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Graduate School of Education News
February 2008
Features
Sold on Kira Orange-Jones
Working 90-hour weeks in a city still trying to rebuild, Kira Orange-Jones, Ed.M.'06, hopes she and her teachers can make a differencein New Orleans' schools before the spotlight shifts. (From Ed.magazine)
Muralidharan Explores Teaching Incentives in India
Postdoc Karthik Muralidharan is researching incentive programs to help improve learning outcomes in Indian public schools.
Everyday Heroes: Frankie Cruz, Ed.M.'06
Frankie Cruz, Ed.M.'06, knows firsthand that mentoring students from low-income backgrounds can make all the difference in their academic success. Read about what our newest Everyday Hero is doing for students in Boston.
To view a more complete list of feature stories, please visit the HGSE News home page.
Events
February 15: HGSE Reception at the American Association of School Administrators Conference
If you are planning to attend the AASA National Conference in Tampa, FL, please be sure to join us for the Harvard Graduate School of Education reception!
View Askwith Education Forums from the fall 2007 semester online at WGBH Forum Network.
Please check the HGSE Events Calendar frequently for information on more upcoming campus events.
HGSE In The Media
The following is a list of recent media appearances by HGSE faculty members. Please note: websites are increasingly requiring registration and, in some cases, charging fees for viewing content. Current availability is noted.
Teachers Advised to 'Get Real' on Race
"'When should educators be race-conscious, and when should they be colorblind?' [Associate Professor Mica] Pollock said in an interview this month. 'I realized this was a can of worms nobody could address individually.'" (Education Week, 1/30/08, Registration required)
Preschool Priorities
"Research from Harvard University's Center on the Developing Child finds that high-quality early-learning programs combine 'highly skilled staff; small class sizes and high adult-to-child ratios; a language-rich environment; age-appropriate curricula and stimulating materials in a safe physical setting; warm, responsive interactions between staff and children; and high and consistent levels of child participation.'" (Education Week, 1/25/08, Registration required)
The NYC Teacher Experiment Revisited
"In September, an academic experiment headed by two very talented researchers, Jonah Rockoff (Columbia Business School) and Tom Kane (Harvard Grad School of Ed), was announced. It was presented as an experiment intended to generate academic knowledge, not to inform human resources decisions in real time." (Education Week, 1/24/08)
Stress on Babies May Cause Brain Damage
"'This is not just about other people's children. It's about our country's economic viability,' Dr. Jack P. Shonkoff, a Harvard professor of child health and development told Connecticut educators and policymakers last week at the Early Childhood Summit called the 'First 1,000 Days.'" (The News Times, 1/20/08)
Researchers' Assessment of NCLB Shows Need for Improvement
"Three researchers from Harvard - Michael Kieffer, Nonie Lesaux, and Catherine Snow - revealed what needs to be done in terms of adequately assessing English-language learners." (Diverse Issues in Higher Education, 1/17/08)
Drive On to Improve Evaluation Systems for Teachers
"Thomas J. Kane, an economist at Harvard University's Graduate School of Education who has looked at the relationship between principals' observations of teacher effectiveness and teacher effectiveness as measured by student test-score gains, said it was high time districts turned their attention to evaluation, which he characterized as 'their most potent tool' for improving teacher quality." (Education Week, 1/16/08, Registration required)
Pediatrician: Life's Tracks Set By Age 3
"'Things are happening early on in the lives of young children that are either going to set a strong foundation for high economic achievement and high economic productivity ... or can build a foundation that's going to be the beginning of failure, of school failure and economic dependence and criminal behavior,' said [Jack] Shonkoff, a professor of child health and development and founder of the Center on the Developing Child at Harvard University." (Hartford Courant, 1/16/08, Paid registration required)
Teacher Pays Tribute to Black History through Mural at High School
"Part of Parker's thesis is the implementation of his three-part 'Young Masters Among Us' program, which includes apprenticeship, in-depth studies of master artists, and a critical thinking component in association with Project Zero at the Harvard Graduate School of Education." (Cambridge Chronicle, 1/16/08)
New book from Civil Rights Project takes aim at No Child Left Behind
"'We know far too little about how to hold schools accountable for improving student performance,' says Harvard University testing [Professor] Daniel Koretz, who argues in the book that the entire NCLB accountability system is not based on hard evidence." (UCLA Newsroom, 1/14/08)
The Early Bird Gets the Bad Grade
"According to Paul Reville, a professor of education policy at Harvard and chairman of the Massachusetts Board of Education, 'Trying to cram everything our 21st-century students need into a 19th-century six-and-a-half-hour day just isn't working.' He says that children learn more at a less frantic pace, and that lengthening the school day would help 'close the achievement gap between disadvantaged students and their better-off peers.'"
(The New York Times, 1/14/08)
Archdiocese Names School Superintendent
"Mary Grassa O'Neill was named secretary of education and superintendent of schools for the Archdiocese of Boston, the archdiocese announced Friday." (Boston Business Journal, 1/11/08)
Working Conditions Trump Pay
"'Teachers today know they have many more options,' says Susan Moore Johnson, an education professor at Harvard University's graduate school of education. 'Often, they've chosen teaching because it means more [to them] and they want to work with young people. If conditions preclude their success in these classrooms, they're much more likely to leave than their predecessors.'" (Education Week, 1/10/08, Registration required)
Harvard Education Publishing Group
Harvard Education Press is pleased to announce the release of Transforming Schools with Technology: How Smart Use of Digital Tools Helps Achieve Six Key Education Goals by Andrew Zucker. In this timely and thoughtful book, Andrew Zucker argues that technology can and will play a central role in efforts to achieve crucial education goals, and that it will be an essential component of further improvement and transformation of schools. For the past 20 years, Andrew Zucker has worked in independent nonprofit organizations as an education researcher, strategic planner, and evaluator, and he is now a senior research scientist at the Concord Consortium.
The Winter Issue of the Harvard Educational Review is now available. This issue includes a special symposium, Equity and Access in Higher Education, with contributions from Alicia Dowd, Rebecca Zwick, Brian Shanley, and Shirley Tilghman. The issue also includes Is Teaching for Social Justice Undemocratic? by Eric Freedman and From Visibility to Autonomy: Latinos and Higher Education in the U.S., 1965–2005, by Victoria-María MacDonald, John Botti, and Lisa Hoffman Clark.