NEWS
- NAACP investigating teacher departures at Howard University Middle School [Howard University Middle PCS mentioned]
- D.C.'s 3 sector funds appear to survive in President's 2016 budget
- Study: High-quality early education could reduce costs
NAACP investigating teacher departures at Howard University Middle School [Howard University Middle PCS mentioned]
The Washington Post
By Michael Alison Chandler
February 2, 2015
The D.C. chapter of the NAACP has begun investigating the termination of three social studies teachers at Howard University Middle School of Mathematics and Science, after parents alleged they were targeted for teaching extra lessons about African and African American history.
However, Akosua Ali, president of the NAACP D.C. chapter, said the preliminary finding is that the three were not discharged for teaching black history.
Nevertheless, she said, the civil rights group is concerned about how the teachers were treated, and about other issues connected to the overall quality of the education received by the middle school’s students.
The announcement of the NAACP investigation came hours after students at the charter school staged a protest and gave school administrators a list of demands, including their priority: “New Social Studies teachers that will be treated with respect.”
School officials did not respond to requests for comment, and the teachers could not be reached on Monday.
Adilah Bilal, president of Parents in Action, a parent group at the school, said the social studies teachers came to the group on Jan. 22 and said they were planning to resign. Bilal said the reason the teachers gave was that they wanted to introduce more African history into a curriculum that focuses heavily on Greek and Roman history, but they claimed the administration did not support them. One teacher said that she had been written up for a lesson she gave about former mayor Marion Barry near the time of his death, Bilal said.
She said the teachers had planned to resign this Friday, so they could stay long enough to help students meet the Feb. 2 deadline to apply to high school through the citywide enrollment lottery. In the meantime, the parents resolved to hire a mediator to help the teachers and administrators work out the dispute. But early last week, administrators asked the teachers to leave immediately, she said.
The charter middle school is on the campus of Howard University, a historically black school. The middle school’s students gathered in the university’s main quad at about 11 a.m. Monday and formed a circle. Some students held up a poster that stated, “They don’t care about us.” Others held up pan-African flags.
News of the demonstration spread on Twitter using the hash tag #MS2Protest, and many people online encouraged the students to stand up for their rights.
Angelicque Blackmon, the middle school’s chief academic officer, is new this year.
School parents said they confronted her twice last week, asking how and why the teachers left so abruptly. “We just want to know what’s going on,” said Dorothy Lowery, whose daughter is in the sixth grade. In particular, she said she wants to know what is in the social studies curriculum.
“These are African American kids. They should learn African American history,” she said.
Lowery said the teachers had been forced to leave the school in the middle of the day and were given termination papers in front of the students. “My daughter came home very upset,” she said.
In a statement, the D.C. Public Charter School Board said public charter schools “are allowed the sole discretion on specific academic decisions including the hiring and termination of their staff and teachers.”
The board said it uses a “variety of methods — including reports, analysis and site visits — to ensure that public charter schools are providing quality educational opportunities to their students and are complying with the law.”
D.C.'s 3 sector funds appear to survive in President's 2016 budget
The Examiner
By Mark Lerner
February 3, 2015
Although it is extremely difficult to discern accurate information at this early stage, it appears from my research that President Obama's proposed 2016 Federal Budget maintains three sector education funding for D.C.'s schools. The three sector funds, devised by philanthropist and businessman Joseph E. Robert, Jr. include $20 million for DCPS, charters, and the Opportunity Scholarship Program. For evidence, consider yesterday's press release by Representative Eleanor Holmes Norton in which she thanks the President for continued funding for the first two sectors. The Congresswoman is a strong opponent of the private school voucher plan.
In addition, the Heritage Foundation's Brittany Corona claims that Mr. Obama's budget proposal includes an additional $200,000 for administration of the OSP. This would be an excellent move as the D.C. Children Youth and Investment Trust Corporation is working hard to publicize the availability of scholarships. 89 percent of the low income children enrolled in the program graduate from high school and 98 percent of these kids attend a two or four year college.
Also included in the draft budget is an increase in money allocated for the DC TAG program, the plan that allows D.C. residents to attend out-of-state public universities for in-state tuition costs. The expenditure would go up by $10 million to a $40 million total. However, family earning eligibility for DC TAG would decrease to $450,000 from one million dollars a year in the 2016 to 2017 school year. Remember that Ms. Norton had expressed fear that there would be a detrimental impact to TAG when Councilman David Catania's Promise Program was approved that provides up to $7,500 a year to children living in poverty for college costs.
Study: High-quality early education could reduce costs
The Washington Post
By Lyndsey Layton
February 3, 2015
High-quality early childhood programs can reduce the number of children diagnosed with certain learning disabilities by third grade, according to a study published Tuesday in the Educational Evaluation and Policy Analysis journal.
The study, conducted by Clara G. Muschkin, Helen F. Ladd and Kenneth A. Dodge of Duke University, could have significant implications for reducing the financial burden special education services place on municipal budgets.
The researchers explored how two early childhood initiatives in North Carolina affected the likelihood that children would be placed in special education by the end of third grade. It focused on a preschool program for four-year-olds from at-risk families and a program that provides child, family, and health services for children from birth through age five. The study tracked 871,000 children who were born between 1988 and 2000 and were enrolled in third grade between 1995 and 2010.
Children who participated in the More at Four preschool program, now called NC Pre-K, were 32 percent less likely to be placed in special education by third grade, compared to peers who did not participate in the preschool program, the study found.
Those enrolled in the Smart Start program for children from birth through age five were 10 percent less likely to be receiving special education services by third grade, the researchers found.
Together, both programs reduced the likelihood of third-graders receiving special education services by 39 percent, the researchers said. That could translate into significant savings, as special education in the U.S. costs almost twice as much as regular classroom education.
“It shows a level of benefit not only in academic terms but also financially, because special education services are so expensive,” Muschkin said. “This gives policy makers useful evidence that investments in early childhood education are a source of significant cost savings for the state.”
Some small studies have suggested children enrolled in high-quality preschool gain lifelong benefits, such as better jobs and higher wages and are less likely to be involved in the criminal justice system and to receive social services.
But in 2013, a large-scale study of nearly 5,000 children enrolled in Head Start, the federal government’s early childhood program for low-income children from birth to age five, found that progress in literacy among those children fades by the end of third grade. Critics of President Obama’s push to make preschool universal for low-income four-year-olds have pointed to the Head Start study in arguing that heavy investment in preschool might not be cost effective.
The Duke study suggests that high-quality preschool might not only benefit children who would otherwise need special education services, but that it has a “spillover” effect that benefits other children, Muschkin said.
Children in the same high-quality preschool programs as those who were enrolled through “More at Four” also benefitted, because the program was high-quality, Muschkin said. “The state funding goes to the slots in the classroom, but because the quality has to be high, the other children in the classroom also benefitted, even though they didn’t qualify for More at Four,” she said.
The children who attended state-funded early childhood programs also were ready for kindergarten and beyond, which made their public school classrooms better for their peers, she said. “When kids come to school ready to learn, it’s better for all kids,” she said.
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