School Survival

By Kristin Rushowy and Amy Dempsey Drug use, vandalism and swearing at a teacher are the kinds of things that can get a student suspended from school. But Emil Cohen was kicked out of Northern Secondary — for a day and a half — for speaking his mind after being told not to. Mind you, […]

BY MEREDITH KOLODNER More than a thousand students were arrested by safety agents last school year, and nearly 300 were collared during just the first two months of this academic year, the Daily News has learned. The arrest statistics were revealed as advocates prepare to testify before the City Council in support of the School […]

by Sam Dillon --- 12/10/10 --- The New York Times --- http://www.nytimes.com/2010/12/11/ed...1education.htm How useful are the views of public school students about their teachers? Quite useful, according to preliminary results released on Friday from a $45 million research project that is intended to find new ways of distinguishing good teachers from bad. Teachers whose students […]

And believe it or not, some students support that. Here is the article: At some districts the truancy problem is so bad, GPS technology is being used to handle the more serious offenders. Some students are being asked to keep a hand-held tracking device with them at all times. It may sound a little far […]

A North Posey student scribbled the mother of all swear words on a survey at school. He says it's free speech. Now he's going to have a couple of days to sit at home and think about it. Administrators say Richard Karns was treated just like any other who violated the school's rules. But Karns […]

by: Judy Molland Can this really be happening in our schools in the 21st century? Earlier this month, the Southern Poverty Law (SPLC) filed a federal class action lawsuit regarding the use of mace as a means of basic discipline against school children in Birmingham, Alabama. Mace As A Tool For School Discipline Chemical weapons […]

When a mother in Orange County, NY, called her teenage sons’ school earlier this week to say that the boys were staying home sick, the skeptical principal decided to take a page from the Ed Rooney playbook. In a move that might remind some of the slimy villain from the '80s teen movie “Ferris Bueller’s […]

by Carol Scott Edward Burroughs, an 18-year-old college freshman who battled ageist stereotypes as he ran for School Board, is running a victory lap today. The 2010 high school grad beat his opponent, a retired teacher and principal who slammed him as a "child," for a spot on the Prince George's County, Maryland School Board. […]

by Jerry Mintz (originally posted here) In reference to: http://voices.washingtonpost.com/answer-sheet/school-turnaroundsreform/how-billionaire-donors-are-har.html It’s too bad that the school reformers and the billionaire funders have to make every mistake there is to make on their way to, perhaps, finding the real clue to how learning actually works. I think they mean well. Probably they feel a little guilty […]

by Peter Gray In my last post I described some instances of cheating in science; summarized some data about the percentage of scientists who, on anonymous questionnaires, admit to cheating; and ended with the question, "Why do scientists cheat?" Cheating--by publishing fraudulent data--completely destroys the purpose of science, which is to discover truths; so why […]