State Board of Education

Effective Leaders
Professor Howard Fuller speaks at the National Charter Schools conference. Fuller challenged all of us to consider, among other things, the following questions:
- Are you preparing students to live in the 21st century or to create the 21st century?
- Are you preparing students to engage in the practice of freedom?

Rigorous, Relevant Curriculum
In […]

Effective Leaders
Education Secretary Arne Duncan tells charter school advocates that they need to make sure poor performing schools close.
Effective Teachers
Chris Lehman from the public Science Leadership Academy in Philadelphia, lets his students talk about how they’re faring in “education 2.0″:

“Teachers in the age of Google have one thing left to teach, and that is wisdom.” […]

As you watch this talk by author Clay Shirky, consider what he is saying through an education lens. He’s talking about Twitter, media and China’s efforts to censor the Internet. But, think about “professionals” (teachers) and “amateurs” (students) and their relationship, then and now. Consider the following questions: What is the education […]

Since we missed last week, we’re publishing two this week.
Effective Leaders
Iowa State Professor Scott McLeod compiled this list of podcasts (audio and video) for school leaders. In the video below, David Warlick talks about moving from “education 1.0,” which prepared our students to work in straight rows, doing repetitive tasks under close […]

Effective Leaders
Rising Above IQ: NYTimes columnist Nicholas Kristof looks at success in three groups: Asian-Americans, Jews and West-Indian blacks:
What’s the policy lesson from these three success stories?
It’s that the most decisive weapons in the war on poverty aren’t transfer payments but education, education, education.
This Business Week article talks about moving beyond NCLB to […]

We’re publishing early this week. The Reader will be on vacation but back again June 10.
Malcolm Gladwell writes about underdogs–in athletics and other settings–in a recent New Yorker article. He frames the discussion around a girls’ basketball team that made up for its lack of skill with effort (full-court press, all the time).
As you […]

Here is something to chew on while you read the rest of this post:
Is anyone willing to argue that achievement gaps were smaller before evil NCLB came along and messed us all up? Does anyone think that we were doing a fine job of meeting the needs of underserved populations before ‘the tests?’ Have we […]

Effective Leaders
Suburban school districts competing for students? Yes, through marketing to real estate agents.
Cars and school leadership: A story in this week’s isssue of The Economist focused on FIAT’s Sergio Marchionne, who appears to be positioned to take over Chrysler–and potentially GM’s Opel product line in Europe. Marchionne said the following about FIAT’s success […]

Since all of the weekly reader posts are organized around the foundational principles of the State Board’s Master Plan (effective leaders; effective teachers; rigorous, relevant curriculum; and sufficient resources), it made sense to compile selected resources around each of those areas. Here is a compilation of material to spur ideas about effective leadership in […]

On April 30, 2009, a rulemaking hearing was held regarding the proposed rule rule on isolation and restraint of students eligible for special education services (which is being promulgated as required by the legislature).
Comments were accepted through May 1, and then responses to those comments through the end of last week.
This PDF document […]