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LOS ANGELES - -- A state appeals court reversed itself today and ruled that parents in California have the right to home school their children even if they lack a teaching credential. The Second District Court of Appeal in Los Angeles had ruled Feb. 28 that the state's compulsory education law requires parents to send their children to a full-time public or private school or have them taught by credentialed tutors at home. The ruling caused an uproar among home-schooling advocates and could have made truants out of an estimated 166,000 children in California who are taught at home by...

An appeals court in California has ruled that state law does permit homeschooling "as a species of private school education" but that statutory permission for parents to teach their own children could be "overridden in order to protect the safety of a child who has been declared dependent." The long-awaited case resolves many of the questions that had developed in homeschooling circles across the nation when the same court earlier found that parents had no such rights – statutorily or constitutionally – in California. The ruling released this morning by the 2nd Appellate District in Los Angeles said the dispute...

Democrats send AB 2567 to Governor Schwarzenegger Sacramento, California – AUGUST 7 Campaign for Children and Families (CCF), a leading California organization protecting parents' rights and children's innocence, condemns the passage of AB 2567, which will instruct all California public schools to "conduct suitable commemorative exercises" in support of the anti-religious, sexual-anarchy agenda of the late San Francisco Supervisor Harvey Milk. On Thursday, August 7, the California Assembly passed AB 2567 on a 43 to 26 vote, Democrats for, Republicans silently against. Earlier this week, AB 2567 passed the California State Senate on a 22-13 vote, Democrats for, Republicans against....

Only a year after banning all negative messages about homosexuality in public schools throughout the state, the California Legislature now is ordering school children to celebrate "gay" lifestyle choices. "If signed into law, AB 2567 will mean an official day commemorating homosexuality, bisexuality, and transsexuality in California government schools," said Randy Thomasson, president of the Campaign for Children and Families. "This will harm children as young as kindergarten," he said. "Every May 22, AB 2567 will positively portray to children homosexual experimentation, homosexual 'marriages,' sex-change operations, and anything else that's 'in the closet.' Gov. Schwarzenegger should say no to this...

CCF MEDIA: News Releases CAMPAIGN FOR CHILDREN AND FAMILIES For Immediate Release August 07, 2008   California Legislature Approves Gay Day in Public Schools Democrats send AB 2567 to Governor Schwarzenegger Sacramento, California – Campaign for Children and Families (CCF), a leading California organization protecting parents’ rights and children’s innocence, condemns the passage of AB 2567, which will instruct all California public schools to “conduct suitable commemorative exercises� in support of the anti-religious, sexual-anarchy agenda of the late San Francisco Supervisor Harvey Milk.Today, the California Assembly passed AB 2567 on a 43 to 26 vote, Democrats for, Republicans silently...

A DUP MLA has sparked controversy calling for creationism to be taught alongside evolution in science classes. Education Committee chair Mervyn Storey's demand comes amid fresh debate over the origins of mankind, in the run-up to the 150th anniversary of Charles Darwin's famous work On the Origin of Species

(Angus Reid Global Monitor) - Roughly three-in-five adults in Canada side with the theory of evolution, according to a poll by Angus Reid Strategies. 58 per cent of respondents believe human beings evolved from less advanced life forms over millions of years. Conversely, 22 per cent of respondents think God created human beings in their present form within the last 10,000 years, while 20 per cent are not sure. Charles Darwin’s "The Origin of Species" was first published in 1859. The book details the British naturalist’s theory that all organisms gradually evolve through the process of natural selection. Darwin’s views...

The state's largest school bus operator has agreed to renovate more than 2,000 buses in California to run cleaner, settling a lawsuit that accused it of exposing children to diesel exhaust in leaky passenger cabins. The settlement was announced Wednesday by Laidlaw Transit and three environmental groups that sued the company in 2006. Without admitting any wrongdoing, Laidlaw agreed to spend $4.7 million over five years to retrofit buses that are more than five years old, and $23.6 million more to continue renovating those buses or buy new ones. The company will also pay $6.6 million to the environmental groups...

Folks, I'm so mad I can't see straight and I hope the smarter(than me) people here at FR can advise us on this. At school registration we got a handout informing us about a change to school policy. Starting this school year, any student who wishes to participate in any extra curricular or co-curricular activities must consent to random drug testing! Needless to say I was 'stuned' and speechless. We're not a big metropolitan school district, we're a very small, rural school. This was apparently done during a closed session of the school board's meeting over the summer. As far...

The six-year running battle over the admissions policy of a highly regarded private school in Hawaii — the Kamehameha Schools — is back in the courts, with one side specifically aiming for an ultimate test in the Supreme Court. An earlier case, testing whether an 1866 civil rights law still bars the use of race in private school admissions, reached the Court last year, but was settled before the Justices took final action on it. A new lawsuit, raising the same challenge, was filed Wednesday in U.S. District Court in Hawaii — with the same name (Doe v. Kamemameha Schools),...

Each day during the school year, a long line of cars sits idling outside Lake Oswego schools, potentially damaging the environment of the very children they're picking up. Three Lake Oswego teenagers decided the idling has to stop. It's an easy fix: shut off the car. The hard part is getting people to act. Jacob Shimkus, Emily Carlson and Sierra Sweigert call themselves the Green Teens, and their plan is to place "No Idle Zone" signs at every school. "The generation above us is leaving all of this to us, and it's up to us to decide what we're going...

Majority Democrats in the California Assembly have rejected two amendments that would have allowed schools to fire any employee discovered to be part of an extremist terror network and require users of school facilities to affirm they are not terrorists. A report from Karen England at the Capital Resource Institute said the amendments were submitted by assemblymen Martin Garrick and Chuck DeVore to a plan that also would allow members of the Communist Party to teach in public schools. "I am appalled that Democrat lawmakers will not agree to these commonsense amendments," said England, executive director of CRFI. "My son...

This afternoon the California Assembly debated SB 1322, the bill that will allow Communists to teach in public schools and use government property for their meetings. CRFI has actively opposed the measure as we recognize the inherent danger in allowing Communists—those who seek the violent overthrow of our democratic republic—access to the impressionable minds of young students. In an attempt to draw attention away from the Communism-accommodating provisions in the bill, author Senator Alan Lowenthal amended the bill to also exempt from government “loyalty oaths” those with religious beliefs opposing such oaths. Republican legislators also recognize SB 1322’s danger and,...

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ABINGDON, Va. – After an in-service training session last week, some Washington County, Va., school teachers are preparing to implement a curriculum on climate change and environmental stewardship. Developed by a group of educators, the program is aimed at teaching children about the connection between their actions and the wider world – so they can help save the planet. “More and more information is coming towards these kids every day,” said Deni Peterson, who runs the Learning Landscapes program that has brought educational gardens to county schools. “These are depressing issues, these are hard issues for these kids, so I...

I was too tough on Illinois State Senator James Meeks. Last week, I offered both a commentary and rigorous interview of Rev. Meeks on the WLS airwaves as to Meeks' controversial declaration that he will bus thousands of Chicago Public School (CPS) students up to New Trier High School on Chicago's ritzy North Shore for the first day of school next month to protest state education funding inequities. While I stand by the substance of what I said, I violated a cardinal rule of politics in making the perfect the enemy of the good. On The Don & Roma Morning...

Before Congress spends billions to build public schools that meet "green" environmental standards, it should review Washington state's experience, which shows that green buildings have higher than expected costs, and the energy savings and other projected benefits are either small or nonexistent, says Todd Myers, director of the Center for the Environment at the Washington Policy Center and an National Center for Policy Analysis E-Team adjunct scholar. Several pilot schools in the Olympia, Northshore and Spokane school districts were created to test the effectiveness of green building strategies. By the summer of 2007, all but one of these schools had...

ScienceDaily (Aug. 5, 2008) — A growing number of the world's children are mildly to severely nearsighted (myopic), with rates especially high among urbanized East Asians. In addition to coping with poor distance vision, children with severe myopia are more prone to visual impairment and blindness later in life. Although genetic inheritance plays a role, the rapid rise of myopia suggests that environmental factors are driving the trend. Myopia usually begins and progresses during children's school years, but research on the role of intensive reading or other "near work" has determined that this is a minor factor. A new study...

Fast Learners Montgomery County officials say accelerating students in math will better prepare them for college, but a revered teacher says it's time to step on the brakes. By Emily Messner Sunday, August 3, 2008; Page W20 It's the day before final exams start at Montgomery Blair High School in Silver Spring, and Eric Walstein is teaching a class he calls "a travesty." It's not that he minds teaching Algebra II, but these students are in Blair's acclaimed math and science magnet program, and traditionally the magnet hasn't bothered with the course -- the kids were smart enough, and their...

Teachers' unions are expert at presenting the interests of their members and of public school students as one and the same. Which is why it's always illuminating to see how the nation's largest teachers' union, the National Education Association, spends its political money.[snip]It's a shame the NEA doesn't spend as much money and effort trying to improve lousy schools as it does trying to keep taxes high.

The local Arcata California University radio station KHSU came under fire this week amid a hasty management resignation over uber-liberal programming. (depiction of our troops as bloody kikkers ) and possible financial mis management. There is a new sheriff in town…meet Vice President, Rob Gunsalus.

Wellthy & Wise by: Emily Miller, August 04, 2008 Education and health: two seemingly separate domains, but according Robert Kaestner, professor at the University of Illinois at Chicago, the two are closely intertwined. Education is a “powerful” determinant of health, the professor decrees, making good education policy good health policy. According to Kaestner’s longitudinal study, education is a greater “predictor” of health and health behaviors than income level. He found that individuals who graduated high school raised their physical health by ¼th of the standard deviation and decreased the probability of poor health by thirty-five percent, while those who earned...

The School District in the City of Madison, Ohio will save $300,000 each year for the next 5 years by privatizing their school busses. Naturally, the union is trying to stop this savings by taking the city to court. Apparently, the union contract for the school busses ran out and the city decided to privatize the system instead of continue with the union. Of course, this is a long term savings, too. It eliminates the healthcare costs and pension costs to the city, as well. All good policy decisions, to be sure. Saving the tax payers hundreds of thousands of...

Judged by the astonishing increase in journal papers written by scientists in China, there can be little doubt that China is finding its place as one of the world's scientific power houses. Michael Banks, Physics World's News Editor, quantifies this surge in scientific output from China and asks whether quality matches quantity in August's Physics World. Nanoscience, quantum computing and high-temperature superconductivity are three of the cutting-edge areas of physics that have seen particularly large increases. Published journal articles in nanoscience, for example, with at least one co-author based in China, have seen a 10-fold increase since the beginning of...

Campaigning at town halls across America, I am often asked about my plans to reform our public schools. And the answer begins with two points on which most everyone agrees: Every public school child deserves a first-rate education. And too many of our schools are producing second-rate results. Beyond that, the education debate divides quickly into two camps. Some say all that's needed is more taxpayer money, along with more prekindergarten and after-school programs. Others believe that the basic structure of the education system is flawed, and that fundamental reform is needed. You can put me squarely on the side...

"Most devout Muslims are creationists so when you go to schools, there are a large number of children of Islamic parents who trot out what they have been taught," Prof Dawkins said in a Sunday newspaper interview. "Teachers are bending over backwards to respect home prejudices that children have been brought up with. The Government could do more, but it doesn't want to because it is fanatical about multiculturalism and the need to respect the different traditions from which these children come." Prof Dawkins, professor for the public understanding of science at Oxford University, is author of books including the...

The Review-Journal editorialized, back on July 25: "To understand and explain American exceptionalism, like it or not, it may be necessary to at least understand why aeroplanes were not used in the Civil War, why the British couldn't use the train to get back and forth between New York and Philadelphia in 1788, and why the Jackson Democrats kept making such a fuss about the National Bank. What is this? "Nevada's Council to Establish Academic Standards was scheduled to meet July 21 to adopt new public-school history standards. When some attention was drawn to what they're up to, they promptly...

I have one simple goal for the 2008-2009 academic year: I want to organize more federal lawsuits against universities in one year than I have in the last four years working with organizations like the Alliance Defense Fund. In order to succeed, I need two things from ordinary Americans (including, but not limited to, typical white people). First of all, I need parents to start raising children who know something about basic constitutional principles. One way to ensure this is to provide kids with alternatives to public education. Even a short two-week stint at a place like Summit Christian Ministries...

Posted on Saturday, August 02, 2008 8:44:19 AM by Soliton don't remember when I first learned about the theory of evolution, but nowadays I find myself reading of it a great deal in the popular press and hearing it discussed in the media. As my daughter enters elementary school, I find myself anxious to discuss with her teachers what they will cover in science class and where in their curriculum they plan to teach evolution. OUR COUNTRY HAS LAWS THAT SEPARATE church and state. Public institutions like schools must be neutral on the subject of religion, as required by the...

H.L. Mencken said during the Scopes Trial in 1925 that "those religious groups leading the war against the teaching of evolution are conspiracies of the inferior man against his betters." The proponents of teaching the God-creation theology in public schools have not given up despite the U.S. Supreme Court rulings like the 1987 case where Louisiana tried to use code words for teaching creationism, calling it the Balanced Treatment Act. Other code words for sneaking God into science class are "intelligent design" and "academic freedom." And these anti-evolutionists lobby state legislatures and put political pressure on school boards to subvert...

don't remember when I first learned about the theory of evolution, but nowadays I find myself reading of it a great deal in the popular press and hearing it discussed in the media. As my daughter enters elementary school, I find myself anxious to discuss with her teachers what they will cover in science class and where in their curriculum they plan to teach evolution. OUR COUNTRY HAS LAWS THAT SEPARATE church and state. Public institutions like schools must be neutral on the subject of religion, as required by the Constitution's First Amendment. Our courts have mandated that creationism is...

Education: A private takeover of L.A.'s infamous Locke High may already be starting to turn it around. Success here would send a message to other failing schools: You've run out of excuses.Readers of these pages may recall Alain Leroy Locke High School, in the Watts area of Los Angeles. Now and then it's in the news — we've mentioned it before — and invariably the news seems bad. In 2005, a 15-year-old student was killed there by gunfire from a gang shootout. Earlier this year, Locke was the scene of a melee involving about 600 students, apparently sparked by a...

(IsraelNN.com) A class of 30 hareidi men scored overwhelmingly better than the national average on a recent psychometric exam - despite, or because of, their lack of general studies schooling. Facts Belie Editorial Haaretz newspaper editorialized angrily this week against the exemption of hareidi students "from acquiring knowledge such as English and math" - and just a few days later reported on the hareidi students' high scholastic achievements. The editorial was in response to a law passed the Knesset this week. The new law states that hareidi high schools - "yeshivot ktanot" - will continue to receive State funding, despite...

It’s that time of year again as parents scramble to pick up the necessary supplies to send with their children as they are bussed off to the public school (I call them government indoctrination centers) across town. Unlike years ago, when our parents sent us to school with a notebook for each class, a couple of pencils and our lunch money, today’s child will lug clear or mesh backpacks filled with such necessities as liquid anti-bacterial hand soap, boxes of baby wipes and, in the case of Hermitage Elementary School in Hermitage, Arkansas, their first graders will supply two rolls...

...Obama says that as president he will “set a goal for all American middle and high school students to perform 50 hours of service a year, and for all college students to perform 100 hours of service a year.” What he doesn’t say is that he’ll make such voluntarism compulsory by attaching strings to federal education dollars. The schools will make the kids volunteer. It’s called plausible deniability. In a commencement speech at Wesleyan University, Obama advised graduates not to pursue the American dream of success, but to serve others. “You can take your diploma, walk off this stage and...

It's sweltering in Boston, and a dozen Tufts University coeds are out in shorts and tanks, attracting the usual stares. Only today the stares are for a different reason: the girls are huddled around a 750-pound machine that looks like a spaceship, long and wide with a bubble-shaped cockpit open to reveal a mass of pipes and wires. It's actually a solar car—one they've built from the ground up and hope to race next year. Suddenly sparks fly, and the girls jump back. They may be engineering whizzes, but they know a hazard when they see one. They call a...

ABC News' Teddy Davis and Lindsey Ellerson Report: Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill., told Planned Parenthood Tuesday that sex education for kindergarteners, as long as it is "age-appropriate," is "the right thing to do." "I remember Alan Keyes . . . I remember him using this in his campaign against me," Obama said in reference to the conservative firebrand who ran against him for the U.S. Senate in 2004. Sex education for kindergarteners had become an issue in his race against Keyes because of Obama’s work on the issue as chairman of the health committee in the Illinois state Senate. "'Barack...

Ask Republican candidates for the Kansas State Board of Education about the issues they think are most important and you will hear about the teacher shortage or engaging students with vocational education. On the campaign trail, however, many voters are using evolution as their litmus test.

Yes, there are two Americas. The one where John Edwards used to have a scholarship program that he intended to set up as an example for all of America to follow... and the one where he cancels that scholarship program. Is it because he isn't running for president any more? Since Edwards has other things to do now -- like hiding from the media in his mistresses' house and maybe getting a few $400 haircuts -- Edwards has pulled the plug on his pilot scholarship program in North Carolina. It was for the kids... now it isn't. As the media...

OKEECHOBEE - In a move the American Civil Liberties Union is calling "groundbreaking," a federal judge has ruled in favor of students who claimed the school board discriminated against them by opposing their gay tolerance club.

Teach for America is an organization that helps recruit and place bright college graduates and professionals as temporary teachers in needy schools. The non-profit group wins lots of kudos for its intentions and work. It has grown from modest beginnings in 1990: $2.5 million and 500 teachers. Today, the group says it has 5,000 teachers in training – and the 2007 budget was $75 million. Funding comes from a mix of public and private sources. According to Teach for America's financial disclosures, about a third of its money is your tax dollars – because it comes from local school districts,...

Gonzales Independent School District has new navy blue jumpsuits for dress code violators to wear during class. But some people say it will make students feel like prisoners. The district says it is just a way to keep kids dressed appropriately for learning. Gonzales High School senior Jordan Meredith told News 4 he understands why there is a dress code. But he doesn't understand why the school district took what he says is a drastic fashion stance for dress code violators. "I don't think it is going to work at all," said Meredith. Starting this school year, if Gonzales students...

I was reading about the math curriculum at the Lexington, MA public schools at the site above. For grades 1-5, it says they will "Continue with Everyday Mathematics (EDM) as our core elementary curriculum. Purchase pilot ancillary materials to address identified program gaps and needs of special populations. Both Singapore Math and Saxon Math, teacher and student materials, will be purchased by the special education department to pilot with various students based on individual needs." I think of Singapore and Saxon math, which are both pretty popular with homeschoolers, as being for kids of normal abilities (not just for the...

Supporting more money for the Chicago Public Schools (CPS) is not the same thing as being a supporter of public education. This distinction is lost on both the media and our political class as witnessed by PR stunts like the one pulled by Illinois State Senator James Meeks yesterday. Meeks wants to bus Chicago public school students up to New Trier High School in Winnetka on the first day of school to protest the disparity in funding levels. While it may be that per pupil expenditures for the Chicago Public Schools (roughly $11,000 per student) exceed the national average, exceed...

Pros Parents can monitor their children at school Teachers are less likely to pursue a hidden agenda Greater control of bullying Incompetent teachers can be identified Overall classroom behavior likely to improve Cons I don't see any

. . . and also, it seems, for the New York Times. 28 July 2008 The New York Times is determined to show that women are discriminated against in the sciences; too bad the facts say otherwise. A new study has “found that girls perform as well as boys on standardized math tests,” claims a July 25 article by Tamar Lewin—thus, the underrepresentation of women on science faculties must result from bias. Actually, the study, summarized in the July 25 issue of Science, shows something quite different: while boys’ and girls’ average scores are similar, boys outnumber girls among students...

German homeschool families continue to be persecuted and receive harsh treatment from government agencies in the Federal Republic of Germany while the European Union’s Petitions Committee has promised to look into accusations against Germany for repressing homeschooling. We told you recently about the Dudek family of in Archfeldt, Germany, who have just received their formal written sentence of three months each in prison because they homeschool. Although the family knew of the sentence after the hearing last month, the court took weeks to prepare its formal written opinion. The family now has four weeks to submit their written appeal of...

For the first time in over 15 years, a United States jurisdiction has enacted laws that significantly increase restrictions on homeschooling freedom! This past Wednesday, the D.C. State Board of Education (SBOE) approved the State Superintendent of Education’s June 27 draft of the home education regulations. After some discussion, the SBOE voted 5 to 1 in favor of the superintendent’s regulations. Only Board Member William Lockridge voted “no.” When giving his reasons, he exposed the unbridled discretion the Superintendent would now have over homeschoolers. Lockridge likened the new power of the Superintendent over parents as a type of “socialism.” These...

Los Angeles Unified School District officials are considering asking voters to approve a $7 billion bond measure in November, more than twice as big as previously discussed and nearly half of it set aside for unspecified future projects. LAUSD's board is set to vote Thursday on whether to support the bond measure, which allocates more than $3.2 billion for future "repair and safety," "modernization, repair and technology," "green technology" and to "attract, retain and graduate more students," according to a draft summary of the bond funding distribution. Meanwhile, district and charter officials are wrangling over exactly how much charter schools...

SCARSDALE, N.Y. — While the children of this upscale suburb go to camp or travel abroad, many of their teachers are spending summer vacation in school, taking students’ seats. In a class on economic, environmental and social sustainability at Scarsdale High School, two dozen teachers in T-shirts, shorts, skirts and sandals debated the value of bacteria to a community and read aloud poems about a strawberry’s journey to the table. Rachele Colantuono, an eighth-grade science teacher who is helping to run the class, took attendance and authorized bathroom breaks. “I tend to let these guys go without a pass,” she...