Education News
Montgomery schools hopes to raise enough money for 50,000 backpacks
Just $10 — about the cost of a couple of large lattes — could provide a Montgomery County schools student with a free backpack full of school supplies in August.
The school system recently launched its “MCPS: Give Backpacks” drive in preparation for the next school year and has set an ambitious goal, aiming to collect enough donations to supply 50,000 students with backpacks.
Read full article >>Petition to block changes to Prince George’s school system fails to get enough signatures
A community activist group that opposed Prince George’s County Executive Rushern L. Baker III’s plan to restructure the public school system collected about 4,500 signatures, falling short in its attempt to block a new law that gives Baker new powers over the schools from going into effect on Saturday.
Read full article >>Students Can Learn by Explaining, Studies Say
Surveillance Cameras Gain Ground in Schools
The Learning Network Blog: Found Poem Favorite | ‘Barbie’
Jeb Bush's disdain for public education
It's always useful to know where people are coming from, so we can thank former Florida governor Jeb Bush for making it so easy to understand where he stands on public education. He has nothing but disdain for it.
Read full article >>The Learning Network Blog: Student Opinion | Do You Enjoy Reading Tabloid Gossip?
The Learning Network Blog: 6 Q's About the News | This Season's Broadway Stages Feature Many Child Actors
Five ways to improve literacy learning (that work better than high-stakes tests)
The following letter from Sandy Hayes, president of the National Council of Teachers of English to organization members, supports a moratorium on the high-stakes consequences of standardized tests aligned to the Common Core State Standards. American Federation of Teachers President Randi Weingarten made the call for a moratorium in April because teachers haven't had enough time to properly absorb and create curriculum around the standards. A number of organizations and education activists from different sides of the education debate have supported the call, though Jeb Bush's Chiefs for Change, a group of former and current state education superintendents, opposed it. Hayes also details five ways to help improve literacy that would be better investments than more high-stakes tests.
Read full article >>Cowboy-style cap gun gets 5-year-old suspended from school in Calvert County
A kindergartner who brought a cowboy-style cap gun onto his Calvert County school bus was suspended for 10 days after showing a friend the orange-tipped toy, which he had tucked inside his backpack on his way to school, according to his family and a lawyer.
Read full article >>U-Va. astronomer wins $1 million 'Nobel of the East' Prize
University of Virginia astronomer John Hawley, and Steven Balbus, a former U-Va. colleague who is now at the University of Oxford, are co-winners of the Shaw Prize, which is commonly known as the "Nobels of the East."
Read full article >>St. Mary’s College trustees plan to discuss college president’s future
When Joseph Urgo became president of St. Mary’s College of Maryland three years ago, trustees considered him a devoted scholar who could steer the small, public honors college toward greater financial stability.
Read full article >>Gray administration wants to establish unified lottery for D.C. public and charter schools
The Gray administration is seeking to establish a unified enrollment lottery for the city’s traditional and charter schools in time to determine admissions for the 2014-15 school year, officials said Thursday.
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