Filed under Secondary (9-12) …

Six Ways to Fall in Love With Teaching Again

Issues with the bureaucracy of education, funding, changes in class size, class structure, and mode of instruction, as well as student issues, all contribute to our falling out of love with the teaching profession. Additionally, oftentimes personal obligations and responsibilities add stressors that create burdens and affect our happiness in our personal and work lives, … Continue reading →

What Exactly is Personalized Learning?

It remains to be seen exactly how and where Mark Zuckerberg and his wife, Dr. Priscilla Chan, will spend the estimated $45 billion they’ve declared they will donate to charitable ventures, including education. But their announcement this week made one thing clear: in education, the two are focused on the potential of “personalized learning.” For … Continue reading →

The U.S. Congress Passes Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA)

[Last] week’s U.S. House passage of the Every Student Succeeds Act, a reauthorization of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act, makes it clear: If you want to see education policy in the next few years, look to state capitols, not Washington, D.C. The current version of the law, the No Child Left Behind Act, created … Continue reading →

Obama Administration Calls for Limits on Testing in Schools

Faced with mounting and bipartisan opposition to increased and often highstakes testing in the nation’s public schools, the Obama administration declared Saturday that the push had gone too far, acknowledged its own role in the proliferation of tests, and urged schools to step back and make exams less onerous and more purposeful. Specifically, the administration … Continue reading →

Atlanta Educators Convicted in School Cheating Scandal

In a dramatic conclusion to what has been described as the largest cheating scandal in the nation’s history, a jury here on Wednesday convicted 11 educators for their roles in a standardized test cheating scandal that tarnished a major school district’s reputation and raised broader questions about the role of high-stakes testing in American schools. On … Continue reading →

No Child Left Behind Law Faces Its Own Reckoning

Ginn Academy, the first and only public high school in Ohio just for boys, was conceived to help at-risk students make it through school — experimenting with small classes, a tough discipline code and life coaches around the clock. Its graduation rate was close to 88 percent last year, compared with 64 percent for theCleveland … Continue reading →

Does the College Major Really Matter?

Every year, high-school students and their families spend an inordinate amount of time on the college search, but comparatively little on the search for a college major. Perhaps that’s why a quarter of all freshmen change their major by the end of their first year, according to UCLA’s annual Freshman Survey, and half of first-year … Continue reading →

Governor Proposes Boost For Career Education

Career education is projected to receive a boost under Gov. Jerry Brown’s proposed budget, part of a larger push for workforce development training in California. The governor’s budget proposal for 2015-16 includes $876 million for career technical education and other job training initiatives at K-12 schools and community colleges – welcome news for programs that … Continue reading →

A Wi-Fi Enabled School Bus

Near the shore of the murky Salton Sea in this southern California desert, a bus drives up to West Shores High School each day with a critical connection: A Wi-Fi router mounted behind an interior mirror, providing Internet access for students whose homes aren’t wired. At night, the bus driver parks on a sand driveway … Continue reading →