I have to admit I’m torn on the issue of high-stakes testing. In a recent article for the Washington Post, Valerie Strauss aptly describes it as a national obsession in education thanks to No Child Left Behind. Her piece includes a column by Kenneth Bernstein, an award-winning teacher and education blogger. Bernstein, who is now […]
Rochester school district
Posted inNews & Opinion
Clock ticking for RCSD?
Rochester schools Superintendent Bolgen Vargas’s warning in his recent State of our Schools speech that the community faces its “last chance” to turn around the city’s troubled district left many people wondering what, exactly, he meant. In an interview after the event, Vargas said he wasn’t trying to be provocative when he made the comment. […]
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WEEK AHEAD: White announcement; RCSD budget; State of the Union party; MCC decision day
Rochester businessman Alex White will make an announcement this afternoon regarding the 2013 elections. White, a member of the Green Party, has waged unsuccessful bids for Rochester mayor and City Council in the recent past. “There has been speculation as to my intentions for the local races this year,” White said in a press release. […]
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Vargas continues attendance push
More than 60 school officials, parents, and residents gathered at the Rochester school district’s central office this morning in another organized effort to track down truant students. In groups of two to four, volunteers were handed a list of students and their addresses from schools 4, 17, 22, 30, and Monroe who have not attended […]
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Week Ahead: RPO court case, city violence forum, RCSD meetings, saving School 16
At 11:30 a.m. today, State Supreme Court Justice Kenneth Fisher will hear arguments on a lawsuit against the Rochester Philharmonic Orchestra’s board. Attorney Eileen Buholtz is suing the board over its annual meeting and elections, which took place on January 23. She says that neither the RPO board nor its executive committee set the membership […]
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Superintendent’s eval reflects on board
Rochester schools Superintendent Bolgen Vargas met with school board members last night to discuss his evaluation. The seven-member board’s chief responsibility is to hire and supervise the superintendent. But board members’ evaluation of Vargas is also a review of their own skills as a publicly elected body. And their participation in and influence on the […]
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New report analyzes charter schools
A new report from Stanford University’s Center for Research on Education Outcomes indicates that the success of charter schools can be determined within the first three years. Charter schools that are well-managed, high-performing schools from the start are likely to remain so, the report says. And those with problems in their first year aren’t apt […]
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Vargas lobbies Albany for education spending
Rochester schools Superintendent Bolgen Vargas was in Albany yesterday responding to Governor Cuomo’s proposed budget and urging lawmakers to increase funding for the Rochester school district, the lowest performing of the state’s Big Five school systems. Vargas wants more funding to meet a district goal of getting 90 percent of city third-graders to read at […]
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A better model for neighborhood schools
Once again in Rochester, there are calls for a return to neighborhood schools. While it is important to create neighborhood elementary schools within urban villages where possible, and to align accountability, consolidate services, and make it all transparent, my experience brings me to conclude that for a future system of education to be successful and […]
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Second chance for controversial fire program
Lieutenant Lawrence “Shawn” Brumfield was part of the second class of students to graduate from a firefighter trainee program formerly at East High School. The purpose of the program as it existed then was to introduce interested East students to a potential career in the fire service.
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School choice is a slice of the education pie
The 30 or so children assembled in Rochester Prep Elementary School’s gymnasium are not students; they’re scholars in the charter school’s “believe it and you’ll be it” vernacular. At times, they jumped to attention, marched, and even stepped to a cheer in honor of the higher education institution their homeroom is named after, Howard University. […]
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RCSD adopting ‘common core’ curriculum
For much of the last decade, graduation rates for most of New York State’s Big Five school districts have been around 50 percent. But the numbers have gradually improved for the New York City and Yonkers districts, which have graduation rates over 60 percent. Rochester’s graduation rates continue to hover around 50 percent, however, with […]
