Education Update

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AUGUST, 2009

NEWSPAPER SPECIAL SECTIONS

8/6 Education Special Section Las Vegas Review-Journal Jobs Today
8/12 Careers & Education Cleveland Plain Dealer

PUBLICATIONS/DEADLINES
• Academe – (Published by the American Assoc. of Univ. Professors)
9/28: Deadline for the November/December issue
• American Teacher –
8/6: Deadline for the October issue
• Chronicle of Higher Education
8/17: Deadline for the 8/28 issue
8/21: Deadline for the 9/4 issue
8/31: Deadline for the 9/11 issue
• Community College Times
8/3: Deadline for the 8/14 issue
8/17: Deadline for the 8/28 issue
8/31: Deadline for the 9/11 issue

Diverse: Issues in Higher Education
8/13: Deadline for the 9/3 issue
8/27: Deadline for the 9/17 issue (Special Focus: Hispanic Heritage Month)
• Education Leadership
8/25: Deadline for the November issue
• Education Week
8/12: Deadline for the 8/26 issue
8/19: Deadline for the 9/2 issue
• The Hispanic Outlook in Higher Education
8/4: Deadline for the 8/24 issue
8/18: Deadline for the 9/7 issue
• Instructor
8/3: Deadline for the September/October issue (Bonus Circulation at: EdNet,
NSBA T&L)
• Women in Higher Education
8/18: Deadline for the September issue

EDUCATION JOB FAIRS

No Job Fairs at this time

EDUCATION CONFERENCES & SEMINARS

No Conferences/Seminars at this time

LAYOFFS
Southeastern Louisiana University
Hammond, LA
Southeastern Louisiana University will let go of 19 full-time employees and furlough
most of its employees for two to four days in response to $10 million in budget cuts
from the state, officials announced. A total of 64 faculty and staff positions will be
eliminated, including 45 unfilled vacancies. Among the layoffs are 14 full-time staff
members and five "non-permanent" faculty members. - The Advocate

Warrensville Heights Board of Education

Cleveland, OH
The Warrensville Heights school board voted Thursday night to cut 13 positions,
including some assistant principals, following a state audit that found the district
could slash several million dollars from its budget without substantially reducing
services to students. - Plain Dealer

TRENDS

Bill Gates Stresses the Importance of Good Teachers

- Article from Teacher Magazine

PHILADELPHIA (AP) — The U.S. must improve its educational standing in the world
by rewarding effective teaching and by developing better, universal measures of
performance for students and teachers, Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates said Tuesday.

Speaking at the National Conference of State Legislatures' annual legislative summit,

Gates told hundreds of lawmakers how federal stimulus money should be used to
spark educational innovation, spread best practices and improve accountability.

Gates, one of the world's richest men, has been a longtime critic of American public
schools and has used philanthropy to advocate for a better educational system.

The U.S. must reward effective teaching and develop better, universal measures of
performance for students and teachers, the Microsoft co-founder said Tuesday.
—Matt Rourke/APU.S. schools lag their international counterparts because of "old
beliefs and bad habits," and it's not clear how to get them back on track without
uniform achievement standards, he said.

"We don't know the answers because we're not even asking the right questions and
making the right measurements," Gates said.

On Tuesday, he urged legislators to ask colleges and universities in their districts to

publish their graduation rates. The institutions should be rewarded with funding
based on the number of degrees granted, not just students enrolled, Gates said.

Teachers, too, should be rewarded for effectiveness and not just for seniority and
master's degrees, he said.
Gates suggested that developing data to identify the best instructors should be a
priority for legislators even in a tight economy. Better teachers are more likely to
result in higher achievement than other approaches such as lowering class size, he
said.

"The way I see forward is to use measurement to drive quality," Gates said.

The Seattle-based Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation spent nearly $4 billion between
2000 and 2008 to improve America's high schools and award scholarships, primarily
to low-income and minority students.

Its aim is to increase the U.S. graduation rate from about 70 percent to 80 percent
and to double the number of low-income adults who get a degree or certificate
beyond high school by age 26.

In an interview later Tuesday with The Associated Press, Gates, 51, talked of the
importance of improving the quality, quantity and searchability of online lectures,
which he noted his own kids have used.

Community colleges and other financially strapped schools might find online lectures
to be the most cost-effective way to teach introductory courses such as Physics 101,
Gates said. The savings could then be spent on student-oriented discussion and lab
sessions.

"The world of education is the sector of the economy so far the least changed by
technology," Gates said. "Ten years from now, that won't be the case, and these
online lectures are the cutting edge of that."

Kentucky state Rep. Kent Stevens, a retired principal who spent nearly 28 years in
education, said after Gates' speech that public school teachers do a good job with
the vast mission they've been given.

"We have to provide an appropriate education to anybody that walks through the
door," said Stevens, a Democrat from Lawrenceburg, Ky. "That's a wide variety."