A reminder about school exams

Just a reminder to all you parents out there that school is set to begin in a matter of weeks, so get your kids in for those before-school exams!

Illinois’ recently changed its rules to require all students either entering kindergarten or beginning an Illinois school to have an eye exam. Those entering kindergarten and second and sixth grades must also have a dental exam.

If you have any questions, check with your local school district.

Illinois named NCLB pilot program

Last week, Education Secretary Margaret Spellings named Illinois one of six pilot programs under No Child Left Behind.

Basically, what it means is that the big-wigs at the Illinois State Board of Education (most of whom haven’t been at the head of a classroom in years, if at all) get to make up some fancy new rules for holding schools accountable.

One state has decided to focus more on principal training. Others are developing their own programs.

Illinois, on the other hand, is relying on tutoring. Under the current federal NCLB rules, schools which fail Adequate Yearly Progress (AYP) for two years in a row have to offer their students school choice. After three years, schools have to offer tutoring.

This is pretty backwards, because it would stand to reason that tutoring should come BEFORE letting families jump ship. In Illinois, tutoring will now (if a school decides) be available after two years. After three years failing AYP, both school choice and tutoring have to be offered.

While it’s a step forward toward not making NCLB a cookie-cutter approach to education, I wish that the Illinois administrators would take a more proactive and creative approach. Instead of waiting until a school has failed for two years, for example, step into ALL schools and require tutoring based upon certain standards.

For me, it’s too little too late in the dying program that is NCLB. Either it needs to be nixed completely, or it needs some major overhauls.

Campaign 2008 and education?

One thing which has been conspicuously absent from the presidential campaign thus far has been discussion of education issues.

Sure, there’s been the occasional comment slung around about NCLB, but nothing has been gone into in-depth. I hope that, since both major parties have their presumptive nominees, the voters can begin to hear about more than the “major” issues.

Just so you can all educate yourselves, here are the campaign website links for Obama and McCain.

I will discuss them in more detail in later posts, especially as the campaign heats up, but a lack of time at the moment prevents me from doing so.

Some closure in a sad tale

An indictment has been returned in the case of 13-year-old Megan Meier, a Missouri girl who hanged herself in October 2006 after receiving cruel messages from “Josh Evans” via MySpace.

Problem was, Megan wasn’t talking to anyone named Josh Evans. He wasn’t 16 years old. And he wasn’t male.

He was the mother (and her employee) of one of Megan’s schoolmates, who had created the profile to gather information about Megan. Unfortunately, as happens in far too many cases where people try to conceal their identities for information-gathering purposes, the information-gathering took a horrible turn. Lori Drew wrote posts calling Megan all sorts of names, saying he never wanted to speak to her again. It’s these posts which Megan’s parents credit with their daughter’s suicide.

The story says the suit brought into court by Meier’s parents alleges

MySpace members agree to abide by terms of service that include, among other things, not promoting information they know to be false or misleading; soliciting personal information from anyone under age 18 and not using information gathered from the Web site to “harass, abuse or harm other people.”

Drew and others who were not named conspired to violate the service terms from about September 2006 to mid-October that year, according to the indictment. It alleges they registered as a MySpace member under a phony name and used the account to obtain information on the girl.

This case will, undoubtedly, be seen as a landmark in online litigation. It will be cited in any future cases of this nature.

While what happened in this situation is deplorable and Drew deserves to be punished for what she did, what some in the blogosphere fail to mention is that Megan’s parents weren’t necessarily as vigilant with monitoring her online activities as they should have been.

She was 13 years old. While three years’ difference may not seem like much in your later teens or beyond, the age and maturity difference between 13 and 16 are gigantic. No 13-year-old girl should be talking to a 16-year-old boy online.

And, that’s another matter. Parents need to be monitoring their children’s online activities, and they need to verify that the people their children are speaking with have real, flesh-and-bone counterparts. They should not be allowed to talk with people, especially to the point of developing a serious-sounding relationship with them, online unless they know them in person prior to conversing online.

Another issue in this case, compounding the tragedy, is that Megan was being treated for depression before her death. Her parents, then, should have been extra careful in watching what she was doing and who she was talking with. They should have had some more serious discussions with her about the potential dangers of getting too attached, and should have more closely monitored their daughter’s actions.

This situation, while incredibly tragic, could have been prevented by a little more vigilance on the Meiers’ part. Drew could have still created the false MySpace profile, but if Megan’s parents were following what she was doing online and having regular discussions with her, Drew’s actions may not have had the impact that they did.

What do you think?