Education

The American Spectator, April 30, 2008

This was just the latest defeat for school reformers. They also lost a battle in Idaho to develop a teacher performance pay plan and have seen recommendations made by an education panel in California convened by California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger almost summarily ignored...Read more

Data Errors

The American Spectator, Jan. 17, 2008
For reform-minded education researchers of all ideological stripes, No Child has not only given them the ability to fully evaluate school performance, but even get a handle on how states and school systems track student achievement. What they have learned proves the old adage that there is often little difference between lies and statistics.
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The Myth of High-Stakes Testing
The American Spectator, Dec. 18, 2007
The standards struggle is as much about control over the nation's public schools as it is about learning. For reform-minded advocates, change-oriented urban school superintendents, business leaders, and a few civil rights groups such as the National Council of La Raza, exit exams advance their agenda by exposing the shoddy instruction given to children -- especially minorities and the poor -- by school districts.
Read more.

When Mayors Get Schooled

The American Spectator, Dec. 11, 2007

Driving these efforts is a realization that declining academic performance is a key reason for the flight to suburbia that has hobbled many cities. Improving the schools or offering new ones, especially so-called arts and science magnet schools, back-to-basics curricula and Montessori-style programs, will keep young, middle-class families and, in turn, spur economic growth. Competition from vouchers and charter schools, so goes the theory, will spur traditional districts to change. For school reformers and many grassroots leaders, mayoral-led reform is a chance to bypass school bureaucracies and their allies, who are unwilling to embark on much-needed fixes.
Read more. And Joanne Jacobs offers her own thoughts.

The American Spectator, Nov. 15, 2007
Parents seem to agree that schools are a mess. In a 2007 survey of parents by the Gallup Organization and Phi Delta Kappa, 84 percent gave public schools overall grades of C or lower; only 63 percent of parents rated the schools so woefully three years ago. But the fact 89 percent of the nation's students still attend traditional public schools suggests that most parents aren't dissatisfied with the status quo.        Read more. And check out the Education Gadfly's comments on this piece and vouchers in general.

The courts

Two Cheers for the Ninth Circuit

The American Spectator,

Of course, "as liberal" needs some context here. As the largest of the 11 Federal judicial districts, covering California, eight other Western states, and two U.S. territories, the Ninth Circuit naturally attracts attention. It has come under fire from conservatives for its rubber band-like interpretations of the Constitution and rulings that often go against the intent of Congress... Just in the last two years, Ninth Circuit appellate judges ruled against U.S. Attorney General John Ashcroft's efforts to fight California's legalization of medical marijuana and threw out the death penalty conviction of former alarm salesman John Visciotti, who allegedly teamed up with another colleague to murder and rob two of his former co-workers in order to pay off their motel bill.

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Economic Affairs and Globalization
Made in Europe
The American Spectator, April 2, 2004
Along with McDonald's restaurants and Levis jeans, American entertainment has long been blamed by Europe's political and intellectual elites for imposing a "cretin" culture and weakening native cultures. That consumers actively seek out and enjoy Mickey Mouse and other Hollywood fare doesn't seem to register.

Neither does the reality that Hollywood recycles as many European cultural staples -- think Cinderella, Tomb Raider, and Harry Potter -- as it exports all things American. Among the top film directors are German native Roland Emmerich of Independence Day fame and British-born Anthony Minghella, whose Civil War epic, Cold Mountain, was shot in Romania.
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Government Reform and Accountability
Bust Times
The American Spectator, May 24, 2004
Money management isn't the first thing that comes to mind when one thinks of San Diego. The southernmost major city in California is better-known for its beaches, naval bases, biotech firms and, for hedonists and illegal aliens, its convenient location to Tijuana and the Mexican border.

But residents of San Diego and other cities throughout the nation have come to learn the meaning "actuarial charts" and other arcane elements of the financial discipline. The hard way. Thanks to fat retirement packages for government employees handed out during the last decade's bull market, taxpayers may end up forking over billions to shore up its pensions. -- Read More

Immigration

H-1B Education

The American Spectator, Aug. 12, 2008
You would expect high tech giants such as Microsoft, Cisco Systems, and the U.S. division of India's tech support powerhouse, Infosys, to be among the biggest users of H-1B skilled-labor visas. The same holds true for universities such as Johns Hopkins, the University of Michigan and Purdue -- the world's training ground for skilled workers and research-and-development.

But some of the largest users of H-1B visas aren't tech firms or major research universities. Rather, these unlikely users are the nation's public school systems...-- Read More