Sunday Leftovers

New Newsworks column: Is it time to reevaluate the preeminence of high school sports?

October 17, 2014

“Neuromyths” in Education

October 20, 2014

By Laura Waters at October 19, 2014

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General

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The number of students in Paterson Public Schools deemed “college-ready” fell from 26 in 2013 to 19 this year, according to the benchmark set by the organization that runs the SAT tests…

The 19 students represented just under 3.2 percent of the district students who took the test, which is used by many universities as part of their admissions evaluation. Last year, 4.3 percent of Paterson students taking the SATs were deemed college ready.

“That’s a problem,” veteran Paterson school board member Jonathan Hodges said of the college-readiness numbers. (The Record)

Also from The Record: “Montclair Public Schools has formed an “ ‘Achievement Gap Advisory Panel’,” in order to “slice through the tangle of racial and socio-economic inequalities that have long existed in Montclair’s public schools.”

NJ Spotlight covers Newark Superintendent Cami Anderson’s two-hour presentation “On the Move: Newark Public Schools – Looking Back and Planning Ahead.” From the article: “Much of the morning program sounded like a pep talk, with nothing but good news about Newark’s schools – even if the claims of improvement and progress were not always accompanied by actual data.”

Newark Mayor Ras Baraka wrote a 4-page letter to Pres. Obama pleading for “presidential intervention” into the “disruptive and illegal education reforms” being implemented by Cami Anderson.

Trenton Superintendent Francisco Duran comments on the SDA’s decision to not preserve historical features of Trenton High School but to build from scratch: “This is not about the adult issues in the room,” Superintendent Francisco Duran said before the vote, adding people could debate all night about preservation versus new construction. “This is about what our students deserve, need and have long awaited for.” (The Trentonian)

NJ Spotlight reports on Thursday’s Senate hearing on Sen. Ruiz’s charter school bill.

Art Imitating Life Dept.: Luna Stage in West Orange is featuring a new play about school residency fraud in N.J. schools. The Star Ledger: “Lines in the Dust tells the story of a Newark woman who lies about where she lives so that her daughter can attend Millburn schools, and her friendship with a Millburn school administrator who previously sent her son to Newark schools.”

Dave D’Allessandro of the Star Ledger says, in the context of the Sayreville hazing coverage, that the “same school funded by taxpayers who would be within their rights to ask – right now, today – whether it’s time to discuss the elimination of high school football.” (ICYMI: here’s my Newsworks column this week.)

The Star-Ledger reviews school districts’ scores on the state’s anti-bullying rubric.

David Cruz of NJTV writes about Assemblywoman Donna Simon’s call “for the establishment of a task force to study school consolidation and ease the way — with incentives — for more districts to join hands. Recent studies point to New Jersey as a state where a lack of consolidation of school districts is costing over $100 million in savings. But if it’s such a good idea, why isn’t everyone doing it?

“People have an emotional attachment to the town that they live in and they want the best for their kids and sometimes they don’t want to share that with their next door neighbors, whether it makes sense or not,” he said. “There are two questions to ask here. Is it fiscally smart or educationally smart? If it works in both cases, it’s perfect.”