382. College Access and Success News

Here are links to recent news on college access and success.

by

Joe Rottenborn
Executive Director, Mahoning Valley College Access Program (MVCAP)

1. Read The Joe Rottenborn Daily ▸ today's top stories on college access and success via @rottenbornj ▸ http://paper.li/rottenbornj

2. At White House Meeting on Affordability, a Call for Urgency, Innovation, and Leadership, by Collin Eatonhttp://chronicle.com/article/At-White-House-Meeting-on/130012/ -"Improving completion with the existing enrollment is not going to close the gap, we're going to have to get more students and get more students to complete—a good portion of them are going to have to be nontraditional students, those already in the work force."

3. Questions for the SAT's Top Cop, by Jacques Steinberg: http://nyti.ms/s4deNW - "During the 2010-11 academic year, the office conducted about 9,600 investigations of SAT testing irregularities, including fire alarms going off during testing and reports of test taker impersonation. On test day, test takers must present their admission ticket as well as an acceptable form of photo ID. The name on the admission ticket must match exactly the name on the ID, and the ID must include a recent, recognizable photo. Test center staff members are authorized to refuse admission to any test taker with invalid or questionable ID. A list of acceptable forms of ID is available on the SAT Web site."

4. The 'Boy Problem' Examined, by Elizabeth Murphy Inside Higher Ed: http://bit.ly/tE7mzE via AddThis - "The female advantage is present across racial groups, as well, according to the data. In 1981, the most recent birth year calculated, white women have an 11 percent point advantage over white men, black women are at 9 percentage points and Hispanic women at 6 percentage points, according to the paper."

5. GAINS AND GAPS: CHANGING INEQUALITY IN U.S. COLLEGE ENTRY AND COMPLETION, by Martha J. Bailey and Susan M. Dynarski - http://www.nber.org/tmp/1823-w17633.pdf - "We find growing gaps between children from high- and low-income families in college entry, persistence, and graduation. . . . Sex differences in educational attainment, which were small or nonexistent thirty years ago,are now substantial, with women outpacing men in every demographic group. The female advantage in educational attainment is largest in the top quartile of the income distribution."

6. Districts see rise in homeless students, by Charlie Boss The Columbus Dispatch - http://www.dispatch.com/content/stories/local/2011/12/05/when-shelter-is-home.html - "It seems like in December and January, everything falls apart for a family,” said Pam Reveal, who oversees enrollment for Groveport Madison schools. “They lose their homes and jobs. A lot of them won’t go to a shelter unless they absolutely have to. Some have been sleeping in parking lots." The 5,822-student school district just southeast of Columbus has the highest rate of homeless students in Franklin County. About 8percent of the district’s students did not have a permanent address at one point last school year. That’s about 450 students, more than triple the number from the 2006-07 school year."

7. How to Rescue Education Reform, by FREDERICK M. HESS and LINDA DARLING-HAMMOND: http://nyti.ms/tntDvY - "Perhaps No Child Left Behind’s most enduring lesson is the value of humility — a virtue that must be taken to heart in crafting a smarter, more coherent federal role in schooling."

8. Employers Say College Graduates Lack Job Skills, by Lacey Johnson -http://chronicle.com/article/Employers-Say-College/130013/ - "The group surveyed more than 1,000 employers in various industries last month about whether job applicants possess the skills to thrive in the workplace. More than half of employers said finding qualified applicants is difficult, and just under half thought students should receive specific workplace training rather than a more broad-based education."

9. Guest post: A more relaxed approach to Early Decision, by Jeff Rickey - College, Inc. - http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/college-inc/post/guest-post-a-more-relaxed-approach-to-early-decision/2011/12/06/gIQAo1JXZO_blog.html?tid=sm_btn_twitter via Washingtonpost.Newsweek Interactive - "Instead of making them wait to hear from us until the middle of March, we developed a plan that allows students to apply Early Decision at any time up until our Regular Decision deadline of February 1. Students declare their Early Decision intentions by completing and submitting the Early Decision contract, and, once that is received and the admissions application is complete, the application is evaluated and the student is notified, usually within a couple of weeks of completion."

10. Still Waiting: Black Male Achievement in America, by LaVar Young - http://www.huffingtonpost.com/lavar-young/black-male-achievement_b_1121379.html?ref=education&ir=Education - "But, the statistics are tangible and certainly disturbing, and they start immediately at birth. For one, black infant mortality rates are more than twice that of whites, in a country that already has one of the highest infant mortality rates in the developed world. As they grow into toddlerhood and childhood, the evidence mounts. Two-thirds of black children live in single parent households, which is three times that of white children. And one-third live in poverty, compared with one tenth of their white counterparts. In school, black males score lower on standardized tests, are nearly twice as likely to drop out of high school, three times as likely to be suspended from school and less likely to go on to a two-year or four-year college."

381. College Access and Success News

Here are links to recent news on college access and success.
by
Joe Rottenborn

Executive Director, Mahoning Valley College Access Program (MVCAP)

1. Read The Joe Rottenborn Daily ▸ today's top stories on college access and success via @rottenbornj ▸ http://paper.li/rottenbornj

2. Private Colleges That Keep the Average Student Debt Low, by Rebecca R. Ruiz: http://nyti.ms/uXMfI9 - "While the average college student graduates with about $28,000 in personal debt and two out of every three students borrow money for school, according to the College Board, the extent to which a student is in the red at graduation can vary dramatically by institution."

3. Protecting Friendships During the College Admissions Process, by Susannah L. Griffee: http://nyti.ms/vvNeMx - "Looking back, I wish I had kept my college list completely private. It may have made me feel proud to publicly post my acceptances, but I know it made the people who didn’t get into those colleges upset and resentful. The trade-off wasn’t worth it."

4. Obama administration issues affirmative action guidance for colleges, by Scott Jaschik Inside Higher Ed: http://bit.ly/vdliEY via AddThis - "Guidance issued jointly Friday afternoon by the Departments of Education and Justice states that diversity is an important educational goal, and that colleges should be able to use a variety of methods (including the consideration of race and ethnicity in admissions) to achieve diversity."

5. Employers' 11 favorite recruiting strategies for hiring new college grads, by Lynn O'Shaughnessy - http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-505145_162-57332235/employers-11-favorite-recruiting-strategies-for-hiring-new-college-grads/?tag=mncol;lst;10 - "While most employers use eight to 10 recruiting methods when searching for new talent, internship programs were favored by 66% of workplaces, while career fairs came in second among job recruiters looking for new hires."

6. What employers are paying new college grads, by Lynn O'Shaughnessy - http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-505125_162-57332487/what-employers-are-paying-new-college-grads/?tag=mncol;lst;9 - "The survey included salaries for selected bachelor's degrees and the results clearly show that graduates with advanced math skills are at the top of the salary heap."

7. Hechinger Report For millions of college dropouts, second chances prove difficult, by Emily Hanford: http://hechingerreport.org/content/for-millions-of-college-dropouts-second-chances-prove-difficult_7065/#.TtzZdMlu4i4.twitter via AddThis - "Capece finally gave up and dropped out, becoming one of 37 million Americans who have some college credits but no degree. That’s more than 20 percent of the working-age population. At a time when there’s more of a push than ever to increase the number of Americans with college degrees, close to half of the people who start college, like Capece, end up walking away, many of them saddled with debt. College dropouts who took out loans leave with a median debt of $7,000. Some give up only a few credits away from graduation."

8. Why Does the SAT Endure? - http://www.nytimes.com/roomfordebate/2011/12/04/why-should-sats-matter via @roomfordebate - "If, as critics claim, the test can be gamed, why are the scores still so meaningful to college admissions officials, and does the SAT put students who can’t afford to take prep classes at a disadvantage?"

9. A Good Intelligence Test, by David Z. Hambrick - http://www.nytimes.com/roomfordebate/2011/12/04/why-should-sats-matter/the-sat-is-a-good-intelligence-test via @roomfordebate - "Large-scale meta-analyses by researchers at the University of Minnesota have found that SAT performance is as good of a predictor of overall college grade point average as it is of freshman grade point average, and Vanderbilt researchers David Lubinski and Camilla Benbow have documented that the SAT predicts life outcomes well beyond the college years, including income and occupational achievements."

10. Khan Academy Blends Its YouTube Approach With Classrooms, by SOMINI SENGUPTA: http://nyti.ms/s840SN - "Mr. Khan, 35, has become something of an online sensation with his Khan Academy math and science lessons on YouTube, which has attracted up to 3.5 million viewers a month. Now he wants to weave those digital lessons into the fabric of the school curriculum — a more ambitious and as yet untested proposition. This semester, at least 36 schools nationwide are trying out Mr. Khan’s experiment: splitting up the work of teaching between man and machine, and combining teacher-led lessons with computer-based lectures and exercises."

11. Why School Choice Fails, by NATALIE HOPKINSON: http://nyti.ms/vO0FWI - "Such inequities are the perverse result of a “reform” process intended to bring choice and accountability to the school system. Instead, it has destroyed community-based education for working-class families, even as it has funneled resources toward a few better-off, exclusive, institutions."

12. White House Invites College Leaders to Closed-Door Meeting on Affordability, by Collin Eaton - http://chronicle.com/article/White-House-Invites-College/130007/ - "The discussion will be a candid conversation about how higher education can remove barriers "to college access, affordability, and success for students," according to a letter of invitation, from the White House to the higher-education leaders, that was obtained by The Chronicle."

13. Some Asians' college strategy: Don't check box – http://usat.ly/sKy4Dq via @USATODAY - "For years, many Asian-Americans have been convinced that it's harder for them to gain admission to the nation's top colleges. Studies show that Asian-Americans meet these colleges' admissions standards far out of proportion to their 6 percent representation in the U.S. population, and that they often need test scores hundreds of points higher than applicants from other ethnic groups to have an equal chance of admission."

380. College Access and Success News

Here are links to recent news on college access and success.

by

Joe Rottenborn
Executive Director, Mahoning Valley College Access Program (MVCAP)

1. Read The Joe Rottenborn Daily ▸ today's top stories on college access and success via @rottenbornj ▸ http://paper.li/rottenbornj

2. New book says elite black students don't try for high-paying jobs, by Allie Grasgreen Inside Higher Ed: http://bit.ly/saSoWE via AddThis - "Yet, many of the students she interviewed socialized primarily with other black peers. “While black students may derive substantial value from these networks, there is also a considerable downside to their separation from the wider campus community. Racially integrated networks provide access to information otherwise unavailable to these students, including the existence of occupations they had never considered, the awareness of how to obtain training for them, and connections to professionals (white and nonwhite) who possess them.”

3. Poverty Matters, by Peter DeWitt - http://blogs.edweek.org/edweek/finding_common_ground/2011/11/poverty_matters.html via @educationweek - "On average, professional parents spoke over 2,000 words per hour to their children, working class parents spoke about 1,300, and welfare mothers spoke about 600. So by age 3, children of professionals had vocabularies that were nearly 50% greater than those of working-class children and twice as large as those of welfare children" (Rothstein, 2004, p. 28)."

4. On Long Island, SAT Cheating Was Hardly a Secret, by JENNY ANDERSON and PETER APPLEBOME: http://nyti.ms/vPRg6d - "In Great Neck, a place where the high-achieving schools are the center of public life, and where high-priced tutors and admissions consultants are routine advantages for the wealthy, educators and parents are mortified that the community’s reputation could be muddied by the SAT scandal. But while it is clear that only a tiny proportion of students at the schools cheated, the scheme came to light only because it was widespread and well known enough that officials at North got wind of it."

5. Consumer Advocate Says States Fall Short in Oversight of For-Profit Colleges, by Goldie Blumenstyk - http://chronicle.com/article/Consumer-Advocate-Says-States/129978/ - "While the federal government and some states have recently increased their regulation of the sector, "only a few states have devoted sufficient resources in recent years to challenge for-profit school abuses and provide relief for students," says the report from the National Consumer Law Center. "Regardless of their views on how best to deliver higher education, all regulators and policy makers should be against ripping off students."

6. What matters most in college admissions — money or merit? by Esther Quintero - The Answer Sheet - http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/answer-sheet/post/what-matters-most-in-college-admissions--money-or-merit/2011/11/30/gIQALNKEJO_blog.html?tid=sm_btn_twitter via @washingtonpost - "Money, not only merit, matters in college admissions. According to the survey of 462 directors and managers, in the face of generalized budget cuts, universities are favoring applicants who don’t need financial assistance to pay their tuition.About 22 percent agreed that “the financial downturn [had] forced them to pay more attention to an applicants’ ability to pay when [making] admissions decisions.” Directors acknowledged seeking more candidates who would not need financial aid, including out-of-state and international students. Furthermore, 10 percent of four-year colleges reported that the admitted students who could pay in full had lower grades than their peers who couldn’t."

7. Guest post: In defense of a liberal education, by Christopher Nelson - College, Inc. -http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/college-inc/post/guest-post-in-defense-of-a-liberal-education/2011/12/02/gIQAj8plKO_blog.html?tid=sm_btn_twitter via @washingtonpost -"The best educated person today, just as yesterday, is one fully capable of adapting to or taking advantage of changing conditions, precisely because the well-educated adult has integrity of character, a rootedness in essentials, and a self-understanding that makes it possible to live well and consistently in an unpredictable world."

375. College Access and Success News

Here are links to recent news on college access and success.

by

Joe Rottenborn
Executive Director, Mahoning Valley College Access Program (MVCAP)

1. Read The Joe Rottenborn Daily ▸ today's top stories on college access and success via @rottenbornj ▸ http://paper.li/rottenbornj

2. Financial Aid Help: http://t.co/eV0mVNlE - "Seniors and Senior Parents: It’s a great time to sign up for your pin #’s from FAFSA.ED.GOV (the Free Application for Federal Student Aid). A parent needs a pin # and a student needs a separate pin # in order to file. Go to fafsa.ed.gov and click “Get Pin #” to proceed."

3. 'Evaluating, Understanding And Comparing Financial Aid Offers' http://t.co/9SmcutMC - "So you have been accepted at several colleges that you applied to. You filed your FAFSA and other financial aid forms. You have been waiting for the numbers to arrive and finally they start filling you mailbox. Now what?"

4. Counselors Urge Applicants to Hit Aid Deadlines http://t.co/DkQaiIT7 via @townnews - "High school officials are urging parents to pay attention to deadlines so there are no missed opportunities while applying for student loans and financial aid for high school seniors."

5. North Star Financial Advisor Gives Back http://t.co/dEUXTXC4 via @sfgate - "Clarisa Hernandez of North Star Resource Group works to help create a better future for underprivileged children."

6. Minnesota Early Childhood Education Achievement Gap http://t.co/EFKnJgLk via @ABC6NEWS

7. Are black students lacking basic skills? http://t.co/mNyf0AtQ - "OPINION - Across the country, the achievement gap between white students and black students persists. . . ."

8. Minorities’ ISAT scores on rise in D300 - Elgin Courier News: http://t.co/gCVAZ0xb via @AddThis - "ALGONQUIN — Elementary and middle school students who are Hispanic and black are closing achievement gaps in Community Unit School District 300."

9. Frenzy over SATs - http://t.co/cUcqeSZC - "In my work with families I encounter a great deal of anxiety about the college application process. Much of this anxiety occurs when parents and kids come late to the tasks at hand. In a panic, they desperately try to play catch-up in order to get through everything that needs to be done . . . ."

10. Mexicans in New York City Lag in Education, by Kirk Semple: http://nyti.ms/tt9mlb - "Mexicans, the fastest-growing major immigrant group in the city, have the highest dropout rate: about 41 percent of Mexicans ages 16 to 19 have dropped out of school. . . . This crisis endures at the college level. Among Mexican immigrants 19 to 23 who do not have a college degree, only 6 percent are enrolled. That is a fraction of the rates among other major immigrant groups and the native-born population."

373. College Access and Success News

Here are links to recent news on college access and success.

by

Joe Rottenborn
Executive Director, Mahoning Valley College Access Program (MVCAP)

1. Lee El Diario de Joe Rottenborn ▸ noticias destacadas del dia via @rottenbornj ▸ http://paper.li/rottenbornj

2. Panel's Failure Means Education Cuts in '13, by Rebecca R. Ruiz: http://nyti.ms/tvlcqO -"While the Pell Grant program is exempt from cuts in the first year, the other student-aid programs will lose $134-million, reducing aid to at least 1.3 million students. Career, technical, and adult education will lose $136-million, affecting 1.4 million students, says the committee."

3. More Charges, More Details in SAT Cheating Scandal Inside Higher Ed: http://bit.ly/rwfAXd via AddThis - "Some of those charged allegedly paid others to take the SAT on their behalf. Prosecutors said that they believed that 40 students and former students were involved, but that the statute of limitations prevented charges from being brought against all of them."

4. Poll shows concern over Penn State and other athletic programs, by Allie Grasgreen Inside Higher Ed: http://bit.ly/v5PVRh via AddThis - "A full 72 percent of respondents said Division I college athletic programs have “too much influence over college life.” Only 3 percent said programs have too little influence; 16 percent said they have “about the right amount” and 9 percent were unsure."

5. GAO releases new investigation of for-profit colleges, by Paul Fain Inside Higher Ed: http://bit.ly/tXujkA via AddThis - "The U.S. Government Accountability Office has released results from a second undercover “secret shopper” investigation of for-profit colleges, this time attempting to enroll a fictitious student online at 15 unnamed institutions. The findings were mixed, but investigators uncovered problems with how seven of the colleges handled online course grading, academic dishonesty, or students’ exit counseling."

6. Finding Common Ground: Why Educators Should Join Twitter, by Peter DeWitt - http://blogs.edweek.org/edweek/finding_common_ground/2011/11/why_educators_should_join_twitter.html via @educationweek - "We live in the 21st century where our students don't just "do" social networking; it is a part of who they are as digital citizens. To us, it's a big deal to get on Facebook or Twitter, and to our students it is something they cannot fathom living without. Understanding their connection with those sites will increase an educator's connection with their students. Being able to talk their language may even provide an opportunity to breakthrough to a hard to reach student."

7. More Students Charged in Long Island SAT Cheating Case, By JENNY ANDERSON and WINNIE HU: http://nyti.ms/uA0Cx7 - "The investigation began when administrators at Great Neck North looked into student rumors. Their focus soon fell on students who had registered to take the tests outside the district, and those whose scores and grades showed a disparity. They turned over the details to prosecutors, who opened a broad examination."

8. How the Future Looks From High School http://www.nytimes.com/roomfordebate/2011/11/22/how-the-future-looks-from-high-school via @roomfordebate - "How does the future look to a high school senior? We checked in with 15 of them, at four American high schools."

9. Undercover Probe Finds Lax Academic Standards at Some For-Profit Colleges, by Kelly Field - http://chronicle.com/article/Undercover-Probe-Finds-Lax/129881/ - "The probe, which is described in a report made public Tuesday, found that staff at six of the 12 colleges that enrolled the investigators tolerated plagiarism or awarded credit for incomplete or shoddy work."

368. College Access and Success News

Here are links to recent news on college access and success.
by
Joe Rottenborn
Executive Director, Mahoning Valley College Access Program (MVCAP)

1. Read The Joe Rottenborn Daily on http://paper.li/rottenbornj

2. Only One in Three Full-Time Students Pays Full Tuition, by Rebecca R. Ruiz: http://nyti.ms/vuXtgU - "In a piece entitled, “College Is Cheaper Than You Think,” Ms. Scott-Clayton, an economics professor at Columbia University, asserts that a school’s sticker price, ever-rising, carries little meaning. She notes that only one-third of full-time students pay a college’s published price, writing: 'For the average full-time student, net tuition – which subtracts grants and tax-based aid – is less than half of the published price at private nonprofit four-year schools and less than a third of the published price at the typical public four-year institution.'"

3. Judith Scott-Clayton: College Is Cheaper Than You Think: http://nyti.ms/vM7IGE - "After accounting for this assistance, net tuition and fees in the public four-year sector, at $2,490, are only $170 higher today (in constant 2011 dollars) than they were five years ago. At private nonprofit four-year institutions, net prices are $500 lower than they were five years ago. And at community colleges, the average student actually faces a negative net price – meaning they receive about $800 more in aid than they are charged in tuition and fees."

4. Part 3: Answers to Your Questions on Scholarships and Student Loans, by Mark Kantrowitz: http://nyti.ms/w1ke0x - "One of the best strategies for cutting college costs is to send your children to an in-state public college. According to the College Board’s Trends in College Pricing2011, the average published charges for tuition, fees, room and board at an in-state public four-year college in 2011-12 is $17,131. This is much less than the $29,657 average for out-of-state public four-year colleges and the $38,589 average for private non-profit four-year colleges. Even if you get no financial aid, you will still save money at an in-state public college. Many public colleges are high quality, yielding an excellent return on the investment in your child’s future."

5. Tax credits for tuition growing rapidly, by Libby A. Nelson Inside Higher Ed: http://bit.ly/toF6Mt via AddThis - "When the American Opportunity Tax Credit took effect in 2009, the tax savings claimed by students and families for college expenses more than doubled, climbing from $6.6 billion to $14.7 billion, according to the College Board’s Trends in Student Aid 2011 report last month. The explosive growth of Pell Grants in the same time period generated discussion, debate and an uneasy consensus that the $37 billion program is unsustainable in its current form. The parallel climb in spending on tax credits has attracted little notice."

6. Annapolis Group survey finds high satisfaction among liberal arts college graduates, by Kevin Kiley Inside Higher Ed: http://bit.ly/w0zs3I - "According to the results, 77 percent of alumni from liberal arts colleges rated their undergraduate experience “excellent,” compared to 59 percent of alumni from private universities and 56 percent from the top 50 public universities. Graduates of Annapolis Group member institutions also reported that their college experience made them better prepared for life after college, career changes, and graduate school than did alumni from other sectors. They also reported being as prepared for their first jobs as alumni from other institutions."

7. Erroneous Pell Grant Payments in 2011 Total $1 Billion Inside Higher Ed: http://bit.ly/syimSh via AddThis - "The Obama administration credits the drop to new measures that linked the Free Application for Federal Student Aid to Internal Revenue Service data, making it less likely that information about students' family income would be entered improperly."

8. No More Excuses: We Can Get All Children Reading, by Robert Slavin - http://blogs.edweek.org/edweek/sputnik/2011/11/no_more_excuses_we_can_get_all_children_reading.html via @educationweek - "The latest NAEP results, released this month, remind us that there are far too many children who do not read well, that disadvantaged and minority children are overrepresented among poor readers, and that the inequalities in academic outcomes by race and class--our most serious social as well as educational problem--begins with reading inequalities in the early grades. Everyone knows that children who don't read well will incur huge expenses over time in remediation, special education, repeated grades, and ultimately delinquency, dropout, and unemployment."

9. 11 States Seek Relief From ‘No Child’ Provisions, in Return for Raising Standards, by Sam Dillon: http://nyti.ms/u5sJqw - "Colorado, Florida, Georgia, Indiana, Kentucky, Massachusetts, Minnesota, New Jersey, New Mexico, Oklahoma and Tennessee asked the department for relief from some No Child provisions, including the requirement that all students be proficient in English and math by 2014."

10. Penn State case presses others on abuse laws, by Marisol Bello and Greg Toppo – http://usat.ly/s1cA1d via @USATODAY - "A key issue likely to be debated in state legislatures is whether reports should go straight to police, and whether new laws are needed to shore up vague guidelines and polices about child safety on campus."

11. Are the SAT and ACT to blame for the inferiority of U.S. schools? by Jay Mathews - http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/class-struggle/post/admissions-101-are-the-sat-and-act-to-blame-for-the-inferiority-of-us-schools-compared-to-those-finland-japan-singapore-and-shanghai/2011/11/14/gIQAHKAiMN_blog.html?tid=sm_btn_twitter via Washingtonpost.Newsweek Interactive - "Unlike the SAT and the ACT, the content of the entrance exams in these countries is controlled by the universities and is closely tied to the content of the courses given in senior high school grades. Usually the exams must be scored by human beings since they are full of essay questions."

366. College Access and Success News

Here are links to recent news on college access and success.
by
Joe Rottenborn
Executive Director, Mahoning Valley College Access Program (MVCAP)

1. Read The Joe Rottenborn Daily on http://paper.li/rottenbornj

2. SAT Essay Question Proves Prescient, Jacques Steinberg: http://nyti.ms/tiKkNa - "The test-takers were then asked to answer a question — “Is it often difficult for people to determine what is the right thing to do?” — and directed to use “examples taken from your reading, studies, experience, or observations.”

3. Seeking Your Questions on Scholarships and Student Loans, by Jacques Steinberg: http://nyti.ms/rwHDtl - "I’ve once again asked Mark Kantrowitz, a financial aid expert and founder of the Web sites finaid.org and fastweb.com, to spend a week in our virtual Guidance Office."

4. Latest Developments on Penn State Inside Higher Ed: http://bit.ly/v6k4eS via AddThis - "For those seeking perspective on how the Penn State scandal compares to other major athletics scandals, Slate has assembled links to some of the better long-form journalism on such scandals in the past, as well as some more recent coverage."

5. HechingerEd Blog The new G.I. Bill: Big money, big challenges [podcast]: http://bit.ly/rDEFfU via AddThis - "In September, Hechinger Report writer Jon Marcus reported for The Washington Post that universities were heavily recruiting veterans to get a piece of the $11 billion made available through the new post-9/11 G.I. Bill, but providing little of the additional support that many veterans say they need."

6. Why Do Top Schools Still Take Legacy Applicants? http://www.nytimes.com/roomfordebate/2011/11/13/why-do-top-schools-still-take-legacy-applicants via @roomfordebate - "A recent article in The Times about the pressure felt by Ivy League alumni to get their children into their alma maters — and by those children to get into their parents’ colleges — demonstrated that legacy preferences are still a big part of the admissions process at top schools."

7. Affirmative Action for the Rich, by Richard D. Kahlenberg - http://www.nytimes.com/roomfordebate/2011/11/13/why-do-top-schools-still-take-legacy-applicants/affirmative-action-for-the-rich via @roomfordebate -"Legacy preferences provide the equivalent of a 160 point boost on the math and verbal SATs, not the “tiebreaker” that many universities claim. These preferences disproportionately benefit wealthy white students, providing, in essence, affirmative action for the rich."

8. How Do You Define Merit? Debra J. Thomas and Terry L. Shepard - http://www.nytimes.com/roomfordebate/2011/11/13/why-do-top-schools-still-take-legacy-applicants/humans-cant-be-ranked-by-merit via @roomfordebate - "Fewer than 100 of the nation's 3,500 colleges and universities -- less than 3 percent -- have so many qualified applicants that they have to choose among them. At this handful of institutions, legacies are only a small fraction of the candidates. Of these few legacies, not all are admitted, and many that are would have been accepted anyway."

9. Bad for Diversity, by John C. Brittain - http://www.nytimes.com/roomfordebate/2011/11/13/why-do-top-schools-still-take-legacy-applicants/legacy-preferences-are-bad-for-campus-diversity via @roomfordebate - "A study conducted by researchers at Duke University in 2005 found that underrepresented minorities constitute 28.2 percent of the U.S. population; 12.5 percent of the entire applicant pool of 18 national schools; but minority legacy applicants only accounted for 6.7 percent of the applicant pool. The researchers concluded that legacies today reflect the domination of whites that have in their words, “monopolized” higher education throughout history."

10. Respect for Tradition, by Stephen Joel Trachtenberg - Room for Debate
http://www.nytimes.com/roomfordebate/201...

- "More likely legacy admissions are a small number of a large group of set-asides, of special categories crafted and blended into a tapestry of talent that make up an incoming class: legacies, yes, but also musicians, athletes, veterans, minorities, students from all regions of the country and nations of the world, along with those who wish to study rare languages or STEM subjects (science, technology, engineering and mathematics)."

11. Hard-Core Economics, by Peter Sacks - http://www.nytimes.com/roomfordebate/2011/11/13/why-do-top-schools-still-take-legacy-applicants/hard-core-economics via @roomfordebate - "Elite institutions have struck an implicit bargain with their alumni. That bargain essentially says, “You give us money, and we will move your kid to the front of the line.” . . . The whole enterprise is brought to you by the generosity of ordinary American taxpayers, via tax breaks and subsidies. Their children are waiting patiently in the back of the line, buying into the myth that the system is fair and meritocratic, when in fact, the game is rigged, and the winners are pre-ordained."

12. Athletes Are the Problem, by Michele Hernandez - http://www.nytimes.com/roomfordebate/2011/11/13/why-do-top-schools-still-take-legacy-applicants/in-college-admissions-athletes-are-the-problem via @roomfordebate - "Like it or not, 40 percent of the class at most top colleges are reserved for "hooked" kids -- the largest group is generally recruited athletes (up to 20 percent), the rest are legacies, underrepresented minorities, development cases (donors) and V.I.P.'s (famous people's kids). It's hard for me to say legacy preferences are not fair because the truth is that the process isn't fair and legacies take up a relatively minor percentage of the class (typically 10 percent)."

13. Crime on Campus: Penn State Raises Question, Do Colleges Have Too Much Power? by Kayla Webley - http://ti.me/rZSq5p via TIME - "One of the few oversight tools the government has is the Clery Act. Named after a Lehigh University student who was raped and strangled by another student in 1986 in her dorm room, the Jeanne Clery Disclosure of Campus Security Policy and Campus Crime Statistics Act requires all colleges and universities that participate in federal financial-aid programs to disclose each year the number of alleged criminal offenses, including sexual offenses, that are recorded on campus or in other areas that are under university control, such as remote classrooms and fraternity houses. In addition, schools must also issue timely warnings in cases in which the reported crime represents a threat to the campus community."

14. Proof there is no proof for education reforms, by Carol Corbett Burris- The Answer Sheet - http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/answer-sheet/post/proof-there-is-no-proof-for-education-reforms/2011/11/13/gIQAAeVWJN_blog.html?tid=sm_btn_twitter via @washingtonpost - "Jonah Rockoff of Columbia University, who consults with the New York State Education Department on VAM (value-added modeling) scores and teacher evaluation, recently made a presentation at the Nassau Boards of Cooperative Educational Services. He included a slide, far more modest in its claims, regarding effective teaching and the achievement gap.When I questioned him about it, he was quite honest and admitted that there exists no empirical proof that three effective teachers in a row would close the achievement gap. It is merely a hypothetical extension of results from a model. He also honestly admitted that there exists no study that demonstrates that evaluating teachers using student test scores results in gains in achievement."

364. College Access and Success News

Here are links to recent news on college access and success.
by
Joe Rottenborn
Executive Director, Mahoning Valley College Access Program (MVCAP)

1. Read The Joe Rottenborn Daily ▸ today's top stories on college access and success via @rottenbornj ▸ http://paper.li/rottenbornj

2. South Korean students' 'year of hell' culminates with exams day, by Jiyeon Lee #cnn http://www.cnn.com/2011/11/10/world/asia/south-korea-exams/index.html READ THIS. "Most South Korean students consider their final year in high school "the year of hell." It is when all students are put to the ultimate test. About 700,000 test applicants sat down in classrooms across the country Thursday to take their college entrance exams -- also known as the College Scholastic Ability Test (CSAT). . . . For many, this one test -- which lasts a good eight hours -- will determine which university they enter. It is considered the chance to make or break one's future."

3. A New Book Argues Against the SAT, by Rebecca R. Ruiz: http://nyti.ms/rMhctr - "That study broke applicants into three socio-economic classes. They found that 29 percent of students from the highest social class scored above 1400 on the SAT, compared to 24 percent of middle class students and 14 percent of lower class students. Turning that pyramid on its head, the study found that those students from lower social classes were more likely to have earned a top high school G.P.A.. . . “High school grades are the single most powerful predictor of college performance,” he said. “High SAT scores over-predict how well a student is going to do in college, and they’re inversely related to academic engagement.”

4. Part 4: Answers to Your Questions on Applying with a Learning Disability, by Marybeth Kravets: http://nyti.ms/uIDMUQ - "In this fourth round, Ms. Kravets addresses the question of physical disabilities that impact learning capacity."

5. Report Finds One in Three College Students Has Taken an Online Class, by Rebecca R. Ruiz: http://nyti.ms/ssMpaB - "Nearly a third of all college students are now taking online courses, so said a new study released on Wednesday by the Babson Survey Research Group and the College Board."

6. L.I. Inquiry on Cheating Now Covers Five Schools, by Jenney Anderson - http://www.nytimes.com/2011/11/10/nyregion/sat-cheating-inquiry-on-long-island-expands-to-include-act.html?_r=1 - "At the hearing, representatives of the Educational Testing Service said that about 3,000 test scores were examined for irregularities each year — out of more than two million exams taken — and that of those, 1,000 were canceled, most after test-center supervisors reported irregularities, or because of large jumps from scores on previous tests. Suspected impersonations constituted about 150 of those canceled scores. About 700 people were turned away for questionable identification at test sites."

7. Penn State president and football coach lose jobs amid sex abuse scandal, by Kevin Kiley Inside Higher Ed: http://bit.ly/sav1IK via AddThis - "The Pennsylvania State University Board of Trustees and Graham Spanier have decided that, effective immediately, Dr. Spanier is no longer president of the University," the board said in a statement Wednesday. "Additionally, the board determined that it is in the best interest of the University for Joe Paterno to no longer serve as head football coach, effective immediately."

8. Essay on why smart people make foolish ethical choices, by Robert J. Sternberg Inside Higher Ed: http://bit.ly/t68Gdz via AddThis - "Every time there is a new ethics scandal, whether in a university or some other setting (such as in government or the corporate world), observers wonder how those involved could have been so stupid. Could they really have done the things of which they are accused? If so, what were they thinking? In fact, there are three precipitating factors for ethics scandals that practically guarantee that they will not be going away anytime soon. The three factors are foolishness, the complexity of ethical reasoning, and ethical drift, which I discuss in turn."

9. Survey Finds Pell Grant Support Among Young Adults Inside Higher Ed: http://bit.ly/s8id8n via AddThis - "Adults aged 18 to 34 are overwhelmingly concerned about the cost of college and levels of student debt, regardless of whether they attended college, and oppose cuts to federal student aid programs, according to survey results announced Wednesday by the Institute for College Access and Success, Young Invincibles and Demos: Ideas and Action, three advocacy groups. The survey found that 73 percent of respondents believe college students graduate with too much debt, while only 21 percent described the average debt as "manageable."

10. Digital Education: Blended Learning on the Rise, Report Says, by Katie Ash - http://blogs.edweek.org/edweek/DigitalEducation/2011/11/blended_learning_on_the_rise_r.html via @educationweek - "The eighth annual Keeping Pace with K-12 Online Learning, released today at the Virtual School Symposium in Indianapolis, finds that single-district online programs—many of which include blended learning—are the fastest-growing segment of online education this year. (Single-district online programs are created by a district for the students in that district only.)"

11. Community Colleges Open an Online Doorway to Better Grades and Graduation Rates, by Josh Fischman - http://chronicle.com/article/7-Community-Colleges-Try-an/129605/ - "There are two things Clint McElroy knows about community-college students: A huge number of them don't stay in school. And many of them—who are often the first in their families to go to college, and who must juggle work and parenting—don't understand how to balance all those demands while studying at the college level. . . . And just 27 percent of all students graduated within three years of starting community college, according to "What Works in Student Retention," a 2010 report by ACT, the nonprofit education-assessment organization. The survey, of 305 colleges, reported that the leading reasons for attrition were a student's lack of readiness for college-level work, deficient study skills, and money problems."

12. Is an Ivy League education money wasted? by Brad Tuttle http://ti.me/u1FlJq via @TIMEMoneyland - "The college-selection equation today is not unlike shopping for a new car, with some consumers preferring a flashy, eye-catching model, and others seeing more value in a dependable, unexciting product that is cheaper to pay off, and that still gets you where you need to go.Continuing with this metaphor, what we’re seeing is that more students are going with the Honda Civics of higher education, rather than the Porsches and Corvettes. The Wall Street Journal reports on the trend for students to not only question the value of an Ivy League education, but to attend cheaper (or free) public colleges even though they were admitted to much “better” institutions."

13. Did Penn State officials violate the Clery Act? by Jenna Johnson - Campus Overload - http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/campus-overload/post/did-penn-state-officials-violate-the-clery-act/2011/11/09/gIQAh0CZ6M_blog.html?tid=sm_btn_twitter via @washingtonpost - "The Clery Act requires colleges and universities to annually disclose campus crime statistics and, in some cases, to warn the community if a crime poses a safety threat. The education department oversees compliance of the act, and notified the university of its investigation on Wednesday. “If these allegations of sexual abuse are true then this is a horrible tragedy for those young boys. If it turns out that some people at the school knew of the abuse and did nothing or covered it up, that makes it even worse,” Education Secretary Arne Duncan said in a statement. “Schools and school officials have a legal and moral responsibility to protect children and young people from violence and abuse.”

346. College Access and Success News

Here are links to recent news on college access and success.
by
Joe Rottenborn
Executive Director, Mahoning Valley College Access Program (MVCAP)

1. Creating Education Success at Home, by Marc Tucker - http://www.edweek.org/ew/articles/2011/10/19/08tucker_ep.h31.html via @educationweek - "First, most of these top-10 nations put more money behind their hardest-to-educate students than those who are easier to educate."

2. Syracuse, Selectivity, and ‘Old Measures,’ by Eric Hoover -http://chronicle.com/blogs/headcount/syracuse-selectivity-and-‘old-measures’/28973 - "Generally speaking, enrolling more low-income students means emphasizing grades over ACT and SAT scores, one of the many trade-offs admissions officials often weigh. When a college enrolls more Pell-eligible students, it can expect to see standardized-test scores to go down."

3. Not Marching in Step, by Elizabeth Murphy - Inside Higher Ed - http://bit.ly/ql6mGn via @AddThis - "It reported that a majority, but not all members, recommended bringing Naval and Air Force ROTC back to Brown. Katherine Bergeron, committee chair and dean of the college, said that while the group’s main duty was fact-finding, this final recommendation did come down to a vote, with six members for a recommendation to bring Naval and Air Force ROTC back to campus and four against. “We reported the split because in effect we found it analogous or reflective of the range of opinion on campus,” Bergeron, also a professor of musicology, said. “The idea was maximal engagement.”

4. More than 100 cities, counties agree to push early literacy, by Valerie Strauss -The Answer Sheet - http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/answer-sheet/post/more-than-100-cities-counties/2011/10/16/gIQAMuQFqL_blog.html?tid=sm_btn_twitter via Washingtonpost.com - "The Campaign for Grade Level Reading is a collaborative effort by dozens of funders to make sure that all children, especially those from low-income families who often enter kindergarten already behind, learn to read. Signing onto the campaign are big cities such as Chicago, Los Angeles, Houston and Atlanta, and the entire state of Arizona. This issue is as important as any in public education; kids who don’t read have enormous difficulties later in life. To borrow a famous phrase from the campaign of former president Bill Clinton: It’s the reading, stupid."

5. Community college placement falters, by Jay Mathews - http://www.washingtonpost.com/local/education/community-college-placement-falters/2011/10/13/gIQANywVpL_story.html?tid=sm_btn_twitter via Washingtonpost.com - "All of the local two-year colleges I surveyed were aware that new research is forcing them to justify remediation. Half to two-thirds of their incoming students must pay for no-credit catch-up courses before they are allowed to take credit courses in those subjects. This requirement for remediation is contradicted by a study of thousands of community college students. Those who found ways to take for-credit courses despite flunking placement tests passed the courses 71 percent of the time. Headden said that was close to the 77 percent passing rate for all students in those courses."

6. Study Shows Parents Struggling to Save for College Education News - http://shar.es/bq5wm - "The study showed that 25% of U.S. households are contributing less toward their children’s college education — or have stopped saving entirely. 44% have not started saving at all. A meager 15 percent have reduced spending on other things to keep saving/paying for their children’s college educations."

7. Read The Joe Rottenborn Daily ▸ today's top stories on college access and success via @rottenbornj ▸ http://t.co/xt4njNy8

343. College Access and Success News

Here are links to recent news on college access and success.

by

Joe Rottenborn

Executive Director, Mahoning Valley College Access Program (MVCAP)

1. Read The Joe Rottenborn Daily ▸ today's top stories on college access and success via @rottenbornj ▸ http://paper.li/rottenbornj

2. Politics K-12: Senate ESEA Draft Bill Would Scrap Adequate Yearly Progress, by Alyson Klein - http://blogs.edweek.org/edweek/campaign-k-12/2011/10/senate_esea_draft_bill_would_s.html via @educationweek - "The measure, which is already being decried by civil rights groups as a giant step backwards when it comes to accountability for poor and minority children, would scrap the 10-year-old law's signature yardstick, known as Adequate Yearly Progress or AYP. Instead, states would have to ensure that all students are making "continuous improvement" in student outcomes. . . . The draft would keep in place the law's requirement that states continue to report information on specific subgroups of students. And the law's testing schedule for reading and math—grades 3 through 8 and once in high school—would remain the same."

3. Bills Show Dueling Priorities on K-12 Spending, by Alyson Klein - http://www.edweek.org/ew/articles/2011/10/12/07spending.h31.html via @educationweek - "Both bills strive to keep the maximum Pell Grant at $5,500. The Senate bill would do that by making changes to the Federal Stafford Student Loan Program. The bill before the House committee, by contrast, would make significant changes to the program’s eligibility requirements, according to a New America Foundation analysis. For instance, students who attend college less than part time would no longer be eligible for Pell Grants. And students would be able to take part in the program for only a maximum of 12 semesters, down from 18 now. In addition, the maximum family income that would automatically qualify a student for the biggest Pell Grant would be cut in half, to $15,000, from $30,000."

4. Bill Would Overhaul No Child Left Behind, by Sam Dillon - http://www.nytimes.com/2011/10/12/education/12educ.html?_r=1&hpw -"But for about 9 of every 10 American schools, it would scrap the law’s federal system of accountability, under which schools must raise the proportion of students showing proficiency on the tests each year. That system has driven classroom teaching across the nation for a decade."

5. Alumni Tutoring Effort Strives to Raise Diversity at Elite Public Schools, by Anna M. Phillips - http://www.nytimes.com/2011/10/12/nyregion/graduates-of-elite-new-york-city-public-schools-tutor-students-seeking-admission.html?src=recg - "For more than a decade, the number of black and Hispanic students scoring high enough to be offered a seat at the city’s specialized high schools has been on the decline. Last February, just 12 black and 13 Hispanic students were admitted to Stuyvesant High School, which had 3,287 students."

6. Pressure and Lack of Repercussions Are Cited in SAT Cheating - http://www.nytimes.com/schoolbook/2011/10/12/pressure-and-lack-of-repercussions-are-cited-in-sat-cheating via Schoolbook - "Some teenagers believe that student integrity keeps cheating rates close to zero, while others say illegal score boosting is the norm. “After [students] are done with a section, they share answers in the bathrooms,” a Stuyvesant High School senior, Ahlam Rafita, said. “If the person is really good at math, they’ll finish it and can easily switch back to the reading sections.”

7. Poor kids still lose race despite better scores, by Jay Mathews - Class Struggle - http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/class-struggle/post/poor-kids-still-lose-race-despite-better-scores/2011/10/08/gIQAN9qTeL_blog.html?tid=sm_btn_twitter via Washingtonpost.com - “We find that although low-income students have shown strong gains in the indicators that lead to admission to highly selective schools . . . higher income students have simultaneously made even stronger gains on these same indicators,” they say in their paper “Running in Place: Low-Income Students and the Dynamics of Higher Education Stratification” in the September issue of the journal Educational Evaluation and Policy Analysis."

8. NCLB bill: The problem with ‘continuous improvement,’ by Valerie Strauss - The Answer Sheet - http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/answer-sheet/post/nclb-bill-the-problem-with-continuous-improvement/2011/10/11/gIQA7nztdL_blog.html?tid=sm_btn_twitter via Washingtonpost.Newsweek Interactive - "Instead of requiring all students to be “proficient” in these basic skills by 2014 (as NCLB demands), or to be “college ready” by 2020 (as the Obama Administration proposes), the Harkin bill will require only that schools show “continuous improvement” for all students, and for students from low-income families, those who don’t speak English, minority students, and students with disabilities (see page 52 of the draft bill)."

336. College Access and Success News

Here are links to recent news on college access and success.

by

Joe Rottenborn

Executive Director, Mahoning Valley College Access Program (MVCAP)

1. AT WHAT COST: Pursuing athletic scholarships is expensive for families http://t.co/OhNiGNTc via @reviewjournal - "It doesn't pay for most families chasing the dream of an athletic scholarship. . . . "I marvel at the money parents spend over the years in the pursuit of athletic scholarships," says Beth Walker, a former college volleyball player at Kansas and now owner of College Funding Coaches. . . . "For most athletes, if they can get even 25 percent of their tuition paid, that's huge. But many of these families are sure they have the next Division I superstar and there are full scholarships coming. I don't know what they're smoking. They're not coming from a place of reality. It's scary."

2. Long Island SAT Fraud Prompts Wider Investigations, by Rebecca R. Ruiz - http://nyti.ms/rrmgXy - "When the Educational Testing Service, the company that administers the test, detects irregularities, it simply notifies the affected students that their scores are being withdrawn. Neither colleges nor high schools are ever alerted that cheating was suspected.
That happens about .04 percent of the time, Ms. Anderson reports, with about 1,000 scores being withdrawn each year out of 2.25 million. Nearly all of those withdrawals – 99 percent of them – are due to one test-taker having copied off of another."

3. Public Schools Also Lose When Online Students Fail, by Burt Hubbard and Nancy Mitchell - http://www.edweek.org/ew/articles/2011/10/03/06enc_online.h31.html via @educationweek - "Colorado taxpayers will spend $100 million this year on online schools that are largely failing their elementary and high school students, state education records and interviews with school officials show. The money includes millions in tax dollars that are going to K-12 online schools for students who are no longer there."

4. Are Top Students Getting Short Shrift? - Room for Debate - http://nyti.ms/oSu0fj -"By trying to teach children of varying abilities in one classroom, is American society underdeveloping some of its brightest young people?"

5. In Classrooms, the Ideal vs. the Reality, by C. Kent McGuire - Room for Debate - http://nyti.ms/n8bpom - "The central challenge for American schools is to produce much higher levels of achievement for the vast majority of students. National attention to new Common Core Standards and to 21st Century Skills is based on this challenge. The policy debate we need to have is about how to accomplish this."

6. Latinos Need More Support to Raise Lagging Graduation Rates, Report Says, by Lacey Johnson - http://chronicle.com/article/Latinos-Need-More-Support-to/129247/ - "The study, conducted in 2009, found that only 19.2 percent of Latinos between the ages of 25 and 34 had earned a two- or four-year degree, compared with 41 percent nationally. To increase Latino college completion, policy makers and educators must, among other steps, improve middle- and high-school counseling, make preschool more available to low-income families, provide additional need-based grant money, and simplify the financial-aid system, the report says."

7. Two bitter education rivals begin to bury the hatchet, by Greg Toppo - http://usat.ly/o3HTwG via @usatoday - "We believe you cannot ignore poverty. We just believe right now the reason we have this problem is we're sending kids who face all these extra challenges into the same setup -- not even, because the kids in the more resourced communities have stronger schools, so we're sending them into a lesser version of the same setup that we send kids with many more privileges into, and that is why we have the achievement gap."

8. Online textbooks moving into schools, by Emma Brown - http://www.washingtonpost.com/local/education/online-textbooks-moving-into-schools/2011/09/27/gIQAwn0KGL_story.html via Washingtonpost.com -"Starting this fall, almost all Fairfax middle and high school students began using online books in social studies, jettisoning the tomes that have weighed down backpacks for decades. It is the Washington area’s most extensive foray into online textbooks, putting Fairfax at the leading edge of a digital movement that publishers and educators say inevitably will sweep schools nationwide."

9. Best Bang For Your Buck Colleges: Unigo List - http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/10/03/bang-for-your-buck-colleges-unigo_n_991943.html - "Want a great education but don't want to accrue tremendous debt to get it? Well, you are in luck. College information site Unigo recently named the colleges that are the best "bang for your buck" --vi.e. colleges that are relatively inexpensive that provide a first-class education."

10. Read The Joe Rottenborn Daily ▸ today's top stories on college access and success via @rottenbornj ▸ http://paper.li/rottenbornj

335. College Access and Success News

Here are links to recent news on college access and success.
by
Joe Rottenborn
Executive Director, Mahoning Valley College Access Program (MVCAP)

1. Read The Joe Rottenborn Daily ▸ today's top stories on college access and success via @rottenbornj ▸ http://paper.li/rottenbornj

2. Educators, Financial Literacy Advocates Respond to Growing Student Debt - Southern Maryland Headline News: http://t.co/OxtpdgLD via @AddThis

3. Dream Act: Brown's Nightmare? NBC Los Angeles - http://t.co/sxRw2Zkz via @propzero

4. Test scores reveal Ky. educational challenges - http://www.kentucky.com/2011/09/29/1901496/test-scores-reveal-ky-educational.html

5. Why Achievement Gap Mania Isn’t Cost-Free - http://bit.ly/oR1O90

6. Better Literacy Will Close the Achievement Gap @PolicyMic Matthew Clair - http://www.policymic.com/articles/better-literacy-will-close-the-achievement-gap

7. Dispelling myths about college admissions - NeXt - The Buffalo News - http://t.co/b3KUfGi2 via @TheBuffaloNews

8. SAT Cheaters: College Admissions Exam Has History of Fraud - http://t.co/1toTvo1O via @thedailybeast

9. SAT cheating scandal: Are stakes getting too high for college admission? - Yahoo! News - http://t.co/Oq3XxVzr via @YahooNews

334. College Access and Success News

Here are links to recent news on college access and success.

by

Joe Rottenborn

Executive Director, Mahoning Valley College Access Program (MVCAP)

1. 7 arrested in alleged SAT cheating scam, by Brad Lendon – This Just In - http://news.blogs.cnn.com/2011/09/28/7-arrested-in-alleged-sat-cheating-scam/ via @cnn -"Prosecutors allege Eshaghoff impersonated six Great Neck North High students between 2010 and 2011, charging between $1,500 and $2,500 to take the SAT test for them. Eshaghoff would take the test at schools other than Great Neck, where proctors would not be familiar with the students' identity, and present fake, unofficial identification, prosecutors say."

2. More financial help for NCAA athletes on the way, by Steve Wieberg – http://usat.ly/nHjyfJ via USAToday - "A committee weighing a number of potential changes is expected to recommend that the value of individual scholarships be raised by as much as $2,000 in the top-tier Division I, moving them closer to covering the athletes' full cost of attending school. Full grants currently cover only room, board, books and tuition. The NCAA's Division I board of directors would act on the proposal when it meets Oct. 26 and 27 in Indianapolis."

3. YSU, faculty reach deal, by Virginia Shank - Tribune Chronicle - Warren, OH: http://bit.ly/qvYc6Y via @AddThis - "The two sides issued the joint statement after meeting Wednesday morning that explains they resolved the remaining provisions in the proposed contract. Union leaders said the proposal is a revision of the "best and final" offer administrators made last month that the faculty ultimately rejected. YSU-OEA and the YSU Board of Trustees are planning to review and vote on ratification of the tentative agreement early next week. They said details of the agreement would not be released until after the votes."

4. At Seton Hall, Sharp Cuts in Tuition for Those With Good Grades and SATs, by Jacques Steinberg: http://nyti.ms/qtODVZ - "How would one qualify for this discount, which Mr. Perez-Pena describes as equal to about two-thirds of this year’s $31,440 tuition? (Room, board and other fees add about $13,000, for a total annual bill of nearly $42,000.) Writes Mr. Perez-Pena:Students must graduate in the top 10 percent of their high school classes and have a combined score of at least 1,200 on their math and reading SATs — but no less than 550 on each — or an ACT score of 27. Mr. Perez-Pena says that the experts on admissions and financial aid whom he consulted “knew of no other college providing such a blanket discount for top-flight students.”

5. Going Off on Online Rankings, by Paul Fain - Inside Higher Ed - http://bit.ly/qkJb76 via @AddThis - "The publication is analyzing six types of online academic programs for the new rankings: baccalaureate degree programs and master’s degrees in business, computer information technology, education, engineering and nursing. Both for-profits and nonprofits with substantial online offerings, like UMassOnline and the University of Maryland University College, were asked to participate. (To be eligible, programs need to have coursework that is collectively at least 80 percent online, according to a web presentation by U.S. News officials.)"

6. Dump the Slump, by Allie Grasgreen - Inside Higher Ed - http://bit.ly/qMGfV2 via @AddThis - “The sophomore year is a time of transition, where students sometimes do feel like they’re in a slump. They’re not yet necessarily deeply on their track toward whatever their path is, but they’re no longer in that special moment of being the first-year class whom everybody dotes on,” said Stephen Nowicki, dean and vice provost for undergraduate education at Duke."

7. Academic Performance and the BCS, by John V. Lombardi, Elizabeth D. Capaldi, and Craig W. Abbey - Inside Higher Ed - http://bit.ly/o2zBdW - "It will come as no real surprise to those who watch our academic landscape to discover that the Big 10 leads the field with an academic distinction index of 55, followed closely by the Pac-12 with 48. The ACC falls some distance behind with an index of 28.5 and the SEC a significant distance away at 14, followed closely by the Big-Twelve and the Big East at 12. As a reference, we also constructed an index for the Ivy League, to put all this into perspective. This premier academic conference would fall into second place, after the Big-10 and before the Pac-12."

8. The Man Behind the Controversial College Rankings, by Lynn O'Shaughnessy - http://moneywatch.bnet.com/spending/blog/college-solution/the-man-behind-the-controversial-college-rankings/6761/ via @cbsmoneywatch - "What you probably don’t know, however, is who is responsible for the rankings’ controversial methodology. The person behind the college rankings is Robert Morse, who is US News’ director of data research. At the annual conference of the National Association for College Admission Counseling last week in New Orleans, I interviewed Morse about his rankings baby. Here’s what he had to say."

9. Politics K-12: Roadmap to Winning an NCLB Waiver, by Michele McNeil - http://blogs.edweek.org/edweek/campaign-k-12/2011/09/_overall_instructions_a_plan.html via @educationweek - "Then, the peer reviewers will drill down and focus on the three main commitments states have to make to get more freedom under NCLB. On adopting college and career ready standards: Judges will ask: Is there a plan to provide professional development to teachers and principals? . . . On adopting guidelines to improve teacher and principal effectiveness: Is student growth a significant enough part of the new evaluation system to differentiate among teachers who have made "significantly different contributions" (emphasis added) to student growth or closing achievement gaps?"

10. Politics K-12: Obama to Nation's Students: Aim for College, and Innovate, by Alyson Klein - http://blogs.edweek.org/edweek/campaign-k-12/2011/09/obama_to_nations_students_aim.html via @educationweek - "This year's remarks were pretty innocuous. They focused on urging students to push themselves academically and set high goals, namely pursuing education or postsecondary training after high school, and finishing those studies. "If that means college for you, just getting into college isn't enough," Obama said. "You've got to graduate. ... Our country used to have the world's highest proportion of of young people with a college degree. We now rank 16th. That's not good enough. We need your generation to bring us back to the top."

11. Hispanic Children in Poverty Exceed Whites, Study Finds, by Sabrina Tavernise - http://www.nytimes.com/2011/09/29/us/hispanic-children-in-poverty-surpass-whites-study-finds.html?src=rechp - "While the number of Hispanic children in poverty is the highest ever, the poverty rate — 35 percent in 2010 — is well under its 1994 peak of 41 percent. Nor do Hispanics have the largest share in poverty of all racial and ethnic groups. In 2010, 39.1 percent of black children — 4.3 million — lived in poverty, as did 12.4 percent of white children. . . . And Hispanic children in poverty are more likely to live in married couple families than either non-Hispanic whites or African-Americans, according to the report, a pattern that can help cushion an economic fall. Forty-six percent of Hispanic children lived in married couple families in 2010, compared with 41 percent of whites and 16 percent of African-Americans."

12. Coming Together to Dismantle Education Reform, by Andrew J. Rotherham - http://ti.me/mPIiso via @TIME - "As evidence of the severe disconnect between the state's high standards on paper and lax enforcement in practice, consider that 98% of schools in Virginia — a state system I know well, since I served as a member of its board of education for four years — are fully accredited under the state's rules. But just 22% of the Hispanic students and 14% of the African-American students who attend these schools are reading at the "proficient" level on the National Assessment of Education Progress by eighth grade. Hard to square that with a 98% success rate."

333. College Access and Success News

Here are links to recent news on college access and success.

by

Joe Rottenborn

Executive Director, Mahoning Valley College Access Program (MVCAP)

1. Read The Joe Rottenborn Daily ▸ today's top stories on college access and success via @rottenbornj ▸ http://paper.li/rottenbornj

2. From 'Today' on NBC: Beginning the Search: http://nyti.ms/qYKZP5 - "The “Today” show — which occasionally partners with The Choice on college admissions segments — broadcast a report on Tuesday morning on how to begin your college search. . . . You can watch the full piece — featuring a tour of the University of Michigan campus and an interview with the director of admissions, Ted Spencer – by clicking at the top of this post."

3. The Hazards of Attending College Part Time, by Lynn O'Shaughnessy - http://moneywatch.bnet.com/spending/blog/college-solution/the-hazards-of-attending-college-part-time/6746/ via @cbsmoneywatch - "College graduation rates in this country are terrible, but they are far worse for the majority of students who attend college part time. . . . While the typical image of a college student is someone who lives in a dorm, attends school full time and has most of the bills paid by their parents, the reality is starkly different. About 75% of students are commuters, who hold down jobs and juggle family obligations as they pursue their college dreams."

4. Study: Suburban Districts Falter in Global Competitiveness, by Sarah D. Sparks - http://blogs.edweek.org/edweek/inside-school-research/2011/09/study_suburban_districts_falte.html via @educationweek - "The report, published in an online preview of the Winter 2012 issue of Education Next, argues that when average district achievement in math or reading is compared to average achievement in those subjects for students in industrialized countries, as measured on the Program for International Student Assessment, or PISA, even wealthier districts in areas like Beverly Hills, Calif., or Fairfax, Va., come out in the middle of the pack or worse."

5. Is the SAT losing its edge? by Jay Mathews - Class Struggle - http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/class-struggle/post/is-the-sat-losing-its-edge/2011/09/27/gIQAbS7h3K_blog.html via @washingtonpost - "More graduating seniors took the SAT last year than ever, 1.65 million. So why are the scores declining, and why is the best-known and most fearsome college-entrance test in U.S. history losing its edge? Let’s start with the obvious. More students are taking its rival, the ACT."

6. Middle school survey: sex, fear and suicide attempts, by Bill Turque - D.C. Schools Insider - http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/dc-schools-insider/post/middle-school-survey-sex-fear-and-suicide-attempts/2011/09/27/gIQAKwz92K_blog.html via Washingtonpost.com - "Chancellor Kaya Henderson sketched a bleak statistical picture of life in DCPS middle schools at Tuesday’s D.C. Council hearing, including a chilling survey finding that 10 percent of the school system’s 4,000 eighth graders have tried to kill themselves."

7. The 10 Best Places To Go To College: Unigo List - http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/09/26/the-10-best-places-to-go-_n_980907.html#s372162&title=Boston_University - "Crave a life beyond the campus multi-purpose room? Check out Unigo's list of the coolest towns -- that also happen to have great colleges -- below. Vouch for your own college town in the comments section!"

8. The New Ivy League: Unigo List - http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/09/27/the-new-ivy-league-unigo-_n_982994.html - "The hallowed Ivy League is famed for its exclusivity, and cluster of eight elite Northeastern institutions can only accomodate a fraction of today's talented students. But fear not, there are other places in America that can offer a home of equal value to the world's burgeoning brains. Using student reviews they compiled, Unigo formed a list of colleges that match the Ivies in terms of rigor and vigor. See them below in alphabetical order."

9. New data highlight YSU retention problem, by Denise Dick - http://www.vindy.com/news/2011/sep/28/new-data-highlight-retention-problem/ via Vindicator - “More serious is what happened in the percentage of returning undergraduates,” he said. There were more than 1,000 students who didn’t return this year. “That surprised all of us,” Fahey said."

10. Youngstown City schools, after state criticism, developing plan for ‘better gains,’ by Denise Dick - http://www.vindy.com/news/2011/sep/28/city-schools-after-state-criticism-devel/ via @vindicator - "He believes people in the district understand the sense of urgency. “We have to move forward,” Hathorn said. “The longer we wait, the worse it’s going to get.”