[Ohiogift] Public Education NewsBlast — January 13, 2015

[Gifted and Talented in Ohio Discussion List]

                            January 13, 2015 - In This Issue:
       Help-seeking, teacher response, and socioeconomics
  College support for foster youth who've aged out
  Education: the epicenter of injustice in our society
  Suspension hurts both 'good' and 'bad' alike
  Getting precise about ELLs and federal law
  Quality Counts 2015: Early Education
  A home-schooling free-for-all?
  Teacher/administrator communication, or its lack
  BRIEFLY NOTED CALIFORNIA
  BRIEFLY NOTED
  GRANTS AND FUNDING OPPORTUNITIES
                                            Help-seeking, teacher response, and socioeconomics
A new article in American Educator describes how students' experiences and outcomes -- even in the same classroom -- often diverge along socio-economic lines. Through her research, Jessica Calacaro finds current explanations for class-based inequalities are limited by lack of attention to children themselves and how teachers respond to them. Children are not passive recipients of advantages (or disadvantages). Rather, they bring class-based behaviors to the classroom that play a powerful role in generating inequalities. In classes Calacaro observed, children used diff­erent problem-solving strategies depending on socioeconomic level. Middle-class children actively sought help from teachers, while working-class children tried to manage problems on their own. These di­ffering approaches did not automatically generate inequalities. Instead, inequalities resulted from teachers responding to strategies in distinct ways, perhaps inadvertently. Ambiguity in teacher expectations was a common byproduct of today's interactive elementary school classrooms. To avoid this, teachers can set clear expectations for when and how students should seek help. When teachers do not make expectations around seeking help extremely explicit, students are left to determine whether and how to make requests. Such decisions, in turn, exacerbate class differences in help-seeking and outcomes. More
 College support for foster youth who've aged out
Over the last few years, a nationwide push has arisen to get more foster youth to college, and to help them stay and graduate, reports Jennifer Guerra for NPR. More than 20,000 youths around the country age out of foster care every year. Roughly half drop out of high school. Those who make it to college rarely graduate -- less than 3 percent. Now some states, like Michigan, are actively helping former foster kids persevere in college. Working in conjunction with its colleges and universities, Michigan is among a growing list of states that offer essentially a full college ride -- or close to it -- for foster youth who have aged out. The goal is to help every former foster youth in the state matriculate and graduate. To succeed, these youth need more: Many leave foster placement with next to nothing -- no family, no money, no support. The most successful support programs offer year-round housing, a way to connect with other former foster youth, and campus coaches on call 24 hours a day. Schools across the country that have undertaken this kind of comprehensive approach have a promising track record in improving foster-youth graduation rates. Outcomes from programs that offer tuition assistance alone are less successful. More

Education: the epicenter of injustice in our society
Low-income children of color are at the epicenter of injustice in our society, writes Mark Warren in The New England Journal of Public Policy. It will take a social movement to break this cycle, but education reformers seldom think in movement terms. Most reformers take a technical or an organizational approach, concentrating on how education is delivered, e.g., improving curricula or better training teachers. But the failures of public education are less organizational than a reflection of the lack of power held by low-income communities of color in terms of resources, accountability, and performance. Those with power seldom recognize or admit these failures are systems of oppression, rationalizing them as a result of natural forces, even as they work to alleviate them. Movements transform unequal power arrangements in part by demanding recognition, voice, and participation. A social movement can galvanize broad public consensus for far-reaching efforts to transform public education itself and to connect this transformational work to a larger movement to combat poverty and racism. As it stands, we are asking teachers to solve our biggest societal problems virtually on their own. More
Suspension hurts both 'good' and 'bad' alike
A large-scale study published in the American Sociological Review tracked 17,000 students over three years and found high rates of school suspensions harmed math and reading scores for non-suspended students, reports Jane Meredith Adams for Ed Source. The study is the first to look at academic performance of students who have never been suspended, and found that higher numbers of suspensions in a semester led to lower scores on end-of-semester reading and math evaluations for non-suspended students. Author Edward Morris theorizes that this stems from anxiety and disconnection created in students when peers are subject to frequent suspensions, often for infractions like dress-code violations or insubordination. Other studies have found that schools that reduce suspension rates and institute alternative methods of conflict resolution see academics improve. "The studies I've seen are not of this magnitude," said Laura Faer of the Public Counsel Law Center, which promotes alternative disciplinary measures. Faer said that when she speaks about school discipline to groups, the number-one comment from audiences is that suspensions are necessary because "when you remove bad kids, it helps other kids learn." This new study, she said, takes research about the importance of a positive school culture and the harms of an excessively punitive culture, "to a whole different level." More

Getting precise about ELLs and federal law
The Obama administration has released guidelines highlighting the civil rights of students learning English as a second language (ELLs), who under federal law are guaranteed targeted help and a high-quality public education, reports Emma Brown for The Washington Post. Five million English-language learners attend schools in the U.S., nine percent of all public school students. This number is increasing, along with civil rights complaints: National data show a persistent achievement gap between native English speakers and ELLs. The administration's open letter comes amid public debate around responsibility to serve the thousands of unaccompanied and undocumented minors that cross the border each year. It also follows President Obama's executive action to allow nearly five million undocumented immigrants to remain in the country. Some ELLs are immigrants; others are children of immigrants. The new guidance is the first in 24 years to address rights of ELLs and comes 40 years after the Supreme Court ruled schools must provide targeted help. It does not establish new policy, but lays out in one place the many obligations schools have under federal law, particularly the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the Equal Educational Opportunities Act of 1974. Among these requirements: language programs led by qualified teachers, integration as much as possible into mainstream classrooms, and communication with parents in a language they understand. More
 
 The open letter:
     Quality Counts 2015: Early Education
The latest annual Quality Counts from Education Week examines issues and forces shaping early-childhood education, and how new academic and accountability demands are changing early-childhood education for administrators, teachers, and children. It includes an Early Education Index that analyzes data through 2013 to portray state participation in early-childhood programming, preschool, and kindergarten, with a specific emphasis on low-income families. The nation as a whole received a grade of D-plus for early-childhood education, which varies dramatically across states, spans public and private sectors, and falls under a patchwork of programs, institutions, and laws. The report also graded states overall on education: The nation as a whole gets a C. Massachusetts topped the ranking with a B, followed by New Jersey, Maryland, and Vermont, in that order. Wyoming reached the top 10 for the first time with a B-minus. Mississippi fell last with a D; New Mexico and Nevada were only slightly higher. On spending alone, the U.S. dedicated an average of $11,735 per pupil. Vermont topped the spending list at $18,882, with Utah at the bottom with $6,688. In terms of equity, the nation overall got a B. Alaska was the only state that gave more funding to property-poor districts than wealthier ones. Notably, individual states simultaneously earned widely differing scores on spending and equity. Florida, for example, was second in equitable distribution of funding, but 46th in spending. Vermont, though first in spending, was 45th in equity. More

A home-schooling free-for-all?
Unlike much education in this country, home-schooling is broadly unregulated, writes Motoko Rich in The New York Times. Along with its steady growth has come a debate and lobbying war over how much oversight such education requires. Eleven states do not require home-schooling families to register with district or state agencies, according to the Coalition for Responsible Home Education. Fourteen states do not specify subjects that families must teach, and only nine states require parents have at least a high school diploma to teach their children. In half of states, children taught at home never take a standardized test or are subject to formal outside assessment. The movement was once concentrated among religious families and parents who wanted to release their children from the strictures of traditional classrooms; it now attracts parents seeking escape from excessive testing and stringent new standards. According to the most recent federal statistics, 1.8 million children were home-schooled in the U.S. in 2011-12, up from 1.5 million in 2006-07. The highest concentration of home-schooling families are in the South and West, though precise figures are difficult to collect because many states, including Connecticut, Oklahoma, and Texas, do not require registration. More
Teacher/administrator communication, or its lack
Administrators and teachers are mostly in agreement about the importance of trying new tools and methods for instruction, yet each identifies the other as an obstacle, writes Jordan Shapiro in The Hechinger Report. Administrators want teachers to adopt new methods, but feel teachers resist change. Teachers yearn to be creative, but feel this is impossible within a rigid bureaucracy. Blame creates a gridlock that obstructs innovation. The problem may be that teachers and administrators lack a dependable shared language, says Shapiro. While educational innovation is big on trendy concepts and buzzwords, it's short on specifics. The absence of shared definitions makes it difficult to evaluate success rates and convey accomplishments. For instance, what counts as blended learning? What's the difference between game-based learning and gamification? Clear definitions and classifications are fundamental building blocks to good communication. Without this, administrators struggle to identify and reward teachers for finding and integrating innovative tools into their practice, and lacking good ways to incentivize trying new things, administrators can't provide the support that teachers want and deserve. More
          BRIEFLY NOTED CALIFORNIA
 
Here comes the money
Gov. Jerry Brown, in his 2015 inaugural speech, announced schools will receive $65.7 billion next year. More
 
Offset
California districts will be reimbursed some $12.3 million to help offset costs associated with administering the state's new Common Core-aligned, digital student assessments, set for official rollout this spring. More
 
Opportunity lost
Few parents in six large Orange County districts have taken advantage of a little-known law that allows students to transfer out of poor-performing schools. More
 
Healthy development
The healthy-student survey is making a comeback among some California districts as a resource for administrators tasked with setting new performance goals required by the Local Control Funding Formula. More

          BRIEFLY NOTED 
 
Little equivalence
One year after the launch of a major overhaul of the GED exam -- the first since 2002 -- the high school equivalency program has seen a sharp drop in the number of people who took and passed the test. More
 
Mildly revolutionary
President Obama has proposed two years of free community college for American workers, part of what the White House says is an effort to make community college as universal as high school is today. More
 
Shorted
Back in 2003, public colleges were funded primarily by state governments, but for the first time, students are putting more money into public colleges than states. More
 
Not even close
In the second year of what was intended to be a tough new system of evaluating Indiana educators, the results were as usual: Hardly any were rated ineffective and nearly all were certified as doing their jobs effectively. More
 
Getting out of the ACT
Juniors in Michigan's public high schools will be able to take the SAT college admission test for free starting in 2016, ending the dominance there of the ACT. More
 
Another troubling gap
A majority of U.S. states don't mandate sex education, even though two-thirds of Americans think students should get comprehensive birth control information at school. More

          
GRANTS AND FUNDING OPPORTUNITIES


  
Fund for Teachers
Fund for Teachers enriches the personal and professional growth of teachers by recognizing and supporting them as they identify and pursue opportunities around the globe that will have the greatest impact on their practice, the academic lives of their students and on their school communities. Maximum award: $10,000 for teams; $5,000 for individuals. Eligibility: teachers preK-12 with at least three years' experience and who intend to return to the classroom the following year. Deadline: January 29, 2015. More
 
AASL: Distinguished School Administrators Award
The American Association of School Librarians Distinguished School Administrators Award honors administrators outside the library profession who through individual leadership and sustained effort have made worthy contributions to the operations of effective school library services and to advancing the role of the school library services in the educational program. It is also intended to stimulate planning, implementing, and support of the library services that are essential to a meaningful educational program. Maximum award: $2,000. Eligibility: state, county, or district school superintendents and building principals, currently in administrative office, directly responsible for a school or group of schools at any level, who are not working in a library services department and who are not a regular ALA/AASL member. Deadline: February 1, 2015. More
 
Ezra Jack Keats Foundation: Minigrants
The Ezra Jack Keats Foundation offers Minigrants to public and school libraries for programs that encourage literacy and creativity in children.  Programs relating to the work of Ezra Jack Keats are welcome, but not required. Maximum award: $500.
Eligibility: public and school libraries. Deadline: March 15, 2015. More
 
Gloria Barron Prize for Young Heroes
The Gloria Barron Prize for Young Heroes honors outstanding young leaders who have focused on helping their communities and fellow beings and/or on protecting the health and sustainability of the environment. Maximum award: $2,500. Eligibility: youth 8-18. Deadline: April 15, 2015. More

 
Quote of the Week:
 
"Several districts have created offices like these, and it's not clear if they will have a positive impact on the broad array of challenges facing black males. Ultimately, what matters most is for schools to find ways to improve the learning environment, reduce punitive approaches to school discipline, and provide greater social and emotional support. Anything less is just window dressing.'' -- Pedro Noguera, executive director of the Metropolitan Center for Research on Equity and the Transformation of Schools at New York University, regarding new programs in some districts that focus on the academic achievement of black male students. More


 

-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://lists.osu.edu/pipermail/ohiogift/attachments/20150113/21e0393b/attachment-0001.html>