Editorial Staff

Jason Bedrick on Religious Freedom & Private School Autonomy

/0 Comments/in , , , /by Editorial Staff
Share on Facebook
Share on Twitter
Share on
LinkedIn
+

Bob and Cara talk with Jason Bedrick, EdChoice’s director of policy, about New York’s controversial “substantial equivalency” proposal that would give the state Department of Education oversight of school curricula at yeshivas and other private and parochial academies to ensure parity with their public school counterparts. Jason explores the historical roots of “substantial equivalency” statutes, and questions their compatibility with a free and pluralistic society. He points to European approaches to educational pluralism, and New York’s case, as bellwethers for the rest of the country. This battle is the subject of Jason’s forthcoming book with Jay Greene, Yeshivas vs. the State of New York: A Case Study in Religious Liberty and Education.

Stories of the Week: In Michigan, a new partnership model to improve struggling schools that serve 50,000 students puts the districts themselves in charge of managing their own turnaround plans instead of the state – can this strategy work? Is Texas’s cap on special education services an arbitrary and unfair denial in violation of federal disability laws, or a legitimate effort to limit over-classification of special needs students? A new report claims that teacher morale has fallen dramatically, from 50 percent in 2018 to 34 percent in 2019 – how can we change course?

Commentary of the Week: Erik Hanushek in Education Next, “Professionalizing Teaching and Winning the Salary Wars.”

Tweet of the Week:  Marilyn Muller ~ Dyslexia Advocate @1in5advocacy

 

Newsmaker Interview Guest:

Jason Bedrick is director of policy for EdChoice. Previously, Bedrick served as policy analyst with the Cato Institute’s Center for Educational Freedom. He also served as a legislator in the New Hampshire House of Representatives and was an education policy research fellow at the Josiah Bartlett Center for Public Policy. Bedrick received his master’s degree in public policy from the John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University, where he was a fellow at the Taubman Center for State and Local Government.

EDCHOICE.ORG

Twitter: @JasonBedrick

Next week’s guest: Steven Wilson, Founder and former CEO, Ascend Charter Schools

News Links:

https://www.educationviews.org/a-new-michigan-education-model-shows-promising-signs-for-students-in-struggling-schools-but-can-it-work-long-term/

https://www.houstonchronicle.com/news/houston-texas/houston/article/Students-denied-special-education-failing-schools-14831755.php

https://finance.yahoo.com/news/low-teacher-morale-has-reached-a-tipping-point-study-142620535.html

https://www.educationnext.org/professionalizing-teaching-winning-salary-wars-higher-pay-increased-accountability/

Check out our other episodes of “The Learning Curve” podcast!

UK Oxford’s Sir Jonathan Bate on Shakespeare’s ‘Julius Caesar’

This week on The Learning Curve, U.K. Oxford and ASU Shakespeare scholar Prof. Sir Jonathan Bate, discusses Shakespeare's timeless play Julius Caesar on the Ides of March. Sir Jonathan explains the Roman lessons for American constitutionalism, including warnings against the dangers of dictatorship and civil war.

Lauren Redniss on Marie Curie, STEM, & Women’s History

0 Comments
/
This week on The Learning Curve, Cara and Gerard mark Women's History Month with Lauren Redniss, author of Radioactive: Marie & Pierre Curie: A Tale of Love and Fallout, the first work of visual nonfiction to be named a finalist for the National Book Award.

“The Last Candid Man”: B.U.’s Dr. John Silber

0 Comments
/
This week on The Learning Curve, Cara and Gerard talk with Rachel Silber Devlin about her memoir, Snapshots of My Father, John Silber, which captures the wide-ranging and remarkable life of the late philosopher, teacher, and president of Boston University.

OECD’s Andreas Schleicher on PISA & K-12 Global Education

0 Comments
/
This week on The Learning Curve, Andreas Schleicher, Director for Education and Skills at the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), discusses global K-12 education, skills, and competition.

India Unbound: Gurcharan Das on the Rise of the World’s Largest Free-Market Democracy

0 Comments
/
This week on The Learning Curve, Gurcharan Das, author, public intellectual, and former CEO of Procter & Gamble India, discusses the rise of India since independence to become a thriving, incredibly diverse nation of 1.4 billion people—the world's largest free-market democracy.

Dr. Deborah Plant on Zora Neale Hurston’s Barracoon: The Story of the Last “Black Cargo”

0 Comments
/
This week on The Learning Curve, Dr. Deborah Plant, editor of the 2018 book Barracoon: The Story of the Last “Black Cargo" discusses Zora Neale Hurston's work as an anthropologist telling the story of one of the last survivors of the infamous Middle Passage.

George Weigel Discusses Pope St. John Paul II for National Catholic Schools Week

0 Comments
/
This week on The Learning Curve, George Weigel, the biographer of Pope St. John Paul II explores how Karol Wojtyla's education, deep faith, and experiences during World War II shaped his life as a spiritual leader and helped lead to the fall of Communism.

Award-Winning UK Author & Filmmaker Laurence Rees on the Holocaust, Auschwitz, and Remembrance

0 Comments
/
To mark International Holocaust Remembrance Day, Laurence Rees, a former head of BBC TV History Programmes and author of The Holocaust: A New History, sheds light on Germany in the 1920s and 1930s and the cultural and political conditions that led to the Holocaust.

D.C.’s Kevin Chavous on National School Choice Week

0 Comments
/
This week on The Learning Curve, Cara and Gerard talk with Kevin Chavous, president of Stride K12, Inc. and a former member of the Council of the District of Columbia, on the growing movement toward school choice in education. Chavous discusses recent Supreme Court rulings and the expansion of school choice programs, education savings accounts, and vouchers.

Pulitzer Winner Prof. David Garrow on the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. and the Civil Rights Movement

0 Comments
/
https://chrt.fm/track/4655F8/api.spreaker.com/download/episode/53284998/tlc_davidgarrow.mp3 This…

Independent Institute’s Dr. Richard Vedder on Higher Education, Skyrocketing Tuitions, & the Student Debt Crisis

This week on “The Learning Curve," co-hosts Cara Candal and Gerard Robinson talk with Dr. Richard Vedder, Senior Fellow at the Independent Institute and Distinguished Emeritus Professor of Economics at Ohio University. He shares analysis on the macro impact of COVID on the U.S. labor market, and the long-term economic prospects of American college students. He reviews insights from his recent book, "Restoring the Promise: Higher Education in America."

Get Updates on Our Education Research