Annotative Bibliography
Pols 342: Public Policy
Dr. Meyers
11/9/05
Fall Semester 2005
Tuesday, September 6, 2005: “Back to School, Thinking Globally,” By:
Editorial Desk
The No Child Left Behind Act has encouraged
states to focus on educational inequality, but has lacked in
encouraging educators and politicians to see how the United States’
students are lagging behind other countries academically. According to
this article there are three myths that people in the United States buy
into in order to tell themselves that the United States isn’t lagging
behind academically. They consist of: “Europeans only educate their
elite, America’s white elite children compare favorably with those
abroad, and that the nations who do better than the U.S. student’s are
homogenous societies.” “The author feels that America can be top notch
academically if “it would develop a coherent policy that strives to
make schools better everywhere and strengthens teaching and curriculum
in poor communities.”
Tuesday, September 6, 2005: “No Strangers to the Blues,” By: Bob Herbert
Even before hurricane Katrina hit, many
people, organizations, and places were left neglected when in dire need
of assistance from family, friends, administrations, and local, state,
and national governments. One of these organizations was the New
Orleans school systems. Many factors have contributed to the school
system’s rating as one of the worst in the nation. These factors could
have been eliminated before the hurricane with a few measly policies
however, they were left to fester and as a result, are now a huge
problem for the state of Louisiana.
Wednesday, September 7, 2005: “Across Nation, Storm Victims Crowd
Schools,” By: Sam Dillion
Since hurricane Katrina hit New Orleans,
assistance is needed in every area of life, even within the education
system. The hurricane has caused many people, including President Bush
and Secretary of Education Margaret Spellings to rethink certain
policies for the time being. One of these policies is the No Child Left
Behind Law. Many feel that the No Child Left Behind Law should be
lifted until schools can get children settled in their new schools,
familiar with the curriculum, and up to pare of their studies. However,
the decision about what to do with this Law is up to Ms. Spellings and
President Bush. Another policy that is hovering over educator’s heads
is the amount of federal aid that will be available to them, to help in
the education process of some of the hurricane victims. Currently the
budget for homeless students is $61 million, which according to
Spelling “is obviously insufficient,” leaving much to be done in
helping those student’s struck by hurricane Katrina, get back on their
academic feet.
Friday, Sept. 9, 2005: “Eating, Writing, and Rithmetic,” By: Kim
Severson
When talking to people about school, and what
things make up an important education, I’m sure many of them wouldn’t
say a healthy diet, but at Promise Academy in Harlem, a healthy diet is
a necessity to establishing a proper education. 90% of the students
come from poor families and 44% of the students are obese, leaving the
challenge of creating a healthy eating environment and one in which
students can have for the rest of their lives, to Mr. Andrew Benson, a
chef with a culinary degree from Johnson and Wales University. Mr.
Benson uses part of the food budget on fresher foods then the typical
processed foods. His approach helps when it comes to regular weigh-ins
and fitness records that the students are required to participate in.
This data is important in the schools quest to show the importance of
school food programs, “just like the national Head Start program did to
prove the effectiveness of early education and support for children.”
Monday, September 12, 2005: “Tough Day for Kindergartners (and
Parents),” By: Laurie Tarkan
Children entering kindergarten may have a
tough time making the transition from nursery school to kindergarten.
Many school districts are coming up with policies and procedures that
will make this transition much easier, like involving the parents more
in the process. However, even though policies are being made to help
the students transition, there is nothing to help the parents
transition. Many parents have as much, if not more, anxiety then their
children, when it comes to letting them go on their first day of
Kindergarten. Policies and procedures may be making changes to help
students, but who or what is being done to help parents with this
transition?
Thursday, September 15, 2005: “Judge Rules Reciting Pledge In Schools
Is Unconstitutional,” By: Dean E. Murphy
On Sept. 14th A Federal Judge in Sacramento,
CA ruled that “reciting the Pledge of Allegiance in public schools was
unconstitutional endorsement of religion.” The judge said that he was
bound by a ruling in 2002 by the United States Court of Appeals for the
ninth Circuit in San Francisco, in which the court concluded the
recitation of the pledge to be “impermissibly coercive towards a
religious act” and places “students in the untenable position of
choosing between participating in an exercise with religious content or
protesting.” This ruling has started a whirlwind of disapproval and
disagreement over the pledges place in reference to the phrase “under
God.” The lawsuit was brought by Michael Newdow, whose daughter attends
a school in the courts district. Many are sure that the school
district, will more than likely, appeal and challenge the ruling and
lawsuit by Mr. Newdow.
Thursday, September 22, 2005: “Tenure, Turnover and the Quality of
Teaching,” By: Hal R. Varian
In November, California folks will vote on a
proposition that weakens tenure rules for kindergarten through 12th
grade teachers. Does teacher quality have an impact on student’s
learning? This is a big question being considered in this vote. Eric
Hanushek, John Kain, Daniel O’Brien, and Steven Rivkin wrote a working
paper called “A National Bureau of Economic Research,” which talks
about this debated issue. They feel that teacher effectiveness should
be measured by how much students continually gain on standardized
testing. The authors realize that there are problems with this and have
thought of ideas to fix those problems. First, they realized they
needed to figure out what contributed to teacher effectiveness. They
realized that things like experience (the most important factor) have a
huge impact on teacher effectiveness but didn’t know if this was
associated with survival of the fittest or the longer you teach the
better you get. Also, they researched if teacher effectiveness had to
do with teachers being more effective when teaching students of their
own race. They found that teacher’s were in fact more effective when
teaching their own race. Lastly, the authors looked at teacher
mobility. They found that teachers who quit school and move to
different schools tend to be below average in effectiveness. Using
these persuasive facts, the four some hopes to sway California voters
into seeing the importance of teacher effectiveness, and using this
knowledge to vote accordingly, in November.
Wednesday, September 28, 2005: “Discrimination in Head Start,” By: No
author specified
House Republicans are trying to pass a new
plan for the Head Start program which would license Head Start programs
to discriminate by not hiring individuals who do not share the same
religion has those religious groups that sponsor the local Head Start.
Republicans were trying to pass this bill by tagging it onto another
Head Start bill that unanimously cleared the House education committee
last June. This bill is being backed by the White House. Those who
disagree with the White House believe “the program serves fewer than
half of all eligible children, so what it needs is more money, not
religious discrimination.
Tuesday, October 4, 2005: “Teacher Merit Pay Tied to Education Gains,”
By: Michael Janofsky
Governor Mit Romney of Massachusetts has come
up with a plan to improve education which involves new laptops for
students, new science and math teachers, and merit pay tied to
classroom performance. Mr. Romney’s reasoning for this daring plan is
that “the ability to close the achievement gap is the civil rights
issue of our generation.” The country is lagging behind in production
of scientists and engineers, as well as test scores, and this plan is
aimed at fixing that problem. Mr. Romney’s plan would require $46
million in new spending for 2006 and $143 million for 2007. Other
states like Minnesota and Colorado have put more money towards
bettering education. For example, in Denver an initiative ballot will
ask voters to approve raising property taxes by $25 million a year in
order to pay public school teachers more money.
Mr. Romney’s idea to develop merit pay has
been considered nationwide. However, for all those who are in favor of
Mr. Romney’s plan, there are just as many who think he needs to think
it through better or has no case at all. “State lawmakers and union
leaders have criticized it as inadequate to deal with the more
entrenched problems of public education and as unfair for limiting the
number of teachers who can qualify for a $5,000 bonus offered to
teachers in three categories: those who teach Advanced Placement
courses, those recruited to teach science and math, and the top
one-third of teachers in each school district as measured by classroom
improvement.” Democratic Senator Robert R. Antonioni says that some of
Mr. Romney’s ideas are clever, however he needs to think them through
more. Many feel that Mr. Romney could improve his ideas by taking a
more “fundamental approach to education overhaul, like building more
classrooms, spending more for texts and raising salaries across the
board.” Mr. Romney stays firm in his position saying “you can’t keep
spending more money the same way and expect different results. That’s
the definition of crazy.”
Wednesday, October 5, 2005: “Secret to Better Scores: Making the
Reading Tests Easier,” By: Michael Winerip
Many politicians are excited because state
testing in many states has improved, leading many politicians to
believe that their reforms are working. However, teachers are saying
that the tests were easier, leading to the reason why there has been
such an improvement. Ms. Rosenstein, who has been a principal for 13
years, said that the minute she opened up the testing booklet for 2005,
she could tell the test was much easier than the 2004 test. She said on
the 2004 English test, the first reading was 451 words long, talking
about a family traveling west on the Oregon Trail. However, the reading
section on the 2005 test was only 188 words and talked about the life
of an otter. The story was so easy it gave the kids confidence, leading
them to do much better on the test. The state representative for
education, Mr. Jonathan Burman, said that indeed the 2005 test was
easier, but said that the state compensated by using a tougher grading
scale.
Monday, October 17, 2005: “Tucked in Katrina Relief, a Boon for Online
Colleges,” By: Samuel G. Freedman
United States Senate Bill 1715 has kindly proposed assistance for the
many students and teachers affected by Hurricane Katrina, though sadly,
tucked within the bill is a proposition supporting profit-making online
colleges by “barring federal student loans and grants from colleges
that enroll more than half their students in online divisions or offer
more than half their courses through distance education.” “Propriety
colleges would receive $20,000 or more a year for each student who gets
such a common federal aid as Pell grants and Perkins, Stafford and PLUS
loans.” Unfortunately, this would be done by using the hurricane as an
excuse to accomplish some shady policy goals.
This bill, angers many teachers’ unions,
college admissions counselors, and college administrators who have seen
the history of abuses used by proprietary colleges. Despite the
addition of the 50 percent rule by congress in 1992, proprietary
schools have consistently been misbehaving by admitting unqualified
students, inflating graduation and job-placement rates, lying about
accreditation, etc. If Bill 1715 is passed, the 50 percent rule will be
thrown out, leaving proprietary schools to openly misbehave at the
expense of innocent victims of Hurricane Katrina.
Thursday, October 20, 2005: “Education Law Gets First Test in U.S.
Schools,” By: Sam Dillon
The No Child Left Behind Act got its first
trial test this past year and the results came in on Wednesday, October
19th. For some the results were hopeful, for others they were a
disappointment, it all depends on who you ask. “Math scores were up
slightly but eighth grade reading showed a decline, and there was only
modest progress toward closing the achievement gap between white and
minority students,” which is one of the Bush administration’s primary
goals. Some feel that despite the progress in math scores, there was
just too much negative to outweigh the positives of the Act. However,
President Bush was pleased with the results stating, “It shows there’s
an achievement gap in America that is closing.”
The test uses a 500 point scale with scores
assigned to achievement levels: below basic; basic, and proficient. The
results showed that fourth-grade students improved in math, with 36
percent scoring proficient, compared with 32 percent in 2003. In math
scores were another important gain, with the proportion of black
students performing below basic declining from 46 percent to 40
percent. The improvements are great, but are they enough to reach the
goal of full proficiency for all students by 2014? According to the
above results, proficiency won’t be achieved until 2034, causing many
to believe that the No Child Left Behind Act, though a good idea, is
not enough soon enough.
Thursday, October 20, 2005: “Fierce Battle is Joined Over Teachers,”
By: Michael Janofsky
A ballot will go before California voters in
November that would extend the time that public school teachers wait to
gain tenure, from two years to five years, and will be given the power
to change the rules for dismissal, “allowing administrators to fire any
teacher after two unsatisfactory evaluations without a 90 day period
for improvement and a comprehensive appeals process.” Governor
Schwarzenegger has gained a lot of attention with this measure, with a
clean split on both sides of the issue.
Teachers and teacher unions are leading the
opposition, “arguing that the initiative would do little to improve
classroom achievement, would scare way new teachers, and would
encourage school districts to get rid of older teachers who cost more
in salary and benefits.” Many of these teachers see the stagnation in
student achievement having less to do with problems in the teaching
then the bill proposes or hopes to fix. Many have expressed that if the
bill aims to fix teacher effectiveness, the state needs to look at the
lack of resources and willingness of school districts to help teachers
improve.
However, supporters of the bill see it as a
way of fixing the “broken tenure system” and improving state test
scores. Supporters feel that the current tenure system allows teachers
with a long history of poor teaching performance to stay in schools,
putting kids at a disadvantage. The bill allows for teachers to be
observed for longer periods of time before being given tenure, possibly
benefiting those teachers who need time for improvement. However, both
sides of the field have failed to gain enough evidence to clearly sway
voters in how they should vote, leaving everyone to wait until November
for a clear opinion from the public.
Friday, October 28, 2005: “Protest on College Severance Deal,” By:
Michael Janofsky
Students, faculty, and trustees at American
University in Washington, D.C. are upset after departing President,
Benjamin Ladner was awarded a $3.7 million severance package. Student
President, Kyle Taylor expressed his concern by stating, “Please do not
let American University set a precedent for Enron-style corporate crime
within higher education.” Mr. Taylor has decide to seek help from
Congress since Congress chartered the university in 1893 and retains
certain oversight responsibilities, including the right to ask the
Justice Department or the Unites States attorney for the District of
Columbia to investigate allegations against trustees by members of the
university. The seriousness of the issue can be understood, by the fact
that several trustees resigned rather then going along with the
majority on this issue for reasons like Mr. Ladner’s internal audit,
which found that he had engaged in lavish spending.
Wednesday, November 2, 2005: “Are Schools Passing or Failing? Now
There’s a Third Choice…Both,” By: Michael Winerip
Due to No Child Left Behind, we now have state
and national education testing. These tests are aimed at improving the
education of students however, “it’s hard to know what to make of the
results, since big discrepancies in scoring exist between the tests. In
Florida, for example, “30% of fourth graders were proficient in reading
on the federal test in 2005, yet on the state test, 71% were proficient
in reading.” What does this mean? To some it’s to confusing to mean
anything, yet to others it’s more information that can be used to
improve education.
What should schools do with these results?
Some schools, like Lake Alfred in Polk County, Florida, have
manipulated the numbers so they passed state standards. “In 2004,
because Lake Alfred had failed to make adequate progress under the
federal system for two years, students were given letters permitting
them to transfer out. This year students were transferring in to the
school. Same school, same principal, same teachers, so what gives? “In
the past the school’s special education program failed to make adequate
progress with only 4 of 26 special education students making progress,
coming in at 15%, far below the 37% required of them by federal
standards. However, because Lake Alfred only had 26 students instead of
30, the failure rate didn’t count.” Are these standards and tests aimed
at improving student’s education, or is it just a number game? This
question will continue plaguing law makers, teachers, and school
administration until a uniform system is developed between state and
national test makers.
Friday, November 5, 2005: “A Bush-Style Education School in Texas,” By:
Michael Janofsky
Southern Methodist University in Texas
has come up with a new way to educate future teachers and narrow the
growing achievement gap in reading between white and minority students.
The program aligns itself with President Bush’s No Child Left Behind
Act, by using test scores and research results and applying the results
to educating teachers.
The new program has many followers and
believers, but it has also picked up critics along the way. Many people
feel the program is shady because of its attachment to the No Child
Left Behind Act, who itself has achieved much criticism. “Critics also
say that dependence upon one method of teaching may be too rigid for
contemporary classrooms.” However, believers in the program feel
positively about its focus on reading as the foundation of the learning
process, since the largest gap between minority and white students is
in reading. Many feel that the program is positive in throwing out
“untested theories, harmful fads, and good intentions that teachers try
to use to help educate their students, with methods of instruction
based on proven results.” Critics say that this use of testing and
research is great, but they remain skeptical sighting that other
schools of education use science-based research and blend it with other
approaches to give their graduates more tools.” Education students at
Southern Methodist would be missing this well roundedness, that would
allow them to improve the lives of students in more areas then
reading.
Wednesday, November 16, 2005: “Test Prep Help for Those Too Poor to
Afford Kaplan,” By: Michael Winerip
Wealthy Minneapolis students have the luxury
of being able to afford professional tutors to help with schooling,
personal assistants to help with studying for the ACT’s and SAT’s, and
writing coaches to assist in forming a professional college application
and resume. Poor students on the other hand, have had no such luxuries.
To help with this problem, Jim McCorkell started Admission Possible, in
2000. Admission Possible aims to give 600 poor teenagers (average
income of $25,000 per year) the help with schooling that many wealthy
teenagers enjoy, through monetary corporate donations and foundations.
The students get 15 weeks of an ACT prep course with individualized
help on anything the test covers. The program’s benefits are extremely
noticeable with student’s scores rising an average of 15 percent.
Each spring the program begins recruiting
students by going to faculty meetings, pep rallies, sending letters
home, and going to parent teacher conferences at high schools through
out Minneapolis. By setting standards, such as receiving a 2.5 grade
point average, passing the state skills test, interviewing with
Admission Possible workers, receiving recommendations, and making a
commitment to four hours of after school test preparation, students are
encouraged to work hard to be illegible for the program. The hard work
pays off when students are accepted to colleges of their choice and are
able to make dreams they never dared to dream, come true.
Professor Comments: I could not find the professor's comments for this
article, however I do remember that I earned an A on the assignment and
received an A in the class.