03.29.06

financial aid for the financially challenged

Posted in News at 12:07 am by Paloma Cruz

Program offers a wealth of aid for poor with college ambitions
– reported by the Kansas City Star

[snip]

That is why the Kauffman Scholars program, funded by the Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation, struck a three-year, $1.4 million partnership with The Princeton Review to help back Kauffman’s guarantee of a free college education to qualifying students and families.

Members of the first class of Kauffman Scholars, who came into the program as seventh-graders in 2003, are high schoolers now.

The Princeton Review will provide Kauffman Scholars with tests to gauge college readiness, along with college admission counseling and preparation for the entrance exams.

The Kauffman Foundation launched its Scholars program in 2003 for incoming seventh-graders from district and charter schools in the Kansas City and Kansas City, Kan., school districts. A second class of seventh-graders joined in 2005, and the foundation now is recruiting current sixth-graders and a limited number of ninth-graders to enter the program for the 2006-07 school year.

The program accepts students who meet academic and financial guidelines, and who are willing, with their parents, to commit to extra instruction and academic and life counseling. In return, the Kauffman program supports them through college.

The program is holding meetings through the end of March for families interested in applying to join Kauffman Scholars. To reserve a place at one of the meetings, call (816) 932-1206 or go to www. kauffmanscholars.org.

03.28.06

Louisiana teachers in Texas

Posted in News at 12:23 pm by Paloma Cruz

Louisiana educators have been making a contribution in Texas, but they say negative incidents have overshadowed their stories
Evacuee teachers filling a gap
– reported by the Houston Chronicle

[snip]

Palmer is one of hundreds of educators who have stepped in to fill vacant classroom slots and help the state handle the 46,000 students from hurricane-ravaged areas who enrolled last fall.

She believes their stories have been lost in the ongoing tale of Hurricane Katrina’s aftermath. Her concerns seemed confirmed by a poll released last week in which three-quarters of Harris County residents surveyed by a Rice University sociologist said the influx of Katrina evacuees has put a “considerable strain” on the community.

Palmer said she thinks the poll results have “a lot to do with the fact that only the sob stories have been told, not the stories of survival and rebuilding.” She wonders how many of those questioned for the poll have actually met and talked to someone like herself who is having a positive influence on her new community.

With many school districts facing a chronic shortage of qualified math teachers, Palmer said she provided stability to geometry students who had been drifting along without a permanent teacher since school started in August.

[snip]

Some teachers, like Palmer, have been hired under an emergency certification program set up by the state one week after Hurricane Katrina’s Aug. 29 landfall. As of mid-March, 77 teachers had been granted the one-year certificates and another 36 were awaiting the results of their fingerprint check.

Many others have been hired on an hourly basis or as permanent substitutes. Houston ISD hired 192 extra employees, mostly teachers, as hourly workers instead of giving them contracts.

Joel Trevino, staffing director for the Fort Bend Independent School District, was impressed when he began interviewing teachers in September. The 66,000-student district has hired 22 teachers under the emergency certification program, more than any other district in the state.

[snip]

it’s college financial aid time

Posted in News at 6:20 am by Paloma Cruz

Tackle college aid by sifting minutiae
Most families sort through stress and find solutions
– reported by the Houston Chronicle

It’s panic time in many American homes as parents struggle to evaluate the financial aid packages for their soon-to-be college freshmen children — and figure out what to do if they don’t get enough.

This rite of spring is triggered when colleges and universities begin mailing financial aid award letters, which give incoming students a breakdown of the amount of grants, scholarships, work-study jobs and federal loans they can expect.

Comparing the various offers — and appealing for reviews from campus aid offices — can be daunting, as is figuring out how to finance the rest. But most families work things out, experts say.

[snip]

Joyce recommends three Web sites where families can look for scholarships and other financial aid information. The sites are: www.finaid.org, www.collegeboard.com and www.fastweb.org. And Sallie Mae maintains the online site www.collegeanswer.com that has a calculator families can use to compare college aid packages.

[snip]

the search for PISD superintendent continues

Posted in News at 5:46 am by Paloma Cruz

Salary key in Pasadena superintendent search
Trustee studies strategy designed to recruit, retain
– reported by the Houston Chronicle

Deciding how much to pay a school superintendent can make school board members lose sleep.

It’s such a hot item that the Texas Association of School Boards had a workshop session on the topic at its statewide winter conference two weeks ago in Corpus Christi.

In fact, the session on Planning Superintendent Compensation was offered twice during the three-day conference.

Nelda Sullivan, the Pasadena Independent School District board president, was there, taking notes.

[snip]

Pasadena ISD is seeking a replacement for Rick Schneider, who retired in mid-December after nearly 14 years as superintendent.

His annual base salary of $255,000 reflected not only the unusual length of his service but also the district’s size — nearly 50,000 students and 5,000 employees — and students’ scores on the Texas Assessment of Knowledge and Skills, Sullivan said. If he were still working, Schneider would rank as the third highest paid superintendent in the area, according to a Houston Chronicle study conducted as part of Sunshine Week, a national program that stresses the importance of open records.

While the search is under way, Kirk Lewis, who was previously deputy superintendent for administration, is serving as acting superintendent.

[snip]

As acting superintendent, Lewis earns $144,000.

[snip]

At his base salary of $255,000, Schneider was among the best paid superintendents in the state, according to this year’s superintendent survey conducted by the Texas Association of School Boards in conjunction with the Texas Association of School Administrators.

As self-reported by 775 superintendents across the state, the average superintendent salary in the responding districts is $100,027, an increase of 4 percent over the 2004-05 school year.

The median superintendent salary (with half the reported salaries below that point and half above it) also increased by 4 percent, to $87,464 for this school year.

The Houston area’s seven-county Region 4 Education Service Center, with 54 school districts, has the state’s highest paid superintendents, with an average base salary of $148,573.

[snip]

03.27.06

MySpace impacts college entrance possibilities

Posted in News at 11:17 pm by Paloma Cruz

MySpace, TheirSpace
– reported by PittsburghLive.com

[snip]

In fact, they already have because they created personal Web sites, posted inappropriate photos of themselves and wrote things they wouldn’t dream of saying to someone in person.

And their potential employer has seen it all.

Welcome to the world of Internet social networking. It’s a place, many places in fact, where today’s young people let their hair down and connect, they hope, with other like-minded people.

Problem is, the Internet is available to everyone — including people whose job it is to dig up the dirt on prospective employees.

Employers, bankers, insurance brokers, and college admissions officers are becoming wise by using social networking and blogging sites as an addition to traditional background checks, such as credit and criminal history.

The more than 70 million people using these sites make it easy for anyone who wants to learn about them.

“Unfortunately, I think most of the people who are posting those are only thinking about their intended readers,” said Steven Rothberg, president and founder of CollegeRecruiter.com, the highest traffic career site used by students, recent graduates, and employers.

“If you’re a 20-year-old college student and you like to get drunk on the weekends, you’re probably going to put that on your profile because you want to hook up with other people that do the same.”

[snip]

Career services offices at universities across the country are working to protect students from unfortunate experiences by educating them about how widely used social sites are.

[snip]

Facebook users have the option to block their profiles from other students, faculty, or alumni of their sites, Hughes said. This can prove a good option for students who don’t want alumni who now work in human resources for major corporations to hold information on their sites against them when it comes to employment.

[snip]

Found via Bloggers Blog, which I found via LifeHacker.

Cy-Fair needs $20 million to make the payroll

Posted in News at 2:14 am by Paloma Cruz

Cy-Fair School District borrows $20 million to meet payroll
– reported by KHOU CBS Channel 11

A local school district has asked for and received one whopping bank loan.

How about $20 million?

That’s how much it claims it needed to meet payroll.

And we’ve learned the problem may get worse before its gets better.

The Cy-Fair School District is pointing to state lawmakers for the reason behind its payroll problem.

[snip]

And district administrators say if the legislature doesn’t come up with a solution this time, Cy-Fair may have to borrow even more money, as much as $40 million just to make school payroll next year.

[snip]

03.26.06

tuition to rise in UT Austin

Posted in News at 2:16 am by Paloma Cruz

UT-Austin may increase tuition 9.4%
Board of Regents is set to consider the plan Tuesday
– reported by the Houston Chronicle

Tuition and fees at the University of Texas at Austin would increase as much as 9.4 percent this fall under a plan the Board of Regents will consider Tuesday.

The proposal would increase the cost for an in-state undergraduate to attend the flagship campus by $329 a semester to $3,815. The plan also includes an increase of less than 1 percent starting in fall 2007.

[snip]

The plan comes on the heels of an 8.9 percent increase at Texas A&M. On Friday, regents approved a plan that raises tuition and fees at the College Station campus to $3,483 a semester for in-state undergraduates, up from $3,199.

03.25.06

residents concerned over HISD bus barn

Posted in News at 3:32 am by Paloma Cruz

New HISD bus barn causing traffic concern for residents
– reported by KHOU CBS Channel 11

Future construction on a new transportation hub for HISD has caused some concern for residents in northwest Houston.

Residents said a new bus barn is only going to create more traffic headaches in what is already considered a congested area.

HISD said the project is already moving forward, but the bus barn battle is far from over.

[snip]

The neighborhood in question is Pinemont.

03.23.06

Detroit sick-out

Posted in News at 3:29 am by Paloma Cruz

More than 50 Detroit schools closed by teacher sick-out
– reported y KTRK ABC Channel 13

Hundreds of Detroit teachers stayed home Wednesday, forcing more than 50 schools to close in what school officials described as a sick-out to protest a temporary pay cut.

The teachers are upset because some principals are getting raises while they are giving up five days of pay to help balance the district’s budget, district spokeswoman Mattie Majors said.

School officials estimated that 1,500 of the district’s 10,000 teachers were out sick Wednesday. Administrators and substitutes were sent to fill in, but 53 schools had to close, officials said.

[snip]

03.21.06

Online coloring book

Posted in Resources at 1:01 am by Paloma Cruz

LifeHacker pointed me to this online coloring book:

For those of you who love to color (or who have kids who love to color) coloring-book.info has a whole bunch of printable coloring book sheets. They’ve got everything from A Bug’s Life to The Chronic (what!?) cals of Narnia and everything in between. Who needs coloring books anymore?

The coloring book is provided by Xiti Gratuite.

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