The Washington Post reports that a delegation of Washington area students and a diamondback terrapin named Happy took part (via videoconferencing) in Thursday’s United Nations Climate Change Conference in Copenhagen to help advance a solution for curbing carbon emissions.
Dressed in crisp white shirts and ties, seven students from Paul Public Charter [...]
BoardBuzz stumbled across Engineer Your Life this morning. This website acts as a guide to engineering careers for high school girls. In 2004, WGBH Educational Foundation and the National Academy of Engineering formed a coalition to encourage girls to enroll in engineering programs. The fact that women are underrepresented in fields of science and [...]
BoardBuzz recently wrote about whether engineering should have a place in the school curriculum. And, of course, we think it should. But as the National Academy of Engineering says, engineering is often the missing letter in STEM education. So BoardBuzz was pleasantly surprised to learn that Derby Public Schools [...]
BoardBuzz came across this Washington Post item asking for readers to help select the best education blogs of 2009. As the Post’s Jay Mathews writes:
I have put out a best education blogs list the last two years, but I wasn’t a blogger myself then, and really didn’t know what [...]
USA Today reports that Clarksville-Montgomery County school district in Tennessee decided to go mostly paperless with student report cards. The district now makes grades available to parents with secure online accounts. The same system, called Power School, is used by parents to access progress reports, attendance, and student lunch accounts.
NSBA’s own Ann [...]
We hear a lot about 21st century skills these days, but what does it really mean? Will teaching our kids critical thinking skills really help them to function better in the “real world?” NYU Education professor and former assistant secretary of education Diane Ravitch believes that without the knowledge behind [...]
According to a recent Intel Corporation survey, parents are more comfortable talking about drug abuse than math and science with their children. Despite a perceived importance of math and science for success, and an overwhelming willingness to be involved, the survey results reveal that parents, particularly those of teenagers, often find [...]
As the holidays near, BoardBuzz likes to reflect on the “cornucopia” that is the American student population. Without a doubt, the cultural diversity of American students is a great asset. However, effectively accommodating the wide variety of social, religious, and cultural beliefs of students and their families in the school [...]
October is about to come to a close, and since it is National Cyber Security Awareness Month BoardBuzz thought we’d end the month by mentioning an excellent piece about teaching your child to be internet-savvy from the get-go.
Wired’s Geekdad has recently had a series of guest posts by Adam Rosenberg, [...]
October is National Cyber Security Awareness Month (NCSAM), a national public awareness campaign to encourage everyone to protect their computers, children, and data.
As the Internet becomes increasingly pervasive, it is important that everyone takes steps to stop it from becoming invasive. People are constantly connected from home, school, work, and even in between on [...]
Should engineering be taught in schools? Could it become the proverbial fourth “R”: Reading, Writing, Arithmetic, and Engineering? Well, a recent study from the National Academy of Engineering (NAE) claims that teaching engineering in K-12 grades would not only boost interest in technical careers (global competitiveness), but would also improve all students’ [...]
BoardBuzz was interested to learn of Samsung’s Four Season of Hope contest that New York Giants Quarterback Eli Manning is supporting. Manning, the Giants’ nominee to be the Walter Payton NFL Man of the Year Award in 2007 and 2008 for his off-field contributions, kicked off the start of the [...]
BoardBuzz came across this interesting post on Ars Technica about a new study that reveals students seem less willing (or able) to cheat when taking part in online classes:
Anyone who has ever taught knows that students sometimes cheat. With the increasing prevalence of online classes, there has [...]
Today marks the eighth anniversary of the terrorist attacks on Sept. 11 and while there are still moments of silence, prayer and somberness to commemorate the tragedy, the event serves as a history lesson for those too young to remember it and an indelible marker for those youth now [...]
ABCNEWS.com reports today that a Kentucky high school football coach “took nearly two dozen players on a field trip to an evangelist church service where nearly half the kids were baptized.” Apparently, the coach’s actions were supported by his school superintendent, Janet Meeks, who permitted the use of [...]
Wired had an interesting piece in this month’s issue on how to reform education. Yes, BoardBuzz subscribes.
The gist of the article is about how a venture capital firm staged a daylong conference on school reform where a group of authors, professors, financiers, and entrepreneurs discussed embracing “digital culture” to transform education. [...]
Apparently, we have civics on our mind…
BoardBuzz has known for some time about Our Courts, a web-based education project designed to teach students civics and inspire them to be active participants in our democracy.
Our Courts is the vision of Justice Sandra Day O’Connor, who is concerned that students are [...]
BoardBuzz was encouraged to learn today of one new educational use for Twitter. Mashable reports that federal judge and current First Lady of Pennsylvania, Marjorie O. Rendell, created the @CivicsFirst account on Twitter expressly for the purpose of creating a community around civics education. Reuters tells us—in her own [...]
Were you bullied as a child? If so, you probably didn’t tell anyone. The prevailing wisdom used to be that bullying was a natural part of childhood and that children should work these things out without adult intervention.
Attitudes about bullying were changing, albeit at a glacial pace, when the worst [...]
ACT announced today the test scores of this year’s graduating students. There was a slight increase in students who met all four of ACT’s readiness benchmarks (in English, reading, math, and science), but there was also a slight decline in students’ composite scores.
ACT says the results point to “the need [...]
BoardBuzz was astounded to discover (hat tip to Boing Boing) that a Belarusian textile company (their announcement is only available in Russian) has developed a special school uniform that protects kids from—get this—electromagnetic radiation emanating from their cellphones! Now that’s innovation! Guess it’s time to toss those old tin foil hats.
The [...]
… love to hear the robin go tweet, tweet, tweet. Do you Tweet? Do you know what Twitter is? If the answer is no, don’t worry. You’re in good company—69 percent of adults don’t really know either.
You would think that with an estimated $48 million of free media coverage [...]
BoardBuzz was intrigued to come across yet another example of “when poor thinking and social networking collide.” You may remember our coverage of the Bozeman, Montana incident where the city requested that job applicants hand over logins to sites like Facebook, MySpace, Twitter, etc.
Well, as we predicted a similar situation has now [...]
Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates gave the keynote speech at the general session of the National Conference of State Legislatures at the Pennsylvania Convention Center on Tuesday. His message was one that BoardBuzz can largely get behind: now is the time for innovation.
Gates said that “difficult times can spark great [...]
Last week, Google effectively declared war on Microsoft by announcing the Google Chrome OS, its new operating system (OS) for personal computers. Everyone is still debating the ramifications and likely outcomes of such a move, and while the debate continues, people overlook the fact that this competition is a storied one. In [...]
Our own Ann Flynn, NSBA Education Technology Director, speaks on how technology innovation can be leveraged to improve or benefit school district administration. Check out the video available below from Education Week.
Ann Flynn: Why Tech Innovation Matters from Education Week on Vimeo.
[...]BoardBuzz came across this story recently and was left thinking that policies on social media require some real thought. Basically the city government of Bozeman, Montana made headlines last week when their rather curious method of background checks was widely reported.
The crux: the city requested that job applicants hand over logins to sites like [...]
Joining the 21st century at last, the National School Boards Association has recently added RSS feeds to various parts of our website. BoardBuzz, as you know, has always been available via RSS. If you don’t already subscribe, well, why not?
The newest RSS feed comes from the Council of School [...]
Old-school wood blocks
As Ars Technica notes, blocks are often a child’s first toy, and stacking those blocks is one of our earliest forms of play. But something new is just over the horizon. What if those old wood blocks could be more? Well, MIT graduate [...]
