ACET, Inc. Blog

ACET will be attending the 2011 Public Affairs Student Association (PASA) Career Engagement Fair on Feb. 24 at the Hubert H. Humphrey School of Public Affairs at the University of Minnesota. We would love to talk with interested parties about our company and the field of evaluation. We will also be prescreening for positions at the fair. If you’re a graduate student or alumnus interested in a career in research and evaluation, please find our table – we would love to talk to you!

Cassie

Minnesota Governor Mark Dayton recently released his “7-Point Plan for Achieving Excellence” in education. The seven points in the plan focuses on three main areas: improve state education funding; focus more resources and raise the profile of Early Childhood Education; and narrow the achievement gap.

Dayton spoke about the plan on his website, stating, “Education was key to our State’s past prosperity, and it will be key to our future prosperity. An excellent public education system will be the driving force behind job creation in Minnesota. We must prepare today’s students for the jobs and the industries of the future, and thus we must make important innovations in our public school system. With this plan, we will take what is good with Minnesota’s K-12 education and make it even better, to ensure every student full opportunity to succeed in this ever more competitive global economy.” (http://mn.gov/governor/newsroom/pressreleasedetail.jsp?id=9625)

Specifically, the seven points are as follows:

1. Funding education for the future – including investing in early childhood and kindergarten and maintaining efforts to close the achievement gap. Part of this mandate calls for establishing a Governor’s Commission on Better School Funding.

2. Better early childhood education – by targeting all-day kindergarten, expanding the K-12 system to a pre-K-12 system, and implementing school readiness standards.

3. Close the gap – through setting accountability targets to close achievement gaps and establishing a Governor’s Award for Excellence in Education and Governor’s Achievement Gap Innovation Fund.

4. Reading well by third grade – by launching a statewide literacy campaign, molding accountability standards to meet this goal, and adopting literacy standards for pre-K-3.

5. Support teaching for better schools –  setting alternative pathways to teacher licensure, establishing a statewide teacher performance evaluation, development system, and support networks, and supporting early childhood teacher observation and development.

6. Better testing for better results – including developing assessments for learning (i.e., formative assessments: see our former post on formative assessment), establishing a Test Reduction Task Force, and including growth as an accountability measure.

7. A department of education that provides educational leadership and support – by repositioning the Minnesota Department of Education to support teachers, schools, and districts; reauthorizing the Statewide Early Childhood Advisory Council and reestablishing the Children’s Cabinet; and charging the Commissioner of Education with leadership of early childhood initiatives.

To read the full press release, follow this link: http://mn.gov/governor/newsroom/pressreleasedetail.jsp?id=9625

For an outline of the seven-point plan, follow this link: http://mn.gov/governor/images/Better-Schools-For-A-Better-Minnesota.pdf

Joseph

Although we focus on research and evaluation tips or grant leads on this blog, we also understand the need for some lighthearted posts – that’s why we occasionally have staff book reviews. Many of you may know that I majored in English in college, which would lead you to the obvious assumption that I like to read. You may not know, however, that one of my all-time favorite authors is Dr. Seuss. My parents introduced me to Dr. Seuss when I was a very young child – I even taught myself to read using Dr. Seuss’ books when I was 3! His works stuck with me as I grew up. To this day, my favorite Dr. Seuss book is “The Sneetches” and I would give anything to own a one-piece Sneetch pajamas!

You can imagine my interest when I discovered “The Seuss, the Whole Seuss, and Nothing But the Seuss,” by Charles D. Cohen. By reading the book, I learned how Theodor Seuss Geisel gradually adapted his pen name to Dr. Seuss after he began publishing in “Judge” magazine (he was adding mock authority to a cartoon he drafted). I learned that Dr. Seuss had many varying explanations for his odd characters, so one rarely knew the accurate story of how he created them. Dr. Seuss was well-known among his schoolmates and peers as a clever and witty person – in fact, he was penning whole pieces of parody when he was only 14 years old. Although I knew that Dr. Seuss had done far more than authoring children’s books, I found that he also created adult books, publications, illustrations, paintings, sculptures, screenplays, and more! And, of course, I learned the history of “The Sneetches.” Dr. Seuss created the characters to promote equality in a world of intolerance after seeing multiple court cases involving racial segregation.

Cohen’s detailed biography of Dr. Seuss proved to be an interesting, and informative read for any Seuss bibliophile curious about the life and ideas of the popular author. The book is also filled with pictures and illustrations – some of which were nearly lost and required much research and dedication on the behalf of Cohen. Cohen’s book is particularly useful because much of the information out there is cursory or even incorrect. I appreciate that I now have a deeper understanding of a man who has influenced my entire life through his works.

Cassie