Free Republic

Silicon Valley is world-renowned for the Nobel Prize winners and MacArthur "geniuses" behind theoretical breakthroughs in science, technology, engineering and math. Less well-known are people like Patrick Pickerell, a high school dropout whose $10 million-a-year Pleasanton metal manufacturing company is powered by people with no university credentials but plenty of math and fix-it skills -- ingredients essential to innovation. A new report, "The Hidden STEM Economy," reveals that a university degree is not required for 27.5 percent of all jobs in the San Jose area in the fields of science, technology, engineering and math. The number is even higher --...

Absolutely no one I know is satisfied with the education their children are getting in public schools. But most of the people I talk to with young kids have two parents that work full time outside the house and are unable to homeschool their children. But a lot of parents are making the sacrifice as evidenced by the explosion of home schoolers in the US. From Breitbart: As dissatisfaction with the U.S. public school system grows, apparently so has the appeal of homeschooling. Educational researchers, in fact, are expecting a surge in the number of students educated at home by...

A Texas high school silenced its Valedictorian’s microphone during his speech when he diverted from his pre-approved remarks and instead spoke about the Constitution.

HIGHLAND PARK - "Negative environment" is blamed for the sudden, involuntary transfer of four North Shore District 112 teachers this week. One of those moved to a new school, fourth-grade teacher Ellie Rubenstein, made her side of the story public with a YouTube that's being viewed by thousands. In Rubenstein 10 minute video, now viewed by over 162,000, she blames her sudden transfer to her resistance curriculum changes and burdensome testing. "I'm not a yes man," and that teaching is no longer meaningful. "I have to get out!" Rubenstein says. snip The Common Core Learning Standards (CCLS) are a set...

There are few victories sweeter in life than that of young teenagers triumphing over organized mean-spirited adults in positions of seemingly absolute power. This is a story that comes out of my own home town of Gold Beach, Oregon. It pits the high school band, consisting of 15 teenagers ranging in age from 15 to 18, against the powerful local teacher's union that tried to shut the band down because their unpaid volunteer band director, who everybody agreed was doing a good job, did not possess an Oregon teaching credential. http://www.backwoodshome.com/articles2/duffy141.html

highly controversial school curriculum used in much of Texas known as “CSCOPE,” which came under relentless assault from activists and parents who said it was promoting “progressive” anti-American and anti-Christian propaganda, was dealt a major blow by policymakers this week. However, despite media reports and legislators heralding the death of the divisive educational program, major elements remain in place. The system surged into the national spotlight earlier this year when conservative media outlets began exposing the curriculum contents, which critics lambasted as everything from “Marxist” indoctrination to “pro-Islam” attacks on Christianity. Others complained that parents were not allowed to access...

An Irving high school student drugged a 15-year-old classmate for several days and forced her to have sex with men who gave him drugs and money in exchange, police said Tuesday. Nimitz High School student Travis Lekas, 17, is also accused of trying to recruit other students from Nimitz and Bowie Middle School to engage in prostitution. Police said they are working to determine whether Lekas had other victims. Lekas, who was arrested at his home Monday, faces one count of human trafficking of a minor, one count of compelling prostitution and one count of sexual performance by a child....

CAHOKIA • A Cahokia High School assistant teacher and coach has been charged with having sexual contact with a teenage boy and transmission of HIV. Mario L. Hunt, 35, of the 1900 block of Florence Street in Cahokia, was charged in St. Clair County on Monday with criminal sexual assault, aggravated criminal sexual abuse transmission of HIV. The offenses happened with a 17-year-old boy during the first six months of 2011.

Common Core is an educational curriculum being forced upon the states by the Obama administration, which is scheduled to be mostly implemented this year in the 45 states that have adopted it. Common Core eliminates local control over K-12 curriculum in math and English, instead imposing a one-size-fits-all, top-down curriculum that will also apply to private schools and homeschoolers. Common Core was has been promoted in a manner that sounds good and commendable – “States working together to create national standards for education… standards that are designed to be robust and relevant in the real world.” Common Core describes itself...

Hot teacher alert!

From time to time, I have been highly annoyed with the school that my daughter attends. I have set up meetings with teachers, principals, and administrators. I have brought in paperwork and pleaded my case on a variety of topics. I have made scathing remarks. Once, I even had the utter audacity to argue a point with the principal with my daughter right there in the room, which is apparently a no-no because it “undermined the authority of the principal”. However, I haven’t yet gone on a rampage against which the police would need to come in and defend the...

Here is a list of the teacher 'sexpidemic' cases WND has documented where female teachers have been accused, or convicted, of assaulting students: Abbie Jane Swogger, 34: Teacher's aide at Highlands Senior High School in Harrison, Pa., was arrested Feb. 22, 2008, for renting a hotel room where police found beer, marijuana, an open condom wrapper and at least four teenage girls and boys, including several of her 15-year-old son's friends. Though categorically denying rumors she was having sex with students from the school, Swogger was quoted as saying, "I was stupid, very stupid. I already know I was and...

We’ve almost become immune to the everyday horror stories perpetrated on innocent children in government schools. Too many parents are oblivious to the predators in and around their children – many of whom are paid with their tax dollars. But last week WND noticed the trend is reaching epidemic proportions – from teachers providing sexually explicit material to students to same-sex rape to torture to kidnap to delivering drugs to students to rigging test scores for cash. The disturbing series of reports starts in Utah, where a high school teacher is accused of sexually abusing a 17-year-old student. Both are...

During the dot-com boom, Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers, the venture capital investment firm, all but minted money, making prescient early investments in Netscape Communications, Amazon.com and Google and delivering astonishing returns to investors. Along the way, it became a symbol of Silicon Valley. But the firm has hit a rough patch over the last decade, frustrated by unsuccessful forays into clean technology and by a catch-up effort to take later-stage stakes in social media companies. Kleiner has held a series of status-report meetings with its outside investors this year, acknowledging that recent fund performance “wasn’t great,” one attendee said....

SUFFOLK, Va. — Two Suffolk second graders have been suspended for making shooting noises while pointing pencils at each other. Media outlets report the 7-year-old boys were suspended for two days for a violation of the Suffolk school system’s zero-tolerance policy on weapons. They were playing with one another in class Friday at Driver Elementary. “When I asked him about it, he said, ‘Well I was being a Marine and the other guy was being a bad guy,’” said Paul Marshall, one of the boys’ fathers. “It’s as simple as that.”

Teacher who stomped on flag receives $85,000 settlement The South Carolina teacher placed on administrative leave after throwing an American flag on the floor and stomping on it was paid $85,000 as part of an out-of-court settlement in a case arising out of that incident. The settlement does not include the salary that Chapin High School English teacher Scott Compton will continue to receive until June 7, according to The State. He continues to get paid although he was placed on leave in January and submitted his resignation on Mar. 27. “Prior to his resignation, attorneys for Mr. Compton informed...

A teacher was arrested after she allegedly raped a boy in her classroom after he handed in a test. The high school teacher in New Mexico is accused of raping her male student in her classroom. Jennifer Vigil, 31, was arrested Tuesday after the student told police he was forced into having sex with his teacher at the Pojoaque Valley High School in Santa Fe. Vigil maintains that the sex was consensual, but the student disagreed he claimed that the teacher forced him to have sex after she locked the door of the classroom and he was unable to leave....

Prepare ye the way of the Common Core. And then the Word will be made Fed. And Obama will dwell amongst us forever. Amen. -- From the Book of Common Core  Parent Led Reform, in collaboration with Truth in American Education, hosted a second rally via Twitter Thursday May 2nd to stop the implementation of Common Core standards. Common Core standards are national, top-down K-12 education ideology imposed by federal and state government. The #Stopcommoncore Twitter rally reached of nearly 9.8 million Twitter users. The traffic was so heavy and the complaints from liberals so loud that Twitter temporarily suspended...

Is President Obama taking-over our nation’s public schools? Is a United Nations agenda infiltrating America’s K-12 classrooms? No, not exactly. Not Yet. But the so-called “Common Core” public education agenda could be paving the way for some serious trouble.Here are a few basic assumptions that people are making about Common Core – along with the facts of the matter. Assumption # 1 : “Common Core” is a set of educational curriculum requirements being imposed on the states by the Obama Administration. Technically speaking, this is false. “Common Core,” whose official name is the “Common Core State Standards Initiative,” is not,...

A group of charter public school advocates, private-sector business people and state employees have been meeting to come up with ideas on how to provide better public education at a lower cost through technology and competition. The group hopes to provide a “value school” model costing about $5,000 per pupil, reports The Detroit News, which broke the story. If it works, this would mean an education at substantially less than the $13,000 school districts receive now in per-student revenue or even the roughly $7,000 per pupil they receive strictly from the state. Most of the criticism of the program has...