June 27, 2014
Local News
WDDE
Colonial School District names Blakey new superintendent
Colonial School District has a new superintendent. “I am humbled and honored to be selected to lead the Colonial School District during a time of change and reform,’ said Dr. D. Dusty Blakey in a statement. “I look forward to working with all constituents as we continue our quest to make certain every student is college and career ready.”
WDEL
Colonial School District names new superintendent
Blakey started his career in 1992 as a social studies teacher in the New Castle County Vocational Technical School District and has been an administrator in Colonial for 13 years. Blakey’s priorities include improving ties with business partners and increasing student achievement.
Coastal Point
IRSD rejects free lunch for all students in some schools
The Indian River School Board of Education this week discussed, and ultimately rejected, a free meals program. Funded by the U.S. government, students could get free breakfast and lunch though Community Eligibility Provision, regardless of economic necessity. The CEP aims to feed children in high-poverty areas.
National News
Education Week
College readiness needs to go beyond content to skill sets, researcher says
Colleges need more information about incoming students to get a better sense of whether they are truly ready for higher education—not just to be admitted, but also have the skills to successfully complete a degree.
Tennessee teacher-retention bonus paid dividends, study finds
Tennessee teachers with top teacher evaluation ratings were more likely to continue teaching in low-achieving schools when given a substantial pay incentive, according to a new working paper. But there’s a catch: The bonus program only seemed to affect teachers working in the “tested” grades, not those teaching other grades or subjects.
We must better prepare students for college
As high school graduation ceremonies wind down across the country, the nation’s foremost yardstick for measuring progress in student achievement is telling us that we are coming up short in preparing most of our high school seniors for the academic life they will face after receiving their diplomas.
Detroit Free Press
Concerns over charter school performance persist as more open in state
Two decades into Michigan’s charter school experience, it’s clear that some schools excel academically, others don’t — and charters have not found the key to educating children in poverty. In other words, their results are similar in many ways to the traditional public schools they hoped to outperform.
Washington Post
Montgomery schools chief offers new plan to tackle high rates of math exam failure
Montgomery County school officials have found no single cause to explain the district’s steep failure rates on high school math exams, but they are proposing a series of steps designed to help boost student performance and close the math achievement gap. Superintendent Joshua P. Starr offered a plan last week following concerns that started more than a year ago when exam failure rates of 50 percent to 60 percent in some courses alarmed parents in the high-performing school system.
Politico
Obama alums join anti teachers union case
Teachers unions are girding for a tough fight to defend tenure laws against a coming blitz of lawsuits — and an all-out public relations campaign led by former aides to President Barack Obama. The Incite Agency, founded by former White House press secretary Robert Gibbs and former Obama campaign spokesman Ben LaBolt, will lead a national public relations drive to support a series of lawsuits aimed at challenging tenure, seniority and other job protections that teachers unions have defended ferociously.