One central Virginia high school replaced hundreds of lockers with device charging stations this fall to bolster its 1-to-1 program. Of the 2,000 high school students in Albemarle County Public Schools, only 25 requested lockers last school year, as more students carry their devices and books in backpacks, says Principal Jay Thomas. The school fully […]
Some say that for principals, every day is their first day on the job. Alongside day-to-day building management issues such as hiring teachers, overseeing finances and student discipline, principals now guide teachers through new state standards and testing. As principal evaluations become a more common practice, district leaders need to provide them with a PD […]
Former New York City Schools Chancellor Dennis M. Walcott was appointed by the state in August to lead a team studying the troubled East Ramapo Central School District in New York. Last fall, a state investigation found that the district's school board members diverted money from public schools to children attending private religious institutions, leaving […]
Public outcry over new standards-aligned tests led some states to cut funding, changing the exam landscape for 2015-16. In 2012, nearly every state was part of either PARCC or the Smarter Balanced Assessment Consortium. As of this July, just 18 states remained in Smarter Balanced, and 10 (plus Washington, D.C.) had stuck with PARCC. Twenty-two […]
How can districts use the Common Core-aligned assessments to improve education if the results won't be available until later this fall, after the current school year is well underway? That's the question district administrators have been asking themselves for months, ever since millions of American students took the first round of Common Core-aligned assessments earlier […]
By the time a 220-pound linebacker gets in his way, a high school running back has built significant momentum. The resulting collisions have been described with metaphors involving rams, brick walls and Mack trucks. Regardless of the analogy, these impacts can and do result in injuries for players of all ages. The most frequent sports-related […]
Forrest Claypool, a top aide to Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel, was named CEO of Chicago Public Schools in July. Previous CEO Barbara Byrd-Bennet resigned in June amid a federal investigation into a $20.5 million no-bid contract awarded by the school board to her previous employer. The district is grappling with a budget shortfall of about […]
There's good news for district leaders in the ongoing battle to meet the ever-increasing demand for bandwidth. One-gigabit networks are coming to more areas, the cost of service per megabit is decreasing, and funding through E-rate and other sources is increasing. Many district networks are straining under the deluge of digital learning resources. Web-based learning […]
State-of-the-art science labs, green buildings and internet upgrades are among major trends in school construction this year, as districts break ground on large projects that address aging facilities, increased enrollment and technology needs, according to the first annual DA School Construction Survey. State-of-the-art science labs, green buildings and internet upgrades are among major trends in […]
A few years ago, San Francisco USD had questions about the hundreds of community-based organizations teaching reading to students and growing school gardens, among a wide range of other activities. Administrators wanted to know the risks of outside groups using school facilities, says Dorothy Gjerdrum, the senior managing director of public sector practice at Arthur […]
