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.

The ED Games Expo Comes to the Kennedy Center

Did you know that game-based learning is gaining popularity in education as more young people and adults learn from games in and out of the classroom? Well-designed games can motivate students to actively engage in content that relates to coursework, and to master challenging tasks designed to sharpen critical thinking and problem solving, as well as employment and life skills.

read more

San Diego Students Study History and Create History with “Hamilton”

VOICE & VIEWPOINT — In describing his runaway hit “Hamilton,” actor and playwright Lin-Manuel Miranda said, “It’s this incredible way to explore how history isn’t told.” For students in San Diego City Schools and surrounding areas, this thought-provoking notion took center stage with their participation in eduHam, an innovative educational program coordinated with the Tony-winning play’s run at the San Diego Civic Theatre, which provided nearly 3,000 students entrée to a special matinee performance on January 11, including a lively Q & A session with some of the cast members, and, for some, the opportunity to perform their own original creative pieces—songs, rap, poetry, scenes, monologues—before an audience of their peers.

read more

CCJEF Ruling Fails Connecticut Students

Yesterday’s State Supreme Court ruling in the Connecticut Coalition for Justice in Education Funding (CCJEF) v. Rell delivered a mixed verdict—bad for school funding, while rejecting the lower court’s attempt to create burdensome schemes for testing, teacher evaluation, and education policy.

read more

New Center for Public Education report finds significant student population left “Out of the loop”

While not equally distributed across the country, CPE’s analysis notes, approximately one-half of school districts, one-third of schools, and one-fifth of all students in the United States are in rural areas. Inadequate funding, lower literacy rates, and less access to advanced courses such as AP and STEM classes impact rural students’ achievement, creating significant barriers to their success. 

read more

DELAWARE: 19 schools recognized for students’ academic achievement

The Delaware Department of Education today named 15 schools 2017 Recognition Schools, two of which also were designated as National Title I Distinguished Schools. Each school will receive an $8,000 award. Funding for the awards comes from the state’s School Improvement funds. Additionally, there are four Schools of Continued Excellence that were honored as Recognition Schools last year and had outstanding performance again this year. These schools are not eligible for a financial award again until 2018.

read more

NAACP and Africa-America Institute Announce Alliance Partnership Includes Pre-K to College Curriculum on the African Diaspora

THE CHRONICLE — On Monday, January 15, 2018, the holiday marking the birthday of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., the NAACP and the Africa-America Institute announced a groundbreaking partnership during the 49th NAACP Image Awards. The NAACP will work with the AAI on the development and distribution of a curriculum designed to highlight the accomplishments, achievements and history…

read more

To Rebuild, Rethink and Renew

This past fall I had the opportunity to visit the U.S. Virgin Islands, twice — first, in October, and two weeks later, in the company of Secretary DeVos. There, I saw firsthand the wholesale destruction left by back-to-back hurricanes. The experience was both humbling and uplifting.

read more

When Does Scholarship Give Way to Bombast and Bluster? – Education Week

I’ve now been doing the Education Week RHSU Edu-Scholar Public Influence Rankings for about a decade, striving to recognize scholars who do academically significant research while also contributing to the public square. After all, I’ve long argued that on an issue like education, our impassioned public debates benefit when scholars take the time to engage. Of course, encouraging this kind of activity always runs the risk of introducing perverse incentives.

read more

Delegate seeks to add more mental health counselors to public high schools

THE LEGACY NEWS – A Prince William County legislator is promoting a bill to add more mental health counselors in public high schools. The bill, HB 252, proposed by Del. Elizabeth Guzman, D-Prince William, would that each student board employ one mental health counselor for every 250 high school students in the local school division.

read more

How Stevie Wonder helped create Martin Luther King Day

THE LEGACY NEWSPAPER — On the evening of April 4, 1968, teen music sensation Stevie Wonder was dozing off in the back of a car on his way home to Detroit from the Michigan School for the Blind, when the news crackled over the radio: Martin Luther King Jr. had just been assassinated in Memphis. His driver quickly turned off the radio and they drove on in silence and shock, tears streaming down Wonder’s face.

read more

Student Meals Feature Another Local Food Source

The Hawai‘i State Department of Education (HIDOE) continues to try and use local agriculture in student meals through its ‘Aina Pono Harvest of the Month program, which kicked off last year with locally grown beef. This month, HIDOE and the Lieutenant Governor’s Office have partnered up with the Hawai‘i Department of Agriculture (HDOA) and various local farms across the state to serve fresh bananas at all public schools.

read more