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Teacher shortages

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I love the Education Intelligence Agency. Click HERE to enter the dimly lit cavernous corridors of the Agency and read the full version of what follows. The topic is teacher shortages, and it is a great concern; but Mike Antonucci (the Education Spymaster) scopes out a brief history of the teacher labor market to ensure that we are thinking about the current shortage without hysteria: One would think that with all the technological and statistical tools at their disposal, school districts and state agencies would be able to make reasonably accurate predictions of enrollment and, therefore, hiring needs. However, in state after state we are seeing layoffs and marked competition for the job openings that do exist. In Florida, for […]

Floor falls out in California housing

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On the LA Times blog today there is a distressing bit of news about the distressed California housing market. Home prices in the state, the blog notes, fell 26 percent (three times the national average) between February 07 and February 08! –Statewide, median sales prices fell by a stunning 26% in February, with home prices dropping at a rate of nearly $3,000 a week, the California Association of Realtors reports. Further, the CAR says the Fed’s interest rate-cutting campaign “will have little near-term direct effect on the housing market.” –In the San Fernando Valley, losing a home to foreclosure is now almost as common for families as buying a home. The L.A. Daily News: “During January and February, there were […]

Boston Cops and the Civil Service Commission

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Michelle McPhee, late of the Herald and currently on WTKK, has a gripping piece on the efforts to root out corruption in the Boston Police Department. McPhee was on the crime beat before and her dramatic writing gives an important story even more life. Halfway through the piece, McPhee fingers one of the key suspects: BPD leaders say one of the biggest hurdles to cleaning up the force is the state’s Civil Service Commission, an independent body established in 1884 to prevent politicians from interfering in the hiring practices of public agencies, or managers from canning people unfairly…Any police officer—or civil servant—who has been disciplined or fired can appeal to the commission and have a full hearing. If it decides […]

Reaching

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Slate’s Tim Noah attempts to draw a parallel between Obama’s membership in Reverend Wright’s church and Hillary Clinton’s interview with reporters and editors at the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review, owned by Richard Mellon Scaife. The clear implication is that Clinton should be held accountable for some statements of the paper’s owner, as recounted by Noah. He’s reaching. Her appearance at the 3rd most widely circulated newspaper in a hotly contested primary state should hardly be newsworthy. Particularly if Noah’s chosen candidate has (gasp!) spoken with reporters at the very same paper.

School choice programs increase 84 percent in 5 years

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No, not here, silly. In the rest of the United States! Do I have to explain everything to you?! Passing on bits of the press release from the Alliance for School Choice: Student enrollment in private school choice programs, which include school voucher programs and scholarship tax credit programs, has increased by 84 percent over five years, according to the School Choice Yearbook 2007… According to the book, there are 16 private school choice programs in nine states and the District of Columbia serving 150,000 children. Last year, legislators in 40 states introduced legislation to advance private school choice programs. The five states with the largest school choice programs are Florida (39,000 students), Pennsylvania (38,000 students), Arizona (28,000 students), Wisconsin […]