Getting ordinary plastic bags to rot away like banana peels would be an environmental dream come true. After all, we produce 500 billion a year worldwide and they take up to 1,000 years to decompose. They take up space in landfills, litter our streets and parks, pollute the oceans and kill the animals that eat […]
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16-year-old finds way to make plastic decompose faster
Student Sent Home For '69' T-Shirt
BOSTON -- A Billerica, Mass., mother is furious after her 14-year-old daughter was suspended for a day from her middle school for wearing a T-shirt that said "SOPHOMORE 69."Christina Morrison, an eighth-grader at the Marshall Middle School, was sent to the office Tuesday when she arrived at school wearing the shirt. The assistant principal told […]
Students in New York collectively refuse to take test
New York 8th-Graders Boycott Practice Exam But Teacher May Get Fired.----AMY GOODMAN: Very quickly, you did a story yesterday: "New York 8th-Graders Boycott Practice Exam But Teacher May Get Ax." He was fired, and what happened?JUAN GONZALEZ: Yeah. Well, this is an amazing story in the South Bronx at an intermediate school. Last week, 160 […]
School Confiscates Cell Phones After Nude Photos of Junior High Girls Circulate
Police in a Galveston County, Texas, school district have been confiscating dozens of cell phones from students after nude pictures of two junior high girls began circulating, the district superintendent said."Those students forwarded the images and the circle opened up and got wider and wider," Superintendent Jon Whittemore said Tuesday.He said that it all started […]
Acceptance of Homeschooling Grows but Myths Persist
How we see ourselves and how others perceive us can be very different. That's one of the lessons from a recent survey by Ellison Research that looked at public attitudes toward various education options.On a five-point scale regarding the overall quality of education, public school received a 3 and homeschooling a 3.14. According to Ron […]
Schools try to aid disadvantaged children, but pressure to help the family often trumps an education
Eventually, it all became too much for Jonathan Cole -- the time missed from school to take care of his siblings; the repeated moves to new schools; the realization that he was getting further and further behind his classmates. So, he took the path that many children bearing the burden of poverty take: He dropped […]
Woman Accused of Driving Girl to Suicide Is Indicted
LOS ANGELES - In a highly unusual use of a federal law generally employed in computer fraud cases, a federal grand jury here on Thursday indicted a Missouri woman accused of using a phony online identity to trick and taunt a 13-year-old girl, who committed suicide in response to the cyberbaiting.The woman, Lori Drew, was […]
University students pressured to say positive things on survey
Students from a range of universities are claiming they are being pressed to make falsely enthusiastic responses to an official satisfaction survey.Staff at Kingston University were recorded telling students to falsify their ratings in the government-backed annual National Student Survey.In response, hundreds of students have e-mailed the BBC News website claiming this is a more […]
Man jailed when daughter fails to get diploma
CINCINNATI (AP) - A man ordered by a judge to make sure his daughter hit the books has found himself in jail because she failed to earn a high school equivalency diploma.Brian Gegner, of Fairfield, was sentenced last week to 180 days in jail for contributing to the unruliness or delinquency of a minor.He was […]
American kids, dumber than dirt
Warning: The next generation might just be the biggest pile of idiots in U.S. historyI have this ongoing discussion with a longtime reader who also just so happens to be a longtime Oakland high school teacher, a wonderful guy who's seen generations of teens come and generations go and who has a delightful poetic sensibility […]
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