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Many STEM Teachers Don't Hold Certifications
Tweet Share on Facebook June 8, 2011 Comment (2)With teacher layoffs and staff shortages nationwide, some teachers are being asked to teach subjects they are not certified to teach.
Roughly 30 percent of chemistry and physics teachers in public high schools did not major in these fields and haven't earned a certificate to teach those subjects, according to a new survey released Monday by the National Center for Education Statistics (NCES). Half of earth science teachers are similarly unqualified.
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Summer Job Outlook Bleak for Teens
Tweet Share on Facebook June 6, 2011 Comment (3)Summer job hiring is off to a slow start for people ages 16-19, according to new employment numbers from the government.
Between April and May, 71,000 jobs were added for teens. While still an increase from the 6,000 jobs added in 2010 between those two months, the overall number of young people with jobs is still down from 2010. Steep decreases in teen employment over the past 12 months mean 159,000 fewer 16-to-19-year-olds are employed than in May 2010, when more than 4.3 million teens had jobs.
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Cyber Bullying Growing More Malicious, Experts Say
Tweet Share on Facebook June 3, 2011 Comment (15)Over the past several years, high-profile cases of cyber bullying—like those that resulted in suicides by teens Tyler Clementi and Phoebe Prince—have pushed the issue to the forefront of America's consciousness. But experts disagree on the prevalence of cyber bullying, who's responsible for preventing it, and even how to define it.
In the past, students and parents have been concerned with cyber bullies who made threats on sites like Facebook or Myspace, spread online rumors or scandalous pictures, or stole passwords to e-mail and social networking accounts, says cyberlaw expert Parry Aftab, who was honored by Congress in 2005 for her work in cyber safety. But bullies have gotten more complex and malicious as Internet access becomes more accessible with the rise of cheap, Internet-enabled mobile devices and as social networking becomes more intertwined with students' everyday lives.
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Major Corporations Promote STEM Education
Tweet Share on Facebook June 1, 2011 Comment (2)The Dow Chemical Co. has created products such as plastic bags, water purifiers, and military weapons for more than 100 years, but the company is worried that America's science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) education crisis might leave it understaffed.
"We need not only the workforce to produce [our products], but [also] a society that understands how science and chemistry are important and won't be frightened by new products," says Bo Miller, president and executive director for the Dow Chemical Company Foundation, the community outreach arm of the company.
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Fewer Students Attend Private Schools
Tweet Share on Facebook May 30, 2011 CommentThe number of pre-K through 12th grade students enrolled in private schools—especially Catholic institutions—has sharply declined over the past decade, according to a new government report released May 26.
Private school enrollment from pre-kindergarten through 12th grade dropped 12.7 percent between the 2001-02 and 2009-10 school years, according to the Congressionally mandated annual report "Condition of Education." In the fall of 2001, 6.3 million students were enrolled in private schools; in 2009, just 5.5 million attended private schools.
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America's Most Popular Online Teacher
Tweet Share on Facebook May 27, 2011 Comment (6)America's most popular teacher doesn't work at Harvard University or a fancy prep school. In fact, he doesn't work in a school at all, but his lessons have been viewed more than 56 million times. Salman Khan, a former hedge fund manager, is the founder of Khan Academy, a free online learning platform with a library of more than 2,300 videos covering everything from basic algebra and differential equations to the Vietnam War.
In 2004, Khan's younger cousin in New Orleans, Nadia, was having trouble in her math class. Khan, an MIT graduate who was working in New York City, began tutoring Nadia over Yahoo! Messenger. Soon, more relatives began asking for help, so he started making YouTube videos explaining different topics, which they could view when they had time. Eventually, other people discovered his videos and thought they were useful.
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U.S. Can Learn From Other Countries' Education Systems
Tweet Share on Facebook May 25, 2011 Comment (13)It's time for America to start following other countries' leads when it comes to education, according to a new report by the National Center on Education and the Economy (NCEE), an organization that researches education systems around the world. The group held a conference Tuesday in Washington, D.C. to release the report, which was attended by Secretary of Education Arne Duncan, politicians, and school leaders.
Education achievement in the U.S. has fallen to the middle of the pack among developed nations, according to the 2009 Program for International Student Assessment (PISA) report, which ranked the knowledge of 15-year-olds in 70 countries. The U.S. ranked 14th in reading, 17th in science, and 25th in mathematics.
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Houghton Mifflin to Crowdsource Ideas
Tweet Share on Facebook May 23, 2011 CommentHoughton Mifflin Harcourt, one of the world's largest textbook manufacturers, is launching a contest that it hopes will improve student achievement and result in new products.
The company is asking anyone over 18 to submit ideas for improving the way students learn. Contestants only need to write a few paragraphs on an online form describing a problem with education and a way they think it could be solved. The ideas are then posted to a message board where they can be discussed and improved upon. The contest started May 18 and will run through the end of July. A panel of judges that includes prominent education thought leaders, policymakers, and business executives will choose several winners in September, who will split $250,000 in cash and prizes.
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Rethinking Summer School
Tweet Share on Facebook May 20, 2011 Comment (1)Summer is just a few weeks away—but most high school students won't spend it learning. According to a 2010 study by the Wallace Foundation, a national education nonprofit, just 25 percent of school-age children participate in a summer learning program. I spoke with Ron Fairchild, an education consultant and former director of the Johns Hopkins University Center of Summer Learning (now known independently as the National Summer Learning Association), about the problems students face over the summer and what constitutes a good summer learning program.
Fairchild will speak to youth leaders, politicians, and business owners about the importance of summer learning programs at the Boys & Girls Clubs of America National Conference in New Orleans this weekend. The organization offers a number of free, community-based summer learning programs for students of all ages.
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More States Consider 4-Day Weeks
Tweet Share on Facebook May 19, 2011 Comment (3)With states looking to balance budgets, more school districts are considering switching to four-day school weeks.
About one fourth of South Dakota's school districts will operate four-day weeks next fall. In California, Gov. Jerry Brown said the 180-day school year could be cut by up to five weeks.
