School Community

Students began trickling in early. Some dressed up in button-down shirts. Nervous chatter and fidgeting arose around the room.

And then in walked Professor Ben Bernanke, also known as the chairman of the Federal Reserve.

The 30 undergraduates at George Washington University sent up a round of applause. It was, they’d been told beforehand, “appropriate, even encouraged, to politely applaud” Tuesday’s guest lecturer.

Few needed prompting. They were about to hear from perhaps the world’s best-qualified person to lecture their class, titled “Reflections on the Federal Reserve and Its Place in Today’s Economy.”

“We have a chance to speak one-on-one with a guy who’s arguably one of the most important people in the world,” said Sameer Iqbal, a junior finance major. “He’s taking time out of his schedule to speak to 30 college kids? I think that’s awesome.”

Also, unusual. In giving the first of his four scheduled lectures to the GW class, Bernanke became the first sitting Fed chairman ever to help teach a college course.

Reporters and news photographers nearly matched the number of students. Bags were searched. And security personnel stood guard.

Michael Feinberg, a senior finance major, said he normally doesn’t get to class a half-hour early. But “normally I don’t have my bag sniffed by a bomb-sniffing dog.”

Tuesday’s lecture focused on U.S. central banking dating to the panics of the 19th century and early 20th century, which led to the Fed’s creation in 1913. The second lecture, on Thursday, will involve the central bank’s actions after World War II.

In the final two, on March 27 and 29, Bernanke will review the roots of the 2008 financial crisis and the Fed’s response to the crisis and the recession that followed.

Anyone can view Bernanke’s lectures live. The Fed will maintain the four one-hour lectures on its site for later viewing.

The number of people viewing Tuesday’s lecture at the Fed’s website held steady at about 3,300 throughout Bernanke’s class.

The students seemed most engaged when the Fed chairman tried to convey macroeconomic concepts in real-world terms. He drew some laughs in describing the pitfalls of a gold standard for a nation’s currency.

It is costly, Bernanke noted dryly, to dig gold up in “South Africa or somewhere” and “put back in another hole.”

Mostly, students listen intently to the lecture, which Bernanke delivered with the aid of a 50-slide PowerPoint presentation.

Bernanke’s staff had approached GW late last year about the possibility of allowing Bernanke to give some lectures. The university and the Federal Reserve are within blocks of each other in the Foggy Bottom neighborhood of Washington.

GW assembled the class from 80 applicants who wrote essays on what they hoped to learn.

For Bernanke, the GW lectures serve a dual function:

They give him a chance to reprise the role of professor he played for more than two decades, first at Stanford and then at Princeton, where he eventually chaired the economics department.

And they give him a way to expand his mission of demystifying the Fed. As part of that campaign, Bernanke became the first Fed chief to hold regular news conferences and conduct town-hall meetings.

Tim Fort, a business professor who specializes in ethics, developed the GW course in consultation with Bernanke’s staff. Beyond Bernanke’s lectures, Fort has enlisted about a dozen GW faculty members to help teach the class.

A controversial viability audit of Northern Ireland’s schools is falling apart at the seams just days after it was published, it has been claimed.

Hundreds of schools were publicly ‘red-flagged’ by the department this week for missing a series of targets. But it has now emerged that some of the findings were based on historic information.

GCSE results from 2011 were not included in the controversial audit — a healthcheck of all schools announced by the Education Minister last September.

Instead, the department based its findings on schools’ GCSE performance in 2009 and 2008.

DUP MLA Mervyn Storey and chair of Stormont’s education committee has accused the department of “educational negligence” and of being “grossly irresponsible” over its handling of the situation.

He said: “Why has the department used data that in some cases is more than two years old?”

On Tuesday an audit of every primary and post-primary school was published on the education and library boards’ websites. More than 500 schools were found to fall short on department-set targets in three areas — quality of education, finances and pupil numbers.

A snapshot analysis by the Belfast Telegraph found that if GCSE results from 2011 and 2010 had been used, two of the nine grammar schools that had been identified by the department for falling down on the quality of education would not have been red-flagged.

The criteria the department used to judge grammar schools was based on if less than 85% of pupils achieved seven GCSEs including English and maths at grades A* to C in both of the last two years (2009 and 2008).

Both the Royal Belfast Academical Institution (RBAI) and the Royal School Armagh were above that target last year. RBAI had 91.3% of pupils achieve seven good GCSEs including English and maths, and Royal School Armagh 94.1%.

Janet Williamson, principal of RBAI, said: “The audit is using historic data and is not accurately reflecting where schools are educationally and in terms of their finance.

“I feel strongly that the department has to take responsibility for over 500 of their schools being publicly described as stressed using their criteria, which was never discussed with any of the unions.

“Their data does not give a full picture. They have created the stress. How did the department let it get this far?”

Also of the 15 schools earmarked as failing on all three criteria — finances, enrolment and quality of education — one school would not have been in that category if the latest results had been included.

Under the department’s criteria St Columban’s College, Kilkeel, fell down because fewer than 25% of its pupils did not get five GCSEs including English and maths at grades A* to C in both of the last two years (2009 and 2008).

However, if 2011 GCSE results had been used St Columban’s would have been over that target as 29.2% of its pupils achieved five GCSEs including English and maths at grades A* to C.

Mr Storey, who is also his party’s education spokesman, said: “If the department was aware of the problems in the system, why did it not try to help those schools without naming and shaming.”

Use of old results defended by body

The Department of Education has defended its use of out of date data to determine the viability of Northern Ireland’s schools.

However, it has vowed that last year’s GCSE results will be factored into area plans for the future of the schools’ estate.

A department spokesman said: “The viability audits produced by the boards are a snapshot of the schools’ situations using the most up to date information available at the time.

“In the case of GCSE attainment for the 2010/11 year, fully validated and finalised statistics will be available in the very near future and will be factored into area plans. No decisions on the future of any school will be made without incorporating the most recent data and taking account of all pertinent factors.”

• Why is there such a variation in the targets for grammar schools and non-grammar schools?

• Why were those particular benchmarks chosen?

• And why were so many of our schools allowed to fall into such poor health?

To pass the viability audit, grammar schools had to meet a target of 85% or more of pupils achieving seven GCSEs, including English and maths, at grades A* to C in both 2008 and 2009.

There was a significant difference in the averages between grammar and non-grammar schools visible in the results, with fewer than 25% of non-grammar school pupils achieving five GCSEs, including English and maths, at grades C and above.

Tisch spoke on a GothamSchools panel in 2011.

Breaking her silence on the citys plan to overhaul 33 struggling schools, Regents Chancellor Merryl Tisch said late Wednesday that she believes turnaround is a political strategy, not an educational one.

Theres a fight going on here that has nothing to do with whats going on at the school, she said. Its a labor dispute between labor and management and has nothing to do with the kids.

Tisch was referring to the stalemate between the Bloomberg administration and the teachers union that gave rise to the citys turnaround plans. Bloomberg announced the plans in January as a way to get federal funds for the schools even though the city and union had not been able to agree on new teacher evaluations, a requirement of less aggressive strategies already in place. The turnaround strategy, which require the schools to be closed and reopened after changing their names and half of their teachers, has only deepened enmity between the city and UFT.

On Wednesday, Tisch visited one of the schools, William E. Grady Career and Technical Education High School, and said she was impressed by the changes underway, which she attributed to its principal, Geraldine Maione. The school received millions of federal dollars in the last two years while undergoing transformation, which funded extra tutoring, additional programs, and new technology.

This is a school that is moving in a really fine direction, Tisch said of Grady, which received a B on its most recent city progress report. This is the wrong message to this school at this time. Dont be so dismissive of the efforts going on in that building.

It was Tischs second visit to the school. Last week, she brought fellow Regent Kathleen Cashin for a visit that was scheduled after she met Maione in February at a principals union event featuring Diane Ravitch. On Wednesday, Maione said, Tisch and Cashin brought State Education Commissioner John King along with them.

Tischs support would be a boon to the school, whose teachers and students have been protesting the citys plans for weeks. But Kings presence was especially significant because he must sign off on the citys turnaround plans in order for the schools to receive federal funding. So far, he has only commented on the technical viability of the citys strategy, calling the concept approvable.

The city has not yet submitted formal turnaround applications to King and has said that it will go through with the turnaround plans with or without the federal funds. Still, if King denies or pushes back against a turnaround application, it would strike a blow to the Bloomberg administration and could leave the city on the hook for paying for school improvements it has promised.

Maione said she is hopeful that the officials presence would help her school get a fair consideration as the citys turnaround plans move forward.

I enjoyed having them and I think they saw a Grady they didn’t think they would see, Maione said Wednesday. I think they were pleasantly surprised.

In the past, Tisch has said other schools on the turnaround list were not improving quickly enough under the citys interventions. When she visited Automotive High School last fall, she said the city was using the school as a warehouse for high-needs students. Now, Automotive is set to be closed and reopened just as Grady is.

I believe in closing schools, Tisch said. I will not defend failure, but Im also not going to sit back and watch a school such as Grady be closed.

Science education degrees continue to be important areas of specialization in teacher education and teacher certification. For many who choose the career path, it is because they enjoy science and also love working with students.

Regardless of your reasons for pursuing a degree in science education, you need to pick the right combination of both college and course so that you are able to fulfill your dreams and realize your ambitions in life. In order to be eligible for a science education degree, you must have good verbal as well as quantitative skills. Many students choose to specialize in science education after attaining their first degree. A bachelors science education degree can be completed after doing a full four years of study though for architecture and engineering it may even take five years. In certain US colleges and universities, there may be a separate track called the honors or scholars program which is offered to high achieving students. Teacher education programs are accredited by the National Council for Accreditation of Teacher Education (NCATE) and the Teacher Education Accreditation Council. Students usually must choose a specialization, for example elementary education or secondary mathematics education,

Western Governors University

• M. A. in Science Education (5 – 12, Biological Science)
• M. A. in Science Education (5 – 12, Chemistry)
• M. A. in Science Education (5 – 12, Geosciences)
• M. A. in Science Education (5 – 12, Physics)
• M. A. in Science Education (5 – 9)
• M. A. in Teaching – Science (5-9 or 5-12)
• M. A. in Teaching – Social Science (5 – 12)

University of Phoenix

• MA in Education/Teacher Education Middle Level Science
• MA in Education/Teacher Education Secondary Science

Capella University

• Doctor of Philosophy (PhD) in Education – K–12 Studies in Education specialization

Walden University

• M. S. in Education – Science (Grades K-8)

Grand Canyon University

• Bachelor of Science in Elementary Education with an Emphasis in Science (Grades K-8) (IR)
• Bachelor of Science in Secondary Education with an Emphasis in Biology (IR)
• Bachelor of Science in Secondary Education with an Emphasis in Chemistry (IR)

Science education degrees offers a comprehensive curriculum that is focused on helping science teachers work toward their K-12 teaching certification. In general, science education programs culminate in a supervised student teaching internship. This helps students to apply what they are learning in their teacher education courses, whether for preparation for future elementary or secondary school careers. Science education courses may include:

• Educational psychology
• Technology integration in science education
• Classroom management
• Instructional strategies
• Educational research methodology
• Conceptual development in science
• Elementary and secondary school science curriculum
• Assessment of learning in science programs

In addition students are often required to take additional science courses, which are often offered in colleges of arts and sciences. These science courses may include physics, chemistry, biology, earth science, geology, astronomy, etc.

Careers with science education degrees can include working as a K-12 classroom teacher, science curriculum design, educational administration, education leadership, educational technology, etc. Other options include working as an educational consultant, working for a tutoring service, and working for a state department of education.

Teaching science in both elementary and secondary schools is an important that continues to see a high in demand for teachers. Hence, the job outlook for those who have completed their degree in science education is very bright, especially for those who have obtained a computer science degree. The United States Bureau of Labor Statistics estimates that elementary school teachers earn over $50,000 while secondary school teachers earn over $52,450. Science teachers who have a specialized education degree often earn in income that is in the upper range of reported salaries ranging from $60,000 to $75,000 range. Education administrators earn over $82,120. Science education degrees are therefore an area of consideration for those students who enjoy science and also working with students in K-12. Employment of K-2 teachers is projected to grow 13% through 2018.

Online science education degrees and curriculum and instruction degree programs

Almost half of places to train as maths teachers have not yet been filled, according to the TDA. 

Figures show 46 per cent of places are empty around six months before courses start.

The Training and Development Agency for Schools, which administers the process, insisted numbers were up on last year but admitted there was “still an urgent need for even more high quality recruits”.

It also emerged that courses in other subjects such as science and foreign languages – seen as vital to the country’s economic competitiveness – are also lacking trainees.

According to figures, some 70 per cent of places on physics courses are still unfilled.

The disclosure comes despite the introduction of generous bursary packages designed to pull graduates with top degrees into the teaching profession.