Pepsi To Restrict Caloric Drinks In Schools Worldwide (NPR, 3/18/10)

Derek Yach, senior vice president of global health policy for PepsiCo., says the company would withdraw "full-calorie beverages" from all schools. Schools for younger kids would get only bottled water, juices in certain portion sizes, and low-fat or skim milk.

A principal critiques Obama’s education plan (The Washington Post, 3/18/10)

George Wood, principal of Federal Hocking High School in Stewart, Ohio, and executive director of the non-profit Forum for Education and Democracy: "The administration’s blueprint does not [...] go far enough. In fact, by making more Title 1 funds based on competition, rather than going to support the schools with the highest numbers of low-income students, the administration’s plan may increase rather than decrease the inequity about which they are concerned."

Lawmakers Say Needs of Rural Schools Are Overlooked (New York Times, 3/17/10)

Lawmakers who represent rural areas told Secretary of Education Arne Duncan in a hearing Wednesday that the No Child Left Behind law, as well as the Obama administration’s blueprint for overhauling it, failed to take sufficiently into account the problems of rural schools, and their nine million students.

Must schools change how writing teachers are taught? (USA Today, 3/18/10)

"I was incredibly well trained to teach college writing, but only one course at a time. How do you teach five classes when you've only been trained to teach one?" That was the question of a community college writing instructor who has taught herself how to manage the workload she now has. Her experience reflects the sense shared by many composition experts that it's time for a new approach to teaching those who will teach writing at community colleges.

Raymond was deployed to Iraq in August 2009. His wife Colleen had daughter Emma in October. Earlier this month, Raymond came home and got to meet Emma for the first time.

I'll say no more -- just look.

(via Kirsty)

Yup, I admit it: For years, I've been on a secret mission to integrate the bookshelves and toy chests of a bunch of my daughters' white friends. Every time Mari and Lila were invited to a birthday party, I'd send them with fancy gift bags full of copies of Debbie Allen's "Dancing in the Wings," bell hooks' "Home Made Love," and Faith Ringgold's "Tar Beach," plus a chocolate Barbie for good measure.

Subversive? Yes.

Necessary? Very.

See, the majority of the parents of my daughters' friends, no matter how kind and smart and sweet they are, didn't buy black books, dolls, or movies for their children. I don't think they were being racist or striking out against diversity, by any stretch; it just never seemed to really occur to them that maybe, just maybe, their daughters would identify with the pretty, round-faced girl pie in "Home Made Love," or Sassy, the talented but shy ballerina in "Dancing in the Wings" -- or that there would be value in letting their daughters read their sweet, insightful, beautifully human stories.

Thank you so much to our Family Budget Boot Camp families and advisors! We know it's been a lot of hard work for everyone involved. We appreciate your honesty about spending -- including sharing your checking account balance!

Just tuning in? Read the series from the beginning, and check out the magazine feature on the families.