The Mother of All Unfunded Mandates
If there ever was a time for the states to challenge federal unfunded mandates, it is now.
Colorado Legislative Session off to Blazing Fast Start on Education Bills
Today is the start of Colorado’s legislative session, and the people under the Golden Dome are wasting no time getting to work on education issues. With Race to the Top deadlines looming, lawmakers are working to speed some bills through the process.
Right now, the Senate Education Committee is considering Senate Bill 36 — which […]
NEA’s Recent Political Giving Flatters Colorado with a Badge of Honor
Every year the Education Intelligence Agency’s Mike Antonucci undertakes the daunting work of going through the National Education Association’s federal financial disclosure report (hosted online by the U.S. Department of Labor).
In his latest exclusive analysis, Antonucci found the NEA’s contributions to advocacy groups and charities reached $26 million in 2008-09 — nearly double from […]
Just How Tired Will Colorado Legislators Be of Education Reform?
Two days from now Colorado’s state legislature starts the 2010 session. And with a recession cutting into tax revenues, many lawmakers will show up without the enthusiasm to create new programs or boost spending on existing programs. As legislative sessions go, this one has a particularly strange character about it. Tough and unpleasant decisions will […]
Health Insurers' 'Sins' Don’t Justify Reform
Are health insurance companies evil? A web search for the phrase turns up almost a million hits. The common reasons for this passionate indictment are insurance company profits, denial of claims, and rescission of policies. But these do not justify the Democrats’ goal of expanding political control of health insurance. Rather, they call attention to existing controls that unfairly advantage insurers and limit competition that would keep insurers honest. They also suggest government’s failure to enforce contracts
Unveiling TFA’s Secrets of Quality Teaching… How Do We Scale It Up?
Writing for the new edition of The Atlantic, Amanda Ripley talks to the Teach for America (TFA) crew about what they’ve learned about quality teaching from their vast stores of data. We know quality instruction can make a huge difference, but you may be surprised to learn what characteristics TFA finds match up with making […]
Families Leaving Private Schools Can Make Strong Choice Advocates
A new USA Today article by education reporter Greg Toppo is featured under the banner of “Recession fuels shift from private to public schools” — more middle-class parents with less money to spend on tuition are making the switch:
Private-school parents typically find that the structure of public schools takes some getting used to. In most […]
Male Teacher? Female Teacher? Boys Really Need School Choice
You can write about education issues a lot, have your eyes focused on the future, and still miss some of the debates that are going on out there. Washington Post blogger Valerie Strauss says that schools need to hire more male teachers, especially in the early grades, for the sake of boys. Citing Richard Whitmire’s […]
Disrupting Class Means Future Change for School System, Teacher Unions
So with this new year of 2010, I’m really thinking all futuristic. Yesterday it was brain skills testing. But what about technological changes that promise to transform our education system?
That’s what Harvard professor Clayton Christensen writes about in his 2009 book Disrupting Class: How Disruptive Innovation Will Change the Way the World Learns. If you […]
It’s 2010, the Future is Here, What About More Brain Skills Testing?
Did you miss me while I was gone for a couple weeks there? Okay, hopefully not too much. One of the articles I nearly missed right before Christmas makes the case for a type of reform that could be easily overlooked in the Race to the Top. From December 21 of last year (last decade […]
