MORE ARTICLES
NYT’s Anupreeta Das on Bill Gates, Microsoft, & Tech BillionairesAugust 28, 2024 - 12:03 pm
Harris’ Tax Vision: Policy & PoliticsAugust 27, 2024 - 3:23 pm
Poll: State Voters Overwhelmingly Support Ending Public Records Exemption, Auditing the LegislatureAugust 26, 2024 - 10:45 am
National Alliance’s Starlee Coleman on Public Charter SchoolsAugust 21, 2024 - 1:14 pm
How Has Employment Changed In Massachusetts?August 20, 2024 - 4:03 pm
How Has Transportation Been Changing In Massachusetts?August 20, 2024 - 2:31 pm
Digital Privacy Divide: Can Law Enforcement Google Where You’ve Been?August 20, 2024 - 11:40 am
American Bar Association Elects President of the Pioneer Law Center as Vice Chair of Judicial DivisionAugust 20, 2024 - 9:30 am
Pioneer Institute: 340B Hospitals Does Not Necessarily Translate to Charity CareAugust 19, 2024 - 12:49 pm
Wrap Up of the Massachusetts Legislative Session – Or Is It??August 14, 2024 - 1:53 pm
Turning up the heat on MCAS
/0 Comments/in Blog, News, Related Education Blogs /by Scott W. Graves and Micaela DawsonI don’t know how or why the Gov’s folks think moving away from the MCAS is something they are going to get any buy-in on. If you want to push it to the end of the school year, as many teachers have long asked–sure, that makes sense. If you want to limit the number of days a school can take to give the exam–sure, makes sense. But the attempt to sell this as a question of whether the MCAS is “a” versus “the” requirement is too lawyerly. In a previous post, I went through the Worcester T&G’s take on the Gov’s plan. Take a look at Jon Keller’s blog “Deval’s MCAS Folly”. Tough words from Keller: And if he thinks the […]
What’s all this then about… the Worcester T&G
/0 Comments/in Blog, News, Related Education Blogs /by Scott W. Graves and Micaela DawsonThe June 5 T&G makes one more point worth mentioning. As Monty Python used to say, What’s all this then about… free community colleges? As the editorial notes, the idea “disappointingly fails to address more immediate concerns.” As the piece notes, Community colleges play a vital role as a portal into post-secondary education — including four-year colleges and technical programs — for nontraditional students, limited-English speakers and others. While state funding may have made community colleges beyond the means of some, doesn’t everyone agree that we have a lot of work to do to ensure that CCs are effective delivery systems for skills needed in the market place? I mean, a financial services firm, to remain unnamed, has a wonderful relationship […]
Whatever you do say nothing
/2 Comments/in Better Government, Blog, Blog: Better Government, Economic Opportunity, Related Education Blogs /by…when you talk about you know what. The above line is from an old Irish song (full lyrics below), mocking some unspeakable truth that can’t be related in polite company. I thought of it today reading about the travails of John Hynes who had the audacity to say the following, as an explanation for his plan to open a private school as part of a major development in the Seaport: Unfortunately, 200 to 300 young families leave the city annually because they don’t want to send their kids to private school, can’t get into the public school of choice, or don’t want their 7-year-old spending two hours traveling to a private school, so they move to the suburbs (Quoted in […]
Anybody have an education bandaid?
/0 Comments/in Blog, News, Related Education Blogs /by Scott W. Graves and Micaela DawsonThe education announcement was long on desire, but its lack of detail and, um, how to get it done (sometimes known as an implementation plan) is buying the Governor more static. Check out the June 5 editorial in the Worcester Telegram & Gazette, which makes three points: Conspicuously absent from his presentation, however, were a price tag for the sweeping expansion he envisions and an action plan for overcoming resistance by unions, school administrators and taxpayers to various aspects of his education plan. A decade and a half after enactment of the landmark education reform law, the No. 1 standing of Massachusetts students nationwide has vindicated the “grand bargain” that underlies the effort’s success: a major infusion of funding accompanied by measurable standards and accountability for results. […]
Biotech vs. Precision Plastics
/0 Comments/in Better Government, Blog, Economic Opportunity, News /by Scott W. Graves and Micaela DawsonGood play on the radio and in the print media subsequent to our piece in the Herald giving Pioneer’s take on the billion-dollar biotech bonanza, excerpted below: We all want to attract and grow biotech companies. [But] why not focus on financial services, which employs 180,000, or precision plastics, a large employer in Worcester and Springfield? [Why] not focus on the small business sector as a whole, which creates many times more jobs than biotech. Those jobs start people up the economic ladder – and stay in Massachusetts. The only way to grow and retain jobs and broad prosperity is to improve the business climate by addressing areas of competitive disadvantage like unemployment insurance, permitting, health care and energy costs. Massachusetts has the […]