Teaching

Background

Merit pay; eliminating tenure; new teacher evaluations — how are school, district and state policies affecting how educators and their students perform?

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February 6, 2012

How Does Arne Duncan Feel About Florida’s New School Ranking System?

Last month, Gov. Rick Scott told the Florida Department of Education to rank all of Florida’s 3,078 schools from best to worst. That list was released last week — to criticism that it relied mostly on FCAT scores and did not take poverty into account. So, my colleague John O’Connor and I wondered how U.S. […]

February 1, 2012

Building A Better Middle School STEM Teacher

Florida’s state universities have been doing a lot of thinking about science, technology, engineering and mathematics education recently, spurred by Gov. Rick Scott and the Legislature’s interest in turning out more graduates ready for high-tech jobs. Last week WUSF Mark Schreiner profiled a University of South Florida researcher trying to figure out what attracts students […]

January 19, 2012

Miami-Dade Teacher Evaluations Insufficient, Report Says

Miami-Dade schools do not do enough to weed out poor-performing teachers, according to a new study by the National Council on Teacher Quality. The nation’s fourth-largest school district fired just 10 of more than 20,000 teachers last year for poor performance, according to the report. In comparison, Springfield, Illinois fired 10 of 2,144 teachers while […]

December 19, 2011

MDC School Board Member: Charter School Turned Away My Daughter Because Of Autism

Our recent story on the difficulties students with severe disabilities have found trying to enroll in charter schools has drawn plenty of reaction from parents in similar situations. Just 14 percent of Florida charter schools enroll students with profound disabilities. More than half of district schools enroll similar students. We heard from parents, such as […]

December 15, 2011

Cashing In On Kids: Investigations Raise Questions About Florida Charter Schools

New investigations by the Miami Herald and StateImpact Florida raise serious concerns about Florida’s charter schools – including who’s profiting from them, and whether they are serving kids with severe disabilities. That’s the topic of a one-hour radio special, “Cashing in on Kids,” by WLRN/Miami Herald News in conjunction with StateImpact Florida and WUSF Public […]

November 22, 2011

Before Thanksgiving Comes The “Disillusionment Phase” For New Teachers

It’s that time between Halloween and Thanksgiving when first-year teachers start losing some of the initial excitement they had at the start of the school year, and when students (who haven’t had a school break in a while) start pushing new teachers to see what they can get away with. Roxanna Elden, calls the month of […]

November 15, 2011

Read the Emails Between Suspended Hillsborough Teacher and Union Officials

A Hillsborough County high school teacher suspended last week over his objection to a new evaluation has apparently posted his emails with school and union officials online. Newsome High School teacher Joseph Thomas objected to a peer evaluator he believed did not have enough experience. The review is part of a new teacher evaluation system […]

November 8, 2011

Shortage of Nursing Faculty May Bring Online Doctorate Programs

We’ve heard plenty about the need for more nurses. But students who want to become nurses are being turned away from training programs because there aren’t enough instructors to teach them. Schools are looking for alternatives. The latest is the University System of Georgia, where leaders hope computers can fill in some of the educational […]

November 4, 2011

Feedback Loop: Payback on Teacher Pay Study

In politics, they talk about hitting the “third rail” – a topic so controversial that it’s almost deadly. And this week, we think we’ve touched the third rail of education policy: teacher pay.

October 13, 2011

Would You Donate Your Sick Days to a Colleague?

If a cancer-stricken colleague has burned all of his or her sick leave, would you want to donate yours to help them out? A Florida lawmakers has introduced a bill allowing just that. Stuart Republican Rep. Gayle Harrell told TCPalm.com that the bill was inspired by Karen Gangi, a Martin County elementary teacher who used […]

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