Lorain Council drops charter school plan - The possibility of another charter school moving to Lorain was all but killed Monday by City Council. An ordinance that would rezone the Colorado Avenue Industrial Complex so that 8.6 acres of land could be sold for Constellation Community Schools to build a 100,000-square foot facility to serve kindergartners through 12th-graders was tabled in committee, effectively guaranteeing the issue won’t be considered again as proposed.

Think Tank Faults Vouchers For Disabled - Another pillar of former Gov. Jeb Bush’s educational reforms - McKay Scholarships - took a jab in a study released Tuesday. Florida’s largest voucher program, using taxpayer money to pay private school tuition for students with disabilities, lacks accountability and offers no proof that it helps children, the study from Education Sector says.

Council Mostly Applauds Nominee - D.C. Council members and city leaders yesterday gushed praise on Mayor Adrian M. Fenty’s nominee to take over the $2.3 billion public school modernization program, but some were highly critical of the mayor for the secrecy with which he made the choice. Council members questioned Allan Y. Lew during a public roundtable on his nomination and voiced displeasure with Fenty’s lack of consultation in the process for choosing Lew and other appointees.

N.H. raises dropout age to 18 - Gov. John Lynch signed a law Tuesday that raises the school dropout age from 16 to 18. More than a dozen states, including California and Texas, already require students to stay in school until age 18.

High School Sports: Legislature looks at eligibility issues - Jordan Bingham of northern Utah County is going to be a high school sophomore this fall. He wants to attend the new Karl G. Maeser Preparatory Academy in Lindon, a charter school preparing to open on Aug. 20 with about 175 students.

State has balanced budget - Last week, the sky was falling on state lawmakers and Gov. Ted Strickland after news broke that the state had a $230 million hole in the two-year state budget.

New Report Clears School of Cheating - When Philip Nobile reported in 2004 that the assistant principal of the Brooklyn high school where he taught had ordered other teachers to cheat on the scoring of Regents exams, he was embraced by a powerful city investigator as a whistle-blower.

Lt. Governor Cagle Announces Charter Advisory Committee Appointments  - Lt. Governor Casey Cagle announced the appointments of Dr. Charles Knapp, Otis Brumby Jr. and Mark Whitlock to the new Charter Advisory Committee.

Charter schools’ bid for cash stalls - With the loss of up to $800 million in construction money looming over them, Broward School Board members decided Tuesday to hold off on giving Pembroke Pines charter schools a share of the school district’s construction money.

Charter schools booming in the suburbs - Such rigorous curriculum and individual attention, administrators say, have boosted the Chester County school’s standardized math and reading scores substantially since it opened in 2000. Last month, the Center for Education Reform recognized that improvement by naming Renaissance a national charter of the year.

Blacks in Fairfax, Montgomery Outdo U.S. Peers in AP - Black students in Montgomery and Fairfax high schools are far more successful in Advanced Placement testing than their peers in nine of the 10 school systems in the nation with the largest black populations, according to a Washington Post analysis.

Midland ponders enrollment - Midland School District Superintendent Lynn Roe King is optimistic with a hint of worry. King said he is confident the district can re-invent itself after being placed on the state’s fiscal distress list in 2006, but declining enrollment has the longtime educator troubled.

Schoolyard secrets - Editorial: The arrest this month of a reporter, accused of trespassing for taking soil samples at a pesticide-contaminated Paramus, N.J., middle school, is a powerful reminder of our tolerance for official secrecy about environmental health risks at schools.

Atlanta wants to shut down charter school - Atlanta Public Schools officials want to close a charter campus — which opened four years ago with hopes of getting more inner-city children into college — even though the principal says his students are outperforming their traditional public school peers.

New charter bridges Africa and Minnesota - Comfort Lartey-Ofori said she decided to start a charter school because for years she and other African professionals in the Twin Cities complained that traditional American schools teach children very little — if anything — about West African people and their culture.

Santa Fe school board, union strike contract deal - The Santa Fe school board ratified a collective bargaining agreement with the teachers union Tuesday after 15 months of drawn-out and sometimes contentious negotiations.

Consistency counts - Editorial: The LAUSD’s policy for charter schools is to give failing campuses a one-year extension to fix their academic problems before getting their charters renewed. That is, unless the school is really failing, in which case it either gets its charter revoked or a five-year extension - depending on whether it rounds up hundreds of furious parents to stamp around and scare L.A. school board members. 

New York Daily News:  For kids, parents work the system

The New York Daily News takes a look at what it takes for inner-city families to provide a good education for their children with a new series.  The series follows the 13-year path of 23 Harlem kids from kindergarten to high school graduation.  It’s a glimpse into the struggles to graduate high school in an urban environment that many people never understand.

Some lied about addresses to get their children into better schools. Others used connections to make sure their kids ended up with the best teachers. One stayed in public housing to afford Catholic school, while another fled the city for New Jersey - and a fresh start.

Their stories show that haggling and string pulling is not just limited to the wealthy and middle class - parents of all incomes do whatever they can to work the vast public school system for the sake of their children.

"People do what they have to do for their children," said Terry Love, who used an acquaintance’s address to send her daughter, Danique, to two prestigious public schools on the upper West Side from third grade through eighth grade.

Though the kindergartners at Public School 36 began their education in the same classroom in 1994, their paths diverged significantly as their parents struggled to ensure their kids got what all New York families want - a quality education.

Washington Post:  Ex-aides break with Bush on ‘No Child’

President Bush urged lawmakers yesterday to renew No Child Left Behind, his landmark education initiative, but one of his biggest political liabilities in achieving that goal comes from an unlikely source: his former aides.

Five years after they helped craft and implement the initiative, senior administration officials from Bush’s first term are speaking out against the law with increasing boldness. The shift, combined with mounting criticism from both the political right and left in Congress, is causing supporters of the law to worry that it might not win renewal this year.

"I had these second thoughts in the back of my mind the whole time," said Eugene W. Hickok, a former deputy education secretary. "I believe it was a necessary step at the time, but now that it has been in place for a while, it’s important to step back and see if there are other ways to solve the problem."

Some former senior department officials said they have a strained relationship with Spellings over first-term disputes and her second-term agenda. That friction might hinder her efforts to gain support from key education groups and lawmakers for renewal of No Child Left Behind, several senior officials said.

Times Picayune: Recover School District Superintendent promises reform during aid bid

As part of a bid for federal aid, Recovery School District Superintendent Paul Vallas told the state’s recovery board Monday that he will try to lower the New Orleans district’s student-to-teacher ratio and expects to be judged harshly if test scores and attendance rates don’t rise.

"You can expect scores to go up, you can expect graduation rates to go up," Vallas said. "The scores (now) are so low that if they don’t go up, I should leave town in shame. The scores at some of the schools, you could do as well by guessing."

Vallas told the state board that the district will try to maintain a 20-to-1 ratio of students to teachers in elementary schools with a "slightly higher" ratio at high schools. A district spokeswoman later said Vallas wants to limit the ratio to 25-to-1 at high schools.

He predicted there will be an "adequate number of seats available for our children" in New Orleans schools come September. Pastorek has said he expects a total enrollment in all New Orleans public schools of about 33,000 this fall, up from 27,000 this past year.

State offers $665 a child for full-day K - Indiana school districts will receive $665 per student to pay for full-day kindergarten, officials were told Monday. That number is higher than the $440 per student worst-case scenario educators were told about but much lower than the best-case scenario of $2,500 per student.

Five charter schools may move to Rio Nuevo site - The future of five downtown charter schools could be decided Wednesday as builders pitch plans to the city on developing 14 acres west of Interstate 10. The schools hope their dream to share a 20,000-square-foot campus that would include a cafeteria, gymnasium and auditorium will be included in the developers’ proposals, said Frank DiPietro, founder of the Downtown Charter School Alliance.

Ex-Aides Break With Bush on ‘No Child’ - President Bush urged lawmakers yesterday to renew No Child Left Behind, his landmark education initiative, but one of his biggest political liabilities in achieving that goal comes from an unlikely source: his former aides.

Ex-Miami-Dade teachers union head, convict dies at 81 - Pat Tornillo, a former head of Miami-Dade County’s teachers union who championed education but was later sent to prison for stealing from the group, has died, his attorney said Monday. He was 81.

$116 million awarded in U.S. history grants - U.S. Secretary of Education Margaret Spellings recently announced the award of $116 million for 122 new grants to improve the quality of American history education. The grants are being awarded to school districts in 40 states, including Baltimore City, which received $995,283.

Parents tout Total Learning’s successes - Tameka Mesidor was poised to enroll her son, Fritz, at New Beginnings Charter School last fall when his Head Start preschool teacher told her to consider a new program at Columbus School instead.

Charter schools rank high in survey - Wisconsin Connections Academy announced that an independent survey found more than 95 percent of parents who enrolled their children in WCA gave the program an A or B grade.

For kids, parents work the system - Some lied about addresses to get their children into better schools. Others used connections to make sure their kids ended up with the best teachers. One stayed in public housing to afford Catholic school, while another fled the city for New Jersey - and a fresh start.

FD schools discuss No Child Left Behind - Superintendent Linda Brock outlined a set of strategies Monday night for the Fort Dodge Community School District to implement in the push to improve student performance. The strategies are part of the district’s plan, developed in consultation with the Iowa Department of Education, to emerge from the list of districts “in need of assistance” as determined by the federal No Child Left Behind law.

S.C. Governor Vetoes Public School Choice Bill - Gov. Mark Sanford vetoed a bill Friday that allows parents to send their children to the public school of their choice, saying the legislation doesn’t go far enough. Under the bill, parents would be able to enroll their child in a public school in any school district without paying tuition.

Special Ed Students in City Lag in Entering Mainstream - While other school systems across the state have significantly increased the number of students who attend classes in schools with mainstream students, the number of students in separate schools — spending all their time with other special education students — has been mostly stagnant in the city, according to a report released by the state’s Board of Regents.

Recovery School District Superintendent promises reform during aid bid - As part of a bid for federal aid, Recovery School District Superintendent Paul Vallas told the state’s recovery board Monday that he will try to lower the New Orleans district’s student-to-teacher ratio and expects to be judged harshly if test scores and attendance rates don’t rise.

Officials urge another try for KIPP - As a vote looms to formally close a charter school in Edge water, Anne Arundel County Executive John R. Leopold and schools Superintendent Kevin M. Maxwell Monday called on an Annapolis art institute and the college that has housed the 2-year-old KIPP Harbor Academy to find room for its students.

Black students gain ground - For the first time ever, the proportion of blacks enrolled in higher education in the region equaled their representation in the population of Delaware and 15 other states. But those students still face some of the most challenging roads to obtaining a degree, a new study found. 

Washington Post:  New schools chief builds team

Acting D.C. schools Chancellor Michelle A. Rhee is assembling a transition team that will guide the strategy for the new school session starting in August, focusing on hiring principals and other pressing issues during the summer months.

The team will be led by Jenny Abramson, 30, an advertising manager at The Washington Post, city officials confirmed yesterday. Abramson will take an unpaid leave of absence from The Post for an unspecified period to work for Rhee, company spokesman Eric Grant said. Abramson previously directed program strategy for a year at the national nonprofit organization Teach for America.

Meanwhile, sources said Rhee is actively recruiting Billy Kearney, the Memphis director of the New Leaders for New Schools, a nonprofit training program for principals, to work on principal hiring for the school system. Last week, Rhee decided to freeze the hiring of new principals because she was concerned about the quality of the candidate pool.

Rhee is assembling her team before a scheduled July 2 confirmation hearing by the D.C. Council. The council also will hold a confirmation hearing June 27 for Victor Reinoso, the Deputy Mayor for Education.

To read more about the future of the DC takeover and Michelle Rhee’s place in it, check out Jeanne Allen’s Op-Ed in today’s Washington Examiner.

New York Times:  The high school kinship of Cristal and Queen

They graduated together yesterday from the High School of International Business and Finance, a duo who beat the odds in a school system where despite improvements, only 50 percent of high school students graduated on time last June, according to state statistics.

How they did it is a story of two outsiders who found each other in one of the small schools the city has turned to in an attempt to break up large high schools that, with graduation rates of 25 to 40 percent, became known as factories of failure.

Both girls blossomed in the performing arts, joining the choir and the theater group. They never missed a chance at a school trip — with free tickets — to a Broadway show.

The girls applied to many four-year state and city schools, but by mid-June all Queen and Cristal had were rejections. Then on Tuesday, Cristal learned that she had been accepted at the State University at New Paltz, where she had applied through the state’s Educational Opportunity Program, which offers grants, and special consideration, to qualified economically disadvantaged students.

Oakland Tribune:  Oakland mother to educate Washington lawmakers

To most people, "Supplemental Educational Services" might just sound like the string of edu-speak that it is. But an Oakland mother of three has taught herself all about the private tutoring provision of No Child Left Behind that allows low-income parents in struggling schools to choose a free, private company to teach their kids after school.

Russlynn Ali, director of the Oakland-based advocacy group Education Trust-West, said such input is essential for creating sound policy. "Far too often we determine federal, local and state policy without the real and most organic stake holders — and that’s the parents and students in our schools everyday," she said.

Unlike many other school districts, Shipp said, Oakland has made it easier for parents to access private tutoring for their children. Still, she noted, some school leaders don’t go out of their way to make sure families access those resources.

"The jury is not in on SES," she said. "But parents should know their rights and why they need to make the choice."

Charter schools sue over state rules - Some charter schools are going to court to block state education officials from dictating to them exactly when they have to teach certain subjects. A lawsuit filed in Maricopa County Superior Court charges that state Superintendent of Public Instruction Tom Horne and the state Board of Education lack the legal authority to force them to align their teaching schedule with the ones imposed on other public schools.

House, Senate OK school choice bill - A public school choice bill approved by the S.C. House and Senate Thursday will provide parents with additional educational opportunities for their children, State Superintendent Dr. Jim Rex said in a press release.

New Schools Chief Builds Team - Acting D.C. schools Chancellor Michelle A. Rhee is assembling a transition team that will guide the strategy for the new school session starting in August, focusing on hiring principals and other pressing issues during the summer months.

Algiers charter schools near capacity - Four Algiers schools are at capacity for the 2007-08 school year, officials announced today. But parents may still register their children for three other elementary schools and the new Algiers Technology Academy for high school students.

Charter school up for renewal - The state Board of Regents Monday morning will consider a recommendation to renew the International Charter School of Schenectady’s charter, despite a public school chief’s misgivings.

‘Mainstreaming’ Trend 
Tests Classroom Goals - When school started last August, veteran first-grade teacher Patricia McDermott made sure to place one student, 8-year-old Andrea Gavern, in a seat beside her own desk.

Oakland mother to educate Washington lawmakers - To most people, "Supplemental Educational Services" might just sound like the string of edu-speak that it is. But an Oakland mother of three has taught herself all about the private tutoring provision of No Child Left Behind that allows low-income parents in struggling schools to choose a free, private company to teach their kids after school.

Weiner named new director of area First Tee - Jeffrey Weiner will be the new executive director of The First Tee of St. Johns County, bringing past experience at building youth programs and charter schools to the facility.

Groups sponsor forum on No Child Left Behind - A forum on the No Child Left Behind Act, the disputed federal education mandate championed by President Bush, will be held Monday at the library of Roosevelt Middle School in San Diego.

Schools without borders - The Stursbergs live so close to the Pasco-Hillsborough county line that it just doesn’t matter. Not for work — mom Lorraine commutes to an insurance job near the University of South Florida. Not for play — son Chris practices swimming in Arbor Green and Land O’Lakes. And not for school — Chris, 15, attends Wharton High in New Tampa, which is much closer to their house than his assigned school, Wesley Chapel High.

The High School Kinship of Cristal and Queen - How they did it is a story of two outsiders who found each other in one of the small schools the city has turned to in an attempt to break up large high schools that, with graduation rates of 25 to 40 percent, became known as factories of failure.

School districts cope with fewer students and less money - After decades of increasing enrollment, most school districts throughout the county have started losing students in the last few years, according to a North County Times analysis of state figures.

HISD set to honor Rod Paige - One person suggested Colin Powell. Another proposed Condoleezza Rice. But the crowd at the north Houston community meeting clearly had a favorite: Rod Paige.

Michelle Rhee doesn’t matter — yet - Editorial: Handpicked by D.C. Mayor Adrian Fenty as the new D.C. schools chancellor, Michelle Rhee inherits a city awash in cash, but allows more than half of its students to attend dangerous and ineffective schools.

Charter school doomed at start? - The announcement that one of the county’s two charter schools is closing was made on Wednesday. But its fate was sealed four years ago, supporters of alternatives to public education said.

Big-Name Consultants Greeted With Wariness - Two dozen high-priced consultants have set up shop on three floors of the D.C. public schools’ headquarters, wearing pinstripe suits, toting binders and BlackBerrys and using such corporate jargon as "resource mapping" and "identifying metrics."

Schools Pinched In Hiring - As hundreds of thousands of baby boomers retire and the No Child Left Behind law raises standards for new teachers, school systems across the country are facing a growing scarcity of qualified recruits.

Charters ‘the enemy’? - After more than two hours of debate, the Los Angeles Unified School District board voted to renew the charter for Discovery Prep in Pacoima for a year.

School celebrates hard-won success - Annette Hayes squeezed into a seat near the stage for the eighth-grade promotion at Mastery Charter School’s Shoemaker campus in West Philadelphia because she just knew she was going to holler and cheer for her son, Leroy.

Schools adopt narrow curriculum to increase students’ math and reading scores - The federal No Child Left Behind law is prompting many schools to focus increasingly on math and reading at the expense of other subjects, new research suggests.

City charter school shines - A small charter school serving poor children in Northwest Baltimore has transformed students’ academic careers, turning low-performers into some of the city’s highest scorers on reading and math tests, while their peers in neighboring schools have continued to lag behind, according to a new study.

Parents propose all-girls charter school for county - Angela Phillips of Frederick wants girls to be able to raise their hand in math and science classes without a fear of being wrong. To that end, she is proposing Frederick County Public Schools open a charter school for 360 girls in grades seven through 12.

Some fear law is leaving smart children behind - Jodie Guro attended an open house at Northeast Middle School in September to make sure her daughter, an A-track student entering sixth grade, was going to be challenged academically.

Franklin charter school has new life - A Finance Committee of Conference has tentatively breathed new life into the Franklin Career Charter Academy by providing $800,000 in the state budget for next year’s operations — the money to be split between the three state charter schools that are in danger of closing next year.

Wilmington charter school gets a home - Students have been going to school in modular classrooms since the Maurice J. Moyer Academy first opened in northeast Wilmington last August. But that soon could change.