First Bell 2-19-13

yes Pamela Tatz / February 19, 2013

A first look at today's most important education news:

After more than a month of striking, the union for NYC’s school-bus drivers has thrown in the towel, handing Mayor Bloomberg a win. During the strike, the more than 100,000 students who rely on school buses (many thousands with special needs) had to look for alternate means of reaching their schools—which were sometimes costly. (Wall Street Journal and New York Times)

Reuters contends that charter schools build hurdles into their application processes, such as complicated applications and mandatory interviews, in order to weed undesirable students from the lottery.

Congressman George Miller proposes the Transforming Education through Technology Act, which would aim to hasten the adoption of technological advances in education. (Huffington Post and Digital Education)

In an effort to test for giftedness rather than preparedness, NYC’s education department has decided to change part of its admissions exam; the New York Times looks at the impact. 

An award-winning teacher argues that Common Core need not demoralize teachers. (Huffington Post)

The superintendent of the Los Angeles school district announced that he wants student test scores to comprise 30 percent of teachers’ evaluations; the city’s teacher union maintains there should be no fixed percentage. (Los Angeles Times)

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