John O'Connor is the Miami-based education reporter for StateImpact Florida. John previously covered politics, the budget and taxes for The (Columbia, S.C) State. He is a graduate of Allegheny College and the University of Maryland.
New federal data shows Florida's graduation rate is improving, but the state's national ranking has changed little since 2001-2002.
Florida’s graduation rate is increasing but the state still ranks among the nation’s lowest, according to new federal data.
Just six states and the District of Columbia had a lower graduation rate than Florida’s 70.8 percent, according to the National Center for Education Statistics for the 2010-2011 school year. In the 2001-2002 school year, just five states and the District of Columbia had a lower graduation rate than Florida.
However, Florida’s graduation rate has risen to 70.8 percent in the 2010-2011 school year from 63.4 percent in the 2001-2002 school year — a 7.4 percentage point increase. During the same period, the national rate increased to 78.2 percent from 72.6 percent — a 5.6 percentage point increase.
These figures use an older method for calculating graduation rates. The federal government has required states to use a new, standardized method. Those figures allow for a better comparison among individual state graduation rates.
Thursday's Florida Supreme Court decision could be cited in another legal challenge pushed by teachers.
In 2011 lawmakers approved a law requiring public employees — including teachers — pay 3 percent of their salary into their retirement account.
Public employee unions challenged the law, arguing it unconstitutionally changes a contract with workers and violates workers’ right to collectively bargain pay and benefits.
A circuit court overturned the law, but Thursday the Florida Supreme Court upheld the law in a 4-3 decision.
The decision is likely to set a precedent when a lower court issues its decision on another teacher-related lawsuit (A decision which is expected to be appealed to the Supreme Court).
That suit challenges a 2011 law, the Student Success Act, requiring teachers to be evaluated, in part, based on student standardized test scores, requiring district to design merit pay programs to pay better performing teachers more money, and ending long-term contracts for new hires.
Veterans would have an easier time receiving in-state tuition at Florida colleges and universities if a bill introduced by Sen. Jack Latvala becomes law.
The Senate has also introduced a bill, SB 180, granting the U.S. citizen children of undocumented immigrants in-state tuition rates. Those students would have to attend school in Florida for four years and apply to college within twelve months of graduating from a Florida high school.
Charters are now serving a record 2.3 million students based on estimates from the current school year. But a pro-choice non-profit says Florida school districts are preventing more charters from opening.
Data collected by the Alliance show charter schools now make up more than five percent of public schools in the country.
It took two decades to get there. Most of the growth happened in the last five years.
Since 2007-08, the Alliance reports “the public charter sector has added 1,700 schools – almost a 50 percent increase – and is serving an additional one million students – an increase of 80 percent.”
HB 29 would grant any U.S. citizen who graduates from a Florida high school after attending for one year in-state tuition at Florida colleges and universities.
HB 17 would set stricter rules to qualify for in-state tuition. Students would have to attend a Florida high school for four consecutive years to qualify for the lower tuition. HB 11 also mandates dependents of undocumented immigrants who are U.S. citizens also qualify for in-state tuition, but would leave it to the State Board of Education to set the rules.
It’ll cost a fortune, it doesn’t improve the identification of effective teachers, but we need to do it to overcome resistance from teachers and others. Not only will this not work, but in spinning the research as they have, the Gates Foundation is clearly distorting the straightforward interpretation of their findings: a mechanistic system of classroom observation provides virtually nothing for its enormous cost and hassle. Oh, and this is the case when no stakes were attached to the classroom observations. Once we attach all of this to pay or continued employment, their classroom observation system will only get worse…
So, rather than having “figured out what makes a good teacher” the Gates Foundation has learned very little in this project about effective teaching practices. The project was an expensive flop. Let’s not compound the error by adopting this expensive flop as the basis for centrally imposed, mechanistic teacher evaluation systems nationwide.
Gates Foundation researchers say they believe schools can accurately assess teacher performance using a statistical formula.
The Gates Foundation says teacher performance can be accurately evaluated using data-based statistical formulas, but the best teacher evaluations also include student ratings and classroom observation.
That’s the conclusions from a three-year, $45 million study of a number of big school districts across the country including Hillsborough County, Charlotte, Dallas, Denver, Memphis, New York City and Pittsburgh.
The most definitive conclusion is likely to be the most controversial. Gates researchers say that a teacher’s so-called value-added scores accurately predict a student’s future performance.
But Gates researchers say value-added is essential to any teacher evaluation.
“The research confirmed that, as a group, teachers previously identified as more effective caused students to learn more,” the report concludes. “Groups of teachers who had been identified as less effective caused students to learn less.”
These ideas include assigning A through F grades to schools and school districts based in part on standardized test results, retaining low-performing third graders, expanding school choice, teacher evaluations and others.
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