‘Perfect storm’ ahead for summer youth programs, By Mary Ann Zehr, May 30, 2011, San Antonio Express-News: “With widespread cutbacks around the country in public funding for both summer school and summer-jobs programs, youths in some cities, such as Los Angeles and Washington, may have plenty of time on their hands in the coming months. Many jobs programs for young people are facing a funding cliff now that federal stimulus money from the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 has run out. School districts face their own funding cliff with the phasing out of stimulus funds channeled to them through Title I of the No Child Left Behind Act. In addition, the slashing of state budgets has affected both jobs programs and districts’ summer school offerings…”

• N.J. high court’s Abbott ruling means other school districts will still be short funding, By Jeanette Rundquist and Jessica Calefati, May 25, 2011, Star-Ledger: “Tuesday’s Supreme Court ruling means the state’s 31 poorest districts get to share $500 million in additional state aid.  But it also means some 550 districts will go without. ’Once again, districts like Woodbridge and Piscataway have been left out in the cold,’ said John Crowe, the superintendent in Woodbridge. He said it is ‘disheartening to think a student who is born into poverty in Woodbridge somehow requires less assistance than a student born into poverty in another district.’ Crowe, along with other suburban superintendents, said Tuesday’s ruling short-changed their district despite the fact they, too, may educate at-risk children…”
• Tracing the history of rulings on school funding in poor N.J. cities, By Jeanette Rundquist, May 25, 2011, Star-Ledger: “In 1875, in an effort to get control of a patchwork public school system, the New Jersey state Legislature amended New Jersey’s constitution and made it the state’s responsibility to provide a ‘thorough and efficient system of free public schools.’ For more than 100 years since, the state’s courts and elected officials have wrestled with those eight words.  The participants and dollar amounts have changed over the years, but the issue has largely been the same: how to give children in New Jersey’s poorest cities the same level of education as those in its wealthiest communities.  The state Supreme Court took another stab at the issue Tuesday, ordering the state to increase school funding to poor districts by $500 million. Here is a look back at decisions leading up to Tuesday…”
• N.J. high court orders more school funding, By Rita Giordano, May 25, 2011, Philadelphia Inquirer: “New Jersey’s Supreme Court on Tuesday ordered the state to come up with $500 million more to aid certain poor and largely urban school districts next year, finding that the state did not enforce its own law or live up to promises made to the court. However, the justices, in their highly anticipated decision, declined to restore the full amount of the state’s aid shortfall - about $1.6 billion - that could have benefited many districts, including others with low-income children. The strongly worded, 3-2 ruling requires the additional funds for only the 31 former Abbott districts, which through more than two decades of corrective court orders had come to receive a large share of state aid. They still do, but the state funding formula, enacted under Gov. Jon S. Corzine, sought to spread money more evenly to other districts with poor children…”

Indiana lawmakers OK broadest voucher plan in U.S., By Deanna Martin (AP), Indianapolis Star: “Indiana will create the nation’s broadest private school voucher system and enact other sweeping education changes, making the state a showcase of conservative ideas just as Gov. Mitch Daniels nears an announcement on a 2012 presidential run. The Republican-controlled state legislature handed Daniels a huge victory today when the GOP-led House voted 55-43 to give final approval to a bill creating the controversial voucher program. It would allow even middle-class families to use taxpayer money to send their children to private schools. Unlike other systems that are limited to lower-income households, children with special needs or those in failing schools, Indiana’s voucher program will be open to a much larger pool of students, including those already in excellent schools. Families would have to meet certain income limits to qualify, with families of four making up to about $60,000 a year getting some type of scholarship…”

Homeless, but finding sanctuary at school, By Micael Winerip, May 1, 2011, New York Times: “The bus ride from the homeless shelter to Fern Creek Elementary School was, as usual, raucous. A hundred times, Doretha Brown, the bus driver, had to yell for everyone to sit down. ‘This noise is what holds us up every morning and evening!’ Ms. Brown shouted, although the Collins girls - Brianna, 8; Tamara, 7; and Sydney, 6 - could barely hear her above the din. A first grader and a second grader got into a fight on the 15-minute ride, and someone else threw up. Brianna, Tamara and Sydney paid no mind. As their father, James Collins, says, ‘To get by at a shelter, you have to focus yourself.’ This is the sisters’ second stay at a shelter, so they are becoming accustomed to being homeless. Roxanne Schreffler, a kindergarten teacher, was struck by Sydney’s arrival at Fern Creek in February. ‘She walked into kindergarten in the middle of the day and sat right down,’ Ms. Schreffler said. ‘She’d immediately adapted to her new situation. There was no time integrating her into the class; she was ready to go…’”

• JCPS schools search for success against poverty’s stacked deck, By Chris Kenning, April 23, 2011, Louisville Courier-Journal: “It was just before 7:30 a.m., and youth-resource coordinator Lekiesha Davis was standing by Shawnee High School’s front entrance, exchanging hellos and handing out hugs to the students streaming into the hallway. But her task extended beyond the friendly morning welcome. Davis eyed each child closely for signs of exhaustion, dirty clothes or sullen, depressed glances that might signal a night of sleeplessness, domestic turmoil, or lack of food, electricity or supervision - problems that kids cart around every day in one of Louisville’s poorest neighborhoods, piling on to a lifetime of disadvantages that have already left them years behind their middle-income peers academically…”
• Solutions to high-poverty schools may lie outside the classroom, By Chris Kenning, April 23, 2011, Louisville Courier-Journal: “The solution to achieving success in America’s high-poverty schools must reach beyond the classroom, most educators say. That’s why several urban districts have turned their focus to finding their students social support -such as counseling, nutrition and after-school care -to help turn around their failing high-poverty schools. So far, however, many of those efforts have resulted in mix results - with no clear formula for lasting success, experts say…”
• Cincinnati’s Oyler Elementary finds winning formula to fight poverty, By Chris Kenning, April 23, 2011, Louisville Courier-Journal: “In the late 1990s, many of Cincinnati’s urban public schools were sliding into decline: Enrollments had shrunk, poverty had risen, achievement had fallen and voters were rejecting higher tax levies. Perhaps nowhere was that decline felt more than Oyler Elementary, tucked into Lower Price Hill, a poverty-stricken industrial neighborhood along the Ohio River built in the 1800s as factory housing by German immigrants. More than 80 percent of Oyler’s students never made it to tenth grade. It’s parents weren’t involved, and resources were scarce…”

Student homelessness tests families, schools, By Lisa Pemberton, April 3, 2011, Tacoma News Tribune: “Last fall, Desiree Lee of Lacey held a huge yard sale, packed family photos and other keepsakes into a storage unit and checked into an emergency shelter with her husband, David, and four children, ages 11, 8, 5 and 1. The couple couldn’t find work, and her parents had been helping them with bills. But then her mother died last summer, and Lee’s dad could no longer afford to help pay their rent. They walked away from a home that they had lived in for four years. For six weeks, the family lived in limbo - sleeping quarters were first-come, first-served; weekly showers were a luxury; and the laundromat wasn’t just a place to wash clothes, it was a warm, dry, safe place to hang out until the shelter opened. Lee, 28, said she slipped into survival mode. Things that would normally be important no longer showed up on her radar. For example, she missed an appointment with school officials about an education plan for one of her children who has a learning disability. And homework? ‘I couldn’t help them with their homework - I didn’t have time,’ Lee said. ‘I was more concerned about getting to the shelter in time and getting dinner…’”

Bennet introduces bill to close loophole in how feds fund high-poverty schools, By Yesenia Robles, April 1, 2011, Denver Post: “In an attempt to close funding disparities between high- and low-poverty schools, a bill introduced in Washington, D.C., on Thursday would force districts to be more detailed in reporting school-by-school funding, closing a longtime loophole. The bill, introduced by Sens. Michael Bennet, D-Colo., and Thad Cochran, R-Miss., targets districts that collect federal Title I funding for high-poverty schools…”

• 41% of state students eligible for meal subsidies, By Amy Hetzner, March 11, 2011, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel: “About two of every five Wisconsin school children now qualify for federally subsidized meals because of low family incomes, according to data released Thursday by the state’s education agency. The proportion of students who qualify for free and reduced-price lunch has rapidly increased over the past seven years, climbing from 29.5% in the 2003-’04 school year to 41.4% this school year. The rising number of children who meet the standard for subsidized meals reflects increasing economic hardships among Wisconsin families as well as a push among schools to have qualifying students registered for the lunch program, which often is used to calculate government grants. In a news release announcing the new figures, the Department of Public Instruction noted that 95 of the state’s 424 school districts now have at least half their students receiving subsidized lunches. Milwaukee Public Schools had the second highest percentage of students in the state qualifying for free and reduced-price lunch at 82.6% in the 2010-’11 school year. The Lac du Flambeau School District had 90.3% of its students qualify for subsidized meals…”
• Number of Green Bay students living in poverty rises, By Patti Zarling, March 10, 2011, Green Bay Press Gazette: “More than half the schoolchildren in the Green Bay School District qualify for free or reduced-price meals - an indicator of poverty - and that number is growing. Figures released Thursday by the Wisconsin Department of Public Instruction show 56.5 percent of Green Bay students qualify for the special meal prices this school year, up from 52.9 percent for the 2009-10 school year…”

• When test scores seem too good to believe, By Greg Toppo, Denise Amos, Jack Gillum and Jodi Upton, March 6, 2011, USA Today: “Scott Mueller seemed to have an uncanny sense about what his students should study to prepare for upcoming state skills tests. By 2010, the teacher had spent his 16-year career entirely at Charles Seipelt Elementary School. Like other Seipelt teachers, Mueller regularly wrote study guides for his classes ahead of state tests. On test day last April, several fifth-graders immediately recognized some of the questions on their math tests. The questions were the same as those on the study guide Mueller had given out the day before. Some numbers on the actual tests were identical to those in the study guide and the questions were in the same order, the kids told other Seipelt teachers. The report of possible cheating quickly reached district officials, who put Mueller on paid leave. He initially denied any wrongdoing. Ultimately, investigators concluded that Mueller had looked at questions for both fifth-grade math and science tests in advance - a violation of testing rules - and then copied them, sometimes word for word, into a school computer to develop his study guides…”
• When test scores don’t add up: 32 metro Detroit schools show improvements too good to be true, By Peggy Walsh-Sarnecki, Chastity Pratt Dawsey and Kristi Tanner-White, March 6, 2011, Detroit Free Press: “Each year, millions of children in Michigan and across the nation take state standardized tests that impact everything from a school’s reputation to how teachers will be evaluated to whether schools will even survive. The pressures to perform, experts say, tempt some school administrators and teachers to cheat. The Free Press, as part of a nationwide investigation with USA TODAY and other partners, analyzed millions of test score results and found that 34 schools across Michigan — 32 of them in metro Detroit — showed test score gains over a one-year period that experts say are statistically improbable. More broadly, the analysis found 304 schools in six states and the District of Columbia that had test scores so improbable, they should be investigated. Besides Michigan, the states were Arizona, Colorado, California, Florida and Ohio…”

• Nebraska schools: More minority students, more meeting poverty standard, By Margaret Reist and Mark Andersen, March 6, 2011, Lincoln Journal Star: “Linda Baumert, who has taught first-graders in Schuyler Community Schools for 27 years, was there when the first hints of change squeezed into a desk in her classroom. The first Hispanic student in the district walked into Baumert’s room in the mid 1980s during her first few years of teaching, a harbinger of things to come. Drawn by a meatpacking plant 4½ miles west of town, the district’s Hispanic population grew slowly until about 10 years ago, when a trickle became a torrent. From 2005 to 2010, the district’s Hispanic population grew 533 percent, from 201 students to 1,272. Today, 89 percent of the K-3 elementary school is Hispanic, 68 percent of the high school. For reasons that go beyond race, 73 percent of Schuyler’s students are enrolled in the federal free and reduced-price lunch program. Free and reduced-price meal counts are the commonly accepted method for determining poverty in public schools across the country, Nebraska Department of Education spokesman Betty Vandeventer said. Schuyler is an extreme example of two long-term trends in Nebraska’s public schools: increasing diversity and a growing number of students who meet the districts’ poverty standard…”
• LPS student trends mirror those statewide, By Margaret Reist, March 6, 2011, Lincoln Journal Star: “Lincoln Public Schools mirrors two statewide student enrollment trends over the past 15 years: more minority students and more students qualifying for free or reduced-price lunches. This school year, the percentage of K-12 students qualifying for the lunch program — a schools standard for measuring poverty — hit 43 percent, surpassing 40 percent for the first time, according to LPS statistics. In elementary grades, nearly 46 percent of students today meet the poverty standard. Those percentages are even higher when students attending LPS’s federally funded preschools are included. Last year, according to the Nebraska Department of Education, 42 percent of all LPS students from pre-K to 12th grade met the poverty standard…”

City eyes new tactic for failing schools: The turnaround, By Fernanda Santos, March 8, 2011, New York Times: “The Bloomberg administration’s signature strategy for low-performing schools has been to shut them down, a drastic move that often incites anger and protests from teachers, parents and neighborhood officials. Since the beginning of the mayor’s first term, more than 110 schools have been shuttered or are in the process of closing. The administration is now thinking of testing another approach at two schools in the Bronx: replacing the principals and at least half of the teachers, but keeping the schools and all of their programs running - a strategy known as a turnaround. The plan would bring together unlikely partners: the New York City Department of Education, the teachers’ union and the founder of a charter school network who is best known for turning around one of the toughest high schools in Los Angeles. There are benefits and risks for each side. The city would be departing from its philosophy of closing large schools and opening smaller ones in their space. But it could cause less political blowback…”

Tight budgets mean squeeze in classrooms, By Sam Roberts, March 6, 2011, New York Times: “Millions of public school students across the nation are seeing their class sizes swell because of budget cuts and teacher layoffs, undermining a decades-long push by parents, administrators and policy makers to shrink class sizes. Over the past two years, California, Georgia, Nevada, Ohio, Utah and Wisconsin have loosened legal restrictions on class size. And Idaho and Texas are debating whether to fit more students in classrooms. Los Angeles has increased the average size of its ninth-grade English and math classes to 34 from 20. Eleventh- and 12th-grade classes in those two subjects have risen, on average, to 43 students. ‘Because many states are facing serious budget gaps, we’ll see more increases this fall,’ said Marguerite Roza, a University of Washington professor who has studied the recession’s impact on schools. The increases are reversing a trend toward smaller classes that stretches back decades. Since the 1980s, teachers and many other educators have embraced research finding that smaller classes foster higher achievement…”

• Milwaukee students rank below average on national science test, By Erin Richards, February 24, 2011, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel: “Among 17 urban school districts that participated in a national science assessment in 2009, Milwaukee students in fourth and eighth grades scored below the average performance of their respective peers attending public schools in other large cities, according to a new report. On the National Assessment of Educational Progress, also called the Nation’s Report Card, Milwaukee’s fourth-graders ranked 11th out of 17 urban districts based on the percentage of its children who scored at or above a basic level of science achievement. In eighth grade, Milwaukee ranked 13th out of 17 big-city districts based on the percentage of students who scored at or above basic. Basic is defined as having partial mastery of the material presented on the test, which featured questions about physical science, life science, and Earth and space sciences…”
• Chicago students lag in science, By Joel Hood, February 24, 2011, Chicago Tribune: “A new national study on science proficiency indicates Illinois students are on par with their peers across the U.S., but Chicago students are lagging well behind counterparts in other large urban school districts. The findings were not surprising for Chicago Public Schools, whose students, on average, are also testing behind others in math and reading. Instead, as the district braces for yet another change in leadership under Mayor-elect Rahm Emanuel, educators said the findings are a stark reminder of the challenges confronting CPS as it strives to prepare students for a global economy…”
• National science test news is mixed, By Ann Doss Helms, February 25, 2011, Charlotte Observer: “A national science exam shows Charlotte-Mecklenburg students outperforming counterparts in most urban districts but paints a bleak picture of any of the districts’ ability to prepare minority and low-income children for a science-oriented world. In CMS, fewer than 1 in 10 black and low-income eighth-graders rated proficient at science on the 2009 National Assessment of Educational Progress, which released results for 17 urban districts Thursday. Two-thirds of those students lacked even basic science skills, according to the test, known as ‘the nation’s report card.’ That was still better than most of the participating districts, which include such cities as Detroit, Chicago, New York City and Atlanta…”

Some schools cut lunch options for kids who struggle to pay, By Alex Johnson, February 21, 2011, MSNBC.com: “At the turn of the new year, the Lee County, Fla., public schools were losing about $2,000 a week on school lunches. Then came the cheese sandwiches. When classes resumed Jan. 3 after the winter break, the district - the 40th-largest in the United States, with about 80,000 pupils - had a problem. Up to 1,100 pupils weren’t paying for their meals, school officials say. Because the National School Lunch Program, or NSLP, requires participating schools to provide nourishing meals for all pupils, what do school administrators do if a pupil shows up in the lunchroom with no cash and with no money left in his or her electronic meal account? Most raise their prices for kids who can pay, according to research by the nonprofit School Nutrition Association, which found that nearly 60 percent of public school districts raised lunch prices in 2009, the last full year for which national figures were available…”

School-lunch aid up in Ohio, local suburbs, By Catherine Candisky, February 13, 2011, Columbus Dispatch: “The federal free and reduced-price lunch program for low-income children now feeds more than four of every 10 Ohio students. New statistics from the Ohio Department of Education show that the proportion of students receiving the tax-funded benefit - regarded as one of the most-reliable indicators of poverty - has increased nearly 50percent in the past five years to a record high. Although the program has long been a staple in urban and rural districts, some of the largest spikes in recent years can be seen in suburban schools surrounding Columbus, not often seen as the front lines of poverty…”

Suburban schools see growing levels of financial stress among families, By Sheena Dooley, January 18, 2011, Des Moines Register: “The number of low-income families living in Des Moines suburbs is on the rise, a trend that is pushing educators to find ways to ensure school-age youngsters keep pace academically. Iowa had more than 180,700 children and teens who qualified for free or reduced-price meals in 2009-10, up nearly 32,000 from 2004-05. Among those seeing the largest increases were suburban Des Moines districts. In 2009-10, for instance, 14 percent of Johnston’s students qualified for free or reduced-price meals. That percentage has more than doubled since the 2004-05 school year. Over the past five years, hundreds of suburbanites in Iowa and the nation have fallen out of the middle class. The result has been increased levels of poverty and demands for social services in communities where low-income residents have typically been in the shadows…”

Achievement gap more than a black and white issue, By Maggie Gordon, January 18, 2011, Stamford Advocate: “The achievement gap between low-income and non-low-income students in Connecticut is the largest in the nation, according to data from the National Center for Education Statistics. The gap between low-income students and their non-low-income peers is not the only achievement gap in Connecticut; white students also consistently outperform black and Hispanic students. ‘We know there is a high correlation between poverty and ethnicity in Connecticut, and that if you look at Hispanic and black student groups, there is a high likelihood that they’re also poor,’ said Tom Murphy, spokesman for the state Department of Education…”

• ‘Achievement gap’ between rich and poor, different races persists in N.J. schools, By Jeanette Rundquist, January 5, 2011, Star-Ledger: “The ‘achievement gap’ between rich and poor students, and among those of different races, persists in New Jersey schools, according to statewide test score data released Wednesday by the state Board of Education. The ‘achievement gap’ has long been an issue facing educators in New Jersey and elsewhere. Today, the state released results of tests taken last spring, showing as much as a 38.4-point difference in the passing rate in third-grade language arts, between African-American and Asian students. On that test, about 60 percent of black or African-American third-graders failed to achieve proficient scores, compared to 21.4 percent for Asian students and 31 percent for whites…”
• N.J. test scores reveal achievement gaps, By Leslie Brody and Patricia Alex, January 5, 2011, The Record: “New Jersey’s achievement gaps remained stubbornly wide last year, starting with the earliest round of statewide test scores in third grade. Scores released Wednesday showed that in third-grade language arts, roughly 60 percent of black students and 56 percent of Hispanic students failed to meet proficiency standards last spring, compared with 31 percent for whites and 21 percent for Asian students. Poverty played a key role; about 60 percent of low-income children did not meet standards for third-grade language arts, compared with 30 percent of those from economically stable families. Schools and families have struggled to close these gaps for years…”

Decade of change: Education system deals with fewer students, more poverty, less control, By Julie Mack, January 5, 2011, Kalamazoo Gazette: “Michigan educators found they had some learning of their own to do in the past decade, and the subject was ‘change.’ People leading both the K-12 systems and the colleges find themselves in very different places at the start of 2011 than they did 10 years ago, working through an unprecedented transformational period. Districts statewide have about 200,000 fewer students - but more children from impoverished homes - as the economy took its toll and competition with charter schools and choice plans offered parents other options. And the federal and state governments claimed more of a role in decision-making, leaving fewer things for local districts to control. Meanwhile, public universities and, especially, community colleges, enjoyed tremendous growth despite a gradual decline in state assistance - made up by nearly doubling tuition during the decade. But as state officials look to education to pull Michigan from its economic doldrums, they can point to some success…”

Following Felix: Special education in Hawaii 5 years after federal oversight, series homepage, December 15, 2010, Honolulu Star-Advertiser.

• Learning gaps slow to change, By Jason Wermers, December 14, 2010, Augusta Chronicle: “Student achievement gaps that run along lines of race and gender still persist, and educators’ efforts to narrow those differences have led to slow and uneven progress, according to a report being released today. That is true nationally as well as in Georgia and South Carolina, according to ‘State Test Score Trends through 2008-09, Part 2: Slow and Uneven Progress in Narrowing Gaps’ by the Center on Education Policy, a nonpartisan think tank based in Washington, D.C. ‘Achievement gap’ refers to the difference in test results among groups of students along racial, economic or other lines such as disabilities or English language skills…”
• Racial academic achievement gap remains a problem, By Brian Bull, December 15, 2010, Superior Telegram: “A new report says academic achievement gaps among racial lines persist among U.S. students, despite some progress. And narrowing these gaps will take awhile. The non-profit Center on Education Policy analyzed standardized test scores from all 50 states, with data going back nearly a decade. And while the center’s president, Jack Jennings says overall student performance has improved, he says it’s not nearly fast enough to close the gap…”

New faces of homelessness, series homepage, November, 2010, Racine Journal Times: “Racine has a large homeless student population. This series examines what those students face and how they cope…”

Fewer tots deemed set for school, By Mary Vorsino, December 6, 2010, Honolulu Star-Advertiser: “This school year, more Hawaii kindergarten students started school without key skills, fewer had attended preschool and more than half came from low-income families, according to a new state Department of Education readiness report. The figures, all indicators of future academic outcomes for kids, put new urgency to long-term plans for a state-funded preschool program, say advocates and educators. Research has shown that low-income children, those who do not attend preschool and kids who fall behind in kindergarten are more likely to struggle through school than their peers. Educators say the kindergarten readiness report confirms what they have seen on their campuses: The economic downturn has meant many families cannot afford to send their children to preschool…”

Numbers not adding up for minority students in algebra classes, By Joe Robertson, November 30, 2010, Kansas City Star: “Algebra I in the eighth grade - before high school - is supposed to be the ticket that helps propel students to greater success beyond high school. But Kansas City area students aren’t getting an equal shot. Minority students and students from low-income families are significantly less likely than others to be enrolled in eighth-grade algebra, a Kansas City Star analysis of Missouri test records shows. Gaps were found between the percentage of minority and low-income students in eighth-grade classes and the percentage of those groups taking Algebra I. The gaps exceeded 20 percentage points at some schools. The Center School District, however, enrolls all of its eighth-graders in Algebra I. But more often area schools with some of the highest populations of poor or minority children tested few or no students in eighth-grade algebra…”

• Congress approves Child Nutrition Bill, By Robert Pear, December 2, 2010, New York Times: “Congress gave final approval on Thursday to a child nutrition bill that expands the school lunch program and sets new standards to improve the quality of school meals, with more fruits and vegetables. Michelle Obama lobbied for the bill as a way to combat obesity and hunger. About half of the $4.5 billion cost is financed by a cut in food stamps starting in several years. Mrs. Obama said she was thrilled by passage of what she described as a groundbreaking piece of legislation. By a vote of 264 to 157, the House on Thursday passed the bill, which was approved in the Senate by unanimous consent in August. It goes now to President Obama, who intends to sign it…”
• House votes a $4.5 billion boost for child nutrition, school lunches, By Amanda Paulson, December 2, 2010, Christian Science Monitor: “Congress took aim at childhood obesity and hunger Thursday with passage of a landmark child nutrition bill. The bill, formally known as the Healthy, Hunger-Free Kids Act, includes some of the biggest changes to the Child Nutrition Act since the program was started nearly half a century ago. The House passed it by a vote of 264 to 157 Thursday. The Senate unanimously approved it in August, and President Obama is expected to sign it soon…”

House votes to send child nutrition bill to President Obama, By Nick Anderson, December 2, 2010, Washington Post: “The Democratic-led House voted Thursday to send President Obama a bill that would enable more poor children to receive free meals at school, raise the nutritional quality of cafeteria fare, and reduce the junk food and sugary beverages sold in school vending machines. The bill, which cleared the Senate in the summer, won House approval on a 264-157 vote. More than 15 Republicans broke party ranks to join Democrats in favor of the bill. A handful of Democrats were opposed. The bill, a priority for the president and first lady Michelle Obama, would boost spending on child nutrition $4.5 billion over 10 years and raise federal reimbursements for school lunches more than the inflation rate for the first time since 1973. It also would require for the first time that free drinking water be available where meals are served…”

• U.S. school graduation rate is rising, By Sam Dillon, November 30, 2010, New York Times: “The nation’s high school graduation rate, which declined in the latter part of the 20th century, may have hit bottom and begun to rise, according to a report to be issued Tuesday by a nonprofit group founded by former Secretary of State Colin L. Powell. ‘The United States is turning a corner in meeting the high school dropout epidemic,’ General Powell and his wife, Alma J. Powell, wrote in a letter introducing the report. The report cites two statistics. The national graduation rate increased to 75 percent in 2008, from 72 percent in 2001. And the number of high schools that researchers call dropout factories - based on a formula that compares a school’s 12th-grade enrollment with its 9th-grade enrollment three years earlier - declined to about 1,750 in 2008, from about 2,000 such schools in 2002…”
• Federal aid to high schools is up; so are graduation rates, By Nick Anderson, November 30, 2010, Washington Post: “The Education Department announced Tuesday that it has provided an unprecedented amount of aid to turn around struggling high schools, while an independent report found the nation’s high school graduation rate is on the rise. The federal announcement and the report from America’s Promise Alliance, a nonprofit organization founded by former secretary of state Colin Powell, reflected a coordinated response to what some experts have called high school ‘dropout factories…’”
• Report: ‘Dropout factories’ on decline in US, By Dorie Turner (AP), November 30, 2010, Washington Post: “The number of so-called ‘dropout factory’ high schools in the United States has declined since 2002, translating into at least 100,000 more students getting a diploma, a new report shows. But the report from America’s Promise Alliance to be released Tuesday also said that progress needs to increase fivefold for the country to graduate nine out of 10 students by 2020, a goal of the Obama administration. States including Tennessee, Texas, New York and Georgia have already figured out tactics that work. But fixing the problem won’t be easy, said report co-author John Bridgeland…”

Student transfers from failing schools via No Child law swamp successful ones, By Michael Birnbaum, November 23, 2010, Washington Post: “In some struggling school districts around the country, students transferring from failing schools are overwhelming the few successful schools in their areas, an unintended byproduct of the No Child Left Behind law. The issue arose in Prince George’s County this year, when the parents of nearly 3,000 middle-schoolers learned just days before school started that they could switch their children to the only two non-specialized middle schools in the county that met the law’s performance goals. About 200 families accepted the offer, taking their new schools by surprise. The flurry of transfers - more than 700 in Prince George’s this year across all 12 grades - has packed classrooms while underscoring a tough aspect of the Bush administration’s landmark education initiative. It demands steadily rising achievement - all students are supposed to pass benchmark tests by 2014 - and, as a result, more schools fail every year…”

• 12th-grade reading and math scores rise slightly after a historic low in 2005, By Sam Dillon, November 18, 2010, New York Times: “Reading scores for the nation’s 12th-grade students have increased somewhat since they dropped to a historic low in 2005, according to results of the largest federal test, released Thursday. Average math scores also ticked upward. Experts said the increases, after years of dismal achievement reports, were surprising because every year the nation’s schools are educating more black and Hispanic students, who on average score lower than whites and Asians. The black-white achievement gap dates back more than a century, though researchers debate why it persists. Researchers presume that language barriers pull down scores for Hispanics…”
• 12th grade students still below ‘92 reading scores, By Christine Armario (AP), November 18, 2010, Washington Post: “A national education assessment released Thursday shows that high school seniors have made some improvement in reading, but remain below the achievement levels reached nearly two decades ago. The National Assessment of Educational Progress, referred to at the Nation’s Report Card, tested 52,000 students in reading and 49,000 in math across 1,670 school districts in 2009. Students scored an average of 288 out of 500 points in reading comprehension, two points above the 2005 score but still below the 1992 average of 292. Thirty-eight percent of 12th grade students were classified as at or above the ‘proficient’ level, while 74 percent were considered at or above ‘basic…’”

Is ‘Race to the Top’ aid at risk?, By Catherine Candisky, November 19, 2010, Columbus Dispatch: “In an effort to preserve his education plan, outgoing Gov. Ted Strickland went to Education Secretary Arne Duncan to put pressure on his successor to keep it. Strickland said yesterday that he told Duncan he fears Ohio will lose its $400 million federal Race to the Top grant if Gov.-elect John Kasich follows through on his plan to dump Strickland’s evidence-based school-funding model. ‘I asked Secretary Duncan if the (U.S.) Department of Education allowed states to change their plans’ after funds were awarded, ‘and how could it possibly be fair to other states,’ Strickland said. The governor said his evidence-based model ‘was such a vital part’ of Ohio’s plan that he questions whether the state would still qualify for the federal money…”

Poverty rising in suburban schools, By Rita Price, November 17, 2010, Columbus Dispatch: “Suburban school districts more known for their affluence are seeing double- and triple-digit increases in the percentage of students considered to be economically disadvantaged. A report to be released this week by KidsOhio, a Columbus-based education nonprofit organization, found that nearly half of the disadvantaged students in Franklin County now are enrolled in a suburban school district. The report documented the change over five years, from the 2004-05 school year to last school year. Although Columbus schools have the highest rate of disadvantaged kids, that district’s increase was more modest…”

• Increasing poverty among students challenges educators, By Adam Wise, November 6, 2010, Wisconsin Rapids Tribune: “In the past 10 years, the poverty rate has nearly doubled in some local school districts. The financial struggles of thousands of families in Wood and Adams counties is increasing the stress on school officials, as they try to address achievement gaps between impoverished students and the general student population. Locally, district poverty levels — measured by the number of students receiving free or reduced-price lunches — increased in five local school districts, including a more than 80 percent increase in the Wisconsin Rapids and Nekoosa districts from the 2000-01 school year to 2009-10…”
• As family homelessness rises in Washtenaw County, educational project works to help kids stay in school, By Kyle Feldscher, November 7, 2010, AnnArbor.com: “For two years, Amina Brewer did her best to act like every other student at Ann Arbor’s Pioneer High School. The energetic 17-year-old pulled strong grades, had plenty of friends and seemed as carefree as her classmates. But she was hiding a secret from her friends. When the bell rang at the end of the day, the reality of Amina’s life would snap into focus. Her family was homeless…”

• Homeless students on the rise throughout Washington, By Carol Smith, October 24, 2010, Seattle Post-Intelligencer: “School districts around the state are grappling with how to help growing populations of homeless students, even as budget cuts further slash their ability to meet their federal obligation to do so. Under the federal McKinney-Vento Act, school districts are required to identify and report homeless students and to guarantee those students transportation so they can stay at their original schools even if they have been forced to find emergency shelter outside the district. Being homeless can affect how children learn, can lead to depression, and can be misdiagnosed as learning disabilities, labels that stick with a child for years…”
• Homelessness can cause mental problems in kids, By Carol Smith, October 24, 2010, Seattle Post-Intelligencer: “The truest victims of homelessness are young children, who have no control over the decisions that put them there, and no power to change their circumstances. The typical homeless families in the country are headed by young women in their 20s, typically with two children. Nearly half those kids are under age 5. The consequences of homelessness can be devastating and long-lasting for young children. By age 8, one in three homeless children has a mental health problem that affects their functioning, said Karen Hudson, social worker with Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia and a national expert on homeless children…”

D.C. schools dinner program aims to fight childhood hunger, By Bill Turque, October 19, 2010, Washington Post: “D.C. public schools have started serving an early dinner to an estimated 10,000 students, many of whom are now receiving three meals a day from the system as it expand efforts to curb childhood hunger and poor nutrition. Free and reduced-price breakfast and lunch long have been staples in most urban school systems. But the District is going a step further in 99 of its 123 schools and reaching nearly a quarter of its total enrollment. Montgomery and Prince George’s Country also offer a third meal of the day in some schools but not on the scale undertaken in the city. The program, which will cost the school system about $5.7 million this year, comes at a time of heightened concern about childhood poverty in the city. Census data show that the poverty rate among African American children is 43 percent, up from 31 percent in 2007 and significantly higher than national rates…”

School study sees benefits in economic integration, By Stephanie McCrummen and Michael Birnbaum, October 15, 2010, Washington Post: “Low-income students in Montgomery County performed better when they attended affluent elementary schools instead of ones with higher concentrations of poverty, according to a new study that suggests economic integration is a powerful but neglected school-reform tool. The debate over reforming public education has focused mostly on improving individual schools through better teaching and expanded accountability efforts. But the study, to be released Friday, addresses the potential impact of policies that mix income levels across several schools or an entire district. And it suggests that such policies could be more effective than directing extra resources at higher-poverty schools…”

Some Obama allies fear school lunch bill could rob food stamp program, By Robert Pear, September 23, 2010, New York Times: “In her campaign to reduce childhood obesity and improve school nutrition, Michelle Obama has become entangled in a fight with White House allies, including liberal Democrats and advocates for the poor. At issue is how to pay for additional spending on the school lunch program and other child nutrition projects eagerly sought by the White House. A bill that the House is expected to consider within days would come up with some of the money by cutting future food stamp benefits. When the Senate passed the bill in early August, Mrs. Obama said she was thrilled. But anti-hunger groups were not. They deluged House members on Thursday with phone calls and e-mails expressing alarm…”

Number of homeless students in Oregon continues to increase, By Anne Williams, September 23, 2010, Register-Guard: “Oregon public schools continued to see swelling numbers of homeless students in 2009-10, a testament to the reach and tenacity of a stubborn recession. More than three in every 100 students - 19,040 - met the federal definition of homelessness last year, an increase of 5.5 percent over 2008-09, according to a state report released Wednesday. The uptick surprised no one on the front lines of providing services to homeless families. ‘We see how the recession has hit,’ said Janet Beckman, the liaison to homeless families in the Springfield School District, which counted 482 homeless students last year, up from 464 the year before. ‘We know that we’re seeing families we’ve never seen before, that have never been in this type of situation before. There’s been a shift in the type of people who are needing assistance.’ But the increase between the two years wasn’t as large as the previous year’s 14 percent…”

Education Dept. awards grants to 21 distressed communities to plan for ‘Promise Neighborhoods’, By Christine Armario (AP), September 21, 2010, Los Angeles Times: “Organizers in distressed communities from Los Angeles to Washington, D.C., will soon begin plans to create what the Department of Education envisions as ‘Promise Neighborhoods,’ where children and families receive support services that boost a student’s chance of being successful in school. Twenty-one applicants for the program to transform communities and student outcomes were named on Tuesday. They will receive planning grants of up to $500,000. ‘Communities across the country recognize that education is the one true path out of poverty,’ Education Secretary Arne Duncan said. ‘These Promise Neighborhoods applicants are committed to putting schools at the center of their work to provide comprehensive services for young children and students.’ The program is modeled after the Harlem Children’s Zone, which provides comprehensive support for families from pregnancy through birth, education through college and career. Children in the program’s charter schools have made impressive gains on standardized tests and in closing the achievement gap…”

Report: Poor countries face education crisis, By Jason Straziuso (AP), September 20, 2010, Washington Post: “Nearly 70 million children around the world are not getting an education despite much progress in the last 10 years, and Haiti and Somalia are the two worst countries in which to be a school-age child, a new report released Monday said. The global financial crisis has forced poor countries to cut their education budgets by $4.6 billion a year at a time when intensified efforts are needed to achieve the U.N. Millennium Development Goal of ensuring a primary school education for every child in the world by 2015, it said. The report listed 10 countries at the bottom of the education list, all but Haiti are in Africa. In addition to Somalia, the others are Eritrea, Comoros, Ethiopia, Chad, Burkina Faso, Central African Republic, Mozambique, Zimbabwe and Liberia. It based the rankings on access to basic education, teacher-student ratio and educational provisions for girls. Even Kenya, considered successful compared to its East African neighbors, had to delay free education to 9.7 million children over the last year due to budgetary constraints, the report said. The report was produced by Education International, Plan International, Oxfam, Save the Children and VSO…”

Racial disparity in school suspensions, By Sam Dillon, September 13, 2010, New York Times: “In many of the nation’s middle schools, black boys were nearly three times as likely to be suspended as white boys, according to a new study, which also found that black girls were suspended at four times the rate of white girls. School authorities also suspended Hispanic and American Indian middle school students at higher rates than white students, though not at such disproportionate rates as for black children, the study found. Asian students were less likely to be suspended than whites. The study analyzed four decades of federal Department of Education data on suspensions, with a special focus on figures from 2002 and 2006, that were drawn from 9,220 of the nation’s 16,000 public middle schools…”

Breakfast in class: Fight against kids’ hunger starts at school, By Martha T. Moore, September 14, 2010, USA Today: “At 8:28 a.m., the cafeteria ladies of Centennial High School take up positions in the second-floor hallway, just outside closed classroom doors. Each woman is pushing a cart loaded with milk, juice, whole-wheat doughnuts and individual packages of Cocoa Puffs and Lucky Charms cereal. When science teacher Sue Aronofsky opens the door of her classroom, kids stream into the hallway. ‘You go around, you get your stuff, and you tell the lady thank you,’ she says. Students eat at their desks as announcements drone from the public-address system. After a brief pause to pledge allegiance to the U.S. flag and toss empty milk cartons, Aronofsky’s freshmen turn to examining pill bugs under magnifying glasses. Time: 8:45 a.m. The same scene occurs all over the 1,034-student school. Last year, when Centennial served free breakfast in the cafeteria each morning before the start of classes, fewer than 100 students showed up to eat daily. On this morning four days into the new year, with breakfast delivered to classrooms, 864 students have been fed. That many children eating school breakfast is rare. Although the number of hungry children in the U.S. is rising, fewer than half of the kids who could be eating a free or low-cost breakfast at school are getting one…”

Education’s less-than-certain windfall, By David Harrison, September 3, 2010, Stateline.org: “It sounded at first like the best of news for South Carolina. The $26 billion jobs bill passed by Congress earlier this month would send $143.7 million to the state, which has lost between 2,800 and 3,900 teaching jobs over the past two years. Instead, after taking a look at the bill’s fine print, state education officials found a flaw that could deprive them of that money. A set of provisions in the bill requires states to have kept up their level of higher education spending this year, something South Carolina did not do. The bill, which offers money only for K-12 schools, included the higher education funding requirement as a holdover from previous drafts of the legislation. ‘It appears to us that the only fix is going to be possible through Congress,’ says Jim Foster, of the South Carolina Department of Education. U.S. Representative Rep. James Clyburn has promised to help once Congress reconvenes in September. Three weeks after the bill’s passage, several states are - like South Carolina - grappling with its ramifications. Sparking the confusion is language wedged into the U.S. Department of Education’s rules for allocating the money. While the provisions that could harm South Carolina were also present - and stricter - in the 2009 Recovery Act, the stimulus bill made it possible for states to ask Washington to waive those requirements. Thirteen states and Puerto Rico applied for waivers. But this month’s jobs bill does not offer waivers, which means that those states that have made drastic cuts to higher education could miss out on the windfall…”

Drive to overhaul low-performing schools delayed, By Sam Dillon, August 23, 2010, New York Times: “Secretary of Education Arne Duncan set an ambitious goal last year of overhauling 1,000 schools a year, using billions of dollars in federal stimulus money. But that effort is off to an uneven start. Schools from Maine to California are starting the fall term with their overhaul plans postponed or in doubt because negotiations among federal regulators, state officials and local educators have led to delays and confusion. In this sprawling district east of Los Angeles, for example, the authorities announced plans earlier this year to use the program to convert Pacific High, one of California’s worst-performing schools, to a charter school, involving a comprehensive makeover. But with time running short this summer, the San Bernardino district switched course, adopting only smaller changes - a crackdown on tardiness and extending the school day, among others - that officials said would be more manageable…”

• $75M Payday,By Mary Vorsino, August 25, 2010, Honolulu Star-Advertiser: “The $75 million Race to the Top federal grant announced yesterday for Hawaii schools will kick-start some of the biggest reform initiatives ever seen in the state’s public education system, educators say. The money will be targeted on efforts to turn around low-performing schools, boost student achievement, better evaluate teacher effectiveness and steer low-performing teachers out of the classroom. Officials say although the changes are sweeping, they are also doable — through measured phase-ins and targeted work to help students, teachers, principals and schools in need of the most help…”
• Race to the Top losers: Why did Louisiana and Colorado fail?, By Amanda Paulson, August 24, 2010, Christian Science Monitor: “Nine states and the District of Columbia have emerged as winners in Round 2 of the closely watched Race to the Top competition, the Department of Education’s innovative - and controversial - competition to reward reform efforts. Together, they were competing for $3.4 billion available in federal funds. In order of their rank, the winners are Massachusetts, New York, Hawaii, Florida, Rhode Island, D.C., Maryland, Georgia, North Carolina, and Ohio. ‘We funded as many states as we could [until we] ran out of money,’ said Education Secretary Arne Duncan in a press call with reporters, noting that just a few points separated some of those states who failed to make the cut from the winners. ‘I can’t overstate how strong the applications were in the second round.’ Still, the big news among many education experts was who lost - particularly Louisiana and Colorado, widely considered leaders in education reform with priorities that are strongly aligned with those favored by the administration. And some of the winners - including Maryland, Ohio, and Hawaii - raised eyebrows, as well…”
• Eastern states dominate in winning school grants, By Sam Dillon, August 24, 2010, New York Times: “When Secretary of Education Arne Duncan announced on Tuesday the latest states to win the Race to the Top competition - and a share of $3.4 billion in federal financing - he said they were chosen because they outlined the boldest plans for shaking up their public school systems. But others noted another common denominator: geography. Of the dozen states that have won major grants to date in the two-part grant contest that is the Obama administration’s signature education initiative, 11 are east of the Mississippi and most hug the East Coast, including Florida and Georgia in the South and New York and Massachusetts in the North. Among the winners, Hawaii is the lone geographic exception. Educators in many of the states that did not win, or did not even participate in the competition - which includes every state from Tennessee west to the Pacific - said they were hamstrung from the outset…”

9 states, DC get $3.4B in ‘Race to the Top’ grants, By Dorie Turner (AP), August 24, 2010, Atlanta Journal-Constitution: “More than 13 million students and 1 million educators will share $3.4 billion from the second round of the federal ‘Race to the Top’ grant competition, the U.S. Education Department said Tuesday. The department chose nine states - Florida, Georgia, Hawaii, Massachusetts, Maryland, New York, North Carolina, Ohio and Rhode Island - and the District of Columbia for the grants. Education Secretary Arne Duncan said 25,000 schools will get money to raise student learning and close the achievement gap. The ‘Race to the Top’ program, part of President Barack Obama’s economic stimulus plan, rewards states for taking up ambitious changes to improve struggling schools. The competition instigated a wave of reforms across the country, as states passed new teacher accountability policies and lifted caps on charter schools to boost their chances of winning…”

Triumph fades on racial gap in city schools, By Sharon Otterman and Robert Gebeloff, August 15, 2010, New York Times: “Two years ago, Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg and his schools chancellor, Joel I. Klein, testified before Congress about the city’s impressive progress in closing the gulf in performance between minority and white children. The gains were historic, all but unheard of in recent decades. ‘Over the past six years, we’ve done everything possible to narrow the achievement gap - and we have,’ Mr. Bloomberg testified. ‘In some cases, we’ve reduced it by half.’ ‘We are closing the shameful achievement gap faster than ever,’ the mayor said again in 2009, as city reading scores - now acknowledged as the height of a test score bubble - showed nearly 70 percent of children had met state standards. When results from the 2010 tests, which state officials said presented a more accurate portrayal of students’ abilities, were released last month, they came as a blow to the legacy of the mayor and the chancellor, as passing rates dropped by more than 25 percentage points on most tests. But the most painful part might well have been the evaporation of one of their signature accomplishments: the closing of the racial achievement gap…”

States cut preschool from budgets, Associated Press, August 8, 2010, USA Today: “States are cutting hundreds of millions from their prekindergarten budgets, undermining years of working to help young children - particularly poor kids - get ready for school. States are slashing nearly $350 million from their pre-K programs by next year and more cuts are likely on the horizon once federal stimulus money dries up, according to the National Institute for Early Education Research at Rutgers University. The reductions mean fewer slots for children, teacher layoffs and even fewer services for needy families who can’t afford high-quality private preschool programs…”

• Bill slashing food stamp funds worries charities, By Renee C. Lee, August 7, 2010, Houston Chronicle: “Local charities already struggling to provide food for needy families worry that a U.S. Senate bill that cuts $14 billion from the national food stamp program will increase demand for assistance in the Houston area and put more strain on nonprofit groups. Harris County stands to lose an estimated $174.3 million in federal aid, leaving thousands of poor and low-income families who depend on the monthly stipend to go hungry, said JC Dwyer, state policy director for the Texas Food Bank Network. ‘We think this is a huge mistake,’ Dwyer said. ‘The food program is the front line of hunger relief in America. With the cut, the pressure falls to charities that are not equipped to handle it.’ The Senate approved a $26 billion financial aid package Thursday to help state and local governments cover Medicaid payments and avoid teacher layoffs. And it’s doing it by siphoning money from the food stamp program…”
• Use of food stamps increases, and more people seek aid from food banks, By Matt Campbell, August 8, 2010, Kansas City Star: “Another month, another record number of Americans on food stamps. More than 40.8 million people, or 13 percent of the country, are now receiving monthly help for basic groceries as the unemployment rate remains stuck at 9.5 percent. Newcomers are joining the food stamp rolls all the time. One of them is LeAnn Ward of Kansas City, who made her first visit to a food pantry Friday while waiting to receive her initial monthly allotment of food stamps for herself and her son…”
• School lunches show poverty bite, By Kelli Gauthier, August 8, 2010, Chattanooga Times Free Press: “In the last five years, Hamilton County managed to woo Volkswagen, help Tennessee snag a $500 million federal grant and invest millions of dollars in at least six brand-new school buildings. The telltale signs of progress and promise of economic prosperity are everywhere. But what often goes unnoticed is that a greater number of families are slipping into poverty. Since 2005, Hamilton County has seen a 20 percent increase in the percentage of students eligible for free or reduced-price lunches - the measure used by the federal government to determine how much financial assistance a school or school system receives for poor students, according to Tennessee’s education Report Cards…”

Homeless Ind. students up 26 percent since 2006-07, By Ken Kusmer (AP), July 28, 2010, Chicago Tribune: “Homelessness among children enrolled in Indiana public schools rose 26 percent over the two years ending in 2008-09 as the state felt the brunt of the economic downturn, a new report shows. The report this week by First Focus, a children’s advocacy group, cited recently released federal data showing that homelessness among students nationwide grew for two straight years since 2006-07. The group called on Congress to pass new funding for homeless student programs, noting that stimulus funding for that purpose is running out…”

Federal government eying free lunches for all students in high-poverty areas, rules for vending machines, By Dave Murray, July 8, 2010, Grand Rapids Press: “The federal government could soon be paying for lunch for entire communities of children under a new plan in the U.S. House of Representatives. Christina A. Samuels of Education Week reports that the Improving Nutrition for America’s Children Act of 2010 would allow schools in high-poverty areas to be covered under a ‘community eligibility’ option that allows free meals to all students without the traditional paperwork to determine eligibility. That would mean free meals for an extra 20 percent of students in Grand Rapids, where eight of 10 students already meet income levels to qualify for free or reduced-price meals. The districts provides students who are eligible for reduced-price lunches to get them at no cost, using money from a surplus in the lunch program’s account. But Samuels said there are more far-reaching effects, including establishing nutritional standards for foods served outside the cafeteria, such as in vending machines…”