two sexual assaults committed by the same student. The Northern Virginia district drew national attention last year after a father accused it at a school board meeting of covering up […]
Scott Girard: West math teacher Sigrid Murphy said that even more recently, in the 2020-21 school year, “30% of the students in geometry at West identified as white while 72% of the students in geometry honors identified as white.” The school’s overall enrollment that year was about 52% white students. “Within the (West) math department, […]
Wall Street Journal: The parental revolt even spread to Minnesota despite opposition from teachers union. Denise Specht, the president of the teacher’s union Education Minnesota, claimed in September that its “political program has been successful between 80 and 90 percent of the time when our locals make endorsements in school board races and carry out an […]
Ed post: In a California school district, a group of formidable mothers are raging against a new superintendent, whom they say is working to indoctrinate their children with left-wing ideals about race and gender. In the name of parental choice, they say, the district should give the superintendent the boot. They attack the superintendent for […]
Scott Girard Vander Meulen has faced an opponent in each of her two previous campaigns. In 2017, Ed Hughes was on the ballot but dropped out of the race following a health issue in his family and in 2020, the late Wayne Strong ran against her, but suspended his campaign amid his own health issues before returning […]
Jessica Winter: The 2022 midterm elections offered many snapshots of the contemporary school wars, but one might start with the race for Superintendent of Education in South Carolina, a state that languishes near the bottom of national education rankings and that’s suffering from a major teacher shortage. Lisa Ellis, the Democratic candidate, has twenty-two years of teaching […]
David Blaska: Because our Woke school boss confuses correlation with causation. Like all good critical race theorists, he’s big on disproportionality. If A doesn’t equal B, he goes all Al Sharpton. Today’s subject is time outs in an empty room for troublemakers or, rarely, restraint. Restraint being just holding back a kid so he doesn’t bust another […]
Wall Street Journal: According to Open The Books, which focuses on government transparency, the state has 132,188 public employees with salaries and benefits over $100,000. That’s a total cost of $17 billion. The list includes 10 police department leaders and 18 school superintendents with salaries above $300,000 and some 16,592 retirees with six-figure pensions. Five […]
Dick Hall-Sizemore Governor Youngkin declared it “catastrophic” and proceeded to blame his predecessors. It should be pointed out that the Northam administration and the “mainstream media” had begun sounding alarms several years ago. The Richmond Times-Dispatch, much criticized on this blog, declared in 2018 that “Virginia’s failing grade on reading SOLs must not be tolerated.” The administration began […]
Bianca Vazquez Toness and Jocelyn Gecker: But there’s another reason for asking what lessons have been learned: the kids who have fallen behind. Some third graders struggle to sound out words. Some ninth graders have given up on school because they feel so behind they can’t catch up. The future of American children hangs in the balance. […]
Scott Girard: “This means a lot to me because I don’t want students who are younger than me to lack various resources and opportunities that will be offered,” La Follette’s Yoanna Hoskins said. “I want my teachers to be well compensated and respected for all the hard work they put in every single day.” Adding […]
Scott Girard: Two years into the job, Madison Metropolitan School District superintendent Carlton Jenkins received praise from the Madison School Board for his handling of the district’s 2022-23 budget and leadership. A summary of the board’s annual performance review of the district’s top staff member was released Wednesday evening. While most of the review was […]
Leah Triedler: But in a statement after the speech, Republican Sen. Alberta Darling, chair of the Senate Education Committee, said Wisconsin students’ poor performance stems from Gov. Tony Evers “refusing to reform education in Wisconsin” despite Republican efforts, including a literacy bill Evers vetoed twice. Darling said Underly is following in his footsteps. “The DPI Secretary […]
Mitchell Schmidt: A new coalition of conservatives, policy groups and advocacy organizations has begun developing a package of education goals for the coming legislative session — with expanded school choice as a top priority — that could play a considerable role in the upcoming race for governor this November. Officials with the Wisconsin Coalition for […]
Mitchell Schmidt: A new coalition of conservatives, policy groups and advocacy organizations has begun developing a package of education goals for the coming legislative session — with expanded school choice as a top priority — that could play a considerable role in the upcoming race for governor this November. Officials with the Wisconsin Coalition for […]
Moria Balingit: While students saw across-the-board gains in the 2021-2022 school year compared to the previous academic year, state education officials said the progress was not enough, and pinned some of the good news on lowered standards — not on better student performance. “Despite the scores being up from last year, they are down from […]
Heather Smith: During his rough and tumble 1997 campaign Evers directly criticized fellow Democrat Benson saying he had failed to call attention to the problems in our state’s education system, and that continual promotion of the good without sounding the alarm on the bad “wrecks our credibility.” Evers said students and districts were in trouble […]
Christopher Fountain: Per D.C.’s Office of the State Superintendent of Education website, “Beginning in the 2022-23 school year, the COVID-19 vaccine is required for school enrollment and attendance in the District of Columbia for all students who are of an age for which there is a COVID-19 vaccination fully approved by the US Food and Drug […]
Dave Cieslewicz: That’s an average of about 3.5 times a day or almost once per day to each school. According to a story in this morning’s Wisconsin State Journal the breakdown is 220 calls to East, 158 to La Follette, 170 to Memorial and 92 to West. In addition to the raw numbers there were […]
MacIver: Claim 1: Tony Evers has Taken Wisconsin Schools into the Top 10 in the U.S. The ad repeats a brag Evers has been making for months. The top 10 ranking issued by US News, shows Wisconsin’s rank improved 10 places since the 2018 list. Evers has been taking credit for the improvement although the […]
Scott Girard: While there is a large influx of federal COVID-19 relief funding, officials have expressed hesitancy at using that one-time money for ongoing operational costs like salaries. “You’re going to hear no argument from us that our teachers and our staff deserve better,” LeMonds said at one of MTI’s rallies in May. “The fiscal […]
Matt Barnum: Catholic schools are serving tens of thousands fewer students than they were before the pandemic, indicating that these schools have typically not been the destination for students across the U.S. forgoing public schools. Catholic enrollment cratered during the 2020-21 school year, when those schools saw their biggest enrollment decline in many decades. In the most […]
Sean Phillip Cotter: Boston Public Schools, which has narrowed its ostensibly nationwide superintendent search down to one current and one recent former BPS administrator, is beset on all sides by poor student outcomes, yawning socioeconomic achievement gaps, reports of increased violence in and around school buildings, declining enrollment and snarled student transportation strategies. The commissioner […]
Jenna Russell: The discussion came one day after the release of the state’s latest report on Boston schools, which tracked the district’s progress since 2020 in addressing a series of critical shortcomings. The review, part of an ongoing process of state oversight, found a few encouraging results, but mostly highlighted wide swaths of continuing stagnation, […]
Thomas Kane A third alternative would be lengthening the school year for the next two years. Of course, districts would have to pay teachers, janitors, and bus drivers more, perhaps at time and a half, to work the extra weeks. But unlike with tutoring or double-dose math, districts already have the personnel, the buildings, the […]
Dana Goldstein: How Professor Calkins ended up influencing tens of millions of children is, in one sense, the story of education in America. Unlike many developed countries, the United States lacks a national curriculum or teacher-training standards. Local policies change constantly, as governors, school boards, mayors and superintendents flow in and out of jobs. Amid […]
Libby Sobic: Gov. Tony Evers’s recent vetoes put him at a historic rate of total vetoes compared to previous governors. Of the more than 100 vetoes he executed a week ago Friday, about a quarter were related to education. In many veto messages, the governor cited his previous role as state schools superintendent. Yet his […]
Daniel Lennington and Will Flanders Last week, Wisconsin Superintendent of Public Instruction Jill Underly put out a press releasebroadly outlining her plans to address Wisconsin’s racial achievement gap. While it is perhaps a positive to finally see the superintendent addressing the failings of Wisconsin’s public schools, this release offers a disturbing window into the way […]
Libby Sobic: Gov. Tony Evers’s recent vetoes put him at a historic rate of total vetoes compared to previous governors. Of the more than 100 vetoes he executed a week ago Friday, about a quarter were related to education. In many veto messages, the governor cited his previous role as state schools superintendent. Yet his […]
Molly Beck: Democratic Gov. Tony Evers on Friday vetoed legislation that would have dramatically overhauled education in Wisconsin by making all children eligible to receive a taxpayer-funded private school voucher, regardless of their household income. Parents would have been able to sue school districts for violations of a new “parental bill of rights” under another bill Evers […]
NEO Remember back when transgender rights was about adults, and there was lengthy screening by the medical and therapy professionals involved to make sure that those adults were not making the choice because of other mental health issues? Now it’s about keeping kids’ secrets from parents whose rights diminish every day: “Parents are not entitled […]
Heather Knight: San Francisco public school officials and board members talk a lot about kids like Royal Holyfield, an 11-year-old Black boy in fifth grade at a Tenderloin elementary school. They talk a lot about equity. They talk a lot about narrowing the persistent achievement gap between Black kids and their white and Asian peers. […]
DPI Superintendent Jill Underly: Dear Wisconsin Families and Educators, I am writing this letter to you as a fellow parent and a former teacher. Like you, I know what it means to be involved with my children’s education, and I love it. But I look at the way politicians talk about parental involvement, and I […]
Molly Beck: Two Republicans running for governor said this week they would sign legislation that dissolves the state’s largest school district while the Democratic incumbent who spent a career in education said the idea would throw Milwaukee’s children into “chaos.” Gov. Tony Evers, a former state superintendent and public school educator, signaled Tuesday he would […]
Wisconsin State Senator Alberta Darling: Wisconsin has a reputation for reform. It’s time we regain our status as a national leader and innovator for education reform,” Darling said, “We are putting parents and their children firstw , we are going to increase transparency and accountability, and we will be funding students, not systems.” Parental Bill […]
Will Flanders, DPI itself has also contributed to this problem in a number of ways. Nearly $150,000,000 of state education spending is retained at the state level for operations. In addition, DPI has contributed and created the barriers for teachers to access the classroom. With barrier upon barrier to get licensed to teach, it is difficult to recruit and […]
Lindsey Burke and Corey DeAngelis: Imagine being a second grader in a major city right now. If you entered kindergarten during the 2019-20 school year, COVID-19 first closed your school in March, potentially offering “remote learning.” As you prepared to enter first grade the following fall, you were one of more than half of students […]
Scott Girard: MMSD spokesman Tim LeMonds told the Cap Times in an email Tuesday the district’s attendance rate Monday was 80.6%. That’s below the average of more than 90% throughout the 2020-21 school year, according to attendance data received through an open records request. Other area school districts, which all returned from winter break as […]
Douglas Belkin: K-12 schools around the country are pressing forward with tentative plans to reopen after the holiday break in the midst of a surge in Covid-19 cases. Their biggest challenge: getting enough rapid tests to be able to step up or launch “test-to-stay” strategies. School-district superintendents are weighing how—and when—to reopen, a decision driven […]
Brett Healy: Further proving that we have learned absolutely nothing from the last 22 months, both Milwaukee Public Schools (MPS) and the Madison Metropolitan School District (MMSD) announced plans to scrap students’ return to the classroom following Christmas break. Neither sounded particularly optimistic that this would be a temporary move. “While it is our goal […]
Elizabeth Beyer: It’s a complaint echoed by parents across the district Monday, on a day most expected to see their children back at school, as they were elsewhere in Dane County (but not in the state’s largest district, Milwaukee, which also went back to online learning temporarily). Several parents said they didn’t object to the […]
Mackenzie Mays: California’s first superintendent of equity lives in Philadelphia and has a separate job there, more than 2,500 miles away from the schools he advises as one of the highest paid officials in the state Department of Education, according to records and interviews. Daniel Lee, a psychologist, life coach and self-help author, owns a Pennsylvania-based […]
Clint Cooper: “To a child who doesn’t read,” the nearly 50-year-old public service television advertisement intoned, “the world is a closed book. Drifting, dropping back, dropping out. Once you start a child reading, there’s no stopping them. If America is to grow up thinking, reading is fundamental.” The commercials were made on behalf of a […]
Representative Jeremy Thiesfeldt: Moving the goal line on scores doesn’t change the sorry outcomes Rep. Jeremy Thiesfeldt and the Chairman of Assembly Committee on Education released the following statement on the results of the 2019-20 District and School Report Cards released by the Department of Public Instruction on Nov. 16:“Wisconsin State Superintendent Jill Underly and […]
What is happening in our public schools? Tonight I will again be speaking at an event hosted by @RightsParents. Topics include CRT, vaccines, @WILawLiberty‘s litigation & policy work, and lots of time for Q&A – 6PM. Lancaster City Hall, 206 S. Madison Street, Lancaster, WI pic.twitter.com/inSf0kKgDW — Dan Lennington (@DanLennington) November 16, 2021 Meanwhile, Ali […]
Minneapolis parents have taken their frustrations with the school district’s level of illiteracy to the superintendent’s house pic.twitter.com/dSVOLyoUDa — Beth Hawkins (@beth_hawkins) November 7, 2021 Seth 2017: West High Reading Interventionist Teacher’s Remarks to the School Board on Madison’s Disastrous Reading Results Madison’s taxpayer supported K-12 school district, despite spending far more than most, has long tolerated disastrous […]
Ian Prior: It all started in February 2019 when Loudoun County made national news after the president of the Loudoun County NAACP claimed that students at Madison Trust Elementary were instructed to pretend to be slaves during a gym class activity. This exercise was presented to the media as a “runaway slave game.” The school was quick […]
Abbi Debelack: The latest data on testing and proficiency rates for Wisconsin’s children were recently released by the Department of Public Instruction and it is not pretty. Yet despite the alarmingly low test scores, there appears to be little to no outrage by the media and education establishment. Each year, Wisconsin students, in various grades, […]
Karen Vaites: Later that evening, Minneapolis superintendent Ed Graff nearly lost his job. Four school board directors voted not to extend his contract. The only named concerns related to literacy, a weak spot in his performance review and a source of community concern (cut to 1:52:15 of the meeting for more). Graff held onto his job by […]
Paula Bolyard: ** I recall a former Madison Superintendent occasionally using these words “we have the children”. ** Moms and dads, you know what’s best for your own children. That’s long been my mantra, harkening back to my early blogger days when I fiercely defended a parent’s right to determine the course of his or […]
Riley Vetterkind: Teaching public school students and training employees about concepts such as systemic racism and implicit bias would be banned under legislation Republicans passed in the state Assembly Tuesday. GOP lawmakers also approved a bill, 61-37, that would create a statewide civics curriculum that all Wisconsin public and private schools would have to follow. […]
Representative Robin Vos: “Funding for K-12 education in Wisconsin is at historic levels, and this year our schools received a massive amount of one-time federal dollars. The Democrats’ singular focus to push more money into schools isn’t a winning strategy for our kids. We need to look at improving how they are being taught and […]
In her State of Education Address, State Superintendent Jill Underly commented on the divestment of schools in WI. But schools don’t have a funding crisis. With COVID aid coming into WI, schools received a record amount of funding in the 21-23 budget. https://t.co/h3IP4iCwYq pic.twitter.com/zHwFCpNTgu — MacIver Institute (@MacIverWisc) September 23, 2021 2017: West High Reading […]
Emily Files Hamilton Superintendent Paul Mielke believes his district is following CDC recommendations. “It still came across as a ‘recommend’ and we are strongly recommending [masks,]” Mielke says. “So we’re actually matching their language. If they would have said schools should mandate, we would have looked at that.” Still, Mielke says the masking decision was […]
Elizabeth Beyer: The DeForest, Middleton-Cross Plains, Monona Grove, Mount Horeb, Stoughton, Verona and Wisconsin Heights school districts have not yet made a decision regarding mask requirements in school buildings for the 2021-22 school year. Most of the Dane County districts that responded to requests for comment said they plan to finalize safety plans in August. […]
Joanne Jacobs: Only 45 percent of would-be elementary teachers pass state licensing tests on the first try in states with strong testing systems concludes a new report by the National Council on Teacher Quality. Twenty-two percent of those who fail — 30 percent of test takers of color — never try again, reports Driven by […]
Joe Hong: Some school officials are flouting the updated state rules, saying students will be allowed to return to the classroom with or without a mask. California’s smallest school districts say they will refuse to send kids home for not wearing a mask despite a new state mandate. Superintendents in these tight-knit and typically more […]
Shannon Whitworth: School Choice advocates across the nation were given a gem of an opportunity this past year to prove the value of their programs when teachers unions refused to return teachers to classrooms when it was demonstrably safe to do so. In fact, across 30 states nearly 50 school choice bills were introduced this […]
Chris Mertes: Sun Prairie School Board members who questioned district administrative team decisions to end “high stakes summative” semester and final exams on Monday, June 21 were cautioned to remember board governance procedures and reminded it was not an area over which the board could take action. The questioning of administrators began during the board’s […]
Wisconsin Supreme Court: For the respondent, there was a brief filed by Remzy D. Bitar, Sadie R. Zurfluh, and Municipal and Litigation Group ̧ Waukesha. There was an oral argument by Remzy D. Bitar. For the petitioners Wisconsin Council of Religious and Independent Schools, et al., there was a reply brief filed by Richard M. […]
Peter Anderson: The Capital Times editorializes, “Madison has a great public schools system” and Board President “Ali Muldrow, is a dynamic leader “who will move Madison schools in the right direction” — sentiments reminiscent of the acclaim it offered former Superintendent Jennifer Cheatham, whose policies Muldrow seems poised to continue. But is it really great? […]
Wisconsin Policy Forum: Since 2013, the Wisconsin Policy Forum has produced an annual report on the superintendent’s proposed Milwaukee Public Schools (MPS) budget that analyzes and describes the key elements and provides an independent assessment for school board members as they deliberate its contents. Last year, for the first time, we produced a similar budget […]
James Varney: An occasional interview series with Americans who are challenging the status quo. Picking fights with lawyers and Green Berets can be a bit risky, and that is doubly true when one of them has extensive experience with totalitarian tactics. Gordana Schifanelli is a lawyer married to a former Army special forces officer, and what’s […]
WILL: The Wisconsin Institute for Law & Liberty (WILL) issued a letter, Monday, to Madison Metropolitan School District (MMSD) Superintendent, Dr. Carlton Jenkins, urging the school district to address the racial segregation employed at Madison West High School for Zoom conversations on current events. This is the second occasion in the last year where WILL has warned […]
Institute for Reforming Government, Wisconsin Manufacturers & Commerce, Wisconsin, Federation for Children School Choice, Wisconsin Action ExcelinEd in Action, Wisconsin Institute for Law & Liberty, The John K. MacIver Institute for Public Policy Badger Institute, FreedomWorks and Building Education for Students Together: Dear Governor Evers, Speaker Vos, Majority Leader LeMahieu, and State Superintendent Stanford Taylor, […]
David Dahmer: As president, Reyes has been the face and often the spokesperson of the Madison School Board during some very trying and challenging times including the COVID-19 pandemic and the canceling of in-person classes, the hiring of new MMSD superintendent twice (Dr. Matthew Gutierrez rescinded his acceptance of the job before MMSD started over […]
Molly Beck: One of the most influential lawmakers over the state budgeting process said he wouldn’t support increasing funding for the state education agency because its new leader elected Tuesday was heavily backed by Democrats and teachers unions. Assembly Speaker Robin Vos, R-Rochester, made the statement just an hour after Pecatonica School District Superintendent Jill […]
Molly Beck: The $797 million allocated for Milwaukee amounts to $11,242 per student — the second-highest distribution of COVID-19 relief funding. On the lowest end, the McFarland School District in suburban Madison will receive $107 per student, according to an analysis released by the nonpartisan Legislative Fiscal Bureau. Republicans who control the state’s budget-writing committee […]
Transcript [Machine Generated PDF]: Deborah Kerr: [00:43:53] Um, whose turn is it to go first? Okay. That’s fine. Yeah, we’re pretty good at figuring this out. Um, [00:44:00] so that’s one thing we can do. Um, yes, I support the FORT. I fo I support the Praxis test. So you gotta think about something. Why […]
Wispolitics: State superintendent candidate Deb Kerr called for all K-12 schools to reopen for in-person instruction, claiming “the science is clear” such a move is kids’ best interest. Meanwhile, Kerr’s opponent Jill Underly slammed her for lying about the science behind reopening schools. At a Saturday news conference on the Capitol steps, Kerr warned the […]
Dylan Brogan: District officials are refusing to release a 2020 report detailing an investigation into a former Madison East High School educator. David Kruchten allegedly placed hidden cameras in the hotel bathrooms of students he was chaperoning on school trips. Students found these cameras concealed in smoke detectors, alarm clocks and air fresheners while at […]
The Economist: Montgomery County, where your columnist’s three offspring attend (loosely speaking) public school, is on track to be the last of America’s 14,000 districts to return pupils to the classroom. Provided the board does not put the brakes on its latest back-to-school plan, as it has three times previously, Lexington’s two sons in elementary […]
Scott Girard: Superintendent Carlton Jenkins shared the data from the family survey that went out Feb. 17 with the School Board this week. He said about 65% of families — or about 7,790 families — with a student in those grades, which will be among the first to return in a phased reopening process, had […]
Will Flanders: Governor Tony Evers’ 2021-23 budget includes a Christmas tree for teachers unions in the form of higher spending and no requirements to get kids back into the classroom. But it also represents a renewed assault on the state’s high-performing school choice and charter programs. Below are three school choice takeaways from the governor’s budget proposal. Enrollment Caps on Choice Programs […]
Kristin Graham: The Philadelphia School District has pushed back its reopening date for a third time. Superintendent William R. Hite Jr. said Wednesday 9,000 prekindergarten through second-grade students won’t return on Feb. 22 as planned but will instead go back March 1 amid an ongoing building safety dispute between the district and its teachers’ union. […]
Patrick Marley and Molly Beck: Republican legislative leaders immediately rejected the full proposal because of provisions within it that would roll back policies they enacted under a Republican governor. “He’s not serious about governing, he’s serious about politics,” Assembly Speaker Robin Vos, R-Rochester, told reporters after the budget address. Vos said the budget proposal was […]
Rebecca Bodenheimer, PhD: I think we’re at a crucial point in this debate on school reopening right now. Case rates are dropping quickly, the surge is over, and people are starting to get vaccinated — though way too slowly of course. The public health community, including the CDC, have reached consensus that reopening schools is […]
Isaac Chotiner: Last month, San Francisco’s Board of Education voted, 6–1, to change the names of forty-four schools, including schools named after Abraham Lincoln and George Washington. A committee formed by the board in 2018, in the wake of the white-supremacist rally in Charlottesville, had determined that any figures who “engaged in the subjugation and enslavement of human […]
Kristen A. Graham and Maddie Hanna: The Philadelphia School District and its teachers’ union on Thursday moved toward a possible showdown over plans to reopen schools next week, with teachers questioning whether it’s safe to return to buildings and Superintendent William R. Hite Jr. saying he expected them to do so. Days after criticism erupted over […]
David Blaska: Our favorite Madison morning daily newspaper, the Wisconsin State Journal, wants our public schools open for in-classroom teaching (and, often, learning). So do the kids. So do their parents. What’s the hold-up? The teachers union, of course. It is always the teachers union. In sticking their nose above the foxhole here in the occupied […]
Erica Green: The reminders of pandemic-driven suffering among students in Clark County, Nev., have come in droves. Since schools shut their doors in March, an early-warning system that monitors students’ mental health episodes has sent more than 3,100 alerts to district officials, raising alarms about suicidal thoughts, possible self-harm or cries for care. By December, […]
Anthony Lonetree: The St. Paul school board is being asked Tuesday night to sign off on nearly $1.3 million in wage-and-benefit increases for many of the district’s highest-paid employees. The agreement spans the 2019-20 and 2020-21 school years and covers 25 members of Superintendent Joe Gothard’s administrative team. The group is not represented by a […]
New Jersey Left Behind: This is a petition circulating among Montclair parents who oppose the district’s decision to begin the school year remotely, despite 70% of parents voting for an “in-person hybrid model.” At the bottom of the petition, signatories ask that district personnel, not MEA (Montclair Education Association, the teachers union) fulfill requests under the Open Records Act […]
Alec Johnson: Data from the Waukesha School District shows students have been struggling in the district’s hybrid learning model, with about 30% of high school students failing at least one class during the first quarter last fall. The data, which came from an open records request submitted by parent Rebecca Flaherty, was sent to a reporter by […]