The Washington Examiner warns that Donald Trump & Betsy DeVos should learn the lessons of Common Core and No Child Left Behind, avoid top-down initiatives.
Jeb Bush’s RNC Speech
Former Florida Governor Jeb Bush spoke Thursday night at the 2012 Republican National Convention. As you might guess he focused his remarks on education. Here’s his speech below. I’m not going to provide commentary on his speech. I’ll let you do that in the comments section.
Voucher Programs Need to Be Cut Off From the Common Core
I’m a school choice advocate, and full disclosure – my wife and I (mostly my wife) homeschool our three children. That said I’m concerned by how current voucher programs are structured with more and more strings attached. A friend of ours, Melissa Smith wrote a letter-to-the-editor that was published in the Ft. Wayne News-Sentinel that […]
Open Thread Discussion: What Do You Think About Same Sex Public Schools?
North Carolina just opened up two of them. I have mixed feelings. On one hand as a former youth pastor who had to lead all boy junior high small groups the thought makes me shudder and I feel sorry for the teachers at the male academy. On the other hand as a Dad of three […]
Transferring Poor Performing Public Schools to Poorly Performing Charters
I had a post from Diane Ravitch emailed to me this morning. In a post entitled “Theft of Public Education in Memphis” she described what seems to be a colossal shift of taxpayer money from public schools to charter schools in Memphis, TN. The Memphis schools will be merged with the schools of Shelby County, […]
School-Based Management
Governing highlighted a practice that seems to fly in the face of the current trend toward centralization… Detroit for instance is moving toward giving schools more authority by implementing five person boards per school. They also highlight Edmonton, Alberta which could be a model for school choice as well. Edmonton has a population of 1.1 […]
Online Education: Choice is Good, Mandates Are Not
I read an article written by Beth Hawkins that was part news and mostly conspiracy theory in the MinnPost. First the news, she discussed a proposed bill in the Minnesota Legislature, House File 2127, that would require all students starting in four years to take one online class to graduate. This section of the bill […]
The Missing Ingredient to Education Innovation: Choice
While a recent Council on Foreign Relations Task force report indicated that we need national standards of which I vehemently disagree. They also determined that choice in education was necessary to achieve educational innovation, this I totally agree with. Joe Klein a member of the task force and former New York City schools chancellor wrote […]
Mick Zais’ Battle for Education Reform in South Carolina
Ben Velderman of the Education Action Group wrote an excellent profile on South Carolina State Superintendent of Education Mick Zais in a guest post over at Caffeinated Carolina. I encourage you to read it. Here’s a money quote for me: “The education industrial complex is bipartisan,” Zais said. “We have RINOs – Republicans in Name […]
Local Control Doesn’t Have to Be Sacrificed for School Choice
The Hoover Institution’s Koret Task Force on K-12 Education released a white paper this week entitled “Choice and Federalism: Defining the Federal Role in Education.” I looked forward to reading what this conservative think tank based at Stanford University had to say. I was disappointed. While I applaud their ideas as they relate to school […]