Zorg

The Christian Science Monitor (2/4, Paulson) reported that a new Gallup survey shows "more than 80 percent of elementary-school principals believe that recess has a positive impact on academic achievement." Also, according to "two-thirds of the principals" polled, "students listen better and are more focused in class" after recess. "The findings support a growing wave of educators who are pushing to restore the place of recess in schools and, in some cases, to improve its quality." Schools in some cities such as "Chicago, Atlanta, and Boston...have dropped recess completely," amid budget cuts and an increasingly intense focus on test preparation.

        Nancy Shute wrote in the US News and World Report (2/4) On Parenting blog, "Recess has almost disappeared from the curriculum at many schools, edged out by more math and reading work as schools push to raise scores on standardized tests." But more and more research "shows that adding more play to the day, not less, improves the likelihood of better test scores and behavior." However, Shute adds, "The news wasn't all good. The principals said most of their discipline problems happened during a recess or lunch break and said that they would like to have more staff to monitor the playground, better equipment, and training in playground management."

Fox News (2/4) reported that a new study published online in the January issue of the Journal of Adolescent Health finds that gay or lesbian adolescents "get bullied two to three times more than their heterosexual peers. While the researchers aren't sure why this sexual minority gets bullied more than others or the type of bullying, which can include various verbal insults and physical assaults, they suggest in general those who are different from the social norm are often bully targets." Fox added that this research "adds to accumulating results on the topic of bullying, with studies showing kids who bully at school are more likely to do the same at home; workplace bullying can wreak havoc at the office and is worse than sexual harassment; and key nonverbal cues could identify children who are likely to be bullied and rejected by others."

Katherine Leal Unmuth wrote in the Dallas Morning News (2/4) Irving blog that a forty-year-old woman was sentenced to 34 years in jail on Thursday "for her role in the identity theft of numerous current and former Irving schoolteachers." She was given "two years apiece for two counts of credit card abuse and 30 years for fraudulent use or possession of identifying information." The woman, Sharon Denise Seeley, "told police that the personal information came from a binder that was thrown into a school district dumpster that held the social security numbers of up to 3,200 current and former employees." In court, three teachers whose identities were stolen "detailed thousands of dollars in charges in their names that wrecked their credit." Irving school officials have been contacted by about 103 affected teachers and the district is currently "in the process of compensating them for damages."

McClatchy (2/4, Martin) reported that three Skagit County, WA districts "will participate in a statewide pilot program to bring the state's standardized test from pencil and paper to the computer." According to McClatchy, "Statewide about 25 percent of schools will participate in the pilot program," a "computer version of the Measurement of Student Progress. ... The rest of the students will take the paper-and-pencil test."

The Salt Lake Tribune (2/5, Schencker) reports that based on the results of the Iowa Test of Basic Skills (ITBS) "given this past fall," students in Utah "are smack in the middle compared with other students across the nation" in the areas of "reading, language arts and math." State Superintendent Larry Shumway said the test results are "reason to be proud," because most "either remained the same as last school year or increased slightly. He said that's an accomplishment, given recent cuts to education funding and Utah's changing demographics." Lawmakers, however, are broadly supporting Utah's SB16, which would end the ITBS in Utah public schools. "The Senate and a House committee passed the bill with no dissenting votes. It now moves to the House floor."

Jay Mathews wrote in a column for the Washington Post (2/4) that Marni Barron, an instructional coach for teachers at Phoebe Hearst Elementary School in DC, "shares my discomfort with many Washington area school districts that rate nearly 100 percent of their teachers as satisfactory. ... But we disagree over the region's most daring effort to assess educators honestly, the DC schools' IMPACT program." Mathews adds that he views the program as a "worthy experiment," yet Barron "thinks it needs to do much more than it is designed to do to train teachers in its intricacies and demands."

The State (SC) (2/5, Smith) reports that South Carolina Gov. Mark Sanford (R) "flew to Washington on Thursday to tell the Obama administration that South Carolina wants $300 million in federal stimulus money. Sanford, who spent much of last year fighting parts of the Obama administration's stimulus plan, now wants SC to have a piece of $4 billion in 'Race to the Top' education money." Sanford met with Secretary of Education Arne Duncan "to learn more about a charter school program Duncan started in Chicago, said Ben Fox, the governor's spokesman."

        Mark Silva wrote in a "The Swamp" blog posting for the Chicago Tribune (2/4) that Sanford attended the National Prayer Breakfast on Thursday in Washington, D.C. and "conducted official business, too, meeting with U.S. Education Secretary Arne Duncan to discuss charter schools and education grants funded by the federal stimulus package."

The Detroit News (2/5, Hurst, Schultz) reports, "Robert Bobb, the emergency financial manager overseeing a massive overhaul of Detroit Public Schools, got a major boost in his quest for academic control of the district as the nation's top education official said he supported Bobb's reform efforts. 'I think that'd be a big step in the right direction,' Secretary of Education Arne Duncan said during a roundtable with reporters on his department's plans for nationwide school reforms." According to the Detroit News, "Duncan's comments come as state lawmakers consider changing Michigan's emergency financial manager law to expand Bobb's purview from fiscal matters to those of academics as well."

The Hartford Courant (2/4, Merritt) reported that educators in Connecticut have expressed support for President Barack Obama's proposed overhaul of No Child Left Behind to create "a more competitive approach that rewards reforms designed to raise student achievement, improve teaching and inspire students to excel in math and science." University of Connecticut education professor, George Sugai, said the proposal "more clearly defines what's most important to invest in." State Board of Education spokesman Thomas Murphy pointed out that with the President's proposal, "We see a refocused shift from No Child Left Behind, which was based on year-to-year test scores and consequences, to a new calculus of focusing on instruction, using data and putting more emphasis on student performance from year to year."

        Colorado Education Reforms Aligned With Federal Priorities, Officials Say. The Denver Post (2/4, Meyer) reports, "Colorado officials believe that the state's recent retooling of its education system aligns well with President Barack Obama's proposed changes to No Child Left Behind. ... In many ways, Colorado has already begun to comply with many parts of Obama's plan by creating a measurement system that tracks academic growth, getting all subgroups of students on track to college and career readiness." Obama's "proposed plan would make federal funding more competitive, rewarding schools that push reforms and close the achievement gap."

The Des Moines Register (2/4, Hupp) reported that home-schooled first grader Matthias Beattie has been suspended for a week from a "a Des Moines school district program that pairs public school teachers with home-schooled children" because he brought a shotgun shell to school. According to father Dan Beattie, "his son found the shotgun shell as they cleared out a wall of their Carlisle farmhouse," but said he did not "know the shotgun shell was in Matthias' pants pocket" when the child was dropped off at school. Matthias was suspended because "Des Moines elementary schools follow a uniform no-weapons policy that includes a range of punishments, from conferences with parents to expulsion." Even though "Matthias isn't a public school student in the eyes of state law," Des Moines School "officials say Matthias and other home-schooled students are bound to discipline policies."

USA Today (2/5, Morrison, Eisler) reports that the US Department of Agriculture issued plans on Thursday to "assure the safety and quality of food" purchased for the National School Lunch Program." The new measures include "tightening requirements on companies that supply ground beef to schools, testing the beef more often and more thoroughly, and improving communications within the USDA to 'identify potential food safety issues' before children get sick." The agency "also pledged to review the safety records of its school lunch suppliers more carefully and bar companies that have had repeated problems with their commercial products."

Bill Turque wrote in the Washington Post (2/4) DC Schools Insider blog that "after waiting nearly two months for a mayoral response" to their letter-writing campaign to keep principal Patrick Pope at Hardy Middle School in DC, "about 120 seventh graders and teachers from" the school traveled to Mayor Adrian M. Fenty's office on Thursday to deliver a second "round of letters." The Hardy principal, "who founded the [school's] highly regarded visual arts and instrumental music program" at the school "is scheduled to be replaced this summer by Dana Nerenberg, principal of nearby Hyde-Addison Elementary, who will run both schools." English teacher Janelle Henry "is using the letter-writing effort as a class assignment," but said that none of her students were "pushed" into going on the trip. Students, meanwhile, say they just want to have their input considered.

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