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Keystone
State Education Coalition
PA
Ed Policy Roundup March 30, 2017:
DeVos
suggested that ED “is considering rejecting states’ proposals for new
accountability systems if they do not include options that empower parents or
provide them with additional educational choices for their children.”
Pop
quiz, part 2: Test your knowledge of public education in Pennsylvania
Keystone
Crossroads
“Representatives in areas designed to
support re-election can afford to be more extreme in their views, playing to
the base that will protect their seats rather than moderating positions to
appeal to the broadest number of voters. The problems flowing from such an
arrangement are all too apparent. Elected officials who have no incentive to
cooperate retreat into polarized camps, and nothing gets done.”
Op-ed: Pennsylvanians' growing sentiment
to make elections fair
WHYY Newsworks COMMENTARY BY PAMELA J. FORSYTHE MARCH 30, 2017 SPEAK EASYThere were no pitchforks or torches when I attended a public forum earlier this month at Chestnut Hill United Church about how Pennsylvanians could — just maybe — restore some fairness to the political process. Currently, lines are drawn by a politically embedded committee of five, including the majority and minority leaders of the Pennsylvania House and Senate. Boundaries change roughly every decade, on the heels of the national census. Ideally, districts are to contain about the same population and be geographically “compact and contiguous.” Not surprisingly, career politicians have engineered the process to work to their own benefit through a process known as gerrymandering. It consists of dividing geographic areas into representative districts that advantage one party or group over another. The term originated in 1812. A journalist with The Boston Gazette noted that a Massachusetts electoral district had taken on the shape of a salamander to benefit Gov. Elbridge Gerry. Soon, gerrymander was in common use.
Betsy
DeVos Calls for More School Choice, Saying Money Isn’t the Answer
New York Times By ERICA L. GREEN MARCH 29, 2017
WASHINGTON — Betsy
DeVos, in her first extended policy address as education secretary, argued on
Wednesday for an expansion of school choice programs, pointing to lagging test
scores and a program championed by the Obama administration that funneled billions
into low-performing schools but failed to produce better academic outcomes. Speaking at the Brookings Institution, which
released a ranking of choice options in the country’s 100 largest school
districts, Ms. DeVos made her case for choice policies that she said focused on
the “individual child.” And she called for the rejection of an “us versus them
mentality” when it comes to investing in programs, like charter schools and
school vouchers, to which President Trump has proposed giving part of a $1.4
billion funding increase in the fiscal year that begins in October. “Our nation’s
commitment is to provide a quality education to every child to serve the
greater public, common good,” Ms. DeVos said in her address. “Accordingly, we
must shift the paradigm to think about education funding as investments made in
individual children, not in institutions or buildings.” While Ms. DeVos offered no new details about
the Education Department’s budget — which in the president’s budget blueprint
takes a $9 billion, or 13.5 percent, cut — she rejected the notion that money
was a panacea for the challenges facing public schools.
DeVos says her predecessor
wasted money on school reform
Inquirer by MARIA DANILOVA, The Associated Press Updated: MARCH 29, 2017 12:57 PM
EDT
WASHINGTON (AP) -
Education Secretary Betsy DeVos on Wednesday accused her predecessor of wasting
billions of dollars trying to fix traditional public schools and said that
school choice was the way to reform the system.
Speaking at the Brookings Institution in Washington, DeVos said that
Arne Duncan's signature $7 billion project targeting failing schools did not
produce any significant improvement. That failure, she said, was further proof
that it is vital to give American parents the options of charter, private and
other schools. "At what point do we
accept the fact that throwing money at the problem isn't the solution?"
she asked. "The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and
over again and expecting different results. That's not policy making."
“Roy also said that
discussions about "failing schools" ignore the social and economic
conditions -- such as healthcare access, housing instability and food scarcity
-- that schools deal with. "DeVos'
notion that if we just give the money to privately run schools all these issues
go away is fantasy and unsubstantiated by research," Roy said. "Not
to mention her privatization plans undermine the public schools that need
financial support and undermine the communities that make up public
schools."
Bethlehem Area superintendent: Betsy DeVos dead wrong
in saying federal grants don't work on struggling schools
Jacqueline
Palochko Contact Reporter Of The Morning
Call March 29, 2017
Earlier today,
Education Secretary Betsy DeVos said School Improvement Grants have
not produced significant improvements in schools, The Associated Press
reported. But Bethlehem Area
Superintendent Joseph Roy says DeVos is wrong. An economically disadvantaged
Bethlehem Area elementary school that has received a School Improvement Grant
has closed the achievement gap, he said.
The School Improvement Grants were implemented in 2010-2015 under
then-Education Secretary Arne Duncan and aimed to improve struggling
schools.
“Under the new education
law, the Every Student Succeeds Act, states are required to devise new
accountability systems using a variety of metrics to show how their students
and schools are performing. And for those schools that aren't performing well,
states must formulate a plan to fix them.
States are in the process of finalizing those accountability proposals,
with the first submission deadline of April 3 fast approaching. The second
deadline is Sept. 18, and both deadlines require states to implement their
plans beginning in the 2018-2019 school year.”
“The Department of
Education is considering rejecting states' proposals for new accountability
systems if they do not include options that empower parents or provide them
with additional educational choices for their children.”
DeVos Says Accountability Systems Could Promote School
Choice
The education secretary suggested that the
new education law could be the mechanism for prodding states to provide options
for parents and children.
US News By Lauren Camera,
Education Reporter | March 29, 2017, at 2:52 p.m.
The Department of
Education is considering rejecting states' proposals for new accountability
systems if they do not include options that empower parents or provide them
with additional educational choices for their children. "I think there's certainly going to be a
lot of discussion and back and forth as we go through this process,"
Secretary of Education Betsy DeVos said Wednesday in answering a question
about whether her agency would reject a state's accountability proposal if she
views it as "antithetical to serving parents' interests." "The goal is clearly to implement as
Congress has intended and to really push it back to the states to step up and
create and innovate in ways they haven't done before," said DeVos, who
since being confirmed as education secretary has pounded the importance of
parents having choices for where they send their children to school.
Letter: "Inner
city" comments by Eichelberger 'vitriolic'
The Sentinel Letter to the Editor March 29, 2017
Barbara A.
Simmons, Education Chair, Black Women's Leadership
Council
Deborah Gordon
Klehr, Executive Director, Education Law Center-Pennsylvania
Susan Spicka, Executive
Director, Education Voters of Pennsylvania
Dear Editor: State Sen. John Eichelberger’s recent
comments about placing “inner city” students in “a less intensive track” are
extremely disturbing. “Inner city” historically has been code for students of
color and it is wholly inappropriate for a representative of Pennsylvania to
engage in such vitriolic, racist rhetoric.
Further, tracking students by race violates both state and federal civil
rights laws. In fact, the Upper Dublin School District currently is under
federal investigation for this exact type of racial discrimination. In an op-ed, Eichelberger wrote to defend his
statements (“All students deserve opportunity to succeed,” The Sentinel, March
9), he professes a desire for “an open and honest discussion about giving our
students the best chance to thrive.” We’ve
sent a letter asking the state Senate Education Committee to hold a hearing
about racial opportunity gaps and their origins, racial tracking, and the
disproportionate impact of under-funding on our state’s students of color.
These are students who, contrary to the senator’s belief, are failed by the
entire system, not individual schools. Comments
degrading “inner city” students, and implicitly students of color, are not only
tied to school funding but are also indicative of entrenched and ongoing
racism. We call for this hearing to
remind the Legislature of its responsibility to address these consequences of
racial discrimination as well as their root causes. We hope to begin an honest,
productive discussion that focuses on ensuring that all children in
Pennsylvania, no matter their race or ZIP code, receive a quality public
education.
Blogger Comment: These
is nothing to prevent concerned business owners from making charitable
contributions to support private and religious schools without diminishing
funding available to support public schools.
Tax credit programs are an end run around the PA Constitution’s
prohibition of using tax dollars for sectarian schools. The General Assembly enacted a new school
funding formula with overwhelming bipartisan support last year; we should fund
the formula, not divert another $75 million to unaccountable private schools.
Parents need educational
choices (column)
York Daily Record Opinion by Rep. Dawn Keefer1:35 p.m. ET March 28, 2017
Rep. Dawn Keefer
is a Republican whose district includes parts of York and Cumberland counties.
Government and
“educrats” have hijacked our educational system. Taxpayers are trapped, only
those with the means and large bank accounts have options. We’ve utilized a
myriad of “one-size-fits-all,” standards-based testing approaches to
education for more than 30 years with no measurable gains. Yet we continue to
soldier down the same path. I believe this is called insanity – doing the same
thing over and over again and expecting different results. It would take years to overhaul our
dysfunctional educational system – returning true control back to local
governments and parents; and returning to the tried and true classical education.
The reality is, parents and children need options now. The Educational
Improvement Tax Credit provides that option. EITC is a vessel that allows
businesses to make contributions to a scholarship organization, an educational
improvement organization, and/or a pre-kindergarten scholarship organization. The House of
Representatives took a major step in providing school choice when we passed
House Bill 250 earlier this month. The legislation would increase the amount of
tax credits available under both EITC and the Opportunity Scholarship Tax
Credit programs. Funds available for EITC would increase by $50 million
to a record $175 million. Funds available for the Opportunity Scholarship
Tax Credit would increase by $25 million to $75 million. The legislation now
goes to the Senate for consideration.
Workshop prepares teachers
to help and protect immigrant students
Inquirer by Michael Matza, STAFF WRITER @MichaelMatza1 | mmatza@phillynews.com Updated: MARCH 29, 2017 — 9:30
PM EDT
When teachers meet
to talk immigration, their stories can be wrenching:
Undocumented parents
afraid to drop their kids off at school. A soccer league visited by
immigration agents one weekend, and players too fearful to turn out the
following week. A sixth grader with ICE agents at her door, frantically texting
her sixth-grade teacher. A student sick with worry because her day laborer
father is afraid to seek work, terrified that he could be snared in a raid. Such were among the stories shared Wednesday
at “Protecting Our Immigrant Students,” a workshop sponsored by the
Philadelphia Federation of Teachers. With
President Trump demanding a crackdown on illegal immigration and Attorney
General Jeff Sessions threatening to withhold federal funds from
sanctuary cities, the atmosphere is fraught with worry. “Our children come to school frightened and
stressed,” PFT president Jerry Jordan told the 50 or so educators who came
together after the end of the school day to hear a panel of lawyers and
advocates talk about rights and responsibilities.
Immigrants win right to
attend Lancaster public high school
Inquirer by Michael Matza, Staff Writer @MichaelMatza1 | mmatza@phillynews.com Updated: MARCH 29, 2017 — 2:37 PM EDT
Refugee children in
Lancaster can choose to attend the city’s main public high school instead of
the privately run alternative academy to which the school district had funneled
them, according to the settlement of a nine-month lawsuit announced Wednesday by
the American Civil Liberties Union of Pennsylvania. The agreement, approved by the Lancaster
School Board on Tuesday night, opens the way for newly arrived 17- to
20-year-old immigrant students with little or no English fluency to attend a
newcomer program at J.P. McCaskey High School and restricts the district from
outplacing them to the for-profit Phoenix Academy, which plaintiffs in a
federal lawsuit had alleged was an inferior option.
Lancaster settlement is a
victory for immigrant students
The notebook by Greg
Windle March 29, 2017 — 4:57pm
A nine-month legal
battle over newly arrived immigrant adolescents in the Lancaster school
district ended in a comprehensive settlement yesterday. The plaintiffs were
refugees, but the settlement will affect immigrant students of all kinds. The Lancaster district’s school board
approved the agreement Tuesday, which stops the district from placing newly
arrived 17- to 20-year-old immigrant students who don’t speak English fluently
into a privately run-alternative school, called Phoenix Academy, as the
district was doing before the settlement.
Phoenix Academy is run by Camelot—a private provider that runs
alternative schools for older students and those with behavioral issues, and
was recently found to have problems with staff members using physical force to
discipline students in
a report by ProPublica and Slate. Phoenix Academy was one of the
schools where staff allegedly abused students.
Instead, the Lancaster district must enroll those students in their
International Program for immigrant students at the main public high school,
McCaskey.
Pa. considers opioid abuse
warnings and instruction in schools
Inquirer by Teresa Wiltz, STATELINE Updated: MARCH 29, 2017 — 1:43
PM EDT
Stateline is an inititative of The Pew Charitable
Trusts.
Michigan lawmakers
are considering requiring mandatory opioid abuse education in public schools as part of
a package of bills aimed at combatting the addiction and
overdose epidemic in the state. The
proposal is similar to action taken in nearby Ohio to provide K-12 students with instruction on the
dangers of prescription opioid use. If the bill passes, the program would be
implemented by the 2018 school year by the Michigan Department of Education. Massachusetts,
Pennsylvania, and South Carolina are considering similar bills. The bills are among a series of measures that
states plagued by high rates of opioid painkiller and heroin abuse have
experimented with to combat addiction at an early age. Among the
experiments: recovery high schools that enroll only kids who have
drug and alcohol addiction.
“The Pennsylvania School
Boards Association's Executive Director Nathan Mains sent a letter to senators assuring
them that school boards don't take decisions about raising taxes on their
friends and neighbors lightly. Mains
said the association would support this legislation requiring two-thirds
approval but only if the Legislature leads by example and first passes
legislation mandating the two-thirds' approval on statewide tax increases as
DiSanto's bill would require.”
SB406: Propery tax
increases could become harder for school boards to pass
Penn Live By Jan Murphy |
jmurphy@pennlive.com Email the author | Follow on Twitter on
March 29, 2017 at 12:34 PM, updated March 29, 2017 at 12:39 PM
Legislation that
would require school boards to approve property tax increases
by at least a 6-3 vote instead of a simple 5-4 majority won approval
of the Senate Education Committee on Wednesday.
Requiring a two-thirds vote of a nine-member board is seen as a way to
ensure adequate vetting of the need for the tax increase. The bill's sponsor, Sen. John Rafferty,
R-Montgomery County, said this idea grew out of his days as a school board
member when he saw property tax increases narrowly pass by a 5-4 vote, as was
the case last summer in Susquenita School District when the school board approved its first tax increase in 12
years. Considering the ramifications
if a property tax bill goes unpaid which can cause a homeowner to lose their
homes, Rafferty said, "I think it's very important that we look at this
sixth vote to allow more deliberation, more sharing of information among the
local school boards because of the fact that they do have that authority, that
power to tax real estate."
PA Senate Education Committee Roll Call Vote on SB406
March 29, 2017
The Fair Share Tax to Support Public Investment in
Pennsylvania
PA Budget and Policy Center Posted by John Neurohr on March 21, 2017
Executive Summary
This paper puts
forward a plan, which we call the Fair Share Tax, that would take a major step
toward fixing Pennsylvania’s broken tax system and raise the revenues we need
to invest in the public goods that are critical to creating thriving
communities and individual opportunity in our state: education, infrastructure,
protection for our air and water, and human services.
- The Fair Share Tax divides our Personal
Income Tax into two parts: 1.) a tax on wages and interest, and 2.) a tax
on income from wealth (dividends; net income [from a business, profession,
or farm]; capital gains; net income from rents, royalties, patents, and
copyrights; gambling and lottery winnings; and income from estates or
trusts.)
- The Fair Share Tax increases the tax on
income from wealth from 3.07% to 6.5% and decreases the tax on wages and interest
from 3.07% to 2.8%.
- Under the Fair Share Tax, 58.3% of
taxpayers will see their taxes go down, 26.2% will see no change in their
taxes, and only 15.4% will see their taxes go up.
- The Fair Share Tax brings in $2 billion
in new revenue. Of that $2 billion, 50% comes from the top 1% of families,
72% comes from the top 5% of families, and 88% comes from the top 20% of
families.
- Out-of-state taxpayers will pay 15.6% of
the $2 billion increase in revenues.
- There is little variation in the impact
of tax from one county to another or one legislative district to another.
The percentage of taxpayers in a county that see a decrease or no change
in their taxes ranges from 71% to 90%, with all but nine counties in the
80% to 89% range. In both rural and urban counties, an average of 85% of
taxpayers will see their taxes go down or remain unchanged under the Fair
Share Tax. Much the same is true in state legislative districts.
- Even after implementation of the Fair
Share Tax, the effective rate on the top 1% of Pennsylvania taxpayers will
be only 3.6%, less than that of any neighboring state and only 45% of the
rate found in New York and New Jersey.
Hate to burst your bubble,
but it's time to rethink standardized tests: Jerry Oleksiak
PennLive Op-Ed By Jerry Oleksiak on March 29,
2017 at 7:42 AM
Jerry Oleksiak is a special
education teacher in the Upper Merion Area School District, and president of
the 180,000-member Pennsylvania State Education Association.
For years, educators
have spoken out forcefully about the toxic effect standardized tests have on
public schools. As a teacher with more
than 30 years of experience in the classroom, I've spoken out to my students'
parents, my colleagues, and to state and federal officials. But you don't have
to just ask me. Ask the classroom
teachers in your community. They will tell you that too much standardized
testing is interfering with teaching and learning. Students spend 12 hours taking the
Pennsylvania State Standardized Assessment tests and Keystone Exams each year.
Students lose up to 110 hours each year on standardized tests and test
preparation. For teachers, that's a loss
of valuable time that could be spent providing assistance to students who are
struggling, and enrichment to students who have mastered content knowledge and
skills in core subjects. The impact of
over testing and overemphasizing test scores has undermined the fundamental
hallmarks of great teaching. It stifles
creativity and innovation in the classroom in order to devote more classroom
time and resources to prepare, administer, and remediate students around tests
mandated by state and federal laws.
Bill Hite Has the Hardest Job in the Country
He seemed like just the man to turn around
Philly’s floundering, cash-starved public schools. But four years later, his
pragmatic, levelheaded approach has yielded … not much at all, actually. What
needs to change — our expectations, or Hite?
PhillyMag BY SIMON VAN ZUYLEN-WOOD | MARCH
27, 2016
image:
http://cdn.phillymag.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/03/BillHite_01-940x540.jpg
On the third
Thursday of every month, William Hite is subjected to four hours of ritual
torture.
The sessions take
place in an auditorium at the headquarters of the School District of
Philadelphia, on North Broad Street. Starting around 5:30 p.m., several hundred
education obsessives march in and locate seats. Sometimes they bring musical
instruments. Hite sits at the front of the room next to the five members of the
School Reform Commission, Philadelphia’s peculiar version of a school board.
Well-built, impeccably dressed, perfectly composed, Philly’s school
superintendent awaits the onslaught.
In theory, the point of these meetings is for the SRC to vote on things.
In practice, they are dominated by ferociously opinionated people using their
three minutes of allotted time to yell at Bill Hite. Most commenters fall into
one of three categories. There are the (mostly) white, female activists who
decry Hite and his SRC abettors as blood-sucking corporate fetishists. There are
the (mostly) white, male charter-school operators and reform advocates who
dismiss these people as teachers-union toadies. Then there are the (mostly)
black parents and students, who tend to have a greater personal stake in the
decisions before the board. Three reporters live-tweet everything. Hite stares
at his interlocutors and nods in silence. The pattern repeats itself every
month.
Read more at http://www.phillymag.com/articles/bill-hite-has-the-hardest-job-in-the-country/#IXCVAsk52WVisF20.99
EXCITEMENT, DISAPPOINTMENT AT WEST PHILADELPHIA SCHOOL
LOTTERY
More than 1,300 kids
applied, but there was only room for 81. (WPVI)
6ABC By Christie Ileto March
29, 2017 WEST PHILADELPHIA (WPVI) -- More than 1,300 kids applied, but there
was only room for 81. Global Leadership
Academy in West Philadelphia held their annual lottery Tuesday night. Some
parents left overjoyed, many more left disappointed. Xuri'lyn Feliciano is one of the newest
members of the charter school. "This
is the fourth school, well it's the first try for this school," said Tiana
Peartree, who adds her child didn't get into the others she applied to. The charter school attributes its explosive
enrollment to a forward-thinking teaching method. "People want to have their child here
because it's a different kind of education, that's one thing. The other thing
is people are dissatisfied with what they're getting in terms of District of
Philadelphia and public education, and the fact that they have to go to their
neighborhood school, and that they don't have the choice to pick a better
school around the city," said Global Leadership Academy CEO Dr. Naomi
Johnson-Booker.
Court upholds School
District of Lancaster’s rejection of ABECS charter application
Fox43 POSTED 1:06
PM, MARCH 27, 2017, BY PAUL SMITH
Superintendent says case
underscores need for charter school reform
Lancaster, PA — A Commonwealth Court decision upholds the rejection of a charter school application by the School District of Lancaster. The Academy of Business and Entrepreneurship Charter School application to open a charter school in Lancaster was rejected after the court determined fewer than 30 percent of signatures on a petition to appeal the school board’s initial rejection. This ruling means ABECS cannot appeal SDL’s rejection of the charter application to the Pennsylvania Charter School Appeal Board. The district says it invested hundreds of man-hours evaluating and considering the academy’s 2012 application. The application was overwhelmingly rejected by the School Board.
Lancaster, PA — A Commonwealth Court decision upholds the rejection of a charter school application by the School District of Lancaster. The Academy of Business and Entrepreneurship Charter School application to open a charter school in Lancaster was rejected after the court determined fewer than 30 percent of signatures on a petition to appeal the school board’s initial rejection. This ruling means ABECS cannot appeal SDL’s rejection of the charter application to the Pennsylvania Charter School Appeal Board. The district says it invested hundreds of man-hours evaluating and considering the academy’s 2012 application. The application was overwhelmingly rejected by the School Board.
Lancaster nonprofit introduces healthy eating habits
to Columbia students
Lancaster Online by ALEX GELI | Staff Writer
March 30, 2017
Hannah Funk takes
pride in her green thumb.
She’d rather be
digging in the dirt of her mother’s garden than sitting in the comfort of her
family’s home. But other than the fruits
and vegetables her family grows, the 11-year-old doesn’t always find healthy
options in the house. Her father often
works late, so Hannah and her family sometimes eat SpaghettiOs or other
easy-to-prepare, processed foods for dinner, the sixth-grader said. Unlike
Hannah, her brother regularly snacks on junk food, she said. Fruits and vegetables often go untouched in
the refrigerator, Hannah said, as they’re pushed out of sight, left to spoil. Now, Hannah and
fellow students at the Taylor Campus of Columbia Middle School are getting some
help in learning how to keep fruits and vegetables front and center in their
diets. Created by Lancaster nonprofit CHI St. Joseph’s Children’s Health,
“Building a Better You: A Healthy Habits, Healthy Smiles School Partnership
Program” seeks to introduce more nutritious options into kids’ diets via taste
testing in classrooms and community outreach.
Through fruit and vegetable taste testing twice a week for 36 weeks,
children can eat the healthy foods they love — whether they knew it or not.
Strike averted for
Keystone Oaks schools; teachers union, district reach tentative deal
PITTSBURGH POST-GAZETTE MAR
30, 2017
The Keystone Oaks
teachers union has reached a tentative contract agreement with the school
district, averting a strike that was scheduled to start Thursday. Classes are being held on Thursday; there are
no classes on Friday due to an already scheduled teacher inservice day. Details of the
tentative agreement, reached during a nearly 14-hour bargaining session that
went into early Thursday, have not been released. The union said more details would be released
after the union membership and school board ratify the new contract, which is
expected by April 11. “We are pleased that
the district and KOEA were able to come to an agreement that is sustainable,
fair and, above all else, puts the students first,” school board President Matt
Cesario said. “We look forward to working with the teachers, counselors
and nurses to continue to provide a high quality education for all Keystone
Oaks students.” The agreement provides
for a one-year extension of the current contract.
DeVos Compares School
Choice Fight to Uber vs. Taxis; Decries State of Test Scores
Education Week
Politics K12 Blog By Andrew Ujifusa on March
29, 2017 12:17 PM
At a Tuesday event
hosted by the Brown Center on Education Policy at the Brookings Institution,
U.S. Secretary of Education Betsy DeVos in a speech compared the the response
of the education establishment to taxi services undercut by services like Uber
and Lyft. "Just like the
traditional taxi service revolted against ride-sharing, so too does the
education establishment feel threatened by the rise of school choice,"
DeVos said. (It's not the first time
she's raised Uber in the context of educational innovation, or the lack thereof.) But in a subsequent discussion Brookings'
Grover J. "Russ" Whitehurst asked DeVos whether she was concerned
that if school choice expansion is implemented badly it could actually hurt
educational outcomes. Her response? She
said she wasn't sure they could be much worse, and cited two national tests to
back up her point. "Our PISA scores
have continued to deteriorate" when compared to other nations, DeVos told
Whitehurst. She was referring to the Program for International Student
Assessment, which is given to 15-year-olds in 77 countries and educational
systems. And she said that the country's National Assessment for Educational
Progress (NAEP) scores are "stagnant at best."
Trump wants $3B cut to
education this year
Politico By MICHAEL STRATFORD 03/28/17 10:00
AM EDT
With help from
Caitlin Emma, Kimberly Hefling, Helena Bottemiller Evich and Sarah Ferris
TRUMP WANTS A $3
BILLION CUT TO EDUCATION THIS YEAR: After proposing a $9.2 billion cut to the Education
Department’s budget for next year, the President Donald Trump is now
calling on Congress to slash nearly $3 billion in education funding for the
remaining five months of this fiscal year, according to a document obtained by POLITICO. The White House on
Friday sent House and Senate appropriators detailed instructions on how they
should craft spending legislation to fund the federal government beyond April
28, when the current stopgap spending bill expires. — The Trump proposal seeks cuts across
many federal agencies, but calls for the deepest reductions at the Education
Department. The administration proposes $1.3 billion in cuts from the
Pell grant program’s surplus this year — on top of the $3.9 billion proposed
cut for next fiscal year. The CBO estimates the program will operate with a
$10.6 billion surplus next year, but advocates for student aid and Congressional
Democrats have blasted efforts to “raid” the Pell surplus and direct that money
outside of financial aid programs.
“If Trump gets his way,
his budget will eliminate the $115 million NASA Office of
Education. The popular NASA initiative provides internships,
enrichment programs, camps and scholarships for young scientists, and tries to
get more underrepresented communities into STEM. Advocates say it’s a critical way for more
women and minorities to enter these fields, and that axing it would be
devastating.”
Ivanka Trump Promotes ‘Hidden Figures’ As Her Dad
Tries To Slash NASA Education Funding
She appeared at the National
Air and Space Museum with a female astronaut to promote women in science.
Huffington Post By Amanda Terkel 03/28/2017 02:42
pm ET
WASHINGTON
― Ivanka Trump and Education Secretary Betsy DeVos held an event at the National Air and Space Museum Tuesday,
promoting the administration’s support for young women in the fields of
science, technology, engineering and mathematics. They even appeared with
astronaut Kay Hire and showed the movie “Hidden Figures,” a story about the
achievements of African-American women at NASA. Trump paid homage to the women featured in
the movie for “paving the way for greater representation of women and
African-Americans in these fields.”
“My father’s
administration has expanded NASA’s space exploration mission and added Mars as
a key objective,” she added. President Donald Trump’s 2018
budget, however severely undercuts this women-friendly image put forward by
DeVos and his daughter Tuesday.
Education Secretary
Betsy DeVos and Ivanka Trump visited the Smithsonian’s National Air and
Space Museum on Tuesday for a women in STEM event.
Are some U.S. charter
schools helping fund Fethullah Gulen's movement?
MARCH 29, 2017, 7:32
AM| Over the past two decades, followers of the controversial Turkish religious
scholar, Fethullah Gulen, have opened up taxpayer-funded charter schools in the
U.S. But CBS News has learned the FBI is investigating whether Gulen followers
have skimmed money from those charter schools in order to fund his movement in
Turkey. Margaret Brennan reports.
The
2017 PenSPRA Symposium Keeping Current: What’s New in School
Communications April 7th Shippensburg
Join PenSPRA Friday, April 7, 2017 in Shippensburg, PA 9 a.m. to 3:30 p.m. with evening social events on Thursday, April 6th from 5 - 8 p.m. at the Shippensburg University Conference Center
The agenda is as follows: Supporting transgender students in our schools (9 am), Evaluating School Communications to Inform Your Effectiveness (10:30 am), and Cool Graphics Tools Hands-on Workshop (1:15 pm).
Join PenSPRA Friday, April 7, 2017 in Shippensburg, PA 9 a.m. to 3:30 p.m. with evening social events on Thursday, April 6th from 5 - 8 p.m. at the Shippensburg University Conference Center
The agenda is as follows: Supporting transgender students in our schools (9 am), Evaluating School Communications to Inform Your Effectiveness (10:30 am), and Cool Graphics Tools Hands-on Workshop (1:15 pm).
The $150 registration fee also
includes breakfast, lunch and Thursday’s social! You can
find more details on the agenda and register for the Symposium here:
PSBA
Advocacy Forum and Day on the Hill APR
24, 2017 • 8:30 AM - 5:00 PM
Join PSBA and your fellow school
directors for the fourth annual Advocacy Forum on April 24, 2017, at the
State Capitol in Harrisburg. Hear from legislators on how advocacy makes a
difference in the legislative process and the importance of public education
advocacy. Government Affairs will take a deeper dive into the legislative
priorities and will provide tips on how to be an effective public education
advocate. There will be dedicated time for you and your fellow advocates to hit
the halls to meet with your legislators on public education. This is your
chance to share the importance of policy supporting public education and make
your voice heard on the Hill.
“Nothing has more impact for
legislators than hearing directly from constituents through events like PSBA’s
Advocacy Forum.”
— Sen. Pat Browne (R-Lehigh), Senate Appropriations Committee chair
— Sen. Pat Browne (R-Lehigh), Senate Appropriations Committee chair
Registration:
Visit the Members
Area of PSBA’s website under Store/Registration tab to register.
SAVE THE DATE LWVPA Convention 2017 June
1-4, 2017
Join the
League of Women Voters of PA for our 2017 Biennial Convention at the beautiful
Inn at Pocono Manor!
Save the Date
2017 PA Principals Association State Conference October 14. 15, 16, 2017
Doubletree
Hotel Cranberry Township, PA
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