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Featured Term (selected at random:GRAVISSIMUM EDUCATIONIS Declaration of the Second Vatican Council on Christian education. The focus of this declaration is mainly threefold. It tells all Christians that they have a right to a Christian education; it reminds parents that they have the primary duty and right to teach their children; and it warns believers of the danger of state monopoly in education. Catholic schools on every academic level, including universities, are encouraged, their teachers praised, and the right of the Church to conduct educational "institutions under their control" is defended (October 28, 1965). All items in this dictionary are...

From school board races to Senate primaries, the education reform package known as Common Core is proving uncommonly divisive this campaign season, popping up as an issue in primary elections all over the country. Former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, a Republican, cites opposition to Common Core as a key reason for her endorsement of state Rep. Chris McDaniel over incumbent Sen. Thad Cochran in Mississippi’s hotly contested Republican Senate primary. Former Oklahoma state House Speaker T.W. Shannon, a Republican, says Obama administration pressure on states to adopt Common Core “is a prime example of why I’m running for the Senate.”

Secretary of Education Arne Duncan can threaten us all he wants; we’re finished with Common Core in Oklahoma. Last week Governor Mary Fallin made it official, signing into law legislation repealing the law’s impact on our state’s education standards. As a state representative, I was proud to have voted to stop Common Core. As a conservative, I’m outraged I had to in the first place. We need to be standing up for school choice, not whitewashing standards that are better for bureaucrats than parents and children. At any rate, the Obama administration is none too happy with us. “We partner...

New horizontal expansion includes government-funded Bachelors and Masters programs wherein students pay Digital Domain to work for Digital Domain Soon after my tweet I get an email from a new VFX blogger called OccupyVFX who was able to find audio of the presentation given by Digital Domain’s CEO John Textor. The whole 22 minute presentation is posted above but the surprising part starts around 15:40 when Mr. Textor talks about their new VFX school in Florida called Digital Domain Institute: Classes starting in the education space, what’s interesting is the relationship between the digital studio and the college. Not only...

( headline Dad Refuses to Take His Son for Psych Evaluation After Harmless School Incident. Then He Received a Letter That Left Him in Disbelief ) A New Jersey father defended his son, Ethan, after a simple pencil-swirling incident nearly resulted in the boy’s suspension earlier this year because a classmate claimed he was spinning it like a “gun.” Following intense media scrutiny, school officials reportedly backed off and it looked like the situation would just blow over. Then Michael Chaplin says he received a stunning letter from New Jersey’s Department of Child Protection and Permanency and Department of Children...

Judges of the European Court of Human Rights. Credit: Council of Europe. Strasbourg, France, Jun 13, 2014 / 12:02 am (CNA/EWTN News).- Although the European Court of Human Rights has allowed a bishop to set standards for Catholic religion teachers in Spain, some say the threat of government interference still gives cause for concern. “If government can dictate who teaches a particular religion, then government can dictate what the content of that religion is,” Eric Rassbach, deputy general counsel at the U.S.-based Becket Fund for Religious Liberty, said June 12. Rassbach, an expert consultant with third parties who intervened in...

Things NOT to Learn in School by R.J. Riggins modifications made by H. Geller] Do not -- repeat -- do not learn these lessons. If we're teaching you these things, we're sorry. If you've learned any of these already, forget them fast, before you get out of school! 1. YOU ONLY NEED TO GET A 70 70% is NOT OK. 70% stinks. Name one occupation in which it is OK to be right only 70% of the time. What job lets you be totally wrong three times out of every ten -- and keep your job more than a week...

LOS ANGELES — A California judge ruled Tuesday that teacher tenure laws deprived students of their right to an education under the State Constitution and violated their civil rights. The decision hands teachers’ unions a major defeat in a landmark case, one that could radically alter how California teachers are hired and fired and prompt challenges to tenure laws in other states. “Substantial evidence presented makes it clear to this court that the challenged statutes disproportionately affect poor and/or minority students,” Judge Rolf M. Treu of Los Angeles Superior Court wrote in the ruling. “The evidence is compelling. Indeed, it...

Today’s reflection:Can you connect the dots in the three stories below? I’ve provided some hints along the way.Story #1: “Paul Robeson High School’s 2014 prom theme: “This is Are Story.” Drafted by prom committee, reviewed and approved by their TA (teacher advisor). And since this is the Senior Prom, we assume that this was written by one of the lucky 25% who are/our actually going to graduate high school. Story #2: LOS ANGELES—A California judge declared the state's strong teacher-tenure laws unconstitutional in a rebuke that promises to spur similar challenges around the country.The student plaintiffs in the lawsuit against...

In education circles, universal preschool is hot. But it’s only half the answer. If we really want to raise a generation of employable kids, we need universal 13th and 14th grades too. As taxpayers, we’ve decided to subsidize the education of every American child between the ages of 5 and 18. But current education funding structures reflect a bygone industrial age, when a high school diploma met or in some cases exceeded the needs of the local and national economies. Now, neither preschool nor college is a luxury, and families shouldn’t have to pay for the schooling that keeps society...

Education: Oklahoma joins South Carolina and Indiana in opposing one-size-fits-all U.S. education standards that have turned schools into leftist re-education camps, with political statements masquerading as instruction. Not as much attention has been paid to Common Core as has been paid to ObamaCare. But like the faux Greek columns in Denver at Barack Obama's nomination in 2008, they were supposed to be the twin pillars of his legacy. Both, however, are fake promises, Trojan horses for government control of key sectors of American society and our economy. Five years ago, 46 states gave up a big chunk of their sovereignty...

An unsurprising yet groan-inducing addendum to the empty gestureexecutive order President Obama so magnanimously introduced this week to allow millions of student-loan borrowers to cap their monthly payments at 10 percent of their current income and then be fully forgiven after 20 years — a “favor” to borrowers to lessen their burdens that will, in the long run, only serve to inflate future tuition prices and borrowing costs ever further. I missed this on Monday, but the WFB didn’t:CLICK ABOVE LINK FOR THE VIDEO SECRETARY OF EDUCATION ARNE DUNCAN: We actually don’t know the cost yet. Obviously we have...

Children learn a great deal about the world from their own exploration, but they also rely on what adults tell them. Studies have shown that children can figure out when someone is lying to them, but cognitive scientists from MIT recently tackled a subtler question: Can children tell when adults are telling them the truth, but not the whole truth? Led by Laura Schulz, the Class of 1943 Career Development Associate Professor of Cognitive Science, the researchers found that not only can children make this distinction, but they can also compensate for incomplete information by exploring more on their own....

A Los Angeles Superior Court judge ruled Tuesday that tenure, seniority and other job protections for teachers have created unequal conditions in public schools and deprive poor children of the best teachers. In a case that could have national implications for the future of teacher tenure, Judge Rolf Treu sided with a Silicon Valley mogul against some of the most powerful labor unions in the country. In a 16-page ruling, in the case of Vergara v. California, Treu struck down three state laws as unconstitutional. The laws grant tenure to teachers after two years, require layoffs by seniority, and call...

In a tweet Tuesday, President Obama’s official account attempted to draw attention to the plight of women workers, saying that it wasn’t 1963 anymore — when, as implied by an image and text, man first walked on the moon.

Los Angeles Superior Court judge ruled Tuesday that key job protections for teachers in California are unconstitutional, in a major loss for unions.. The verdict represents a complete victory by attorneys who argued that state laws governing teacher layoffs, tenure and dismissals harm students by making them more likely to suffer from grossly ineffective instruction. If the preliminary ruling becomes final and is upheld, the effect will be sweeping across California and possibly the nation. Ruling "The law was on our side and the evidence was overwhelming,” said Marcellus McRae, an attorney for the plaintiffs. "Whatever happens, we can’t go...

Thursday marked a high point for opponents of Common Core, as Oklahoma Gov. Mary Fallin signed legislation making her state the third to ditch the national educational standards. In a press briefing at the White House on Monday, though, U.S. Education Secretary Arne Duncan struck back by vaguely suggesting that the federal government may now punish Oklahoma. Duncan asserted that “40 percent of high school graduates” in Oklahoma “have to take remedial classes when they go to college” and only “25 percent of Oklahoma’s eighth-graders in math are proficient.” The Obama administration education chief declared that the Common Core Standards...

The most controversial issue in education today is clearly Common Core. It's being more hotly debated than bullying, zero tolerance, sex ed, abortion or even school lunches. Common Core is the title of a new set of standards the Obama administration has been trying to force the states to use. Even before the standards were written, 45 states and the District of Columbia signed on, encouraged by inducements of federal funds. The principal outliers are Texas, Alaska, Nebraska and Virginia. Now that parents and teachers are finding out what is commanded by Common Core State Standards and what is being...

Up to 5 million Americans struggling to make their monthly student loan payments could find relief under a program President Barack Obama expanded Monday, part of an election-year push by Democrats to paint Republicans as blocking common-sense steps that could help the middle class.....

...Shonda Rhimes delivered a poignant commencement speech to Dartmouth's graduating class of 2014. And while she admitted to being so nervous she could poop (her words) and completely unqualified to give advice, the Grey's Anatomy and Scandal creator did, in fact, dish out some extremely useful information..... "When people give these kinds of speeches, they usually tell you...Dream and dream big. As a matter of fact, dream and donÂ’t stop dreaming until your dream comes true. I think thatÂ’s crap.... "Whenever you see me somewhere succeeding in one area of my life, that almost certainly means that I am failing...