School Readiness

American Federation of Teachers Convention Speech, 2000

jhelpap — Thu, 14 Jul 2011 16:36:52 -0400

At the 76th annual AFT Convention, Feldman addresses the issues of turning around failing schools, school vouchers, high-quality early childhood education, teacher salaries and the quality of teachers in the profession.

Commonwealth Magazine: “What Schools Should—and Shouldn't—Learn From Markets”

jruss — Wed, 25 Feb 2009 13:49:41 -0500

In this article from the Commonwealth Club of California's publication, Al Shanker discusses the need for schools to develop incentive systems that work to motivate both students and teachers. He sees lessons in corporate capitalism and in foreign education systems. He argues that gaining entrance into college should be more difficult and that employers should consider high school performance in hiring decisions. This would encourage students to work harder. read more »

Testimony before the NGA Task Force on School Readiness

jruss — Wed, 11 Feb 2009 15:01:42 -0500

Al Shanker discusses the problems with children's level of school-readiness. He states that simply promoting students to the next grade because of their age is counter productive. He advocates for longer kindergarten programs to ensure basic school-readiness. He also advocates for public pre-school programs. Shanker also notes that investing in such programs for young children will save the money that is invested in safety net programs at a later age, and will likely have a greater effect than later programs. read more »