K-12

Listening her way across the city. Budgeting her way to perdition. Dr. Jeanice K. Swift was not the Ann Arbor Board of Education’s first choice to lead the Ann Arbor Public Schools. The search for Dr. Patricia Green’s replacement began…

THE AAPS 2012-2013 audit represents the best of times and the worst of times. When auditor Plante Moran delivered the audit to the Board of Education on November 13th the BOE discovered that the AAPS has a $9.42 million fund balance. Prior…

A FEW YEARS ago, I met with my former high school social studies teacher to catch up over drinks. “Miss F” was one of my favorite teachers and we hadn’t seen each other in about 12 years. As we reminisced about our field trips, my other…

JUST 22 PERCENT of candidates passed a beefed-up version of Michigan’s basic-skills tests, up from more than 80 percent under the previous iteration. The plummeting passing rates are due to the state’s overhaul of all of its…

THE NUMBERS, ABOVE, represent the number of children enrolled in the Ann Arbor Public Schools who qualify for free or reduced price breakfasts and lunches. One in four children enrolled in the Ann Arbor Public Schools qualifies. This number…

ON MAY 14, 2012 the University of Michigan Mott Children’s Hospital released the results of a National Poll on Children’s Health which asked parents of middle- and high-school-age children nationwide about participation and cost of school…

THE ANN ARBOR Board of Education is asking voters to approve a proposed five-year renewal of its 1 mill sinking fund millage. That means the owner of a home with a taxable value of $200,000 would pay $100 per year. By law, funds captured…

Saline, Michigan public school Superintendent Scot Graden has been blogging about his job, public education and a variety of other education-related issues since 2007.  In 2009, writer Mark Stock published a piece in The School…

By P.D. Lesko Last year at this time my two sons, ages 10 and 13, were advanced in reading, mathematics and science, according to their work on the MEAP tests. This year, one son is advanced in social studies and that both are Level 2…

The New York Times recently published a feature about the 1 Percent. Reporters Shaila Dewan and Robert Gebeloff write: "Now, the colossal gap between the very rich and everyone else — the 1 percent versus the 99 percent — has become a…