September 10, 2013

Local News

The News Journal
Delaware’s Tower Hill School embraces new approach to learning
As students and teachers at Tower Hill School outside of Wilmington filed through the school’s brand-new science and math center on the first day of school this week, the reaction was similar. “Just wow,” sophomore Russell Applegate said. “It looks so state of the art. It’s like a college campus.” School officials say the 25,000-square-foot, $7 million facility will double the school’s teaching space for science and math.

SCSunTimes
Q&A with Smyrna School Board student member Diana Wilson
Smyrna High School senior Diana Wilson is the student member for the Smyrna Board of Education for the 2013-2014 school year. This duty includes giving reports of student achievements and activities at the monthly board meetings. Wilson recently took a few minutes to talk to the Sun-Times about her desire to be the student board member. She also talked about her involvement this summer as a member of the American Legion Auxiliary Girls State program that gives students an inside look into the state government.

Middletown Transcript
MOT Charter students raise $1,100 for new high school
A group of students and supporters of MOT Charter School held a fundraiser last month to help raise money for the construction of a new high school. The Light A Smile Foundation, as the group is known, hosted a carnival during the school’s Back-to-School Open House on Aug. 19. The event raised more than $1,100 for the new high school, which is slated to open next fall. The $13 million high school proposed for construction on 33-acres off of Cedar Lane is planned to open with 376 ninth- and tenth-graders enrolled in an arts academy or a science and technology academy.

National News

Politico
We must invest in early education
An opinion by Governor Jack Markell
Delaware is one of many states investing in strengthening its education system by, among other things, implementing the Common Core standards, an effort by America’s governors to raise expectations for what our students learn. But the impact of all K-12 education policies will be limited unless students are prepared to learn on Day One. Unfortunately, we are still not investing enough in early childhood education across the country.

Education Week
Arne Duncan to California: We can’t approve your testing plan in ‘good conscience’
California’s plan to dump most of its state testing program as it muddles through the tricky transition to new tests aligned to the common-core standards got a major rejection letter from U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan Monday. In a statement, Duncan said he couldn’t approve California’s plan in “good conscience.” The federal department, as required by the Elementary and Secondary Education Act, would have to approve any major changes to a state testing system—such as not administering tests to large groups of students.

The New York Times
One classroom, two genders
An op-ed by Jennifer Finney Boylan
As the nation’s classrooms welcome back teachers and students, it’s worth taking a moment to consider the methods — and the gender — of your own favorite teacher. A 2006 study by Thomas Dee, now a professor at Stanford, suggested that boys do better in classes taught by men while girls are more likely to thrive in classes taught by women. The study found that girls were more likely to report that they did not think a class would be useful to their future if it was taught by a man, and boys were more likely to say they did not look forward to a particular subject if it was taught by a woman.

Ed Source
State Board adopts national K-12 Next Generation Science Standards
California became the sixth state—along with Kansas, Kentucky, Maryland, Rhode Island and Vermont—to adopt the Next Generation Science Standards with the approval by the state board of education. The board, however, has not yet adopted a timeline for implementing them. There is some concern that teachers already will be overwhelmed by the Common Core math and English standards.

Inside Higher Ed
Pondering Pell
A new report from the Congressional Budget Office provides some facts about why spending on the Pell Grant program has grown significantly since 2006. The report also offers evidence about the potential effects of some of the current proposals to change the program and some alternative methods of helping low-income students afford college.