If you couldn’t make it to the San Diego Unified board meeting last night, you can always check out the gritty (and sometimes not-so-gritty) details on my Twitter feed. Now for the newsblitz:
- While the teachers union hasn’t chosen yet who to endorse, its board has recommended that teachers choose a Republican political consultant over longtime incumbent (and former friend of the union) John de Beck, we blog. Teachers vote on the endorsements today.
- In SDNN, de Beck opines that San Diego Unified should replace staff development days — when teachers and principals get together to plan and do training — with instructional days.
- Oceanside schools are warning 200 teachers of possible layoffs, the North County Times reports.
- The federal Office of Civil Rights is investigating whether Los Angeles schools provide adequate services to kids learning English, the Los Angeles Times writes.
- The San Francisco Chronicle reports on the tough choices facing schools that were put on a state list of persistently failing schools.
- Educated Guess blogs that the Obama Administration is putting a second round of education stimulus money on hold until Gov. Schwarzenegger responds to questions about adequate school funding. San Diego Unified signed on to the complaint that raised many of those questions.
- Also in Educated Guess: Parents can trigger changes in schools under a new law. But now what?
- Education Week reports on a draft set of national education standards, which set out what students are supposed to learn in each grade. The Washington Post writes that so far, the reaction is good, despite the controversy around the idea of common standards.
- Also in EdWeek: States will face new limits on how many kids with disabilities and how many English learners they can exempt from testing.
- The New York Times writes about an expert who says the U.S. is falling behind other nations in education.
- USA Today reports on the mixed evidence for school turnarounds, which Obama is pushing for those persistently failing school lists.
- And Public School Insights interviews a California principal who sees English learners as an asset — not a liability.
— EMILY ALPERT