November 17, 2015

Delaware News

Delaware 105.9
Lawmakers question Wilm. redistricting funding plan
With a month to go before the Wilmington Education Improvement Commission goes before the State Board of Education with its redistricting plan, lawmakers are asking tough questions about how it will be funded.

The News Journal
Carney: renew grants for science, engineering majors
U.S. Rep. John Carney, D-Delaware, wants to resurrect a federal program that gave $4,000 in grants to college juniors and seniors who come from low-income families and enroll in science and engineering majors. The goal is to train more workers for American jobs that are sitting open because there are too few workers with needed skills, while bringing diversity to fields historically dominated by white males.

Cape Gazette
O’Mara: Miles to go, a lot to be proud of: Fifth annual Sussex Outdoors Summit focuses on children
Parents and schools are two big obstacles between kids and outdoor experiences, said Collin O’Mara, speaking to a few dozen outdoor enthusiasts gathered Oct. 30 for the fifth annual Sussex Outdoors Summit. A whole generation of people did not spend time outside when they were young, and in schools, a lot of nature-based education has fallen by the wayside because it’s viewed as an unnecessary extra-curricular activity, said O’Mara, former Delaware Department of Natural Resources and Environmental Control secretary and current National Wildlife Federation president and CEO.

WHYY
Sussex County organization is helping to build up teenage girls
A Sussex County organization is helping young women see their worth. The organization Pathways to Success which helps high school students get through school and transition to college, has been working on programs to teach young men and women life skills after learning about some alarming statistics. According to Faye Blake, the program’s executive director, Sussex County has one of the highest unintended pregnancy rates when it comes to girls between the ages of 14 and 18.

WDEL
Brandywine to seek referendum next year
Four years since its last vote, Brandywine School District has begun the process for bringing another referendum forward with Superintendent Dr. Mark Holodick leading the charge. “The reality is if you don’t pass a referendum, and there are plenty of fine examples, unfortunately, around us right now in other districts who did not pass referendums last year, you have to cut staff,” said Holodick. “You have to minimize your programming, and it impacts what happens in the classroom and in the school.”

National News

Argus Leader
SD public universities transition to yearlong student teaching
Traditionally, student teaching lasts a semester, but South Dakota’s public universities are transitioning to a yearlong model.

Education Week
California’s largest online charter school network gets green light to unionize
eachers at California’s largest online charter school network have unionized, according to the San Bernardino County Sun. The state’s Public Employment Relations Board gave the green light on Oct. 30 to California Virtual Educators to become the official union for California Virtual Academies. The California Teachers Association will be the bargaining representative. CTA is the statewide National Education Association affiliate, and last year its leadership said it planned to focus more on unionizing charter schools.

NPR
Your school shapes how you think about inequality
Ask yourself this question: Were you aware of inequality growing up? Your answer may depend in part on where you went to high school. Students at racially diverse schools, particularly black and Hispanic students, are more tuned in to injustice than students going to school mostly with kids that look like them. That’s one of the main threads of a new book by Carla Shedd, an assistant professor of sociology and African-American studies at Columbia University. In Unequal City: Race, Schools, and Perceptions of Injustice, Shedd goes straight to the source: the students at four Chicago public high schools. She even let the kids pick their own pseudonyms.

Record
Advanced Placement courses surge, but so does debate about worth and stress
Advanced Placement courses are all the rage in New Jersey this school year, with many high schools having added more of the college-level courses to meet surging demand. Students and advocates of the courses cite their value as college preparation, and parents hope to save on the cost of college credits earned for free in high school. But critical observers also are pointing to the amplified stress that AP courses put on already high-achieving students with packed schedules.