Daily postings from the Keystone State
Education Coalition now reach more than 3150 Pennsylvania education
policymakers – school directors, administrators, legislators, legislative and
congressional staffers, Governor's staff, current/former PA Secretaries of
Education, PTO/PTA officers, parent advocates, teacher leaders, education
professors, members of the press and a broad array of P-16 regulatory agencies,
professional associations and education advocacy organizations via emails,
website, Facebook and Twitter
These daily emails are archived and
searchable at http://keystonestateeducationcoalition.org
Follow us on Twitter at @lfeinberg
The Keystone State Education Coalition
is pleased to be listed among the friends and allies of The Network for Public Education. Are you a member?
Keystone State Education Coalition
Pennsylvania Education Policy Roundup
for March 22, 2014:
Another school board resolution
opposing Senate Bill 1085
Congressional
hearings on testing needed now! Please RT to your Senators and Congressmen. #testhearingsnow
Colonial school board passes resolution opposing Senate Bill 1085
By Brendan
Wills, The Times Herald POSTED: 03/20/14, 9:09 PM EDT |
WHITEMARSH
— The Colonial school board unanimously passed a resolution at Thursday night’s
board meeting in opposition to Senate Bill 1085, known as the charter school
reform bill.
The
bill, if passed, would amend the language of Public School Code of 1949. The
new language would change regulations for charter school funding and allow
university or college officials to authorize the creation of charter schools. “We’ve been urged, along with a number of
other school districts, to inform members of the senate about the potentially negative
impact of this legislation on public schools,” said board member Christina
Frangiosa. “The bill includes some fairly positive changes to charter school
funding, but it has some pretty negative components as well, including taking
away local control for authorizing charter schools.”
Frangiosa
indicated the potential for nonlocal authorities to use taxpayer money without
the same regulatory restraints in place for school boards that currently
oversee the authorization of charter schools.
Education Debate - Pittsburgh
by Yinzercation
March 20, 2014
Please mark your calendars now
and plan to be a part of this event:
Tuesday, April 8th atPittsburgh 6-12 515 N. Highland Ave. , Pittsburgh
PA 15206
Tuesday, April 8th at
Who is
running for governor of Pennsylvania? What will the candidates do
to help our schools? How will they support public education as
a civil right and a public good?
So far this primary season, Governor Corbett has declined invitations to
debate. He does have someone running against him in the Republican primary, but
political analysts give his opponent almost no chance of bumping the incumbent
from the ticket. I look forward to debates this fall when Gov. Corbett will be
asked to publicly defend his record on education. But right now we need to know
more about the Democratic candidates vying to take on the governor in the
general election. That's why the PA
Interfaith Impact Network (PIIN) and Yinzercation decided to co-host a
Democratic Gubernatorial Candidate education debate. This will be the only
debate in Pennsylvania focused exclusively on education issues! And all of the
major candidates have committed to coming: Rob McCord, Katie McGinty, Allyson
Schwartz, Jack Wagner, and Tom Wolf.
WHYY
Radio Times with Marth Moss-Coane March 21, 2014
Guests:
Chris Borick and James O’Toole Audio
runtime 52:00
Pennsylvanians
go to the polls on May 20th to vote in the Democratic and Republican primaries.
The gubernatorial race has captured national attention with incumbent
Republican Tom Corbett considered one of the most vulnerable governors in the
country this year. The Democratic field is packed with five candidates vying to
reclaim the Commonwealth’s executive office. It’s sure to be an interesting
election. We’ll handicap the primary with two political observers: CHRIS
BORICK, professor of political science at Muhlenberg
College and JAMES
O’TOOLE, columnist at the Pittsburgh
"But Pileggi also knows that those most at risk of being
overrun by rampaging property taxes are seniors and those on fixed
incomes. That’s why he’s sponsoring Senate
Bill 299, which would freeze property taxes for residents who are at least 65
years old and have qualified for a Homestead
Editorial: Time to spring
into action on property-tax reform
Delco TImes March 22, 2014
Welcome Spring!
Rarely have such words had more meaning than after one of the
most miserable winters in memory. We suffered the indignities of 67.6 inches of
snow, making it the second snowiest winter on record. For some reason, memories
of the winter of 2009-10, just four scant years ago, seem more distant. Maybe it’s because this year’s snow was accompanied
by brutal, unending cold temperatures that made venturing outside – if even
dashing from the car to the office or back into the house – an unpleasant
experience. We endured an ice storm that
left much of the region in the dark – without power or heat – for as much as a
week. So we proclaim today the arrival
of spring, and its promise of new life.
Unfortunately, it brings with it something else, an old problem.
Quakertown superintendent faces
questions about loss of state job
Interim superintendent answers
online queries, including those about his resignation as education secretary.
By
Melinda Rizzo, Special to The Morning Call 9:21 p.m. EDT, March 21, 2014
Read
more: http://www.mcall.com/news/local/mc-quakertown-school-board-0321-20140321,0,2053390.story#ixzz2wgMAmqSW
Follow us: @mcall on Twitter | mcall.lv on Facebook
Follow us: @mcall on Twitter | mcall.lv on Facebook
Easton Area School District
officials, teachers agree to talk about fiscal issues
By on
March 21, 2014 at 2:55 PM
Easton
Area School District officials, school
board members and teachers
unions have agreed to sit down and talk about ways to solve the district's
budget woes. School board President Frank
Pintabone, Superintendent John Reinhart and Easton Area Education
Association President Jena
Brodhead showed up to a noon
press conference together, marking a symbolic change from past district and
teacher relations. "I am extremely
happy to announce that the association, the board and the administration will
be entering into a dialogue immediately that will best address the financial
and educational position of the district," Pintabone said, reading from a
statement at Easton Area High School
in Palmer Township
The
2014-15 preliminary budget before the school board projects 36 teacher layoffs and a 4.9
percent property tax hike. District officials have said class sizes would
increase if the layoffs proposed in the latest budget come to fruition.
"Enlisting parents as reading
coaches is the linchpin innovation of a remedial reading initiative
called the
Springboard Collaborative. Springboard, created by Alejandro Gac-Artigas,
has run summer reading programs in charter schools the past three years and
expanded to include four District schools last summer. “Parents are the greatest natural resource in
education,” Gac-Artigas said, “and what’s crazy is that this resource is almost
entirely untapped in high-poverty communities.”
Parents learn how to turn
kids into confident readers
thenotebook by Connie
Langland on Mar 21 2014
Posted in Latest news
On a March afternoon,
8-year-old Jakai Rhoades and his mother, Ebony Wilkie, began tackling his
homework. “What does this word
look like?” Wilkie asked her son, a 3rd grader at nearby Blaine Elementary School
“Spaceship,” he
answered, correctly. “Rumble … rumble …
ROOAAARRRR,” read Jakai. “The rocket goes up into …” He stumbled on the next
word. But his mom was at the ready, pointing upwards again and again, offering
Jakai a really big hint. He tried again,
reading, “The rocket goes up into … space!” Yes! Jakai was pleased, and so was Wilkie.
In this household in the
Strawberry Mansion
Councilman wants slots at Philadelphia International Airport
WHYY
Newsworks BY TOM MACDONALD MARCH 20, 2014
A
Philadelphia City Councilman wants to make the airport into a mini-casino. The
revenue generated would go to city schools.
Councilman Jim Kenney says he thinks putting slot machines in
Philadelphia International Airport would be a great way to raise money for
education.
"We
need new revenue sources for the school district. The state legislature has
been reticent to pay anything with the word tax associated with it. 1300
machines at Las Vegas
creates 27-30 million dollars a year. They get more visitors than we do but
certainly the revenue would be significant." The general public would NOT be able to
gamble at the airport under his plan.
"It is illegal in Pennsylvania
Common Cause Pa.
WHYY
Newsworks BY HOLLY OTTERBEIN MARCH 21, 2014
Barry
Kauffman wishes he would never have to read about Pennsylvania politicians accepting cash
gifts from lobbyists ever again. The
head of Common Cause Pennsylvania ,
a government watchdog group, said he has been urging the General Assembly to
ban all gifts to public officials for decades.
Kauffman renewed that plea Thursday in light of news, first reported by
the Philadelphia Inquirer, that four state lawmakers and a city judge
allegedly accepted money or gifts from a lobbyist who was wearing a wire for
the Pennsylvania
attorney general's office.
New data: Even 4-year-olds get
suspended
Politico
By CAITLIN
EMMA, STEPHANIE
SIMON and MAGGIE SEVERNS |
3/21/14 12:02 AM EDT Updated: 3/21/14 11:09 AM EDT
More
than 8,000 toddlers in the U.S. were suspended from preschool at least once
during the 2011 school year, new data from the U.S. Department of Education
show — a small but significant number, experts say, because preschool students
shouldn’t be sent home from school at all.
The stat is part of a flood of information from the Obama administration
that examines race and equity issues in schools through dozens of data points,
from pay for teachers in low-income schools to the percentage of black students
taking AP calculus.
Read
more: http://www.politico.com/story/2014/03/civil-rights-education-race-equity-104879.html#ixzz2wgTjKsQo
"No one who has not taught in a public school can
possibly appreciate how hard teaching is. There are no shortcuts to
effectiveness. That's long been the case. But today teachers are
subjected to increasing demands, making the job more challenging than ever
before. I'm glad that TFA is making changes. It will be good for all
stakeholders."
Teach for America Finally
Gets Real
Education Week Reality
Check blog By on March
21, 2014 7:18 AM
Teach for America's
decision to launch a pilot program requiring a year of classes in educational
pedagogy and theory, together with actual classroom experience is long overdue
("Teach
for America tests out more training," The Washington Post, Mar. 10).
I've never understood how five weeks of training in the summer before
recruits begin teaching were adequate. Yet until now, TFA defended its
policy. Although the change is being
attributed to complaints by recruits that they were not well prepared for the
realities of the classroom, I think there's another factor at play. So
far, TFA has received about 50,000 applications for the 2014-14 school year, a
12 percent decrease compared with last year's pool. As the economy
improves, I expect to see a further drop in the number of applicants.
That's because I've always believed much of the appeal of the program was
the result of the dearth of jobs in the private sector.
NYT Letters: The Role of Charters in
School Reform
New
York Times MARCH 20, 2014
“A Saner
Charter School Debate” (editorial, March 17) points to a fact that is often
overlooked: New York City ’s
charter schools educate only about 6 percent of the city’s students. Yet
charter schools continue to dominate public debate about reform in education.
It’s
time to change the conversation to focus attention and resources on the other
94 percent — including the more than one million New York City children who
still rely on traditional public schools to prepare them for college and the
workplace.
Charter Schools
New
York Times By THE EDITORIAL BOARD MARCH 16,
2014
Mayor
Bill de Blasio campaigned on the promise of re-evaluating the practice of
co-locating charter and noncharter schools in public school buildings. Critics
of charter schools were encouraged; charter enthusiasts feared he would damage
schools that served students well.
So far,
however, he has hardly waged “war” on charter schools, which are independently
run, exempt from some state regulations but receive public money. In reviewing
17 charters granted space in public school buildings by the Bloomberg
administration late last year, Mr. de Blasio vetoed only three proposals. His
critics questioned the fairness of denying a high-performing Harlem
charter school, with fifth and sixth grades, the right to expand to include
seventh grade. The administration said it would find a way to allow the
expansion and keep the school intact at an alternative site.
NSBA makes recommendations on Race to the Top Preschool Development
Grants
NSBA
School Board News Today March 21, 2014
Lucy
Gettman, Director of Federal Programs at the National School Boards Association
(NSBA) spoke at a public meeting on the Race to the Top Preschool Development
(RTT-Preschool) Grants, which was held at the U.S. Department of Education (ED)
in Washington , D.C.
Field-Testing Set to Begin on
Common-Core Exams
Education
Week By Catherine
Gewertz Published Online: March 21, 2014
Next
week marks a major milestone in an assessment project of unprecedented scope:
the start of field-testing season for new, shared tests of a common set of
academic standards.
Between
March 24 and June 6, more than 4 million students in 36 states and the District of Columbia
will take near-final versions of the tests in mathematics and English/language
arts. Those exams—tied to the Common Core State Standards that all but a
handful of states have adopted—were created by a bevy of vendors hired at the
request of two groups of states: the Smarter Balanced Assessment Consortium and
the Partnership for Assessment of
Readiness for College and Careers, or PARCC.
Fairtest - The National
Center
Sign up for weekly Testing
Resistance & Reform News and Updates!
Pre-K and Early Education in Pennsylvania
The next EPLC "Focus on
Education" show will air this coming Sunday, March 23 at 3:00 p.m.on
PCN television.
This March 23 panel will discuss the issues of quality and access to
early education in Pennsylvania, what research says about the value of early
education, state funding for early education, how Pennsylvania compares to
other states, and other related topics.
The
panel will include:
- Ron Cowell, President of The Education Policy and Leadership Center
and Host of the "Focus on Education" programs;
- Tracey Campanini, Director, Bureau of Early Learning Services, Office of Child
Development & Early Learning, Pennsylvania Department of Education;
- Michelle Figlar, Executive Director, Pittsburgh Association for the Education of
Young Children;
- Blair Hyatt, Executive Director, Pennsylvania Head Start Association;
and
- Philip A. Peterson, FSA, Partner at Aon Hewitt and co-creator of the Aon/United Way of
Southeastern PA Hand-in-Hand Award for quality child care in the business
community, and former co-chair of the Early Learning Investment Commission
PA School Board Members
interested in running for PSBA officer positions must file applications no
Later than April 30th
PSBA's website Electing PSBA Officers
All persons seeking nomination for elected positions of the
Association shall send applications to the attention of the chair of the
Leadership Development Committee during the month of April, an Application for Nomination on a form to be provided by the
Association expressing interest in the office sought. "The
Application for nomination shall be marked received at PSBA Headquarters or
mailed first class and postmarked by April 30 to be considered and timely
filed. If said date falls on a Saturday, Sunday or holiday, then the
Application for Nomination shall be considered timely filed if marked received
at PSBA headquarters or mailed and postmarked on the next business day."
(PSBA Bylaws, Article IV, Section 5.E.).
Details and position descriptions: https://www.psba.org/elections/index.asp
Live Chat with PA's Major Education Leadership Organizations on Twitter
Tuesday March 25th at 8:00 p.m.
PSBA
website 3/11/2014
On Tuesday,
March 25 at 8 p.m., Pennsylvania's major education leadership organizations
will host a live chat on Twitter to share the opinions of school leaders from
throughout the state and invite feedback.
Join the conversation using hashtag #PAEdFunding and
lurk, learn or let us know what you think about the state of support for public
schools. If you've never tweeted before,
join us. It's a simple, free and fast-paced way to communicate and share
information. Here are directions and a few tips:
- See
more at: http://www.psba.org/news-publications/headlines/details.asp?id=7286#sthash.OGonknCO.dpuf
How the Business Community Can Lead on
Early Education
Economy
League of Greater Philadelphia
Join
business and community leaders to learn about how you can help make sure every
child arrives in kindergarten ready to succeed. On April 29th, the Economy
League of Greater Philadelphia and the United Way of Greater Philadelphia and
Southern New Jersey will host a forum featuring business leaders from around
the country talking about why they’re focused on early childhood education and
how they have moved the needle on improving quality and access in their states.
Featured
Speakers
- Jack Brennan, Chairman Emeritus of The
Vanguard Group
- Phil Peterson, Partner, Aon Hewitt and
Co-Chair of America’s Edge/Ready Nation
- And more to be announced!
- Date & Time Tuesday, April
29, 2014 | 5-7 PM
Registration begins at 5 PM;
program from 5:30 to 7:00 PM
- Location Federal Reserve Bank of
Philadelphia
10 North Independence Mall West Philadelphia,
PA 19106
Registration:
http://worldclassgreaterphila.org/worldclasscouncilforum
PILCOP Special Education Seminars 2014
Schedule
Public
Interest Law Center of Philadelphia
Tuesday, March 25th,
12-4 p.m.
Tuesday, April 29th,
12-4 p.m.
Wednesday, May 14th,
1-5 p.m. and 6-8 p.m.
Register Now! EPLC’s 2014 Education Issues
Workshops for Legislative Candidates, Campaign Staff, and Interested Voters
EPLC’s Education
Issue Workshops Register Now! – Space is Limited!
A Non-Partisan One-Day Program forPennsylvania
A Non-Partisan One-Day Program for
Wednesday, March 19, 2014 in Monroeville ,
PA
Thursday, March 27, 2014 inPhiladelphia ,PA
Thursday, March 27, 2014 in
2014 PA Gubernatorial Candidate Plans for Education
and Arts/Culture in PA
Education Policy and Leadership Center
Below is an alphabetical list of the 2014
Gubernatorial Candidates and links to information about their plans, if
elected, for education and arts/culture in Pennsylvania. This list will be updated, as more
information becomes available.
No comments:
Post a Comment
Note: Only a member of this blog may post a comment.