February 3, 2016
Delaware
Department of Education
Eligible DE students could save thousands in college tuition with Academic Common Market
More than 100 southern public colleges provide in-state tuition to eligible Delaware residents pursuing majors not offered at the University of Delaware or Delaware State University through the Academic Common Market (ACM). “The Academic Common Market saves students who want to pursue majors not available at Delaware’s public colleges a great deal of money,” Secretary of Education Steven Godowsky said. “It also provides more opportunities to Delaware students who want to pursue degrees not offered at these colleges.” The ACM is a tuition-savings agreement among 15 states that are members of the Southern Regional Education Board (SREB).
NewsWorks
Delaware teen teaches chess and valuable life lessons
Southbridge teenager Johnny Means has formed a chess club designed to do more than just play games. Johnny Means’ goal is not to just play chess well but use it as a life lesson to keep others out of trouble. For the past six years Means has worked on mastering the game and spending three nights a week teaching it at the Neighborhood House in Wilmington. Many of the young people are learning the game for the first time, but Means certainly has their full attention. He teaches about 20 students and has several goals in mind for each of them.
The Dover Post
Caesar Rodney hosting tutorials on updated SAT
The new Common Core-aligned SAT is coming next year and Caesar Rodney School District wants parents and student to be ready. Christine Alois, director of curriculum and instruction, said the high school will be holding information sessions. “This is a good way for us to work individually with students to prepare them for the test next year,” she said. The first round begins next week. The decision comes in the wake of the Gov. Jack Markell’s Jan. 6 decision to replace the Smarter Balanced Assessment for high school juniors with the SAT. Alois said switching gears isn’t going to be difficult.
Capital brings students into energy savings plan
Capital School District is looking to become more energy-conscious and wants help from its students. The district business manager, Sean Sokolowski, has introduced the School Energy Conservation Initiative to promote this goal. “It’s an area that we’d like to improve upon so we’re trying to get the schools involved to try and save energy themselves,” Sokolowski said. They originally discussed hiring a consultant to monitor the district’s power consumption by visiting each school to ensure they were cutting back.
The Harrington Journal
Colleges award Lake Forest senior nearly $2 million
For Lake Forest High School senior Daia Daniels, applying to one college wasn’t enough. Sixty-three college applications later, she’s been awarded with almost $2 million towards college and received only one rejection letter. When she’s not applying to colleges, Ms. Daniels, 17, stays busy with school, sports and volunteering. She currently maintains a 3.9 GPA, is a member of the National Honor Society and plays volleyball and basketball. She also played soccer during her high school career. This past summer, the teen volunteered at the Lake Forest Food Pantry Mondays through Thursdays for three hours each day to help serve lunch to area children at the home of another volunteer.
Teacher at Lake Forest East Elementary begs for more testing after cancer diagnosis
School officials are again discussing a possible cancer cluster at Lake Forest East after hearing of another staffer diagnosed with breast cancer. Lake Forest School District Superintendent Dr. Brenda Wynder said she plans to contact the company that formerly conducted an inquiry into the issue following a public comment made by a teacher of the Frederica facility who came forward during the meeting to “beg for more testing at East.” District officials previously contracted with Batta Environmental Associates, Inc. of Newark in 2014 to conduct an investigation due to the insistence of staff and community members.
WDEL
Gallaher Elementary to be 1st in Delaware to participate in NASA challenge
You may have a piece of NASA in your very own home and not even know it. “We have these missions that are very unique, so we have to develop a lot of our own technology, and any time a new technology is developed, our office looks at it and says, ‘How can this be used back down here on Earth?'” said Darryl Mitchell, Senior Technology Manager in NASA’s Innovative Technology Partnerships Office. Now, kids at Gallaher Elementary School outside Newark will come up with their own ideas for a spin-off as they become the first school in the state to compete in NASA’s Optimus Prime Spinoff Promotion and Research Challenge, that’s aimed at educating kids and the public about the secondary goal of all of NASA’s space mission–to bring new technology down to Earth.
National
Education Week
U.S. Education official apologizes for poor judgement, behavior
A senior Education Department official is apologizing for what he acknowledged was poor judgment and “unacceptable” behavior related to working on his side businesses with subordinates, failing to pay taxes on his profits and awarding a government contract to a friend’s company. The department’s chief information officer, Danny Harris, who’s set to testify before a congressional hearing scheduled Tuesday, received counseling but was not expected to receive any further punishment. Prosecutors declined to file criminal charges related to his acknowledged failure to report income from his side business to the Internal Revenue Service.
NPR
The Education Secretary calls for fewer, better tests
Acting U.S. Education Secretary John B. King Jr. wants states and districts to focus on streamlined, higher-quality tests in a broader effort to win back some classroom time. And here’s the kicker: The feds will actually pay for (some of) the transition. “Good assessments can be part of great learning experiences. But simplistic or poorly constructed tests just take away from critical learning time without providing useful information,” King said in a video announcement. “Despite good intentions, there are too many places around the country where the balance still isn’t quite right.”
PBS
Oklahomans have embraced free, universal education – and its working
One of the biggest employers in this hardscrabble working class town in western Oklahoma is the Bar-S Foods Company meat packing plant, where many of the city’s 9,500 residents work. Clinton also boasts a Route 66 Museum, a somewhat epic indoor waterpark, and free universal preschool for every 4-year-old in town. Ninety-one percent of the town’s 170 4-year-olds enroll in a public program annually, said Tyler Bridges, the assistant school superintendent. About 140 attend the state-supported district preschool while another 15 or so attend the local Cheyenne-Arapahoe Head Start program.
The Hechinger Report
California faces a dire teacher shortage. Should other states worry too?
California should consider recruiting teachers as early as high school and offer clear pathways to the classroom for aspiring educators who transfer from other careers or states to mitigate a chronic teacher shortage. Those are two of the policy recommendations in a new report by the nonprofit California-based Learning Policy Institute, which suggested seven strategies to get more teachers into the classroom, especially in hard-to-fill positions.
USA Today
Obama seeks $4B for computer science classes
President Obama will ask Congress for more than $4.2 billion to reboot computer science education programs in what the White House is calling an “Eisenhower moment” for technical education. The three-year initiative, called Computer Science For All, would help train teachers, equip classrooms, and develop new class materials. “We have to make sure all our kids are equipped for the jobs of the future – which means not just being able to work with computers, but developing the analytical and coding skills to power our innovation economy,” Obama said in his weekly radio address Saturday.