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February 1, 2012

The Serpent in Finland's Garden of Equity:Essay Review of Finnish Lessons: What Can the World Learnfrom Educational Change in Finland by Pasi Sahlberg

Essay Review of Finnish Lessons: What Can the World Learn from Educational Change in Finland by Pasi Sahlberg (NY: Teachers College Press, 2011) Author(s): Sandra Stotsky — Publication date: 2012-03-05 Category: Education Abstract: About four decades ago, Finland introduced major reforms to...
January 31, 2012

Carmen Ortiz is Making Beacon Hill Nervous

Think you’ve had a tense few weeks at work? Consider potential targets of US Attorney Carmen Ortiz’s probe into wrongdoing at the state’s Probation Department. The Globe Spotlight Team and the Ware Report detailed the madness, absurdity, and outright corruption of the...
January 27, 2012

The Weakest Link?

Like most places, Massachusetts uses elections to insure accountability in government. Don’t like how things are being run? Vote’em out. So, it’s interesting to note that some of the most egregious breakdowns in public accountability over the past few years have occurred...
Opportunity, Transportation
January 24, 2012

Introduction to the Massachusetts Transportation Dashboard

Author(s): Steve Poftak — Publication date: 2012-01-24 Category: Better Government Abstract: Pioneer’s Transportation Dashboard is intended to communicate the performance of the state’s transportation system and inform the public about the effectiveness of the state’s transportation leadership. As a single-page of primarily...
January 24, 2012

Meet the Transportation Dashboard

How well did the Patriots do this weekend? That’s easy. Look at the scoreboard. How well has the state spent your tax dollars since the enactment of transportation reform? Well, that’s harder. There’s some reports that highlight the changes in management structure...
January 20, 2012

9 Keys For Reality TV Chefs

(What, you think we can only do policy?) There’s been a proliferation of reality cooking shows — Top Chef, Kitchen Nightmares, Iron Chef, Chopped, and so on — as well as spinoffs and brand extensions. For those aspiring chefs seeking to success...
January 20, 2012

Beacon Hill Budget Games

I’m a bit perplexed at the latest round of expectation-setting from Beacon Hill regarding the FY2013 budget. First, it turns out we still have a structural deficit. But, didn’t the Governor tell us that the FY12 budget “eliminates the structural deficit I...
January 13, 2012

Budgeting Innovation?

If you deal with budgets regularly, you know the pain of trying to get through those last final steps of balancing spending and revenue to the penny. But our friends at the State House may have delivered a new innovation — the...
January 11, 2012

Can the MBTA Learn From Germany?

Participate in the transportation conversation long enough and you hear a familiar refrain: Why can’t we be more like Europe? Europe being shorthand for an enlightened land of high-speed rail, pervasive bike use, and public transit everywhere. (There’s notable less interest in...
American Citizenship, Opportunity
January 10, 2012

Benefit of The Doubt? Not For Gov. Tim Murray

Lieut. Gov. Tim Murray has forfeited the benefit of the doubt. Murray, in a recent letter to political supporters, complained that he has been subjected to “false rumors and wild speculation” in connection with the crash of a state-owned car last Nov. 2...