美國教育界 Some of the News Fit to Print

Some of the News Fit to Print
THE SPLIT BETWEEN THE STATES
On Medicaid, education and many other issues, the map of the United States is becoming a patchwork of conscience and callousness. People on one side of a state line have access to health care, strong public schools and colleges, and good transportation systems, while those on the other side do not. The breakdown of a sense of national unity in Washington is now reflected across the country, as more than two dozen states begin to abandon traditions of responsible government. The editorial is in The New York Times.
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ACCREDITATION FAST TRACK?
WASHINGTON -- A proposal is circulating quietly on Capitol Hill to ask accreditors to create a new, more flexible form of approval for new and nontraditional providers of higher education. The measure, a slight 37 words, contains few details about the new system it envisions. Its odds are long; so far, no lawmakers have volunteered to sponsor it. Still, the proposal represents a shot across the bow at the traditional system of higher education accreditation, which has been under increasing pressure since the second half of the Bush administration. Margaret Spellings, the former education secretary, tried to take on the system through tighter scrutiny and new regulations, but met opposition in Congress. The article is in Inside Higher Ed.
THE DECEPTIVE DATA ON ASIANS
It is time to disaggregate data about Asian-American students as much as possible, says a report, issued Thursday by the Educational Testing Service and the National Commission on Asian-American and Pacific Islander Research in Education. The failure of most schools and colleges to do so has resulted in key problems facing Asian-American groups being "overlooked and misunderstood," said Robert T. Teranishi, associate professor of higher education at New York University and principal investigator for the report, during a news briefing. Aggregated data "conceals significant disparities," Teranishi said.
THE CHANGING FACE OF HIGHER EDUCATION
Two historic pieces of federal legislation, the original G.I. Bill and the Civil Rights Act of 1964, transformed America by helping hundreds of thousands of Americans to earn postsecondary degrees, and dramatically expand the middle class. Now again, we are faced with demographic shifts will transform our country and our education system. Growth in the Hispanic/Latino population leads the way. The post is in The  Hill’s Congress Blog.
CALIFORNIA RESIDENTS SAY TUITION UNAFFORDABLE
A majority of California residents say public university tuition is unaffordable, but would prefer to keep the schools top-notch instead of making them cheaper, according to a poll released Thursday. The University of Southern California Dornsife College of Letters, Arts and Sciences/Los Angeles Times poll found that 56 percent believe public university tuition is unaffordable in California. But 46 percent said maintaining excellence was more important than lowering tuition. Thirty-six percent said affordability was more import than quality. The article is in the Huffington Post.
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PROMOTING DATA IN THE CLASSROOM
The No Child Left Behind Act launched a decade of development in state educational data systems, and since its passage, states and school districts have produced reams of student achievement data each year. However, unless teachers are able to capture those and other data and utilize them in the classroom to ensure each student’s needs are met, they are of little value to school officials or students. A recently released report from the New America Foundation offers federal policymakers a view into two states’ federally funded efforts to implement data systems that work for teachers. It also provides states with a glimpse of the challenges and successes each state reached throughout the implementation of their projects, and explores the federal policy implications of each project.
OBAMA ANNOUNCES INTERNET PLAN FOR ALL SCHOOLS
President Barack Obama announces a plan to enhance Internet speed in America's schools while creating jobs in the process. Obama unveiled the plan at Mooresville Middle School in North Carolina Thursday. The piece ran on NBC News.
HOUSE REPUBLICAN INTRODUCES EDUCATION BILL
Staking a claim in the debate over how the federal government should direct public schooling, Representative John Kline, chairman of the House Education Committee, introduced legislation on Thursday to replace the decade-old No Child Left Behind federal education law. The article is in The New York Times.


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NATION’S GRADUATION RATE NEARS A MILESTONE
At the beginning of the last decade, before concerns about the nation's graduation rate ascended to prominence on the policy agenda, only about two-thirds of U.S. public school students were finishing high school with a regular diploma. A new analysis from the Editorial Projects in Education Research Center finds that the graduation rate for America's public schools stands just shy of 75 percent for the class of 2010, the most recent year for which data are available. The article is in Education Week.
G.O.P. BILL ON SCHOOLS WOULD SET FEWER RULES
Signaling a preference for a much smaller role for the federal government in public schooling, Senator Lamar Alexander, Republican of Tennessee, is introducing legislation on Thursday to revise No Child Left Behind, the Bush-era education law. Coming two days after Senator Tom Harkin, Democrat of Iowa and chairman of the Senate education committee, released a 1,150-page education bill, the bill by Mr. Alexander, who is the ranking Republican on the committee, will compete with it. T  he article is in The New York Times.
POSTPONING ‘STAKES’ FOR COMMON CORE WON’T WORK
Postponing high stakes for the common-core assessments would delay important progress, writes Alice Johnson Cain of Teach Plus in Education Week.“The common core is not just another reform; it is truly a revolutionary development. But it is also a package deal in which next-generation assessments will inform and improve instruction in ways that make far more sense to teachers than the current "bubble tests" that are often disconnected from what they teach and what their students need,” she writes. “The common core defines critical, real-world understandings that students need for success in college and career, broken down by grade level.”
BETTER TEACHERS FOR NEW YORK CITY
The new teacher evaluation system that the New York State education commissioner, John King Jr., has imposed on New York City represents an important and necessary step toward carrying out the rigorous new Common Core education reforms. These reforms, which set learning benchmarks, have been adopted by 45 states, and it is essential that teachers be good enough to meet them. The new evaluation system could make it easier to fire markedly poor performers. But the most important task at hand is helping the great majority of teachers become better at their jobs. The editorial is in The New York Times.
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THE POST-SECONDARY EDUCATION CONUNDRUM
Postsecondary education in the United States faces a conundrum: Can we preserve access, help students learn more and finish their degrees sooner and more often, and keep college affordable for families, all at the same time? And can the higher education reforms currently most in vogue—expanding the use of technology and making colleges more accountable—help us do these things? The article is from the Brookings Institution.
STUDY SEES IMPACT OF COACH-STYLE COLLEGE COUNSELING
Using a coaching-style of college counseling -- in which the advisors work intensely with high school students to help them navigate the application process -- can result in more students opting for four-year colleges rather than two-year colleges, a new study in the journal Educational Evaluation and Policy Analysis has found. The study was based on students in the Chicago Public Schools. The information is from Inside Higher Ed’s Quick Takes.


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ACADEMICS NOT ONLY FACTOR IN STUDENT SUCCESS
Predicting just who will go to and finish college can be tricky. A new report from ACT Inc. underscores that while academic readiness is important, it is not the sole factor at play in college success. About 19 percent of high school graduates in 2011 who took the ACT and were considered college-ready in at least three of the four subject areas never enrolled or didn't return for a second year, the Reality of College Readiness 2013 report released today reveals. The post if from Education Week’s College Bound blog.
WORK READINESS SKILLS NOT WELL DOCUMENTED
A new release from ACT ventures into territory that is largely uncharted: postsecondary work readiness standards and benchmarks. While many now have a grip on what college readiness looks like, comparable standards for work readiness-the skills involved in workplace success-are less well understood. According to the author, work readiness skills are foundational and occupation specific, vary in importance and level for different occupations, and depend on the critical tasks identified via a job analysis or an occupational profile. Examples of skills required for accountants and welders are profiled. This information is from Education Commission of the States.
WHO’S OUR COMPETITION?
Matt Reed writes in Inside Higher Ed’s Confessions of a Community College Dean blog: Community colleges are now seeing possible competition from new corners. MOOCs are still in their infancy, but are already making a mark.  If they can solve the “business model” issue, they could become formidable.  (Alternately, they may simply become variations on Open Educational Resource providers for traditional colleges as a way to ensure their survival.)  Western Governors University is experimenting with competency-based credits, and SNHU’s College for America has gone all-in with competencies.  (So far, enrollment is mostly employer-based, but that’s not necessarily intrinsic to the model.)  Credit for Prior Learning is gaining steam, and I wouldn’t be surprised to see it take off in the next few years, particularly for working adults.
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BILL TO ALTER BUSH-ERA EDUCATION LAW GIVES STATES MORE ROOM
Renewing the effort to revise No Child Left Behind, the signature Bush-era federal education law, Senator Tom Harkin, Democrat of Iowa, introduced a new version on Tuesday that he said would “replace the failed tenets” of the law. Less than two years after Congress last tried to update the law, which governs public schools that receive federal money to support the country’s most disadvantaged students, Mr. Harkin, chairman of the Senate education committee, opened what is likely to be a fierce debate over the proper role of the federal government in public education. The article is in The New York Times.
SOME EDUCATION REFORMS TO BE PHASED IN
The Connecticut House give final passage to a bill which allows districts to move a little slower in implementing two elements of the 2012 education reforms pushed by Gov. Dannel P. Malloy. The bill gives districts the flexibility to roll out the new teacher evaluation process over two years instead of one and delays programs to address the high rate of elementary students struggling to read. The article is in the Connecticut Mirror.