While Mississippi’s population is predominantly white, its public schools are less so. In fact, public schools in Mississippi remain nearly as segregated as they did in the 1960s, writes Alan Richard in the Hechinger Report. In 2010, 51 percent of the public school population in Mississippi was black but only 44 percent were white students—one of the lowest percentages of white stuContinue Reading »

We want our kids to grow up in a country where they have access to the best schools and the best teachers.

President Barack Obama

Election victory speech

November 7, 2012

In his victory speech Tuesday night President Obama reached out to the country to help him make the next four years a time of renewal and reaffirmation. There is no better place to launch such a shaContinue Reading »

The Washington Post deserves praise for the series they’ve been running recently on charter schools. But this graphic is mislabeled and misleading. Charter schools are public schools too, and it’ll be nice when they’re seen as complementary, friendly competition to traditional public school systems. Tweet Continue Reading »

The recent celebration of National Charter Schools Week is as good a time as any to make an observation that’s been rattling around in my mind for a while in search of a home, or lacking that, a blog post. Which is: charter schools are a boon to public education, but not for the reasons often advertised.

This is year 2 of the Public Education Network’s national campaign for good public schools. Its aim is to get people talking about public schools, caring about public schools, etc. I don’t know how PEN is evaluating its success, or if it can, but its efforts are a drop in a pretty dry bucket. In an effort to improve public schools, we’re all pretty focused on what’s not Continue Reading »

When I read the headline of this New York Times article (Leaving the City for the Schools, and Regretting It), I was excited – perhaps there was finally an article extolling some of the virtues of urban public schools. Yes, these schools have plenty of troubles and there are schools in NYC that any parent would run from (assuming they could), but there are also schools in NYC that provide a goContinue Reading »

So, Ryan at Edspresso, Joe Williams, AFTie Michele and NYC Educator are engaged in a lively debate about whether or not public officials who have some responsibility for public education and send their kids to private schools are hypocrites. Several people also wrote to me and Tom about this issue in DC following our Post piece about the problems facing DCPS. I tend to react negatively to theseContinue Reading »