State Education News

Ohio adopts student restraint, seclusion policy (Canton Repository)

The Ohio Board of Education has approved a policy on how educators seclude and physically restrain students in schools…Read more...

Allison named Canton City Schools superintendent; gets 5-year contract (Canton Repository)

Nearly 64 years after his grandfather became the first black employee hired in the district, as a janitor, Adrian Allison becomes its first black superintendent…Read more...

Key district official in data-rigging case retires (Columbus Dispatch)

In a flurry of developments yesterday, a key figure in the investigation of Columbus City Schools’ data-rigging retired; the Board of Education gave a cool reception to Mayor Michael B. Coleman’s request to critique district business operations…Read more...

Schools’ use of seclusion now limited (Columbus Dispatch)

State Board of Education members say their seclusion and restraint policy isn’t perfect, but they’re proud to have done something to protect Ohio’s children…Read more...

Gov. Kasich says his comprehensive school plan will be delivered shortly (NPR)

Gov. Kasich has signed a bill into law that grades schools on an A through F grading scale. But as Ohio Public Radio’s Jo Ingles reports, that’s a part of a bigger education plan that the Governor intends to release soon…Read more...

OPATA offering free training for educators (Portsmouth Daily Times)

Ohio Attorney General Mike DeWine says more training opportunities for Ohio’s educators have now been scheduled…Read more...

State says former treasurer must repay school (Youngstown Vindicator)

A state audit has revealed excess payments to the retirement fund of the school district’s former treasurer…Read more...

Local Education News

North Canton takes proactive security steps in schools (Canton Repository)

After the horrific school shooting in Newtown, Police Chief Stephan Wilder feared a copycat gunman could strike here…Read more...

Looking at the bottom line, Heath schools open doors (Columbus Dispatch)

Less than 24 hours after the board agreed to allow open enrollment at Heath City Schools, a parent sat in the district parking lot filling out applications…Read more...

After-school shooting sends boy to youth prison (Columbus Dispatch)

A 15-year-old boy who fired a gun outside an East Side elementary school, grazing the head of a 17-year-old girl, was committed to the Ohio Department of Youth Services yesterday…Read more...

City schools board enters agreement for energy savings (Mansfield News Journal)

Mansfield City Schools could save “tens of thousands of dollars” in energy expenses through a new program, Superintendent Dan Freund said…Read more...

County delays decision on school funding (Springfield News-Sun)

Clark County commissioners delayed a decision about contributing $100,000 to the Global Impact STEM Academy due in part to uncertainty about the project…Read more...

Schools to cash in (Warren Tribune Chronicle)

Area schools are cashing out. Local school districts soon will receive the first payment of casino-tax revenue, with some districts set to take in more than $110,000…Read more...

Columbus City Schools Hopes To Have New Superintendent In 6 Months (WBNS)

The Columbus School Board is meeting Tuesday night with the firm that has been hired to lay out the process for searching and hiring a new superintendent. The goal is to have someone hired in six months…Read more...

Ohio school workers to carry guns have police training (WEWS)

Two of the four employees who have agreed to carry guns at a rural Ohio school apparently have law enforcement backgrounds…Read more...

Superintendent, board respond to concerns about enrollment at Austintown (Youngstown Vindicator)

Open enrollment was the hot-button topic at the Austintown school board meeting…Read more...

Editorial

Aiming to excel (Akron Beacon Journal)

As a national monitor for effective and high quality education, Education Week’s annual Quality Counts surveys are a valuable resource in comparative data…Read more...

In Part I, we discussed the size and scope of the Gates Foundation, and it's subjective approach to reform. In this part we'll take a closer look at his current effort to promote corporate education reforms.

Gates is now moving on to his next article of faith in his quest to reform public education - attacking teacher seniority and professional education requirements. If it's not the school structure, it must be the teacher to blame goes the new thinking.

The Gates agenda is an intellectual cousin of the Bush administration's 2002 No Child Left Behind law, which required all public schools-though not individual teachers-to make "adequate yearly progress" on student test scores. Some opponents of No Child Left Behind questioned its faith in data; are scores too narrow a gauge of how well kids are learning? Gates sees nothing wrong in relying on quantitative metrics. "Every profession has to have some form of measurement," he said in a late June interview with Bloomberg Businessweek. "Tuning that, making sure it's fair, getting the teachers so they're enthused about it" are the keys.

After the Small Schools Initiative debacle, Gates hired a new leader, Vicki Phillips, who in turn hired Tom Kane. Kane had authored a study using high stakes testing results, which concluded that "Teachers who ranked in the bottom quarter after their first two years in the classroom should be fired."

Gates, with this flawed study in hand, set about deploying his checkbook to cash strapped school districts prepared to take a gamble. One such district is Hillsbrough County Public Schools in Florida. Hillsbrough agreed to, among many other provisions, "Empower principals in the recruitment and dismissal of teachers based on performance".

The corporate reform doesn't stop there however, the distrcit also hired 2 outsiders, at some expense to assist with the 7 year reform implementation

The new positions being considered today will cost $223,202 in salaries and benefits for two years; a $100,000 grant from the Gates Foundation would pay for about half that, while the school district would pick up about 25 percent. The other 25 percent would be paid by The Broad Foundation, an entrepreneurial philanthropic group that offers residencies for experienced private industry executives interested in a career switch to public education.

The two candidates being recommended are Jamal Jenkins, a former Chrysler executive who worked in human resources and has experience as a recruiter, and Donald Dellavia, a former plant manager for the H.J. Heinz Co.

If you're wondering what an executive from a bankrupt car company, and a ketchup plant manager can offer public education, you're probably not alone.

In our final Part, we'll take a look at some of the other efforts the Gates Foundation is making, including those in Ohio.

Education News for 01-16-2013

The Gates Foundation Exposed. Part II