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YouCAN Advocate launches Youth Advocacy Month in Georgia

Danielle A. Stewart Ed.D. — Thu, 11 May 2017 20:02:33 +0000

In March, Danielle Stewart joined the second class of YouCAN Advocates to develop a youth education advocacy month in DeKalb County, Georgia. She sat down with 50CAN to share a look into how her work is progressing and what she’s learning in the field.

As a YouCAN Advocate in DeKalb County embarking on my journey, my focus has been on community building—looking at the organizations that have given me a sense of community in my personal life and replicating their strengths in my project. One of the most fulfilling organizations in my life has been volunteering, mentoring and connecting with students and parents of the Beulah Rising Stars Gavel Club. This club consists of an enthusiastic and passionate group of young people who are committed to becoming great leaders and public speakers.

We designated the month of April “Youth Educational Advocacy Month” to give students the platform to apply the public speaking skills which they were being taught for their own personal causes and to vocalize their educational passions.

Weekly, students were asked to think about their passions and beliefs and to reflect on what myths existed in their education worlds. This included topics about school closings and not being labeled a statistic of failing schools, issues around school choice, accountability and responsibility for academic success.

For the first week of Youth Educational Advocacy Month, we selected the theme “stand for something or fall for anything.” I facilitated a discussion on the topic which included a time for students to share their thoughts about their personal beliefs regarding academic excellence and their personal convictions in life. By identifying and sharing these beliefs, students could vision-set for how they wanted to get involved in educational advocacy.

The following week, the group was asked to think about the role and the power of individual voice and how advocates could benefit from many voices with the theme “my voice, your voice, our voice.” The session taught students about the power of listening to and utilizing all three voices. Students shared stories that illustrated situations where each voice was appropriate. They also engaged in a role-playing activity to determine the pros and cons of using each voice.

The third week, dubbed “great expectations,” was geared towards having students determine their personal goals, identify people in their support system—their schools, families and communities—and the expectations they have for their networks. Additionally, they were given the opportunity to express their opinions about great leadership, maturity and accountability. During the session, students presented to mentors and peers on what they expected from their networks so that they could reach their personal academic goals.

The last meeting of the month had students reflect on all they learned over the month and gave them the stage to present on their future planning and college goals, as well as the role of community, school and family in their lives. Reflecting on the month of programming, Alstenia Smith-Sellers, coordinator of the Beulah Rising Stars Gavel Club, was excited about the opportunity for the young people to express themselves as advocates: “Young people are the voices of our community today. We must help prepare them to articulate their thoughts clearly and with conviction. With the continued support of Dr. Stewart and her educational sessions, we help set the stage for their success.”

I will continue to identify and present this training to other organizations and families in the Dekalb County area in the coming months, partnering with groups who support the nurturing of young leaders and educational advocates in order to promote the importance of academic excellence in our community.

Beulah Rising Stars Gavel Club is a club affiliated with Toastmasters International, a 501(c)3 organization whose mission is to provide a supportive and positive learning experience in which members are empowered to develop communication and leadership skills, resulting in greater self-confidence and personal growth.

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from the field

youcan class of 2017

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Mornings with Mimi (5-9-17)

Mimi Woldeyohannes — Tue, 09 May 2017 13:58:12 +0000

Here are news and opinion stories educators, advocates, policy wonks and makers are talking about today:

News and Analysis

National
Michelle Obama Vows To Prioritize Education ‘No Matter What House We Live In’
Michelle Obama is continuing her legacy of inspiring young people to pursue higher education. On Friday, the former first lady held her 2017 College Signing Day, hosted by Nick Cannon, at New York City’s Public Theater. Continuing in the tradition she started in 2014 as a part of her Reach Higher initiative for the first time after leaving the White House, Obama addressed about 300 high school students, mostly first-generation, in the audience. (Huffington Post)

Efficiency Can Cost Education
Don't pursue efficiency in schools at the expense of other important goals. There are very good reasons to resist (or at least be skeptical of) efforts to drive "efficiency" in public education. One of the biggest reasons is that any attempt to maximize efficiency automatically elevates – some might say inflates – the role of performance metrics. Once we decide which indicators are going to define success and then set people off to find the swiftest and cheapest way to get those outcomes, we can begin to distort complex enterprises. Other outcomes become expendable, even if those outcomes are important. (U.S. News & World Report)

State
Florida
Massive education bill alters testing, recess, teacher evaluations, bonuses, charters
Lawmakers approved a giant, multi-pronged education package Monday that backers cheered as an education game-changer and critics called manipulative and detrimental to public schools. The 278-page bill eliminates a section of Florida’s often-criticized, 2011 teacher merit-pay law, changes standardized testing rules, mandates recess for elementary school children, expands a controversial teacher bonus program and provides new bonuses for most teachers for the next three years. (Sun Sentinel)

New York
New York state says it wants to expand its definition of success — and focus on equity — in judging schools
New York unveiled a blueprint Monday for education policy under a new federal law, which officials said will help launch the state beyond a narrow focus on test scores when it comes to evaluating schools. The Every Student Succeeds Act is designed to provide more flexibility for states to decide what makes a school successful and to support schools that don’t meet that bar. New York education officials have said they hope to capitalize on the extra wiggle room – and framed that choice as a statement of values. (Chalkbeat)

Pennsylvania
Gov. Wolf pushes for early childhood education funds
Gov. Tom Wolf called for increased funding for early childhood education during a news conference at the state Capitol on Monday. Wolf’s 2017-2018 budget includes a $75 million increase for early childhood education. He says the nearly 40 percent increase will allow more than 8,400 additional children to enroll in Pennsylvania Pre-K Counts and the Head Start Supplemental Assistance Program. (ABC27 News)

Rhode Island
Will Personalized Learning Become the New Normal? Inside Rhode Island’s Statewide Tech Initiative
Over the past few years, Rhode Island has emerged as a national leader in the drive to put personalized-learning programs into actual classroom practice. Now education leaders in Providence, the state’s capital and most populous city, are looking to scale their early efforts statewide, pushing district leaders to think bigger about pilot programs and technological infrastructure, while also commissioning new research on how an understudied learning model could drive student performance. (The 74)

Tennessee
Tennessee initiative wants to spark youth interest in teaching
The State Collaborative on Reforming Education is looking to fill a key hole in teacher recruitment through an initiative hoping to foster Tennessee millennials' interest in education. "Teach Today. Change Tomorrow," launched on Monday, is billed as a way to get high school students interested in teaching, with the eventual goal of building a pipeline of quality educators to place in front of every student statewide — especially in high-need teaching subjects. (The Tennessean)

Washington D.C.
Digital Pioneers Academy Joins Cohort to Reimagine K-12 Learning
Washington, D.C., May 3, 2017 – Digital Pioneers Academy is proud to announce its selection as a member of the 2017 Invent cohort at NewSchools Venture Fund. Digital Pioneers Academy is one of 28 organizations in the 2017 investment group. Each cohort member is committed to launch a new, innovative school or instructional model designed to meet all students where they are, help them succeed, and inspire them to create a brighter future for us all. In addition to the funding, NewSchools will provide management assistance and create a community of practice for the cohort members. (Education Dive)

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Mornings with Mimi (5-5-17)

Mimi Woldeyohannes — Fri, 05 May 2017 13:53:06 +0000

Here are news and opinion stories educators, advocates, policy wonks and makers are talking about today:

News and Analysis
National
Education changes in Trump's first 100 days
Those who follow federal education policy or work on education at the state level are well aware of a few big changes wrought by the Trump team (with some help from Congress) in its first hundred days, including wiping out the late Obama ESSA accountability regs and easing off on bathroom access rules. But another quintet of recent ed-related developments in Washington begs for attention by anyone wondering what may actually be changing (or hoping or fearing that change will occur) in our schools and for our children in the Trump era. (Fordham)

To Test or Not to Test: As Tax Credit Scholarships Expand, Questions About Accountability and Outcomes
“Parents need to have information on how their child is doing,” Secretary of Education Betsy DeVos recently said at the Brookings Institution. “That is, I think, the first form and the best form of accountability. That information needs to be more broadly shared with those who would consider a choice for their child.” Yet this vision — of families empowered with information — might contrast with DeVos’s push to expand tax credit scholarship programs, which offer tax breaks to individuals or corporations that donate money to fund private school scholarships. (The 74)

Under Trump, Ed-Tech Leadership Is Big Question Mark
From his seat in the East Room of the White House, Joseph South had a clear view of Barack Obama’s teleprompter, and he watched as the president veered off script during a 2014 speech to more than 100 school superintendents. The leaders were assembled to sign a pledge committing to improve digital learning in their districts, part of the federally supported Future Ready program. Off the cuff, Obama began telling stories about the inspiring ways he had seen educational technology being used in classrooms across the country. (Education Week)

After reshaping itself to combat declining interest, Teach For America reports a rise in applications
Teach for America says its application numbers jumped by a significant number this year, reversing a three-year trend of declining interest in the program. The organization’s CEO said in a blog post this week that nearly 49,000 people applied for the 2017 program, which places college graduates in low-income schools across the country after summer training — up from just 37,000 applicants last year. (Chalkbeat)

State
Florida
School testing reform faces pass/fail exam Friday in House
TALLAHASSEE--After several days of private collaboration among lawmakers, one major late-night rewrite and some last-minute tweaks, senators unanimously passed a sweeping education bill on Thursday — the main feature of which is to address excessive testing in Florida’s public schools. HB 549 eliminates only a single test — the Algebra 2 end-of-course exam — and it requires the state Department of Education to study by Jan. 1 whether national exams, like the SAT or ACT, can be used as alternatives to the Florida Standards Assessments and other statewide tests. (Miami Herald)

New Jersey
New Jersey Judge Tosses Parents’ Lawsuit Claiming Last In, First Out Layoff Rules Harm Students
A New Jersey judge swiftly dismissed a lawsuit Wednesday that challenged state rules requiring school districts to base teacher layoffs on seniority regardless of performance in the classroom. New Jersey Superior Court Judge Mary C. Jacobson told a Trenton courtroom that the plaintiffs had failed to establish how seniority-based layoff rules known as “last in, first out” were harming their children. (The 74)

New York
Gov. Cuomo touts $1.1 billion in new education funding
New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo is touting a big jump in public education spending. The Democratic governor traveled to a school in Queens on Wednesday to celebrate a $1.1 billion increase in school funding. Overall the state will spend a record $25.8 billion on public education under the budget approved by Cuomo and lawmakers last month. (Daily News)

Rhode Island
RI Charter Public Schools Receive More Than 15,000 Applications - A New Record
Rhode Island charter public schools received a total of 15,430 applications for the 1,770 open sets available for the 2017-18 school year. The number represents an increase of 5.5% over the previous record of 14,628 set last year. The numbers come according to data put together by the Rhode Island Department of Education. (Go Local Prov)

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Mornings with Mimi (5-4-17)

Mimi Woldeyohannes — Thu, 04 May 2017 14:18:11 +0000

Here are news and opinion stories educators, advocates, policy wonks and makers are talking about today:

News and Analysis

National
ESSA State Plan Submission
The following States have submitted plans under the Elementary and Secondary Education Act of 1965 (ESEA), as amended by the Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA) for the spring peer review window. Please note that a link is provided to the State plan for those that are determined to be complete and have been sent forward for peer review. The Department is still determining whether the other State plans are complete. (U.S. Department of Education)

Poll: Schools With Mostly White Teachers 'Not Really Trying' to Educate Students of Color
Black and Latino parents whose children’s teachers are mostly white are more likely to believe schools are “not really trying” to educate students of color than those with mostly black or mostly Latino teachers. That’s one of the major findings in the second annual poll from The Leadership Conference Education Fund and Anzalone Liszt Grove Research, which aim to capture the views of parents and families of color on education – a group, the poll organizers underscored, whose members are often left out of debates about education policies that directly affect them despite the fact that their children constitute a majority of public school students. (U.S. News & World Report)

A Little-Noticed Target in the House Health Bill: Special Education
While House Republicans lined up votes Wednesday for a Thursday showdown over their bill to repeal the Affordable Care Act, Vickie Glenn sat in her Murphysboro, Ill., office and prayed for it to fail. Ms. Glenn, a Medicaid coordinator for Tri-County Special Education, an Illinois cooperative that helps more than 20 school districts deliver special education services to students, was worried about an issue that few in Congress were discussing: how the new American Health Care Act, with its deep cuts to Medicaid, would affect her 2,500 students. (The New York Times)

U.S. at Risk of Not Reaching 90 Percent Graduation Rate Goal by 2020
Since 2001, 2.8 million more students have graduated from high school rather than dropping out. In an economy that prizes educational attainment more than ever before, these rising rates have created enormous benefits for individuals, communities and our entire nation. But even now with the current national graduation rate at 83.2 percent, it is becoming more evident that the nation will be unable to meet its high school graduation rate goal without intensifying efforts to reach the students who have historically faced the greatest challenges. The country remains off-pace to reaching its goal for the second year in a row. (PR Newswire)

State
Georgia
Charter school meets first of five deadlines set by state officials
Cirrus Academy has updated one portion of its special education practices, but it has several more changes to go under orders by the state. Earlier this spring, three teachers at the Macon charter school filed a formal complaint under the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act. They expressed concerns that services and plans listed in students’ individualized education programs were not being followed. The Georgia Department of Education investigated the allegations and responded with a report March 31 detailing corrective actions that Cirrus had to take. (The Telegraph)

New Jersey
Sweeney threatens N.J. government shutdown over school funding
New Jersey Senate President Stephen Sweeney on Tuesday threatened to shut down state government next month, declaring he would block a budget that doesn’t change the formula the Legislature uses to fund schools. “The Senate is not going to pass a budget that doesn't start to address the unfairness in this funding formula,” Sweeney (D., Gloucester) said at a rally Tuesday outside the Statehouse Annex, where he was joined by school officials and advocates from Cherry Hill, Robbinsville, Freehold, and other districts. (The Philadelphia Inquirer & Daily News)

North Carolina
Durham County commissioners want DPS, charters to collaborate
Durham County commissioners want to get Durham Public Schools and charter school leaders together to talk about what’s working and not working in educating local children. The task may not be as easy as it sounds, said Commissioner Heidi Carter, a former school board chairwoman. Carter said the Board of Education wanted to collaborate on a vision for quality public schools in Durham about four years ago, but the charter schools and DPS couldn’t agree on all the tenets of that vision. (The Herald Sun)

Tennessee
Before voucher legislation comes back in 2018, Tennessee lawmakers want a plan to determine whether vouchers work
While Tennessee lawmakers will go home this year without passing school vouchers into law, they’re not leaving the idea behind. In the coming months, lawmakers who backed the proposal to start a five-year pilot program in Memphis will fine-tune it. One goal: clearing up questions about what kind of tests students need to take so lawmakers can determine if the program is “working.” (Chalkbeat)

Washington D.C.
Trump praises D.C. voucher program with mixed record
President Donald Trump on Wednesday celebrated Washington, D.C.'s voucher program despite findings that it had a negative impact on children's reading and math scores — saying it makes an "extraordinary difference" to students in the nation's capital. Flanked by Education Secretary Betsy DeVos, Vice President Mike Pence and several D.C. student participants, Trump said that 98 percent of scholarship recipients get "their high school diplomas and they're really very, very special, they go onto tremendous successes." (Politico)

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Mornings with Mimi (5-3-17)

Mimi Woldeyohannes — Wed, 03 May 2017 14:23:41 +0000

Here are news and opinion stories educators, advocates, policy wonks and makers are talking about today:

News and Analysis
National
Charters, Vouchers, ESAs Add Heat to State Legislative Debates
The appointment of U.S. Secretary of Education Betsy DeVos has brought plenty of national attention to the debate over vouchers, Education Savings Accounts, and charter schools. But the real action at this point is still at the state level, where legislators and governors have the most say over the future of these sorts of policies. That's because states, in most instances provide the bulk of K-12 funding, not the federal government, and changes in state education governance would have to come from them. (Education Week)

Trump Takes Aim at School Lunch Guidelines and a Girls’ Education Program
The Trump administration took aim Monday at two signature programs of the former first lady Michelle Obama, rolling back her efforts to promote healthy school lunches nationwide and potentially rebranding her program to educate adolescent girls abroad. Agriculture Secretary Sonny Perdue announced that school meals would no longer have to meet some requirements connected with Mrs. Obama’s initiative to combat childhood obesity by overhauling the nation’s school menus. (The New York Times)

The School Discipline Revolution: How Policy and Rhetoric Outstrip Hard Evidence
School districts across the country have dramatically altered how they deal with student misbehavior. From Los Angeles to Chicago to New York City, schools have reduced the frequency with which they give out-of-school suspensions, saying taking students out of the classroom does more harm than good. A recent analysis of California schools found that suspensions there declined precipitously across all ethnic groups between 2013 and 2015. (The 74)

Pre-K: Decades Worth of Studies, One Strong Message
Some of the nation's top researchers who've spent their careers studying early childhood education recently got together in Washington with one goal in mind: to cut through the fog of studies and the endless debates over the benefits of pre-school. And they came away with one clear, strong message: Kids who attend public preschool programs are better prepared for kindergarten than kids who don't. (NPR)

State
Florida
Title I ‘portability’ debate comes to Florida Legislature
Proposed changes to the way federal funding flows to public schools have set off a late-session debate in the Florida Legislature. Proponents of the changes argue money should follow students to whatever school they attend, and school leaders — not district administrators — should decide how the money gets spent. School districts are fighting to keep their authority to decide where the money goes. They argue the changes would dilute funding intended to help disadvantaged students in schools with concentrated poverty. In short, it’s a state-level version of the national debate over funding “portability.” (RedefinED)

New Jersey
Good kids, bad decisions: Why Camden schools are suspending fewer students
Camden High principal Alex Jones can point to a few stories that make him believe his school’s new approach toward suspensions is making a difference, like one recent day when a teacher told him about a ninth-grade student who was acting out in class. A year ago, the student’s behavior might have triggered an automatic visit to the office, possibly angering the student further. Had the student yelled or thrown something, he might have faced a two-day suspension or worse. (The Philadelphia Inquirer & Daily News)

New York
State Senate boss John Flanagan suggests renewing Mayor de Blasio’s control of schools only if NYC adds more charters
The leader of the GOP-controlled state Senate said Monday that renewal of Mayor de Blasio’s control of the schools should be linked to an expansion of charter schools. Senate Majority Leader John Flanagan (R-Suffolk County) also signaled that the Senate intends to press the de Blasio administration for more detail on how it spends state education dollars before signing off on any renewal of the law that gives de Blasio control of the school system. (NY Daily News)

Pennsylvania
House Speaker Says Philly Charter School Action Could Imperil Funding
The state House Speaker is suggesting that Philadelphia school funding could be affected because of what he called “overreaches” by the district charter school office. The School Reform Commission Monday night renewed eight charters, non-renewed Laboratory charter and tabled action on Memphis Street Academy. This, on a day when House Speaker Mike Turzai warned that it would be tough to justify more funding for Philly schools if the district put up roadblocks to charter renewals. Charter operators – including Boys Latin CEO David Hardy — say the district is forcing them to sign burdensome renewal agreements. (CBS Philly)

Washington D.C.
Congress expected to reauthorize D.C. school vouchers in sweeping budget deal
Congress is expected to extend the D.C. school voucher program as part of a bipartisan budget deal this week, a move that follows the release of a new federal analysis showing that some voucher recipients in private schools trailed their public-school counterparts on standardized tests. The legislation would reauthorize the D.C. Opportunity Scholarship Program, which helps 1,100 low-income students attend private schools, through fiscal 2019. The program is the only federally funded effort of its kind. (The Washington Post)

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Mornings with Mimi (5-1-17)

Mimi Woldeyohannes — Mon, 01 May 2017 12:19:47 +0000

Here are news and opinion stories educators, advocates, policy wonks and makers are talking about today:

News and Analysis

National
Scratch This: The Fall (and Possible Rise) of State Lotteries in Education Funding
The purchase of a lottery ticket offers an assurance of virtue with its promise of vice. Shell out for a Powerball or scratch ticket, ads declare, and you’ll be making a deposit to your state’s education fund — customers, local businesses, and students all benefit. If there can be such a thing as a win-win in the transactional arena of budget-making, surely this is it. Today, 15 states dedicate all or most of their lottery proceeds to schools, including California, New York, and Texas. Across the country, lotteries generate around $70 billion in annual sales, more than the combined profits from music, books, video games, and tickets to movies and sporting events. (The 74)

School vouchers, rising in many GOP states, founder in Texas
Gary VanDeaver describes himself as a conservative less than a minute into many conversations. The Texas state representative blames "unelected federal judges" for imposing gay marriage on America and has been endorsed by anti-abortion groups and the National Rifle Association. But when it comes to one centerpiece conservative initiative — allowing tax-subsidized vouchers for students to enroll in private schools — VanDeaver says absolutely no way. (ABC News)

If You Mostly Care About Test Scores, Private School Choice Is Not For You
If you mostly care about test scores, private school choice is not for you. Despite the vast majority of randomized control trials (RCTs) of private school choice showing significant, positive test score effects for at least some subgroups of students, some of those gains have been modest and other effects have been null for at least some subgroups. And now we have two RCTs, in Louisiana and DC, showing significant test score declines for at least some subgroups and in some subjects. The Louisiana decline is large and across-the-board, but the significant, negative effect in the new DC study appears to be “driven entirely by students in elementary grades not previously in a needs-improvement school.” (Education Next)

State
Georgia
Deal signs school turnaround legislation, calls it a ‘dramatic step’
With the stroke of a pen Thursday, Gov. Nathan Deal initiated an experiment that could yield innovative strategies for improving Georgia’s lowest-performing schools or saddle him and future governors with an intractable problem. House Bill 338 was not Deal’s first choice of tools to fix schools. Last year, voters rejected a referendum on establishing a much more powerful statewide Opportunity School District. Had that constitutional amendment passed, Deal would have had authority to seize “chronically failing” schools, put them into that special district and appoint someone to run them. (The Atlanta Journal-Constitution)

New Jersey
The 50 N.J. school districts paying their teachers the most
Trenton-The median salary among New Jersey teachers is $66,117 this school year, but the paycheck for a typical teacher can vary greatly from school district to school district. Statewide, the median teacher salary in school districts ranges from as low as $43,911 to as high as $105,650. Why such a big difference? A number of factors can affect teacher pay, such as regional cost of living, grade levels offered in the district and faculty experience, among others. Plus, the median salary in a district can swing by thousands of dollars in a given year if a district has a rash of retirements or major layoffs. (NJ.com)

North Carolina
Governor kicks off inaugural Education Cabinet meeting
Democratic Governor Roy Cooper held his first Education Cabinet meeting yesterday, calling on members to work together and eschew ideology and politics. “We all owe the citizens of this state to put all that political stuff aside … regardless of what happens, we need to be working in the same direction,” he said. But politics did crop up earlier in the meeting. When asked to introduce his staff, cabinet member Mark Johnson, the state’s Republican Superintendent of Public Instruction, made introductions and then pointed out one significant omission. (EdNC)

Pennsylvania
Charter supporters ask SRC for a second chance
Students, parents, and teachers from a Port Richmond charter school that the Philadelphia School District has recommended for nonrenewal turned out in force Thursday to ask for a second chance. Citing poor academic performance, the district's charter school office said Memphis Street Academy at J.P. Jones should not receive a new charter. The school, which serves grades five through eight, has been run for the last five years by American Paradigm Schools, a local education management company. (The Philadelphia Inquirer & Daily News)

Tennessee
Sweeping charter school bill passes Tennessee legislature
Tennessee is close to overhauling the way it oversees charter schools. The state Senate voted 25-1 on Wednesday to approve the so-called High Quality Charter Act, which now heads to Gov. Bill Haslam for his signature. The proposal overwhelmingly passed the House last week. The bill would replace Tennessee’s 2002 charter school law. (Chalkbeat)

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Mornings with Mimi (4-28-17)

Mimi Woldeyohannes — Fri, 28 Apr 2017 14:28:53 +0000

Here are news and opinion stories educators, advocates, policy wonks and makers are talking about today:

News and Analysis

National
Trump starts review of federal 'overreach' in education
In a move meant to follow through on promises he made to conservatives during the 2016 campaign, President Donald Trump signed an executive order Wednesday that aims to rein in federal control of education in the United States. The order, which Trump signed while flanked by Education Secretary Betsy DeVos, Vice President Mike Pence and Nevada Gov. Brian Sandoval, initiates a process that could see substantial changes made to K-12 education in the United States, the clearest signal yet that Trump hopes to put his stamp on the Education Department before his 100th day in office on Saturday. (CNN)

A Path Out Of Poverty: Career Training + Quality Pre K
What makes a high-quality learning program effective not just for the child but the whole family? What else, besides a well-run pre-K, is essential to help families break out of intergenerational poverty? These are some of the key questions that an approach called "two-generation" programs are working to answer. There are many of these "two-gen" programs across the U.S. And while they differ in emphasis and detail, at their core they intentionally focus on ways to help both the child and parent. Usually this happens through targeted education and career training and other vital support such as health services, mentoring, and transportation. (NPR)

Family by Family, How School Segregation Still Happens
Elana Shneyer and Adam Kaufman live a few hundred feet from Public School 165, the Robert E. Simon School, on West 109th Street, at the edge of Morningside Heights in Manhattan. When they started looking for a kindergarten for their son, who will start in the fall, the school was an early stop. That made them unusual.Although their neighborhood is diverse, the children who go to P.S. 165, its zoned school, are mostly Hispanic and low-income. Most of the white students who live in the area it serves attend school elsewhere. (The New York Times)

Report: 5 Ways to Address Teacher Shortages — Where They Really Exist
The often-described “teacher shortage” may not be as widespread as commonly thought, but there are places and subjects where teachers are hard to find, and a new report puts forth some fairly straightforward solutions for that. The analysis, published through the Hamilton Project at the Brookings Institution, wades into the much-argued question of whether teacher shortages are real and what should be done about them. (The 74)

State
Florida
Lawmakers — privately — cut $200M deal to help kids in failing schools
Lawmakers secretly struck a tentative compromise Thursday on one of the most consequential education reforms of the 2017 session — a $200 million program to help students who attend perpetually failing K-12 public schools in Florida. Specifics of the proposed deal were not released, as some of it was still being finalized, House and Senate pre-K-12 education budget chairmen said late Thursday. But the general description of the agreement was enough to earn initial support from some House Democrats, who had — until very recently — staunchly opposed the concept. (Miami Herald)

New Jersey
Baraka and Pro-Charter Slate Sweeps Newark School Board Elections Again
The Newark Unity Slate—a compromise ticket designed by Newark Mayor Ras Baraka, the city’s influential North Ward, and charter-school advocates—swept the city’s school board elections Tuesday night. Of the 15 candidates on the ballot, the top vote-getter was Josephine Garcia. She brought in 3,566 votes, according to preliminary results by the Essex County Clerk’s Office. (Observer)

Tennessee
SCS says it can't help state-run charter students in limbo
The possibility that students at two charter schools will be able to finish middle school in their current schools dwindled this week after Shelby County Schools' lawyer denied the district had any say-so in the matter. The schools' leaders say they haven't given up hope, but time is running out to find a legal avenue by the fall for Aspire Coleman to add the eighth grade and Memphis Scholars Florida-Kansas to add the seventh and eighth grades. (The Commercial Appeal)

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Mornings with Mimi (4-27-17)

Mimi Woldeyohannes — Thu, 27 Apr 2017 14:34:14 +0000

Here are news and opinion stories educators, advocates, policy wonks and makers are talking about today:

News and Analysis

National
Trump orders study of federal role in education
President Trump signed an executive order Wednesday that requires Education Secretary Betsy DeVos to study whether and how the federal government has overstepped its legal authority in K-12 schools, a move he framed as part of a broader effort to shift power from Washington to states and local communities. “Previous administrations have wrongfully forced states and schools to comply with federal whims and dicate what our kids are taught,” Trump said at the White House. “But we know that local communities do it best and know it best.” (The Washington Post)

The Case for Contentious Curricula
On August 9, 2014, the police officer Darren Wilson shot and killed Michael Brown on the streets of Ferguson, Missouri. Wilson is white; Brown was black. He was also unarmed. Within a few days, Ferguson was engulfed in riots. In dozens of other American cities, thousands of protesters took to the streets to condemn racism and police brutality. (The Atlantic)

Planning for ESSA Shows State Shortcomings
Turnover at the top levels of state government and a lack of relational infrastructure appear to be hampering some states in their efforts to develop plans to comply with the new federal law governing American education. Both Indiana and West Virginia recently welcomed new state education superintendents. Officials in both states claim that repairing relationships with educators and other stakeholders is a top priority for the incoming chiefs, and officials from each state have expressed confidence they would meet federal submission rules under the Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA). However, the turnover, along with questions about what previous office-holders had done to advance school accountability and student performance measures, have put the two states into a precarious position regarding the looming federal deadline. (Real Clear Education)

As Trump Readies Sweeping Tax Reform, School Choice Experts Argue Merits of Federal Tax Credit Scholarships
President Trump is set to unveil his far-reaching tax reform proposal Wednesday, and the eyes of the education world will be focused on whether it includes the creation of a federal tax credit scholarship program. A day earlier, advocates at a Thomas B. Fordham Institute event debated not just the best way to design such a program — should states be allowed to opt in or out — but whether or not it was wise for the federal government to oversee. (The 74)

State
North Carolina
NC may change what is labeled a low-performing school
Hundreds of schools each year would avoid the stigma of being labeled by the state as low-performing under a bill unanimously approved by the state House on Wednesday. House Bill 826 changes the definition of low-performing schools to exclude schools with D and F performance grades that met growth targets on state exams. Supporters said the change gives a more realistic and fair view of how North Carolina schools are performing. (The News & Observer)

Rhode Island
States continue move away from Common Core tests
Rhode Island will become the latest in a growing list of states to drop its national consortium designed assessment in favor of using a college-readiness exam to meet federal accountability requirements, education officials announced last week. Beginning with the next school year, high school students will use the PSAT and SAT for annual assessments, and students in grades three through eight will use a version of the Massachusetts Comprehensive Assessment System administered by Rhode Island. These will take place of the grade-level Partnership for Assessment of Readiness for College and Careers exams. (Cabinet Report)

Tennessee
As lawmakers scrutinize the price tag of school vouchers in Memphis, here’s a cost breakdown
If the legislature votes to pilot school vouchers in Memphis, the state will have to spend about $45,000 on envelopes and stamps to get the word out to eligible families. But the vast majority of the cost for the five-year pilot would fall on districts that operate in Memphis — and that could be more than double the $18 million that’s been cited. The House Finance Committee is scheduled to vote Wednesday on the bill, and the Senate finance panel is to weigh in next week. Their role is to consider the cost of the program to taxpayers. (Chalkbeat)

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Campaign progress report: Georgia and Maryland

Marc Porter Magee — Thu, 27 Apr 2017 07:31:00 +0000

In February, we announced the 34 policy goals our local leaders are pursuing this year across the 10 states in the CAN network. Today, in the first of what will be a series of state updates throughout the year, I’m pleased to share our progress made in the first states to wrap up their legislative sessions: Georgia and Maryland.

The stoplight indicates a green light for an advocacy win, a yellow light for significant progress made towards a goal, and a red light for an advocacy loss. Read on to see what our inspiring local leaders have been working on at the capitol and in the community.

MarylandCAN

Develop a core group of high-performing Baltimore principals who will advocate for greater school-level autonomy within the district. MarylandCAN successfully trained 33 Baltimore principals through the innovative Baltimore Principal Leadership Consultancy, a professional development program that provides school leaders with the tools and framework to develop advocacy campaigns in their communities. This program matches new principals with principal mentors to develop a robust bench of school-level leaders.

Secure the ability for non-county entities to employ principals and teachers and authorize a new class of schools in Baltimore City. MarylandCAN supported Governor Hogan's proposal, which, among other improvements to the charter school landscape, would have secured the ability for non-county entities to employ principals and teachers. However, the legislation did not advance past committee.

In addition to these goals, MarylandCAN was at the forefront of a coalition that worked to protect the state’s accountability system, with MarylandCAN board member Pastor Michael Phillips appearing in conjunction with Governor Hogan as he vetoed the legislation, HB 978. Unfortunately, the Democratic-controlled General Assembly overrode the veto. MarylandCAN also spent the legislative session collaborating with the Faith Leaders for Excellent Schools coalition to build an organic reform community movement from the ground up in Baltimore.

GeorgiaCAN

Improve Georgia's charter school environment. GeorgiaCAN and the Georgia Charter Schools Association successfully advocated for the passage of HB 430, a bill that implements the education reform commission's recommendations of ensuring Georgia charter schools receive equitable distribution of state and federal funds and establishing an authorizer code based on the NACSA Principles and Standards for Charter School Authorizing. This bill will be signed by the governor and begin its implementation in the fall of 2017.

Move Georgia to a student-centric state education funding formula. After 3 years of advocating on its behalf, GeorgiaCAN successfully passed a bill on school-level fiscal transparency in this legislative session. This bill lays the foundation for moving Georgia toward a student-centric funding formula in the future.

Expand options for children to have access to the school of their choice. GeorgiaCAN pursued several bills in support of school choice at the committee level, but none of the bills advanced in the legislature this session.

In addition to legislative work, GeorgiaCAN organized parents and students to send more than 900 calls and emails to legislators on education issues. Throughout the year, they’ll continue to work with local community leaders to support citizen advocacy throughout the Peach State.

We know that the end of a legislative session or the passage of a bill is not the end of our work, but rather a step in a continuing journey to bring a high-quality education to all kids, regardless of their address. We aim to learn from our successes and setbacks in Georgia and Maryland as we chart the path forward—and look forward to sharing our next update on our work in Tennessee and South Carolina in June. In the meantime, you can always follow along with the work our advocates are doing in the field on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram.

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Mornings with Mimi (4-26-17)

Mimi Woldeyohannes — Wed, 26 Apr 2017 14:28:12 +0000

Here are news and opinion stories educators, advocates, policy wonks and makers are talking about today:

News and Analysis
National
Trump expected to order study of federal role in education
President Trump is expected to sign an executive order Wednesday that would require Education Secretary Betsy DeVos to study how the federal government “has unlawfully overstepped state and local control,” according to a White House official. Trump has repeatedly pledged to downsize the Education Department and its role in U.S. schools and colleges. The order he plans to sign is “intended to return authority to where Congress intended — state and local entities,” the White House official wrote in an email. (The Washington Post)

U.S. News Ranks America’s Top Public High Schools — and for the First Time, Charters Dominate Top 10
U.S. News and World Report has released its 2017 rankings of America’s public high schools, and for the first time ever, the majority of the schools in the top 10 are charters.
BASIS Scottsdale, BASIS Tucson North, and BASIS Oro Valley — all Arizona public charter schools in the BASIS network — placed one, two, and three atop the 2017 list. Rounding out the top tier are Arizona’s BASIS Peoria and BASIS Chandler schools (ranking #5 and #7 respectively) and California’s Pacific Collegiate Charter (#10). (The 74)

Building an Education Marketplace
With school choice supporters helming both the White House and the U.S. Department of Education, media attention to school choice has focused on potential changes at the federal level. It's true that change could come from Washington: Trump could make good on his promise of $20 billion for school choice, or after hearing arguments last week in Trinity Lutheran Church v. Pauley, the Supreme Court could pave the way for more choice programs by ruling that Blaine Amendments, which prohibit state funds from going to religious schools in 37 state constitutions, are unconstitutional. However, the real action to date on school choice has been at the state level, as evidenced with this month's dramatic expansion of education savings accounts, or ESA, in Arizona. (U.S. News & World Report)

State
Pennsylvania
Sued once over school tax increases, Lower Merion calls for another hike above state cap
After being sued for raising property taxes above the state cap last year, the Lower Merion School District — which lost the case — is proposing to do the same to fund next year's budget. On Monday night, about 200 people packed district headquarters in Ardmore to hear administrators make a brief pitch for their $266 million budget proposal for 2017-18, a 2.7 percent increase over the current school year. The tax rate would rise 2.99 percent, meaning a homeowner with a property at the median assessed value of $250,000 -- an estimated market value of $445,000 -- would pay an additional $205. (The Inquirer Daily News)

New Jersey
Freehold Borough school district to sue state over lack of school funding
The borough's school district intends to sue the Department of Education over millions in state aid the district claims it's not receiving. A resolution that sets the stage for litigation unanimously passed the Freehold Borough Board of Education at its meeting Monday evening. A lawsuit will be filed in about a week or so, said attorney Bruce Padula, who is representing the school district. (NJ.com)

New York
The Research Argument For NYC's Preschool Plan For 3-Year-Olds
Mayor Bill de Blasio this week pushed ahead with plans to make New York City one of nation's few big cities to offer free, full-day preschool for all 3-year-olds.
The plan would serve, when fully rolled out over several years, more than 60,000 children a year. It builds on one of de Blasio's signature accomplishments of his first term – universal pre-K for 4-year-olds. (NPR)

North Carolina
House committee approves charter school growth, enrollment 'perks' for charter partners
RALEIGH, N.C. — The House K-12 Education Committee approved several charter school bills Monday, including one that would allow faster growth and another that would give children of charter school business partners enrollment priority. House Bill 779 would allow North Carolina charter schools to grow by 30 percent without an additional performance review by the state. Any school seeking to grow more than 30 percent would have to be reviewed. The current law sets the bar at 20 percent. Lawmakers initially proposed allowing schools to grow by 40 percent but lowered the threshold to 30. (WRAL)

Tennessee
State explores new approach for improving five failing Hamilton County schools
State and local school leaders want to create a separate district tasked with turning around five of Hamilton County's lowest-performing schools. "The district's iZone has not been as successful as we would have hoped for, and you have an opportunity because all of these students are in the same feeder pattern to do something very unique and supportive of 2,300 kids," said Tennessee Education Commissioner Candice McQueen. (Times Free Press)

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