George W. Bush delivered what he called the "last policy address" of his presidency at a school in Philadelphia yesterday, on the seventh anniversary of his signing No Child Left Behind into law. You can read what he said here, or I'll spare you the task: He thanks everyone under the sun, defends the premise of testing and talks about how much NCLB has improved America's schools. He says that now is not the time to retreat to the "soft bigotry of low expectations" by weakening the law.

Groups including the National Education Association promptly issued statements decrying the havoc NCLB has wreaked. "President-elect Obama views children as citizens of the world, not just standardized test scores," NEA's statement says.

Find more about NCLB's birthday on this Education Week blog.

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For those of you watching tonight's BCS National Championship football game between the Florida Gators and Oklahoma Sooners, pay extra special attention at the start and during halftime.

On the field will be Calvert Hall's competition marching band, which won the Band Championship Series National Championship in Miami yesterday with awards in five of six areas: music, marching, percussion, color guard and general effect. The band championship is hosted by BCS (the Bowl Championship Series) and another partner, and involves bands throughout the country.

Calvert Hall will join fellow bands to peform the national anthem before the game, and will also perform during halftime, after the college bands.

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Hundreds attended a memorial service for Harford County Superintendent Jacqueline C. Haas yesterday. To see photographs, go here and view images 7 and 8. Among those present was Sun reporter Mary Gail Hare, who shares the following observations:

Hundreds participated in the celebration of life for Dr. Jacqueline C. Haas Wednesday at Aberdeen High School. Floral tributes filled the gymnasium. Boys, from a club that Haas helped found, served as ushers. The North Harford choir sang a favorite aria and put a familiar Irish blessing to music. Haas' pastor encouraged the crowd to honor her memory by moving forward mindful of her strong work ethic for children and her steadfast values. Numerous speakers offered glimpses into Haas' life.

Continue reading "Active portrait of Harford superintendent emerges " »

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If ever there were a validation of the work that teachers do and the need to increase salaries, training and support for teachers, it can be found in the MGT report that was released yesterday at a news conference in Annapolis.

The report, written by a consultant hired by the Maryland General Assembly for just under $3 million, says that about half the Thornton money was spent on increasing salaries and benefits. The result of all the money was a marked increase in the scores of students in reading and math.

The report also gives details of a survey of what 16,000 teachers in the state said they think works. They believe the best practices should include cooperative planning among teachers and teacher analysis of data. Not surprisingly, the survey also says it helps to make sure teachers are qualified and have a good principal.

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I sat through more than two hours of the meeting that City Councilwoman Sharon Middleton called at Western last night for system officials to explain their plan to put a new all-girls middle school in the building for two years. About 200 people were there. At the end of two hours, I still had trouble understanding what the problem is, except that students and alumnae of an excellent school are extremely defensive about it.

According to a slide in a PowerPoint that Dr. Alonso presented at the beginning of the meeting, Western's enrollment has declined from 1,400 in 1993 to 800 today. Its capacity is 1,300. There have been extensive heating problems in the building shared with Poly -- two of the four boilers don't work at all -- but the school is not eligible for state construction money because its enrollment is too low. The plan is to increase enrollment for two years by placing the new Baltimore Leadership School for Young Women in the building: next year with a sixth-grade class, the year after with sixth and seventh. In the meantime, Western will be charged with coming up with a plan to increase its enrollment over the long term. Alonso said he's open to the idea of extending Western to the middle grades (with its admissions requirements) if the school supports it.

Opposition to the temporary placement of the new school is fierce, but the reasons given for the opposition contradicted each other. On one hand, people in the long line of speakers said they didn't want a school without admissions requirements in their building, essentially saying it would ruin the culture of Western. (The new school, which will eventually serve grades six to 12 in a permanent location, is being modeled on a school in East Harlem with a 100 percent graduation and college placement rate.) On the other hand, they were afraid the new school would provide unnecessary competition for Western and put the school out of business that way.

To me, the low point of the night happened when Alonso asked the principal of the new school, Lorna Hanley, to come to the stage to talk about her program. There was a gasp in the room -- people clearly didn't know the principal was there -- and a few of them booed. Others tried to compensate by clapping tepidly.

At the end of two hours, with the line of people to speak still extending midway through the auditorium, Middleton announced that Alonso had to leave and his many cabinet members in the audience would continue answering questions.

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If you read the fine print in the Quality Counts state rankings posted this morning on Education Week's Web site, you'll see that Maryland ranks No. 1 overall.

The report is an annual accounting of how the states are ranked on 14 different catagories. The data are massive but worth reading to see where the state's strengths and weaknesses are.

Sterling Lloyd, a senior researcher at the Educational Project in Education, the parent company of Education Week, said the analysis shows Maryland and a couple of other states are not very different.

"Maryland fared very well compared to states across the nation and Massachusettes and New York were not far behind," he said.

State Superintendent Nancy Grasmick said in an interview last night that she is "very happy." She said it reflects on the state's progress in setting pollicy. If there is one area she said needs some improvement it is in setting more rigorous standards in high schools so that more students graduate ready to go to college or into the workplace.

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I visited two journalism classes this morning at Homeland Security Academy in the Walbrook complex, the same classes that crime columnist Peter Hermann visited in the fall. After Peter's visit and the column he wrote, the principal was removed and, from all the accounts I've heard, the school continued to sink into chaos. Before the winter break, there were several top administrators from North Avenue stationed there. Several hall monitors and mentors were brought in to bring the school under control.

When I arrived today, the halls were quiet. And the students in the classes I visited were terrific: bright and intellectually curious. They peppered me with questions about both journalism and the city schools. Do I think press coverage has the power to swing an election? With the newspaper industry ailing in the Internet age, how else can I present information? How does my experience with investigative reporting compare with Woodward and Bernstein's? Who's responsible for their having to take the HSAs? How much money does Dr. Alonso make?

One of the kids asked me, if I were writing a story about their school, what negative things had I seen today that I would include? My answer: nothing. I said I'd heard the school had a lot of problems lately, but that I hadn't observed them yet on this visit. If I saw something on my way out, I added, it would be fair game.

And sure enough... As a mentor was walking me out, talking about how the school climate has improved, we bumped into police officers escorting a boy in handcuffs to their car outside. School system officials would say only that he was asked to leave the premises; he refused and was transported to DJS.

The front entrance to the school was blocked off with yellow crime scene tape. A school employee said the tape was to prevent kids from leaving; it wasn't really because of a crime. But what kind of message does that send? The students I met talked about how badly they want to stop the violence that pervades their community. Do they need the yellow tape as a reminder?

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The struggling Adams 50 school district, which serves a working-class suburb north of Denver, will eliminate grade levels and begin grouping students based on ability, according to this article in The Denver Post. The Gates Foundation has paid for some school districts in Alaska to try the same thing.

We all know the challenges teachers face when presented with a class where some students are academically prepared and some aren't. But clearly, grade levels also play a big role in the socialization process. The problems leading to a high dropout rate among the many over-age students in Baltimore aren't just academic; it's socially awkward for them to be in class with kids who are significantly younger. On the flip side, what would happen to an academically gifted child if placed alongside classmates who are much older? 

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In my story today for The Sun's Closeup section, I went into a bit more detail than we have previously about these Bridge projects that students can do if they can't pass one or more HSAs. So far, it seems, many students are having an easier time submitting an acceptable project than they are passing a three-hour test. In Baltimore, officials believe that the seniors who don't graduate this year will be held back for reasons other than the HSA requirement.

Of 298 projects submitted in the city between August and November, the pass rate was 62 percent: 84 percent in algebra, 68 percent in English, 75 percent in biology and 20 percent in government. But officials say they've had extensive professional development for government teachers this fall, and they expect that the pass rate (in government and overall) went up significantly for the 880 (total) projects submitted in December.

There are many reasons it might be easier to pass a project than an exam. Besides the fact that a project doesn't have to be done in one sitting, adults are supervising the work to make sure the students are following the correct steps. If a project is deemed unacceptable, a student needs only to redo the portion of the project that was unacceptable, whereas students who fail a test must retake the whole thing.

Not being an Algebra 1, English 2, American government or biology teacher myself, I was interested to read the sample projects available on this Web site.

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