|
General Ed Reform |
|
Click on a topic below to begin:
|
|
Featured Resources
The Really Big List of Classroom Management Resources: There are
classroom management techniques tailored to elementary and secondary education,
discipline ideas for new and experienced teachers, tips for handling special
education, suggestions for getting organized, strategies for preventing behavior
problems, sample classroom rules, ways of creating a caring community, and more.
The
Learning Page is a huge collection of
professionally produced instructional materials for you to download and print.
Lesson plans, books, worksheets, and much more can be found on the site. Some
items require a free membership to view or download.
Crisis Prevention
Institute, Inc.
-
Supports the work of professionals who work with challenging or potentially
violent individuals by providing a relevant, practical behavior management
program.
|
|
|
Articles and
Websites Related to General Ed Reform |
|
55 Teaching Dilemmas - This book gives
teachers specific, practical ideas for conquering a variety of common
challenges: managing classroom time, supporting struggling students,
preventing burnout, communicating with parents, motivating students, leading
effectively inside and outside the classroom, and much more.
WA WA to
Pay for Free College of Low Income Middle-schoolers - Teresa Jackson
is raising three grandchildren by herself on a fixed income, and saving
money for their college education is nearly impossible. But now Washington
state is stepping in to help low-income students like Jackson's
grandchildren go to college.
High School Seniors Get 'F' in Finance
- Young people's financial know-how has gone from bad to worse.
High school seniors, on average, answered correctly only 48.3 percent of
questions about personal finance and economics, according to a nationwide
survey released Wednesday by the Federal Reserve. That was even lower than
the 52.4 percent in the previous survey in 2006 and marked the worst score
out of the six surveys conducted so far.
OH
Early-college Plan Details Scant - High schools across the state can
begin applying this week for the first funds available to start “Seniors to
Sophomores” early college programs. But it is unclear how many of those high
schools – and their college partners – will be in the Cincinnati region.
Some school officials here are just beginning to talk about how to launch
the initiative in the fall. Proposed by Gov. Ted Strickland, Seniors to
Sophomores would allow seniors to spend their fourth year of high school
taking courses on college campuses in Ohio. They’d earn college credit and a
high school diploma at the same time.
MD
Villa Julie Focuses on Middle Years - Better teacher preparation for
grades 6-8 is goal of planned program, a first in Maryland. Middle school
teachers are usually thought of in the teaching profession as having a
unique quality that allows them to put up with -- sometimes even enjoy --
the students who are turning from sweet children to awkward teenagers. But
until yesterday no university or college had focused its undergraduate
education majors on that period of life when kids need to learn a lot --
from how to write a paper to algebra -- and also get through those wacky,
difficult years. Villa Julie College announced yesterday that, beginning
this fall, it will offer Maryland's first teacher preparation program
designed for the middle grades.
Education Watch:
Afterschool Detention Can be a Chance to Learn Better Behavior - Six
boys schlep into a second-floor classroom at Calcutt Middle School for what
would have been afterschool detention in any other school. At Calcutt, it’s
afterschool re-engagement.
How to Make Great Teachers - There's little research on what makes
for a successful merit-pay system, but several factors seem critical, says
Matthew Springer, director of the National Center on Performance Incentives
at Vanderbilt University. In Denver, for example, Professional Compensation,
or ProComp, is the product of a seven-year collaboration among the teachers'
union, the district and city hall. Rolled out last school year, ProComp
includes nine ways for teachers to raise their earnings, some through
bonuses and some through bumps in salary. New hires are automatically
enrolled, while veterans have the option of sticking with the old salary
schedule. But in just one year, half of Denver's 4,555 teachers have signed
on. Denver's program includes several of the factors critical to success: a
careful effort to earn teacher buy-in to the plan, clarity about how it
works, multiple ways of measuring merit, rewards for teamwork and schoolwide
success, and reliable financing. In fact, Denver's voters agreed to pay an
extra $25 million a year in taxes for nine years to support the program.
Film Raises Troubling Questions About U.S. Students - At first blush,
Brittany Brechbuhl and Neil Ahrendt seem American success stories: They
attend Carmel High School, a gleaming glass-and-brick edifice in suburban
Indianapolis, where taxpayer support buys a genetics lab, a swimming pool
and a 91% graduation rate. Brittany is 28th in her class, with a nearly
perfect GPA; Neil is a National Merit semifinalist and class president. What
could possibly be wrong with this picture?
Longer School Days Create Additional Opportunities for Learning -
Struggling learners can get additional help and other students have more
time for arts, music and enrichment at the increasing number of schools
nationwide that are lengthening the school day or year, proponents say. "Our
aspirations for both children and schools have increased dramatically, and
we're still working out of the old, very limited box," said Paul Reville,
Massachusetts Board of Education chairman, and co-chairman of a Boston-based
organization formed to promote longer school days. "We're not getting all
students to high standards. It seems to us, the way to do that is make more
time available."
Blue-collar Teacher Contracts Work Against the Students - In an
unfortunate accident of history, the labor contracts that won decent pay for
teachers also cemented into place a factory-model design for schooling.
Blue-collar labor contracts spell out and limit a worker’s obligations on
the factory floor, or in this case a classroom, as if teachers were as
interchangeable as die-press operators.
National List of Problem Teachers Made Public - A confidential,
nationwide list of 24,500 teachers who have been punished for a wide array
of offenses had been made available to the public by a Florida newspaper.
The database can be searched online at
http://www.heraldtribune.com/article/20071219/NEWS/997571940.
Study Questions
Wisdom of Shift of 6th Graders From Elementary to Middle Schools -
Sixth graders do better in elementary school than middle school, according
to researchers at Duke University and the University of California at
Berkeley who found that sixth graders in middle school had more discipline
problems and lower test scores than their sixth-grade peers in elementary
schools.
Classroom Management Tips:
Start Your Day the Right Way
Behavior Management Tips:
Encouraging Classroom Participation
Motivating Kids:
Try a New Strategy
Help for Homework Hassles:
What's Tonight's Assignment Again?
Best Idea Ever:
Say "Thanks" to Your Student Teacher
Cutting Provisions Could Free Funds - Report finds that certain
contract provisions for teacher pay raises have "a weak or inconsistent
relationship with student learning." U.S. public schools could have as much
as $77 billion more a year to improve teaching if they reduced spending on
pay increases based on seniority, professional development days, generous
health and retirement benefits, teacher's aides, class size limits and other
measures often found in teacher union contracts, a new study contends.
Commission Recommends Drastic Changes to U.S. Public Education - A
bipartisan commission has proposed a series of dramatic changes that would
shake up American public education in an effort to make the nation more
competitive globally. The New Commission on the Skills of the American
Workforce issued its recommendations — which include paying teachers
significantly better salaries, authorizing school districts to pay companies
to run schools, and enrolling many students in college after tenth grade —
in a 170-page report on the future workforce.
Do Corporations Peddle Junk Science to School Kids? - The oil
industry, the coal industry and other corporate interests are exploiting
shortfalls in education funding by using a small slice of their record
profits to buy themselves a classroom soapbox, through textbooks, classroom
posters and teacher seminars. Students should expect, and parents should
demand, that educators present an honest and unbiased look at the true state
of knowledge about the challenges of the day, writes Laurie David, the
producer of documentary "An Inconvenient Truth." In the meantime, Mom and
Dad may want to keep a sharp eye on their kids' science homework.
Summer Learning
Opportunities Can be a Key to Academic Success - This Urban Institute
evaluation on the nationally recognized summer enrichment program operated
by BELL -- a nonprofit provider of after-school and summer programs to 8,000
low-income students in Boston, New York, Baltimore and Washington,
D.C.—found that the program increases students’ reading skills and their
parents’ involvement in their education.
TX
New High School Sets Bar High for Students - How do you build a high
school from scratch? In Collin County's Lovejoy ISD, it begins with high
expectations. All students in the small district's first high school will
take pre-AP classes when the new campus opens Aug. 7. The strategy is
unusual and makes some parents nervous, but local officials and some experts
say it potentially could boost student performance. Principal Mike Goddard
visited schools as far away as New Hampshire and Minnesota to help develop
the school's strategy.
Bill Gates
Gets Schooled - Six years and a steep learning curve later Melinda
Gates says she and Bill didn't realize at first how much cooperation it
would take from school districts and states to break up traditional big
schools. "If you want to equate being naive with being inexperienced, then
we were definitely naive when we first started," she says.
A textbook Case of
Failure - As younger, inexperienced teachers are thrown into
classrooms to meet new federal standards, as much as 90 percent of the
burden of instruction rests on textbooks, yet, few if any textbooks are ever
subjected to independent field testing of whether they actually help
students learn. “This is where people miss the boat. They don’t realize how
important the textbooks are,” said Frank Wang, a former textbook publisher
who left the field to teach mathematics at the University of Oklahoma. “We
talk about vouchers and more teachers, but education is about the books.
That’s where the content is.”
WI
Madison Schools Closing Racial Achievement Gap - Madison's public
schools appear to be succeeding with efforts to attack a problem common to
urban districts nationwide — the performance gap between students of
different races, according to two education researchers who attributed the
gains to strategies that promote improved training of teachers and more
focused tutoring.
The 65% Solution is Worth a Try - Five states have now adopted laws
which require that school districts spend at least 65% of their budgets
directly in schools to support classroom teaching and learning. Why? In
order to understand what is really going on it is necessary to take a step
back and look at the culture in major urban districts and what is really
causing the problem of misappropriating funds away from classrooms. These
districts have created a very clear reward system that distributes money,
power and status to adults on the following basis: The less contact one has
with children and youth in classrooms the higher one's status salary and
power; the more direct contact with the students, the lower one's status,
salary and power.
The Big Gift:
A
New Fundraising Strategy For Public Schools (PDF) - In 2004, more
than $240 billion was contributed to worthy causes across America. Of this
amount, approximately $31 billion (13 percent) went to education -- second
only to religion in grants and gifts received. More than 80 percent of all
contributions, including bequests, came from individual donors. That’s $170
billion. What does all this mean to public schools trying to bring in
outside monies? It means that the schools need to learn how to pursue
individual donors as never before.
Why School Achievement Isn't
Reaching the Poor - We are at the point where any study that shows
how low-income schools can reach the heights of academic performance is also
an indictment of how the nation has no commitment to lifting all schools.
Helping Pupils,
Other Teachers - It was in language arts class, four
weeks into the school year, when Aileen Mercado saw the impact
she was having on American children. As usual, her sixth-grade
pupils were spending the first 10 minutes writing in journals.
Unprompted, Elizabeth Mendoza decided to write about her
teacher. I am going to tell you about Mrs. Mercado she is a very
nice person and she is a beautiful lady. Then also Mrs. Mercado
is really helpful to me and every one in the school. "I almost
cried," Mercado says later. "It affirms that I'm doing my part
somehow."
Are Single-sex Classrooms the Best Way to Teach Kids? -
Three years ago, Principal Jeff Gray realized that his school
needed help—and fast. Test scores were the worst in the county
and the students, particularly the boys, were falling far
behind. Gray revamped the curriculum and divided the classes by
gender. Gray says the gender-based curriculum gave the school
"the edge we needed." Tests scores are up. Discipline problems
are down.
FL
Miami-Dade
Schools May Split Genders - When the single-gender
classes began last year -- voluntary for both students and
teachers -- the results were jarring. In co-ed fourth-grade
classes, 33 percent of boys and 59 percent of girls passed the
state's standardized writing test. In the single-gender classes,
those figures jumped to 86 percent for boys and 75 percent for
girls.
Blogging Classroom
Connects to Parents - Some parents struggle to get their
children to surrender even a scrap of information about what
they did in school. But last year, Joyce Schubert didn't even
have to ask. Each day, after her fifth-grade daughter, Kayla
Vance, disappeared into a Pinellas Park Elementary School
classroom, Schubert would log onto the Internet for a virtual
peek inside.
8th Grade Equivalent Isn't the Same Anymore - Could You Have Passed
the 8th Grade in 1895?...Take a Look: This is the eighth-grade final exam
from 1895 from Salina, KS. USA. It was taken from the original document on
file at the Smoky Valley Genealogical Society and Library in Salina, KS and
reprinted by the Salina Journal.
Practice Scenes For the Tough Choices of Adolescence - Role playing
helps students engage in class and show less aggression, a study shows.
MA
Dorchester School's Seniors
All Accepted to College - One 9th grader read at the 3rd grade level.
A few struggled to multiply or divide. One girl's father had been slain.
Another student was homeless. Most students who entered the new Codman
Academy charter high school never expected to get into college. Some simply
did not want to try. But they had no choice at Codman. Each had to apply to
college before they would be allowed to graduate.
Forget Midterms, What About
Midriffs? Teacher Attire Becoming a Touchy Topic - Teachers are
expected to bear long days, challenging students and demanding parents. Now,
apparently, some teachers are baring too much of themselves. School boards
and superintendents increasingly are pursuing dress codes for teachers. At
issue is the same kind of questionable attire most often associated with
students.
NY
How A
District in the Bronx Got Results: From Pushing - For decades,
District 9 was a tale of woe. The local school board had a history of
corruption and for many years, the district's reading scores were the worst
in the city. Six years ago only 17.1 percent of District 9's fourth graders
scored at grade level, now, the number 17.1, represents the district's
percentage-point gain in fourth-grade scores. Parents and community groups
banded together to form CC9, the Community Collaborative to Improve District
9 Schools. Last year CC9 brokered a remarkable deal between the teachers'
union and the school system to create a "lead teacher" program, in which
veteran educators were paired to share a class so they could spend half
their time mentoring less experienced colleagues. Lead teachers are paid an
extra $10,000 a year.
Commentary:
Schools Need to go Back to Basics - Apparently believing more than
200 years ago that an idle mind can be the devil's playground, Wordsworth
and his classmates spent 11 hours a day in school, five days a week, and
half a day on Saturday.
Do Clothes Make the Student? - Many administrators say uniforms help
improve student behavior and learning.
Tool:
School Communities that Work - The complexity of traditional school
funding formulas makes it difficult to compare budget allocations among
schools in a district. In urban districts, especially, the diversity of
programs, student populations, and funding streams can result in very
different per pupil dollars for different schools. Assessing Patterns of
Resource Distribution (APRD) is a free online tool that allows district
officials and other stakeholders to compare district spending for schools
with different students and programs, pinpointing possible inequities. All
you need to do is enter public data on spending and enrollment, and the tool
does all the calculations.
NC
Parents Decry Inner-city Schools - They say educational quality
suffers in high-poverty CMS areas Frustrated black parents complained
Saturday that their children are getting a second-rate education in
inner-city schools that are filled with students from poor families.
MA
Schools Feed a Need - This wasn't sixth-grader Kevin Roche's day. It
was well after 6 p.m., and he was still at school, racking his brain to
explain the chemical reactions of acids and bases. Worse, his Dad sat beside
him, peering at his every pencil scratch. And just across the cafeteria
table sat his teacher, making sure he stayed on task. They came to Andrews
Middle School for a ''Family Homework" dinner, where once a month teachers
and students prepare a meal for families in the cafeteria. After breaking
bread, everyone breaks out the books.
MI
At-risk Kids Get Education Boost - Commerce Twp. middle-schoolers who
struggle get help in alternative program. When Kandiss Keller tried to
understand her homework last year, she would often get frustrated and give
up. This school year, she has the help of Skills for Success, an alternative
middle school program that meets twice a day, at the beginning and end of
the school day.
MI
Dearborn Schools Enlist Online Tutors - The first 24-hour online
tutoring program in the state for middle and high school students was
launched Tuesday in the Dearborn Public Schools to boost standardized test
scores, homework grades and comprehension of classroom lesson plans.
UK
The Head Who Banned
Homework - Spiritualists believe the village of Marlborough, in
Wiltshire, lies at the heart of the modern-day crop circle phenomenon. Last
week, however, a local headmaster achieved something even more mystical: he
made homework disappear.
The One-size-fits-all Way Girls Are Taught Explains Their Differences With
Boys - A distinguished Harvard professor suggests women may be
innately less capable of scholarship at the highest levels and asserts that
the pursuit of an academic career will cause a woman's body to shunt blood
away from the uterus toward the brain, rendering that woman "irritable and
infertile." A flurry of press coverage ensues.
MN
Minnesota Governor Unveils School Improvement Plan - Gov. Tim
Pawlenty unveiled a sweeping education agenda for Minnesota on Wednesday
before hundreds of educators, business leaders and politicians. That agenda
includes higher pay for teachers who work in tough schools. The plan also
gives more power to schools so they can pick their own teachers and set
their own budgets. Pawlenty was joined at his talk by Louis V. Gerstner Jr.,
chairman of the Teaching Commission, a nationwide policy consortium of
business leaders, educators and political figures dedicated to, among other
things, changing the way teachers are paid and improving teacher training.
Gerstner said Minnesota will be the first of four to six states the
commission wants to work with to implement its agenda for education change.
MI
State Superintendent
Taps Energy of Model School - A meeting with the front line troops in
West Bloomfield served as an energy booster for Michigan's head of public
schools Monday. Tom Watkins, state superintendent of public education, spent
most of Monday at the Bloomfield Hills Public School's Model High School to
find out what teachers and students believe is important in education.
MI
Local Students Provide
Insight to State Education Leader - Bay-Arenac Community High
School's progress with troubled and challenged students has caught the
attention of the state's top educator. Tom Watkins, Michigan's
superintendent of public instruction, visited the Essexville school on
Friday to ask the students what has helped them become successful. "You'll
hear some real pearls of wisdom," Watkins said of talking to the students.
"They'll tell you what works and what doesn't."
Emotional Ties to School Vital to Success - There's a growing body of
evidence that building emotional connections between young people and their
schools improves their commitment to education and increases their ability
to resist risky behavior. Research shows that 40 percent to 60 percent of
all students -- urban, suburban and rural - are "chronically disengaged"
from school. And these numbers don't include kids who actually drop out of
school. "Essentially, we're telling kids they're on their own, and while
many of them succeed, many don't. This is not acceptable."
No Black-White Test-Score Gap at Age 4, But It Appears After Children
Enter School - African American
children and white children from similar family backgrounds who
entered kindergarten in 1998 began school with approximately the same
test scores. This striking finding is drawn from the national Early
Childhood Longitudinal Study. But by the end of first grade African
American children have lost ground to comparable white children. The
authors find no evidence that slippage occurs over the summertime, an
oft-offered explanation for the test-score gap. Nor are differences in
family background the likely cause. Instead, it appears that the cause
is within the schoolhouse.
CA
Teachers Find Making House Calls Pays Off -
Katrina Ramos had difficulty keeping her class under control when she first
started teaching at Hiram Johnson High School three years ago. Her students were
defiant and talked back to her, making it difficult to teach, the special
education teacher said. So she opted to take advantage of a local program,
receiving the training necessary to make individual home visits. The result: Her
classroom's behavior turned around in no time.
»
Click here for more in-depth resources
and information on this topic.
|
|
Literacy |
|
»
Click here for more in-depth resources and
information on this topic.
|
|
Teacher Certification |
|
Uncertified Teachers Performing
Well, Study Finds - According to a new study, uncertified teachers end up
performing just as well in the classroom as certified teachers and alternatively
trained teachers. The study's results appear to challenge requirements under the
federal No Child Left Behind Act that every classroom have a "highly qualified"
teacher, instead suggesting that schools should put more emphasis on weeding out
bad apples after the teachers have been hired. While alternatively certified and
uncertified teachers do worse at first, they appear to improve at faster rates
than traditionally certified teachers and by the teachers' third year on the
job, students of alternatively certified and uncertified teachers are performing
just as well as those of traditionally certified teachers.
Challenge to Teacher Ed - For-profit venture seeks to offer a new model,
involving close ties to school districts and a curriculum based on the latest
research.
Innovations In Education - "Alternative Routes
to Teacher Certification" looks at six programs that prepare people who already
have content knowledge -- such as mid-career professionals, liberal arts
graduates, retired military personnel, and other college graduates -- to teach.
"Alternative Pathways to School Leadership" provides examples of successful
strategies to prepare candidates for school leadership positions. To receive two
copies of each new book, write to Courtney Phillips at
Courtney.Phillips@ed.gov
or click on the link above. [Source: Office of Innovation and
Improvement, U.S. Department of Education]
Check your child's
Michigan Teacher Certification Status
KY
Kentucky Teachers Taking Alternative Paths to Certifications - A growing
number of Kentucky teachers are taking alternative routes to their certification
- getting into the classroom while earning their credentials.
Alternative teacher-certification program debuts online -
A new internet-based program that allows underqualified teachers,
career changers, and other professionals to bypass teacher colleges to become
"highly qualified" certified teachers made its debut Aug. 22. Passport to
Teaching targets people who are interested in becoming teachers but don't want
to take the time and incur the expense of completing a traditional
teacher-education program. [Free registration required to
read/view this article @
www.eschoolnews.com]
Attention Michigan Teachers: Information and teacher certification
applications can be found at the Michigan Dept. of Ed. website at
www.michigan.gov/mde. Click on
educators on the left and then on professional preparation on the left.
Looking
for a job? K-12 job opportunities may be found at
www.greatschooljobs.com or
www.mireap.net.
What's
Wrong With Teacher Certification? - Current teacher licensing, or
teacher certification, as it is commonly called, does not do what it is intended
to do. It does not differentiate clearly between those who are qualified to
teach and those who are not.
Paige
Backs Reform in Certification of Teachers - Mr. Paige yesterday
endorsed the new American Board for Certification of Teacher
Excellence (ABCTE), whose mission is to certify subject experts,
experienced professionals and military veterans as public school
teachers, even if they don't have degrees in education.
Teachers get an easy pass
- Minnesota teachers hold a national reputation for excellence, but
when it comes to the tests they take to get their licenses, the state
allows some of the lowest passing scores in the country.
|
| Leadership |
|
Innovations In Education - "Alternative Routes
to Teacher Certification" looks at six programs that prepare people who already
have content knowledge -- such as mid-career professionals, liberal arts
graduates, retired military personnel, and other college graduates -- to teach.
"Alternative Pathways to School Leadership" provides examples of successful
strategies to prepare candidates for school leadership positions. To receive two
copies of each new book, write to Courtney Phillips at
Courtney.Phillips@ed.gov
or click on the link above. [Source: Office of Innovation and
Improvement, U.S. Department of Education]
Building Academic Success on Social and Emotional
Learning: What Does the Research Say? - A new publication from the Collaborative
on Academic, Social, and Emotional Learning, examines the relationships between
social emotional education and school success, specifically focusing on
interventions that enhance student learning. The book provides both scientific
evidence and practical examples in describing the benefits of social emotional
learning programs, such as: skill-building linked to cognitive development;
improved relationships between students and teachers; school-family partnerships
to help students achieve; and increased student confidence and success. To order
a copy from Teachers College Press go to
http://store.tcpress.com/0807744395.shtml.
ISLLC Standards Found Lacking in Practices Related to Student Achievement
(PDF) - The Mid-continent Regional Education
Laboratory takes a look at the Interstate School Leaders Licensure Consortium (ISLLC)
standards for licensing school principals and finds that they contain some---but
not all---of the leadership responsibilities and practices that are correlated
with student achievement. If you’re one of the 40 states that have incorporated
ISLLC into their leadership standards, you’ll want to read
this report.
Eight Elements for Superintendents Who Want to Make a Difference
- Today’s superintendency calls on deep reserves from leaders who
understand and seek to practice fundamental tenets of what Michael Fullan calls
"system thinkers in action." The eight elements of sustainability constitute the
agenda for the superintendent who wants to make a difference and has the resolve
and energy to keep going: (1) Public service with moral purpose; (2) Change the
entire context within which people work; (3) Strengthen peer relations across
schools; (4) Increase the capacity of schools to engage in self-review; (5)
Continuous improvement, adaptation and collective problem solving in the face of
complex challenges; (6) Dual commitment to short-term and long-term results; (7)
Taking the energy, additional time, and ingenuity required for the next
breakthrough; and (8) Developing other leaders in the district.
KS
In Less Than 2 Years, Principal
Restores Discipline, Improves Test Scores -
After Denise Wren took over one of Wichita's toughest high schools, she did more
with less. A lot more. Math and reading test scores rose. Writing scores jumped
14 percentage points.
Featured Website:
e-Lead.org,
a partnership of IEL (Institute for Educational Leadership) and the
Laboratory for Student Success (LSS), offers states and districts
information about how to provide better professional development for
principals The renovated site now includes over 30 programs in its
selected database, in addition to other guidance and resources.
Commentary: Is Unity
Possible? - One of the challenges of
leadership in any organization (or country) is how to respect and
incorporate diverse viewpoints and experiences while uniting behind a
common vision in order to reach common goals – and not allowing the
process to be derailed.
MI
Everett's Principal is Named Best in the State
- Dale Glynn, who has led Lansing's diverse Everett High
School since 1995, is Michigan's new High School Principal of the
Year. Affectionately known as "Rainbow Man" because of his inclusive
nature, Glynn said the students "become my sons and my daughters."
Mentors Are Biggest Help to New Teachers, Report Indicates
- Since 1999, researchers at the Harvard Graduate School of
Education have followed the careers of 50 new Massachusetts
teachers.
The Waiting Game - Alexander Russo looks at the
struggles of graduates of the highly competitive program New
Leaders for New Schools to find jobs in traditional public
schools. New Leaders fellows receive the kind of leadership
and management training that principals hired through
traditional routes seldom enjoy. Each cohort of “new leaders”
is chosen through a highly competitive application process.
Those selected take courses during the summer, then spend a
year in full-time “residency” at a school under the guidance
of a mentor principal. The current fellows range in age from
their late 20s to their mid-50s. Two-thirds are
African-American, Hispanic, or Asian-American, and two-thirds
are women. Most important, they are among the most confident,
determined, and accomplished school leadership candidates you
can imagine.
It Takes Much More Than Mentors to Help New Teachers -
On Sunday, May 16, 2004, I saw a posting from azcentral.com
headlining “Mentors are biggest help to new teachers, report
indicates.” It cites the May/June Harvard Education Letter and
the Public Education Network to support its headline and
article. Both the azcentral.com posting and the Harvard
Education Letter are incorrect. A definition is in order.
Mentoring and induction are not synonymous. Mentoring is what
a mentor does. Induction is the name given to the
comprehensive process used to train, support, and retain new
teachers, of which a mentor may be one component. Mentors are
very important, but they must be part of an induction process
aligned to the district’s vision, mission, and structure. For
a mentor to be effective, the mentor must be trained and then
used in combination with the other components of the induction
process.
FL
In This Florida District Diversity Hasn't Reached the Principal's
Office - In Florida's giant Broward
County school district, only 10 school principals are Hispanic. That's
6 percent, compared with nearly one in four students. Even as the
county rapidly grows more diverse, school administrators are still
mostly white non-Hispanics--and their grip on the principal's office
can be damaging, Hispanic parents say.
OH
Fewer Want to be Superintendents -
Superintendents are retiring in record numbers, but schools can't fill
their positions.
Seven Principles of Sustainable Leadership - A new study finds
that a key force leading to meaningful, long-term change is leadership
sustainability. Most school leadership practices create temporary,
localized flurries of change but little lasting or widespread
improvement. The study found some exceptions, however. From the first
day of their appointment, some leaders thought hard about how they
might implement deep, broad, and long-lasting reforms. The authors
illustrate seven principles that together define sustainable
leadership.
IL
Portfolios the First Phase of New Principal Screening - 600
eligible candidates must document leadership experience and students'
academic gains.
The Star Principal Questionnaire -
Do you have what it takes to be the principal of a
school serving diverse children in poverty? Individuals who
can be effective school principals are in great demand.
Leaders who can transform failing schools into successful ones
have specific predispositions which have been identified and
constructed into a test.
IL
Schools Plan to Make Becoming a Principal Much Tougher
- Would-be Chicago public school principals would
have to pass a new oral and written exam and produce an
adequate writing sample under a plan that could make Chicago
one of the toughest places in the nation to win a job as
principal, officials said Friday. [Source]
Toolkit - Parent Checklist:
Examining Principal Leadership in Your Community (PDF) from
Parents4PublicSchools.com.
Leadership is an Affair of the Heart -
"When I have asked teachers and principals, 'What is the guiding
principle or big idea that
drives the work of your school and gives direction and
focus to the people who work within
it?' the most common response is, 'We need
to raise test scores,'" writes Rick DuFour. That's
not enough. " Leaders who are most effective in generating
results know how to "appeal not only to the
bottom line, but also to the heart. In fact,
one of the best strategies for improving
results is connecting with people's deepest,
heartfelt hopes." [Source: PEN]
CA
Co-principals:
Divvying up a Monster Job - At Polytechnic High School here,
everyone wants a piece of Principal Shawn Ashley. They all also want a
piece of Principal Gwen Mack. One minute, a teacher is complaining
about kids loitering in the halls. The next, an aide is hauling in a
boy caught in the girls’ bathroom. Then a custodian is griping about
co-workers. Ashley and Mack take it all in stride.
NC
Women Lead
Few School Districts -
The path to the superintendent's office can be
difficult. Leaning slightly in her chair, Orange County schools
Superintendent Shirley Carraway reflects on the path she took to her
corner office in Hillsborough. The journey of a few paces from the
front door was years long, navigating through male-dominated territory
and leaping hurdles of preference, prejudice and perception. It's a
voyage that many women don't get to make.
NY
Principal
Apple of His Eye -
It didn't take an army of cops to turn around troubled
Hillcrest High School in Queens. It took a tough principal. One day
after announcing plans to flood the city's 12 most dangerous schools
with more police, Chancellor Joel Klein made a surprise visit to the
Jamaica school that just two years ago was one of the most violent in
the city. The drop-in was designed to show that Klein thinks
principals, not cops, are ultimately responsible for the safety in
their schools.
CA
A Buddy
System for Educators -
At Polytechnic High School in Long Beach, everyone
wants a piece of Principal Shawn Ashley. They all also want a piece of
Principal Gwen Mack. One minute, a teacher is complaining about kids
loitering in the halls. The next, an aide is hauling in a boy caught
in the girls' bathroom. Then a custodian is griping about co-workers.
Ashley and Mack take it all in stride. Inside their office, with two
gray cubicles and two names on the door, they divvy up a monster job
usually heaped on the shoulders of a single principal.
Guiding
Principles for Principal Professional Development
- "E-Lead," a free website resource dedicated to
providing states and districts with guidance
about and information on the professional
development of school principals, was launched
through the partnership of the
Laboratory for Student Success and the Institute for
Educational Leadership.
[Source: PEN]
Leadership
Opportunity:
Broad Center 2004 Urban Superintendents Academy - The Urban
Superintendents Academy is a 10-month executive management course
designed to prepare leaders from outside and inside the education
sector to become successful urban superintendents. The Broad Center is
seeking high-achieving, dynamic executives from the corporate,
nonprofit, government, military and education sectors who have a
passion for improving public education by serving as chief executive
officers in our nation's largest urban school systems. Application
deadlines are September 15 and October 15, 2003.
The
Education Policy and
Leadership Center (EPLC) is an independent, non-profit,
non-partisan organization focused on
state-level education policy and educational leadership development.
The mission of The Education Policy and
Leadership Center is to encourage and support the use of more
effective state-level education policies to improve student learning
in grades K-12, increase the effective operation of schools, and
enhance educational opportunities for citizens of all ages.
WA
School Chiefs Lack Broad
Authority for Reforms, UW Survey Finds - A University of
Washington study being released Monday suggests the goals of No Child
Left Behind -- a sweeping educational reform that holds schools and
districts accountable for student achievement -- will be difficult to
meet unless school superintendents are given greater authority.
An Impossible Job?
The View From the Urban Superintendent's Chair
- This report, the second in the Center's leadership series,
finds that even the best superintendents cannot make the changes
necessary to raise school performance because district governance
thwarts their ability to implement reform. The research is based on
surveys and interviews of 140 urban superintendents, and the final
chapter outlines a number of recommendations to empower
superintendents. View the summary, policy
brief, press release, or full report.
Agent of Change - A year in the life
of a hard-charging superintendent shows what it takes to overhaul a
school system. (You must login/register to read
this article from Education Week.)
Report on Effective
Leadership Now Available
Report on Effective
Leadership Now Available - Effective Superintendents, Effective
Boards: Finding the Right Fit looks at the relationship between school
boards and superintendents and how it affects student achievement.
This report is available for
free (pdf) on the Web
and $10 for a hard copy at
https://www.ewa.org/cgi-bin/formengine.cgi?form=orderform.
(An Education Writers Association Special Report)
Beyond Instructional Leadership:
The Learning-Centered
Principal -
"When I entered the principalship a quarter century ago, the
research on effective schools warned that without strong
administrative leadership, the disparate elements of good schooling
could be neither brought together nor kept together. I heeded the
message. I was determined to rise above the mundane managerial tasks
of the job and focus instead on instruction—I hoped to be an
instructional leader."
Target Stores and Tiger Woods Restructure Start Something Scholarship
Program - Target Stores and the Tiger Woods Foundation
have restructured Start Something, a program that helps young people
pursue their dreams and goals and encourages youth leadership and
community stewardship.
CA
Chief San Diego
school reformer to leave -
Superintendent calls departure 'mutual'.
Read the article "A
Compass in the Storm" - Guiding
principles for a new age of business and school partnerships.
Leadership dilemmas can only be answered through spiritual and
philosophical traditions - "I’d like
to offer just a few simple practices that I personally can’t live
without if I’m to maintain a sense of focus and peace as a leader...."
By looking
inward, any individual has the capacity to rise to greatness
-
"Leadership is a mysterious and
elusive concept. What we read as history is really the
creation of myths. From an ordinary person, society creates a
Napoleon or Gandhi, a Martin Luther King Jr. or Joan of Arc,
someone who acquires mythic status as a shaper of destiny." -
Deepak Chopra
A Way to Engage,
Not Escape - "In a time when educational leaders are
told to focus on numbers-driven, outcome-based, bottom-line
accountability, the idea of spirituality in leadership can
seem quaint, irrelevant and downright squishy. What possible
use can spirituality have for leaders, other than perhaps to
serve as a brief and unreal respite from the rough-and-tumble
world?"
Five principles
for welcoming soul into school leadership -
“What are the ‘inner’ skills and
strengths you have cultivated and sustained that make you a
strong leader today?” I asked Bob Adams, the superintendent in
Aurora, Colorado.
|
|
Professional
Development
Click here for
information on
Grant Writing.
|
|
KBTeachers.com - A website created by teachers for teachers where you can
buy and sell lesson plans and worksheets. Sample documents are available on the
website.
Learn more about Janice Fialka's unique
approach to strengthening Parent-Professional Partnerships by visiting her
website on
The Dance of Partnership: Why Do My Feet Hurt?
Teaching Style and Classroom
Management - The process of maintaining a calm
and productive classroom environment starts with the teacher.
Editorial:
'Special' Education Helps All
Students - The University of Cincinnati has just announced a plan to
offer free or drastically reduced tuition to teachers willing to enter the field
of special education. That's a cost savings and employment enhancement for
teachers, but the real winners in this package are students - and that's not
just children with special needs but regular education students as well.
Where Some Give Credit,
Others Say It's Not Due - Teachers frequently ask themselves: If a
student shows significant effort but averages a D on her tests, should her
hard work result in at least a C? Or does that render grades meaningless?
Teaching
Children With AD/HD: Instructional Strategies And Practices: 2004 (PDF) -
An excellent overview of strategies and practices for teachers.
The U.S. Department of Education's
Gateway to Educational Materials (GEM) Web site allows educators to quickly
search over 40,000 materials by school subject, grade level, activity type,
target audience, stakeholder group, and price. You can look for third grade
lesson plans on fractions and decimals, for example. To get started on your
search, go to http://thegateway.org/.
MI
Macomb Facility Teaches Teachers - When Meggan
McLain of St. Clair decided to become a special education teacher, she chose
Saginaw Valley State University's Macomb Regional Education Center to help her
achieve her goal.
A Chance to Teach--and to Learn - As a
schoolteacher fights cancer, her pupils are showing her how to "live in the
moment."
A Website Where Students Can Go Figure -
UCLA's problem-solving site demands more critical thinking than
multiple-choice tests. It also lets teachers track students' methods.
Visit
http://www.immex.ucla.edu/ for more information.
[Login/registration required to read this article.]
Featured Educational Websites for Teachers:
MarcoPolo
-
Kathy Schrock -
Blue Web'n
-
4 Teachers
- Michigan Teacher
Network
Looking
for a job? Visit our section on Job
Opportunities & Resources or K-12 job opportunities may be found at
www.greatschooljobs.com or
www.mireap.net.
The Saints of
Education - The demands on the teachers of
special education students are enormous. The work is emotionally and physically
draining. The stress is considerable. The magnitude of the workload is colossal
with all of the mandated reporting and administrative tasks expected of them.
The cumulative effect of teaching the special education child causes many
teachers to leave the profession after just a few years.
CA
Teachers Find Making House Calls Pays Off -
Katrina Ramos had difficulty keeping her class under control when she first
started teaching at Hiram Johnson High School three years ago. Her students were
defiant and talked back to her, making it difficult to teach, the special
education teacher said. So she opted to take advantage of a local program,
receiving the training necessary to make individual home visits. The result: Her
classroom's behavior turned around in no time.
Education Arcade - MIT researchers are creating academically driven
computer games that rival commercial products and make learning fun. It’s early
afternoon on a Sunday at Boston’s Museum of Science. Brittle winter light floods
the lower lobby of the Green Wing, where about a dozen young students are
huddled in teams, peering at Pocket PCs, their parents listening nearby.
The Ganas Factor:
PTA Convention Speaker Charles Garcia
Says
Passion Is the Key to Transforming Education - The author, entrepreneur,
and speaker says that if parents and teachers can get excited about learning,
kids will get excited too. He offers five tips for lighting and feeding that
fire.
EDC
Offers Teachers a Guide Through High School E-Science -
"Hands-on" science is becoming "hands-on-the-computer" science. To
support teachers in that role Education Development Center of Newton MA, with
support from NEC Foundation of America and National Science Foundation, has
produced a guide for teachers: "Selecting Computer-Based High School Science
Curricula." The guide is for teachers trying to decide whether to use a
particular curriculum that comes in digital form. The guide questions them about
the e-curriculum they are considering: what learning is likely to occur, the
teaching requirements, the equity of access and benefit, and the
dollars-and-cents feasibility. The tool tells them why they should ask those
questions. It gives them sample answers written by teachers who use the tool. It
also profiles 14 e-curricula available to classrooms electronically.
The Spirit and the Will to Change - Peter
Block, an expert on leading change, applies his theories and ideas to school
reform in this Journal of Staff Development interview (Spring 2003). "People say
they need more training, they need more skills, they need more tools. People
believe there's something missing in them that needs to be added before they can
make a difference. I'm trying to shift the focus from skills and methodology to
issues of the spirit, of will, of courage." He continues: "We believe people
don't want to change so we have to seduce them into it. That leads to treating
people in their smallest versions. It is not change that people resist, it is
us. I don't like the thought that someone else is having a meeting deciding how
I ought to be transformed. That's why the language of my work now is about
invitation and consent, about strategies that are inclusive and put people in
charge of their own futures."
Mentors Are Biggest Help to New Teachers, Report Indicates
- Since 1999, researchers at the Harvard Graduate School of
Education have followed the careers of 50 new Massachusetts
teachers.
It Takes Much More Than Mentors to Help New Teachers -
On Sunday, May 16, 2004, I saw a posting from azcentral.com
headlining “Mentors are biggest help to new teachers, report
indicates.” It cites the May/June Harvard Education Letter and
the Public Education Network to support its headline and
article. Both the azcentral.com posting and the Harvard
Education Letter are incorrect. A definition is in order.
Mentoring and induction are not synonymous. Mentoring is what
a mentor does. Induction is the name given to the
comprehensive process used to train, support, and retain new
teachers, of which a mentor may be one component. Mentors are
very important, but they must be part of an induction process
aligned to the district’s vision, mission, and structure. For
a mentor to be effective, the mentor must be trained and then
used in combination with the other components of the induction
process.
MI
Featured Website:
Michigan Learnport
- The Michigan Department of Education and Michigan Virtual University
have jointly created a professional development website that houses many of
MDE's resources most commonly used by Michigan educators.
»
Click here for more in-depth
resources and information on this topic.
|
|
Drop
Outs & GED |
|
Detroit Schools Graduation Rate: 32% - Just 31.9 percent of Detroit
students graduate in four years, according to the first major study in Michigan
conducted using a method now mandated by the federal government.
Reviews from the What Works Clearinghouse: Dropout Prevention (March 2007,
Research Reviews) - The What Works Clearinghouse of the U.S. Department of
Education’s Institute of Education Sciences has published reviews of two dropout
prevention interventions: Middle College High School and Twelve Together.
MI
Dropout
Numbers Not Always Verified - Data used by state and
federal policymakers to set education policy, and by parents in making location
decisions, could very well be inaccurate, according to an audit released today.
Whatever It Takes:
Reconnecting Out-Of-School Youth - This new report documents what
committed educators, policymakers, and community leaders across the country are
doing to reconnect out-of-school youth to the social and economic mainstream. It
provides background on the serious high school dropout problem and describes
in-depth what twelve communities are doing to reconnect dropouts to education
and employment training. It also includes descriptions of major national program
models serving out-of-school youth.
Drop Outs: In this three-part series, the Los
Angeles Times examines why so many students drastically limit their prospects by
dropping out of high school.
PART ONE:
Back to Basics: Why Does High
School Fail So Many?
PART TWO:
Algebra: A Formula for Failure in
L.A. Schools
PART THREE:
Trail to Graduation: 'It's Like
You're Climbing Everest'
Big IDEAs: Dropout Prevention Strategies - Big IDEAs: Dropout Prevention
Strategies is the quarterly e-mail newsletter of the National Dropout Prevention
Center for Students with Disabilities. You can browse back issues of Big IDEAs
on the Center’s Website.
Preventing
Dropouts Helps Nation’s Economy -
Four words changed Josh Baker’s life: You can
play football.
IN
Paying the Price for the Dropout Epidemic - Two facts are closely linked:
Indiana was 44th in the nation in job creation last year, and it's 46th in the
educational attainment level of its population. The first number won't rise
until the second is confronted.
CA
Dropout Numbers Called 'Crisis' - A study by the Harvard Civil Rights
Project and the Urban Institute found that California's reported graduation rate
of 87 percent dramatically underestimates the actual number of dropouts.
Researchers found that the actual graduation rate is probably closer to 71
percent. Rates for minority students were even lower: 57 percent for African
Americans, 60 percent for Latinos and 52 percent for Native Americans. Rates for
minority males dropped even further, according to the study.
Math Emerges As Big Hurdle For Teenagers -
Researchers from the United Negro College Fund went to West Virginia last year
and asked 62 high school dropouts in the federal Job Corps program a simple,
open-ended question. “What was it about school,” they wanted to know, “that
caused you to quit?”
Looking for your Michigan GED Transcript?
Click here to download the Michigan GED
Transcript Request Form (PDF; size=61k).
| | |