One of my criticisms of NCLB is that it causes too many schools to focus all of their attention on the bottom 25% of a school’s population while ignoring the middle- and upper-level students. Some of the effects of this focus in my school are: fewer upper-level course choices in order to create more lower-level courses, larger [...]

Naperville Central High School Principal Jim Caudill plagiarized a speech given by a student 11 years prior at the same event. To make matters more embarrassing, that student is now a teacher at Naperville and was in attendance for the event. An irony which surpasses even this is that this same principal fired the 19 year [...]

I’m currently in my 9th year of full-time teaching, and I’ve learned a great many lessons the hard way as I’ve navigated my way through administrative minefields, labyrinthine bureaucracies, challenging curricula, and diverse students. Here are the five best lessons I’ve learned in the classroom as a teacher: 1. Due dates ...

Here is a list of shocking statistics (at least I hope they are shocking) about high school students from the author Betsy Hart: “more than a quarter admitted stealing from a store,” “almost as many [a quarter of the students surveyed] admitted stealing from a relative in the previous year,” “82 percent said they ...

Sometimes sports do reflect the general state of education, and this week is no exception. As Craig Smith notes, two possible WIAA state sports rules could be created and: could be called “Archbishop Murphy Rules.” One would suspend a student who played with an expired physical but NOT the team for the number of games the [...]

I read this article about a teenager killed basically for being gay, and I continue to be amazed at the lack of support within schools for gay, ***, transgender, and bisexual students. My school recently started a group to support all students of diversity, and I admire the leaders of this group and the students involved [...]

A recent article explains how MySpace and Facebook postings are being used for discipline in schools. At my school the same thing occurs on a limited basis. One problem we are seeing is that students will post pictures of athletic code violations. Often, students or coaches will print off MySpace pictures to reveal athletes or students [...]