December 10, 2015

Delaware

Cape Gazette
Local student honored for commitment to conservation
Young environmentalists put their pens to paper recently to support preserving the Cape Region. Winner Emma White, a fifth-grader at the Southern Delaware School of the Arts, used her experience at the beach to write an impassioned essay in support of conservation.

Delaware Public Media
Audit reveals money mismanagement at Family Foundation Charter
Family Foundations Charter School almost lost its charter last January when it was discovered that two board members had used $94,000 on school credit cards for personal use. State Auditor Thomas Wagner, Jr., released another report on the school Wednesday.

The News Journal
Audit: charter school’s use of money “unconscionable”
The leaders of Family Foundations Charter School spent recklessly and allowed hundreds of thousands of dollars in school funds to be spent for personal purchases, a report released Wednesday by the state auditor says. The News Journal has reported since January on allegations that the school’s former co-leaders, Sean Moore and Tennell Brewington, spent thousands on personal items like furniture, car payments, concert tickets and floral arrangements.

The Huffington Post
Career/technical education helping high schoolers
Blog by Jack Jennings, the author of Presidents, Congress, and the Public Schools
The old vocational education as a separate track leading to employment right after high school is being left behind. The new career/tech education seeks to prepare students for further education and advanced job training after high school. Exemplary high schools showing how to bring about these improvements are spread around the country. For example, New York City’s selective career/tech high schools, Delaware’s Sussex Tech, and career academies in various urban areas show how students can benefit from this alternative to the usual academic route.

Dover Post
Longtime Caesar Rodney educator takes new posting
After 30 years as a public school educator, Caesar Rodney School District employee Jeffery “Scott” Lykens, who was crucial in jumpstarting a number of programs in the district, is leaving to teach at the college level.

Office of Senator Coons
Senator Coons’ statement on new federal education laws
Press release
On balance, the Every Student Succeeds Act is a step forward for teachers, parents, and students in Delaware. This bill was negotiated in good faith by Republicans and Democrats, and I’m pleased that at such a divisive time, we have succeeded in putting politics aside for the sake of our nation’s students. While I’m also disappointed that the final version of this legislation didn’t include the American Dream Accounts Act — a bill I introduced with Republican Senator Marco Rubio to create a federal pilot program that awards grants to organizations and partnerships that help low-income students prepare for college — I will continue to fight to pass that important legislation through the Senate.

National Association of State Boards of Education
NASBE Awards Delaware, Maryland, Mississippi, Nebraska, and Wyoming Stipends for Policy Work in Standards and School Discipline
Press release
State boards of education in Delaware, Maryland, Mississippi, Nebraska, and Wyoming will receive $15,000 per year for two years under the Leading a Standards-Based System: Alignment Policy to Standards Stipend initiative. Over the next two years, these states will work with each other and with NASBE to move from a phase of standards adoption to one of policy alignment that results in integrated standards-based leadership. Each state was selected through a competitive application process on the basis of their internal capacity, willingness for change, and ability to collaborate with other state agencies and organizations to improve educational outcomes for students.

National

Los Angeles Times
More exercise at school may be key to improving teens’ health
Researchers have a prescription for improving the health of America’s teens: Get more exercise at school. Public health experts recommend that kids spend at least 30 minutes of the school day engaged in moderate to vigorous physical activity. That would get them halfway to the goal of exercising for at least an hour each day.

NPR
Heated arguments fly at Supreme Court over race in college admissions
Affirmative action in higher education was once again under attack before the Supreme Court Wednesday. In the past the court has allowed race as one of many factors in college admissions. But as it has grown more conservative, it has moved to reconsider the issue — including a test case from Texas that was before the court today for the second time

The Atlantic
Better schools, better economies
The benefits of a better education are most often discussed in terms of personal gain: higher wages, greater economic mobility, and generally, a better life. But not all the benefits are private: Local economies flourish when there are more skilled and productive workers. That’s the conclusion of the economists Eric A. Hanushek of Stanford, and Ludger Woessmann and Jens Ruhose of the University of Munich, whose new paper from the National Bureau of Economic Research takes a look at the financial return for states who invest in improving the quality of K-12 education.

Education Week
ESEA rewrite passes Senate, heads to president’s desk
Blog post by Alyson Klein
The U.S. Senate on Wednesday approved the rewrite of the withering No Child Left Behind Act—the current version of the ESEA—by a huge bipartisan margin, 85 to 12, mirroring the vote of 359 to 64 in the U.S. House of Representatives just days earlier. President Barack Obama is expected to sign the bill Thursday. But even as educators and policymakers toast the passage of the Every Student Succeeds Act, the next set of battles—over how the measure will be regulated in Washington and implemented in states—may just be getting started.

USA Today
Congress approves rewrite of K-12 education law
The Senate voted Wednesday to send President Obama a bill that dramatically overhauls K-12 education policy and ends more than a decade of strict federal control over schools. The Every Student Succeeds Act focuses less on standardized testing than the No Child Left Behind law it replaces, and it makes states once again responsible for fixing under-performing schools.