A new report by LFA and Grunwald Associates, with support from AT&T, examines how parents perceive the value of mobile devices, how they see their children using mobiles, and what they think of the possibilities for mobile learning.
Blog Posts By Charlotte Williams
Edweek recently featured a story on two cases coming before the Supreme Court next 
month that deal with proper protocols of police and school officials in questioning students. School officials are concerned that the court’s decision could put them in an untenable gatekeeping position between police and students. Thus, the National School Boards Association—an LFA member—has filed a court brief outlining concerns with the issues the case brings up that implicate administrators.
The first case—Camreta v. Greene—deals with an incident in 2003 when a state child protective services caseworker and a deputy sheriff in Oregon interviewed a 9-year-old girl at school about suspected sexual abuse by her father. The mother claims that after denying abuse for two hours the girl finally told investigators what they wanted to hear (though charges against the father were later dismissed), and that the interrogation violated the girl’s Fourth Amendment right to freedom from unreasonable seizure. A lower court ruled in favor of ...
On Monday, Slate featured an excellent article by Richard Kahlenberg that focused on the 
problems with Michelle Rhee’s credo and his dismay at the continued media endorsement of her efforts. In critiquing Rhee, the article also provides cogent arguments dealing with anti-union fervor (a timely topic in light of current events in states like Wisconsin, Indiana, and Ohio) and how this can serve to push into the background the singly most problematic element the education industry deals with: disadvantaged prospects and likelihood for achievement among students, stemming from race and income inequalities
While Kahlenberg acknowledges that Rhee made some significant improvements to DC public schools—such as ensuring that students got textbooks on time and making efficient use of space by closing under-used schools—he asserts that contrary to popular claims, “she didn’t revolutionize education in DC.” ...
Like many education stakeholders, I appreciate President Obama’s budgetary commitment to education (even though he found an inhospitable audience in the House). Despite tough financial times, it’s commendable that he is taking a far-sighted approach to the health of the country by focusing on education. However, with his budget, we’re left facing the same problem we’ve faced over the past couple years - over-emphasis on competitive funding programs like Race for the Top.
Perhaps in examining the issue of competitive funding, we should consider largely philosophical roots of competition ideologies. Libertarianism is the poster-child for competition and privatization, but most would agree that this philosophy breaks down in certain categories: some needs simply are not fulfilled well relying on the private sector, and some of these needs—like education—comprise areas where we simply can’t afford market failings.
Maurice Elias recently blogged on this issue on edutopia. He wrote, “it is difficult for me to understand why we want, need, or should tolerate competition for a public function such as education. We don’t have competition for police and fire services. These are required to be uniformly excellent and equitable. They are not always, but ...
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Tomorrow begins a Conference on Labor-Management Collaboration in Denver, sponsored by the U.S. Department of Education, American Federation of Teachers, National Education Association, National School Boards Association, American Association of School Administrators, Council of the Great City Schools, and the Federal Mediation and Conciliation Service. The conference aims to highlight examples of collaborative approaches that ease friction between administrators and union members, expedite education reforms, and lead to better results for students.
U.S. Education Secretary Arne Duncan, NEA President Dennis Van Roekel, and AFT President Randi Weingarten announced plans for the conference in October while celebrating an innovative labor agreement in Hillsborough County, Florida.
In the past several months, there have been numerous negative depictions in the media of teachers and teachers’ unions—including Waiting for “Superman,” some segments of NBC’s Education Nation summit. The messages indicate that
February is National School-Based Health Care Awareness Month, so I wanted to discuss school-based health centers (SBHCs) as beneficial models for communities nation-wide. The National Assembly on School-Based Health Care explains that SBHCs are comprised of partnerships between schools and local health care organizations to deliver health care (physical and mental) to students on a school campus. Currently, schools with SBHCs predominantly serve low-income students who historically experience health care disparities (although even schools with different student demographics could benefit from the SBHC model.) And while SBHCs serve the student and faculty population at the school where they are housed, many also open their doors to students from other schools, as well as to other members of the community. SBHCs can be funded from both government (local, state, and federal) and private groups, depending on the model each community develops. Currently, there are more than 1,900 SBHCs in 48 states and territories.
There are many compelling benefits to SBHCs. Besides providing care for populations that otherwise might not receive it, research indicates they increase school attendance and academic performance, decrease school drop-out rates, and ...
Continuing with the tenure conversation Cheryl Williams began earlier this week, I wanted to discuss a recent New York Times article that outlines current efforts by governors to eliminate tenure in their states.
Connecting poor student performance to teachers is clearly a general emphasis among many critics of public education, and it seems to be an especially potent issue now in politics, as evidenced in part by President Obama’s last two State of the Union address in which he discussed teacher assessments. Jumping on this bandwagon of blaming teachers, governors in Florida, Idaho, Indiana, Nevada, and New Jersey (and legislatures in other states) want to focus on removing perceived ineffective teachers through eliminating or imposing drastic reductions in tenure protections.
I imagine few would argue that current tenure systems are less than ideal, and there are legitimate reforms to tenure that would benefit all major actors involved. And as the article points out, both the American Federation of Teachers and the National Education Association are in favor of good reform (and the AFT practiced what they preach by endorsing a Colorado law last year that allows for the removal of tenured teachers found consistently ineffective). AFT also helped broker tenure and labor reforms in New Haven, Connecticut, and in Baltimore, Maryland, and the NEA was similarly instrumental in principal and teacher evaluation reforms in Hillsborough County, Florida.
So while there are no doubt thoughtful ways to reform tenure to allow for teacher dismissal based on effectiveness rather than simply seniority, these governors and state legislatures seem focused on quick-and-dirty bills that serve more to score political points than ...
President Barak Obama’s State of the Union address has drawn a mixed response from players in the education community. I imagine all appreciate the president’s focus on education as an important issue, and approve of his connecting it to broader American self-interest with talk of jobs and competitiveness in worldwide markets. Likewise, few would disagree with Obama’s emphasis on long-term investment in education, parental involvement in children's learning, the shared responsibility of schools and their communities, recruiting more science, technology, engineering, and mathematics teachers, and the need to overhaul No Child Left Behind. It’s also refreshing that he pointed out teachers are the most important school-based factor in a child’s success; he emphasized the greater importance of parents (and though research more specifically shows the influence of socio-economic status, these two categories are related). His talk of curbing the reach of the federal government was also encouraging to many, although his actual policy emphases related to Race to the Top and other competitive funding measures seem to counter this rhetoric.
Many are concerned with federal oversight of schools, as well as competitive allocation of funds. In a statement responding to the State of the Union Address, American Federation of Teachers President Randi Weingarten discussed the need to protect children from struggling segments of the population. Likewise, NEA President Dennis Van Roekel expressed his continued concern that “competitive grants such as ...
Reauthorization of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (currently known as No Child Left Behind) has long been a concern among the education community and policymakers, but this issue has experienced more buzz within the past several months.
While up till now gaining broad support among policymakers for a focus on ESEA legislation has been slow, there are indications that reauthorization may have turned a corner and could happen in the relative short-term. This is in part due to effects of Education Secretary Arne Duncan’s active effort speaking on behalf of reauthorization in public forums and in meetings with legislative members for the past two years, and to claims that Obama is set to make education a major priority, starting with his upcoming state-of-the-union address (January 25) that is supposed to highlight education. As Susan Ochshorn of the Huffington Post relays, both Obama and Duncan are connecting education—and ESEA renewal—to economic ...
Community support for schools is a crucial issue, especially in light of the current negativity toward public schools by the media, and severe funding limits on the national, state, and local level. It is timely then that during a recent meeting, members of the Learning First Alliance heard from Jamie Vollmer—head of Vollmer, Inc., a public education advocacy firm—who discussed ideas from his most recent book, Schools Cannot Do It Alone: Building Public Support for America’s Public Schools. He focused on the idea of local level community engagement for building school support.
Clearly educators face many challenges and have to work under numerous limitations (money, time, and demographic realities of schools, among others). But Vollmer argues there is a largely unexploited factor that can work to schools’ advantages: the malleability of local communities to accepting area educators as legitimate forces for good.
He asserts that by effectively targeting community members and informing them on how it is in their own self-interest to have good public schools, educators can gain the community support that is so vital to school issues.
To do so, Vollmer proposes that educators reach out using two tracks: a formal track that focuses on community groups, and an informal one that takes place through every day interactions. The formal track should take place “on the communities’ turf and ...
Over the past several years, many in the education industry have debated the significance of master’s degrees for teachers, and often also whether this higher degree warrants more pay. Many blogs have commented on this issue, including Education Week blogs, university blogs, and newspaper blogs.
The American Association of Colleges for Teacher Education (AACTE), a member of the Learning First Alliance, is also contributing to the conversation. Their website currently highlights the controversial issue of the relationship between teacher master’s degrees and student classroom success.
They note recent comments by Bill Gates and U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan that little current evidence suggests a positive correlation between the two, and that therefore we should question the efficacy of master’s degrees and the validity of rewarding them monetarily. Two organizations - the Higher Education Consortium for Special Education and the Teacher Education Division of the Council for Exceptional Children - have responded by writing letters to these two influential public figures, pointing out an IES- supported 2010 study on special education teachers in Florida that found a positive correlation between advanced degrees and ...
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