California is in. State schools chief Jack O’Connell and Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger on Friday morning signed the state’s application for Race to the Top federal funding. “The Race to the Top application outlines how we intend to make systemic changes to our education system in order to accelerate the development [...]
By the way, the student rep on the Santa Rosa School Board, Montgomery High senior Rena Wang, is scheduled to get feted by the State Board of Education in Sacramento Thursday. Readers will likely remember Wang from a story I wrote on Dec. 30 about her myriad political and academic accomplishments. (Read [...]
The state Office of Education today released the results of the annual California Physical Fitness test. More than 1.3 million fifth, seventh and ninth graders took the physical fitness test in the 2008-09 school year. Statewide, more than half of the students in the fifth and seventh grades successfully met [...]
In light of Santa Rosa City School’s consideration of eliminating seven credentialed library/media/technology teachers from district libraries and running the system with a centralized district manager and on-site classified staff, I found this bit particularly timely. State School Chief Jack O’Connell on Thursday announced a draft of his Model School [...]
I'm spending Monday watching President Obama's speech with some Sonoma County students. A story will appear in Wednesday's Press Democrat. Meantime, here is state superintendentJack O'Connell's response to this morning's speech: "I would like to commend and thank President Obama for taking the time to address our nation's students. These [...]
State Superintendent of Schools Jack O’Connell on Friday offered parents his Top 10 back-to-school tips to help ease students back into the love of learning following the long summer recess. “This is an extraordinary year as schools are coping with big budget cuts, teacher layoffs, larger class sizes, [...]