common sense
Numbers that matter: college graduation rates
Another ranking system. the College Grid After helping numerous students with their college applications, we noticed a lack of useful tools to help manage the school selection process. We decided to build a website with a “top-down” approach to researching colleges. Within a week, the College Grid was born. It is improvement over the Princeton [...]
Because bigger is better…
I recently stumbled across this blog from the Fiske Guide website. He has an interesting link to report by Rice justifying why it needs to increase in size by 30%. Fiske Guide Blog But as one undergrad quoted in the report explains, “I feel that we are too small and that increasing by 30 percent [...]
Death threat as a motivation technique
Education | MySanAntonio.com No charges will be brought against New Braunfels Middle School Principal John Burks for allegedly threatening to kill a group of science teachers if their students’ standardized test scores failed to improve, although all four teachers at the meeting told police investigators Burks made the statement. Now imagine if some student at [...]
If it’s all McGee’s fault, why are they settling?
So it looks like we’ll never know after all. I still think that the principal’s handling of this situation warrants a “growth plan”equal to that of McGee’s. Lawson had already collected her data/evaluation before the museum trip but they weren’t revealed to McGee until after the trip. That, in of itself, is no big deal. [...]
Either Or
EITHER Syndey McGee is a champion of the arts and the Frisco school district composed of neanderthals seeking only to please a culturally repressed parent OR Frisco ISD has been unfairly and unwarrantably attacked by a sensationalist press manipulated by an incompetent educator interested only in preserving her job. Sorry, while there are plenty of [...]
Mind-boggling
Guardian Unlimited | World Latest | Wis. Lawmaker Urges Arming Teachers: MADISON, Wis. (AP) – A state lawmaker, worried about a recent string of deadly school shootings, suggested arming teachers, principals and other school personnel as a safety measure and a deterrent.It might not be politically correct, but it has worked effectively in other countries, [...]
Creating a perfect storm
Congratulations to the Dallas Morning News for finally presenting “the other side” of the McGee story. Dallas Morning News | News for Dallas, Texas | Collin County Education: McKinney ISD in 1998 to end her employment as a second grade teacher at Glen Oaks Elementary School. Under the arrangement, Ms. McGee received a positive recommendation [...]
McGee will show hers if Lawson will
Frisco district wants to open art teacher’s personnel file: FRISCO — The Frisco school district wants to open an art teacher’s personnel file to the public to defend itself against her claim that she was reprimanded for allowing a fifth-grade student to see nude art. Frisco district wants to open art teacher’s personnel file: Superintendent [...]
Peer pressure and socialization
WOAI: San Antonio News – Child Beaten Unconscious On School Bus: The Northside Independent School District says a fourth grade boy was beaten and kicked in the back of a crowded school bus Friday morning. The students were being taken to McDermott Elementary School off Huebner. Apparently a 4th and 5th grader beat up the [...]
Why numbers alone don’t tell the story
If TAKS scores go up unexpectedly, you can be flagged for cheating when all you really did was, well, what you were supposed to do: MySA.com: KENS 5: Education: For example, Northside’s Pease Middle School was flagged for gains in eighth-grade math. But districts don’t know which individual student scores stood out. “If they gave [...]