A r c h i v e d  I n f o r m a t i o n

Table of Contents New American High Schools Education Heroes D.C. College Access Act Web-Based Education Commission Mike Smith to Leave the Department Holleman to Be Nominated for Deputy Secretary Fritschler and Cohen Sworn In Budget Poetry Contest: Transportation New Online Credits

New American High Schools This month at the White House Secretary Riley honored 13 high schools for their "classroom innovation, breakthrough instructional methods, imaginative use of technology, and their ability to develop partnerships with the community, parents and colleges." These 13 New American High Schools include comprehensive high schools, academic magnets, charter schools, and redesigned vocational- technical schools. These schools ensure that all students meet challenging academic standards and are prepared to succeed in college and careers. They help students acquire the communications, problem-solving, computer and technical skills needed in today's rapidly changing, global economy. For details, please see: http://www.ed.gov/PressReleases/11-1999/nahsawards.html

Education Heroes This month Secretary Riley presented to 12 individuals the Department's second annual John Stanford Education Heroes Awards. "There are many unsung heroes of education in America," the Secretary said. "Every day, millions of citizens work tirelessly to improve learning. These 12 have made exceptional contributions to education in their communities. They represent all the other education heroes in our nation." The 12 heroes are: Oral Lee Brown, college mentor (Oakland, CA), Wendolyn Norris-Bouie, principal, Gresham Park Elementary School (Atlanta, GA), Coretta Leona McFerren, founder, Westside Schools and Communities Organizing for Restructuring and Planning (Chicago, IL), Rev. Wesley D. Williams, executive director, United Methodist Urban Services, Inc. (Boston, MA), John Jordan "Buck" O'Neil, chairman, Negro Leagues Baseball Museum (Kansas City, MO), Lisa Belzberg, president and founder, PENCIL (Public Education Needs Civic Involvement in Learning) (NY, NY), Sandra L. Zelno, child advocate (North Huntingdon, PA), James Ketelsen, founder, Project GRAD (Graduation Really Achieves Dreams) (Houston, TX), Mary Dorn, volunteer, Monument Valley High School (Monument Valley, UT), Helen Henderson, Carolyn Patton and Diane Turner, founders, Federal WayAfrican American Parent Support Group (Federal Way, WA). For details, including the Secretary's speech, please see: http://www.ed.gov/PressReleases/11-1999/heroes.html

D.C. College Access Act On November 12th, President Clinton signed the D.C. College Access Act of 1999 into law. This legislation, proposed in the President's 2000 budget, provides tuition subsidies to D.C. residents to ensure access to a range of affordable higher education options, as is available to the residents of all 50 states. The legislation authorizes 2 kinds of tuition subsidies. For D.C. residents who attend public colleges and universities in Maryland and Virginia, the federal government will pay the difference between in-state and out-of-state tuition up to $10,000 per year (with a lifetime cap of $50,000 per student). For D.C. residents who attend private colleges in the D.C. area and private Historically Black Colleges and Universities throughout Maryland and Virginia, the legislation authorizes grants of up to $2,500 per year (with a lifetime cap of $12,500 per student). The program will be administered by the Mayor of D.C. For more information, please contact the college information center at (202) 393-1100 or the D.C. government at (202) 727-3685. http://www.ed.gov/offices/OPE/News/dcaccess.html

Web-Based Education Commission Several themes emerged in the first meeting of the Web-Based Education Commission held November 16 and 17 in Washington, D.C. The Digital Divide -- Although prices for computer hardware and software have declined and more Americans are gaining access to the Internet, low-income and minority families are disproportionately cut off from the digital revolution. A recent study shows that this digital divide has increased since 1994 (http://www.ntia.doc.gov/ntiahome/digitaldivide/). The Commission will consider strategies to increase access to quality digital content for the nation's hardest-to-reach communities. Standards and Accreditation -- There has been a tremendous increase in the last several years in the availability of online courses and educational software. Students and other consumers are faced with a range of choices that can be confusing and intimidating. The Commission will examine the applicability of current academic standards and accrediting processes to digital content. Teacher and Faculty Training -- Recent surveys show that a minority of K-12 teachers feel comfortable using technology in the classroom, and an even lower percentage report being adequately trained to do so. Nearly 40% of postsecondary institutions identify "assisting faculty in integrating technology into instruction" as the most important information technology issue their institutions will face in the near future. The Commission will examine current efforts in teacher technology training and offer policy recommendations to increase the number of digital-savvy faculty.

Mike Smith to Leave the Department Secretary Riley announced this month that Acting Deputy Secretary of Education Marshall (Mike) Smith has decided to return to Stanford University early next year to resume his academic career. Smith, a renowned education scholar and author, has helped lead the Department since the beginning of the Clinton Administration. "Mike Smith exemplifies the best in public service, and I am proud to have had him in my Administration," said President Clinton. "Mike's many gifts, his unassailable intellect, energetic spirit, and most of all, his dedication to improving education for all children, have helped to create real and lasting changes for millions of Americans." "More than any other educator in the U.S., Mike Smith has both created the impetus for and crafted the means to bring greater accountability to public schools at all levels," Secretary Riley said. "The welcome movement toward standards in the classroom -- for teachers, for students, for administrators -- has long been a passion of Mike's." The Secretary praised Smith for helping improve management at the Department. He noted that Smith has overseen administrative improvements that now make federal education dollars go further, college more affordable, new technologies more available in the classroom, and schools more academically accountable. Before joining the Department in 1993, Smith was a professor of education and dean of the School of Education at Stanford University. EDITOR'S NOTE: ED Initiatives was born in a staff meeting 4 years ago, when Mike Smith asked if we could create a "weekly look at progress on the Secretary's priorities." That same summer (1995), with Mike's encouragement, we launched EDInfo (this message today is the 500th EDInfo message). In the years since, Mike has championed other Internet experiments. He has pushed for improvements in the Department's web efforts. He has challenged individuals throughout the Department to figure out how to use technology to improve customer service and business processes. We have a long way to go. But we have been blessed to serve a leader who has encouraged us to take risks in hopes of serving you better. We wanted to take this opportunity to say, publicly, thank you, Mike!

Holleman to Be Nominated for Deputy Secretary This month the President announced his intent to nominate Frank Holleman III to serve as Deputy Secretary of the Department. The Deputy Secretary is the Department's chief operating officer and is the Secretary's principal advisor on program policies and budget. Holleman hails from Greenville, South Carolina, and is an attorney with Wyche, Burgess, Freeman and Paham, P.A., the firm where he has practiced since 1997 and previously from 1982-1993. From 1994 to 1997, he was Chief of Staff to Secretary Riley. He previously served from 1993 to 1994 as Deputy Assistant Attorney General for the Civil Division of the Department of Justice, overseeing the Office of Consumer Litigation and the Office of Immigration Litigation.

Fritschler and Cohen Sworn In Michael Cohen and A. Lee Fritschler were sworn in this month to fill top posts at the Department. Fritschler, as the Department's Assistant Secretary for Postsecondary Education, is charged with setting the direction for higher education policy and administering GEAR UP, the Fund for the Improvement of Postsecondary Education, TRIO, international education, the Fulbright program, graduate programs, Developing Institutions, the White House Initiative on Historically Black Colleges and Universities, and other postsecondary education programs. Prior to joining the Department, Fritschler was president of Dickinson College from 1987 until his retirement last summer. Cohen, as Assistant Secretary for Elementary and Secondary Education, will oversee 40 federal education programs and will continue serving as key adviser to the Secretary during reauthorization of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA). Between 1996 and 1999, Cohen was special assistant to the President for education policy. Before that, he served as senior adviser to the Secretary and led the Administration's efforts to enact and implement the Goals 2000 Act. He has also helped lead the Administration's efforts to raise standards, strengthen accountability, reduce class size, increase flexibility, and expand public school choice and charter schools. Prior to joining the Aministration, Cohen worked closely with state and local policymakers while with the National Governors Association and the National Association of State Boards of Education.

Budget On November 29, President Clinton signed into law H.R. 3194, which funds a number of federal agencies, including the Department of Education, for fiscal year 2000 (October 1, 1999 through September 30, 2000). For information, please see: http://www.ed.gov/offices/OUS/budnews.html

Poetry Contest: Transportation This month Transportation Secretary Rodney Slater invited students across the U.S. to compose and submit poems related to transportation in hopes that their writings will inspire them to prepare for transportation jobs in the new millennium by studying math and science. The poetry contest is divided into categories for Grades 1-3, Grades 4-6, and Grades 7-8. The deadline is January 31, 2000. Regional and national winners for each grade category will be announced in March. Winning poems will be published in the Garrett A. Morgan Technology and Transportation Futures Program website and in the program's quarterly newsletter. Winners will be selected based on best presentation of the theme, originality, and artistic interpretation.

New Online The White House recently issued "Twenty Things You Can Do and Learn On U.S. Government Web Sites." http://www.ed.gov/PressReleases/11-1999/wh-1108b.html "Profiles of Successful Schoolwide Programs" (December 1998) describes 8 successful schoolwide programs, including 6 elementary schools, a middle school, and a Grades 7-12 secondary school. This booklet -- Volume 2 of "Implementing Schoolwide Programs" -- is designed to help schools plan, operate, and improve their schoolwide programs. http://www.ed.gov/pubs/idea_profiles/ The "1998 NAEP Civics Report Card" -- a national assessement of student knowledge in Grades 4, 8, and 12 -- found that about two-thirds of students at each grade performed at or above the "basic" level. The National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) is the nation's only ongoing survey of what students know and can do in various academic subject areas. http://nces.ed.gov/nationsreportcard/site/home.asp "How Adults Learn" offers commissioned papers and information from a September conference held by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) and the Department's Office of Educational Research and Improvement on identifying barriers that prevent certain groups of adults from participating in lifelong learning. Successful programs to overcome the barriers to participation are included. http://www.ed.gov/pubs/HowAdultsLearn/ "Early Childhood: Where Learning Begins -- Mathematics" offers simple activities that parents can do with 2- to 5-year-olds to help children get a start on mathematical learning. http://www.ed.gov/pubs/EarlyMath/