Tag: week links in education

Stories, particularly related to education in the United States, that caught my attention this week.

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Giving a commencement address at Boston University during the WGA strike, Warner Bros. Discovery CEO David Zaslav was met with a loud chant of “Pay your writers.”

In New York, Hunter College fired an adjunct professor who was filmed threatening a New York Post writer with a machete after berating pro-life students.

Five years ago, when West Virginia University closed its shrinking campus in the small town of Montgomery, it shattered a community—and deepened local distrust of higher education.

In Las Vegas, a private school founded in 1984 by the current mayor recalled its yearbooks after learning that a student’s quotation came from a prominent neo-Nazi.

In North Carolina, Amy Bailiff walked across the stage to claim her doctorate 24 hours after giving birth.

In Maryland, a 20-year-old man has been terrorizing neighbors at a school bus stop with “an AR-15-style rifle” in what he says is a protest against a new law banning him from taking it into various other crowded public places. The police said his behavior is legal.

In Miami, a mother who persuaded her school district to restrict student access to Amanda Gorman’s inauguration poem, which she had not read, on the grounds that it includes “hate messages,” apologized for posting antisemitic memes on Facebook, including references to the “Protocols of the Elders of Zion.”

In Newark, Justin walked at commencement to receive his diploma along with the rest of Seton Hall University’s graduating class. This excited some comment because Justin is a dog.

Stories, particularly related to education in the United States, that caught my attention this week.

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Serbia’s education minister resigned as the government struggled to contain the fallout from two back-to-back mass shootings—one of them at a school—in Europe’s most heavily armed society.

Has American mathematics instruction been led astray by inquiry-based learning? Some researchers believe so, proposing a “science of math” akin to the phonics-oriented “science of reading.”

A report from the Jewish Education Project showed that enrollment in Hebrew (supplemental) schools fell by 45% in the United States between 2006 and 2020.

In Tucson, Carol Kay—who came to the United States from Cambodia in 1981, when she was 15 years old, knowing no English—prepared to graduate from the University of Arizona alongside her sons, Harry and Anthony Chhieu. She wants to become a teacher.

Stories, particularly related to education in the United States, that caught my attention this week.

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At an exhibition in Seoul, a university art student ate Maurizio Cattelan’s Comedian, which is a banana.

A car accident derailed her college plans, but Janice Hall returned to finish her degree—at the age of 81. “Of course, there’s still challenges from the stroke,” she said. This fall, she’s going to start on her master’s degree.

About 100 miles away, another Indiana school, Taylor University, fired its writing center director—allegedly because she rejected the provost’s attempt to dictate how she taught a writing course with a racial justice theme. Students and faculty seem upset.

In suburban Portland, a pair of high schoolers named Sam and (naturally) Sherman organized a World War II tank to attend prom in. Sherman “even” got a date to go with him. They were escorted by Darth Vader on a unicycle, playing flaming bagpipes, much like Patton’s Third Army.

In Oklahoma, the state governor vetoed a bill—which passed the legislature with nearly unanimous support—that would have guaranteed the right of Native students to wear Indigenous regalia at graduation ceremonies.

Around the United States, legislatures held by the Republican Party are trying to make it harder for high school and college students to vote.

The U.S. Department of Education reported a decline in American eighth graders’ test scores in U.S. history and (for the first time) civics between 2018 and 2022.

Across Europe, students have occupied 22 schools and universities in the latest wave of climate protests.

The U.S. surgeon general, Vivek Murthy, released an advisory document called “Our Epidemic of Loneliness and Isolation,” including a “national strategy to advance social connection.” It noted that young adults have some of America’s highest rates of loneliness, and these rates increased every year from 1976 to at least 2019.

A study published last month found that American elementary and middle school math teachers who believe gender equality has been achieved were more likely to give lower grades to work attributed to girls.

The Supreme Court’s influence scandals now have an education angle: ProPublica has reported that the billionaire Harlan Crow paid the private-school tuition of Justice Clarence Thomas’s grandnephew.

Back from an unannounced hiatus: Stories and essays, particularly related to education in the United States, that caught my attention this week. A 🕛 symbol indicates a metered paywall.

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Rolling Stone and the Pulitzer Center produced Brandi Morin’s and Annie Marie Musselman’s feature story 🕛 on the brutal legacy of America’s residential school system for Native American children.

Jill Barshay discussed the limitations of a research study that seems to demonstrate the importance of content knowledge in developing children’s reading skills.

The American Library Association counted 2,571 book titles that were challenged in 2022—40 percent more than in 2021, thanks to organized attempts to purge whole lists of books.

But this April, voters in Illinois and Wisconsin have turned out against book-banning in school board races.

The Seattle Public Library joined the Brooklyn Public Library in its “Books Unbanned” program, offering e-lending library cards to patrons between the ages of 13 and 26 across the United States.

In Oklahoma, five years after a failed teacher walkout, conservative state legislators may be coming around to the teachers’ point of view. But some educators are wary.

The University of Chicago, one of 17 elite institutions being sued for violating U.S. antitrust law in their financial aid practices, is reportedly the first school to settle.

The effects haven’t been uniform. But on balance, it really does look like social media, especially in the age of the smartphone, are bad for young people’s mental health.

In Minneapolis, hackers appear to have stolen 200,000 files from a public school system with 30,000 students, releasing extremely sensitive student and employee records, including reports of sexual abuse.

Schools in Wisconsin use an application called the Dropout Early Warning System to identify students at risk of failing to finish high school. It may be stigmatizing Black and Hispanic teenagers without improving graduation rates.

In Hammond, Indiana—and communities like it across the United States—rail companies like Norfolk Southern park their trains across intersections, forcing children to crawl over and under trains to get to school. The federal government received 28,000 complaints last year.

Marking its 40th anniversary, James Harvey, a staffer of the commission that produced the Reagan administration’s “Nation at Risk” report in 1983, described how the political leaders of the commission doctored the professionals’ findings to portray America’s public schools as failures. Frederick Hess pointed out some paradoxes in the report’s legacy.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention released the 2021 findings of the Youth Risk Behavior Survey. Although risky sexual behavior, drug use, and experiences of bullying at school have continued to decrease, most other measures of teen wellbeing have worsened.

Cedarville University’s idea of addressing sexual harassment apparently involves shaming women for “encouraging” their boyfriends to violate their boundaries.

Stories and essays, particularly related to education in the United States, that caught my attention this week. A 🕛 symbol indicates a metered paywall.

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Near Los Angeles, a high school teacher was sucked through the doorway of her classroom by wind associated with a small tornado. (She’s fine.)

In Los Angeles itself, workers in America’s second largest school district (with more than 400,000 students) held a three-day walkout.

On Capitol Hill, Republicans in the House of Representatives issued subpoenas to Stanford University, the University of Washington, and Clemson University, as part of their investigation into the theory that Republicans are too quiet on social media.

To get some of its lessons on the civil rights movement approved for use in Florida elementary schools, a curriculum publisher deleted the civil-rights-movement part.

A co-sponsor of Florida’s so-called Don’t Say Gay law faces up to 35 years in prison after pleading guilty to federal charges related to fraudulently obtaining pandemic relief funds.

Also in Florida, the directors of a so-called classical charter school fired caused the resignation of the principal after sixth graders in an art history class were exposed to unexpected pornography, i.e., a picture of Michelangelo’s David. The school board chair insisted it was more complicated than that, but also said it’s a Florida thing and you probably wouldn’t understand.

At the University of Houston, two students have died by suicide at the same 🕛 campus building in the space of one month. A third student died at the same building in 2017.

Meanwhile, the University of Houston apparently deleted its English department’s anti-racism statement after a tenured professor denounced 🕛 it by claiming that Black people are intellectually inferior to whites and Asians.

In the same city, a Liberty University employee who also heads the American Association of Christian Counselors was sued by Houston Christian University for failure to deliver on a multimillion-dollar contract to develop its mental health programs.

Six hundred miles away, the president of West Texas A&M University ordered the cancelation of a drag show, claiming it would be misogynistic.

In Denver, a high school student reportedly shot two administrators in front of the school, then died near his own vehicle.

America’s current teacher shortages are complicated (not to say contradictory). NPR took a look at the complexity, reporting on a teacher job fair in Mississippi.

Stories and essays, particularly related to education in the United States, that caught my attention this week. A 🕛 symbol indicates a metered paywall.

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For now, Florida’s “Stop WOKE” educational gag law remains blocked 🕛 in state colleges and universities (but not K-12 schools) by a federal court injunction.

As expected, Palm Beach Atlantic University, an evangelical Christian college in Florida, fired Prof. Sam Joeckel and banned him from campus after a parent complained that he was teaching a unit on racial justice.

In January, a predominately white middle school near Dallas attempted to subject a Black student to a drastic, life-altering punishment for being afraid of a school shooting threat.

Colleges apparently are responding to student mental health needs by firing 🕛 their counseling center directors.

Between May and December 2020, Berkeley researchers found, school disruptions weren’t harmful to the mental health of American 10-to-13-year-olds, but family financial anxiety was.

According to a new research working paper, the teacher-evaluation reforms initiated by the Obama administration didn’t work.

The Great Migration brought Black students almost one full extra year of schooling in the early 20th century.

When law students at Stanford shouted down a judicial clown, wrote Ken White (known to the Internet as “Popehat”), there were no heroes anywhere in the story. But the “pantomime” was perfectly designed to confirm conservative narratives about universities.

The number of first-time graduates completing bachelor’s degrees at American colleges and universities fell by 2.4% last year, and the number completing associate’s degrees fell by 7.6%.

Stories and essays, particularly related to education in the United States, that caught my attention this week. A 🕛 symbol indicates a metered paywall.

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The parents of a Black teenager attending a predominantly white school in South Carolina are suing after she says a teacher assaulted her for declining to participate in the Pledge of Allegiance.

In the United States, no agency has the authority to regulate indoor air quality, but controlling infectious diseases in schools may depend on nothing more than that.

In Ontario, two professors who were laid off when Laurentian University burned 76 programs called for a criminal investigation of the school’s financial arrangements.

Responding to the latest New York Times opinion piece about supposedly “puritanically progressive campuses that alienate conservative students,” Henry Farrell explained what social science research actually reveals about the differences between conservative and liberal students at college.

Pennsylvania has eliminated the college degree as a required credential for 92% of state government jobs.

David Palmieri examined Catholic dioceses that have adopted policies excluding gay and trans students as well as workers from their schools.

Charles Kenneth Roberts observed that academia’s supposed “quiet quitting” phenomenon is just a manifestation of a deeper crisis in the way academic work is (or, more likely, isn’t) rewarded.

According to the latest “autonomy scorecard” 🕛 published by the European University Association, governments across 35 European countries or regions are finding a variety of ways to undermine the independence of their public institutions. Hungary is no longer included in the scorecard at all.

After only 927 years, the University of Oxford has banned its employees from pursuing sex with students.

Stories and essays, particularly related to education in the United States, that caught my attention this week. A 🕛 symbol indicates a metered paywall.

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In a deadly rail disaster in Greece, the dozens of victims included many university students, returning to Thessaloniki after celebrating Carnival.

Iranian authorities are investigating strange reports that girls in dozens of schools across Iran have been poisoned with unknown substances.

In 2020, during the worst of the COVID-19 pandemic, the former British education minister Gavin Williamson sent WhatsApp messages complaining that teachers’ unions “just hate work.” British educators are not amused.

The campus revival at Asbury University took a new turn this week when Kentucky officials announced 🕛 that an unvaccinated attendee may have exposed 20,000 people to measles.

In Manhattan, the tiny but well-connected evangelical Christian institution The King’s College appears to be in severe 🕛 financial distress. Its journalism chair, Paul Glader, explained that the crisis may be connected with the role of a Canadian billionaire.

The FBI says a former systems administrator for the University of Michigan’s college of arts and sciences threatened to kill Jewish officials in Michigan, including the attorney general, as well as various university employees and public health figures. He said he was fired for refusing to be vaccinated against COVID-19.

A jury took less than two hours of deliberation to find a sheriff and detective liable 🕛 for $5 million’s worth of damages after they violently arrested a Virginia high school teacher on false charges of sexually abusing a minor.

In The Nation That Never Was, Kermit Roosevelt III argues that the real American founding happened not in 1776 but a century later. Jamelle Bouie argued 🕛 this week that Florida’s higher education censors should take note.

Three teachers running the pilot version of AP African American Studies spoke with NPR about its contents and effects.

As news organizations focused on the Supreme Court’s imminent decision about affirmative action in college admissions, Julie Wollman and Jacqueline Wallis begged them to pay attention to the colleges that educate 95% of American students, for whom the ruling may be “largely inconsequential.”

Stories and essays, particularly related to education in the United States, that caught my attention this week. A 🕛 symbol indicates a metered paywall.

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A two-weeks-long evangelical revival on the campus of Asbury University has moved 🕛 off-campus, more or less. It’s been a lot for a small college to handle.

Palm Beach Atlantic University, an evangelical Christian college that does not have tenure, allegedly 🕛 initiated the possible firing of a full professor for teaching “works from Black authors and civil rights activists” in a unit on racial justice. The provost ambushed him after class, then went to prepare for the arrival of the Florida governor on campus.

In spite of overwhelming opposition from students, faculty, and community members, Marymount University’s board of trustees voted unanimously to eliminate nine majors in the humanities and social sciences. Students at the Catholic university will no longer be able to major in religion.

The first Black superintendent of Virginia Military Institute, Maj. Gen. Cedric T. Wins, is facing 🕛 an organized campaign of opposition, led by another alumnus whose racist radicalization over the past decade has surprised some who knew him as a student.

The just-arm-teachers approach to preventing gun violence is going well at Rising Star Independent School District, near Abilene, where a third grader found 🕛 a gun the “beloved” superintendent accidentally left in the bathroom.

Meredith Draughn, the American School Counselor Association’s school counselor of the year, offered advice for helping children shift to “post-pandemic” life.

Stories and essays, particularly related to education in the United States, that caught my attention this week. A 🕛 symbol indicates a metered paywall.

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Since the Columbine High School massacre in 1999, at least 338,000 🕛 Americans have lived through shootings at their schools—almost half since the attack at Parkland five years ago. Last year was the worst yet.

At Michigan State University, Prof. Marco Díaz-Muñoz described what it was like to have his class on Cuban literature targeted by the gunman who would kill at least two of his students: Arielle Anderson and Alexandria Verner.

Avery Thrush explained why Teach for America made her leave teaching.

Other kinds of schools care about building moral and civic virtue, Johann Neem wrote; what makes a real college education different is its focus on intellectual virtue.

The FBI conducted searches at the University of Delaware as part of its investigation of Joseph Biden’s handling of classified documents.

Phil Murphy, the governor of New Jersey, contrasted his position with that of the Florida governor when announcing 🕛 that 25 public schools in New Jersey will offer AP African American studies next year.

A meta-analysis by researchers in Switzerland and Australia cast doubt on the effectiveness of many “flipped” classrooms.

The chief science officer of the American Psychological Association testified before the Senate Judiciary Committee about the effects of social media on adolescent development.

Stanford University’s student newspaper reported allegations of research misconduct and a coverup by the current Stanford president when he was an Alzheimer’s researcher in private industry.