The news that Lynn Olson, Education Week’s senior correspondent, is decamping to the Gates Foundation after more than two decades of writing thoughful trend pieces and news analyses reflects a disquiting trend in American education: the number of experienced journalists writing about schools and colleges for national newspapers and magazines is reaching a disturbingly low [...]
All Posts Tagged: 'Education Journalism'
Frightening Bad Media Trend Convergence
Long-time Q&E readers know that we’re particularly aggravated by two types of bad news stories with weed-like properties of propagation and ineradicability: the bogus trend story, and the voyeuristic female teacher / male student sex scandal. Inevitably, the two have now converged:
(AP) — Heeding a steady drumbeat of sexual misconduct cases involving teachers, at least [...]
Linda Perlstein’s Tested
At any given moment, there’s a limited amount of room in the general consciousness for books about education, and over the past few months a lot of that space has been occupied by Linda Perlstein’s new book, Tested. Which, as I explain in my review in this month’s Washington Monthly, is too bad. Tested is [...]
CNN, So-Called Legitimate News Organization
Cnn.com has revamped its site, including a shakeup of its front-page news categories. “Education” has traditionally had its own spot, usually–this being America–near the bottom under Celebrity News, but still on par with Science, Health, etc.
Well, no more. Education has been nixed as stand-alone category and has been replaced by “Funny News.” As of [...]
Admission Impossible?
Over at The American Prospect Online, here’s my take on why it’s not actually getting harder and harder for high school students to get into a good college, despite what you read in the newspaper every year.
Selective Opinion Gathering
I can’t believe this WaPo “What do you think of the takeover?” piece with comments from parents and educators doesn’t include a single voice representing schools East of the River. And three out of four speakers are linked to schools West of Rock Creek Park.
Panic! Some More
Since the college admission panic story has already been beaten to death by Reuter’s, the Wall Street Journal, and the New York Times, the Washington Post obviously had no choice but to go above the fold with exactly the same story today. This is what happens when there’s a big education story that (A) writes [...]
Bogus Education Trend Stories, Part MCMXLVII
One of the basic tensions in journalism comes between what’s news and what’s a good story. The best journalism combines the two, using the power of narrative to communicate vital, relevant information about the state of the world. Sometimes, however, journalists find good stories that aren’t really news. Unfortunately, they frequently try to make news [...]
A Bit Too Much Editorial Freedom
I couldn’t help read the The New York Times and Wall Street Journal editorials on charter schools over the last couple of days without injecting into the conversation a publication on the status of big-city charters issued recently by the Seattle-based Center on Reinventing Public Education (CRPE).
The two newspaper editorial pages squared off over a [...]
Lowering Student Loan Default Rates: What One Consortium of Historically Black Institutions Did to Succeed 
College and Career-Ready: Using Outcomes Data to Hold High Schools Accountable for Student Success
03/19/10 | Ben Miller is quoted on college graduation rates and the NCAA Tournament in the Detroit Free Press.
03/19/10 | Linda Perlstein links to Education Sector's "College- and Career-Ready" event.
03/17/10 | Ben Miller's column on graduation rates and NCAA Tournament eligibility is mentioned on The Wall Street Journal's The Daily Fix.
03/17/10 | Kevin Carey's critique of Diane Ravitch's latest book is quoted in Doublethink's Conventional Folly blog.
03/15/10 | Ben Miller pens an op-ed for US News & World Report on using graduation rates to determine NCAA Tournament eligibility.