Turning teaching upside-down
Witty, brilliant, self-effacing, a seeming agnostic in the education wars over school choice and performance pay, Salman Khan is an unlikely revolutionary. But Khan, the former hedge-fund manager...
View ArticleA bulwark against bad eating
With monster 49ers tackle Bill “Bubba” Paris heading a soccer ball to Brandi Chastain (her idea) and Superintendent of Public Instruction Tom Torlakson leading elementary school students in San Jose on...
View ArticleNo middle ground
The idea that hormonally-challenged young teens need a school of their own between elementary and high school turns out to be bad academic policy, according to a new study from Harvard University....
View ArticleBig choices for LA teachers
Teachers and principals in the state’s largest school district will be able to free themselves from a range of district policies and restrictions of the union contract – if they choose to. In a break...
View ArticleOnce more around the track of school reforms in Los Angeles Unified
In a new labor agreement that embraces local school autonomy, Los Angeles Unified School District Superintendent John Deasy has jumped from one school reform horse to another. He dismounted the Public...
View ArticleA case study for NCLB waiver
A couple hundred children sitting cross-legged covered the floor of the multipurpose room at Oak Ridge Elementary School in Sacramento. Behind them, parents, grandparents, and siblings filled rows of...
View ArticleInnovators for youth honored
The founder of a network that provides support for gay students and the founders of two effective nonprofits that provide hope and training for at-risk youths in Oakland and Santa Clara County are...
View ArticleState leaders should embrace what Title I permits: arts funding
The status quo is “stalemate.” The intention of the federal Title I program is to improve the academic achievement of children in schools with the highest percentages of children low-income families....
View ArticleLearning 2.0: Writing gets serious when schools become publishers
Ben Heckman, an 8th grader from Framington, Minnesota, is a twice-published novelist whose story was told in a New York Times piece about the growing number of young writers who break into print,...
View ArticleSIGnificant improvementS
John Fensterwald contributed to this report. California received a double dose of good news this week about the School Improvement Grant (SIG) program. U.S. Education Secretary Arne Duncan announced...
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