Andrew Silow-Carroll is the editor-in-chief of JTA
School buses lined up in the Williamsburg neighborhood of Brooklyn, April 24, 2019. (Johannes Eisele/AFP via Getty Images/JTA)
JTA After successful lobbying by US Orthodox Jewish groups and others, Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer tucked $2.75 billion in aid for private schools into the $1.9 trillion pandemic rescue package.
The move came over the objections of some Democratic leaders, including House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, and public school advocates who have fought efforts to funnel federal money to private schools. The National Education Association expressed “strong disappointment” at what it called a “Betsy DeVos-era” policy, referring to former US president Donald Trump’s education secretary.
Kenyon College student workers in Ohio authorize strike over COVID-19 safety
On March 11, members of the Kenyon Student Worker Organizing Committee (K-SWOC) authorized a strike in opposition to the college administration and board of trustees’ refusal to recognize the newly formed union.
Students at Kenyon College in Gambier, Ohio formed K-SWOC in April 2020 in response to employment uncertainty caused by the COVID-19 campus closure in March 2020. According to a press release on the K-SWOC website, most student workers were left in the dark after campus closures, payments stopped and students were told to simply wait for remote employment opportunities. A few workplaces were made remote quickly, but this was not the norm.
Duke undergraduates ordered to shelter in place amid rapid spike in COVID-19 cases
On Saturday, Duke University in Durham, North Carolina issued an order for all undergraduate students to shelter in place, citing a recent spike in positive COVID-19 cases. “Effective at midnight, Saturday, March 13, all Duke undergraduate students are required to stay-in-place until 9 a.m., Sunday, March 21,” wrote three administrators in the initial email to students Saturday.
“If this feels serious, it’s because it is,” they added later on in the same email.
Perkins Library, Duke University (Photo: Wikipedia)
The order follows the largest one-week rise on campus since the beginning of the pandemic last March, with 180 students in isolation from a positive test, and 200 students in quarantine as a result of contact tracing measures. According to the university’s COVID Dashboard, over 300 students have tested positive this semester, more than twice the total of positive test results fr
Growing anger against Biden administration’s mandate for standardized tests during pandemic
Last month, President Biden’s Acting Assistant Education Secretary Ian Rosenblum sent a letter to state education administrators instructing them that standardized tests had to be administered to students in some form this spring, summer or fall.
Rosenblum whose previous job was executive director of the Education Trust-New York, a pro-standardized testing and pro-business organization said states could delay the tests but they could not be canceled like last spring and they have to be conducted as soon as possible. The spring testing window for state tests, including the PSAT and SAT, typically given to high school juniors and seniors preparing for college, has already started in the United States.