Daily EducationNews.org
Monday, April 10, 2006

Akron Beacon-Journal
Ohio impact fees would offer help for growing needs
Expanding communities and schools want authority to make builders pay more
In fast-growing Medina County, there are nice neighborhoods to be found in about every community, but among the most coveted addresses is Montville Township.

Arizona Republic
Scholastic Journalist Awards
Awards for student journalists.

Phoenix robotics teacher finalist for national award
Carl Hayden teacher Fredi Lajvardi is one of 10 finalists nationwide for the $100,000 Kinder Excellence in Teaching Award.

Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Teachers too equal
In high school mythology classes, students learn about the multi-headed hydra, the fire-defying phoenix and the poison-breathed basilisk. After this recent legislative session, there should be another mythical figure added to that list: the less-than-qualified teacher.

Austin American-Statesman
Small classes allow dyslexic kids, and their school, to grow
Rawson-Saunders School provides one-on-one attention for 76 students.
Only six students were in Perry Stokes' combined second- and third-grade classroom one morning last week. Each was called on to answer questions, and those who lost focus found Stokes standing beside them moments later whispering a stern message to pay attention.

Baltimore Sun
Questions arise about pressures of state test
Some link cheating to stress from MSA
This time last year, state school officials had seen their usual share of routine test concerns, such as exam booklets that weren't returned promptly.

Official defends allocations for schools
Top sites' resources won't fund those failing, he says

Boston Globe
Charter schools are urged to switch
Boston Public Schools officials have begun recruiting charter schools to join the city's public school system, in a concerted effort to expand its portfolio of experimental schools.

When bad things happen at good places
WITHIN THE WORLD of higher education, Duke University is widely admired for its skill in public relations. Over the years, it has lifted itself from regional icon to an elite national research university, renowned for its overachieving undergraduates, who migrate to Durham, N.C., from all over the United States.

Chicago Sun-Times
Suit slams school league breakup
The breakup of a large high school athletic league in the south suburbs is an "apartheid-like" maneuver that has "revived racial segregation in public schools" in violation of students' civil rights, according to a lawsuit that attorneys say will be filed today in federal court.

U. of I. goal: Land the world's best students
The hopes, dreams and shortfalls of the state's premier public university -- the University of Illinois -- are laid out in surprisingly candid documents to be presented to its board of trustees Tuesday.

School improvises when toilets go out
ABILENE, Texas -- An elementary school's worst nightmare came true earlier this week when the toilets stopped working. Faced with about 600 wriggling, squirming youngsters, Bonham Elementary officials on Wednesday morning bused them to nearby schools that offered the use of their restrooms.

Chicago Tribune 
Home-school teens get prom
Students who also have attended traditional school dances said the home-school events uphold their values better.

Cincinnati Enquirer
Schools fighting obesity
Local schools are focusing on helping students eat healthier to reverse the increasing trend of childhood obesity.

Columbus Dispatch
Boot camp
Local educators spend a week learning how Marines are made PARRIS ISLAND, S.C. -- Not long after sunup, two buses full of educators roll through the gates and over the marsh. The Marine Corps invited them here to see boot camp as it really is

Contra Costa Times
School rankings flawed, state says
By Dan Nguyen, SACRAMENTO BEE
SACRAMENTO - The discovery of a miscalculation has caused the California Department of Education to withdraw a ranking used to compare academic performance of schools of similar characteristics.

Detroit Free Press
Students' ideas could change auto industry
Sixteen-year-old Jamesha Moore tried to explain her class project in simple terms Thursday, but her words came out sounding like those of an engineer.

Houston Chronicle
Perry puts tax caps on legislative back burner
Perry says he still supports the caps but doesn't want legislators, when they convene April 17, to be distracted by other controversies until they address the court order, which doesn't require action on property appraisals.

Page: For boys, 'Failure to Launch' begins and ends at home
MUCH has been said, especially by chattering pundits like me, about recent reports of lost economic ground among young, undereducated black males, despite the economic boom.

Inside Higher ED
Will 'Voluntary' Accountability Work?  
Before U.S. panel, state colleges propose own reporting system, but skeptics question whether such an approach will satisfy demands.

Surge in Latino Activism  
Movement against immigration restrictions spreads from high schools to colleges.

Let the Litigation Begin
First lawsuit filed over SAT scoring errors. More are expected - and effect could spread far beyond those who took ill-fated test.

Ledger
Students `Rally Against Drugs'

Los Angeles Daily News
MyUnsafeSpace? Sex predators poach online
Jessi still remembers when the stranger walked up to her at a Starbucks two years ago. The 16-year-old Calabasas High School sophomore was expecting a friend. Instead, a 23-year-old man recognized her from her profile on MySpace.com.

Los Angeles Times
Christians Sue for Right Not to Tolerate Policies
By Stephanie Simon
Many codes intended to protect gays from harassment are illegal, conservatives argue.

L.A. Schools in a Legal Mess With Insurer
By Joel Rubin
The district says AIG has left it holding the bag after costly cleanups of toxic campus sites. The company says rejected claims weren't covered.

New York Daily News 
Big fat F for Bronx school
Daily News Exclusive: Forget healthy eating. How about a microwaved White Castle hamburger instead?

Dumb mistakes with smart kids
Editorials: Schools Chancellor Joel Klein plans next year to roll out uniform standards and procedures for admission to programs for so-called gifted and talented children - in other words, special classes for smart kids.

New York Post
CLASSES GETTING SMALLER
By DAVID ANDREATTA Education Reporter CHARTERS OFF HOOK
Class size has mostly declined in public schools that share space with charter schools, a Post investigation has found.

New York Times
Some Parents Letting Children Choose College, and Pay for It
By JONATHAN D. GLATER
More parents are limiting what they will pay, asking children who choose expensive institutions to cover the balance with loans.

How to Lose the Brain Race
By STEVEN CLEMONS and MICHAEL LIND
Other industrial democracies are reshaping their immigration policies to invite the skilled immigrants that the U.S. turns away.

Palm Beach Post
GOP takes new approach on class size amendment\
Officials say there is not enough time to build necessary schools by required deadlines.

Pasadena Star News
Lack of bilingual skills stigma for Lations
As Spanish-speaking immigrants from Mexico in the 1940s and 1950s, Marin Dominguez's parents recall constant discrimination and ridicule for speaking their native tongue.

Philadelphia Daily News
Teaching kids that violence is not the way
By VALERIA M. RUSS
There were giggles, at first, when a poet pranced around the auditorium floor just in front of the stage at the Mann Elementary School last week, calling out the names of several friends.

Philadelphia Inquirer
Teacher firings in Phila. are up
Tighter monitoring has led to 19 this year. Still, dismissals due to poor performance are not easy, educators say.
By Susan Snyder, Inquirer Staff Writer
Few teachers get fired in the Philadelphia School District, but this year the number has more than doubled as the district, under federal pressure to raise student achievement, has encouraged principals to observe and evaluate teachers more aggressively.

Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
Holy Week is Jesus Week at several high schools
Holy Week isn't just for church anymore. At Derry Area High School, students in a 7-year-old after-school Bible club are marking "Jesus Week" starting today with school-wide Bible-themed activities.

Rocky Mountain News
Buddy system
Michael Gaither and Antwan Wilson met in the seventh grade in eastern Nebraska, one tall black kid spotting another on the first day of gym class.

Tallahassee Democrat
How to pay for schools debated
It's been called inscrutable, complex and arcane, but the Florida Education Finance Program was designed to help the state send funds equitably to all its school districts.

USA Today 
First Muslim sorority hopes to form chapters across USA Group promotes campus camaraderie with religious principles
By Donna Leinwand
CAMBRIDGE, Mass. Christine Ortiz slips quietly from the Muslim prayer room on the campus of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and into a group of squealing young women. Some of them are Ortiz's Muslim sisters, the undergraduate pals who embraced her when she converted to Islam from her family's Roman Catholicism.

Washington Post
A Super-Scholar, All Grown Up
Jedediah Purdy, now an assistant professor at Duke University's law school, reflects on life after a youthful star turn on the Washington stage.

Washington Times
School board loses ruling  (Jim McElhatton)
A federal judge has decided that the D.C. Board of Education was wrong to reject a labor deal last fall with 1,350 part-time school-bus attendants.

Schools draw fire for offering credits for protest  (Keyonna Summers)
Montgomery County public school officials are awarding community-service credits to students who participate today in a pro-immigration rally on the Mall, angering some residents, who say the school system is supporting illegal activity.

MITT ROMNEY:  Reforming education
I was in high school when Sputnik happened. Russia's lead in space frightened us. It also woke us up. President Kennedy issued a call to boost science and math education, to produce more engineers. His vision: Put a man on the moon. America, as always, rose to the occasion.

Wichita Eagle
Discipline records at schools are open to the public and free
Each Monday, The Eagle highlights a government record that is open to the public. The record: Disciplinary information at public schools, including suspensions, expulsions and incidents of violence among students

Board of Ed to discuss limiting sex education
State considers just telling teens: Wait till you wed
BY SUZANNE PEREZ TOBIAS, The Wichita Eagle

International Articles

The Age
It's crunch time
| Schools are facing a leadership crisis because few want the top job, Caroline Milburn reports.

Shaping new leaders
The NGV is offering young people a life-changing experience, writes Claire Halliday.

A thinking person's Australia
Can we assume Australia has a single set of values, beliefs, and a set of stories about our identity?

Getting a kick out of coaching
A girls' game? It sure is, says this group. Margaret Cook reports.

The search for meaning
On-campus religious groups are thriving. By Alexandra Roginski

A degree of confidence, hard earned
A team of "mums" put a teen on track, writes Annie McLoughlin.

Horses for courses
Vocational teachers embrace diversity, writes Margaret Cook.

Destiny's child
When fate is one of the players, theatre becomes a platform for the gods, writes Graham Rodger.

A light extinguished
Aspiring writers have lost something special, says Vin Maskell.

Spinning the bottle
Binge drinking is a risky pursuit andyet is a growing trend among young people, reports Vikki Leone.

Campus chatter
Associate Professor John Murphy appointed director of the Australian Centre at the University of Melbourne.

Third degree
Slanderous and childish insults over the collapsing Swinburne Student Union are being aired on the web.

Quandary
Will the new reporting system being introduced to schools be clearer for parents?

Principals need a way forward
Attracting and retaining outstanding leaders is necessary if public education is to be sustained.

Dysfunctional and still deteriorating
Public transport is in desperate need of upgrading, writes Sahrah Ayan.

The British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC)
School reform plans 'are a mess'
Plans to give England's secondary schools more independence are a "mess", a union leader is to say.

Brown to unveil Africa-Asia aid
About £8.5bn in overseas aid for education in Africa and Asia is to be announced by Chancellor Gordon Brown.

The Guardian 
Union leader warns of ghetto risk in new education bill
Education: Education bill is 'a mess' that will widen the divide in the education system, teachers' leader will warn today.

The Gulf Times
Communication, IT show opens
QATAR Chamber of Commerce and Industry chairman Mohamed Khalid al-Mana inaugurated a three-day communication and information technology exhibition at the Qatar International Exhibition Centre yesterday

The Independent (UK)
Polite teachers 'will create pupils with better manners'
A teachers' leader is launching a campaign to promote better manners in the classroom - from his fellow professionals.

The Times Education Supplement
Education reforms will create ghetto schools says teachers' leader:
Tony Blair's controversial education reforms will condemn working class children to "ghetto schools for the underclass", teachers' leaders warned today.

The Toronto Star
Reality of fast food dished out to kids
Gross. That may be one of the reactions of young readers to a new book that takes a riveting - and sometimes revolting - look at the fast food industry. Scott Simmie reports.