Jersey Journal--Jersey City council OKs contract with lawyers to fight school funding changes
JERSEY CITY -- The City Council last night unanimously approved a measure authorizing a $70,000 contract with a Morristown law firm the city says will help fight possible changes to the state's school funding formula.
The vote was taken at the end of a nearly four-hour meeting. There was no discussion among council members about the contract with Riker, Danzig, Scherer, Hyland & Perretti.
New Jersey lawmakers are considering changes that have Jersey City municipal and school officials nervous that millions of dollars in state aid to the Jersey City school district could be slashed. The 28,000-student district's budget is $673 million, with Jersey City taxpayers paying about $114 million and the rest paid for largely by state funding.
Terrence T. McDonald | The Jersey Journal|March 09, 2017 at 1:04 PM, updated March 09, 2017 at 2:38 PM
NY Times--Obama Education Rules Are Swept Aside by Congress
President Barack Obama after signing the Every Student Succeeds Act at the White House in 2015. The bipartisan support for the measure later disappeared. Credit Doug Mills/The New York Times
With all the attention paid to President Trump’s lightning-rod secretary of education, Betsy DeVos, and her advocacy for private school vouchers, little public notice has been paid to the action on education in Congress — where lawmakers have broader power than Ms. DeVos to make changes to the nation’s school system.
Now, Congress has done exactly that, voting to repeal crucial regulations associated with the Every Student Succeeds Act, one of President Barack Obama’s final legislative achievements.
DANA GOLDSTEINMARCH 9, 2017
Washington Post--Transgender families press education secretary on rights
WASHINGTON — Education Secretary Betsy DeVos watched a transgender girl eat apple sauce and draw and listened to another student’s emotional story of feeling marginalized at school, as activists pressed DeVos to make good on her promise to protect all students.
Parents and activists who met with DeVos on Wednesday said they thought she was moved by their stories, but they still left with little hope that she would be a strong advocate for transgender children.
The meeting at the Education Department came two weeks after the Trump administration rescinded Obama-era guidance that instructed schools to let students use bathrooms in line with their stated gender identity, not their assigned gender at birth. The decision was strongly condemned by civil rights groups, who said that it would harm already highly vulnerable students, but it was applauded by conservatives, who said the guidelines violated the safety and privacy of all other students.
By Maria Danilova | AP March 9 at 9:49 PM
Education Week--With White House Backing, Senate Overturns ESSA Accountability Rules
The Senate on Thursday voted 50-49 to block the accountability rules for the Every Student Succeeds Act created by the Obama administration.
Without the rules, the requirements for accountability and state plans will be found in the language of ESSA itself. The Obama-era accountability rules, finalized late last year, set ground rules for how schools must be rated for school-improvement purposes, specified the requirements of (and flexibility for) states dealing with high testing opt-out rates in individual schools, and outlined how states would have to handle the "school quality" indicator in accountability systems.
By Andrew Ujifusa on March 9, 2017 12:34 PM