Editor's note: This post by Ted Kolderie appeared yesterday in the National Journal Online. Ted is a founding partner at Education|Evolving.
If 'Michelle Rhee' was the answer, what was the question?
Presumably: How are student interests put first; as, with the removal of ineffective teachers? Tenure and other things won by the teacher unions made it hard to put students first...
Are urban superintendents warming to innovative uses of technology? To new roles for teachers? In a recent letter to the Washington Post 16 major superintendents indicate yes. But an alternative angle might also be considered.
Toward the bottom of Manifesto, 'How to Fix Our Schools', there is recognition of the need to use technology to increase productivity and customize learning. The authors use encouraging language about the need for improving teacher roles:
...Editor’s note: Each Friday we feature guest bloggers that are involved in rethinking what is possible with schooling and the education system.
Paul Dakin is Superintendent of Paul Revere Public Schools, in Massachusetts. The Paul Revere School is the first of two new Innovation Schools in that state, which are schools inside school districts with autonomy reflective of the chartering sector. Mass. Secretary of Education Paul Reville wrote a...
Peter Thiel, co-founder of PayPal, has announced he will offer 20 adults under the age of 20 up to $100,000 to take time away from school and pursue entrepreneurial ventures. Theil—a law school graduate, whose family immigrated from Germany when he was young—stated that while there are a lot of things people learn in school, “I don't think they learn much about entrepreneurship.”
Thiel was an early investor in Facebook with his company Clarium Capital. After Zuckerberg’s announcement...
On Saturday Larry Cuban appealed to the temperance of those in the education policy world: "Please, don’t hype teacher run schools."
He described an article written in 1990 titled America’s Schools: Choice Is a...
Editor’s note: Big Thought, Inc. is a non-profit organization that works in Dallas to ‘reimagine’ schooling through creative learning. In this guest post LeAnn Binford, director of operations at Big Thought, argues that exposing under served students to expanded forms of learning improves homework completion, reading comprehension, test scores, and classroom behaviors. Autonomy and financial support are necessary for this type of re-working of assessment to function well.
While it is not an innovative...
“Whether it's through art or mentorship, students learn best when they are given the tools to take ownership of their learning.”
So argues Joel Arquillos, executive director at the non-profit tutoring center 826LA on the Huffington Post’s new education site.
Arquillos describes how his group’s work helps to provide students with the resources and experiences that help them understanding what learning can be:...
After Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg announced that he would create and endow Startup: Education (challenging other successful startup entrepreneurs to match his $100 million donation), Gadfly and others argued that more money is not going to make a difference since...
Editor’s note: Each Friday we feature guest bloggers that are involved in rethinking what is possible with schooling and the education system.
In this guest post Nick Mathern describes an attempt to reduce dropout rates by allowing prospective dropouts to move into post-secondary education sooner. Nick is the Associate Vice President of Policy & Partnership for the Gateway to College Program, which helps potential high school dropouts to earn a high school diploma while also earning...
This week in The Education Gadfly Michael Petrilli and Chester Finn ask whether a Republican Congress would be good for school reform. They write: