Across Minnesota, the ratio of 759 students to each counselor in grades K-12 ranks among the worst in the nation — 49th, ahead of only California. The American School Counselor Association recommends a 250-to-1 ratio; the national average is 457 students per counselor. Lagging state funding is blamed for the shortage in Minnesota.

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The four counselors will do traditional one-on-one work with students, helping them cope with issues from family divorce and homelessness to bullying and building friendships.

I had no idea this was a problem in Minnesota. Glad that at least one district is getting funding to improve the situation.

The article, summed up in the last paragraph:

The Teach for America alumni assumed they already had a seat at the table, and a genuine voice in policy creation. The student teachers in Michigan were just trying to get hired.

But on the reading section of the National Assessment of Educational Progress, the gap between English learners and native speakers hasn’t budged. Only 4 percent of California’s English learners were at least proficient in fourth-grade reading in 2009 on the national test, slightly less than in 2003, when it was 6 percent.

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“When you put them in all-English situations, that really retards their academic growth,” said Maria Quezada, CEO of the California Association for Bilingual Education. “You lose that valuable connection to the family, and you put them at a disadvantage when they can’t participate as easily.”

One amendment offered by Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., would have removed the requirement that teachers of students with disabilities be “highly qualified”.

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Another proposal that died in the committee came from Sen. Johnny Isakson, R-Ga. He wanted to do away with limits on how many students with disabilities could take alternate tests, which are different than those their classmates take.

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“The underlying concern we have with Isakson and Paul [is that their message is] ‘It’s too difficult to accommodate you, so let’s separate you,” Jones said. “When that happens, it’s separate but not equal. It’s not a 21st century vision of society.”

In his research, Keith C. Barton, an education professor at Indiana University, argues that preservice teachers need to expand their understanding of their roles as teachers. He writes that teachers must model and teach civic engagement, and that while teacher-preparation programs can help inculcate those values and skills, most don’t.

As I’ve mentioned before, my teacher prep program is not like other programs. Because the focus is on urban education, we look at issues of poverty, race, gender, social justice, and society. It’s not something just the social studies people talk about - it’s important to everyone. And I think that’s what this article is saying, if I’m not reading too much into it: all preservice teachers should be learning about civics instruction, not just the social studies teachers. Because civics affects daily life. It’s kind of like literacy, for which I took the class Teaching Literacy in the Content Areas, where regardless of our concentration we had to learn reading and writing methods.

What are your thoughts on the state of civics education?

They found that students in schools that are closed due to poor performance actually do substantially worse on reading and math tests in the new school to which they are sent for at least a year, and then recover and end up doing about as well as they were doing at their original school. In other words, after all the expense, acrimony, and heartache involved in closing a school, the students involved do not benefit.

D.C. Council Chairman Kwame Brown seeks to recruit top teachers to low performing schools by freeing them for two or three years from the district’s oppressive IMPACT evaluation system.

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If Brown’s idea went national, however, think of the incentive it would provide for teachers who want to actually teach (as opposed to just complying with top down micromanagement) to transfer to poor schools in order to do so. Before long, the suburbs would have lost so many teachers that they would be filling their classrooms with 23-year-old wonders trying to prove how hard they can work with no sleep and no peace of mind, while under the thumb of evaluators whose lack of knowledge just makes them more self-righteous.

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Liberating teachers who commit to the toughest schools would be the first step in liberating all teachers and students from excessive test prep, narrowing the curriculum and rote instruction.

Six students returning to IPS “could not be served because the school did not provide the student with the needed special education services,” White said. Five students were homeless. Failing to serve homeless students violates federal law. Failing to serve special needs students violates state and federal laws.

Simnick said Department of Education data showed charter schools don’t discriminate. He said a high number of students move to and from urban public schools, including charters, because parents change jobs or move their families to different parts of town.

“I have yet to hear a single parent come forward and say a charter school is denying them access to the services they require,” Simnick said.

White last week apologized for his comments in a radio interview that IPS, unlike charter and private schools, cannot turn away hard-to-educate students.

Yet somehow its average SAT score has risen to the top tenth of one percent among all public schools nationally. Less than ten percent of its students are low-income, compared to 40 percent in its city. Maybe that has something to do with the fact that the school is allowed to ask (not require, its principal emphasizes) that every family donate $3,000 and 40 hours of volunteer time a year.

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Charters spend public money. They should do everything possible to convince parents their doors are open to all, as long as that doesn’t get in the way of the deep and imaginative teaching that they are there to provide.

Here’s the thing: public schools can’t “require” anything of parents. Sometimes they get slammed in the media for even “asking” things of parents. So you’re really not comparing apples to apples, no matter what charter schools say. (I’m not saying charter schools are bad. I’m just saying that it’s really hard to make comparisons on goals and academic success when there are so many variables that can’t be attributed directly to the education a child is receiving 8 hours a day.)

Just a few quotes from this article:

“Unfortunately, people are listening to me because my kid died,” Aaberg said.

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She hit a wall after testifying before the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights this May. Lights were flashing at her as she recounted her son’s experience and told the panel about the number of bullied GLBT kids dying from suicide. Afterward, she had to listen to others testify. Some said bullying was freedom of speech.

Clearly, civics education needs some help, because this is not the definition of free speech.