EDUCATION & EQUITY NEWS    

NATIONAL

Only Remnants of Bush's
Education Plan Remain in Bills
The Los Angeles Times, May 14, 2001

From the article: " It's true that the left and the right in Congress have tugged and snipped at Bush's plan. But in declaring the plan eviscerated, the critics, for the most part, overstate the case--and slight the need to accommodate Democratic ideas in a Congress split almost 50-50."

See also:

Education Bill Irks House Conservatives The Washington Times, May 14, 2001

No One's Rallying Cry
The Washington Times, March 15, 2001

U.S. Senate Backs Changes to Bush School Plan
iWon/Reuters, May 10, 2001

Breaking with President Bush's classroom reform plan, the Senate voted on Thursday to nearly quadruple funding for bilingual education programs and to help states set certain standards for student testing in spite of White House calls for fiscal restraint.

See also:

House Bill Would Downplay Bilingualism The Los Angeles Times, May 15, 2001.

Senate Approves $6 Billion For Teachers
to Train, Remain Competent in Their Field
The Cleveland Plain-Dealer, May 9, 2001

The Senate voted on May 8th in favor of a plan to improve teacher training. Under the plan, states would receive an extra $3 billion in federal money in 2002 and $3 billion more over the following six years to be used to train teachers and ensure that they are competent in the subject they teach. The plan would require teachers in schools that predominantly serve poor students to be licensed by their state and deemed "highly qualified."

Special Education Debate Shifts
From Money to New Ideas
The New York Times, May 13, 2001

This week in Washington, Republican and Democratic policy groups made a rare joint call for change in special education, advocating reforms such as emphasizing early reading skills, keeping children who are not disabled from being referred to the program in the first place, and focusing on whether children are learning rather than on whether schools are filling out the required paperwork.

Why We Must Have Testing
The Washington Post, May 13, 2001

Secretary of Education Rod Paige defends President Bush's testing plan in this editorial.

Gains Found for the Poor in Rigorous Preschool
The New York Times, May 9, 2001

According to a study by researchers at the University of Wisconsin that tracked graduates of urban preschools for 15 years, poor children who attend intensive preschool classes are more likely to graduate from high school and less likely to be arrested than poor children who have not participated in such programs.

The New Divides
Education Week, May 10, 2001

Inequities in the availability of computer technology and Internet access still exist. But rather than one single, gaping divide, what the nation's schools are grappling with is more a set of divides, cutting in different directions. Increasingly, those inequities involve not so much access to computers, but the way computers are used to educate children.

From the same issue of Education Week, see also:

Dividing Lines
Money Matters  
Racial Disparities
Not Enough Girls
Academic Record
Rural Connections
Special Needs Gaps
Language Barriers.

Reading Between the Lines
The Washington Post, May 15, 2001

Researchers are wondering whether the grading standards for 4th grade NAEP tests are too high.

Shifting Portrait of U.S. Hispanics
The Washington Post, May 10, 2001

According to census figures, the rising number of Mexican Americans accounted for more than half of the past decade's growth in Hispanics, soon to be the country's largest minority.

Teacher Preparation Linked to Reading Instruction
Education Week, May 9, 2001

According to a study by the International Reading Association, novice teachers who graduated from teacher-preparation programs with a strong focus on reading instruction tend to provide richer literacy experiences for their students than those who attended institutions without such an emphasis.

Regents to Clarify Affirmative Action Stance But Student Member is Trying to Repeal Quota Measures
The San Francisco Chronicle, May 10, 2001

Two competing resolutions will be presented when the University of California Board of Regents meets in San Francisco on May 16th: a compromise resolution intended to give all parties something they can support, and the other stridently calling for a "repeal" of the resolutions that banned racial and gender preferences in 1995.

Identities Blur for 'Third-Culture Kids'
Education Week, May 9, 2001

Third-culture kids, or "TCKs" as many of them call themselves, are a growing legion of students who spent some or all of their childhood years in a country other than the place of their citizenship. As the children of diplomats, military personnel, missionaries, international executives, and expatriates, they typically grow up with one foot in each culture, without ever feeling completely at home in either. Many instead feel their greatest sense of belonging when they are among others like themselves.

Students Use Internet to Cheat
The Washington Post, May 15, 2001

More than half of students from 25 high schools across the country said in a survey conducted by Rutgers University that they had used the Internet to commit plagiarism for school assignments.

Opinion: How America Learned to Hate Bullies
The New Republic, May 14, 2001

The author of this editorial writes that the anti-bullying movement has been characterized by widespread overreaction.

Louisiana Calls Darwin A Racist
Salon Magazine, May 4, 2001

Louisiana legislature has approved a resolution to reject "core concepts of Darwinist ideology that certain races and classes of humans are inherently superior to others." Critics say the race card is only another ploy by creationists to remove evolution from public education and replace it with the religious concept of divine creation.

Feeling Crushed By Tests At Age 11
Time Magazine, April 29, 2001

High-stakes testing is taking an emotional and physical toll on some children in North Carolina, which is often cited as having a model accountability system.

MARYLAND

Maryland Schools Face Crisis
Over Special Education
The Baltimore Sun, May 14, 2001

Maryland is currently experiencing a severe shortage of special education teachers - those trained to deal with learning disabilities, most often expressed as reading problems. That soon will be compounded by a harsh demographic fact: More than half of the state's teachers will be eligible for retirement by 2003.

County Schools Providing More Advanced Tests
The Washington Post, May 10, 2001

The number of Advanced Placement (AP) college preparatory tests given in Prince George's County has increased to 2,948, up 27 percent from 1997.

(See similar profiles of other Maryland counties: Anne Arundel, Howard, Montgomery/Frederick, Calvert.)

City's School Leaders Get Raise
The Baltimore Sun, May 9, 2001

The Baltimore school board has approved significant pay raises for all of its principals The raises go well beyond a 3 percent increase scheduled to take effect this summer. They range from about $8,000 a year to more than $19,000 a year, depending on a principal's assignment, performance and level of education.

Opinion: Teachers Expelled
In Test Scandal Deserve No Pity
The Washington Post, May 15, 2001

The author comments on the recent expulsion of the principal, assistant principal and five math teachers at Silver Spring International Middle School for their roles in giving test questions to students in advance of an exam.

PENNSYLVANIA

Judge Rules in Favor of Charter Schools
Bucks County Courier Times, May 14, 2001

A state Commonwealth Court judge has rejected the Pennsylvania School Boards Association's request to keep the state Department of Education from withholding money from school districts that refuse to pay tuition for students who attend online charter schools.

Opinion: Vouchers and Pensions
The Philadelphia Inquirer, May 13, 2001

"State legislators in Harrisburg last week won a whopping 50 percent increase in their pensions, a nice payoff in exchange for finally giving Gov. Ridge his long-sought prize, expansion of his backdoor school vouchers plan."

VIRGINIA

How Math Is Taught Has Fairfax Squabbling
The Washington Post, May 14, 2001

As Fairfax begins to select new math texts for every grade this month, it must decide between traditional math (also called fundamental math or back-to-basics math) and new math (sometimes called fuzzy math or constructivist math).

Enrollment Rises in AP, IB Courses
The Washington Post, May 10, 2001

Arlington has one of the strongest Advanced Placement (AP) and International Baccalaureate (IB) programs in the region -- and the country.

(See similar profiles of other Virginia counties: Fairfax, Loudoun, Prince William.)

Rare View of School Integration Day Oral History Video Captures Emotions Of Arlington Fight
The Washington Post, May 12, 2001

The recollections of people involved in the struggle to integrate Arlington Public Schools in 1959 (five years after Brown v. Board of Education, which declared school segregation unconstitutional) have been gathered in an hour-long documentary, "It's Just Me: The Integration of the Arlington Public Schools."

WASHINGTON,D.C. METRO AREA

City Schools Push Students
Toward Advanced Placement
The Washington Post, May 10, 2001

The number of AP tests given in D.C. public schools has increased 48 percent to 1,105 tests in just a year.
Behind this surge were assistant school superintendent Wilma Bonner and her colleague, Georgia Arrington-Booker, who used support from the College Board and funds from a new federal program designed to coax more low-income students to prepare for college by taking AP or International Baccalaureate tests.

Tech-Savvy Students Offer Schools a Patch
The Washington Post, May 14, 2001

Schools in several counties -- including Arlington, Montgomery and Prince William -- have put students to work fixing machines in computer labs. The schools say they are giving students academic credit as well as hands-on experience they will be able to draw on in their careers.

SPECIAL ARTICLES & REPORTS

Long-term Effects of an Early Childhood
Intervention on Educational Achievement
and Juvenile Arrest: A 15-Year Follow-up
of Low-Income Children in Public Schools (abstract)
Journal of the American Medical Association, 2001

The Nation’s Report Card in Peril
The Hoover Institution, May 14, 2001

Diane Ravitch, a research professor at New York University, warns that Congress is about to act on legislation that could jeopardize the entire NAEP testing program.

WEBSITES & LINKS

International Reading Association
(www.reading.org)

A professional membership organization dedicated to promoting high levels of literacy for all by improving the quality of reading instruction

Achievement for All: Solving Crucial
Problems Through Education Research
(www.rand.org/multi/achievementforall)

A RAND project supported by the U.S. Department of Education's Office of Educational Research and Improvement (OERI)

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