IN THIS
ISSUE:
MISSOURI RANKS 19TH IN THE NATION IN GRADUATION RATES
Quality Counts 2006 ranked states in a number of categories. Here are a few:
|
Missouri |
National Average |
Rank |
| Education spending per student adjusted for regional cost differences (2002) |
$7,515 |
$7,734 |
32 |
| Average class size for self-contained classes in elementary schools (2000) |
20.9 |
21.2 |
30 |
| Average Beginning Teacher Salary (2002-03) |
$28,075 |
$29,564 |
32 |
| Average Teacher Salary (2002-03) |
$37,641 |
$45,771 |
43 |
| Graduation rates (2002) State overall
|
76 % |
71 % |
19 |
| Black
|
63 % |
56 % |
|
| Hispanic
|
-- % |
52 % |
|
| White
|
79 % |
78 % |
|
For more, see: http://www.edweek.org/ew/states/mo/
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MISSOURI RANKS 43RD IN THE COUNTRY IN AVERAGE TEACHER SALARY, 38TH IN EDUCATION SPENDING PER STUDENT
Average teacher salaries rose 2.5% in Missouri from 2003-2004 to 2004-2005, which moved Missouri from 44th to 43rd nationwide.
Spending
per student rose 7.3% in Missouri from 2003-2004 to 2004-2005. That was
enough to raise Missouri from 40th to 38th nationwide, out of the 50
states and the District of Columbia. Spending rose 3.7% per student, on
average nationwide.
For more rankings and data, see: http://www.nea.org/edstats/images/05rankings-update.pdf
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MISSOURI'S ADEQUATE YEARLY PROGRESS IN 2004–2005
On
December 14, 2005, Education Week released "Room to Maneuver," a
special report on the progress of the No Child Left Behind Act. Only
65% of Missouri schools showed adequate yearly progress in 2004–2005.
That was a drop from 77% in 2003–2004.
Ninety-six percent of Missouri teachers were deemed highly qualified. Thirty-two states had 90% or more of their teachers rated highly qualified.
For this and other data, see: http://www.coloradoea.org/media/nclb_1214.pdf
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PRESIDENT
WANTS TO DECREASE DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION BY $3.1 BILLION
The President's FY 2007
budget requests $54.4 billion in
discretionary appropriations for the Department of Education, a
decrease of
$3.1 billion, or 5.5 percent, from the 2006 level. The White House says
that
the education budget demonstrates an effort to eliminate
underperforming
programs, while increasing resources that promote the competitiveness
of the nation's
students and the nation itself.
Funding for most of the major education programs was held
level. A number of programs were zeroed out in the FY 2007 budget,
including
Even Start, Comprehensive School Reform, Gifted and Talented, STAR
Schools,
Ready to Teach and Arts in Education, along with a number of smaller
programs.
The president, as he did last year, zeroed out the Enhancing Education
Through Technology
(EETT) program. Congress restored some of that funding for
FY 2006, so the final outcome remains to be seen. This is just the
opening
salvo in a long process that needs to be carefully monitored.
Budget information can be found here:
http://www.ed.gov/
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DO
TALL MEN GET BETTER EDUCATION?
A study of 950,000
Swedish men has shown that taller men
get a better education, a researcher said.
The
study,
to be published in the International Journal of Epidemiology, could
suggest
short people are discriminated against as they are expected to be low
achievers, said researcher Finn Rasmussen at Sweden's Karolinska
Institute.
"The
probability of achieving higher education in later life increases
linearly with
height," said the study.
It
looked at
male conscripts into the Swedish army born between 1950 and 1975 and
their
education for up to 27 years after their height was measured at the age
of 18.
"Men
taller than 194 cm (6 ft 4 in) were two to three times more likely to
obtain a
higher education when compared with men shorter than 165 cm," it added.
Feeding
variables into the study such as social background or intelligence, as
measured
by IQ, altered the outcome slightly, but a clear link between height
and
educational attainment remained, the research said.
The
scientists did not draw conclusions, but Rasmussen said it could be
something
to do with social attitudes.
"We do not know if people have negative attitudes
to[wards] short people.
It is possible that there could something in society about the
expectations of
people or attitudes to what people can perform."
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FEDERALLY FUNDED EDUCATION
PROGRAMS 2006
With the approval of the
2006 Federal Education Budget,
public education will see the first reduction in funding in ten years.
An
across-the-board cut of 1% was applied to federal discretionary
programs to
help fund the new Hurricane Education Recovery Act.
MDR has provided a very informative guide to the impact
on federally funded education programs. You can access it by going here:
http://www.schooldata.com/fed_funding_06.html
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TECH-SAVVY
STUDENTS STUCK IN
TEXT-DOMINATED SCHOOLS
Education/Evolving's
report "Real Impact: Student Opinions for a Change" is divided into
two major sets of findings. The first set describes our nation's
increasingly
tech-savvy students and the various ways in which they use computers
and the
Internet. The second outlines students' frustrations with our nation's
still
text-dominated schools, as well as students' ideas for how adult
education
policy and school designers could better meet their needs.
To see
full report, go here: http://www.educationevolving.org/studentvoices/pdf/tech_savy_students.pdf
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THE
65-PERCENT SOLUTION
First Class Education
(
http://www.firstclasseducation.org)
wants all fifty states
and the District of Columbia to reallocate school spending so that at
least 65
cents oF every dollar goes directly into the classroom—on
books and teacher
pay—by the end of 2008.
The concept is taking hold; the "65 percent
solution" has already swept through state capitol domes in Texas,
Kansas,
and Louisiana. Georgia Governor Sonny Perdue (R) introduced
legislation, joining seventeen other states that have proposed bills to
meet that 65-percent threshold. Minnesota's Tim Pawlenty, and Florida's
Jeb Bush are also
throwing their weight behind the plan. Currently, the national average
classroom spending is about 61.5 cents on the dollar, according to the
National
Center for Educational Statistics.
To see complete article, go here:
http://www.csmonitor.com/2006/0125/p01s03-legn.html
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NEW REPORT ON ADULT LITERACY
LEVELS, FIRST SINCE 1992,
SHOWS NEED FOR HIGH SCHOOL REFORM
Significant
improvement in
African-American literacy;
overall math skills rise.
Washington, D.C.—American adults can read a newspaper or
magazine about as well as they could a decade ago, but have made
significant
strides in performing literacy tasks that involve computation,
according to the
first national study of adult literacy since 1992.
The National Assessment of Adult Literacy (NAAL),
released December 15th by the National Center for Education Statistics
(NCES),
found little change between 1992 and 2003 in adults' ability to read
and
understand sentences and paragraphs or to understand documents such as
job
applications.
"One adult unable to read is one too many in
America," said U.S. Secretary of Education Margaret Spellings, who
today
announced plans to coordinate adult education efforts in 2006 across
multiple
federal agencies. "We must take a comprehensive and preventive
approach,
beginning with elementary schools and with special emphasis in our high
schools. We must focus resources toward proven, research-based methods
to
ensure that all adults have the necessary literacy skills to be
successful."
African Americans scored higher in 2003 than in 1992 in
all three categories, increasing sixteen points in quantitative, eight
points
in document, and six points in prose literacy. Overall, adults have
improved in
document and quantitative literacy with a smaller percentage of adults
in 2003
in the Below Basic category compared to 1992. Whites, African
Americans, and
Asian/Pacific Islanders have improved in all three measures of literacy
with a
smaller percentage in 2003 in the Below Basic category compared to
1992.
Hispanic adults showed a decrease in scores for both
prose and document literacy and a higher percentage in the Below Basic
category. The report also showed that five percent of U.S. adults,
about 11
million people, were termed "nonliterate" in English, meaning
interviewers
could not communicate with them or that they were unable to answer a
minimum
number of questions.
NAAL in 2003 assessed a nationally representative sample
of more than 19,000 Americans age 16 and older, most in their homes and
some in
prisons. NCES, which is part of the U.S. Department of Education's
Institute of
Education Sciences, conducted the assessment in both 1992 and 2003.
NAAL uses three categories to define English-language
literacy: prose, document, and quantitative. Prose literacy includes
the skills
needed to understand continuous text, such as newspaper articles.
Document
literacy is the ability to understand the content and structure of
documents
such as prescription drug labels. Quantitative literacy involves using
numbers
in text, such as computing and comparing the cost per ounce of food
items.
NAAL reports literacy in each category using a 0-500
scale score. Scores are then grouped in four literacy levels: Below Basic,
Basic, Intermediate, and Proficient. Below
Basic is the lowest level and
indicates having "no more than the most simple and concrete literacy
skills." Those who can perform "complex and challenging" tasks
are considered at the Proficient level.
The report, A First
Look at the Literacy of America's
Adults in the 21st Century, analyzed literacy results
based on a variety of
factors, including race/ethnicity, gender, age, and level of
educational
attainment. A companion report, Key
Concepts and Features of the 2003 National
Assessment of Adult Literacy, describes the assessment's
key features and major
data types. It was also released today.
Other report highlights:
- White
adults' scores were up nine points in quantitative, but were unchanged
in prose
and document literacy.
- Hispanic
adults' scores declined in prose and document literacy 18 points and 14
points,
respectively, but were unchanged in quantitative literacy.
- Asian/Pacific
Islanders' scores increased 16 points in prose literacy, but were
unchanged in
document and quantitative literacy.
- Among
those who spoke only Spanish before starting school, scores were down
17 points
in prose and document literacy between 1992 and 2003.
To put its findings in perspective, NAAL also reported on
U.S. population changes between 1992 and 2003. During the decade, the
percentage of white adults decreased from 77 to 70 percent, while the
percentage of Hispanic adults increased from eight to 12 percent. The
percentage of Asian/Pacific Islander adults doubled (to 4 percent). The
percentage of adults who spoke only English before starting school
decreased
from 86 to 81 percent.
To view the reports and for more information, visit
http://nces.ed.gov/naal
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CUTS
SEND ED-TECH PROGRAMS REELING
Students in Poor Rural
and Urban Districts Are Hurt the
Worst
By Robert Brumfield, Assistant Editor,
eSchool News
February 8, 2006
President Bush's 2007
budget proposal would cut the main
source of federal funding for school technology out of the budget
entirely--but
state and local school leaders already are grappling with a sharp
reduction in
ed-tech funding this fiscal year. The cuts are likely to affect poor
urban and
rural districts most acutely, because these are the districts most in
need of
continued funding to support existing technology initiatives, educators
say.
President Bush's budget proposal for 2007 would eliminate
the federal Enhancing Education Through Technology (EETT) block-grant
program
altogether, but school technology directors already are reeling as they
try to
absorb the more than $200 million cut from the program this year.
The 45-percent reduction in EETT funding signed into law
on Dec. 30 is part of the first decline in federal education spending
in nearly
a decade.
For more information, visit here:
http://eschoolnews.com/news/showstory.cfm?ArticleID=6075
Losing $221 million in
educational technology dollars has
left state and local officials wondering how they can continue to
support the
hardware, software, and professional development they've purchased
already
through EETT, the primary source of federal funding for ed-tech
initiatives.
The 2006 cuts are affecting different districts
differently, but the consensus appears to be that the loss of EETT
funding will
most severely affect poor, minority students in urban areas and
at-risk,
low-income students in rural areas who depend on distance education and
other
technology-supported services.
For complete article, visit here:
http://www.eschoolnews.org/news/showStory.cfm?ArticleID=6102
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FREE
STUDENT WORKBOOKS AVAILABLE FOR PREVIEW (Advertisement)
Queue, Inc. offers previews of its Missouri test
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