U.S. Department of Education - Page 8

Sen. Marco Rubio asked the U.S. Education Department to “demonstrate leniency” toward a for-profit college network that admitted to falsifying its job placement rates and yet received millions of dollars in federal financial aid while under both state and federal investigations.

In his State of the Union address, President Barack Obama used the words of Pope Francis during his visit last fall to strengthen his call for further openness, specifically toward Muslims in the United States, and as a challenge, particularly to GOP frontrunner Donald Trump.

Male college students accused of rape after casual alcohol and sex hook-ups have been handed over to campus feminist sex crime “courts” that provide little to nothing in the way of due process.

Parents of high-ability students are demanding their San Francisco school board restore their courses for high achievers, which have been set aside while schools in the district switched over to the Common Core standards.

Obama’s comments appear to be a reference to the Common Core standards – though he does not call the reform by name, likely because the unpopular initiative is now often described as “toxic” and “poisonous.” The president nevertheless adopts the usual pro-Common Core position that the nationalized standards are higher or more rigorous than other standards – although there is no independent research that validates that claim.

In a remarkable admission, the former director of the Race to the Top (RttT) competitive grant program and chief of staff to U.S. Education Secretary Arne Duncan says the federal government “forced” full support for adoption of the Common Core standards from each state by requiring its governor, chief state school officer, and head of the state board of education to sign off on the grant application.

Progressive media ridiculed a handful of harmless middle aged and senior citizens peacefully protesting outside the gates of the nation’s first Arabic Immersion Magnet School in the Houston Independent School District (ISD). The school opened Monday for 132 pre-kindergarten and kindergarten students.

Kenyan leaders are warning President Obama not to bring his “gay agenda” with him when he visits his father’s homeland at the end of this month to open the sixth Global Entrepreneurship Summit.

The House’s version of the redo, known as the Student Success Act (H.R. 5), was pulled from the House floor by GOP leadership in late February after it was determined the measure lacked sufficient support. Grassroots parents’ groups – many that have been fighting against the Common Core standards in their states – voiced their concerns that the Student Success Act still required excessive federal intrusion into the right of states to set their own education policies.

On Friday, the U.S. Department of Education (USED), under Secretary Arne Duncan, posted an image of its logo that incorporated a rainbow to show its support for the contentious ruling.

Walker, a likely 2016 contender, has recently affirmed what has been true of Wisconsin school districts all along – that they can choose their own standards. To his credit, he has also proposed defunding the Smarter Balanced test, a product of one of the federally funded, interstate Common Core test consortia. Grassroots parents groups, however, say Walker’s proposed new state exam – called the “Badger Exam,” is also aligned with the Common Core standards.

Jindal has heard the complaints of many parents in his state and has said that as a parent himself he could see the difficulties his own son was having with Common Core math. Ultimately, he unveiled an aggressive plan to eliminate Common Core in Louisiana, one that exposed how the state board of education and department of education can attempt to work around government rules and the state legislature in order to meet its own goals.

The Thomas More Law Center (TMLC) announced Monday that it has joined in filing a lawsuit against the governor of North Dakota and other officials that claims the state’s participation in one of the federally funded interstate Common Core test consortia and the implementation of the Common Core standards is unconstitutional and violates federal laws that ban federal control of public schools and curriculum.

The authors observe that regardless of the decision in Jindal’s case, state and local school boards are facing significant challenges in “the collapsing morale and educational achievement of their students,” and need to consider their own legal path to rid themselves of the Common Core boondoggle.

U.S. Education Secretary Arne Duncan asked for advice via his private email account from Jeb Bush about how to respond to concerns about Common Core from current Florida Gov. Rick Scott.

As the U.S. Department of Education observes the higher education levels of parents who are homeschooling their children, a new trend is developing: institutions of higher learning are actively recruiting homeschooled children.

According to the U.S. Department of Education (USED), while 75 percent of the fastest-growing careers require post-high school education and training, more than half of middle class students who start college fail to earn a bachelor’s degree within six to eight years.

Will the Republican-controlled Congress renew the Elementary and Secondary Education Act’s (ESEA) and permanently lock states into federal control of education?

Potential 2016 contender Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY) targeted the controversial Common Core standards in a swing through first primary state New Hampshire on Wednesday.