If you can’t get enough of the TIMSS (and really, who can, especially this time of year…) here is new analysis from NCES. Worth checking out. Among other nuggets some cool demographic breakouts (affluent schools doing OK, don’t hold your breath for the headline) and interesting achievement gap data, including a narrowing in math in science from the mid-1990s to 2003. Wait, wasn’t a lot of that pre-NCLB and on Clinton’s watch? It was! Margaret Spellings’ first spin job coming up…
John Merrow looked at the debate about military recruiting in high schools for the News Hour (video here). Worth watching. When did it become such an article of faith on the Left that we’re supposed to resist the military? Wait, don’t answer that. Still, for a lot of kids the military provides a great option both educationally and skill-wise. And, in particular the Marines, have figured out a way to reach some kids who were otherwise falling through the cracks. And there is that small matter about protecting us and defending our way of life…That said, the provision in NCLB is just one more bureaucratic hassle for school districts already buried in paper from state and federal requirements.
The Canadians are dissin’ a Republican governor over education policy. Not smart! Don’t they know that this president will attack a country for less?
The LA Times disses California Secretary of Education Riordan in a profile but includes this gem: “But Riordan also could be politically tone deaf. He once greeted hunger strikers while eating a hamburger.”
Here’s a short primer (pdf) from SECTQ on working conditions and teaching.