Ecology of Education

Everyone is familiar to some degree with blood, the liquid in our bodies that carries oxygen, removes waste, and is an important part of our immune system. It is collected by blood collection centers, in mobile blood collection facilities in the parking lot of churches and malls. Blood is everywhere: In vampire movies, featured in [...]

In today’s computer oriented world, games can be educational and fun.  Educational games and educational game sites abound on the internet today.  Most of those sites are promoting games that make learning fun.  We took the top 10 free adult/young adult educational games to several Seattle retirement homes and asked the residents what they thought. [...]

With well over 60% of Americans supporting spending cuts at a federal level and budget cuts becoming one of the key issues in the Presidential election, it stands to reason that fiscal responsibility will be a top priority, regardless of who is elected in November.  If Obama wins, there will be massive pressure from the [...]

When we talk about education reform and fail to mention race, we leave the opportunity to face a central piece of the racial achievement gap at the door. And that is not putting students first.

It is hard to imagine that a person’s rights are only granted when there is money to pay for them.  Seriously, how would it go if people were given the freedom of religion only if there happened to be enough money to build the churches and pay for the preachers?  When times are tough, there [...]

Let’s just be clear for a second: Millions of children living below the poverty line have NO access to quality early childcare to nurture their minds. They enter school already well behind their more affluent peers. That deficit is minimized (not solved, just lessened) by the quality programming on PBS, the flagship of which is [...]

We debate testing, tenure, and “great teachers” ad nauseum. We one up each other over who is putting students more first than anyone else. We parse choice, accountability, and common core until we can barely stand one another. We do this, not because we are gluttons for punishment, but because we know learning matters, and [...]