The Bluegrass Institute for Public Policy Solutions, Kentucky’s first and only free-market think tank, joins with hundreds of groups nationwide to celebrate the fifth annual National School Choice Week (Jan. 25-31). Since its beginning more than 11 years ago, the Bluegrass Institute has been the leading voice to give Kentucky parents effective alternatives to ensure…
In a stunning development, the central committee of the Washington State Democratic Party just adopted a resolution against Common Core State Standards. Suddently, Common Core is rubbing more than just Republican Party groups the wrong way.
Week-long series looks at various types of school choice For Immediate Release: Sunday, Jan. 25, 2015 Contact: Jim Waters @ 270-320-4376 (Frankfort, Ky.) – To show support for enhancing and expanding educational opportunities for all families, the Bluegrass Institute for Public Policy Solutions, Kentucky’s first and only free-market think tank, is joining with supporters of educational…
Could a charter school system have worked better? Louisville’s Robert Frost Middle School and Myers Middle School have been a major problem for years. Frost was tagged as a Persistently Low-Achieving School (PLAs) in the very first “Cohort” named in the spring of 2010. Myers followed into Persistently Low-Achieving status about a year and a…
Is that really right? Could a true rate only be around 47 percent??? New data from the US Department of Education indicates that Kentucky’s 2012-13 high school graduation rate of 86 percent was only exceeded by nine other states. This rate is also notably higher than the US average of 81 percent. Those new numbers…
Herald-Leader columnist Merlene Davis posted interesting comments about charter schools in an interview she recently conducted with Jessica Hiler, president of the Fayette County Education Association. The union leader trotted out most of the union’s anti-charter arguments, but Ms. Davis clearly wasn’t buying. When Hiler said that charter schools don’t produce higher achievement than traditional…
An Eastern Elementary School (Scott County) second grade student owes a big debt of thanks to her school principal, and maybe some good Kentucky school rules, as well. The second grader was choking in the school cafeteria when her principal, Ed Denney, ran in to successfully apply techniques taught in CPR training to dislodge the…
Regardless of your feelings about the Common Core State Standards, you have to admit that it has given the comedy crowd some interesting material. For example: The Colbert ReportGet More: Colbert Report Full Episodes,The Colbert Report on Facebook,Video Archive So, is it the Common Core itself that is bad? Is it only the attempt to…
We hear the question in this blog’s title a lot. It’s based on findings in a number of reports about charter schools such as the now famous (infamous?) 2009 CREDO study, “Multiple Choice: Charter School Performance in 16 States.” The claim that only 17 percent of charter schools outperform traditional public schools comes from that…
Last week we examined Kentucky’s chronic problem with white versus black academic achievement gaps. We learned the problem is very long term from evidence in the National Assessment of Educational Progress. We saw that EXPLORE, PLAN and even the ACT college entrance testing in Kentucky along with the Bluegrass State’s own KPREP testing show serious…