Mom Congress Education News Roundup

Check out the latest education-related news from around the web -- then be sure to sign the Mom Congress petition to fix No Child Left Behind.

‘Race to the Top' grant rules laid out (Chicago Tribune, 11/13/09)

Education Secretary Arne Duncan issued rules for a $4 billion grant
program to promote innovation in education, allaying fears from some
education groups that it would be too focused on testing.

'Staggering’ Crisis in U.S. Education Found in Study (Bloomberg, 11/9/09)

More than two-thirds of U.S. teachers disapprove of how their public
schools are run and 90 percent say “routine duties and paperwork”
interfere with their teaching, a report found.

Gates Foundation gives $335M for teacher quality (Associated Press, 11/19/09)

Three school districts and a coalition of charter schools have agreed
to be test kitchens for some radical ideas for improving teacher
quality. In exchange, the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation announced
$290 million in grants to the four groups, plus another $45 million for
education research aimed at uncovering what exactly is an effective
teacher.

Schools in the dark about tainted lunches (USA Today, 11/17/09)

Following an outbreak of over 100 illnesses at five area schools in
Racine, WI – believed to have been caused by flour tortillas from
Chicago's Del Rey Tortilleria – parents and school officials are
wondering why the FDA never alerted them to company’s long history of
making children sick.  See the U.S. agriculture chief’s response and pledge to issue better food alerts to schools on USAToday.com.

One NJ school district considering fee for detention (Philadelphia Inquirer, 11/19/09)

School board members in one New Jersey town want parents of high school
students who are habitually sent to detention to pay, saying the
district spends $10,000 per year in overtime and maintenance to run
after-school detention.