Start the New Year "In The Loop"

Happy New Year, everyone! Hopefully your winter breaks all served you well with a time to reflect on the successes of 2010 and opportunities for improvement for 2011.

One resolution I'm making is related to STAYING INFORMED ABOUT EDUCATION REFORM IN TN.
OK, this might have something to do with the fact that I'm a nerd, but it seems like a lot of citizens agree that education is important in our communities, but it's also really important to the vitality of our state. 

How do I plan to do this?
- SCORE Daily Updates: You can do that HERE.  They do a great daily news clipping service for FREE that captures statewide information, and major stories from around the nation. 

- TN First to the Top Updates: The State Dept of Education does a weekly e-mail to update people about the progress of the "Race to the Top" money.  Sign up HERE.  The Dept's website for FTTT is HERE. 

- Attending at least 1 school board meeting per month: Find out where your school board meets, and you can just sit in for the first hour on the way home. 

- Subscribe to Google Alerts: If you have Gmail (and no, this is no endorsement of one company over another), it's fairly simple to set up Google Alerts.  Once you log into Gmail, click "My Account" then look for the "Alerts" link.  I like the [education Knoxville] and [education Tennessee] Alerts most, but you can think of others.  Any suggestions for me? More information can be found HERE. 

- Stepping foot in a school AT LEAST once per week: For me, I'm volunteering at Austin East HS and Pond Gap Elementary once per week.  Hopefully other schools will invite me in to discuss what they need from communities to be supported and keep the discussion going.  This way, I can help to support teachers as they try to become the most effective teachers as possible! WHAT WILL YOU DO WITH A LOCAL SCHOOL OF YOUR CHOICE?

- Talk to my legislator ONCE PER MONTH about education: Tell them what you want to see happen to improve education.  From promoting effective teachers in schools to accountability of RTTT funds, just speak what's on your mind.  Find out more HERE.  If you have a new legislator, make sure they know how much you care about education!

Whew, that's quite a list.  My work is cut out for me.  But the children in school are counting on it.  That's motivation enough for me.  Good luck starting your New Year "In The Loop." 

IN THE NEWS:
- United Way discusses what it has done to raise community support for effective teachers.  We also have a part of our website dedicated to this work HERE.
- School report card data released TODAY.
KNOX COUNTY FOLKS: Here are the changes in the school Adequate Yearly Progress. 
STATE OF TN HIGH PRIORITY SCHOOLS: Check them out here.
- Teach for America teachers seem to have higher value-added scores than teachers coming out of traditional teacher prep. programs. 
- East TN lawmakers sit down to talk with the TEA teachers about education in the coming year. 
- Teacher and principal residency program is expanded, and Hamilton County talks about how it'll be put to use. 
- Anderson County Schools takes a look back and a look forward to the challenges ahead. 
- Career / Technical Education tracks take off in Knox County.  This is on the heels of a previous blog post I did about CTE. 
- Local Oak Ridge businesses stepped up for the holidays. 
- Bill Gates and National Teacher Union president sit down and talk about how to fix education.  It's about supporting those effective teachers!
- Stay on top of those RTTT dollars here.  Look for the "Scopes of Work" that outline how districts plan to spend $$$ to fix schools. 
- Even in West TN, this group has education as topping its priorities. 
- Parental engagement links from the TN Dept. of Education. 
- Website helps puts $$$ in East TN schools. 

The list could go on, but that's a snapshot...