Education News from Washington Post

The winner of the first $1 million TED Prize for education innovation is (no, not Sal Khan) Sugata Mitra, for his plan this year to start the "School in the Cloud," which is essentially a computer lab where children in Indian can learn in a student-driven environment.

If there is one area where there is bipartisan support in President Obama's agenda, it is education reform. And that's too bad. Here to explain the history of this -- and why it is a problem -- is Jeff Bryant, a marketing and communications consultant for nonprofits. Bryant is a marketing and creative strategist with nearly 30 years of experience the past 20 on his own as a freelance writer, consultant, and search engine marketing provider. He has also written extensively about public education policy. This post appeared on the Education Opportunity Network, a new online publication edited by Bryant.

Ever since D.C. Chancellor Kaya Henderson announced plans to close 15 city schools, activists and politicians have peppered her with different versions of the same question: How will she persuade students from closed schools to stay within DCPS instead of fleeing to charters?

At a Capitol Hill briefing on Tuesday, officials from the Wolf Trap Institute for Early Learning Through the Arts and Fairfax County public schools superintendent Jack D. Dale outlined the progress of a joint initiative funded by the Education Department.

Hundreds of teachers expressed frustration and despair at a town hall meeting with Fairfax County school board members Monday night, detailing what many educators described as terrible morale in the workforce.

First lady Michelle Obama, in an interview with SiriusXM host B. Smith being aired to mark the third anniversary of her "Let's Move" campaign, said that allowing students to get up and move around helps them concentrate better and get better test scores.

No, ATT, more is not always better than less, and faster isn't either, and neither is bigger — even if your ads to promote phones with 4G say so, in staged conversations with kids, no less.

It's not that I'm not charmed by the kids, which I'm not. It's the crass messages in these ads, in which an adult sits with a group of kids who are asked whether they think more is better or bigger is better or faster is better. Of course they do, Like the adorable little girl who says, "It's better to be fast to not be bitten by a werewolf and then you'll be turned into one and then you will have to stay in and then you will have to be shaved because you are too hot "

KIPP, previously known as the Knowledge Is Power Program, has had more success than any other large educational organization in raising the achievement of low-income students, both nationally and in the District. But many good educators, burned by similarly hopeful stories in the past, have wondered whether KIPP were for real.

Loudoun County School Board members, many of whom campaigned to expand school choice, turned down their only pending charter school application Tuesday night after months of scrutiny and a storm of allegations that the applicants have hidden ties to a Muslim preacher.

The SAT, the most widely used college entrance exam for generations of students, is getting a makeover.

David Coleman, president of the College Board, which creates and administers the SAT, e-mailed his 6,000 members on Tuesday to inform them that the board will redesign the test to more sharply focus on the “core set of knowledge and skills” that high school graduates need to succeed in college.

One struggling D.C. charter school will shrink at the end of this academic year, another will be acquired by a high-performing school and a third will close if it fails to show improvement over the next several months, the D.C. Public Charter School Board decided Monday.