funding

With strong parent support, Highland Park ISD administrators are planning a new elementary foreign language program.

The school year might be finished but there is no end in sight for shrinking enrollments at some once-booming, suburban school systems.

The preschoolers who arrived at school early for free breakfast on a recent morning quietly ate granola bars and yogurt as middle school students recited part of the rosary over the public address system.

Ah Ram Kim is a 17-year-old high school student learning to read English at a first-grade level with the book "The Little Red Hen."

Independent research in recent months has documented that the nation's wealthiest philanthropic foundations are steering funding away from public school systems, attended by 90 percent of American students, and toward "challengers" to public education, especially charter schools.

President Obama has called on the Federal Communications Commission to expand an existing program to provide discounted high-speed Internet service to schools and libraries, even if it means increasing the fees that for years had been added to consumers’ phone bills.

Stronger-than-expected tax collections have left the state with an extra $300 million that could even grow before the fiscal period closes June 30. That is allowing the state to fully replenish its reserves and pay down money it still owes local school districts.

A Georgia grand jury has charged former Baltimore schools information technology chief Jerome Oberlton with seven counts of fraud and other charges related to his tenure with Atlanta Public Schools, during which he and a co-conspirator allegedly took $60,000 in kickbacks and Oberlton's private IT companies took bribes for awarding $700,000 to a contractor.

The Clay County school system is beginning the 2013-14 budget process facing a projected $7.5 million loss of state revenue because of a drop in enrollment.

Department of Defense schools will start the next academic year on time, despite employees having to take up to 11 days of unpaid leave through the end of the fiscal year. The furloughs will necessitate, however, five-day shutdowns during the next school term.