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1. Story of the Week: New study identifies 'opportunity gap' for students
April 17, 2012 | Berth Fertig, The New York Times
Educators have long studied the achievement gap, in which black and Hispanic pupils and low-income students of all races perform at much lower levels than their white, Asian and better-off peers. A new study released on Tuesday by a group that supported efforts to attain for more money for city schools looked at the educational opportunities available to poor and minority students and found the choices lacking.
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2. Frederick charter school a worthy enterprise
April 19, 2012 | Gazette.net
The opening of the Frederick Classical Charter School remains a good idea — if one whose time hasn’t quite yet come.
Hopefully, officials of the school and the Frederick County school board, which must approve the school’s opening, will work together to erase the obstacles that appear to have led to the school being unable to open this fall, as officials on both sides originally had anticipated.
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3. Without subsidy, more kids could be left unprepared
April 18, 2012 | Jen Bondeson, Gazette.net
Surrounded by friends, teachers, crayons, letters and blocks, children in Montgomery County child care and preschool programs are learning more than their peers who stay home, according to an annual study.
About nine in 10 children who entered kindergarten after attending a nonpublic nursery school in the county were fully-prepared for kindergarten for the 2011-12 school year, compared to seven in 10 children in home care, according to this year's State Readiness Report released in March. Overall, 1,458 students came from a nonpublic nursery and 1,758 came from home care.
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4. KIPP Ujima math educator named Baltimore City's Teacher of the Year
April 18, 2012 | Erica L. Green, The Baltimore Sun
A mathematics educator whose students have consistently scored among the highest in Baltimore and Maryland on state assessments was named the city's 2012 Teacher of the Year.
Bradley Nornhold, a seventh- and eighth-grade math teacher at the high-performing charter school KIPP Ujima Village Academy, was surprised with the honor Wednesday by a visit to his classroom — which immediately erupted in cheers — from city schools CEO Andrés Alonso.
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5. City schools with federal turnaround grants have mixed results
April 16, 2012 | Erica L. Green & Liz Bowie, The Baltimore Sun
Once students hurled computers out the windows at Calverton Middle School, but today they are learning on state-of-the-art technology that has flooded into the West Baltimore school. Once teachers couldn't wait to transfer out of a place where students ruled the classrooms, but now faculty turnover has slowed.
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6. Studies give nuanced look at teacher effectiveness
April 15, 2012 | Sarah D. Sparks, Education Week
The massive Measures of Effective Teaching Project is finding that teacher effectiveness assessments similar to those used in some district value-added systems aren't good at showing which differences are important between the most and least effective educators, and often totally misunderstand the "messy middle" that most teachers occupy. Yet the project's latest findings suggest more nuanced teacher tests, multiple classroom observations and even student feedback can all create a better picture of what effective teaching looks like.
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7. I went to some of D.C.’s better schools. I was still unprepared for college.
April 13, 2012 | Darryl Robinson, The Washington Post
Entering my freshman year at Georgetown University, I should have felt as if I’d made it. The students I once put on a pedestal, kids who were fortunate enough to attend some of the nation’s top private and public schools, were now my classmates. Having come from D.C. public charter schools, I worked extremely hard to get here.
But after arriving on campus before the school year, with a full scholarship, I quickly felt unprepared and outmatched — and it’s taken an entire year of playing catch-up in the classroom to feel like I belong. I know that ultimately I’m responsible for my education, but I can’t help blaming the schools and teachers I had in my early years for my struggles today.
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8. Maryland top court will decide if Dream Act goes to voters
April 12, 2012 | Andrea F. Siegel, The Baltimore Sun
The state's top court has agreed to decide if Maryland's Dream Act will be on the ballot this fall.
The Court of Appeals said this week it will hear CASA de Maryland's appeal of a judge's decision to allow the referendum on the 2010 law. The court scheduled arguments for June 12.
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9. Parents must make the grade on involvement
April 12, 2012 | Gloria Bonilla Santiago, Huffington Post
Last week, Louisiana State Rep. Joe Harrison introduced a bill in that state's legislature that -- if passed -- would grade parents on the level and quality of their involvement in their kid's education.
Focusing attention on the need for parental involvement is always a good idea. But Rep. Harrison's "we" versus "they" approach has no chance of achieving the desired results in our country's urban schools.
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10. The government's new way of measuring student success: Implications for black colleges
April 12, 2012 | Marybeth Gasman, Huffington Post
The federal government recently announced that it plans to change the way it measures student success. Instead of measuring graduation rates using first-time, full-time students, the new measurements will take into account part-time and transfer students. The Integrated Postsecondary Educational Data System (IPEDS) has been outdated for several decades now and fails to take into account the changing landscape of students in the United States. This new change is good news for many of the nation's colleges and universities.
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