Daily postings from the Keystone State Education
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directors, administrators, legislators, legislative and congressional staffers,
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SB1085 on PA Senate Calendar for
today, Tuesday December 3rd, 2013
Blogger
Commentary December
3, 2013 :
At school
board meetings this week recently elected school directors will take the oath
of office including a pledge to support, obey and defend the
constitutions of both the United States
and the State of Pennsylvania
This week
the State Legislature may also be considering charter school reform legislation
that includes provisions that would permit colleges and universities to
authorize new charter schools. Charter
school operators, charter school boards, college and university officers and
boards are not elected officials and take no such oath of office. Neither are they accountable to any taxpayers
for the “shrink-wrapped” funds that they receive via a funding formula.
SB1085 Summary from the League of Women Voters of Pennsylvania
Senate Bill
1085 is scheduled to come to the Senate floor on December 5. Although it
contains some much-needed reforms for charter and cyber charter schools, many
of the provisions will diminish local control of charters, negatively impact
district finances, and change the original purposes of charter schools.
Specifically,
the bill will:
- Eliminate the wording that
charters exist to provide innovative educational models to be shared with
other public schools
- Allow 10-year authorizations of
charters
- Allow universities to become
authorizers (bypassing local school districts)
- Provide payment to charters
directly from the Department of Education by subtracting from the
district’s basic subsidy (again bypassing local school districts)
- Remove the right of districts
to negotiate caps on charter enrollment (taking control away from local
school districts and potentially costing the district much more)
- Allow multiple charter school
organizations to apply to the Department of Education for authorization
(again bypassing the local school districts)
SB1085 “Charter
School
SB1085
provisions as described by the Education Policy and Leadership Center
State Senate should reject misnamed "charter
school reform" bill: James Hanak
Patriot-News Op-Ed By James Hanak on December 03, 2013 at 5:15 AM
James Hanak is the CEO of the PA
Leadership Charter School, an online cyber-charter school with offices in West Chester , Pa.
Legislation
now before the state Senate -- inaccurately referred to as the
"Charter School Reform Bill" -- would not only
affect charter school students but also all 1.8 million kindergarten through
12th grade students in Pennsylvania Pennsylvania
Nunery testifies in $6.7
million charter fraud trial
MARTHA WOODALL, INQUIRER
STAFF WRITER Monday, December 2, 2013 , 10:00 PM
PHILADELPHIA
Leroy D. Nunery 2d, a former top Philadelphia
School District
Nunery said
his PlusUltre L.L.C. educational consulting business worked for Brown's Cynwyd Group
L.L.C. for four months, more than a year before he joined the Philadelphia Agora
Cyber Charter
School and a Cynwyd subcontractor, K12
Inc. of Herndon , Va.
Introducing the First Book Gift Catalog!
This holiday season,
choose a gift to honor a loved one
A nonprofit
social enterprise, First Book powers knowledge by providing educators in
low-income communities with ongoing access to new, quality books and resources
for the children they serve. Through breakthrough business models and strategic
partnerships with publishers, corporations and other nonprofit organizations,
First Book has provided more than 100 million new books to children from
low-income families. First Book
currently serves over 75,000 schools and community programs. Thousands more
join the First Book network each month. To receive books, organizations must
serve a student population in which 70 percent or more come from low-income
families.
Reach Out and Read
From New York Times Nicholas
Kristof’s November 30th, 20123 column “Gifts That Reflect the Spirit
of the Holiday Season”
Reach Out and Read,
a literacy program for the disadvantaged that uses doctors to encourage moms
and dads to read to their children. During checkups, the doctors hand out free
books and leaflets promoting bedtime stories — and, in effect, “prescribe”
reading to the child.
It’s a
simple intervention but has far-reaching effects. Randomized controlled trials,
the gold standard of evaluation, find that families in the program are more
likely to describe reading as a child’s favorite activity, and reading aloud is
more likely to be p
art of
family life. Because books are donated by publishers like Scholastic, $50
covers a child’s costs for five years. Information is at ReachOutandRead.org.
"sailed
off through night and day/ and in and out of weeks/ and almost over a year/to
where the wild things are."
Children's Corner: How 'Where the Wild Things Are' changed children's literature
Children's Corner: How 'Where the Wild Things Are' changed children's literature
By Karen
MacPherson / Scripps Howard News Service December 2, 2013 8:16 PM
In February
1963, author/illustrator Maurice Sendak told his editor, Ursula Nordstrom, he
was working on a new picture book. Nordstrom,
the legendary children's book editor of Harper & Row (now HarperCollins),
wrote in a letter several days later to Sendak it was "wonderful"
that "you're hoping to write and illustrate your own beautiful picture
book next -- instead of doing a lot of illustrating for other people." But in the letter, dated Feb. 19, 19 63, and published
in "Dear Genius: The Letters of Ursula Nordstrom" (a volume edited by
children's book historian Leonard Marcus), Nordstrom was a bit fuzzy on the
specifics of the story Sendak wanted to tell in the picture book.
Wake up, now! Snooze
button no longer works for PA schools facing pension crisis
Watchdog.org
Posted By Eric Boehm PA Independent November 28, 2013 @ 4:00 am
School
districts across Pennsylvania
The Public School Employees Retirement System,
or PSERS, this week began
sending notices to school districts that their pension costs will climb to 21.4
percent of payroll in the 2014-15 school year.
Even though
that total could change a bit before it becomes official at an end-of-year
meeting of the PSERS board, it gives a pretty good indication of what school
districts are facing.
For
historical context, the 21.4 percent figure is the highest rate since at least
the 1950s — and it’s quite a jump from the 16.9 percent districts paid this
year.
The actual
cost will vary greatly from district to district depending on the size of
payroll, but statewide the PSERS pension obligation for next year will ring in
around $1.4 billion – with roughly half that cost covered by school districts
and the rest left to the state. Another $537 million will be needed to fund the State Employees Retirement System,
or SERS, next year.
State Rep. Glen Grell, R-Cumberland, believes it’s time for the General Assembly to do
something about Pennsylvania
“A Public Policy Poll released last
week showed Republican Gov. Tom
Corbett trailing a list of likely Democratic
contenders that includes U.S. Rep. Allyson Schwartz, Treasurer Rob McCord and former DEP Secretary
Kathleen McGinty, by double digits.”
Democratic race for Guv is wide open in 2014: Monday
Morning Coffee
By John L. Micek |
jmicek@pennlive.com on December 02, 2013 at 7:46 AM ,
Good Monday Morning, Fellow Seekers.
If this
were any other year, we'd tell you that this year's Pennsylvania Society gala in New York City (which gets underway in a mere two weeks'
time) marks the unofficial start of campaign season in Pennsylvania
“Green was
influenced by M. Night Shyamalan’s book, “I
Got Schooled.” The movie director looked at data and
concluded that schools were successful not because they were charters, but
because they shared certain characteristics. Shyamalan concluded that five
things were key: having effective teachers (and the ability to remove
ineffective ones), enough time (as in longer days and years), a principal
able to concentrate on improving teaching methods and building a positive
school culture, constant feedback for teachers and principals, and smaller size
in terms of enrollment. Shyamalan says that schools must do all these
things -- they can't try two or three and expect to do better.”
What would Bill Green do
as chair of School Reform Commission?
The
notebook by Dale Mezzacappa on Dec 02 2013 Posted
in Latest news
City
Councilman Bill Green has long taken a special interest in the School District of Philadelphia Harrisburg
In an
interview, Green would not comment on whether he is interested in the SRC post
or had talked to Corbett's team about it. However, he was willing to
discuss education policy generally and clarify how his thinking
has evolved since he released the policy papers on the School District in
2010 and 2011.
Sumpter elected
president of Pittsburgh
By
Eleanor Chute / Pittsburgh December 3, 2013 12:30 AM
On the third ballot, the board of Pittsburgh
Public Schools elected Thomas Sumpter, a Schenley Heights
Master's degrees for teachers a matter of debate
By Sara K. Satullo | The Express-Times
on December 02,
2013 at 7:40 AM
Is a
teacher with a master's degree a better educator than one without?
The
teachers' contract dispute in the Saucon Valley School District is
echoing a national dialogue about whether teachers should be paid more for
earning master's degrees.
After
nearly two years of talks -- and 18 months after the last contract expired --
the district and teachers' union still have no deal. The teachers have twice
rejected a neutral fact-finder’s recommendations that the school board accepted.
The Saucon Valley Education Association has
so far refused to explain its rejection of the fact-finder's report. But
school board members say talks are hung up on public pay for graduate
coursework and retirement incentives.
Childhood poverty up 55
percent in Chester County
Delco Times By KENDAL GAPINSKI, 12/02/13 , 10:57 PM
EST |
Childhood
poverty in Chester
County
The report,
which was released on Monday, says that child poverty has increased in the
county by 55 percent since the start of the recession, the highest in the
region.
According
to PCCY, Bucks County
had an 18 percent increase in the number of children living in poverty from
2008 to 2012, while Delaware
County
“Child
poverty rose more dramatically in Chester
County than anywhere else in
southeastern Pennsylvania
Grading PA State
Legislative Leaders: Social Media
PoliticsPA by Nick Field, Contributing Writer December 2, 2013
Last month,
we took a
look at the social media presence of the gubernatorial
candidates. This month, we thought we’d examine the records of the state’s
legislative leaders.
As in the
case of our gubernatorial review, our grades reflect the size and depth of a
member’s following as well as the quality of their social media output.
Community Groups to
Senators: Move Forward on ESEA Reauthorization
Education
Week Politics K-12 Blog By Alyson Klein on December
2, 2013 3:27 PM
A coalition
of nearly 50 advocacy groups—ranging from the Coalition for Community Schools
to the National PTA to the Rural School and Community Trust—are asking Congress
to pretty, pretty please reauthorize the Elementary and Secondary Education Act
sooner rather than later.
The groups,
47 in all, sent a letter to Senate leaders
asking them to get moving already on ESEA reauthorization. (Well, OK, they put
it a little nicer than that.) The waivers, which the Obama
administration has granted to nearly every state, are no substitute for an
honest-to-goodness reauthorization, they say.
Map: Property Taxes in Your County
How much
does the average household in your county pay in property taxes, and how does
your county stack up to the rest of the nation? Use our interactive map to
explore property tax rates and home values at the county level nationwide.
Click a county to zoom in, and click it again to zoom out. Darker colors
indicate higher values; grey shading indicates unavailable data.
(Florida
Information hard to
obtain from some Volusia, Flagler charter schools
Catie
Cooper never got the same answer twice.
The lack of
transparency at Palm Harbor Academy
frustrated the Palm
Coast Florida
National Governors
Association Pushes for Third-Grade Reading
Eye on
early education blog November 25, 2013 by Alyssa Haywoode
“The time
is now to redesign this country’s approach to language and literacy
instruction, and governors who choose to can lead the charge,” according to the
National Governors Association (NGA) report, “A
Governor’s Guide to Early Literacy: Getting all Students Reading by Third
Grade.” Acknowledging the fact that
only one-third of America ’s
fourth graders are reading proficiently, the report points out that America
American 15-Year-Olds Lag, Mainly in
Math, on International Standardized Tests
New
York Times By MOTOKO RICH Published: December 3, 2013
Fifteen-year-olds
in the United States Ireland
and Poland
As
in previous years, the scores of students in Shanghai ,
Hong Kong , Singapore ,
Japan and South Korea Finland , a darling of educators, slid in all
subjects but continued to outperform the averages, and the United States
Key PISA
test results for U.S.
Here
are highlights of the newly released 2012 scores from the Program of
International Student Assessment, an exam given every three years to 15 year
olds around the world in reading, math and science. In this administration of PISA Connecticut , Florida , and Massachusetts
These
results are part of a release on the PISA
FINLAND
Taught by Finland 11/30/2013
Yesterday,
I made a late-night run to a Helsinki
Breaking News
I knew just what these headlines were about. Throughout the fall,Finland has been forecasted to slip in
international rankings based on the 2012
Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA PISA
Just this morning, Pasi Sahlberg (author of Finnish Lessons) reported thatFinland dropped from the Top 10 in PISA 2012,
noting that Estonia ’s
15-year-olds outperformed Finland Finland
Breaking News
I knew just what these headlines were about. Throughout the fall,
Just this morning, Pasi Sahlberg (author of Finnish Lessons) reported that
Reading the
PISA Tea Leaves: Who Is Responsible for Finland’s Decline and the Asian Magic
Yong
Zhao’s Blog 2 DECEMBER 2013 317
“Finland
Fell from the Tip of PISA,” says the headline of a story in the
largest subscription newspaperHelsingin Sanomat in Finland Finland has fallen from the top in the current
round of PISA
This
is big news, with significant implications not only for the Finns but also for
the rest of the world that has been looking at Finland
as the model education system since 2001 when Finland
was number one in the first round of PISA PISA won’t be
officially unveiled until 10am
GMT, December 3rd.the leaked story, published on November 30th,
has already sent the Finns and others to speculate the causes of Finland
While
the Finns are right to be concerned about their education, it would be a huge
mistake to believe that their education has gotten worse.
“The hukou
system prevents children of migrants–numbering at least 500,000 by the
government’s own count and probably many more than that–from attending Shanghai’s
high schools. “
Tom Loveless: Why Shanghai Leads the World on International Tests Like PISA
Diane
Ravitch’s blog By dianeravitch December
2, 2013 //
Tom
Loveless, a scholar at the Brookings Institution, has spent many years
analyzing testing data. He is active in the study of international testing.
For one
thing, China as a whole does
not take the PISA Shanghai PISA , but China
PISA 2012 Results
OECD/PISA
website December
3, 2013
PISA 2012
Vol I (what students know and can do)PISA 2012 is the programme’s 5th survey.
It assessed the competencies of 15-year-olds in reading, mathematics and
science (with a focus on mathematics) in 65 countries and economies.
Around 510
000 students between the ages of 15 years 3 months and 16 years 2 months
participated in the assessment, representing about 28 million 15-year-olds
globally.
The
students took a paper-based test that lasted 2 hours. The tests were a mixture
of open-ended and multiple-choice questions that were organised in groups based
on a passage setting out a real-life situation. A total of about 390 minutes of
test items were covered. Students took
different combinations of different tests. They and their school principals
also answered questionnaires to provide information about the students'
backgrounds, schools and learning experiences and about the broader school
system and learning environment.
“Maintenance of Effort”: Michigan
MLive All
Michigan By Brian Smith | bsmith11@mlive.com
December 02,
2013
The U.S.
Department of Education's proposed regulations would prevent a local district
receiving federal funds for special education students from reducing its local
or state funding below the amount spent the previous year. The rule is intended
to prevent districts from using federal funds to take over a larger share of
special education costs.
Districts
that fail to "maintain effort" by reducing local contributions to
special education funding would be subject to penalties including loss of
federal funds. The provision has drawn objections from school district
officials across the country during an open comment period.
NSBA commends bill to
offer schools flexibility on school nutrition programs
NSBA School
Board News Today by Joetta Sack-Min December 2, 2013
The
National School Boards Association (NSBA) commends and supports new legislation
that offers public schools added flexibility in meeting the mandates of the
Healthy, Hunger-Free Kids Act of 2010. The
Reducing Federal Mandates on School Lunch Act, sponsored by Rep. Kristi Noem
(R-S.D.), to be introduced in the U.S. House of Representatives this week,
offers relief to school districts on some of the federal mandates that have
created soaring operational costs along with other unintended consequences,
such as school lunches that leave students hungry in cases where serving sizes
are inadequate or students do not like the food mandated and are refusing to
eat it.
NPE National Conference
2014
The Network for Public Education November 24, 2013
The Network for Public Education is pleased to announce our
first National Conference. The event will take place on March 1 & 2, 2014
(the weekend prior to the world-famous South by Southwest Festival) at The University of Texas
at Austin
In the coming weeks, we
will release more details. In the meantime, make your travel plans and click
this link and submit your email address to receive updates about the NPE
National Conference 2014.
PA SPECIAL
EDUCATION FUNDING FORMULA COMMISSION
Public
Meeting, 12/11/2013 ,
10:00 AM Hearing Room 1, North Office
Building
Public hearing to consider final recommendations and release
final report)
PCCY’s Public Education County Reports
Public Citizens for Children and Youth November
2013
Congratulations! Getting elected to the school
board was the easy part…..
PSBA New Board Member Training: Great Governance, Great Schools
November 2013-April 2014
Register
Online »
Print
Form »
November 2013-April 2014
Register
Online » Print
Form »
Announcing School
Board Academy ’s
New Board Member Training: Great Governance, Great Schools
You will need a wealth of information quickly as
you jump out of the starting block and hit the ground running as a newly
elected member of the board of school directors. New board members, as well as
veterans who might like a refresher, will want to make the most of the
opportunity to attend PSBA's New Board Member Training Program: Great
Governance, Great
Schools
EPLC is recruiting current undergraduate or graduate students
to serve as part-time interns
EPLC is recruiting current undergraduate
or graduate students to serve as part-time interns beginning January
or May of 2014 in the downtown Harrisburg Pennsylvania School Pennsylvania
The National School Boards Association 74th Annual
Conference & Exposition April 5-7, 2014 New Orleans
The National School Boards Association 74th Annual
Conference & Exposition will be held at the Ernest
N. Morial
Convention Center in New Orleans , LA. New Orleans
General
Session speakers include education advocates
Thomas L. Friedman, Sir Ken Robinson, as well as education innovators Nikhil
Goyal and Angela Maiers.
We have more than 200 sessions planned!
Colleagues from across the country will present workshops on key topics with
strategies and ideas to help your district. View our Conference
Brochure for highlights on sessions and
focus presentations.
·
Register
now! – Register for both the conference and housing using our online
system.
·
Conference
Information– Visit the NSBA conference website for up-to-date information
·
Hotel
List and Map - Official NSBA Housing Block
·
Exposition
Campus – View new products and services and interactive
trade show floor
Join the National
School Boards
Action Center
Participate in a voluntary network to urge your U.S. Representatives and Senators to support
federal legislation on Capitol Hill that is critical to providing high quality
education to America
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