I have to say, a remarkable number of stories in your Friday newsblitz are about jobs in peril. Here’s the news:
We blog that the San Diego Unified school board is revisiting and revising a controversial policy that requires school staff to inform parents if they find out a student is pregnant or planning an abortion.
The Union-Tribune reports that UCSD is giving its chancellor a housing allowance instead of paying a heftier lease.
The Associated Press writes that the Minnesota attorney general is accusing a San Diego nonprofit that sells test prep materials of falsely advertising that the profits would go to scholarships for poor children. Via SDNN.
Marsha Sutton of SDNN calls California test scores a travesty.
Confusion and questions abound at Felicita Elementary, one of the schools tapped by California to make big reforms because of its continually low scores, the North County Times reports. The school board hasn’t decided what to do.
The principal of a Yolo County school that improved dramatically over the last decade was fired by his school board, the Sacramento Bee reports, and nobody is saying why.
Also in the Bee: Nineteen school districts around Sacramento are warning the state they’re in financial trouble.
Principals at San Francisco schools on the state list of failing schools are also fearful for their jobs, the Chronicle writes.
And if that wasn’t enough job anxiety for you: Teachers in Santa Clara County alternative schools are bringing their complaints about safety and management straight to the county board of education. But the Mercury News reports that some fear that doing that will cost them their jobs.
Educated Guess blogs that California already has good educational standards for what to teach and when. So should it bother to join the bandwagon for national standards?
It’s not just an issue in Texas: History has become a flashpoint for debate as states set their standards, Education Week reports.
But the Texas Tribune reports that the frequently reported idea that Texas’ new textbooks will dominate what is taught elsewhere is a myth.
A Georgia school on the failing list is firing all its staff, the Associated Press writes. This echoes what happened at a Rhode Island high school that got a lot of attention for the dramatic move.
First they wooed away our superintendent, now they’re trying to take our teachers! Houston Business Journal reports that Houston school recruiters are coming to California to find teachers.
And most importantly, Passover Education Week begins now.
— EMILY ALPERT