Category: Education (K-12)
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The Tyranny of One
by Dick Hall-Sizemore The superintendent of the Spotsylvania County schools has removed 14 books from the school libraries in response to the complaint of one parent that the books had sexually explicit content. Two of the books removed were by Pulitzer Prize-winning author Toni Morrison. The Richmond Times-Dispatch reports that the superintendent claims that he…
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Math SOLs Up First for New Superintendent Coons
by Eric (Rick) Nelson In K-12 education, can Virginia lead the nation? If that’s the goal, in my view as a career educator, Dr. Lisa Coons is the best possible choice as our new state Superintendent. As Chief Academic Officer in Tennessee, the programs she guided to help teachers improve reading instruction are among the…
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Virginia Democrats in the House of Representatives Vote Against Their Own Daughters
by James C. Sherlock Every Virginia Democratic member of the U.S. House of Representatives voted against a bill to amend Title IX to prohibit biological boys and men from competing against biological girls and women in K-12 and college sports. Voting nay: Donald Beyer, Gerald Connolly, Jennifer McClellan, Bobby Scott, Abigail Spanberger and Jennifer Wexton.…
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Restoring Trust in Institutions
by Matt Hurt Over the last several years, it has become widely accepted that trust in our institutions has declined. Ultra-tribalism has infected almost every aspect of public discourse, which has certainly enriched the war chests of our politicians on both sides of the aisle. On April 20, 2023, the Virginia Board of Education (VBOE)…
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Fourth Circuit Gives Standing to Parents Suing Loudoun County Schools over First Amendment Violations
by James C. Sherlock In a win for freedom of speech, the United States Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit in Richmond overturned a finding by a federal district judge that Loudoun parents did not have standing to sue the School Board for infringement of First Amendment rights. The parents alleged a bias reporting…
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Unaffordable Housing, Redux
by Joe Fitzgerald Proposed housing construction in the city of Harrisonburg could add about 1,200 students to the Harrisonburg City Public Schools, with housing already under construction in Rockingham County possibly adding 400 more. A quarter of the 1,600 potential students could be absorbed by the opening of Rocktown High School, leaving the city to…
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Snow Day in April: Something in the Water
by Kerry Dougherty When the first Something in the Water Festival came to Virginia Beach in 2019, some lemon-sucking locals balked at allowing school buses to be used to transport revelers from satellite parking to the resort area. How will bus drivers be able to drive festival goers until 11 p.m. on Sunday and be…
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Snow Angel Philosophy
by Joe Fitzgerald Snow angels or philosophers? It seemed like an easy choice to me. A James Madison University admissions official read the letters from a male who wrote about how well he understood the great philosophers and a female, from Ohio if memory serves, who wanted to know if she’d be able to make…
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Increasing Teacher Vacancy Rates
by Matt Hurt The teacher vacancy rate in the Commonwealth has become such a problem that the Virginia Department of Education created a database to track this problem. The Staffing and Vacancy Report found on the Education Workforce Data & Reports page of the VDOE website displays unfilled Virginia educator positions at the state, region,…
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Assault and Battery in Schools – Virginia Law and School Division Policies Make “Marks” of Principals
by James C. Sherlock This is addressed directly to Virginia public school principals. You are compliant with current Virginia law whether you report assault and battery to police or do not. Bad law makes for bad policy. Depending upon your school division, your requirements may vary. A lot. In gambling, and this issue is a…
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Hmm. I think I’ll Stick with Google for Now
Supposedly, Microsoft is integrating ChatGPT artificial intelligence technology into its search results. I’m not sure how far along the tech giant is in this process, but what I’m seeing so far is not impressive. Just for yuks, I posed the following query to Microsoft’s Bing search engine: “What is causing the breakdown in discipline in…
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School Bullying and Victimization Data: Just the Facts
by Dr. Kathleen Smith Earlier this week on Bacon’s Rebellion, James Bacon posted “The Fruit of School Disciplinary ‘Reform.’” Regarding the matter of bullying, I am adding a few additional statistics from the Youth and Juvenile Justice System 2022 National Report from the National Center for Juvenile Justice. The abstract embedded in the report includes the…
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Changes to the Virginia Law Requiring Schools to Report Incidents to the Police Makes them Far More Dangerous
I wrote originally about the 2020 changes to the school incidents reporting law. I have removed the content of this column in order to reconcile issues with the current reporting law, including 2022 changes, with the Department of Education. I will repost it when those issues are resolved.
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Five Questions: An Interview with Lieutenant Governor Winsome Earle-Sears
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by Shaun Kenney Last week, The Republican Standard had the opportunity to follow Lieutenant Governor Winsome Earle-Sears as she toured the Richmond Slave Trail — which included not only the site of the notorious Lumpkins Slave Jail but also the site where Gabriel Prosser was executed and presumably buried in 1800. Winsome Earle-Sears brought a…
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Gun Owner Whose Son Shot His Teacher Will Get Her Day In Court
by Kerry Dougherty Four words came to mind when news broke yesterday that a Newport News grand jury had indicted the mother of a 6-year-old school shooter: what took so long? It’s been 13 weeks since a FIRST GRADER brought a handgun to school in his backpack and used it to shoot his teacher in…