Foundations Seek to Leverage Innovation Funding
Education Week, MD, April 29, 2010
A dozen foundations that have been key players in efforts to improve schools are pledging $506 million this year to spur education innovation, including a joint effort to help districts, schools, and nonprofit groups secure matching funds for the federal Investing in Innovation grant competition.

Deborah Gist
TIME, April 29, 2010
When Deborah Gist became commissioner of Rhode Island schools in 2009, she pledged to make every decision in the best interests of children - something we’ve heard before and rarely seen happen. Then she started doing it.

The Buy-In Myth
Education Week, MD, April 29, 2010
The winning states had convinced nearly all of their local school districts and teachers’ unions to support their applications. The need for broad buy-in-and its implication that states must water down their proposals to get it-quickly became conventional wisdom.

FROM THE STATES

Colorado

No Child Left Behind and Standardized Tests
Denver Post, CO, April 30, 2010
Parents may want to guard their children as Congress considers the next round of education reforms and the reauthorization of No Child Left Behind. Before we dig ourselves any deeper, let us reflect on the past decade with NCLB and statewide measure to standardize, track, and test every Colorado student.

Florida

Florida’s Unheralded School Revolution
Wall Street Journal, April 30, 2010
Two weeks ago Florida Gov. Charlie Crist vetoed a bill that would have ended teacher tenure and established merit pay. His action was widely criticized and effectively ended his primary race for the U.S. Senate as a Republican.

Illinois

Vouchers for CPS Students Advances in House
Chicago Tribune Blog, IL, April 29, 2010
Kids in Chicago’s poorest and most-overcrowded schools could get vouchers to help cover costs at private schools under legislation a House panel approved today.

Louisiana

New Orleans Charter Schools Will Outnumber Traditional Schools 2 To 1 Next Year
The Times-Picayune, LA, April 29, 2010
Charter schools will outnumber traditional schools two to one in the Recovery School District next school year, in an effort to rapidly shrink the roster of schools under the state-run district’s direct control.

Maryland

Putting Students First
Baltimore Sun, MD, April 30, 2010
Ms. Grasmick has been talking to teachers associations throughout the state to reassure them that the new evaluation standards are not an attempt to punish teachers or to put their livelihoods in jeopardy. While the immediate impetus behind the change is clearly to make Maryland more competitive for a federal grant, she’s also made it clear that this is a reform that will benefit the state’s schoolchildren regardless of how the Race to the Top turns out. It’s simply the right thing to do.

New Jersey

School Choice: Move Forward
Asbury Park Press, NJ, April 30, 2010
When the state Senate reconvenes next month, it should make passage of a bill that would create a permanent public school choice program in New Jersey a priority. Last month, the Assembly passed its version of the school choice bill 75-0. That’s what is called full-throated bipartisan support.

New York

Tisch’s True Colors
New York Post, NY, April 30, 2010
If it walks like a duck and quacks like a duck, well, it’s probably . . . a duck.
And Regents Chancellor Merryl Tisch sure is quacking like someone who wants to take out New York’s charter-school revolution at the kneecaps.

When Talking Oversight of Charters, Leave the Tricks at Home
Huffington Post, NY, April 29, 2010
There’s been significant ink spillage over a hearing that the foremost critic of charter schools, NYS Senator Bill Perkins, put together last week to supposedly look into how charter schools are regulated.

North Carolina

Charter Schools Allege Inequity In State Policy
Fay Observer, NC, April 30, 2010
Alpha Academy of Fayetteville is among a group of North Carolina charter schools whose leaders have filed a federal complaint alleging discrimination by a state education policy.