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Public Education Is A Labor Issue, Even If You Don't Care About Teachers by Laura Clawson, dailykos.com | July 9, 2012
This year's students are the workers of five or 10 or 15 years from now. There's an obvious statement for you, but it's one that is too rarely considered in discussions of education policy as hedge funders and corporate billionaires try to claim the mantle of doing what's right for kids, implying or saying straight out that teachers are too self-interested to represent kids and should be left out of the discussion altogether. The fundamental question is this: If you don't trust Wall Street or the Walton family to do what's in your best interest as an adult in the American workforce, why would you trust them to do what's in the best interest of the next generation of workers? read more »Doesn’t “Religion” Mean “Conservative Christian?” by Ed Kilgore, Washington Monthly | July 6, 2012
The ongoing fiasco of Bobby Jindal’s “let the parents decide” voucher program in Louisiana is finally beginning to get some national media attention, for the simple reason that its logic is carrying it in directions that horrify its strongest proponents and intended beneficiaries. So down plunges the Pelican State into the political and constitutional thicket of how to shovel money to conservative evangelical schools without looking too closely at what they are teaching, while at the same time keeping away schools that conservative evangelicals hate and fear. read more »Conservatives: Saving America's Youth From "Overeducation" by Terrance Heath, OurFuture.org | June 29, 2012
Now that our "do nothing" Congress is finally set to "do something" to stop interest on student loans from doubling, I think I’ve finally figured out what motivates conservatives on education in general, and conservative opposition to student loans in general. Conservatives are fighting to save our children - your children, my children, America’s children - from a fate worse than collective bargaining. Conservatives are fighting to save America’s youth from being "overeducated." Say what? "Overeducated"? What does that even mean? I used to think it meant having more education than available jobs require; like the students graduating off a cliff, into a market where most of the jobs being created are low wage jobs, as jobs in the middle of the income and skill spectrum are hollowed by the recession. In other words, I used to think "overeducated" was the flip-side of "underemployed." Then, Rush Limbaugh set me straight. read more »Public Education's 'Shock Doctrine Summer' Rolls Out, Part 2 by Jeff Bryant, OurFuture.org | June 28, 2012
With the glow of high school graduations still lingering in many American families, and analysts predicting that an"economic recovery" is on the way, this is a time when you'd expect to start hearing more positive news about the state of US public education. You'd be wrong. read more »Conservatives to Students: Drop Dead! by Terrance Heath, OurFuture.org | June 25, 2012
Never mind "class warfare." Generational warfare continues apace, this time in the editorial pages of the Washington Post, which echoed the conservative message to young (and older) Americans struggling with student debt: Drop dead. read more »The Technocratization of Public Education by Prof. James F. Tracy, globalresearch.ca | June 18, 2012
In modern America the ability of working and middle class people to think for themselves and articulate ideas in opposition to a genetically, financially and demonstrably superior elite is not required. Discuss read more »Death and Student Debt by Terrance Heath, OurFuture.org | June 15, 2012
Collection agencies do not make condolence calls. I understand this, believe me. But there are certain events in life during which people deserve to be treated with more than standard human decency. (Yes, I realize I'm pretending that treating people with human decency is standard these days. Humor me.) A death in the family — especially the death of a child — is one of those times. Or at least it used to be. The story of Francisco Reynoso's struggle to pay off his dead son's student loans, while dealing with collection agencies in the midst of his grief, suggests that times are changing. And not for the better. read more »Democrats Must Oppose Republicans On Education by Jeff Bryant, OurFuture.org | June 15, 2012
A funny thing happened on the way to the news cycle the past two weeks when the issue of education -- specifically, public schoolteachers and student loan relief -- maintained a presence on the political stage. read more »Romney’s Educational Tax Raid by Ed Kilgore, Washington Monthly | June 13, 2012
I was remiss in not writing earlier about Mitt Romney’s big K-12 education initiative, which basically just involves taking all the existing federal money spent for this purpose and tossing it out there as a hand grenade designed for the destruction of public schools. While the Obama administration has committed itself (to its own political peril) to the standards-and-accountability movement aimed at using federal dollars to leverage measurable improvements in low-performing public schools—a movement once championed by Republicans—Romney is moving in the opposite direction, proposing to turn over all those highly conditional taxpayer dollars to parents for use however and wherever they want, with zero accountability for results other than via abstract market forces. The primary beneficiaries, of course, will be private schools that will pocket public subsidies and do whatever they choose. read more »Hey Mitt, Leave Our Teachers Alone by Terrance Heath, OurFuture.org | June 13, 2012
Yesterday was the last day of school for public school students in Montgomery County, Maryland, where we live — including our nine-year-old son, who just completed the third grade. I began the morning by sending a one last email to his teacher. I asked her about the summer reading and math packets we were expecting our son to bring. I also thanked her for all the work she'd done to help our son this year. As I thought about how much our son has grown and improved over the past year, and how very much the dedicated teachers and staff at his school had to do with those changes, I couldn't help being mystified at Mitt Romney's assertion that our children need fewer teachers. Mystified, that is, but not surprised. read more »
The Latest
Schools Turn to Massive Layoffs, Reuters | March 13, 2009
Some U.S. public school districts are turning to mass layoffs of teachers and support staff to ease ballooning deficits in the latest sign of how the recession is hurting ordinary Americans. The Los Angeles Unified School District -- the nation's second largest -- will issue preliminary layoff notices to nearly 9,000 staff members, including teachers. more »
Layoffs Come to Sesame Street, USA Today | March 12, 2009
The crisis on Wall Street is plaguing Sesame Street. Sesame Workshop, the non-profit producer of Sesame Street and other kids' programs, is cutting about one-fifth of its workforce because of the economic downturn. The company said that it's eliminating 67 of 355 staff positions. more »
"No Child Left Behind" to be "Rebranded", iht.com | February 23, 2009
Two years ago, an effort to fix No Child Left Behind, the main U.S. law on public schools, provoked a grueling slugfest in Congress, leading Representative George Miller, Democrat of California, to say the law had become "the most negative brand in America." Education Secretary Arne Duncan agrees. "Let's rebrand it," he said in an interview. more »
Schools Get $106 Billion in Stimulus, Los Angeles Times | February 13, 2009
The massive federal economic stimulus package hammered out by Congress this week contains about $106 billion earmarked for education, an unprecedented expansion of federal spending into the nation's schools. The money would pay for, among other things, special education, school repair and retaining teachers who might otherwise be laid off. more »
Stimulus Could Aid Colleges, Students, Associated Press | February 9, 2009
The stimulus plan emerging in Washington could offer an unprecedented, multibillion-dollar boost in financial help for college students trying to pursue a degree while they ride out the recession. It could also hand out billions to the states to kick-start idled campus construction projects and help prevent tuition increases at a time when families can least afford them. more »
School Funds Double in Stimulus, Christian Science Monitor | February 5, 2009
The economic stimulus bills before Congress contain a $140 billion boost for education — and most of it would be used to more than double federal spending on America's public schools over the next two years. more »
Democrats Seek Stimulus for Schools, Associated Press | January 25, 2009
Democrats want to use the big spending package designed to jump-start the staggering economy to send billions to long-term programs to help poor and disabled school children. President Barack Obama's recovery plan amounts to the biggest increase ever in federal money for schools. Many Republicans say it is not a short-term boost but an immense expansion that will be impossible to roll back. more »
Schools Get Small Slice of Stimulus, money.cnn.com | January 15, 2009
President-elect Barack Obama has proposed an ambitious plan to rebuild the nation's crumbling schools as a part of his economic stimulus package, aiming to help budget-constrained school districts make much needed repairs. more »
Obama Pledges School Upgrades, USA Today | January 1, 2009
Barack Obama probably cannot fix every leaky roof and busted boiler in the nation's schools. But educators say his sweeping school modernization program — if he spends enough — could jump-start student achievement. More kids than ever are crammed into aging, run-down schools that need an estimated $255 billion in repairs, renovations or construction. more »
More Math, Science Teachers Needed, | December 29, 2008
It's no easy task to recruit people with proclivities for science into schools — and to keep them long enough to nurture a talent for teaching. But over the next decade, schools will need 200,000 or more new teachers in science and math, according to estimates by such groups as the Business-Higher Education Forum in Washington. more »
