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February 27, 1996 |
Releasing figures on record breaking school enrollments expected next Fall, Secretary Riley told a press conference February 23 that education budget cuts defy "common sense." The Secretary reported that student enrollment across the nation is expected to rise about a million in the one year from fall 1995 to fall 1996. At the same time, the current continuing resolution (CR) takes about $3 billion away from education, putting enrollment growth and Congressional budget cuts on a "collision course." The Secretary also released new figures on the state-by-state impact of continuing resolution cuts on Goals 2000, vocational, and bilingual education.In the meantime, Congress is back in session this week. At press time, it is expected that the next funding measure (the current CR expires March 15) will be the last for the current fiscal year and will finalize fiscal year 1996 funding levels for Department programs.
Mount Carmel High School (CA) is using Goals 2000 funds to extend instructional time into evenings and weekends, train teachers in identifying student needs, help students set goals, and assist parents in understanding factors that influence student success. In Springfield School District 186 (IL), Goals 2000 funds supported 6 weeks of intensive training for 4-person teams (of teachers and administrators) from 15 schools. The teams were trained in the district's approach to integrating technology across the curriculum. They also developed new curriculum units and their own schoolwide improvement plans.
Half of the public schools in the U.S. have access to the Internet through at least one computer, according to the 1995 Survey of Advanced Telecommunications in U.S. Public Schools, K- 12. That's up from 35 percent of public schools just one year ago. More than half of all schools cite *funding* as the top barrier to using computers and on-line resources as teaching tools, according to the survey. Conducted by the National Center for Education Statistics (NCES), the survey also found that:
- 9 percent of public school "classrooms" have Internet access, up from 3 percent two years ago (classrooms includes school libraries and laboratories).
- Only 31 percent of schools with large proportions of students from poor families (71 percent or higher eligibility for free or reduced-price lunches) have access to the Internet, compared to 62 percent of schools with relatively few students from poor families (less than 11 percent eligibility).
- Access is also related to school enrollment size - - from 39 percent for schools with fewer than 300 students to 69 percent for schools with 1,000 or more students.
- Secondary schools (65 percent) are more likely than elementary schools (46 percent) to be linked to the Internet.
Additional information on the survey is available from the February 16 press release in our Online Library at: http://www.ed.gov/PressReleases/02-1996/telecom.html
The American Library Association and the Library of Congress Center for the Book met with Department staff to plan spring activities for READ*WRITE*NOW! The basic kit for RWN has already been distributed for (or to) nearly 500,000 children. A companion tutoring guide has also been distributed. The next stage of RWN will feature a reading partner video to accompany the tutoring guide and a pre-school kit being developed in cooperation with Even Start, Head Start, and AmeriCorps. The Family Involvement Partnership for Learning is planning a national partners conference in conjunction with Teachers College, Columbia University, and Working Mother Magazine, and the U.S. Department of Education. The conference will be held at Teachers College in April. Working Mother Magazine will kick off the conference by making 1996 Golden Apple Awards to outstanding partnership programs.
At the February 7 annual meeting of the National Association of Independent Colleges and Universities (NAICU) in Washington, D.C., President Clinton emphasized the importance of the income contingent repayment option (under Direct Loans). "I wanted it because I thought that every person ought to have the option to borrow money for college and pay it back as a percentage of their income so that if they came from a poor family, or if they decided to do jobs that were public service jobs, for example, if they decided to be police officers or school teachers or do something else where they would never get rich, they would know that there would never be a single, solitary year when they would be in need because of the payment schedule of their college loans." At the speech, NAICU President David Warren presented Clinton with a "Stop the Raid on Student Aid" tee shirt.
Recent additions to the Online Library include:These and other new additions to the Online Library are available at: http://www.ed.gov/news.html#new
- 91 ERIC Digests (added to a full-text searchable database of 1500 Digests).
- The Student Guide 1996-97 -- Financial Aid from the Department of Education, Funding Your Education. Provides general information about the U.S. Department of Education's federal student financial aid programs -- designed for high school students and others considering entering a postsecondary school for the first time.
- Notices and documents issued by the U.S. Department of Education appearing in the Federal Register.
- Cómo ayudar a sus hijos a aprender ciencia and Cómo ayudar a sus hijos a usar la biblioteca. Spanish-language versions of Helping Your Child Learn Science and Helping Your Child Use the Library (two booklets in the popular Helping Your Child series).
- The FY 1993-94 Biennial Evaluation Report. Provides information on the purpose, funding, target population, services, administration, effectiveness, management improvement strategies, and sources of information for 154 programs administered by the Department during the FY 1993- 1994 period.
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Last Updated -- Feb. 28, 1996, (pjk)
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