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Mass. Becomes 13th State to Allow Some Undocumented Students to Pay In-State Tuition by Jorge Rivas, colorlines.com | November 20, 2012
In a letter sent Monday to the Board of Higher Education, Massachusetts Gov. Deval Patrick said undocumented immigrants who have obtained a work permit through the Deferred Action program are now eligible to pay in-state tuition in the state’s public colleges and universities. The decision will cut tuition fees by about 50 percent for undocumented students attending state colleges. “Our experience has been that the difference between in-state and out-of-state tuition is a prohibitive barrier,” Paul Reville, the state’s secretary of education, told the New York Times. “It’s a step in the right direction but it’s not a substitute for comprehensive immigration reform, we still need that,” Patrick told reporters on Monday. read more »Phony School “Reform” Agenda Takes A Beating by David Sirota, salon.com | November 14, 2012
If your only source of news about American education came from docu-propaganda like “Waiting for Superman,” Hollywood politi-schlock like “Won’t Back Down” and elite-focused national news outlets in Washington, D.C., and New York City, you might think that the so-called education “reform” (read: privatization) movement was a spontaneous grass-roots uprising of good-old-fashioned heartlanders generating ever more mass support throughout the country. You would have no reason to believe it was a top-down, corporate-driven coalition of conservative coastal elites trying to both generally undermine organized labor and specifically wring private profit out of public schools, and you would similarly have no reason to believe it was anything but wildly popular in an America clamoring for a better education system. In other words, you would be utterly misinformed — especially after last week’s explosive election results in three key states. read more »Election Affirms Education "Reform" A Beltway, Rich Person Fetish by Jeff Bryant, OurFuture.org | November 12, 2012
In President Obama's stunningly convincing reelection, only part of his education policies got reaffirmed -- the part he talked about most of the time during the campaign. read more »Romneyism by Robert B. Reich, robertreich.org | November 5, 2012
By now, in these last remaining days before the election of 2012, we have learned enough about the beliefs of the Republican presidential candidate to see them as a worldview all its own – a kind of creed that explains Mitt Romney. Those who say he has no principles are selling him short. Despite its contradictions and ellipses, Romneyism has an internal coherence. It is different from conservatism, because it does not intend to conserve or protect any particular institutions or values. It is also distinct from Republicanism, in that it is not rooted in traditional small-town American values, nationalism, or states’ rights. The ten guiding principles of Romneyism are. read more »Science Is the Key to Growth by Neal F. Lane, The New York Times | October 29, 2012
Mitt Romney said in all three presidential debates that we need to expand the economy. But he left out a critical ingredient: investments in science and technology. Scientific knowledge and new technologies are the building blocks for long-term economic growth — “the key to a 21st-century economy,” as President Obama said in the final debate. So it is astonishing that Mr. Romney talks about economic growth while planning deep cuts in investment in science, technology and education. They are among the discretionary items for which spending could be cut 22 percent or more under the Republican budget plan, according to the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities. read more »Who Really Did "Forget Ed" In The Presidential Debates by Jeff Bryant, OurFuture.org | October 25, 2012
Way back at the beginning of this summer, an eternity it seems in this exhausting presidential campaign, The College Board launched its Don’t Forget Ed campaign to "get the candidates to prioritize education this election." read more »Change.org, Enabler of Davids, Decides To Side With Goliaths Instead by Jeff Bryant, OurFuture.org | October 22, 2012
The online petition site Change.org is best known for enabling individuals to use the viral qualities of the internet to speak truth to power, such as when a 22-year-old nanny used the site to pressure a big bank to drop its debit fee, and an Eagle Scout challenged the Boy Scouts of America's anti-gay policy. read more »Student Loan Mimics Subprime Mortgage Industry by Natasha Leonard, salon.com | October 17, 2012
For many months, writers, commentators, economists and activists have argued that the student loan industry looks all too much like the subprime mortgage industry did on the brink of its collapse. On Tuesday, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau admitted the same again. According to the government watchdog’s annual report, “Student loan borrower stories of detours and dead ends with their servicers bear an uncanny resemblance to problematic practices uncovered in the mortgage servicing business.” The student lending practices directly mimic the risky lending underpinning the housing crisis: private lenders giving out loans without considering whether borrowers would repay, then bundling and reselling the loans to investors to avoid losing money when students default. read more »Education Profiteering: Wall Street's Next Big Thing? by Jeff Faux, alternet.org | October 15, 2012
The end of the Chicago teachers' strike was but a temporary regional truce in the civil war that plagues the nation's public schools. There is no end in sight, in part because -- as often happens in wartime -- the conflict is increasingly being driven by profiteers. The familiar media narrative tells us that this is a fight over how to improve our schools. On the one side are the self-styled reformers, who argue that the central problem with American K-12 education is low-quality teachers protected by their unions. On the other side are teachers and their unions who are cast as villains. The conventional plot line is that they resist change, blame poverty for their schools' failings and protect their jobs and turf. It is well known, although rarely acknowledged in the press, that the reform movement has been financed and led by the corporate class. read more »Romney, If You're Serious About Deficit Reduction, Leave Big Bird Alone by Dr. William F. Baker and Evan Leatherwood , The Nation | October 12, 2012
When Mitt Romney said he’d reduce the federal budget deficit in last Wednesday’s debate, PBS was one of only two programs he mentioned cutting by name. Romney has gone after PBS before, touting its elimination as a “major” potential savings for the American people. There’s an annual $445 million congressional subsidy to public broadcasting that might seem to support Romney’s claim—until you realize that it represents approximately one hundredth of one percent of the entire federal budget. So why does Romney speak as if Big Bird were one of the top two obstacles to national solvency? The reason is simple: he hopes to score a few easy political points. By eliminating funding to PBS, Romney and the Republicans could indeed win some support from radical conservatives, but tens of millions of Americans will lose out, especially poor children struggling to get access to a good education. read more »
The Latest
California: Protect Our Schools from Devastating Layoffs, action.aclu.org | August 8, 2010
The story itself is bad enough but it is also set against the backdrop of Californian civilisation being beaten back into some form of rootless serfdom as the institutions of good governance unravel and fail. more »
Will The GOP Senators Whose States Face Thousands Of Teacher Layoffs Vote Against Teacher Funding? , wonkroom.thinkprogress.org | August 3, 2010
Today, the Senate will be taking a procedural vote on a bill providing $26 billion in aid to state and local governments, $10 billion of which is dedicated to preventing teacher layoffs. This particular batch of funding has been included in, and then cut from, multiple bills, as each time conservatives have objected. more »
Senate Vote on Medicaid, Education Funds Delayed, thehill.com | August 3, 2010
The Senate tabled a jobs measure Monday because Democrats underestimated the package’s cost. Democrats had scheduled a vote to end debate on their proposal to send $10 billion in funding to states and local governments to prevent public teacher layoffs. The package contains another $16.1 billion to help states with Medicaid obligations.
Education Funds Out of Senate War Bill, Politico | July 23, 2010
The Senate sent back to the House Thursday night a stripped-down $59 billion war funding bill, after striking all of the added education assistance which Democrats had wanted to avert threatened teacher layoffs in the fall. more »
Krugman: we're paying the price of dumbing down America., The New York Times | October 11, 2009
American Graduates Finding Jobs in China, The New York Times | August 11, 2009
Shanghai and Beijing are becoming new lands of opportunity for recent American college graduates who face unemployment nearing double digits at home. Even those with limited or no knowledge of Chinese are heeding the call. They are lured by China’s surging economy, the lower cost of living and a chance to bypass some of the dues-paying that is common to first jobs in the United States. more »
Teachers Could Earn More Under Obama Plan, USA Today | July 24, 2009
States that want a piece of the Obama administration's $4.35 billion Race to the Top Fund for schools must hew to internationally benchmarked academic standards and let schools pay teachers and principals more if they work in hard-to-staff schools — or if student scores improve on basic skills tests. more »
Student Loan Measure Clears House Panel, The Washington Post | July 22, 2009
A bill that cleared a House committee would largely remove private lenders from the federal student loan industry, generating an estimated $87 billion savings over 10 years to fund more government grants and loans. more »
Black-White Student Achievement Gap Persists, MSNBC News | July 15, 2009
Despite unprecedented efforts to improve minority achievement in the past decade, the gap between black and white students remains frustratingly wide, according to an Education Department report. There is good news in the report: Reading and math scores are improving for black students across the country. more »
Obama Plans $12 Billion Boost To Community Colleges, USA Today | July 14, 2009
President Obama is expected to announce a $12 billion proposal today that will put the nation's community colleges front and center in his economic recovery plan. Among his goals: to modernize community college facilities, to increase the quality of online courses and to ensure that more students complete their programs. more »
