August 28, 2014

Local News

The News Journal
More charter schools report bus problems
Long-standing issues with bus contractors that serve charter schools boiled over this week as students across New Castle County endured hourslong delays and buses missing stops. One parent said she likes the teachers at Gateway Lab School but pulled her son out of the school because she was so frustrated with bus service.

Schools, use better communication
An editorial
It’s past time to take advantage of 21st-century technology to communicate quickly to parents the steps being taken to insure the safety and whereabouts of their students. While lost buses are not entirely uncommon on the first day, it is unacceptable that drivers are not equipped with modern GPS equipment or cellphones to call for help.

Prevent the hunger that hinders students’ learning
An op-ed by Mark Murphy, Secretary, Delaware Department of Education; Patricia Beebe, President and CEO, Food Bank of Delaware; and Angela Angelucci, President, Delaware School Nutrition Association
As children head back to the classroom this month, more than half of Delaware’s schoolchildren will receive free or reduced-priced meals from the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s National School Lunch program. This number has increased about 46 percent over the last decade

More child migrants placed with Del. families
The vast majority of child migrants placed with Delaware families are living in Sussex County, according to new figures released this week by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. Since January 1, 114 minors apprehended by immigration authorities without a parent or guardian have been placed with sponsors in Delaware’s southernmost county while they await immigration hearings and potential deportation.

A mother’s query highlights a generation’s pain
An editorial
There are just too many unattended young people, with no contact and respect for the guiding presence of adults who once mattered earlier in their lives. Such relationships are vital for this country, if for no other reason than to influence young criminals like Watson to first ask “Is it worth it?”

Smyrna-Clayton Sun-Times
Follow up: Smyrna School Board approves grading policy change
The Smyrna Board of Education approved the first reading of a proposed grading policy change at the June school board meeting. The Smyrna School Board approved the second reading of the grading policy revision Aug. 20 in the Board of Education meeting.

WDEL
Upward Bound Wilmington film wins national competition
Some students from Wilmington’s Upward Bound program are headed to D.C. next month after winning a national film competition. The 4-minute film about the Upward Bound Math Science program at Del Tech in Wilmington took first place out of hundreds of entries.

Delaware State News
New Woodbridge High an idea 45 years in the making
On Tuesday students in Greenwood will walk through the doors at the new Woodbridge High School for the first time. The school board first started talking about building a new high school in 1969, superintendent Heath Chasanov said. The 162,000-square-foot facility was funded when the community passed a $52.5 million referendum in March 2011. Officials broke ground in August 2012.

National News

Education Week
More states create independent charter-approval boards
Washington is among a small but growing group of states that have created independent charter boards to ostensibly add a layer of rigor to the systems that approve, oversee, and close charter schools. Such boards go by different names but are generally authorizing bodies separate from other state and local agencies whose sole purpose is to authorize charter schools statewide.

Women’s voices lacking on school boards
Women make up more than 40 percent of school board members nationally, more than double the average female participation in other governing groups in the United States. But unless they make up a supermajority of a board, women don’t comment and endorse motions as often as men do, according to studies in a newly released book, The Silent Sex: Gender, Deliberation, and Institutions.

Okla. Education Board creates standards committee
The Oklahoma Board of Education created a steering committee Wednesday to develop the process for replacing Common Core education standards for English and math instruction in the state’s public schools.

Hechinger Report
How to educate Americans for jobs? Ask the Germans, employers urge
Many college graduates need years of on-the-job training to get up to speed. Some hiring managers, a few policymakers, and a handful of community colleges are accepting help to solve this problem from an unexpected source: the Germans.

EdSource
No easy answers on “career readiness”
The “career” piece of “college and career readiness” continues to challenge the state advisory committee that is charged with reworking the primary measure of school effectiveness in California.

Daily Beast
What charter schools are getting right and why they top our high school rankings
It’s not a stretch to say that charter schools are some of the biggest winners in this year’s high school rankings list. Even though charters educate just five percent of American students, they represent 30 percent of the top ten schools in this year’s rankings. What’s more—and this is really the kicker—they’re the only ones in the top ten that do not use selective admissions.