The 1,000-student Allegheny Valley district in Pennsylvania boasts generations of alumni and a community so involved with the schools that high school graduation becomes an open celebration in downtown Springdale Borough. Yet the district hasn't asked for a tax increase in three years, and it is pushing out a message to older residents about…

This article reports that amid tight budgets and shrinking revenue, states are wagering that voters in next month's elections will agree to expand state-sanctioned gambling in exchange for increased school aid. Initiatives on six state ballots Nov. 4 involve gambling revenue intended to raise money for everything from community college funding and…

When President Barack Obama unveiled his plans this summer for a $12 billion federal investment in the nation's community colleges, he said he wanted the initiative to yield an additional 5 million community college graduates by 2020. Research suggests that reaching that goal may be a tall order. Community colleges have abysmal graduation rates:…

"Quality Counts 2012," the 16th edition of "Education Week"'s annual examination of issues and challenges facing America's public schools, takes aim at topics high on the policy agenda, from the White House and Congress down to the level of local school boards and chambers of commerce: the nation's international standing in…

In this article, the author reports some 3,800 near-simultaneous "house parties" organized throughout Pennsylvania to call on their federal lawmakers to put more money into education. The parties, in which three-quarters of them were organized by teachers such as Jane Dugdale, are the main election-season event of a new coalition of…

During a volunteer stint on a hydroelectric-power project in the mountains of Honduras in 1996, William DeJong began "the walk." As the president of DeJong Inc., one of the top school facility planners in the United States, he wanted to study the conditions of schools in the rugged Central American countryside far from his home in…

This article discusses an open-door policy and innovative program of Thorncliffe Park Public School, located in the heart of the diverse immigrant community in Toronto, that greatly expands community use of public schools. Community use of schools is hardly a new concept in Canada or in the United States, where schools have traditionally been the…