More Cuts Likely to California Higher Education

At LAT, "State colleges, universities may need to make more budget cuts":

Students starting the school year at California Community Colleges this week will pay higher fees and have fewer courses from which to choose. At California State University campuses, students will find their classes packed, fewer library books available and the ranks of part-time faculty thinned.



That dismal picture could worsen if the state's financial problems force colleges and universities to make additional budget cuts mid-year, leaders of the systems said Monday during a conference call with reporters.



As it is, the state's 112 community colleges will offer 5% fewer classes this fall, Chancellor Jack Scott said. Based on projected annual demand, an estimated 670,000 students who otherwise would enroll in at least one class will not be served, he added.



Community college students, whose fees already have risen to $36 per unit for this school year from $26 last year, are likely to face a further increase if state revenue doesn't meet projections. State funding to the two-year colleges was reduced $400 million for this year. Further cuts would trigger an additional $10 per unit fee increase for spring 2012.

Continue reading.



I think it was $10 to go to community college back in 1979. That's when the state still promised a basically free college education to all those who could benefit.

Community College Worries and Challenges

At the annual meeting of the National Association of College and University Business Officers. See Chronicle of Higher Education, "Community-College Officials Swap Notes on Common Worries and Challenges."

And at New York Times, "At Two-Year Colleges, Less Scrutiny Equals Less Athletic Equality."

Los Angeles Southwest College has a new athletic field house and football stadium, but almost no female athletes.

Women make up more than two-thirds of students at this community college in the city’s South Central neighborhood, but less than a quarter of its athletes. The college’s decision to suspend the track team this year left women who wanted to play a sport with a single option: basketball.

Henry Washington, the college’s athletic director and head football coach, acknowledges that his program is most likely violating federal law by failing to offer enough roster spots to women. But he said many of the female students are also juggling jobs and child care, and do not have time to play sports. Then there is the question of money. “I just keep my fingers crossed that we can keep what we have,” he said...

The situation at Los Angeles Southwest, without question, more closely represents the norm among community colleges around the country. Even as they play an increasingly vital role in American higher education — enrolling more than eight million students nationwide last fall, a 20 percent jump since the fall of 2007, just before the start of the recession — community colleges are routinely failing to provide enough athletic opportunities to women, as required under Title IX, the federal law banning sex discrimination in education. Many community colleges offer an array of options for men but just a single team for women. And dozens of colleges over the years had no women on their athletic rosters, according to federal education statistics.

No one disputes that community colleges face distinct challenges, with a lack of money paramount. But Pensacola, one of the rare exceptions among community colleges, offers evidence that the demands of the law can be met.

Continue reading. And note the comparison to Pensacola State College in Florida. This is all about state money. Those states, like California, deeply in the hole aren't going to be able to provide the opportunities required by law. The question becomes one of enforcement. Seems like California colleges would welcome the scrutiny if it forced state officials to better fund the institutions.

College Budget Update

From Ann-Marie Gabel, LBCC Vice President for Administrative Services:

And at Los Angeles Times, "With budget talks stuck, blame game begins," and "Gov. Brown warns of initiative war if bipartisan talks breakdown."

Also at Sacramento Bee, "Republicans now want election, but won't extend taxes on own." And San Jose Mercury News, "Questions abound over what's next at Capitol."

College is Too Easy

Bird Dog links to Mark Bauerlein's discussion of Richard Arum and Josipa Roksa's research on student learning and college performance. And that reminds me of the Arum and Roksa piece that ran in Friday's Los Angeles Times, "College, too easy for its own good":

We recently tracked several thousand students as they moved through and graduated from a diverse set of more than two dozen colleges and universities, and we found consistent evidence that many students were not being appropriately challenged. In a typical semester, 50% of students did not take a single course requiring more than 20 pages of writing, 32% did not have any classes that required reading more than 40 pages per week, and 36% reported studying alone five or fewer hours per week.

Not surprisingly, given such a widespread lack of academic rigor, about a third of students failed to demonstrate significant gains in critical thinking, complex reasoning and writing ability (as measured by the Collegiate Learning Assessment) during their four years of college.

The students themselves must bear some of the blame for this, of course. Improvement in thinking and writing skills requires academic engagement; simply hanging out on a college campus for multiple years isn't enough. Yet at many institutions, that seems to be sufficient to earn a degree. At many schools, students can choose from a menu of easy programs and classes that allow them to graduate without having received a rigorous college education. Colleges are complicit, in that they reward students with high grades for little effort. Indeed, the students in our study who reported studying alone five or fewer hours per week nevertheless had an average cumulative GPA of 3.16.

To be sure, there were many exceptions to this dismal portrait of the state of undergraduate learning. Some academic programs and colleges are quite rigorous, and some students we followed pushed themselves and excelled. In general, traditional arts and science fields (math, science, humanities and the social sciences) tended to be more demanding, and students who majored in those subjects studied more and showed higher gains. So too did students attending more selective colleges. In addition, at every college and university examined, we found some students who were applying themselves and learning at impressive levels.

These real accomplishments do not, however, exonerate the colleges and universities that are happy to collect annual tuition dollars but then fail to provide many students with a high-quality education.

There's more, especially the discussion of why higher education got off track. Still, it'd be worth checking the book itself, for in my experience it's the absence of skills and the culture of anti-intellectualism that's most detrimental to college learning. I'm tempted to say I struggled with maintaining high standards when I first started at LBCC. But that wouldn't be quite accurate. Over time experience has shown how I can better maintain high standards AND improve student performance (it requires intensely personalized instruction, which is hard to do with hundreds of students). That said, I'm less rigid than I was 8 or 9 years ago, and in some cases that means I'm just plain easier (flexibility is key, which sometimes might mean "easier"). Professors are dealing with a range of abilities starting with students who'd be doing just fine at Berkeley or UCLA to those who can barely string a couple of correct sentences together. I'm sad sometimes when I meet students who literally can't read. I largely quit having students do expository reading in class (reading aloud) because I felt bad for the students who struggled to read through a paragraph from the textbook. It's not one particular demographic in particular, although a lot of Latino students are ESL and a lot of blacks demonstrate something of a stunted degree of formal learning, and I'm talking rudimentary basic skills acquisition. And worse, with the exception of the odd student here or there, black kids generally don't seem to care. (Don't even get me going about the black student athletes.)

Facebook Revolution: The Democratization of Egypt and Changes in the Middle East

A panel discussion at my college today:

The college may upload the talk to YouTube, and if so I'll post it here.

Community Colleges Make Sharp Cuts in Enrollment

My college is discussed, at LAT, "California community colleges to slash enrollment, classes":

Facing a state funding cut of up to 10%, California's community colleges will enroll 400,000 fewer students next fall and slash thousands of classes to contend with budget shortfalls that threaten to reshape their mission, officials said Wednesday.

The dire prognosis was in response to the breakdown in budget talks in Sacramento and the likelihood that the state's 112 community colleges will be asked to absorb an $800-million funding reduction for the coming school year — double the amount suggested in Gov. Jerry Brown's current budget proposal.

As it now stands, the budget plan would raise community college student fees from $26 to $36 per unit. The fees may go even higher if a budget compromise is not reached.

Keep reading at the link above. LBCC President Eloy Oakley is interviewed. And below is Ann-Marie Gabel, Vice President of Administrative Services:

Republican Party of Wisconsin Seeks E-Mails From UW-Madison Professor William Cronon

This is fascinating.

The background's at the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel, "GOP seeks e-mails of UW-Madison professor." The state GOP wants History Professor William Cronon's e-mails --- those sent on university servers --- going back to January 1st. It's a legitimate open-records request, and the university also has a policy against the use of institutional resources for partisan purposes. I'd personally like to see Cronon's communications. I read his super long response to the party's request this morning: "Abusing Open Records to Attack Academic Freedom." Cronon published an op-ed at the New York Times last weekend: "Wisconsin's Radical Break." I read this at the time and was unsurprised by his progressivism. But check Cronon's blog post. He suggests that the GOP open-records request is pure intimidation, and perhaps it is. But I'd think anyone doing some serious writing and organizing on these issues would be exceedingly careful to segregate teaching and research functions (on university equipment) from political activism likely to raise questions of controversy. Ann Althouse writes on this, suggesting that she's careful to use private e-mail for political advocacy, although she posts a defense of Cronin from UW Chancellor Biddy Martin.

And on top of all this comes Nobel Prize-winning economist and blogging Princeton Professor Paul Krugman, "Academic Intimidation" (via Memeorandum):

Cronon has a wisconsin.edu email address — but nobody, and I mean nobody, considers such academic email addresses something specially reserved for university business. Actually, according to Cronon he has been especially careful, maintaining a separate personal account — but nobody would have considered it out of the ordinary if he mingled personal correspondence with official business on the dot edu address. And no, the fact that he’s at a public university doesn’t change that: when my students take jobs at Berkeley or SUNY, they don’t imagine that they’re entering into a special fishbowl environment that they wouldn’t encounter at Georgetown or Haverford.

But then, we know perfectly well what’s going on here. Republicans aren’t looking for some abuse of Cronon’s position; they’re hoping to find some statement that can be quoted out of context to discredit him. At the very least, they hope that other academics will henceforth feel intimidated.

What I'm loving about this is not that Cronon's getting hassled, but the beautiful hypocrisy that's raised by the obvious counterfactual hypothesis: Had Cronon been a conservative professor and tea party activist, progressives would be cheering the perfect justice of a state Democratic Party open-records request. But Cronon's a big-time leftie, so the big guns like Paul Krugman are coming out in his defense. It's predictable and pathetic. And of course there's nothing secret about leftist professors and union organizers abusing public facilities for their political activities. Warner Todd Huston had a report this morning: "Michigan: Teachers Trying to Hide Union Activism in School Email Accounts."

At my college political communications on the district's server had long been routine, but after progressive faculty members successfully lobbied against my office bulletin board (to censor a GOP campaign bumper sticker), which later resulted in a full-blow investigation, I stopped looking the other way. Here's the policy at the California Community College Chancellor's Office (via):

"The use of district resources to support or oppose ballot measures or candidates is restricted. The fundamental reason for the restriction is that public money cannot be used for partisan activities. Put another way, resources that have been obtained for the district's support from all taxpayers must not be used "to take sides." Therefore, district employee time, equipment, supplies, or other public resources may not be used in advocating for either side of a ballot measure or to support or defeat any candidate. These restrictions are largely set out in an article in the Education Code entitled "Political Activities of School Officers and Employees" that encompasses sections 7050 through 7058."

It pisses the hell out of my communist colleagues, but I'll no longer stand for the despicable double standards. It used to be live and let live regarding campus political activities. But it's to the point of intimidation now. Progressives are thugs --- especially union-backed college professors --- and I'm hardly one to take it lying down.

RELATED: See William Jacobson, "Strange What Gets Them Excited in Wisconsin."

Long Beach City College Announces Cuts, Layoffs

Below is Ann-Marie Gabel, Vice President for Administrative Services, speaking on the fiscal situation last month. Turns out the college administration is making haste on those reductions she's talking about. Budget chopping begins right now. At Long Beach Press-Telegram, "LBCC to Cut 222 Courses Next Fall":

LONG BEACH - About 1,000 fewer students will be able to attend Long Beach City College this fall due to a string of budget cuts that include the elimination of 222 course sections, college officials announced Friday.

The cuts for new academic year also include layoffs, furloughs, salary reductions and the suspension of the golf and tennis programs.

Like schools across the state, LBCC is experiencing one of its toughest financial years in its history. Governor Jerry Brown's proposed budget calls for a minimum of $290 million in reductions to community colleges and $1 billion in cuts to the University of California and California State University systems.

LBCC, which serves more than 30,000 students between its two campuses, is facing a $7 million shortfall in its roughly $110 million general fund.

And that's the best-case scenario.

More at the link.

The college faculty union reached agreement with the administration in January.

California's Public Pensions Crisis

From Steven Greenhut, at O.C. Register, "Pensions Pushing California to the Brink":

There's no getting away from the pension issue these days or from the fact that the state's pension system is on the brink of disaster unless pensions for state and local workers are pared back dramatically. The only people in denial these days are the Brown administration and the state's legislative leaders, as their response to a prestigious government report makes clear.



The well-respected and non-partisan Little Hoover Commission drew some conclusions that even many pension reformers have been reluctant to make – namely, that pensions must be reduced for current employees. The state's unfunded liabilities, or pension debt, is estimated as high as a half-trillion dollars. That is the amount taxpayers will owe to make good on pension for current retirees and employees. Most of the debate has centered on reducing formulas for new hires, but as Little Hoover explained, that won't put a dent in the problem.

More at the link.



I'll be heading to Sacramento if anarcho-communists stage an occupation of the state capitol. Of course, we've got Governor Jerry Brown, so lefties should be well taken care of. Still, some of the anarchists don't care who's in power, so that'll make things tough for the SEIU commie thugs, who'll end up beating on folks who're basically on the same side.



RELATED: AT LAT, "GOP senators claim 'impasse' in budget talks with Gov. Jerry Brown."



Photo Credit, "Anne Stausboll, chief executive officer for the California Public Employees Retirement System, testifies on the state retirement system during a legislative hearing at the Capitol in Sacramento, Calif., Wednesday, March 2, 2011," Albany Times Union, "Democrats cool to targeting workers' pensions."

Green Energy Plan Wastes Millions at L.A. Community Colleges

I've been busy and meant to post on LAT's series on the bond program boondoggle at the Los Angeles Community Colleges, but this one's too good to postpone. See, "Colleges Green Energy Plan Proves Wildly Impractical; Blunders Devour $10 Million":

Larry Eisenberg had a vision. "Amazing," he called it. "Spectacular."

The Los Angeles Community College District would become a paragon of clean energy. By generating solar, wind and geothermal power, the district would supply all its electricity needs. Not only would the nine colleges sever ties to the grid, saving millions of dollars a year, they would make money by selling surplus power. Thanks to state and federal subsidies, construction of the green energy projects would cost nothing upfront.

As head of a $5.7-billion, taxpayer-funded program to rebuild the college campuses, Eisenberg commanded attention. But his plan for energy independence was seriously flawed.

He overestimated how much power the colleges could generate. He underestimated the cost. And he poured millions of dollars into designs for projects that proved so impractical or unpopular they were never built.

These and other blunders cost nearly $10 million that could have paid for new classrooms, laboratories and other college facilities, a Times investigation found.

RTWT. The incompetence is astounding.

And the full series is here: "Billions to Spend: Complete Coverage." And columnist Steve Lopez has this: "Times community college investigation unearths shameful waste."

The district's bond program had incentives for corruption built in from the beginning. There was literally no independent oversight from outside citizens' groups. See the intitial report, "The price of poor planning, weak oversight." Years ago, when my college got its bond program approved by the voters, the administration ended up going with a new contractor after just about a year. I heard all kinds of stories of lush spending with the bond money, for food and Starbucks coffee, and it was probably worse, but should news like that get out to the community there'd be hell to pay. As it is my college's South Quad complex is often ridiculed as the Taj Mahal amid state budget cuts that have put student needs on the backburner. As for the Los Angeles District, it's like an early-20th century big-city machine --- and a Democrat thing, dontcha know! The Democratic Party of the San Fernando Valley held fundraisers for board member Miguel Santiago: "Reelect Miguel Santiago--Los Angeles Community College District Board of Trustees." And the L.A.'s Democratic Party & Courage Campaign endorsed longtime board member Mona Field: "March 8 Election Recommendations from Pacific Palisades Democratic Club." And get this, Mona Field's got a long record of corruption: "Incompetence and Corruption at LA Community College District Must End":

We have lived through an era where public officials and union leaders lost – indeed gleefully destroyed – their moral compass. The cities of Los Angeles, Inglewood, and others teeter on the brink of bankruptcy because elected city officials and public unions have engaged in years of “mutual money massage”.

The public unions commit funds and campaign resources to “friendly” candidates and those candidates, when elected, have given away the public treasury in the form of outrageous pay hikes and rich pension plans no longer seen in the private sector.

And "LACCD Board President Mona Field Admits to Misuse of Bond Funds."

Added: "Candidates for L.A. Community College District board urge greater scrutiny of system."

Kinda like Chicago and the Obamacrats.

PHOTO CREDIT: "The clock tower at East Los Angeles College was built crooked. It cost an additional $157,000 to fix. (Ricardo DeAratanha / Los Angeles Times / November 3, 2010)."

Saudis Vow to Boost Oil Production: Potential Unrest Threatens World's Biggest Petroleum Exporter

At Los Angeles Times, "Saudi Arabia's move to keep oil flowing brings crude prices down":

Reporting from Washington - Crude oil prices pulled back from highs not seen since 2008 as leaders from Saudi Arabia to the White House offered fresh assurances that the world wouldn't run short of oil despite violence in the Mideast and North Africa.



Oil futures hit $103 a barrel in New York trading Thursday but ended the day at $97.28, down 82 cents. In Europe, oil also fell in electronic trading after nearing $120 a barrel.



Petroleum prices had surged on fears that political unrest in Libya, Egypt and other countries could reduce global supplies — pushing fuel costs higher and throwing the fledgling global economic recovery into reverse.



But energy traders were calmed Thursday by news that Saudi Arabia, the world's biggest oil exporter and OPEC's de facto leader, was in talks with European refiners to fill the gap caused by the disruption in Libya, which pumps about 2% of world oil consumption.



In addition, the International Energy Agency, a Paris-based energy advisor to industrialized countries, said it would tap oil reserves if needed. And the White House said the U.S. and other countries had the ability to act if world oil supplies were constrained.



Saudi Arabia's promises to rein in prices by boosting production might appear surprising given that its economy is almost entirely dependent on oil revenue. And Saudi leaders, finding themselves surrounded by unnerving populist revolts, have been frustrated that the U.S. seems sympathetic to the uprisings.



But the latest assurance makes public what the Saudis have been doing quietly since the fall: gradually increasing production to keep up with growing demand and to damp prices.



Like much of the rest of the world, the Saudis fear runaway oil prices. They understand that prices over $100 a barrel threaten to sap global economic growth and with it, demand for oil. With its vast reserves and infrastructure, Saudi Arabia is uniquely positioned to put a lid on prices, an imperative that politics so far has not derailed.

More at the link.



Mostly, the Saudis are worried about losing the support of Washington amid regional instability. Excellent discussion at the clip above. If Saudi Arabia topples, that'd be on the scale of the Egyptian revolution.



RELATED: At PACNW Righty, "Oil Prices Surge on Middle East Unrest."

Gabrielle Giffords is Model of Deliberative Democracy

During my first few days of the semester this week I was afforded an unusual opportunity to engage in a discussion on "deliberative democracy," the theme of my textbook, from Joseph Bessette and John Pitney, American Government and Politics: Deliberation, Democracy, and Citizenship. And as announced by the publisher, a key element of the the text is the focus on "thoughtful, selfless consideration of issues and on civic participation as essential components of good citizenship."

And it strikes me that while the "deliberative democracy" model outlined there is often quite idealistic, we do have many role models for the kind of elevated politics to which the model aspires. And while I'm about as partisan as they come, I noticed immediately that Gabrielle Giffords was a different kind of Democrat, a moderate "Blue Dog" with strong credentials on security and border control. So it's interesting that today's Los Angeles Times features a background report on Congresswoman Giffords stressing these key points, "Arizonans Praise Giffords as Politician Who Tried to Remain Above the Democrat-Republican Divide":

Outside the Tucson office of gravely wounded Rep. Gabrielle Giffords, the well-wishers bearing crumpled notes and pink roses are emblematic of the breadth of her support.

They are tattooed college students and flannel-clad construction workers. They are retirees who clutch their canes and weep. Giffords is Jewish, yet many leave candles depicting the Virgin Mary. Giffords is a Democrat, yet many are Republicans.

"I saw her as a voice of reason. In Arizona, they're real hard to find," said Sharon Baker, a 63-year-old Republican whose face fell at the sight of the cluster of red and blue balloons, greeting cards and stuffed animals.

In a state known for rhetoric gone wild, Arizonans are mourning more than Saturday's shooting, which killed six people and left Giffords battling a traumatic brain injury. The gunman's actions have, for the moment, silenced a rare voice of calm amid the political cacophony.

"She appealed to everyone and that's what we need. We need to elect more Gabby Giffordses," said Laura Walls, 47, a personal trainer who visited the roadside tribute this week. She voted for Giffords' "tea party" rival in November.

There's more at the link.

And I don't want to downplay partisan differences too much here. Rep. Giffords supported progressives on both ObamaCare and cap-and-trade (the one-time hot Democrat prioriorty item), but she certainly appeared as genuinely interested the process of governing itself --- and she has served as an especially dedicated representative of her constituents. And I admit to having a soft spot for her, given that she voted against Nancy Pelosi as the House Minority Leader.

I'll have more on Gabrielle Giffords in the days and weeks ahead. God bless her.

(The interview above is from January 7th, the day before she was shot --- i.e., her most recent television appearance.)

Plagiarism Online

Via Glenn Reynolds, I'm seeing this piece from last summer on classroom plagiarism. I'm pretty sure I saw it at the time, but didn't write about it. Now though I'm almost finished grading fall papers, and I've found three students plagiarizing with direct cut-and-paste from web articles. Check the comments at "Adjunct Law Prof Blog." One suggests "it's a losing battle," but only if professors give up the fight. Obviously most students don't write nearly as well as a New York Times correspondent (or a Wikipedia editor for that matter), and if I sometimes find, while reading through a student summary, inconsistent styling from one passage to the next (often pretty blatant), I just type in the text at Google and up pops the original article. Still, while one of my students literally swiped entire paragraphs (on some California ballot initiatives from Ballotpedia), it's not as common as one might expect. I'm always pleasantly surprised this time of year to find a large batch of students who are very good writers. It's poor students who're tempted to cheat, at least at my college. They simply can't write that well, even two or three paragraphs at a time. It's quite frustrating as a teacher. Some kids come from immigrant homes, including many Latinos, and the schools haven't always picked up where families have left off. It's kinda sad sometimes, but not uncommon. And these kids are in the workforce and often starting their own families. Things will get worse before they get better. Schools are stretched thin at all levels, and to the extent that administration and faculty discuss challenges on campus, it's usually over budgets and contract negotiations. Amazing sometimes how the education of the students, the reason all of this exists to begin with, is filed away as an afterthought. I'm not going to overstate the case, but it's a problem. And there aren't any Chris Christies around to help restore priorities. Teachers are on the front lines, and they gotta keep pushing, looking out for the kids as best they can. That's all you can do sometimes, besides holding on to a bit of sanity.

Success Stories at LBCC

A student e-mailed this morning to say that she had plans for Veterans Day and wouldn't be attending class. And she added a post script:

P.S. Love the Dead Kennedys! Thought it was very cool you knew the lyrics to California Uber Alles when you were talking about Jerry Brown in class on Tuesday!

I don't know if that the kind of teaching excellence that Presdient Oakley is looking for, but that's cool my brief discussion of "California Über Alles" went over well with the students.

So You Want to Get a Ph.D.

Via Glenn Reynolds:

And Betsy Newmark adds this:

Now I'm waiting for the "So you want to be an engineer" cartoon for high school students who got an A in Calculus and figure that doing well in math up through high schools means they will make wonderful engineers and be guaranteed jobs for the rest of their lives.

Or the cartoon for "So you want to be a political science major" for the kids who enjoy following current events but have no idea what type of job they'd get with such a major.

Bounce Boxer!

Longtime readers here will note the delicious irony in this, from Michelle, "Babs Boxer tries to recruit kiddie campaigners in L.A. public schools." (Via Memeorandum.)

Here's the clip social studies teachers were encouraged to share with their students, in violation of the California Education Code:

AND REMEBER: It's okay if Democrats do it, but not conservatives: "Bulletin Board Defacement - Leftist 'Tolerance' at LBCC!"

Obama Renews Initiative on Educational Excellence for Hispanics

LBCC President Eloy Ortiz Oakley attended the signing ceremony yesterday for the reauthorization of the White House Initiative on Educational Excellence for Hispanics. The story's at the Long Beach Press-Telegram, "Long Beach Education Leaders See Obama Sign Order":

LONG BEACH - Three of Long Beach's top education leaders were present at the White House on Tuesday as President Barack Obama signed an executive order renewing the Initiative on Educational Excellence for Hispanic Americans.



Long Beach Unified School District Superintendent Chris Steinhauser, Long Beach City College Superintendent-President Eloy Oakley and Cal State Long Beach President F. King Alexander were among the education officials who looked on as Obama praised the initiative, which aims to boost educational opportunities for Hispanic students.



Obama noted that Hispanic students, who account for one in five students in the United States, are more likely to attend low-performing schools and drop out of high school.



"This is not just a Latino problem, this is an American problem," Obama said. "If one community falls behind, we all fall behind."



The initiative was established in 1990 by President Bush.



Steinhauser, Oakley and Alexander were invited to attend the signing ceremony and give a presentation at the National Education Summit and Call to Action.



Long Beach was one of just two cities in the country whose school administrators were asked to present their model education plan in front of officials from the Obama administration and the U.S. Department of Education. The other city was San Bernardino.



CSULB, LBCC and LBUSD have been nationally recognized for their partnership, which includes a program called the Long Beach College Promise that aims to allow all local students to attend their first semester at LBCC tuition-free by 2011.

"Long Beach is so far ahead in working together, we've become a national model," Alexander said Tuesday.



Officials hope the newly- renewed initiative will bring additional aid and recognition to local schools. More than 50 percent of the students in the LBUSD are Hispanic.



"I think it energizes what we're already doing and hopefully gives us an opportunity to do more," Oakley said.

More at the link.

Michelle Rhee Resigns as Chancellor of D.C. Schools

The main story is at Washington Post. She's too hot politically, but she's got what it takes to shake up the union stranglehold on education:

Rhee's goals - higher student achievement, better teachers and greater accountability for their classroom performance - were generally shared by her predecessors. But with new powers putting the struggling school system under mayoral control, Rhee pursued the goals with an unprecedented zeal.



She closed more than two dozen schools, fired teachers by the hundreds and spent more than two years negotiating a labor contract that gives principals new control over teacher hiring while establishing a new performance-pay system that ties compensation to growth in student test scores.



Rhee also dramatically expanded the number of spaces in preschool, pre-K and Head Start, and opened the Early Stages diagnostic center to help flag learning disabilities in children ages 2 to 5. She piloted a program of "wrap-around" support services for at-risk middle school kids and launched a program of "themed" schools focusing on science and technology, world cultures and the arts.

I'll have more on education issues in upcoming days. But Sweetness & Light adds this on Rhee's departure:

But do note that we have had complete silence about Ms. Rhee from Mr. and Mrs. Obama. Both of whom constantly pretend to be concerned about education, despite doing everything in their powers to undercut any and all teacher reforms. (Such as doing away with vouchers in the District’s system.)



Of course, in actual truth, the Obamas are only interested in funneling more money to their foot soldiers in the teachers unions.



And never mind that they send their own children to the non-union Sidwell Friends school, just like good Washington Democrats always do.

Fixing Our Schools

I'm heading out to see "Waiting for Superman." The film trailer is here. I'll have more on this later, but I'm reading Diane Ravitch's The Death and Life of the Great American School System: How Testing and Choice Are Undermining Education. She makes the interesting argument that a genuinely conservative approach to education reform is to be wary of "speculative" and "uncertain" educational fads. She's particularly worn out on the decades-long push for market-oriented reforms focusing on choice and business-driven "total quality management," which she says basically deteriorated into the raw accountability movement. I'm not near ready to jettison potential reforms focusing on school choice. Still, Ravitch also points out that what all schools need is a coherent curriculum grounded in the liberal arts and sciences, as well as expectations that schools and students should together be working harder, in terms of hours of teaching and homework, than has become the norm today.

I'll have more on these issues in an upcoming post. Here's President Obama's weekly address below. I simply don't trust this administration on education reform, so more on that later. For now check WaPo's forum, "How to fix our schools: A manifesto by Joel Klein, Michelle Rhee and other education leaders."

Donald Wood, 17-Year Math Teacher at Tennessee's McGavock High School, Suspended After Violent Classroom Meltdown

At The Blaze, where there's a fascinating comment thread placing the blame for this guy's breakdown on the students:

There's a link to Gawker as well, where even the lefties suggest the students drove this guy over the edge. It's hard out there. You gotta just dismiss the class sometimes. Go get some fresh air and a Coke.

More commentary at Mediaite, "Student Records High School Teacher’s Breakdown On Cell Phone Camera."