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Tag:

digital learning

Florida Schools Roundup

Florida roundup: School boards, funding, homelessness and more

Travis Pillow August 3, 2015
Travis Pillow

florida-roundup-logo

Tax credit scholarships. The Palm Beach Post talks funding and accountability with representatives of Step Up For Students, which co-hosts this blog and employs the author of this post.

School boards. Supporters of rival school board associations air their views in a political forum. Sarasota Herald-Tribune. The Lake school board won’t switch to single-member districts. Leesburg Daily Commercial.

Funding. Polk County district officials raise concerns about capital funding, which is stretched thin in a large district with many rural areas. Lakeland Ledger. How much of that additional revenue is going back into classrooms? Daily Commercial.

Home education. Florida Times-Union readers weigh in on home schooling.

Digital learning. The state plans to distribute digital classrooms funding, despite the lack of a state technology assessment. Gradebook.

Back to school. The state sales tax holiday starts Friday. Tampa Tribune. Daytona Beach News-Journal. Bradenton Herald. An event distributes supplies to children in need. Fort Myers News-Press. A training workshop helps Polk teachers gear up for the new year. Lakeland Ledger.

Parent involvement. Duval creates parent academies to increase involvement with district schools. Florida Times-Union.

Homelessness. Three Panhandle districts are home to thousands of homeless students, unbeknownst to many in the community. Northwest Florida Daily News.

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August 3, 2015 0 comment
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Florida Schools Roundup

Florida roundup: Charter schools, digital learning, testing and more

Travis Pillow July 29, 2015
Travis Pillow

florida-roundup-logoCharter schools. Parents at a charter school that is putting off plans to open in August have few options beyond their zoned schools. Gradebook. The Miami-Dade school district faces a legal tab in a charter school retaliation case. News Service of Florida.

Digital learning. The Miami Herald‘s back-to-school edition takes a look at the digital landscape. Topics include: The growth of virtual school options, girls learning about high tech, digital literacy, the digital divide in poor communities, students learning to code and the rise of blended learning.

Home education. The Ocala Star-Banner looks at the growth of home schooling in Marion County.

Testing. The Seminole school board backs a plan to drop state assessments in favor of national norm-referenced tests. Orlando Sentinel.

Budgets. Duval, Lee Alachua and Collier districts approve spending plans. Tax rates fall, but tax collections may rise. Florida Times-Union. Fort Myers News-Press. Gainesville Sun. Naples Daily News.

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July 29, 2015 0 comment
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Florida Schools Roundup

Florida roundup: Budgets, digital learning, summer and more

Travis Pillow July 9, 2015
Travis Pillow

florida-roundup-logo

STEM. Students in Orlando’s Pine Hills neighborhood experiment with growing bioluminescent mushrooms. Orlando Sentinel. These 20 public elementary schools excel in science instruction for disadvantaged students. Bridge to Tomorrow. Students at a Lakeland Christian school learn about robotics during a summer workshop. Lakeland Ledger.

Budgets. Miami-Dade school officials plan to lower the property tax rate slightly. Miami Herald. Local districts await state information on property tax revenues for schools. Tallahassee Democrat.

Private schools. A Bradenton Montessori school plans to expand into a new location. Bradenton Herald.

Charter schools. Palm Beach’s new superintendent plans a forum for charter school parents. Sun-Sentinel.

Digital learning. Florida schools seem likely to to receive state digital classrooms funding despite uncertainty caused by a line-item veto. Tampa Bay Times. A parent writes an open letter to Palm Beach’s superintendent on digital learning. Context Florida.

International Baccalaureate. A St. Petersburg student gets rare perfect scores on her college-credit exams. Tampa Bay Times.

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July 9, 2015 0 comment
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Charter SchoolsEducation LegislationFunding

How do school choice issues fare in Florida’s state budget deal?

Travis Pillow June 17, 2015
Travis Pillow

An expansion of Florida’s Personal Learning Scholarship Accounts wasn’t the only school choice-related issue that found new life in a state budget deal reached this week.

The new $78 billion spending plan, set to come up for a final vote Friday, would increase funding for public schools and address a handful of the issues we followed during the regular legislative session.

Digital classrooms. The classroom technology push would get a $20 million boost, or a 50 percent increase. Charter schools were less likely to take advantage of the program last year. Legislation tied to the budget would require the state Department of Education to create a “streamlined” process for charters to submit their digital classroom plans, which might make it easier for them to participate. The extra money might help make it worth their while.

Charter schools. Charter schools would take a haircut in their funding for buildings. Capital funding would decline by a third, to $50 million. School districts would also get $50 million for repair and maintenance, and a larger chunk of money would be divided among school construction projects in rural districts.

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June 17, 2015 0 comment
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Technology and InnovationVirtual Education

Why Florida gets top marks nationally for digital learning policies

Travis Pillow April 29, 2015
Travis Pillow

Digital Learning Now grades states’ policies each year.

Florida gets the highest marks in the country for its digital learning policies, according to a report released Tuesday by an advocacy group.

Florida has typically gotten strong grades from Digital Learning Now in its annual report cards. This year, the state leapfrogged Utah to claim the top score, thanks in part to digital classrooms legislation that increased planning and funding for technology in the state’s public schools.

“Florida has a lot to be proud of, and it reflects a commitment not just to digital learning, but creating more options for kids,” John Bailey, a vice president at the Foundation for Excellence in Education and the director of the digital learning group, said in an interview.

Among the state’s policies that drew praise:

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April 29, 2015 0 comment
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Catholic SchoolsFaith-based EducationReligious Education

Catholic schools find their blended learning comfort zones

Travis Pillow April 13, 2015
Travis Pillow

For more than two years, administrators at Purcell Marian High School in Cincinnati have been navigating the competing pressures of new and old.

They decided the shift to blended learning could help them meet the varying needs of an increasingly diverse student body, and help their students meet a state requirement to pass four years of high school math courses. They also knew that they couldn’t knock down all the walls in their 87-year-old building or upend the traditions that had drawn students to seek a Catholic education in the first place.

In this 2012 file photo, students at Miami's Belen Jesuit Preparatory School Pads during a Spanish class.

In this 2012 file photo, students at Miami’s Belen Jesuit Preparatory School Pads during a Spanish class.

“We couldn’t just gut the school and start over as an all-blended learning school,” Jeanine Flick, the school’s academic dean, told a crowded session at an Orlando conference for thousands of Catholic educators.

Instead, in 2013 the school began a gradual, subject-by-subject shift from paper textbooks to electronic ones, and from instruction led entirely by teachers to what principal Veronica Murphy described as a more “student-centered” approach, in which students work through material based on what they have mastered. It began converting one of its newer buildings into an open-plan “blended learning center.”

While Catholic educators, much like their public-school counterparts, have been exploring blended learning for a few years, it’s now becoming widespread, and was one of the hottest topics at the National Catholic Educational Association’s annual convention last week. Sessions were often packed with teachers and administrators looking to draw lessons from schools like Purcell Marian that have already made the shift and are starting to draw lessons from it.

They’ve faced many of the same the same hurdles as public schools, and some unique ones. For one thing, they often lack public funding to pay for students’ devices or the technology that connects them.

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April 13, 2015 0 comment
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Charter SchoolsTechnology and Innovation

Bill would make sure charter schools participate in ‘Digital Classrooms 2.0’

Travis Pillow February 26, 2015
Travis Pillow
Sen. John Legg

Sen. John Legg

Draw up a detailed plan for using technology in the classroom, and get a funding boost in return.

That was the bargain offered to Florida public schools under digital learning legislation passed last year — one that many school districts found valuable. Charter schools, however, were less likely to take part.

Next year, with more funding expected to be on the table, charter schools would be required to join districts in the technology planning process under a bill filed this week by the chair of the state Senate’s education committee.

Sen. John Legg, R-Trinity, has proposed an update to the “digital classrooms” legislation he authored last year. The new measure would require districts to get input from state technology experts on their digital classroom plans.

Charter schools were included in last year’s legislation. The majority of them did submit technology plans to their local districts, allowing them to receive added technology funding. The updated legislation would clarify that they’re required to do so.

They’re expected to have more reason to participate. Gov. Rick Scott has proposed doubling the current $40 million in digital classrooms funding in next year’s state budget, and Legg and other lawmakers have also said they plan to increase funding for classroom technology now that schools have plans in place to help them use it wisely.

The new legislation would also make it easier for charters to fill out their technology plans, by requiring the state Department of Education to create a streamlined form they could submit online.

February 26, 2015 0 comment
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Charter SchoolsTechnology and Innovation

Will Florida charter schools leave technology funding on the table?

Travis Pillow January 15, 2015
Travis Pillow

So far, all but three of Florida’s school districts have submitted digital learning plans to the state Department of Education, allowing them to claim their share of $40 million in technology funding.

Hundreds of schools, however, haven’t been as quick on the uptake.

Last year, legislation by state Sen. John Legg, R-Trinity, created a new pool of funding for school technology known as the Digital Classrooms Allocation. To qualify, school districts had to draw up detailed plans for how they would use technology to improve teaching and learning. Charter schools could share in the money, too, as long as they submitted similar plans to their local districts.

So far, 70 of the state’s 73 school districts and university lab schools have submitted technology plans to the state, Ron Nieto, the department’s deputy commissioner for innovation, told the state Board of Education during its Wednesday meeting.

He said 397, or less than two-thirds, of the state’s charter schools had done the same.

As board member John Padget noted, “It looks like the charter schools as a group have left some money on the table.”

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January 15, 2015 0 comment
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