Whether they're organizing events, buttonholing legislators, or simply trading ideas and information, a growing number of "parent unions" are attempting to stake out a place in policy debates over education in states and districts, amid a crowded field of actors and advocates. As the term implies, some of these organizations see…

School districts have resorted to hiring debt collectors, employing constables, and swapping out standard meals for scaled-back versions to try to coerce parents to pay off school lunch debt that, in recent years, appears to have surged as the result of a faltering economy and better record-keeping. While the average school lunch costs just about…

In hiring Daniel A. Domenech, the directors of the American Association of School Administrators (AASA) were looking for an advocate who could position the group in the front row of education policy debates in Washington. Domenech, who began his job as the executive director of the AASA in July, has battle scars from years spent in the…

In this article, the author talks about the Shays-Farrell race as one of three closely watched contests in Connecticut that could help determine control of the U.S. House of Representatives in the midterm elections November 7. U.S. Rep. Christopher Shays, a Republican, and Diane Farrell, a Democratic, are the candidates for the state's 4th…

Even the last states to be reviewed on their progress for meeting the "highly qualified" teacher provisions of the No Child Left Behind Act have some distance to travel before satisfying the law, according to Department of Education documents and officials. A case in point is Connecticut, one of the final stops for the federal monitoring…

The backlash against the No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB) was raised to a new level when Connecticut's attorney general announced that his state plans to sue the U.S. Department of Education over the testing mandates in the sweeping federal law. In announcing his intentions, Attorney General Richard Blumenthal said he was inviting other states to…

This article reports the delayed release of information by many states about whether schools and districts have made adequate yearly progress under the federal No Child Left Behind Act until after September 8. Among the states that delayed their release of complete information include Illinois, Kansas, Louisiana, Maine, and Massachusetts. State…

This article discusses legislative efforts to seek flexibility and to coax changes in the No Child Left Behind (NCLB) Act. Even before U.S. Secretary of Education Margaret Spellings had been confirmed in her job on Inauguration Day, a few states had begun testing her pledge to work with them in carrying out the No Child Left Behind Act in a…