Akshay Desai resigned from the State Board of Education to focus on his struggling health care company.
Gov. Rick Scott filled three slots on the State Board of Education Thursday, reappointing John Padget of Key West and appointing Ada Armas of Coral Gables and John Colon of University Park.
On Feb. 25, leaders from the Florida Legislature will be answering your questions at a Town Hall on Session 2013, an event sponsored by Global Integrity.
Education is a big part of the conversation. From teacher pay to charter school funding laws, you can ask Florida lawmakers what their education priorities will be during the upcoming legislative session.
RSVP to join WLRN and The Miami Heraldon Monday, Feb. 25th at 6:30pm for the live, free event at the Broward Center for the Performing Arts in Fort Lauderdale.
The bill adds more restrictions to closed charter schools and requires charter schools to post their board, management firm and some spending online.
The bill also requires school districts to turn over empty buildings formerly used for K-12 education to charter schools at no cost. Charter schools must pay for maintenance or reimburse the school district for the cost.
“This is not a finished product,” Rep. George Moraitis, Jr., R-Fort Lauderdale, said. “We’re still open to changes as we move forward in the process.”
The bill allows charter schools to use empty school district facilities. Charter schools would have to pay for maintenance, or reimburse the district for maintenance.
The 36-page bill would also prohibit a shuttered charter school from spending more than $10,000 without the prior written permission of the school board or other sponsor, with some exceptions.
Charter school employees would not be allowed to serve on the charter school’s governing board.
Those requirements are a direct result of a case from Orlando.
The foundation’s goal is for 60 percent of Americans to earn a high-quality post secondary credential or degree by 2025. Merisotis took questions from the audience.
Q: Does the Lumina Foundation have a position on how the university systems should price their services? In my day, the university system priced its tuition on a quarterly basis, so we took all the hours we could take per quarter. We all finished in four years flat. What do you say about that – do we need to go back?
A: You bet. There are two sides to this financing equation – two elements that you’ve got to address when you’re dealing with the issues of redesigning the financing system.
One side is the cost side, which is getting more productivity out of the enterprise. What I mean is literally increasing the capacity of the system to serve more people better.
Today is Digital Learning Day, an effort to raise awareness about the benefits of integrating more technology into education.
Today is Digital Learning Day, part of an effort to put more emphasis on the possibilities computers, the Internet and new technology offer to improve education.
Advocates argue access and customization are the biggest advantages to digital instruction. Students often find digital instruction more engaging — pull out those smart phones and Wi-Fi enabled iPods, students — and the materials can be more interactive and easily updated.
But Florida lawmakers believe in the advantages of digital learning and have required schools to deliver half of their instruction digitally beginning in the fall of 2015. The state requires students to take one online course in order to graduate high school. Florida students are also more likely to take a standardized test on a computer than in other states.
Lumina Foundation president and CEO Jamie Merisotis. He says the number of Floridians earning higher education degrees is not keeping pace with job openings.
The percentage of Floridians earning college degrees is not increasing fast enough to keep pace with the job market, according to the head of a foundation working to boost higher education graduates.
That’s what Jamie Merisotis, president and CEO of the Lumina Foundation, told the Economic Club of Florida last week.
“It’s an urgent need,” Merisotis said and nearly every state is far from that goal.
“Here in Florida, according to the most recent data, 37 percent of the state’s working age residents (ages 25 to 64) have at least a two-year college degree,” Merisotis said. “That figure is virtually unchanged over the course of the last four years.”
That means the rates are flat in Florida, and “when it comes to educational progress, flat is actually frightening. That’s because educational success is increasingly linked to economic prosperity.”
Lumina’s strategic plan, Goal 2025, is to have 60 percent of Americans holding a high quality post secondary degree, certificate or other credential by 2025.
The Lumina Foundation is a donor to Florida C.A.N., which supports StateImpact Florida.
Michelle Rhee, the education firebrand/lightning rod who is the former chancellor of Washington, D.C. public schools, sat down for an interview with Jon Stewart on The Daily Show last night.
Rhee founded education advocacy group StudentsFirst. Rhee has advised Florida Gov. Rick Scott. She is known for vociferously challenging teacher’s unions and promoting policies
Stewart particularly questioned Rhee about her treatment of teachers and the effect on professional morale. Stewart also asked if it was fair to minimize the effect of poverty and upbringing on student achievement, as Rhee’s brand of “no excuses” school policies often do.
The wave of new education policies, Stewart said, have left teachers feeling like a football team forced to adjust each time a new offensive is brought in.
Hillsborough Community College president Ken Atwater signs a "reverse transfer" agreement Monday as University of South Florida president Judy Genshaft looks on. The agreement allows students who transfer to the University of South Florida to earn credits toward an associate's degree from one of four Tampa Bay colleges.
Students who transfer to the University of South Florida can still earn a degree at their former school.
USF and four Tampa Bay colleges signed a “reverse transfer” agreement Monday.
That means when a student completes a class a USF, the credits can count toward an associate’s degree at Hillsborough Community College, Pasco-Hernando Community College, Polk State College and St. Petersburg College.
HCC president Ken Atwater says students who earn enough credits at USF will automatically receive their degree.
“It’s a great opportunity, because just think about this: This is almost seamless for the students because this will all be electronically done,” Atwater said. ” The students records will be electronically transferred to us. We’ll analyze the records. And if they earned a degree we’ll award the degree.”
Florida comes in 12th in the most recent rankings, but it’s one of the leaders in making progress. Florida is also tied for first overall in policy – with four states getting a B+.
“I’m not sure everyone understands here in Florida just how much of a model for the rest of the country you are,” said Dr. Matt Ladner, a policy advisor at the Foundation for Excellence in Education.
“There are states all around the country that are emulating policies that originated here in the state of Florida.”
Ladner wrote the report, and the foundation he works for was founded by former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush, who serves as Chairman. The report will be released later this week or next and is not yet publicly available, an ALEC spokesman said.
Ladner briefed a small lunch gathering at the James Madison Institute about the report. He said the quality of Florida’s K-12 reforms is reflected in ALEC’s report card.
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