Peanut update (h/t PIM)

 

From Flickr user ♦ Biel's ® ♦ Gabriel Machado ♦

(h/t Politics in Minnesota)

 

FDA has expanded the peanut recall — apparently peanuts as old as 2 years are still floating around out there and are considdered tainted.  PIM says peanuts and peanut products in this phase of the recall were distributed to 197 schools in Minnesota, although they don’t cite their source.  The FDA has more info on the outbreak, including a database of affected products here.

Filed under: Minnesota, National, Education, Minnesota, National Issues, Poisonous Peanuts

Git along, little dogies – It’s the Friday Roundup!

Some things old, some things new, some things borrowed, and some things…well, I don’t think there’s any blue in this list:

– Don’t eat the peanut butter  – still! (NYTimes)

– Joe Nathan (of the Center for School Change)  on TIZA.

– Minnesota gets “D’s” in how well it recruits good teachers and gets rid of bad teachers (National Council on Teacher Quality)

– Minnesota’s own stimulus bill gives $150 billion to school districts, colleges, and childcare centers (Minnesota Independent)

– Pakistan’s public education system is defunct, fuels extremism (Christian Science Monitor)

– The children of Gaza go back to school amid the rubble (al-Jazeera English)

– What’s in Obama’s stimulus package for education? (ohmygov.com)  Duluth gets $8 million (Duluth News Tribune)

– NYTimes: Obama’s magical pixie dust of self-esteem eliminates the achievement gap.  What a bunch of baloney, says everyone else (Tenured Radical via History News Network, and D-Ed Reckoning)

From Flickr user ingirogio

– And, lastly, a recipe for psychadelic, fat-free cake

Filed under: Announcements, National, Achievement Gap, Education, Education Funding, Federal Education Policy, News, Teacher Quality

Charter school association proposes changes in governing laws

(Originally published in the Twin Cities Daily Planet 1/28/09)

It’s like clockwork: last Wednesday, a Twin Cities charter school was sued by the American Civil Liberties Union’s Minnesota chapter for allegedly violating the separation of church and state. last Thursday, the Minnesota Association of Charter Schools announced the details of their proposed reforms to the framework legislation that regulates charter schools.
At the press conference announcing the proposed legislation, the Executive Director of the Association, Eugene Piccolo, said the timing of the two events – and a section of the legislation that bans “organizations with church status” from sponsoring a charter school – was just a coincidence. The bulk of the MACS proposal is focused on clarifying, overhauling, and regulating several aspects of charter school governance, including the relationship of a charter school to its sponsor.

Filed under: Minnesota, St Paul, Achievement Gap, Charter Schools, Education, Education Policy, Education Reform, TIZA

Travelers’ Insurance donation to St Paul schools “ushers in new era” of school/business cooperation – St. Paul Superintendent

“When I joined AVID, in the last quarter of my freshman year…my grades were all over the place,” Jordan Steware, a 10^th grader at Highland Park Senior High in St Paul said yesterday.  “I had one A, but that was in gym; mostly it was B’s and C’s.”

 After half a year in the AVID program at Highland Park, he says his Grade Point Average has risen to 3.4, and he’s enrolled in all International Baccalaureate (IB); classes. IB is a rigorous academic curriculum used in many schools, similar to the Advanced Placement program, which demands more work from its participants and pushes them harder.

Filed under: St Paul, Achievement Gap, AVID, Budget Crisis, College Preparation, Education, Education Funding, Education Reform, Public/Private Partnerships

State officials “close” to resolving budget crisis

(Originally published in the Twin Cities Daily Planet, 1/28/09)

Unless the Commissioner of Education and the state legislature act, a large percentage of Minnesota’s 11th graders willnot be able to graduate next year, because they did not score high enough on a new math test. Introduced as part of the state’s high-stakes testing regimen, theGRAD test is given to all 11th graders. This is the first year students are required to pass the test in order to graduate.

“It’s not fair to let these high schoolers get caught in the cross-hairs” of the test, said Rep. Mindy Greiling (DFL-Roseville). She said the problem is that not all current 9th, 10th, and 11th graders have received the needed support and more rigorous preparation. The high-stakes testing regimen was put in place in lower grades after they had reached high school, and this year’s 11th graders will have limited time for remedial courses.

Filed under: Minnesota, St Paul, Achievement Gap, Carlos Mariani, Charlie Kyte, Education, Mindy Greiling, Minnesota, Testing

Litter pickup was only the begining: beloved Twin Cities Educator remembered

Image courtesy of EcoEducation

“For Kathy, it was never good enough to do a litter pickup,” Mara Coyle said.  “She would never let you say ‘I’ve got this down pat.’  Sure, she’d celebrate your success, but then, in a quiet way, she would push you to do something more.”

This attitude, friends, family, and co-workers said, was what propelled Kathy Kinzig’s efforts to build EcoEducation from a shoestring non-profit when she took the Executive Director’s job in 1997, into a $400,000-a-year organization serving 17 charter and public schools in Minneapolis and St Paul “with a waiting list as long as your arm,” EcoEducation Board Member Jane Prince said.

Kinzig died of bone cancer in December at age 43.  Her family, friends, and former co-workers held a memorial service at the Lake Como Pavilion this past Saturday.

Filed under: Minneapolis, Minnesota, St Paul, Battle Creek Middle School, EcoEducation, Education, Environment, Kathy Kinzig, Minneapolis, Minnesota, St Paul

Friday national news round-up

 

The caption contest is still open!  Come up with a better title for the Friday national education news round-up than, well, the Friday national education news round-up.  The prize is my gratitude, and perhaps your name in the title, if you can find a clever way to work it in.

The Round-up

• San Diego teachers, schools argue about teacher quality 
• Don’t eat the peanut butter!
• St Paul faces a $25 million deficit — expect layoffs, the board is told
• Education Week (sign-in required) on the future of ELL education
• T-Paw suggests an increase in education funding — if schools sign onto his pet program that some have criticized in the past as a union-busting measure
• The Washington Post has the transcript of Education Secretary Arne Duncan’s confirmation hearing
• National Public Radio’s education podcast

In local news, a memorial service will be held at 2pm at St Paul’s Como Park Pavillion for Kathy Kinzig, the much-beloved founder of EcoEducation who died in December after a long battle with bone cancer.  She was 43. 

From the announcement:

“Kathy was the person who figured out that kids didn’t need to go into the woods to learn about the environment — it’s in your own back yard.  The Urban environment’s flora and fauna include workers, residents, business, colleges, dogs and cats, boulevard trees and weeds asserting themselves through the cracks in the sidewalk, which all leave their mark on the health and well being of the city’s eco system.

“Eco Ed serves students and teachers in grades 5-12 at about 14 public and charter schools in the two cities, with a waiting list as long as your arm.  It provides a couple of curriculums which can be taught across disciplines, or through social studies, science and humanities classes, called “City Connections” and “Urban Stewards.”  The programs teach kids how to identify problems they want to solve in their communities and then gives them the tools (through community resource volunteers, buses, equipment, materials) to go forth and make change.  Kids even do grantwriting and make presentations to Eco Ed staff to make their case for additional dollars. “

Filed under: Announcements, National, Arne Duncan, Budget Crisis, Education, Education Funding, ELL, Minnesota, National Issues, Secretary of Education, Teacher Quality, Tim Pawlenty

Bombshell — MN ACLU sues TIZA charter school and MDE

Tarek ibn Ziyad Academy — better known to readers of former Star Tribune writer Katherin Kersten’s column  as TIZA — and its parent organization, Islamic Relief USA, are being hauled into federal court by the Minnesota chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union for violating the constitutional seperation of church and state.

Due to their oversight role of charter schools, the Minnesota Department of Education is also named as a plaintiff in the lawsuit that alleges TIZA funneled state money to organizations explicitly dedicated to promoting Islam.

“TIZA, its Board of Directors, and its sponsor Islamic Relief have set school policies that endorse and promote a single religion, Islam. They have used tax funds to sponsor and establish a school that is pervasively sectarian,” says the MN ACLU’s complaint, linked to from their press release.   (h/t Andy Birkey at the Minnesota Independent)

Filed under: Minnesota, St Paul, Achievement Gap, ACLU, Charter Schools, Education, Education Funding, Immigant education, Islam, Minnesota, multicultural education, TIZA

Big news for education this legislative session

 

(Originally published in the Twin Cities Daily Planet, 1/19/09)

 

State Rep. Carlos Mariani

Charter schools, the mathGRAD test, and No Child Left Behind were among the topics when Daily Planet reporter James Sanna sat down with State Representative Carlos Mariani (DFL – St Paul) Tuesday to talk about some of the issues in public education facing the legislature this year. Rep. Mariani chairs the House of Representatives’ E-12 Education Policy and Oversight Committee.

TCDP: In your committee hearing on Tuesday, Rep. Jim Abler mentioned a proposed law to regulate charter schools – among other things, it gets more specific about a sponsor’s responsibilities or about their religious affiliation – Could you tell us a little more about that?

Filed under: Minnesota, St Paul, Carlos Mariani, Charter Schools, Education, Education Policy, Education Reform, Minnesota, NCLB, Testing

Arne Duncan, Secretary of Education

A day late in posting this, but Arne Duncan has been “warmly recieved” by the Senate.  

“Duncan promised to aggressively pursue Obama’s agenda: expanding preschool, making college more accessible and affordable, finding new ways to prepare teachers and helping overhaul the 2002 No Child Left Behind law.

‘We must do dramatically better. We must continue to innovate,’ Duncan said. ‘We must build upon what works. We must stop doing what doesn’t work. And we have to continue to challenge the status quo.’”

 

Some alternative opinions on Duncan here:

http://www.catalyst-chicago.org/RUSSO/index.php/entry/1429/Duncan_Pros_and_Cons

http://www.democracynow.org/2008/12/18/duncan

http://www.counterpunch.org/libby12292008.html

 

And some advice for Duncan, via the Washington Post

Filed under: National, Arne Duncan, Education, Education Policy, National Issues, Secretary of Education