“How much 'wasted' by OC Department of Education?” plus 2 more |
- How much 'wasted' by OC Department of Education?
- LORI DRUMMER: How to help Latino students improve school scores
- Iraq War Soldier Prevails in Three Tours of Duty, Battling Cancer and Pursuing Excelsior College Degree During ...
| How much 'wasted' by OC Department of Education? Posted: 05 Jul 2010 03:11 AM PDT
She claims that some 40 percent of education spending is lost to maintaining a bureaucracy that plays little role in providing quality education. That calculation has garnered a great deal of scrutiny and much criticism for failing to take into account the different ways that the state finances education. Eager to see whether Whitman's claims might hold water on the local level, we set out to see whether those numbers might apply to the county's top educational administrative unit, the Orange County Department of Education. Of its approximately $250 million budget, the OCDE spends one-quarter on direct aid to school districts. These funds go toward things as mental health funding, regional occupation programs, and special education – some of which under current budget plans Sacramento plan to cut. Of the roughly $110 million spent on salaries for the 2010-2011 school year, the department spends about $50 million on administrative salaries and about $55 million on teaching positions. When the numbers are crunched, 19 percent of the department's budget is spent on administrative salaries alone. After going over their newly approved budget it is clear that this county body puts most of its funds into education. But the OCDE does still have relatively higher administrative costs than other parts of the education system. But those costs appear nowhere near as high as Whitman's estimates. Large figures like $10.6 million spent on professional, consulting, and operating expenses does jump out at the reader, but that figure was reduced by 7.5 percent compared to the previous year and doesn't add up to the type of administrative inefficiencies touted by Whitman among others. But it is surprising that in a year of immense fiscal austerity, the OCDE is only reducing its budget by 1.6 percent. Renee Hendrick, who put together the OCDE's budget, says that's because the department has been laying off teachers and cutting staff for years now. And layoffs, she says, are likely to continue. Last year, OCDE eliminated 125 positions for a savings of $8.5 million and will lay off an additional 80 workers this year to save $7 million, according to Hendrick. And when federal stimulus funding dries up next year more teacher layoffs will probably be inevitable. You can find the OCDE 2010-2011 budget here. The totals may change slightly depending on the budget approved by the state legislature. The Department provides administrative support for smaller school districts, which accounts in part for the higher proportion of the budget spent towards administrative salaries. Some have argued that these boards are redundant- there are 58 of them, one in each county, in addition to all the regular school districts, each of which has its own full-blown administration. Money could be saved by having the local districts provide the services now handled by the county departments do, the argument goes; more on that another time. More Watchdog: More education: Five Filters featured article: Headshot - Propaganda, State Religion and the Attack On the Gaza Peace Flotilla. Available tools: PDF Newspaper, Full Text RSS, Term Extraction. | |
| LORI DRUMMER: How to help Latino students improve school scores Posted: 05 Jul 2010 01:01 PM PDT SAN ANGELO, Texas — Has American public education failed Latino families? Cavernous achievement gaps between Latino and white children persist. If current trends hold, only 11 of every 100 Latino kindergartners in the United States will obtain a bachelor's degree, as projected by the Education Trust. Greater parental-choice opportunities would allow programs with proven track records to better serve Latino families in the United States. Such opportunities include: n New advances in virtual education technology. These promise to revolutionize online and hybrid classrooms, and the benefits for Latinos may be especially valuable. These new opportunities are driven by innovative software that provides teachers with continuous verification of content mastery, and allows them to specialize instruction to the needs of individual children. n School voucher programs, like the Milwaukee Parental Choice Program. Voucher programs offer Latino families access to better, safer schools and the opportunity to choose among specialized learning environments, and they have demonstrated impressive results. n High-performing charter schools, which have proven to be among the most effective tools to close minority achievement gaps. A 2009 analysis of Chicago education determined that Latino students attending charter schools outperformed their Chicago Public Schools peers 66 percent of the time. The differences were even more profound for Chicago's English learners attending charters, who outscored their peers at traditional city schools 83.8 percent of the time. n Specialized scholarships to allow the 8.5 percent of Latino families with children diagnosed with disabilities to transfer to nearby public or private schools. The solution, exceedingly popular among families enrolled, has been shown to save taxpayer dollars. Latino children remain twice as likely as white children to score in the woeful "below basic" category at both the fourth- and eighth-grade reading levels on the National Assessment for Educational Progress. For the two in five Latino eighth-graders nationally scoring "below basic," the test's lowest category, the odds against earning a high-school diploma are extremely steep. Worse still, however, is that Latino proficiency levels essentially failed to improve between 2002 and 2009. This fact holds even more daunting implications considering the Pew Charitable Trusts' projection that 29 percent of the U.S. population will be Hispanic in 2050. Nationally, the higher the percentage of Latino students who attend a particular high school, the more likely they are to be taught by teachers who lack a college major in the subject they are teaching. The fact that school overcrowding often falls most heavily in Latino neighborhoods adds to the urgency of the need for new options. A benefit of parental choice is the ability to help overcome regional teacher shortages, which nationally are most likely to occur in predominantly Latino schools. In Chicago and surrounding neighborhoods, for instance, 35 percent of 16- to 24-year-old Latinos are high school dropouts. Choice options, while effective, are often unavailable. By contrast, reforms rooted in parental choice that were implemented in Florida — including virtual schooling, private-school choices for low-income and special-needs students and a robust charter-school market — have demonstrated a remarkable record of achievement over the past decade. Based on 2009 NAEP scores, Florida's Latino fourth-graders now outscore or tie the statewide reading averages of 31 states. As noted by researchers Matthew Ladner and Dan Lips, Florida Latinos' fourth-grade reading scores were 25 points below the national average of white students in 1998, but by 2009 had closed the gap to just six points. Parental-choice options were key policies that helped ignite this success in the Latino community. Unfortunately, most of the nation's largest Latino constituency and advocacy groups continue to use their considerable political clout in support of liberal political agendas seeking to bolster the public-education monopoly and teacher-union control of government education spending. Likewise, federal Education Secretary Arne Duncan has directed billions of new federal education dollars to initiatives seeking to replicate proven education successes, but has failed to recognize the benefits of private-school choice. Lori Drummer and Don Soifer are education analysts with the Lexington Institute in Arlington, Va., and authors of a new report, "Libertad de la Educacion: School Choice Solutions for Closing the Latino Achievement Gap," at www.lexingtoninstitute.org. Their commentary was written for the Providence Journal. Five Filters featured article: Headshot - Propaganda, State Religion and the Attack On the Gaza Peace Flotilla. Available tools: PDF Newspaper, Full Text RSS, Term Extraction. | |
| Posted: 05 Jul 2010 06:08 AM PDT | Georgia Congressman John Lewis and U.S. Under Secretary of Education Martha Kanter, receive honorary degrees. Albany, NY (Vocus/PRWEB ) July 5, 2010 -- After returning from his first tour of duty in Iraq to Fort Drum, New York, SFC H. Daniel Tulip learned he had cancer of the bladder. His wife Marcie moved into action as his emotional rock, supporting him daily and opting to postpone a major surgery need of her own in order to care for him. After surgery, he was deployed the second time, and then a third time. As a cancer survivor and combat soldier, he took on another challenge during this third deployment: pursuing his college degree with Excelsior College. Back home, his wife remained his base of faith and encouragement.
"I not only survived cancer, I survived the emotional trauma of spending three-and-a-half years in combat, a feat I would have never been able to endure without the support of my wife," said Dan Tulip, now retired. "And it was a lifetime goal, to complete my degree before retiring from the military, to be more successful in the civilian world." Now retired from the Army, Dan Tulip is a candidate for the Troops to Teachers program. During his third and final tour, Dan set his sights on a personal goal: completing that college degree. He earned his Bachelor of Science in Criminal Justice from Excelsior College, and will travel from Greenville, Pennsylvania to march in a traditional Commencement ceremony for nontraditional students on July 9, 2010 in Albany, New York. His wife and their blended family of six sons, ages 12-29, and other relatives, will be in attendance to cheer him on. Dan is this year's recipient of Excelsior's Robert P. Mahoney Award, which honors graduates who completed their education against remarkable odds. Marcie Tulip will also receive the Excelsior Student Support Award, for her extraordinary support of his educational goals, his health challenge, and his military service. Hundreds of other military and civilian students, nearly all of them working adults, will cross the stage at Albany's Empire State Plaza on July 9. Among them is an alumnus who is now a physician and professor of endontics in New Jersey, Dr. Jeffrey Stewart. Dr. Stewart, an alumni award recipient, will escort his mother, 63-year-old Nancy Stewart, as she celebrates completion of her associate degree in nursing. After five decades as a licensed practical nurse, she earned her degree and passed the national licensing examination for registered nurses (NCLEX). She will continue working for hospice, now as a registered nurse. Excelsior College President John Ebersole said, "Military graduates are among those who impress us the most each year, but their achievements are no less remarkable than those of our civilian graduates who have also overcome daunting obstacles to attain their degrees. Education is vital not just for career advancement and credentials, but for enhancement of our knowledge of the world and of ourselves. Learning enriches us, our families, our jobs, and our communities." Excelsior College graduates have stories large and small, but each had a common goal: to complete a degree in higher education. Since 1971, Excelsior has been serving the educational needs of adult students through distance learning options such as transfer of certain prior learning credit, credit by examination, and in the last decade, through online classes. Excelsior offers degree programs in its schools of Nursing, Health Sciences, Liberal Arts, and Business and Technology. The Center for Professional Development provides programs for students seeking a non-degree track toward certification and education in various career fields. Graduates will hear a keynote address from U.S. Under Secretary of Education Martha Kanter; she and Congressman John Lewis of Georgia's fifth district, an outspoken civil rights leader since the 1960s and powerful force in Congress who will also speak, will each receive honorary degrees for their public service. Each year, despite a distance education model that finds students and many faculty dispersed around the country and the world, Excelsior's Commencement activities in Albany, NY are a magnet for hundreds of graduates, their friends and families – including young children who see mom or dad in a cap and gown – who travel here from around the country. The three-day event allows students to meet many of the 425 Albany-based Excelsior employees who are keys to each graduate's success. Festivities take place on July 8-10 in Albany, at the Desmond Hotel, Excelsior College and the Empire State Plaza. At Excelsior College: In 2011, Excelsior will begin celebrating its 40th anniversary with a series of events marking the College's success in serving the needs of adult students who have traditionally been underserved by higher education. Excelsior College http://www.excelsior.edu is an accredited, nonprofit distance learning institution that focuses on removing obstacles to the educational goals of adult learners. Founded in 1971 and located in Albany, NY, Excelsior is a proven leader in the assessment and validation of student knowledge. It offers more efficient and affordable access to degree completion through multiple avenues: its own online courses and college-level proficiency examinations, and the acceptance in transfer of credit from other colleges and universities as well as recognized corporate and military training programs. Excelsior College is accredited by the Middle States Commission on Higher Education. ### Bookmark - Del.icio.us | Furl It | Technorati | Ask | MyWeb | Propeller | Live Bookmarks | Newsvine | TailRank | Reddit | Slashdot | Digg | Stumbleupon | Google Bookmarks | Sphere | Blink It | Spurl Five Filters featured article: Headshot - Propaganda, State Religion and the Attack On the Gaza Peace Flotilla. Available tools: PDF Newspaper, Full Text RSS, Term Extraction. |
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