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THE NEWS
ACADEMIC PREPARATION
Some States Prodding Students to Graduate Early
By Caralee J. Adams, Education Week
To give students an incentive to work hard—and save education dollars along the way—some states are encouraging early high school graduation by ramping up curricula or giving college scholarships. The policies emphasize proficiency over seat time. By giving students the green light to move on if they are ready, the hope is to bypass a senior slump, save families tuition money, and curb districts' instructional costs. While a few states have rewarded early finishers for years, the concept is gaining momentum. New scholarship programs for early high school graduates are being rolled out in Idaho, Indiana, Minnesota, and South Dakota, and legislation is pending in other states. Still, the model can face opposition when state money to districts walks with the departing students. And others are skeptical that students can be truly ready for college a semester or two early.
$70M in remedial work for unprepared students saps SUNY budget
By Scott Waldman, Timesunion.com
ALBANY — New York's high schools are struggling to prepare graduates for college and it is costing the state $70 million in revenue. State University of New York Chancellor Nancy Zimpher said at a state budget hearing on Wednesday that New York spends more on remedial education for its high school graduates than it does on funding eight entire SUNY campuses. She said about half of all students who enter the community college system need remedial and developmental education and that's why taxpayers spend tens of millions in an attempt to help them succeed. Zimpher said state colleges and universities are part of an education pipeline that starts in prekindergarten. She said about half of the children in the state are unprepared for kindergarten, adding that it is essential to address the problems well before students try to transition into college. She said that will require collaboration between early childhood educators, with those from elementary and secondary education and higher education.
Official: White House Path on College Affordability Not Fully Mapped Out
By Jarnaal Abdul-Alim, Diverse Issues in Higher Education
WASHINGTON, D.C. – The White House was purposefully vague on the college affordability plan that it announced last week because the administration wants the higher education community to help shape the plan, a White House official told a group of higher education leaders meeting in Washington on Tuesday. “The reason it’s not more detailed is because the more we thought about it, it would be better to outline what the principles are, then engage in a dialogue with the entire higher education community, experts, students and families, and then talk about what would be the right way to relay these principles,” said Zakiya Smith, senior advisor for education at the White House Domestic Policy Council, at the annual meeting of the National Association of Independent Colleges and Universities.
POSTSECONDARY ACCESS SUCCESS
Gaming the College Rankings
By Richard Perez-Pena and Daniel E. Slotnik, The New York Times
Any love-hate relationship must have its share of pain, so the academic world, in its obsession with college rankings, is suitably dismayed by news that an elite college, Claremont McKenna, fudged its numbers in an apparent bid to climb the charts. Dismayed, but not quite surprised. In fact, several colleges in recent years have been caught gaming the system — in particular, the avidly watched U.S. News & World Report rankings — by twisting the meanings of rules, cherry-picking data or just lying. In one recent example, Iona College in New Rochelle, north of New York City, acknowledged last fall that its employees had lied for years not only about test scores, but also about graduation rates, freshman retention, student-faculty ratio, acceptance rates and alumni giving.
Make It Mandatory?
By Paul Fain, Inside Higher Ed
The success of the “completion agenda” may hinge on whether community colleges set more mandatory requirements for students, and drop their reliance on making academic support offerings optional. That’s the oft-stated argument of Kay McClenney, director of the Center for Community College Student Engagement, who likes to say “students don’t do optional.” Now a new study from the center, which draws on research from four surveys of the community college sector, lends evidence to the case for mandatory. Community colleges have a growing arsenal of tools that research shows will help students earn credentials -- like academic goal-setting, student success courses and tutoring. Yet the study found that relatively few students take advantage of those offerings.
DREAMing at Catholic Colleges
By Libby A. Nelson, Inside Higher Ed
Catholic colleges and the Catholic church, led by Cardinal Roger Mahony, who retired as archbishop of Los Angeles in 2011, are quietly stepping up efforts to enroll and assist students whose parents came to the United States illegally. In recent months, Mahony has held meetings with college leaders and students to find other ways to engage institutions on the issue. The church is planning to distribute several versions of an immigration curriculum, so that colleges can cover the issue from a Catholic perspective in a wide range of classes. In remarks to a small group of college presidents and vice presidents, Mahony cast advocacy for immigrants as part of the heritage of Catholic colleges and a core expression of Catholic values.
INTERNATIONAL NEWS
U.S., Chinese Schools Build Virtual Ed. Partnerships
By Katie Ash, Education Week
Several schools aiming to better prepare students for a global economy and foster cultural understanding between the United States and China have turned to virtual exchange programs between American and Chinese schools. "The global market is changing 24-7," said William Skilling, the superintendent of the 4,600-student Oxford community school system in Michigan. "We feel it is mission-critical for every student to become fluent in a world language and fluent in multiple world cultures." To that end, the district hires only native speakers to teach foreign languages, hosts both virtual and physical exchange programs with Chinese students and educators, and launched an international school in China that will allow students from the district to study there.
Mobile Devices Address Tech. Equity in Africa
By Michelle R. Davis, Education Week
In Ghana, elementary-school-age children who have rarely seen more than a handful of books are now using e-readers to access whole libraries. In South Africa, students are text-chatting with math tutors by cell phone for help with their homework. And in Liberia, educators will soon use electronic tablets to collect vital and accurate information about schools, students, and resources throughout the country.
On the continent of Africa, the use of mobile technology and online content in various forms is gaining steam as a way to bypass some countries' most significant education hurdles, including rural settings, limited electricity, and a lack of educational resources. Experts say mobile technology—whether cell phones, laptops, MP3 players, tablet computers, or e-readers—is likely to aid many African countries in making a leap in education that was impracticable not long ago.
U.S. Agency Will Offer $100-Million to Universities to Study Development Issues
By Ian Wilhelm, The Chronicle of Higher Education
As part of an effort to reinvigorate its work with higher education, the U.S. Agency for International Development is starting a new $100-million program to study foreign aid and generate solutions to problems facing the developing world, like lack of adequate food resources, government corruption, and environmental degradation. The goal is to get the world's poor on the research agenda of the nation's top universities. The agency wants the money, which will be doled out over five years, to forge multidisciplinary partnerships between universities with different areas of expertise, say, in water conservation and disease control, or broader coalitions that could include companies, nonprofits, and foreign higher-education institutions.
REPORTS WORTH READING
A Matter of Degrees: Promising Practices for Community College Student Success
A new report draws attention to 13 strategies for increasing retention and graduation rates of community college students, including fast-tracking remedial education, providing students with experiential learning and requiring students to attend orientation. The report suggests that colleges need to better align their programs and policies with the needs and realities of their students. Community colleges across the country have created innovative, data-informed programs that are models for educating underprepared students, engaging traditionally underserved students, and helping students from all backgrounds succeed. However, because most of these programs have limited scope, the field now has pockets of success rather than widespread improvement. Turning these many small accomplishments into broad achievement — and improved completion rates — depends on bringing effective programs to scale.
The State of State Science Standards 2012
Since Sputnik shot into orbit in 1957, Americans have considered science education to be vital to our national security and economic competitiveness. The impact of the Soviet satellite launch on American science classrooms was almost immediate. Shirley Malcolm, a leader in the field of science education (and presently head of education programs for the American Association for the Advancement
of Science), was a young student in Alabama at the time. A new report offers a bleak picture of state science standards, with just over half earning a grade of D or F. Among the 10 states to receive a failing grade were Idaho, Oregon and Wisconsin. Only California and the District of Columbia were given a solid A, while four states were handed an A-minus, according to the Thomas B. Fordham Institute.
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