Free Republic

Caleb Stewart Rossiter, a college professor and policy analyst, decided to try teaching math in the D.C. schools. He was given a pre-calculus class with 38 seniors at H.D. Woodson High School. When he discovered that half of them could not handle even second-grade problems, he sought out the teachers who had awarded the passing grades of D in Algebra II, a course that they needed to take his high-level class. There are many bewildering stories like this in Rossiter’s new book, “Ain’t Nobody Be Learnin’ Nothin’: The Fraud and the Fix for High-Poverty Schools,” the best account of public...

In a groundbreaking resolution, the Los Angeles Unified District school board voted Tuesday to ban suspensions for “willful defiance,” making it the first district in the state to do so. This decision will stop suspensions for a variety of misbehaviors—anything from mouthing off to teachers, eating food in the classroom, or violating the school dress code—which critics have maintained are too broad and arbitrarily enforced. Instead, starting next year, principals will install alternative disciplinary measures while students remain in school. The ban in LAUSD, the second largest school district in the country, marks a major shift from a zero-tolerance policy...

New Jersey, Maryland Need School Choice, Studies ShowIf high per-pupil spending and widespread underachievement are two of the qualities that make a school system an ideal testing ground for vouchers, then Paterson, New Jersey and Baltimore, Maryland are two prime candidates, according to a pair of recently released studies.State Control of Schools Has Failed to Help Paterson, New Jersey Children: Why Not Choice Instead? by Don Soifer and Robert Holland of the Lexington Institute, and A School Voucher Program for Baltimore City by Dan Lips of the Maryland Public Policy Institute show how vouchers could help solve problems in the...