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ABQ/ APS Seeks $200 Million Bond Approval on February 5
By Aurelio Sanchez
ABQ Journal Staff Writer
November 17, 2012 [posted online 11/22/12]
It's not just that Albuquerque's West Side continues to grow, it's that the growth is paced by young families.
"The Southwest Mesa is growing so fast, and that's where there is room to build, and where people want to build houses," said Albuquerque Public Schools spokesman John Miller.
"But it's not just the demand, it's a demand by young families," he added.
The APS Board of Education on Friday unanimously agreed to put before voters a $368 million funding package for capital improvements, which includes money for the building of new schools and rebuilding and renovating others.
School officials said approval of the $200 million in general obligation bonds and $168 million in property tax levies won't raise taxes but will keep them at current rates.
If voters pass the package on Feb. 5,
- the West Side stands to receive up to $100 million, with the biggest ticket coming for a new $38 million Southwest Mesa school for grades K-8, to be built near Atrisco Heritage Academy. Money will also go toward new construction and improvements at some of its oldest schools, Miller said.
- The unnamed southwest school will have a capacity of about 1,300 and will relieve crowded school populations at Truman and Harrison middle schools and Rudolfo Anaya and Navajo elementaries.
A trio of schools that were built in the 1950s - Rio Grande, West Mesa and Valley - are slated to get major additions, including:
- new classroom buildings to augment a new science building at Rio Grande.
- New classroom buildings will also complement a new ninth-grade academy at West Mesa and
- a new industrial arts building at Valley High.
- Meanwhile, Chaparral Elementary School is slated for a new classroom building, and
- Mountain View Elementary will also receive some major rebuilding.
"We are concentrating on replacing buildings that are 50 years old and older that have to be redone," Miller said, adding that the average age of an APS building is about 45 years.
The package is expected to fund APS' 2011-17 capital master plan. Most projects on the plan consist of renovation and remodeling of older existing schools, including new classroom construction.
- Technology upgrades in classrooms are also planned, with about $30 million to go toward new networks and computers.
- In addition, APS has also dedicated more than $34 million toward the design and construction of charter schools over the next four years.
- The district now houses six charter schools in district buildings and has spent more than $14 million to acquire and refurbish facilities for those schools.
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ABQ/ Title IX: School Board Changes Booster Club Financial Reporting Flow
By Hailey Heinz
ABQ Journal Staff Writer
November 22, 2012
Officers from high school booster clubs are imploring Albuquerque Public Schools to be thoughtful as the district moves toward stricter enforcement of the federal Title IX law.
Band booster officers from Eldorado and Sandia high schools are raising concerns that a new policy could take a toll on booster clubs' ability to pay for last-minute expenses.
- "The flexibility that we require for emergency purchases, broken equipment, issues that arise on trips when I have 100 kids I may need to feed - we need more flexibility than exists in the school system payment process," Charles Richardson told the board during a recent meeting. Richardson is president of the Sandia band boosters.
Despite these concerns, the board passed a policy at its Friday morning meeting requiring that all booster club money flow through school activity funds, rather than being independently kept by parent volunteers. Several board members emphasized that they would involve booster clubs going forward and would work to develop streamlined systems.
APS in line with a state law called the School Athletics Equity Act, which requires all schools to report how much funding is channeled into different sports. The idea is to ensure schools are in compliance with the federal Title IX law, which requires equitable funding for boys' and girls' activities.
- Title IX has been interpreted by courts to include funds raised by booster clubs.
- The state law requires that schools provide detailed reporting about athletic spending so it will be easier to spot inequalities.
- Title IX applies to all activities, while the state law is specific to athletics.
- The new APS policy requires all activities to funnel their funds through the schools.
Booster club officers argued that many activities are co-ed and unlikely to raise equity issues. They said the APS policy is unnecessary and goes beyond the requirements of state law.
"Bands are all co-ed," Richardson said. "They equally benefit young men and young women."
Lisa Childress, treasurer of the Eldorado High band boosters, said the paperwork required to have booster funds flow through the schools would deter parent participation.
"The dedication and flexibility of our volunteers is enormous, but it is not unlimited," she said. "Complying with the tangle of restrictions imposed by APS would become a task volunteers would no longer be able to, or willing to, take on."
Board member David Peercy said APS included all activities in its policy in keeping with Title IX, even though the state law only requires reporting for athletics.
"This is really a federal Title IX issue, and the federal Title IX applies to all activities, not just athletics. So we are trying to be consistent in the policy that we have to put in place, to satisfy the federal Title IX rules. This is not our rule. This is not something APS made up," he said, adding he is sympathetic to the boosters. "We have great sympathy with you all. We do believe it is in fact a tremendous imposition on all of our booster clubs. We understand that completely."
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Santa Fe/ OPINION: Kudos to Governor for Supporting Charter Schools
By Doug Turner [Board President, New Mexico Coalition for Charter Schools]
ABQ Journal
November 21, 2012
Consider this. While only 10 percent of New Mexico's public schools are charters, under our new school grading system, 25 percent of the top 40 public schools that received an "A" grade were charters. In fact, four of the top 10 schools are charters. Charters play an increasingly important role in improving public education in our state and Gov. Susana Martinez gets it.
The governor spoke recently at the New Mexico Coalition for Charter Schools annual conference on the topic of protecting charter schools from the next round of legislation aimed at either limiting charters' potential growth or cutting their funding.
Her speech was both insightful and powerful as she told state charter leaders she had their backs, as well as those of future charters that might form to meet the varied needs of today's students.
We should commend the governor for her acknowledgement of the importance of public charter schools as part of the public school mix and her willingness to throw down a hard line against seemingly powerful interests that feel threatened by them.
- "We all know that charter schools provide an opportunity to create new, innovative and more flexible ways of educating our children," the governor said.
She is right. Any good school district should welcome charter schools and recognize them as incubators of creative change in public education.
Even if your kids are not in a charter, they benefit from them because of the competition they encourage. Nothing breeds complacency, mediocrity and waste like a monopoly, and charters break that bureaucratic monopoly in a way that provides parents with public school choices.
Charters often focus on kids whom regular public schools were not serving well, or who were struggling in that environment. Charter schools are working to bridge the great divide between those who thrive in a traditional environment and those who don't. Unfortunately there are those who are more interested in protecting a failing status quo simply because they work in and benefit from it.
Perhaps this is why bureaucratic rules exist that limit charters' opportunities for growth or expansion.
And while some have argued that charters siphon off needed funds from the regular public schools, the truth is that the money that follows each child to a charter is actually a bit less than what the regular public schools are getting per child overall. We also now know that the "big school" concept is less than optimal for many kids, regardless of who is running it or teaching there.
Charters alone may not be an educational cure-all, since our communities' problems around crime, addiction and other factors weigh against student success. Charter schools are, however, an essential piece of the solution. The governor clearly recognizes that public charter schools are part of the solution instead of being part of the problem and she's pulled no punches in making her defense of charters clear to all interested parties.
- "I will not sign any legislation that unfairly cuts funding to charter schools or legislation that would limit new ones from opening," Martinez added in her remarks.
Given this governor's history of saying what she means and fighting effectively for her key issues, those status quo interests might be well advised to do some soul searching rather than taking her on, and instead try to find some common ground.
With her recent speech to the charter school community, Martinez laid it down straight in a way that will ultimately benefit our kids and our state's future more fundamentally than any in that audience at the time might have recognized.
We should all applaud her for standing with charters and be ready to help take the arguments for educational accountability, competition and excellence to those advocates for the failing status quo.
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Fayetteville NC/ Special Needs Students Benefit from Synched Classrooms
By Gina Cairney
Education Week [Edweek.org]
November 16, 2012 [posted online 11/2112]
In an effort to ensure all its students have the same opportunities for quality classroom instruction, Cumberland County (N.C.) schools are using technology to "bridge" together its classrooms to maximize good teaching, the Fayetteville Observer reports.
With an interactive whiteboard, laptop, webcam, and conferencing software, teachers are able to interact with students anywhere in the district, and, according to the Observer, the school system can better meet federal requirement for having a certified teacher in each classroom.
As more schools integrate technology into their classrooms, there have been some concerns about the technologies' effectiveness, teachers' ability to use them, and even that the tools themselves may be replacing teachers.
But Ruben Reyes, executive director of exceptional child services for the 53,100-student district, tells the Observer that the technology is not meant to replace teachers, but it allows a single teacher to teach more students in the event a vacancy is hard to fill.
It's a "tool to enable teachers to share their expertise," Reyes told the Observer. "Without the teachers, this tool doesn't do anything."
The program, which cost the school district $6,000, was initiated last year by Terrence McAllister, principal of South View Middle School, as a pilot program with a focus in three key areas.
According to McAllister, the conferencing software-called Bridgit, which is designed for use on whiteboards by Canada-based SMART Technologies-ensures that special education teachers and highly qualified teachers are in the classroom for special needs students.
- "[Special education] teachers are now required to be highly qualified in core subject areas in order to teach the course. Since the inception of this requirement it has been difficult to find [highly qualified] teachers to fill vacant positions," McAllister said in an email.
- The software also supports and assists teachers who face challenges with particular objectives.
For example, if a math teacher is having challenges with linear equations, he can have another math teacher who has mastered that objective help out by syncing the classroom whiteboards together. This not only ensures students are getting the best instruction on the subject matter, but it also provides the struggling teacher strategies and support for the material.
- Finally, the software also provides remediation for students. Schools have set aside specific days and times for remedial lessons, which McAllister said allows teachers more time to help students who may be struggling.
- "This allows concepts to be taught to approximately 150-200 students at one time," he said.
While the program is focused on benefiting all students, educators report it is showing the greatest benefits for special needs students.
Sometimes it's difficult to find special education teachers who are considered "highly qualified", which leaves a school with limited options such as placing special needs students in regular classrooms where they may be ignored, or assigning highly qualified teachers into a special needs classroom.
With Bridgit, Gray's Creek High School Principal Vernon Aldridge said in an email, that their special needs students get the benefit of being in a small classroom setting with a certified special needs teacher, while receiving quality instruction by a qualified teacher of a particular subject.
"The smaller setting that Bridgit provides has made our [special needs] students more actively engaged in the learning," Aldridge said.
Rachel Hendricks, a math teacher at Gray's Creek that uses the Bridgit software said in an email that the program gives special needs students a "more focused learning setting which minimizes opportunities to be distracted."
"This provides a lot more opportunity for one-on-one when necessary," she said.
Aldridge also stressed that Bridgit is not a substitute for having a qualified teacher in the classroom.
"There is no piece of technology that can replace having a caring and competent teacher in the classroom," he said.
"We have found that our students are technology savvy and the more technology included in the instruction the more successful they are," and will be in the 21st century workplace.
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Washington DC/ OPINION: Addressing Bullying with School-Wide Solutions
By Nicole Yetter [Yetter is an educational consultant for school districts nationwide on a variety of issues, including bullying, Internet safety, and empathy, and a staff guidance counselor at North Penn High School in Lansdale, Pa. She was a featured presenter at the 2012 National Conference on Bullying, sponsored by the School Safety Advocacy Council, in Orlando, Fla.]
Education Week, Vol. 32, Issue 12 [Edweek.org]
November 14, 2012 [posted online 11/2112]
Kids have been bullying each other for generations. But for Generation Z, also known as the iGeneration or the Net Generation, the ability to utilize technology to expand their reach-and the extent of their harm-has increased exponentially.
Bullying in all forms, face-to-face or via technology, is of course unacceptable, but today's school leaders need to arm themselves with new rules and strategies to address aggressive behaviors that hurt students' well-being, their academic performance, and school climates overall.
One 2011 report suggests that many schools are not adequately preparing students to be safe in today's digitally connected age. It cites basic online safety and ethics as two areas in which students need more education.
The report, "State of K-12 Cyberethics, Cybersafety, and Cybersecurity Curriculum in the United States," was published by the National Cyber Security Alliance and sponsored by Microsoft.
- Among other findings, the report states that 81 percent of school administrators, including principals and superintendents, said they believe their districts are adequately preparing students in online safety, security, and ethics.
- However, only 51 percent of teachers agreed.
To date, not a single state has passed comprehensive legislation mandating that online safety, security, and ethics be part of the K-12 curriculum. The National Cyber Security Alliance is urging states to support legislation that does just that.
Creating comprehensive policies and procedures is critical for the protection of all. In some cases, when bullying is based on race, color, national origin, sex, disability, or religion, it overlaps with harassment, and schools are legally obligated to address it.
It's important for schools and districts to work with school boards to develop comprehensive policies that address bullying (including cyberbullying) and harassment and to be sure to outline what bullying looks like and sounds like while specifying the consequences of such behavior.
I encourage district administrators to assess the extent and scope of the problems within their schools by conducting a survey of their students. Once there is a baseline of what is going on in a school, educators can implement specific strategies to teach students and staff members about the nature and impact of bullying, cyberbullying, and harassment. They can also share creative and powerful ways to change the behaviors, positively.
- "Cultivating a positive school climate starts and stops with adults."
Keep in mind that bullying, in general, is more likely to occur in areas that are less supervised by adults, such as on the school bus and in the cafeteria, locker rooms, restrooms, and hallways. Schools should create a plan of action to address these "hot spots" by adding additional adults to supervise them, using security cameras in less-controlled places, and asking students for suggestions on heading off problems. Getting students involved gives them a sense of ownership in protecting their classmates and the opportunity to be part of the solution.
School administrators should implement such programs with consistency and make all policies and procedures readily available to students, staff members, families, and the larger community. They should also utilize specially created curricula or general-information sessions, such as assemblies and homeroom, or in-class discussions to raise awareness within the student body. And educators should invite specialists to come talk to staff and students (and also be sure to invite parents, or at least send information to them).
Many schools are now offering anonymous-reporting tools, like a cyberbullying hotline that lets students instantly send text messages-or leave a voice-mail message-alerting school officials to an incident. In response, those officials can reply immediately, also anonymously, and provide students the support they need to address the act, whether they are witnessing it or on the receiving end of it. Such a comprehensive program also establishes a reporting mechanism in the school.
Administrators must take each report of bullying or cyberbullying seriously, regardless of whether it was made anonymously or in person.
It's vital, too, that school leaders investigate all reports in a timely manner and gather as much information as possible to ensure accuracy-the who, what, where, when, and how questions must be asked and answered. And remember: Always speak with students individually, never in a group.
Cultivating a positive school climate starts and stops with adults. Research has shown a link between a perceived negative environment on campus and an increased prevalence of cyberbullying, bullying, and harassment behaviors. It's crucial to establish and maintain a school climate of respect and integrity where violations result in informal or formal sanctions.
So remember:
- Putting a stop to bullying takes a collaborative effort.
- Approach the process one step at a time.
- Change happens in small increments. The problem was not created in one day and cannot be solved in one either.
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