Public School Policies

The presence of religion, and more specifically, prayer, in public schools has long been a hot-button topic in the United States. Religious parents maintain that their child has the right to pray and engage in other religious activities while at public school. Meanwhile, parents on the other side of the issue argue that their children should not be subjected to state-sponsored religious activities. Numerous court battles have more clearly defined the role religion can play in public schools, however, the debate regarding the nature and extent of religious practices at school continues.

Religion in Schools: A Brief Overview

In the late 1950s, the Board of Regents of New York’s public schools system composed a nondenominational prayer for students to recite at the beginning of the school day. The prayer was strictly voluntary. A group of parents, including Steven Engel, took exception to the practice and filed suit against the Board. After state courts sided with the Board, thus upholding the school’s right to hold the voluntary morning prayer, Engel appealed the case to the Supreme Court. In 1962 the Court handed down their decision in the landmark case, Engel v. Vitale, in which they declared the practice of school-sponsored prayer unconstitutional.

This video deals with the question of whether or not prayer in school is legal.

In the majority opinion, the justices argued that neither the voluntary nature nor the nondenominational nature of

The Common Core State Standards began, in part, as the brainchild of Janet Napolitano, former governor of Arizona. As the chairperson of the National Governors Association in 2006-2007, Napolitano created a task force on education that released a report calling for standardized benchmarks in education. That report eventually formed the basis of the Common Core State Standards, which thus far have been adopted by 45 states, Washington, D.C., four U.S. territories and the edu8cational branch of the Department of Defense.

This video offers a guide to the Common Core State Standards.

Today, the Common Core is a set of high-quality, rigorous standards that outline what children should learn, know and be able to do at each grade level in the areas of math and language arts. The standards seek to address the variability between state-level educational standards that have for years produced high school graduates with widely ranging academic abilities.

Benefits of Common Core

The Common Core Standards are both relevant and rigorous. Students are engaged in activities that build higher-ordered analytical skills, critical thinking skills, and problem-solving skills that are necessary for success in today’s world. In that regard, the standards are not focused solely on the acquisition of knowledge, but the application of that knowledge as well. Additionally, in states where the standards have been adopted, students receive comparable instruction no matter who their teacher is or what school

In an effort to provide families with a disabled child more choices with regard to their child’s education, some cities and states have implemented school voucher programs that provide taxpayer assistance to pay for a child’s private school education. Doing so, supporters say, gives special needs children an opportunity to get a high-quality education at a school their families may not otherwise be able to afford. Yet, detractors of such programs maintain that private schools are not held to the same standard as public schools when it comes to providing special education services. Specifically, some parents worry about the implementation – or lack thereof – of the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act in private school settings.

What is IDEA?

The Individuals with Disabilities Education Act is a federal law that governs what public schools must do to meet the needs of children with disabilities. As mandated by IDEA, students with disabilities are guaranteed a Free Appropriate Public Education (FAPE) in the Least Restrictive Environment (LRE). Essentially, this means that public schools must make necessary accommodations so students with physical, mental, developmental, or emotional disabilities can learn with the same degree of ease as regular education students. These accommodations can vary widely, from more time to take a test to having specialized technologies or classrooms made available for students with disabilities.

This video offers an explanation of IDEA (Individuals with Disabilities Education Act ).

According to a 2014 report by the U.S. Department of Education’s Civil Rights Office, widespread racial disparities exist in how schoolchildren are punished. The longitudinal study looked at data from the past 15 years and found that minority students face a disproportional number of disciplinary actions in schools across the country, from those in affluent suburban neighborhoods to those in the poorest urban areas.

These disparities have been known for some time in middle and high schools. However, this report reveals that unfair discipline procedures begin as early as preschool. The data, which was collected from 97,000 public schools across the country, paints a troubling picture:

• Black and Latino students are consistently punished more severely than white students for the same infractions.
• Nearly 50 percent of preschool children suspended multiple times are black, yet black children represent less than one-fifth of the preschool population.
• Black students are far more likely to be referred to law enforcement or arrested for a school-based offense than white students or other students of color.
• Black girls are suspended much more than girls of any other race.
• Students with disabilities, who represent only 12 percent of the public school population, account for almost 60 percent of students placed in seclusion.

Zero-Tolerance Policies

Many students suspended or placed in involuntary seclusion are put there because of the zero-tolerance policies that schools have put in place over the last two decades. Zero-tolerance policies began initially as a response to major

Cell phones have traditionally been seen by school districts as distractions that interfere with the learning process. Most instituted bans against the use of cell phones during the school day. However, the advent of smart phones has led some districts to re-explore that decision, and some are now backing away from their bans. Are cell phones and public schools becoming a more amicable union, or are districts merely bowing to student pressure?

History of Cell Phone Bans in Schools

For more than a decade, cell phones and other technology devices have been banned in most public schools across the country. The bans were originally instituted to prevent classroom disruptions and distractions, according to the website for the School Safety and Security Services. As the technology has evolved, concerns have been raised over using the devices to cheat on exams. They have also been seen as a security concern, since phones can now discreetly take photographs of tests or students changing in the school locker room.

Over the years, the use of cell phones in schools has become a matter of debate for students, parents and teachers. Advanced technology has now made phones legitimate instructional tools, as students can now use their phones to access an unlimited amount of information from the Internet. Some have also argued that as cell phones become a more prevalent part of today’s culture, keeping phones out of the classroom prevents schools from moving with the times.

Arguments