A Tale of Two Standards? Who Can Reject a Proposed Union Contract?
It was the best of times, it was the worst of times…. So begins one of the most famous novels of the last 200 years: A Tale of Two Cities by Charles Dickens. I’m too little to know what it’s all about. But the idea of making a clear and direct contrast just seemed to […]
Senate Passes Bipartisan NCLB Rewrite
On Tuesday, we visited the faraway land of U.S. Congress, where the U.S. House recently (and narrowly) passed a sweeping reauthorization of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act, currently known as No Child Left Behind. I had planned on using today’s post to offer a brief update on the U.S. Senate’s ongoing NCLB reauthorization efforts […]
ESEA Reauthorization Grinds Forward in Congress
Colorado’s education scene is so interesting—and the federal education scene so ugly—that I rarely feel the need to drag our conversations beyond our state’s borders. Yet sometimes we have to force ourselves to look at what’s going on inside the Beltway, especially when the federal sausage-making process has the potential to touch Colorado in a […]
PARCC’s Plummet
Despite valiant efforts, I was unable to find a nice, neat, uplifting Friday education story for us to talk about today. That’s kind of a good thing, though. Pressing issues like the Jeffco recall-oisseurs’ inability to tell the truth have distracted us from a large education policy discussion backlog. Today we’re going to nibble on […]
Fact-Challenged (or Math-Challenged?) Jeffco Recallers Send Wrong Messages
You can learn a lot by observing people’s actions, not just their words. How do you “get politics out of our schools”? More politics. How do you “restore democracy”? By trying to overturn the will of the voters. How do you “fight to save education”? By feeding people lies and misinformation rather than encourage critical […]
SCOTUS to Hear Friedrichs Case: Big Moment for Educational Freedom?
After last week’s legal setback for school choice in Colorado, I found a hopeful silver lining in a path to the U.S. Supreme Court. How great is the hope? Honestly, little me doesn’t know. But my attention was so wrapped up in that story and others, that I nearly missed the U.S. Supreme Court’s announcement […]
Denver Post Editors Hit Back-to-Back Homers for Students, Parents
My dad told me about these crinkly pieces of paper with print on them that people used to get, something they would read to find out what’s going on in the world. I guess they’re called “newspapers”? Apparently, some websites actually have newspapers, or so I’m told. The last few days, the editors of one […]
Dougco Decision Brings Good News and Bad
By now, my faithful readers should be familiar with Douglas County School District’s embattled first-of-its-kind local voucher program, the Choice Scholarship Program (CSP). I was super excited about an amicus brief written by my friends at the Friedman Foundation and the Independence Institute way back in August of last year, and could barely contain myself during […]
Jeffco School Board Recall Underway: What’s Really Going On?
It’s Friday afternoon in the summertime. I should be kicking back and enjoying the great outdoors, maybe playing in the pool or racing my remote-controlled cars. But no. Teachers union leaders hide behind a group of parents to file a recall petition against the three conservative Jeffco school board members: One of the stated reasons […]
Thompson and Jeffco Stand up for Fair Charter Funding
Many school districts do not share the additional dollars they get from voter-approved property tax increases with charter schools. Traditional public schools often have access to a good deal more money than charters. But two Colorado districts recently passed budgets that reflect more equitable funding for charter school students. Jefferson County completed its journey toward equalization, and Thompson took the first step. Reform majorities on both school boards drove the move toward funding equalization. Other districts take note: This is how you do it.
Performance-Based Learning, Strategic Compensation Keep My Eyes on Mesa 51
When it comes to K-12 education, I tell you a lot about what’s going on in the Denver area and along the Front Range. That’s where most people in our state live. But Colorado is a big place, and it’s good for me to keep expanding my horizons. One of those places is called the […]
Fact Checking the Fact Checkers: Counting Local Teachers Unions in Colorado
We’ve spent an awful lot of time recently debunking (or at least very critically reviewing) stuff. We beat up a bologna study on school choice, poked holes in a school finance study that made some weird assumptions, poked some more holes in even more school finance reports, and took a very close look at the […]
