Five Best Blogs: What You Missed At The WH Ed Summit

Was it a WH summit on online education, or an online WH summit on education? The latter, it appears.ow.ly/bIpEn

Biden, Rhee, and K. Johnson glad-handing at Tues Obama fundraiser ow.ly/bI3Uc #5bb via @mikephillips1

No longer able to outspend everyone else, Can Unions Survive Citizens United? - The Atlantic Wire ow.ly/bI1px

New Freakonomics study shows kids respond to immediate financial rewards when taking tests Yahoo! Finance ow.ly/bI2RK

Winning campaign issue? Charter schools –USATODAY.com ow.ly/bIedN

Comments

[Bruce]

If charter schools aren't providing college-preparatory rigor or useful vocational skills to the 16-year-olds in their charge -- in other words, if they are having 16-year-olds read "The Hunger Games" in class (as in the photo accompanying the USA Today article), a book my 11-year-old read at home in two days this year -- they are becoming part of the problem rather than part of the solution. We have to focus on outcomes for students, and while saving students from gang life is a worthwhile accomplishment, it isn't good enough, nor is simply keeping them in school until they graduate and then shipping them off to community college, where they end up dropping out. Dropping out at 19 is better than dropping out at 16, but most such young people would be better off getting the training needed to start a career than they are after receiving remediation for a lack of basic academic skills.

[Sarah]

Well, of course students will respond better if money is involved. With the cost of college, our local state university is just over $20k a year without room and board, skyrocketing, I've done many things I never would have imagined in order to earn money to set aside for college.