SACRAMENTO — Medical groups and a lawmaker behind California legislation to crack down on vaccine exemptions said Wednesday they were surprised by Gov. Gavin Newsom's last-minute call for changes to the bill, a move that inserted fresh uncertainty into one of the year's most contentious issues. It was the second...
Many Kids Take a Passion for the Planet Back to School
For many kids, heading back to school means more than resuming classes and homework. It means getting back to clubs and student organizations focused on sustainability — everything from composting and recycling to reducing food waste and promoting cleaner oceans and waterways. "There's a lot of passion there, and a...
Walters: Ethic Studies Time Bomb Explodes
State legislators and then-Gov. Jerry Brown should have known that they were lighting the fuse of a political time bomb three years ago when they ordered up a “model curriculum in ethnic studies” for high school students. The bomb is now exploding. The state Department of Education has released a 303-page...
Walters: Ethic Studies Time Bomb Explodes
State legislators and then-Gov. Jerry Brown should have known that they were lighting the fuse of a political time bomb three years ago when they ordered up a “model curriculum in ethnic studies” for high school students. The bomb is now exploding. The state Department of Education has released a 303-page...
Walters: Achievement Gap Question Still Unanswered
As a species, politicians tend to like inputs more than outcomes. It’s more fun, in political terms, to appropriate money for a new program or cut the ribbon of a new public works project than it is to delve into whether they actually performed as promised, and take responsibility for...
Needy School Districts Getting More Money. What About Needy Kids?
Six years into California’s effort to target school funding more to disadvantaged students, new research has found that high-need districts are getting substantially more money. But the report released Wednesday by the Public Policy Institute of California indicates poorer schools getting most of the extra help are relying on less experienced and...
Girls Cyberbullied More Than Boys as Harassment Increases
SEATTLE — Rachel Whalen remembers feeling gutted in high school when a former friend would mock her online postings, threaten to unfollow or unfriend her on social media and post inside jokes about her to others online. The cyberbullying was so distressing that Whalen said she contemplated suicide. Once she...
UC System Accepts Record Number of California Applicants
SAN FRANCISCO — The University of California system accepted a record number of freshmen and transfer students that includes the most ever from California for the 2019-20 academic year, officials announced. The university system's nine undergraduate campuses accepted 71,655 California freshmen and 26,700 students who will transfer from California community...
Opinion: Higher Education Act Could Benefit Incarcerated Students
The Higher Education Act, first passed in 1965, established financial aid for college-bound students. Over time, lawmakers have changed the HEA’s provisions according to the shifting needs of students and political trends. For example, the Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act of 1994 amended the HEA to exclude incarcerated students...
Walters: New Bill Reignites California's 'Reading Wars'
For decades – close to a century, in fact – America’s educators and politicians have argued furiously over how best to teach children to read, pitting advocates of “phonics” against those of “whole language,” a conflict dubbed "reading wars." Phonics stresses fundamental instruction in the letters and letter combinations that...