Chaza Banda was born in Zambia and didn’t speak much English when she started school in the U.S. eight years. In a few weeks, she’ll graduate from Shaw High School in East Cleveland with credit in several Advanced Placement courses–including English.
Our colleagues at the Sound of Ideas spoke with Chaza and other members of the high school Class of 2013 recognized by the Cleveland Plain Dealer as Senior Standouts.
The Ohio APME named StateImpact Ohio the first-place winner in continuing coverage and second-place winner in investigative reporting for the Locked Away series.
It’s now easier for teachers coming from out-of-state to come work in Ohio – as long as they’ve been teaching for the last five years consecutively and are not coming from Alaska, Montana, Nebraska, North Dakota or Wyoming.
At its meeting this month, the State Board of Education voted on a policy that streamlines the teacher licensure process for most out-of-state teachers. Continue Reading →
[John] Childs, 47, of Planetree Court on the Northwest Side, had been under investigation since last summer after a law-enforcement task force traced 145 files of suspected child pornography to his home computer. Investigators searched his home in October and seized his computer, flash drives, an iPad and several guns.
He had worked for the state for 22 years, including eight years as the Education Department’s chief financial officer.
Source: Thomas B. Fordham Institute/FDR Group report
Ohio schools aren’t ready for major changes the state has mandated, according to the results of a survey of superintendents conducted by the Thomas B. Fordham Institute.
And the rapid pace of school reform may mean Ohio policymakers risk the failure of ambitious efforts to improve schools if the pace doesn’t slow, said Fordham’s Terry Ryan.
Fordham supports many of the reforms superintendents are balking at, like a new way of evaluating teachers and a law requiring third graders to pass the state reading test to move to fourth grade.
Still, “when it comes to Ohio’s reform agenda, are we pushing too hard, too fast? Should we think about slowing it down a bit?” Ryan asked.
“The resistance in the field [to the reforms] is such that a lot of them are going to be blown up.”
Law enforcement officials told Ohio’s state school board Tuesday that allowing teachers to carry guns in schools would not make schools safer.
State Sen. Frank LaRose, R-Copley, told the board he’s leading a school-safety working group developing school-safety policy proposals. Those proposals are not likely to include arming teachers or other school staff, the Associated Press reports.
In the wake of emotional public debate, Ohio Attorney General Mike DeWine told the board Tuesday that he tries to remind the public schools are still among the safest places children can be — compared statistically with, say, riding in a car…
“This is up to the local schools, but I would never, if I was on a school board, have anybody who is untrained with a gun in that school,” he said.
Cleveland Teachers Union President David Quolke, Cleveland Mayor Frank Jackson, and Cleveland Schools CEO Eric Gordon joined forces to pass the Cleveland Plan to Transform Schools. Much of the current tentative contract stems from the Cleveland Plan.
Last night the Cleveland school board unanimously agreed to what city and union officials are hailing as a groundbreaking teacher contract for Ohio. Union members will vote later this month.
The contract spells out a new basis for teacher pay hikes. Raises merely for lasting another year in the job are out; so are automatic bumps for an extra degree. Instead, “pay for performance” is in.
David Vasconez is running radio ads in Ohiofor his company’s new online charter school. He’s working on a sponsorship deal with a minor league sports team. And there’s a grassroots student recruitment plan in the works.
But Vasconez and his colleagues at EdisonLearning don’t actually know if the state will approve the new online charter school the company wants to open next year. They can’t even put in their application with the state until Friday, at the earliest.
Still, Vasconez said EdisonLearning is eager to get into the Ohio online school market.
“Even though we weren’t the first in Ohio, we don’t want to be the last,” he said.
House Committee on Education and the Workforce Democrats / Flickr
AFT President Randi Weingarten testified in Congress in support of common standards in 2009.
Every time I write about the Common Core, I describe it something like this:
The Common Core is a set of expectations for what students should know and be able to do in math and English at each grade level. It was developed by teachers, math and language experts and others in an effort organized by state school chiefs and governors.
But earlier this month, American Federation of Teachers President Randi Weingarten provided a different explanation, one she says better describes the Common Core for parents and others not steeped in education jargon:
Carla Hale and her lawyer, Tom Tootle, announcing that her union will not support her request to get her job back.
Carla Hale, the gay teacher recently fired from a Columbus-area Catholic school, does not have her union’s support in her efforts to get her job back.
Hale was initially fired from Bishop Watterson High School after naming her girlfriend in an obituary for her mother.
Hale argues she was fired for being gay. The Catholic church has maintained that she was fired for revealing a “quasi-spousal relationship” outside of marriage.
Our colleagues at WOSU report the Central Ohio Association of Catholic Educators said it will not support Hale in her efforts to get her job back:
In a letter from the teachers’ union Hale provided to WOSU, union President Kathleen Mahoney stated, “[the union's] decision should not be interpreted as reflecting unfavorably upon Ms. Hale as a person or as an educator.”
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