OPINION: Importance of Educators of Color for Black & Brown Students

NNPA ESSA AWARENESS CAMPAIGN — This month, my organization, the National Alliance of Public Charter Schools released its highly-anticipated report, “Identity and Charter School Leadership: Profiles of Leaders of Color Building an Effective Staff” which examined the ways that school leaders of color’s experiences and perspectives influence how they build school culture, parent and community relationships, and effective staff.

Profile in Education Equity: Sharif El-Mekki

El-Mekki is answering his own “nation building” call. In May, he announced that after 11 years as Shoemaker’s principal and 26 years of being inside schools as a teacher or administrator, he was devoting his full attention and time to launching a new Center for Black Educator Development to help address the urgent need to bring more Black educators into Philadelphia’s classrooms and across the nation. “If I’m going to be serious about trying to change the lives of Black educators and hence the lives of Black children, then it just can’t be my night and weekend job,” he said.

COMMENTARY: Is There More to Teaching and Learning Than Testing?

In order for education to capitalize on the strengths and talents of learners and the skills and professionalism of their teachers, what kinds of additional progress measures might be employed?

OP-ED: Black Studies becomes major factor in social advancement

OUR WEEKLY NEWS — The Black Power movement of the late 1960s helped to redefine African American identity and establish a new racial consciousness. As influential as this period was in the study and enhancement of the African Diaspora, this movement spawned the academic discipline known as Black Studies on our college and university campuses.

Marion S. Barry Summer Youth Employment Program: A Personal Essay

WASHINGTON INFORMER — Barry’s program changed the outcome of many teenagers’ lives, allowing them to build a work history that would afford better chances of future employment. I have been able to reap many benefits from my experience as an MBSYEP worker.

What We Can Learn from Schools that Educate Military Children

A unique program in Virginia Beach public schools includes 28 Military Family Life Counselors, who work closely with schools’ staff and families to support students. One mother we spoke with, talked about the fears her five-year-old daughter had while her father was deployed.

Educator Spotlight: Donald Hense

Three-quarters of the students enrolled in Friendship schools in D.C. are from Wards 7 and 8, the city’s two poorest areas, and nearly all are African-American. Their achievement is reflected in their continuous improvement on standardized tests. Most recently, Donald Hense and his team celebrated, when five of Friendship’s 12 D.C. schools were rated Tier 1 by the Public Charter School Board – the highest of three ratings a charter school can earn.

Lakisha Young, Oakland Reach

Young knows firsthand the aggravation of dealing with the Oakland school lottery. She also understands the anxiety parents feel not knowing whether their children will have to enroll in a low-performing neighborhood school should there not be enough seats available at quality schools. Her personal experience led her to organize other parents and teach them how to advocate for their children.

Florida Education Plan Lacking in Both Promise and Practice

According to Dr. Rosa Castro Feinberg, who serves on the committee for LULAC Florida, an advocacy group serving all Hispanic nationality groups, Florida’s “current plan includes features that contradict common sense, expert opinion, popular will, and the intent of the ESSA. Contrary to the purposes of the ESSA, the Florida plan denies attention to struggling subgroups of students. Without attention, there can be no correction.”

COMMENTARY: Assembly Workers and Widgets

Well, how can we feel more professional and less like factory workers producing widgets? First, we must clarify our mission. Students are not widgets. There can be no reject bins for human beings with different needs and varied learning intelligence!

COMMENTARY: Color “Blindness”

Our perceptions of the value of ourselves and others often determine our treatment of and reactions toward those we view as less than or not as valued. Wars are fought over cultural and religious differences. Regardless of the injury, all people’s blood is red and all of us can hurt or grieve, regardless of color.

COMMENTARY: Classroom Culture Clashes

…in answer to the question when cultures clash in the classroom, who suffers, we all do! Poorly educated students make for a society that alienates its young, one that is unable to retain skilled and experienced teachers, and a country frustrated with unemployment, under-employment, and an ever-growing culture of violence, fear, and intolerance. Court systems and privatized prisons, along with mortuaries, result when the classrooms act as prep schools for these expensive alternatives.

COMMENTARY: Is There More to Teaching and Learning Than Testing?

NNPA ESSA MEDIA CAMPAIGN —In order for education to capitalize on the strengths and talents of learners and the skills and professionalism of their teachers, what kinds of additional progress measures might be employed?

Racial discrimination lawsuit filed against Bronx private school

NEW YORK AMSTERDAM NEWS — A student at the Ethical Culture Fieldston School, a K-12 private school in the Bronx, announced that he and his parents filed a lawsuit against the institution Monday, April 1, in United States District Court, Southern District of New York, with the demand that the Head of the School Jessica L. Bagby and other administrators resign or be terminated.

Demystifying Student Performance Via Parental Engagement

Although parental engagement has a strong correlation to student academic performance and achievement, why is it that African American parents appear disproportionately less engaged than parents of other races?

A New Year’s Resolution for Children in New York: School Improvement

AMSTERDAM NEWS — If we want to improve education outcomes and strengthen our state, we need to improve our schools and assure that every child has access to a high-quality education, no matter their zip code or the color of their skin.

Irving students take flight to new adventures

NNPA NEWSWIRE — “The industry is trying to grow, and it can’t grow because there are not enough people coming in the front door to match the people who are going out of the back door,” said Craig Heckel, program coordinator for Irving High School of aviation science. “…they were going to the colleges to do recruiting but that wasn’t good enough. So now they are going to the high schools to start these programs to get people interested, and let them know there is a huge umbrella of aviation that you can work in: electronics, computer programming, or be a fireman under aviation.”

Developing a universal enrollment system for all Memphis public schools

NNPA NEWSWIRE — “I started in 1995 when I was asked to help open a Family Resource Center in a high school and students without involved parents in their lives took to me. Parents would stop me and say, ‘They are passing my son on to High School and he can’t even read.” — Sarah Carpenter

Telling Black Stories Through Poetry

LA DATA NEWS — As a child, in between born into an interracial family, Poet Michele Reese knew she wanted to write about the Black experience with works that delved into African American history, from very early on.

S.B. School Fights Racist Hate

PRECINCT REPORTER GROUP — A recent hate message to former principal Crecia Robinson, a three-time victim of racist messages at Lankershim Elementary School in San Bernardino, raised parental concerns from parents on both sides over the potential for discrimination in the classroom.

CALIFORNIA: State Schools Chief Tom Torlakson Announces Model Continuation High Schools for 2018

SACRAMENTO—State Superintendent of Public Instruction Tom Torlakson today announced that 32 schools were newly designated as Model Continuation High Schools for 2018. These schools are recognized for creating innovative programs that focus on academics and social and emotional learning and helping students who have faced many challenges, including chronic absenteeism and truancy, get back on the path to realizing their full academic potential.

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ESSA’s Success (or Failure) Is Up to All of Us

When the Every Student Succeeds Act was signed into law two years ago, leaders from both sides of the aisle hailed it as a rare and remarkable display of bipartisanship. The measure represented a significant rollback of the federal government’s footprint in education policy and the dawn of a new era of state autonomy.

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Applications Now Open for Chicago High School Teens Seeking Apprenticeship and Internship Programs with After School Matters®

CHICAGO CRUSADER — After School Matters® is now accepting teen applications for its Spring 2018 program session. More than 400 programs in the arts, communications and leadership, sports and STEM will be offered at nearly 150 Chicago public high schools, as well as Chicago Park District, Chicago Public Library and community organization locations throughout the city.

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HAWAII: $500,000 for Master Plan for Pāhoa Elementary School

Pāhoa Elementary School is the oldest elementary school in Puna. Despite its continued growth, Pāhoa Elementary School has had only one building and had been operating mostly from portable classrooms, a sub-standard administration building and no cafeteria. In fact, part of its playground has been coopted by the county for a baseball field.

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Approved Arkansas State ESSA Plan

This document reflects work that began prior to the passage of the Every Student Succeeds Act. In 2015 the Arkansas team began engaging with stakeholders to determine how our agency could better support students, educators, school and district leaders, and communities in their efforts to improve student outcomes.

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OPINION: Kane: States and Governors Must Collaborate as They Again Learn to Drive Education Under ESSA

With the passage of the Every Student Succeeds Act in 2015, Congress tossed the keys for K-12 education back to states and school districts. However you feel about the expanded federal role in K-12 education since No Child Left Behind was signed in 2002 — whether you saw it as a necessary nudge or federal overreach — that era has officially ended. Our schools need state and local leaders to take the education wheel now. But after 15 years of complying with federal regulations, their driving skills may be a little rusty.

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Black History Month PSAs Set in Charleston Explore Themes of Education, Cultural Traditions and Cuisine

CHARLESTON CHRONICLE — Nickelodeon is celebrating Black History Month with a brand-new series of PSAs set in Charleston, South Carolina, that explore themes of education, culture and cuisine as they relate to African Americans.  Each PSA is narrated by kids and use Charleston’s storied past and rich culture as both a focal point and a backdrop, given how a sited more than 50% of African Americans are able to trace their ancestry to the port of Charleston, which served as a slave-trading center more than a century ago.

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Alabama Poor People’s Campaign holds rally at State Capitol steps in Montgomery in preparation for National Call for Moral Revival

GREENE COUNTY DEMOCRAT — A cold morning brought rays of sunshine this past Monday, February 6, 2018, to Alabama – along with more than 30 states plus Washington D.C. – helping roll out the National Poor People’s Campaign. Initiated by Rev. William Barber of North Carolina, leader of the ‘Moral Monday Movement’, this grassroots movement already has feet beginning to march across the nation in an effort to uplift human dignity.

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