FOX affiliate WTTE-TV in Columbus, Ohio is reporting that Rifqa Bary, the teenage Christian convert who ran away from her Muslim parents to Florida because of claims that her life was in danger, has reached an agreement with her parents. Reports indicate that they have agreed she will remain in the custody of the Ohio Office of Families and Children until she reaches 18 years of age, or the family, collectively, decides they want to go to counseling.
[…]The judge decided the teen would be able to receive third-party correspondence and that he would not force mediation between Bary and her parents. Bary did not make any public comments as she exited the court room.
The proposal would trade labs seen as benefiting white students for resources to help struggling students.
Berkeley High School is considering a controversial proposal to eliminate science labs and the five science teachers who teach them to free up more resources to help struggling students.
The proposal to put the science-lab cuts on the table was approved recently by Berkeley High’s School Governance Council, a body of teachers, parents, and students who oversee a plan to change the structure of the high school to address Berkeley’s dismal racial achievement gap, where white students are doing far better than the state average while black and Latino students are doing worse.
Paul Gibson, an alternate parent representative on the School Governance Council, said that information presented at council meetings suggests that the science labs were largely classes for white students. He said the decision to consider cutting the labs in order to redirect resources to underperforming students was virtually unanimous.
Berkeley is probably the most liberal place in the United States, (located near San Francisco, CA). They best reflect the thinking of radical secular leftists who value equality of outcome far more than liberty and excellence. Rather than introducing educational reforms like merit-based pay, standardized testing, and expedited firing of underperforming teachers, they instead punish success with wealth redistribution.
What’s the best way to help children do well in school?
On the one hand, social conservatives on the right favor the traditional family structure, complete with a father who lives in the home and is an involved parent. Parents have an incentive to help children do well in school because they are biologically linked to the children and they are paying all the bills at home. They are making sacrifices and they want to see some results.
On the other other hand, social liberals on the left favor raising taxes on working families, and funneling the proceeds to unionized public school teachers. Do teachers get paid more for improving the quality of education for students? Or do they get paid more for contributing to Democrats who will increase their salaries? Do they have an incentive to make children learn?
American taxpayers invest heavily in education. Last year, spending on public K–12 education totaled $553 billion, about 4 percent of gross domestic product (GDP) in 2006. For each child enrolled in a public elementary or secondary school, expenditures averaged $9,266 that year—an increase of 128 percent, adjusted for inflation, since 1970.
Despite this increase in public spending, student achievement and educational attainment over the last four decades has remained relatively flat. In 2007, a significant portion of students, disproportionately from disadvantaged backgrounds, scored “below basic” in reading and math on the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP). Sadly, in many of the nation’s largest cities, fewer than half of high school students graduate.
While academic research has consistently shown that increased spending does not correlate with educational gains, the research does show a strong relationship between parental influences and children’s educational outcomes, from school readiness to college completion. Two compelling parental factors emerge:
family structure, i.e., the number of parents living in the student’s home and their relationships to the child, and
parents’ involvement in their children’s schoolwork.
Consequently, the solution to improving educational outcomes begins at home, by strengthening marriage and promoting stable family formation and parental involvement.
The PDF is here. In the rest of the paper, Christine supports her conclusions using evidence.
WINTERY KNIGHT 