October 13, 2017

October 13th, 2017

Category: News

Delaware News

Coastal Point
Carver Academy unveils new murals
For some kids, it was an excuse to leave class. For others, it was a chance to paint past a bad day and inspire others having a tough time. George Washington Carver Academy unveiled five murals this month that are truly meant to make the school a better place. “Over the course of the 2016-17 school year, our students worked with local artist John Donato to create murals to display throughout school focusing on their work and positive actions … as well as utilizing art as a medium to represent themselves in a positive way,” said Principal Melissa Kansak.

Office of the Governor
Governor Carney, Christina School District, Christina Education Association announce letter of intent to form Wilmington schools partnership
Governor John Carney, Christina School District Superintendent Richard Gregg, and Christina Education Association President Darren Tyson announced on Thursday that they have signed a joint letter of intent to work together and develop a partnership with the goal of improving educational opportunities in the City of Wilmington. The partnership will address the long-term success for the 1,640 Christina students in preschool through grade 8 who reside in Wilmington and attend the district’s four city elementary schools and one middle school.

Rodel Blog
Treating the cause, not the symptoms: What education can learn from the social determinants of health
Blog post by Shyanne Miller, policy associate at the Rodel Foundation of Delaware
Individual behaviors play a role in educational outcomes, but inequitable social and economic factors loom even larger. We know that children of all backgrounds—including those from adverse environments—can find success in school and in life. But the stark, empirical reality tells us public education still mostly favors the haves over the have-nots.

The News Journal
Plan to help Wilmington students begins to take shape
Christina School District’s superintendent and union president on Thursday signed a joint letter of intent to work with Gov. John Carney on a partnership to improve education at its schools in Wilmington. The partnership will address the long-term success of the 1,640 Christina students in preschool through grade 8 who reside in the city, according to Carney’s office.

New middle school planetarium a journey in time and space
When Sandra Smithers graduated from De La Warr High School in New Castle in 1962, people, for the most part, still had no idea what Earth looked like from space. Russian cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin made the first ever orbit of the planet in 1961 but recorded very little video of the expedition. The footage he did come back with was black and white and grainy.

National News

Education Week
Charter schools in New York can now certify their own teachers
Some charter schools in New York state will soon be allowed to train and certify their own teachers, a move that is drawing criticism from some of the state’s top education officials. This is likely the first time a charter school authorizer has allowed the schools it oversees to certify their own teachers, according to the National Association of Charter School Authorizers. The State University of New York Charter Schools Committee approved on Wednesday what has become a controversial proposal for the schools it oversees.

Kindergarten assessments begin to shape instruction
In the not-too-distant past, the kindergarten classrooms at Pleasant Grove Elementary in Heflin, Ala., looked much the same as classrooms for older children. Desks were arranged in rows. Children worked on worksheets. “There wasn’t a lot of differentiation in your instruction,” said Kristi Moore, a kindergarten teacher at the school, located halfway between Birmingham, Ala., and Atlanta. “Most of all your children were taught the same way.”

The Atlantic
How Florida’s schools are welcoming Puerto Ricans
As districts across the country brace for thousands of new students fleeing Puerto Rico following the devastation from Hurricane Maria last month, the schools in Orlando, Florida, have a message for educators from the island: We’re hiring. Among the Orange County Public Schools officials who have been stationed at the Orlando airport, greeting more than 100 families and helping displaced parents enroll their children in the city’s public schools, are district human resources personnel interviewing teachers—right there in the terminal.

The Mercury News
Milpitas to DeVos: Public education is working
U.S. Secretary of Education Betsy DeVos, a lightning rod for controversy, visited four classes at Thomas Russell Middle School on Thursday, learning about hypothetical dragon DNA, taking a stab at drawing a self-portrait — and hearing about the virtues of public education that some feels she’s devalued. The secretary said she chose to visit Russell to see its personalized learning.

St. Louis Post-Dispatch
Schools across St. Louis expand lessons using laptops, tablets and smartphones
Rebecca Feazel’s gifted second-graders had a big day recently — it was the day they learned how to use a Google Chromebook laptop. The Hazelwood teacher showed the nine children how to make a Google Slides presentation about fractions on their laptops. They poked the keys one by one with their index fingers, eyes searching for the right letters and punctuation marks. One girl had misspelled the word “dalmatians” as “dolmations.”




Author:
Rodel Foundation of Delaware

info@rodelfoundationde.org

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