Education

A New Jersey school choice advocate says he will not miss the state's outgoing Governor John Corzine or his ineffective methods of improving education for inner-city minorites.

Educational reform supporters are excited about the election of New Jersey's Republican Chris Christie. Governor-elect Christie took a strong stand on education during his campaign, promising that he would not turn a blind eye to the plight of inner-city minorities who are stuck in underperforming schools and are years behind their white peers. Derrell Bradford, deputy director for Excellent Education for Everyone, says outgoing Democratic Governor John Corzine was an agent of the status quo...

(CNSNews.com) – A sex ed administrator with the Cleveland Metropolitan School District says that half of the “Responsible Sexual Behavior” classes for 9th and 10th grade students are taught by Planned Parenthood personnel.

"Planned Parenthood is one of our partners that teaches about 50 percent of our 9th and 10th graders,” Lita-Marie Townsen told CNSNews.com. She made the comment at an event on Capitol Hill last week where sex education activists pushed for federal funding of programs that do not focus solely on marriage and heterosexual couples.

The event, sponsored by the Sexuality Information and Education Council of the United States (SIECUS), the National Education Association, and Healthy Teen Network, included Townsend as a panelist. Organizer said she could speak about the progress of comprehensive sex education programs in public schools “on the ground”...

(CNSNews.com) -- A coalition of liberal sex education advocates says the Obama administration and the Democrat-controlled Congress will end support for abstinence-only programs that emphasize marriage and heterosexual relationships.

“The appropriations bills this year represent the most profound change in national sex education policy that we have ever had in the history of this country,” said William Smith, vice president for education and training with the Sexuality Information and Education Council of the United States (SIECUS), at an event held Thursday on Capitol Hill...

New Jersey school officials responsible for having elementary school students sing an anthem of praise to President Obama remain under fire from parents who accuse the district of political indoctrination.

The controversy began with the dissemination last month of a widely circulated YouTube video showing New Jersey second-graders singing a song praising President Obama to the tune of "Battle Hymn of the Republic." The Burlington Township Board of Education denies that the song was intended to promote a political agenda or make a political statement, and claims it was merely a performance to celebrate Black History Month.

But not all parents and local residents are buying that explanation. A group of 85 protestors gathered across the street from the B. Bernice Young Elementary School Monday to sing songs such as "God Bless America" and "Battle Hymn of the Republic," and chant slogans like "No indoctrination" and "Free children, free minds"...

In a dramatic act of civil disobedience today, six national education leaders
blocked the main entrance of the U.S. Department of Education in an effort to
protect the endangered Washington, D.C. school voucher program. The protesters
refused to leave the premises for nearly an hour, leading to a standoff with
police. Apparently on orders from federal officials, no arrests were made.

The individuals blocking entrance to the building were: former Democratic D.C.
Councilman Kevin P. Chavous, longtime D.C. education activist and executive
director of DC Parents for School Choice Virginia Walden Ford, the Rev. Anthony
Motley, Black Alliance for Educational (BAEO) Board Chair Dr. Howard Fuller,
BAEO President Gerard Robinson, and education reform leader Darrell Allison.

The protesters-who sought to block the entrance of the Department because "the
President and the Secretary have blocked low-income parents from accessing the  read more »

(CNSNews.com) - The “corrected” lesson plans the U.S. Department of Education is suggesting that schools around the country use to turn President Obama’s speech to students today into a “teachable moment” still call for teachers to read books about Obama and to post quotations from Obama in large print on classroom walls.

The Department of Education created two “menus of classroom activities” for use with the president’s speech. One is designed to guide Pre-K through 6th grade teachers, and the other is designed to guide 7th through 12th grade teachers.

The “menus” caused some controversy last week because the original version for Pre-K through 6th grade suggested that students, “Write letters to themselves about what they can do to help the president.” In the corrected version, the guide now calls for students to: “Write letters to themselves about how they can achieve their short-term and long-term education goals”...

A New Hampshire court ordered a home-schooled Christian girl to attend a public school this week after a judge criticized the "rigidity" of her mother's religious views and said the 10-year-old needed to consider other worldviews as she matures.

Ever since the judge's ruling came out in July, the case has aroused the interest of home-schooling groups nationwide, whohave asked why a court has the power to decide whether someone's religious views are too extreme.

The girl's mother, Brenda Voydatch, has engaged the Alliance Defense Fund, a Christian legal group based in Scottsdale, Ariz., to contest the ruling, in which the judge granted a request by the girl's father, Martin Kurowski, that the girl go to a public school...

Texas A&M University in Lubbock, Texas, has worked out an anti-discrimination policy that discriminated against a Christian campus group.

Freshman Leaders in Christ ran into a conflict with the school policy. They then called on Alliance Defense Fund (ADF) attorney Joseph Martins for assistance.

"Basically what had happened was the university had a policy that allegedly was supposed to stop discrimination, and it was one of their non-discrimination statements, and it said that all groups had to be open to membership to all university students," Martins explains...

The Obama administration late Wednesday withdrew a recommendation that school children who watch a video featuring President Obama next week write about how they might "help the president" as part of a classroom assignment.

The decision came after conservative critics attacked the plan by federal education officials that teachers supplement the speech with a special curriculum that was designed in concert with the White House.

Among the activities the government was suggesting for pre-kindergarten to sixth grade students: that they "write letters to themselves about what they can do to help the president." By Wednesday evening, the sentence asking children to think about how they can "help the president" had been removed from the document...

A suggested lesson plan that calls on school kids to write letters to themselves about what they can do to help President Obama is troubling some education experts, who say it establishes the president as a "superintendent in chief" and may indoctrinate children to support him politically.

But the White House says the speech is merely "designed to encourage kids to stay in school."

Obama will deliver a national address directly to students on Tuesday, which will be the first day of classes for many children across the country. The address, to be broadcast live on the White House's Web site, was announced in a letter to school principals last week by Education Secretary Arne Duncan...