Twin Cities Daily Planet (https://www.tcdailyplanet.net/category/national/page/12/)
Should we, as a society, shift our focus from “standards-based reforms” in our schools to a “supports-based” approach?Dr. John Jackson, president of the Schott Foundation for Public Education, thinks so. On October 22, at the invitation of Parents United for All Public Schools, he gave a talk in St. Paul that outlined his argument that our schools need supports-based solutions for students just as much as they need standards.A crowd of around one hundred people, including state legislators and the heads of both the Minneapolis and St. Paul teachers’ unions, turned out to hear Dr. Jackson speak, and introduce the Schott Foundation’s latest initiative, called the “Education Declaration.” This declaration has a distinctly pro-public school bent, stating, for example, that, “We believe good schools are essential to democracy and prosperity—and that it is our collective responsibility to educate all children, not just a fortunate few.”On the topic of our “collective responsibility” to educate all children, Dr. Jackson spoke about how, according to another Schott Foundation report, in 36 out of 50 states, African American males have the lowest high school graduation rates; in the other 12 states, they have the second lowest rates, just above those of Latino males.While these numbers are disturbing, Dr. Jackson made the point that race is not to place blame for these low success rates. Instead, he spoke of states such as North Dakota and Vermont, which have very low populations of black students; in these states, where students can not be as easily segregated by race because of their low numbers, black students have graduation rates equal to that of white students.Therefore, Dr. Jackson asked the audience to think about education in terms of the opportunities and support we currently provide to students, and what we must begin to provide for them, if we want all students to succeed. Continue Reading
A couple of weeks ago the United States was on the edge of a crisis. Had Republicans and Democrats in Congress not come to agreement with President Obama, the United States would have run out of money and defaulted on its debts, potentially throwing the country and the world economy into a recession. This crisis would have been a result of the Congress failing give the president to raise the debt ceiling which would have authorized him to borrow money to pay America’s bills. Continue Reading
A continuing resolution which re-opens the federal government was passed along with a debt ceiling increase that keeps everything hummin’ along until February. It’s good news, at least until the next manufactured crisis comes. We can’t be sure what kind of economic damaged was done in the 16 day shutdown until … well, until the workers in the government that tabulate this stuff get back to work. Continue Reading
From street cars and rapid buses to expanding rural and exurban mobility, many Minnesota communities have ambitious plans for transit. In the past, federal funding has been a key tool to finance local transit needs and expansions. Continue Reading
A little-known Congressional mandate requires U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) to keep an average of 34,000 detainees per day in its custody. This quota has steadily risen since it was established in 2006 by conservative lawmakers who insisted that the agency wasn’t doing enough to deport unlawful immigrants. Continue Reading
So what if Congress and the president cannot reach an agreement to end the partial government shut-down or worse, extend the debt limit? Is the country hopelessly stuck in the middle of a political dispute? Not necessarily. Ignored in the entire dispute is one obvious resolution –the Supreme Court. While some may argue that budget and finance matters are no place for the courts to venture, the partial governmental shutdown and the pending debt limit extension both represent controversies that have a legal or constitutional basis that can be addressed by the courts. Continue Reading
Recent figures show that 2013 is turning out to be a banner year for the tireless workers who turn the fertile soil of American public opinion, planting seeds of doubt and raising the hackles and ire that feed our public discourse. Continue Reading
Amtrak, the National Passenger Railroad Corporation, could cease to be a “national” network if the federal government shutdown drags on. The company has said that it can ride out a short-term shutdown, on the order of “several weeks“, but it’s unclear what might happen beyond that point. The good news is that the company is in better financial health than they have been in a decade or more, somewhat extending the window of time they can operate without federal assistance. The bad news is that it would still be a extremely difficult task to find the $100 million or so per month they would need to keep running the company as it is today. Continue Reading
What does it take for international markets to panic? With the debt ceiling due to be hit in a little more than a week, the short answer is that the “full faith and credit of the United States” is still worth quite a lot. We’re only starting to see the first signs of a panic as an auction of 1-month TBills sold at a net rate of 0.355%. If that doesn’t impress you, it’s worth noting that it was one third that a week ago. Continue Reading