Archive for February, 2008
Thursday, February 14th, 2008
A <3 for Valentines Day
A friend of a friend made this video, and so I felt it was only appropriate to pass it along far and wide on Valentines Day.
It fits my general method of responding to Valentines Day — buying funny (as opposed to hyper-emotional) cards, doing goofy things and hopefully attending San Francisco’s annual Valentines Day pillow fight next year.
• Email This PostWednesday, February 13th, 2008
Obama Smartly Supports Charter Schools
While I’ve been generally unimpressed with all of the major presidential candidates’ (lack of) attention to the issue of education in the primaries, I was happy to see this recent interview with Sen. Barack Obama, in which he said he thinks the federal government should consider funding charter schools in some way.
“I’ve consistently said I think we need to support charter schools,” Obama said. “I think it’s important for us to experiment in terms of how teachers are compensated — working with teachers but looking at how we can reward excellence in classrooms.”
Charter schools are an interesting issue for candidates, as teachers’ unions generally oppose them, saying they take money from district schools. While there’s some merit to that argument, having worked at a KIPP school in Houston, I think charter schools do a ton with very few resources, and deserve some credit for that work.
National education foundations, like Gates and Broad, are finally starting to take notice in a big way. I’m proud to support a candidate who has the guts to take a principled stand and support excellent education for all children.
• Email This PostWednesday, February 13th, 2008
Right to Learn Picks Five Best Stories
As many of you know, I work with an organization called YouthNoise and direct a campaign called Right To Learn. Last fall, Right To Learn set out to ask students throughout California what they thought most needed to change in their schools.
The response was overwhelming and we compiled their tremendous stories in to a report called “Our Schools, Our Stories” and a YouTube video.
Today, we finally were able to announce the five stories voted most compelling by users on the Right To Learn site and an outside panel of judges. I’ve had the great opportunity to get to know these five students over the past couple of weeks and have found them to be tremendously bright and capable.
I encourage you to take a look at their winning stories, and the rest of the stories submitted to Right To Learn, for some inspiration:
- Jean Teodoro, “Free“
- Lauren Grubaugh, “Governor’s cuts will hurt students“
- Eric Seidman, “On Standardizing Education“
- Thomas Bruce, “WHY SHOULD WE CARE?!!!“
- Haiyun Weng, “Psychology“