July 21, 2017

Delaware News

Cape Gazette
Cape increases school tax rate
The Cape Henlopen school board approved a 27-cent increase in the tax rate July 13, primarily to cover increasing costs for special education for six district students. “This is hitting every district, not just us. We’re playing catch up since our tax rate is too low to support the expenditures that are coming,” said Oliver Gumbs, director of business operations. Gumbs said private, residential placements, which are very expensive, have doubled from three students last school year to six for the 2017-18 school year.

Coastal Point
Dagsboro offer for school resource officer rejected by IRSD
At the monthly town council meeting on July 17, Dagsboro Police Chief Floyd Toomey reported to the council on his presentation to the Indian River School District regarding the role of school resource officer. Dagsboro had asked Toomey to approach the district regarding the Town taking over the position of school resource officer for Indian River High School and John M. Clayton Elementary, via contract service through the Dagsboro Police Department.

Delaware Business Times
Survey looks at how teachers feel about their jobs
How do Delaware teachers feel about their jobs? An annual survey aims to figure that out. About 4,000 certified educators out of a total of 10,000 in the state responded to the 2017 Teaching, Empowering, Leading, and Learning (TELL) Delaware survey. They answered questions on everything from workplace conditions to curriculum and student resources.

Human Rights Campaign
Delaware Governor aims to make local schools more LGBTQ inclusive
Delaware Governor John Carney has issued a directive for the education department to draft anti-discrimination policies to protect LGBTQ students in the state’s public and charter schools. The memo was sent to Delaware’s Education Secretary Susan Bunting, calling for stronger protections statewide that would “prohibit discrimination based on gender, race and/or ethnicity, gender identity or expression, sexual orientation, or any other protected characteristic.”

Rodel Blog
Meet Jeremy Hidalgo
Hello! My name is Jeremy Hidalgo and I am excited to join the Rodel Foundation as a policy fellow. I am a Delaware native and recent graduate of the School of Public Policy & Administration at the University of Delaware (UD). At UD, I researched issues like prisoner reentry, healthcare, and reform; civil rights and environmental justice; restorative justice; and the effects of urban development on public education.

The News Journal
Carney vetoes bill eliminating 5-mile radius for charter schools
Gov. John Carney has vetoed a bill that would have eliminated charter schools’ ability to give enrollment preference to students who live within 5 miles of their campuses primarily because he felt it was unfair to Wilmington students in the Christina School District.  The bill would have allowed charter schools to prioritize students who live in parts of a school district “geographically contiguous” to them.

National News

Education Week
Florida to seek waiver from key ESSA provisions
Florida plans to seek a waiver from several fundamental portions of the Every Student Succeeds Act that dictate how schools handle some of the country’s most historically underperforming and disadvantaged students. But the draft request, which seeks to mostly keep intact a state school accountability system that predates the new federal K-12 law, already has inflamed civil rights advocates, and could prove an early test of how the U.S. Department of Education intends to weigh states’ bids for flexibility in the ESSA plans being submitted for approval.

The Atlantic
How teachers are taught
One charter school teacher-training program gives first-year teachers a part-time workload and allows them to learn alongside mentor teachers. Another has summer workshops that include home visits with students’ families. A third network often starts the year with a week of workshops at a Westchester hotel, has a staff member devoted to professional development, and brings in consultants for math, writing, and reading instruction.

The Hechinger Report
African-American boys who tell better stories as preschoolers may learn to read more quickly
Helping African-American boys improve their ability to tell stories in preschool could increase the speed at which they learn to read later on, according to new research from the Frank Porter Graham Child Development Institute at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill. Researcher Nicole Gardner-Neblett said the results were something of a surprise.

The Recorder
State Senate OKs mental health education
Three women from north central Massachusetts were on hand Thursday to watch as the Senate passed a bill they wrote to give high schools the option of adding mental health education to their health courses. The Senate’s approval of the bill marked a milestone for the college-aged women, who began their quest to add a mental health component to health education while attending Leominster High School.

USA Today
Teachers union boss skewers Betsy DeVos on vouchers, likening them to ‘cousins’ of segregation
In a blistering speech slated to be delivered to more than 1,400 teachers here on Thursday, American Federation of Teachers President Randi Weingarten likens U.S. Education Secretary Betsy DeVos to a climate-change denier, saying DeVos refuses to acknowledge “the good in our public schools and their foundational place in our democracy.”