The Week in Review / Educational Policy Institute

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The Most Important Payback of Them All

May 16, 2008

Watson Scott Swail, President & CEO, Educational Policy Institute

For a little US news this week, last night, the House of Representatives killed a $163 billion bill to fund the Iraq and Afghanistan wars, the first time that a large congregation of the GOP has joined the House Democrats in doing so. This was a somewhat unexpected occasion, but one that certainly sends a strong message to the White House and perhaps to congressional hawks.

However, the real story is what the House did pass last night: a wholesale increase in funding for the GI Bill, equivalent to the full cost of a public four-year degree plus some extra for cost of living expenses. This bill would be the largest amendment to the GI Bill since the Bill was introduced as the Servicemen’s Readjustment Act in 1944. In a rather interesting strategy, the Democrats divided the war-related bill into three parts, since they expected the Republicans to support the war funding. But the Republicans changed their tack and did not support the Administration, providing much fodder for the talking heads on MSNBC, CNN, and Fox last night. READ MORE

June is near: Graduation bells ringing or Orders beeping?... cap&gown VS. fast food buttons

The national graduation rate is between 68-71 percent; the graduation rate for Black, Hispanic, and Native American students is about 50 percent, while graduation rates for Whites and Asians hover around 75-77 percent, respectively.

Source: The Silent Epidemic: Perspectives of High School Dropouts





	Dropping out to go to work Emily Richmond, Las Vegas Sun More teens quit school to help financially needy families. Additionally, the percentage of dropouts from low-income households more than tripled, to 8.2 percent last year from 2.5 percent in 2005-06. Are gifted students getting left out? Carla Rivera, Los Angeles Times Nationally, about 3 million kindergarten through 12th-grade students are identified as gifted, but 80% of them do not receive specialized instruction, experts say. Studies have found that 5% to 20% of students who drop out are gifted.	Virtual schools see strong growth, calls for more oversight Ben Arnoldy, Christian Science Monitor Enrollment in online classes last year reached the 1 million mark, growing 22 times the level seen in 2000, according to the North American Council for Online Learning. That's just the start, says a new paper by the Hoover Institute, a conservative think tank at Stanford University. Its authors predict that by 2019 half of courses in Grades 9 to 12 will be delivered online. Private school test-takers on the rise Elizabeth Green, New York Sun The group that tests 4- and 5-year-olds applying to private kindergartens is reporting a jump in New York-based test-takers, providing statistical confirmation for claims by parents and admissions officers that this was a particularly competitive year for private school admissions.


	Colleges to bar illegal immigrants Jane Stancill & Kristin Collins, The News & Observer The community college system will no longer admit illegal immigrants to degree programs based on an advisory letter from the Office of the Attorney General, the system announced Tuesday (051308). Higher education will feel deep budget pains next year Adam Aasen, Florida Times Union Fewer students, fewer professors and higher tuitions could be a hallmark of Florida's public universities next school year. The state's overall budget will have about $7 billion less than the previous year and include a 6 percent decrease in funding for the university system, about $130 million in cuts.	Emerging Higher Ed Act Compromise Dough Lederman, Inside HigherEd A small group of U.S. senators and representatives and their staffs are working at breakneck speed with the hope that Congress can wrap up its work by Memorial Day on compromise legislation to renew the Higher Education Act. The draft measure, which amounts to just shy of 700 pages already even though it lacks three of the bill’s 11 sections (on graduate education, new programs, and private student loans), is the product so far of intense negotiations between leaders of the House and Senate higher education committees as they try to knock out a compromise version of legislation passed by their respective chambers.


	University as an entrepreneur Ceyda Çağlayan, Turkish Daily News (Turkey) Unlike other state universities in Turkey struggling with funding problems, Anadolu University in Eskişehir operates like a private company to ensure it has sufficient revenue to support its research. The university now earns 52 percent of its annual revenue from projects it develops. 2.2mil to sit for university entrance exams VietNamNet Bridge The Ministry of Education and Training on May 14 said that 2.2mil registrations to sit for university entrance exams had been submitted, an increase of 18% over 2007 (1.8mil registrations).	Lack of foreign schools keeps foreigners away Chosun Ilbo, (Korea) There are 47 foreign schools in Korea, including 20 British or American ones and 19 for Chinese students. A total of 7,781 foreign children attend these schools. According to a November 2006 study by the Federation of Korean Industries on OECD member nations, out of a total 24,407 children of foreigners who live in Korea, only 33.6 percent or 8,213 of those children live here. Hundreds of students gather in Santiago to protest against General Education Law Le Segunda Online (Chile) Close to 400 high school students are currently holding a demonstration near the Fuente Alemana, next to Plaza Italia. The students are protesting against the General Education Law proposal, which is being debated in Congress.


	Angry parents want N.B. judge to weigh in on early immersion Jill Mahoney, Globe and Mail A group of New Brunswick parents is asking a judge to intervene in the provincial government's controversial decision to eliminate early French immersion. Opponents filed an application in the Court of Queen's Bench Wednesday (051408) seeking judicial review of the move, saying they weren't sufficiently consulted. Government of Canada invests more than $22 million in knowledge works Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada (SSHRC) Eleven strategic knowledge clusters will receive funding from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council (SSHRC) this year, totalling more than $22 million over seven years. Their research will cover critical issues including globalization, homelessness, business sustainability, education and heritage.	Pragmatic programs attract young people to technology careers Nestor E. Arellano, ITbusiness When students at the Bishop Strachan School (BSS) in Toronto, say they're going do some shop work, they don't mean littering the floor with wood shavings and getting sawdust on their hair. The Grade seven to Grade 11 students in this all-girls school are figuring out structural strength and stability, mechanicals and real-word applications. The program is part of the independent school's initiative to encourage more women to pursue so-called STEM (science, technology, engineering and math) professions.


	$11b education infrastructure fund Associated Press, The Age The Rudd government has taken its education revolution up a gear, revealing a new $11 billion education infrastructure fund. Some $5 billion from this year and next year's budget surpluses will be directed into the Education Investment Fund (EIF), as well as $6 billion from the Higher Education Endowment Fund. Testing times for national education Courier Mail Australia’s school system entered a new world this week, with thousands of Year 3, 5, 7 and 9 students sitting truly national literacy and numeracy tests. For all the headlines about new computers and technical infrastructure for schools, this testing system is where the true education revolution is being generated.	Parents whose children play truant risk losing welfare Patricia Karvelas, The Australian Parents who do not send their children to school will lose their welfare payments under a radical plan being tested in eight communities across the nation. In an extension of the previous Government's plan to get tough on parents who allow truancy the Government will spend $17.6 million in a pilot program with state and territory governments, non-government education authorities and parents to improve school attendance. $718m extra for ‘closing the gap’ plan Australian Broadcasting News The federal Government's aim to close the gap between Indigenous and other Australians is the overriding theme for Indigenous funding for 2008-09. The Government says it has a ‘comprehensive plan’ for tackling Indigenous disadvantage, involving $1.2 billion over five years ($718 million is additional funding).


	2nd Annual Conference on Interventions that Encourage Minorities to Pursue Research Careers Program Book Minorities Affairs Committee of the American Society of Cell Biology, et al. The 2nd Annual Conference on Interventions that Encourage Minorities to Pursue Research Careers took place on May 2-4, 2008 in Atlanta. Organized by the Minorities Affairs Committee of the American Society for Cell Biology and a Planning Committee comprising members of the broader research and education communities, the Conference attracted 200 participants, including researchers, sponsors, program designers, evaluators, and policy analysts. The Conference featured a mix of plenary panels, concurrent mini-symposia, and posters that detailed the knowledge base on interventions (investigative studies on approaches, mentoring, and career choice), as well as professional necessities (funding, collaborations, and publishing). The emphasis on “how to intervene” drew heavily on the literature from the social, behavioral, and economic sciences highlighting methodologies and outcomes in STEM. The Conference sought to inform policy and practice, while fostering a multidisciplinary community of scholars dedicated to hypothesis-based investigations of what succeeds in recruiting and sustaining underrepresented students along the STEM pathway into the workforce. The web site will be updated periodically as a portal to and discussion center about interventions targeted to STEM students, educators, and sponsors. Universities, the US High Tech Advantage, and the Process of Globalization John Aubrey Douglass, Center for Studies in Higher Education (CSHE) In a recent study by Dr. John Douglass of the Center for Studies in Higher Education at the University of California-Berkley, it has been noted that “research universities throughout the world are part of a larger effort by nation-states to bolster science and technological innovation and compete economically. The US remains highly competitive as a source of High Tech (HT) innovation because of a number of market positions, many the result of long term investments in institutions such as research universities and in R&D funding, and more broadly influenced by a political culture that has tended to support entrepreneurs and risk taking. The following essay places universities within this larger political and policy environment by discussing market factors that have influenced knowledge accumulation and HT innovation in the US, their current saliency in the face of globalization, and the growing market position of competitors, such as the EU. The paper also provides observations on major US state-based HT initiatives intended to create or sustain Knowledge Based Economic Areas (KBEA’s). Thirteen variables are used to assess the overall comparative ability for creating KBEA’s, including the vitality of regional and national research universities, patterns of R&D investment, access to venture capital, intellectual property laws, educational attainment levels of the workforce, access and retention of global labor force, and political interest and forms of government support for promoting science and technology.”


The Educational Policy Institute is an international non-profit think tank dedicated to the study of educational opportunity. The Week in Review is a weekly publication that highlights the top news stories, reports and statistics related to academic preparation and access and success in the US, Canada, and beyond. The publication also features a commentary written by either President Watson Scott Swail, EdD or Vice-President Alex Usher. To submit comments, news releases, or submissions, please email Dr. Watson Scott Swail at wswail@educationalpolicy.org or call (757) 430-2200.