The Bluegrass Institute recently sat down to talk about public education in Kentucky with Billy Harper, who recently completed a four-year term on the Kentucky Board of Education. In this final segment, he talks about his optimism for the future of Kentucky’s education system while emphasizing that current reform efforts require persistence. “The worst thing we…
The Bluegrass Institute recently sat down to talk about public education in Kentucky with Billy Harper, who recently completed a four-year term on the Kentucky Board of Education. In this sixth segment, Harper said that “it’s critical” for a representative from the business community to be on the state education board. He emphasizes that “the…
The Bluegrass Institute recently sat down to talk about public education in Kentucky with Billy Harper, who recently completed a four-year term on the Kentucky Board of Education. In this fifth segment, Harper discusses the Obama Administration’s Race to the Top stimulus-funding program and some of its impacts in Kentucky even though the commonwealth did not…
The Bluegrass Institute recently sat down to talk about public education in Kentucky with Billy Harper, who recently completed a four-year term on the Kentucky Board of Education In this fourth segment, he talks about how better utilizing Kentucky’s alternative certification process for attracting quality instructors could help address the lack of science and math teachers. He also…
It’s not exactly a secret: many high school dropouts have reading problems. As a result, they are unable to keep up with classmates, lose heart, and eventually depart the classroom. Unfortunately, despite all the hype you’ve heard, after more than two decades of KERA, reading proficiency rates in Kentucky remain abysmal. On the 2011 National…
I was honored to be a guest on Kentucky Tonight on January 28, 2013 to talk about proposals to raise the minimum high school dropout age in Kentucky to 18. A number of interesting things came up during the discussions, and I have been doing some follow-on research as a consequence. Around 13 minutes into…
I was honored to be a guest on Kentucky Tonight on January 28, 2013 to talk about proposals to raise the minimum high school dropout age in Kentucky to 18. A number of interesting things came up during the discussions, and I have been doing some follow-on research as a consequence. If you listen starting…
The Bluegrass Institute recently sat down to talk about public education in Kentucky with Billy Harper, who is president of Harper Industries, a Paducah-based construction company. Harper has a long record of involvement in education in the Bluegrass State. He recently completed a four-year term on the Kentucky Board of Education, which develops policy and…
Yet another attempt to raise the minimum high school dropout age in Kentucky to 18 is going to be debated during the current legislative session in Frankfort. This idea stalled at least twice before, but that doesn’t seem to stop some non-data oriented, feel-good folks from wanting to try again. Several years ago when this…
The Bluegrass Institute recently sat down to talk about public education in Kentucky with Billy Harper, who is president of Harper Industries, a Paducah-based construction company. Harper has a long record of involvement in education in the Bluegrass State. He recently completed a four-year term on the Kentucky Board of Education, which develops policy and…