Schools For Education

President Carol Folt coordinated with the Academic Senate in September to create the sustainability working group.(Daily Trojan file photo) In alignment with her plans to make USC a sustainable campus, President Carol Folt announced the Presidential Sustainability Working Group in early February, a task force focused on creating recommendations for a more sustainable campus through education, research and operations. In the campus-wide email, Folt said the task force was a University-wide approach to campus sustainability by surveying students and faculty on how they can improve the University’s sustainability efforts.  “Our responsibility is to … think through the kind of institutional changes that are needed to facilitate, to engage, to make it a more viable, sustainable University and recommend things that therefore should be changed or modified in order to accomplish sustainability,” chair of the group and Price School of Public Policy professor Daniel Mazmanian said. The...

Dive Brief: About 60% of California voters think private colleges' admissions generally favor affluent students, according to a recent poll by Policy Analysis for California Education (PACE), a Stanford University-based research center, and the University of Southern California's Rossier School of Education. A smaller share, only 40%, believe admissions at public four-year institutions favor wealthy students. Roughly 2,000 voters were surveyed. The data highlights the public's distrust of college admissions, which surveys show persists nearly a year after the Varsity Blues scandal made headlines. Dive Insight: The results from the latest poll reflect scores of surveys that suggest public opinion of the fairness of college admissions remains low since the Varsity Blues controversy was made public last March. The scandal saw high-profile parents charged, and some since convicted, with paying to secure their children spots at elite institutions, including USC and Yale...

February 7, 2020 Annual PACE/USC Rossier poll also finds voters questioning fairness of college admissions By Ross Brenneman One year after Los Angeles teachers went on strike, momentum hasn’t carried over to the voter turnout required to pass new levies for school funding. (Photo/Margaret Molloy) In winter 2019, strikes by Los Angeles and Oakland teachers dominated headlines. Teachers in both cities ultimately won more pay and support staff, but the strikes also presented an opportunity for additional change. The Los Angeles Times editorial board, for instance, wrote that the L.A. strike “put the importance of a quality education front and center in the public psyche. The urgency and attention generated by the strike must not now be allowed to fade.” The results of the 2020 PACE/USC Rossier poll, however, show that California voters lack enthusiasm about the state education system and local school quality, and it’s unclear what effect such tepid support will have on a range of...

Credit: GOA, Dimitrios Panagos His Eminence Archbishop Elpidophoros of America announced on January 30, 2020, the re-establishment of the High Council for Greek Education in the U.S. The Archbishop made the announcement during an evening celebration for the Feast of the Three Hierarchs and the Day of Greek Letters at the Archdiocesan Cathedral of the Holy Trinity. The celebration for the Three Hierarchs featured a very illuminating lecture by the Very Rev. Prof. Maximos Constas titled “Sing to the Lord a New Song: The Three Hierarchs and the Theology of Music.” Fr. Maximos is the Interim Dean of Holy Cross Greek Orthodox School of Theology in Brookline, Mass. Dr. Anastasios Koularmanis, Director of the Department of Greek Education made introductory remarks and presented the program. Dr. Konstantinos Koutras, Consul General of Greece offered greetings and thoughtful reflections.  Four students from the Archdiocesan Schools spoke on the influence of the Three Hierarc...

The hearing unfolded just as Debbie Critchfield predicted. It’s as if Common Core supporters and opponents pile into their own cars, the State Board of Education president said Wednesday, “and we go around the track again and get back to this point.” Wednesday’s lap around the Common Core debate — a House Education Committee hearing on English language arts standards — wasn’t just predictably polarized. Many talking points fell right in line with the national debate over the controversial standards movement. To put the Idaho debate into broader context, I spent time earlier this week poring over three essays on Common Core, 10 years after its inception. They come from Education Next, a journal sponsored by the John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University. If you’re a wonk about academic standards (and if you’re reading this piece, you probably are), these essays are well worth your time. What the scores say Let’s start with the basics: Are the Common Core standards ...

Traditionally, we commemorate a 10th wedding anniversary with tin to symbolize resilience and strength.  This year’s anniversary of the Common Core State Standards ought to be memorialized with a life raft to signify the wreckage of what seemed like a seaworthy concept in 2010.  In a decade, the standards went from being championed by one Georgia Republican governor to being condemned by another. In 2010, the nationwide ceremony celebrating the release of the standards occurred at Peachtree Ridge High School in Gwinnett in deference to a key architect, Georgia Gov. Sonny Perdue.  Perdue urged states to voluntarily adopt common national standards in English, language arts and mathematics, saying: We have thrown our teachers into classrooms and said, 'Teach!’ But we have been unwilling up until now to articulate exactly what it is that we expect young people to know at different levels. And that was why it was important for states to come together, as a co...

With investments in financial aid and more money for California’s university systems, Gov. Gavin Newsom fulfilled key campaign pledges on higher education in his first year in office, experts and advocates say. On the campaign trail in 2018, Newsom said he would expand financial aid by growing the number of Cal Grants available to older students — known as competitive Cal Grants — and providing two years of tuition-free community college. Newsom and the Legislature in 2019 increased the number of available competitive Cal Grants while also giving community colleges the option of offering two tuition-free years by increasing funding for the California College Promise. Newsom also kept his promise to avoid tuition hikes for the California State University and University of California systems by increasing funding for each system. Left unfulfilled in 2019 was significant reform of the state’s financial aid system to better help students cover non-tuition costs, such as housin...

Whether you’re trying to quit smoking or lose weight, these experts want to help you think positively, set realistic goals and follow through on your resolutions for 2020. [2¾ min read] Sticking to your New Year's resolutions is easier with expert help from these USC Dornsife researchers. (Photo: Pixabay.) Humans have a long history of making New Year’s resolutions. The Babylonians are believed to be among the first to have set them more than 4,000 years ago. When Julius Caesar was emperor circa 46 B.C., the Romans had their own practice of offering sacrifices to Janus, the god of beginnings and endings, as they looked forward to each new year. One would think that after so many years, people would have mastered the art of following through on their resolutions; however, a formal study in 2007 found as many as 88% of people fail to fulfill their resolutions. So, it’s a new year but the same you. The challenge with fulfilling resolutions is that they require starting new habi...