I spent last night tweeting the school board meeting and boy, is my beak tired. You can catch up on all the gritty details here. Now for your morning newsblitz:
- We blog about another objection to the cuts that an internal team has scrounged up for San Diego Unified: Auditors say a recommendation to cut “non-financial auditors” is just plain impossible because they don’t exist. They also argue that cutting the fraud hotline doesn’t make sense because it has recovered more money than it costs. (Want an example? 10News reported on this employee who was rooted out by the anti-fraud team.)
- We also blog about how the two Gompers charter schools are seeking to become one — and how it could impact their status under No Child Left Behind.
- San Diego State is urging local teens to apply to the college, despite new rules that could make it harder for them to get in than before, the Union-Tribune reports.
- 10News explains what the heck San Diego Unified means by “zero-based budgeting” and why they want it.
- The San Diego Daily Transcript reports that La Jolla Country Day got its first campus makeover in 40 years.
- The California Teachers Association is deciding whether or not to go after two ballot initiatives it has filed which would extract money for schools from big businesses, the Sacramento Bee writes.
- In Los Angeles, the teachers union is at odds with the school district over the ideas of layoffs, pay cuts and furloughs, the Daily News reports. Its mantra? Cut bureaucracy first.
- Public School Insights blogs that we should beware of the conventional wisdom on schools — and scolds a journalist for being “schnookered” by it.
- The Gates Foundation is doling out some serious cash to school districts that study and enhance teacher effectiveness, including Pittsburgh, Memphis and Hillsborough County in Florida.
- In Education Week, historian Diane Ravitch opines that the Obama Administration is using the stimulus money to bribe school systems to pursue untested remedies, and questions the gains of charter schools.
- And Jay Mathews at the Washington Post asks: What if some schools just can’t be saved?