Education Week: Obama Unveils Projects to Bolster STEM Teaching

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via Education Week: Obama Unveils Projects to Bolster STEM Teaching.

This article is very interesting. As someone who works at a national non-profit in the STEM education field, I am happy to see that the President has announced that there will be more that $250 million (more than double the amount that Obama announced in November) in private investments to help attract and prepare new teachers for STEM. The money will also help to improve instruction in STEM by teachers that are already practicing.

The article notes that the government can not address the STEM problem alone. Therefore, a partnership between the federal government, companies, foundations, nonprofit groups and science and engineering societies will work with young people across the United States to excel in STEM. However, I think that the partnership should include other entities such as post secondary institutions (both two-year and four-year colleges) with science and engineering programs. These schools prepare students for careers in engineering and would know what is needed for them to succeed at the post secondary level.

In addition, education graduate schools would also be able to further assist in developing adequate professional development of teachers in the STEM areas.

I would also like to see more involvement from the multicultural STEM nonprofits and foundations. As the demographics of the country continue to change and Latinos become a dominant portion of the population, it is important that education to workforce development program include and reach out to all cultures.

 

Sotomayor on Education

I’m not sure if everyone has been following the confirmation hearing for Judge Sonia Sotomayor.  If you haven’t heard about it, she is President Obama’s pick to replace retiring Supreme Court Justice David Souter.  Sotomayor is a federal judge on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit. If she is confirmed, she would the first Latino justice and the third female justice. She is Puerto Rican from the Bronx, graduated summa cum laude from Princeton for her A.B. and received her J.D. from Yale Yale School. She was the ADA in New York, and entered private practice five years later.  She served on the board of directors for the Puerto Rican Legal Defense and Education Fund (now called LatinoJustice), the State of NEw York Mortgage Agency, and the NYC Campaign Finance Board. In 1991 is was nominated to the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York by President George H. W. Bush, and was confirmed in 1992. In 1997, she was nominated by President Bill Clinton to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit and was confirmed in 1998. Sotomayor has ruled on several high-profile cases.

However, she has handled only a small number of K-12 education cases during her 17 years as a federal judge. These cases focused on issues such as special education, racial discrimination, and student freedom of expression.
There are three prominent K-12 education cases from the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit which could show what position she would take on education issues is she is confirmed into the Supreme Court.

In 1999, Sotomayor dissented in part from the majority decision of Gant v. Wallingford Board of Education. In this case, the student’s family claimed that their son, the only black student in his first-grade class at a Connecticut elemenary school, was subjected to racial slurs by other children and that he was transferred to a kindergarten class to alleviate the racial tension without the family’s consent.  Sotomayor agreed with the panel’s rejection of the claim that the school reacted with “deliberate indifference” to the alleged racial hostility, but she also argued that the student’s race stood out as the “likely reason” for his demotion from first grade to kindergarten.

In 2006, Sotomayor joined a unanimous ruling in Frank G. v. Board of Education of Hyde Park. This was a special education case that resembles the Forest Grove School District v. T.A. (2009) case that the Supreme Court just ruled on. Sotomayor joined the unanimous ruling that found that a family could be reimbursed for private school tuition for a child with a learning disability even if the child never received such services from the public district. In Forest Grove School District v. T.A., the Supreme Court made it easier for parents of students with disabilities to get reimbursed for private school tuition, which is aligned with Sotomayor’s decision in the Frank G. v. Board of Education of Hyde Park.

In 2008, Sotomayor signed on to the decision which found that a Connecticut student’s off-campus blog remarks, described in the ruling as “vulgar,” had created a “foreseeable risk of substanital disruption” at the student’s high school. In Doninger v. Niehoff, the panel did not grant the teenager a preliminary injunction to reverse the school’s disciplinary action against her.

Of the 3,000 or so cases that have come before Sotomayor as an appeals court judge, less than 1% have been on schools.  However, some education law experts say the available evidence suggests that she’s a moderate on education issues. But at the same time, conservative groups view Sotomayor as a left-leaning activist seeking to use personal viewpoints to create legislation. Others desribe her case record as middle-of-the-road application of legal principles.

While this is similar to what many people are saying about her overall decisions, it seems to me that her decisions do follow a moderate viewpoint. Many are using her speeches to say that she is liberal because of her “wise latina” comment and other such comments made in six of her many speeches. I think it is important to look at her case rulings over her speeches and looking at that, it would appear as though Sotomayor is conservative on education issues. An analysis conducted by Zirkel found that of 26 decisions on “regular education,” Sotomayor ruled in favor of school districts 83 percent of the time and ruled in favor of districts 58 percent of the time on her 13 special-education cases.

n Monday that makes it easier for parents of students with disabilities to get reimbursed for private school tuition.

Read more: http://www.nydailynews.com/news/politics/2009/06/23/2009-06-23_specialed_activists_hail_supreme_ruling.html#ixzz0LQynMYWP

 

What is the Priority? Immigration Reform? Economic Reform? Education Reform?

The Obama administration seems to want to take on everything from education reform to immigration reform. However, many believe that President Obama should be focusing on the current economic crisis. Of course, education reform would make the United States more competitive in the global market in the long run, and therefore it would make sense to address the education issues.  However, there are many people that think that other reforms that the President is pursuing should be placed on the back burner until the United States recovers from the economic crisis.

One such reform deals with immigration. At the beginning of the month, Obama announced that he would be addressing immigration reform this year. In a NYTimes article, it  says that Obama plans to address the public in May on the issue and then work with a group to begin discussing possible legislation. As I said before, the economy is a bigger priority for many politicans and they will focusing on stimulating the economy, and restructuring many public services before they will address immigration reform.  However, some believe that immigration reform is vital to stimulating the economy.

For instance, the National Immigration Law Center (NILC) released a publication titled “Why Enactment of the DREAM Act Would Aid the Ailing Economy and Generate Tax Revenues” outlines how the DREAM Act would impact the economy. Not only would legalized immigrants increase tax revenues, they would also contribute to the Social Security system. Additionally, it would stimulate the economy by increasing productivity in the educated workforce. The publication also makes the point that many of these students have been educated from K-12 through the United States public school system. Their elementary and secondary education has been invested in through both federal and local taxpayers’ money. However, since these students are not allowed to attend public universities, the return on the investment is not seen. The NILC has another brief called the “Basic Facts about In-State Tuition for Undocumented Immigrant Students.” According to this brief, states that have already passed legislation similar to the DREAM Act have not experienced a substantial cost in its implementation. School revenues have increased because students that would not otherwise be there are now attending.

Additionally, Simon Rosenberg of the Democratic think-tank NDN says that legalizing immigrants would help to end unfair competition for low-wage American workers. At the moment, illegal immigrants are not protected by the same minimum wage rights that citizens are. Therefore, employers will hire undocumented immigrant, pay them under the minimum wage and not report it. This leaves the rest of low-wage American workers without jobs.

According to NPR, Simon also made the same point that NILC made about tax revenues. As more and more illegal immigrants become citizens, they will pay more to federal and state taxes. Furthermore, Rosenberg states:

It means they can start an entry level job, but they can’t really make the step to improve their education, get to the next level,” he says. “And so you’re essentially holding a whole contingent of people back from contributing even more to the economy than they do.

While there are counterpoints to the argument (some of which are in the NPR article), I believe that it is time to address the immigration issue with a reform that will benefit everyone. With the growing numbers of illegal immigrants entering the United States there needs to be more structure around what will happen to them, especially in regards to education.

 

Revamped School Schedules

We can no longer afford an academic calendar designed when America was a nation of farmers who needed their children at home plowing the land at the end of each day. That calendar may have once made sense, but today, it puts us at a competitive disadvantage. Our children spend over a month less in school than children in South Korea. That is no way to prepare them for a 21st century economy. That is why I’m calling for us not only to expand effective after-school programs, but to rethink the school day to incorporate more time – whether during the summer or through expanded-day programs for children who need it.

-President Barack Obama’s
Remarks on a Complete and Competitive American Education
at the US Hispanic Chamber of Commerce

Two weeks ago, I shared a brief commentary of President Obama’s education policy speech at the US Hispanic Chamber of Commerce. The above quote is from that speech. I listed longer school day/year in the key topics that he addressed. That being said, I think it is interesting that many school districts are considering shortening the school week in order to save on money. School districts are expecting to face large cuts in their budgets.

What should districts do in the wake of budget cuts?

• Option 1: Fire teachers?
  Of course getting rid of teachers is not an option since it would just lead to overcrowding. Many districts are already dealing with overcrowding, so getting rid of more teachers would make the problem worse. Children in overcrowded classrooms will not get the necessary attention from their teacher and this will harm their educational achievement.
• Option 2: Decrease teacher pay?
  How many teachers do you know will allow a pay cut? As the child of a NYC public school teacher, I can recount the numerous times that teachers have threaten to strike in order to receive new contracts that included pay increases. Also, teachers are already underpaid, so a pay cut may cause many teachers to pursue other occupations that will pay them more.
• Option 3: Shorten the school week?
  One article in USA Today says that shortening the school week to Monday through Thursday, and adding an hour to each day, will allow districts to save on heating schools, maintenance, buses, substitutes, cafeteria and custodial staff.

I have so many problems with option three that it is hard to know where to start. But here goes:

• What are parents going to do with their children on Fridays? Hire nannies/babysitters? Enroll them in Friday programs? All of which costs money. This is a huge burden on low-income parents.
• A few of the ways that they are cutting costs require salary cuts to blue collared workers, like the bus drivers, cafeteria staff and custodial staff.
• What happens in the event of a snow day? What about national holidays that fall on a Monday, such as President’s Day?  Three day week? How will schools make up for those lost hours now that there is even more pressure on each day a student comes in. Which will also be problematic is students miss a day or two of school for any reason.
• Also, there has been a lot of research done on students’ academic abilities worsening over the summer. While the three day weekend is not two months off, it is something to think about, especially for the weakest students.
• The research shows that students in the United States are falling behind students in other nations and one of the reasons is the fact that students in the US spend less time in school. Why would it make sense to shorten the week? I worry about the effects on already low performing students who are traditionally low-income, minorities, and/or English language learners. Low performing students already need more time in school in order to get to grade level and if they are low-income, they will not be able to afford tutors or after school programs. And the unfortunate fact is, many parents are not helping their children when they are home; either because they don’t know how, they don’t have time or they are not interested in doing so. What happens to these students? Will this cause the gap in educational achievement to widen? I do realize that this change in schedule will be temporary, but we all know that the effects will be carried on to the next grades.
• Let’s do the math: One extra hour a day over four days = four hours. Four hours does not equal the number of hours of teaching in one school day. Therefore, they would be losing teaching hours. Something that many students can not afford to lose. So are schools adding extra days? If so, doesn’t this defeat the purpose?
• Many curricula require a certain amount of minutes a day. How will this be effected by the extended day/shortened week? Getting new curricula requires purchasing and then professional development for teachers, both cost money. Will this cost counteract the savings that they are attempting to receive through the new schedule?

I think a new option is needed to address school budget cuts. Can someone look at overspending in other areas of the system? I think an analysis of school spending would help to access what really can be done to save money, because the shortened school week will not allow our students to succeed.

 

President Obama’s First Education Policy Speech

This past Tuesday, President Obama gave a speech at the US Hispanic Chamber of Commerce on education and discussed his vision for the education system. Of the points that he made, the ones that stood out for me were: 1) merit pay for teachers,  2) better data collection, 3) higher standards, 4) longer school day/year, 5) more support to early childhood education, and 6) better assessments. The President noted that America’s student achievement has not been as successful as that of other countries and noted South Korea as an example. Because of the lag in educational achievement, America is at a disadvantage in the world’s economy.

Transcript

The plan to invest in K-12 education will ensure that we have the workforce needed to ensure the future of the United States.  Obama stated that he wanted to raise standards in education because “by 2016, four out of every ten new jobs will require at least some advanced education or training.” In order for the United States to be a competitor in the global marketplace, it is essential for our schools to do better, for our graduation rates to be increased, and for schools to have qualified teachers in all subjects.

Obama made an interesting point about the programs in which Hispanics are enrolled.

Some children are enrolled in mediocre programs. And some are wasting away their most formative years in bad programs. That includes the one-fourth of all children who are Hispanic, and who will drive America’s workforce of tomorrow, but who are less likely to have been enrolled in an early childhood education program than anyone else.

I think that this was a very important point. Hispanics are the fastest growing population in the United States; however, the proportion of Hispanics in higher education does not equal that of college age Hispanics. Hispanic upward social mobility is not increasing as fast as it should. This is not just a problem that faces Hispanics. African Americans and Native Americans are not receiving the proportionate number of degrees in higher education. In order for the United States to succeed in the international market, education policies and programs need to target these populations.