posted on
Happy New Year and welcome to “Mornings with Mimi”!
Here are news and opinion stories educators, advocates, policy wonks and makers are talking about today:
News and Analysis
Donald Trump and K-12 Education: Five Things to Watch in 2017
The presidential transition means an especially busy start to the year. President-elect Donald Trump may not have talked much about education on the campaign trail, but the first part of the year will tell us a lot about the direction he wants to go and how much of a priority he places on the issue. What’s more, we’ll get a glimpse of how well he’s able to work with Congress on K-12, not to mention early and higher education. Here are five things to watch in the months ahead. (Education Week)
Billionaire Betsy DeVos has been unabashed about using her wealth to advance her own agenda. “We expect a return on our investment,” she once wrote about her family’s massive political contributions. After giving millions of dollars to politicians over the past two decades, she now heads into her Senate confirmation hearing for education secretary with a clear advantage: DeVos and her husband, Dick, have donated to the campaigns of 17 senators who will consider her nomination — four of whom sit on the Senate education committee that oversees the process (Politico)
We all experience stress at work, no matter the job. But for teachers, the work seems to be getting harder and the stress harder to shake. A new report out this month pulls together some stark numbers on this: Forty-six percent of teachers say they feel high daily stress. That’s on par with nurses and physicians. And roughly half of teachers agree with this statement: “The stress and disappointments involved in teaching at this school aren’t really worth it.” (NPR)
Maryland
Debate over school start times flares anew
Nearly two years after Montgomery County leaders voted to start the school day later so teenagers could get more sleep, the debate that many thought was settled shows signs of making a comeback in Maryland’s largest school system (The Washington Post)