Can a state education agency impose professional sanctions against a teacher who beats a child when the child is the teacher’s own son and the beating takes place at home?

This commentary acknowledges the murder of Lawrence King, and provides information on prejudice and bullying based on sexual orientation and gender identity. It considers the public reaction to King's murder, and discusses research on the strategies that make a difference to promote school safety for lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender students. It identifies important questions for future educational research.

“Don’t make a mountain out of a molehill,” is a warning we hear from time to time. In other words, don’t make too much of a problem that really isn’t all that serious. When university administrators become annoyed with a subordinate over some minor matter and are tempted to take strong, unilateral action, they should think about the Stotter case. It is almost always better for academicians to resolve minor disputes among themselves and not in the courts.

The author relies on years of classroom experience as well as data on the health and well-being of the nation’s children to make the case that schools alone cannot address the gap in achievement between economically advantaged and disadvantaged youngsters. The author argues that a large and growing minority of children in this country are living in precarious conditions. These conditions must be addressed if the achievement gap is to be closed.

When we were undergraduates the personal lives of our professors were the stuff of mysterious wonder. Now, more and more professors just like us are creating Facebook pages that reveal a side of ourselves--our taste in music, hobbies, and favorite books--in an effort to connect with a generation of students who were not alive before the Internet came into use. Here is one faculty member's account of using Facebook and some suggested rules for effective online engagement in this instant-messaging world.

From time to time we hear people complain about unwarranted judicial interference in the day-to-day business of public education. But surely we are all grateful that school children have access to federal courts when they are victims of very serious infringements on their basic human rights. Thanks in large part to the federal courts, American school children do not live in the Orwellian world of 1984.

Educators owe a legal duty to their students to protect them from foreseeable harm. Educators, as professionals, are also required to act in an ethical manner towards their students. But what happens when the duty to protect conflicts with the wishes and legal rights of the parents and possibly the student? A do not resuscitate order for a student challenges the legal duty to protect and the professional demand to act ethically. Unfortunately, this situation occurs within the special education community of our public schools with heart wrenching frequency.

In an election season marked by persistent references to JFK, Martin Luther King Jr., Ronald Reagan, and “big brother” surveillance, it would seem axiomatic that familiarity with the stuff of history is essential. Yet, it appears that students soon to graduate high school have, at best, an uncertain grasp of key historical and literary facts. In a new study, forty percent of the nation’s 17-year-olds could not identify the proper half-century in which the First World War took place.

Nearly 32 years ago, while serving an 18-month sentence in a New York State Division for Youth detention facility, I met a teacher who taught math in a way I could understand.

A variety of evidence suggests that modification of current exit exams to reward multiple levels of student achievement with corresponding diploma options is more likely to promote high educational standards and improve student achievement without excessive failure rates.

A teacher educator reminds faculty to think carefully and reflect on their own practice, particularly when students who have previously failed a course must now re-enroll. Keeping the lines of communication open between the Dean and/or Department Chair, extending normal office hours, respecting students' confidentiality, and revising your syllabus accordingly may help faculty better address the needs of both repeating and first-time students.

The question I’m trying to raise has little to do with the value of qualitative or quantitative research. It has to do with the degree to which the amount of qualitative research in the field of education is related to the field’s struggles at building a common knowledge domain.

In 2006, the U.S. Supreme Court issued its decision in Garcetti v. Ceballos, an opinion that sharply restricts the First Amendment's protection for a public employee who reports wrongdoing in the workplace. In years to come, we will likely see federal courts apply the Supreme Court’s Garcetti analysis to cases in which school employees claim they were retaliated against for reporting workplace wrongdoing to their superiors. In most instances, school employees are going to lose these cases and possibly their jobs. For those who believe that school employees should be encouraged to report workplace wrongdoing—not discouraged, Garcetti is indeed unfortunate.

It is time for public school educators to take a stand against state and local anti-immigration laws that are motivated by a desire to force undocumented immigrant families out of their homes and communities. Undocumented immigration is a federal issue that must be addressed comprehensively by Congress—not by state legislators and city council people who are attacking this issue in a piecemeal and often punitive fashion. Individually and through our professional organizations, let us make clear that we oppose such laws because of the harm they cause to children, and let us make our voices heard.

A small retooling of the Grade Point Average may open a window on new and interesting research possibilities. The commentary describes the hows and whys.

I was delighted to read Neil Eckardt’s (2007) commentary “The Prevalence of Qualitative Methodology at AERA’s Annual Meeting and the Potential Consequences.” The questions he raised about ideology in educational research are important. For raising these questions, I commend his effort at establishing a dialogue on the related issues. That being said, I would not be responding to the commentary, if I were not troubled by many of the statements, assertions, and conclusions that he makes in the piece.

In the course of thirty years in higher education, I have seen technology used as delivery system, then as content in the classroom, and finally as classroom, building and campus itself, and in every case, pedagogy changed to accommodate the technology.

Teachers are arguably the most heavily unionized workforce in America. They are also professionals. How do teachers fit together these seemingly disparate roles—union member and member of a profession?

Much like the good and bad hair controversy of yesterday, today I have experienced the same controversies being played out among African Americans in a somewhat different context. It is in the higher education arena that I have witnessed two very disquieting phenomena, both exacting a negative impact on African American faculty. I have noticed what appears to be an ever-widening chasm developing among African American faculty; namely, professional elitism based on academic pedigree and the pervasive “only room for one” mindset that at best quells and at worst kills efforts for collaboration, esprit de corps, and a positive sense of self-efficacy and esteem. This article attempts to untangle these good and bad hair divisions in an effort to improve the climate for faculty of color, particularly African American faculty. For higher education in general and African American faculty in particular, it will become increasingly important to excoriate inequality and injustices exacted from agents not only outside, but also internal to the African American higher education community.

The New York City public school system introduced a new plan this fall to offer monetary incentives to students for performance on standardized tests. This experiment will involve at least 40 schools and at least 9,000 students. This commentary discusses the problems with such an incentive program and argues for other means for addressing “achievement gaps” that are more supported by evidence.

In California, a lesbian school girl sued school authorities, arguing that her constitutional right to privacy had been violated when her principal disclosed her sexual orientation to her mother. The case, Nguon v. Wolf, provides useful guidance to educators about how and when to discuss a student's sexual orientation with the student's parents.

Evidence obtained from AERA’s 2006 Annual Meeting seems to raise an important question, which I encourage the field to take seriously: Might the seemingly high portion of qualitative work at AERA be related to the struggles the field of education experiences in attempting to come together and build up a core knowledge domain?

This commentary considers the problems of New Orleans public schools and the likely impact of new Superintendent Paul Vallas.

The charges brought against six black youth in a small town in Lousiana galvanized the nation’s attention and prompted national consideration of issues of bias and disproportionality in education and the juvenile justice system. Yet controversy in the case runs deep, leaving even many of the basic facts of the matter in dispute. This article argues that the different perspectives that African American and white observers bring to the story are typical when we approach the issue of race and ethnicity. Differences in historical experience have led us to interpret events involving race differently depending on the color of our skin, extending even to the willingness to talk about the issue. In particular, the central symbol of the noose in the Jena Six case has an important history that cannot be ignored. The sensitivity of community and national leaders to that history may be a strong predictor of whether such events remain isolated incidents, or become the first in a proliferation of further hate crimes.

Unfortunately, students and teachers still experience discrimination and harassment based on sexual orientation. Nevertheless, thanks to progressive legislators and courts scattered around the country, discrimination in the schools based on sexual orientation is headed toward the dustbin of American history. Among all the problems that public schools face, it is reassuring to know that the civil rights of gays and lesbians in American schools are expanding and not in retreat.