It is all too easy to yield to a certain dark fatalism, or on the contrary, to invest all one’s hopes in fundamental change on the federal level. While much room for improvement remains in national politics — from ending the farce known as “free trade,” to tackling the debt, and we must hold national […]
education
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Charter connection
The charter will be unique, officials said, since it will be the school district applying for the charter. The school, which will be named the John W. Rex Elementary, will have a capacity of 500 students in grades prekindergarten through sixth grade and be governed by a 15-member board selected by OKCPS and the nonprofit […]
Posted inArts & Culture
Freedom rings
The nationwide Children’s Defense Fund is the parent organization and chooses 80 to 90 book titles that are taught to the children, based around themed weeks. Working on basic skills like comprehension and recognition, executive director Amy Brooks-Young said each class has about 10 scholars with one leader, aka a college intern. “Everything is introduced […]
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Thick as a brick
MAPS 3 provided a spectacular new John Marshall High School building and an equally impressive new U.S. Grant High School building, but one school had news-making student discipline problems when it opened and the other school had teacher problems. Millions of MAPS money is being spent on the Classen School of Advanced Studies building, a […]
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For the public good
Perhaps it’s real anatomy and sexual relations. Maybe it’s real history. Maybe he prefers that his and most other children should be exposed to his religious beliefs 24/7 instead of just all the rest of the time available for his religious teachings except during school. Obviously, he does not care that most people do prefer […]
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Living in ‘1984’
I feel like I woke up in George Orwell’s “1984,” where political “doublespeak” is an accepted form of communication. Doublespeak is defined as a language that “deliberately disguises, distorts or reverses the meanings of words.” We want “better education,” so we cut spending to public education, deny certified teachers their bonuses and promote private school […]
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‘Education as a common good’
The danger in any kind of reform is that change is not an end in itself; it must actually lead somewhere. Therefore, before Oklahomans embark on serious reform of how we educate our children, we need to have an idea of what we want the end product to look like. In order to do that, […]
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Elitism for dummies
That’s what state Rep. Tom Newell, a Seminole Republican, apparently thinks, according to a recent media report, and he wants to “rein” it in through more intense legislative oversight. Newell’s comments were prompted by news that many Oklahoma universities and colleges were actually spending more this fiscal year than last year, despite a recent state […]
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Know your Snooki!
Chicken-Fried News weeps for the future. Seriously, however, OU English composition graduate teaching assistant Sarah Barry came up with the 3000-level course, which was offered during the intersession that ended Aug. 20. The class analyzed how the cast members of MTV’s monster hit “reality” series interacted with one another — more than sexually, you mean? […]
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Best Betz
He takes pleasure in the little things in life, because he doesn’t have time for much else; Betz (pictured right) officially takes office Monday as the 20th president of the University of Central Oklahoma. “When you are selected and choose to follow a pathway like this, you realize that there’s no downtime,” Betz said. “It’s […]