Dear Commons Community,

President Obama yeserday took a step to ensure that schools serving low-income areas get their fair share of the nation’s best teachers.

New guidelines tell states how to equitably distribute teaching talent between affluent and low-income schools, expanding the Obama administration’s Excellent Educators for All initiative. The program, announced in July, called on states to develop plans that would give low-income students the same access to excellent teachers as wealthier schools. Monday’s guidance gives more detail on what these plans should look like and allows states until June 2015 to finish — two additional months. As reported in The Huffington Post:

“Data compiled by the U.S. Department of Education shows that teachers in wealthy districts are more likely to have received a master’s degree or higher than in districts where a majority of students qualify for free or reduced-price lunch. Teachers in high-minority school districts also are less likely to be certified in the subjects they teach. The question of how to separate good teachers from bad teachers has long plagued policymakers and riled teachers’ unions. The administration avoided this controversy with the new guidance. It tells states to define “excellent educators” as they see fit, although it encourages them to use teacher evaluation effectiveness ratings. Many of these ratings include measures that are based at least in part on students’ standardized test scores.

The government sent each state an educator equity profile, outlining the distribution of experienced teachers. Education Department officials said on a call with reporters that these profiles would not be made public until December. The new guidance allows states to identify root causes of inequity in teacher distribution, then develop plans for remedies. In that way, each state may develop measures best for local conditions.”

The President is providing essentially moral support. Teacher placement is a complex issue given the problems with defining “best teachers”, collective bargaining contracts, and the inequity of school district funding.

Tony

Dear Commons Community,

In his most direct effort to influence the debate about the Internet’s future, President Obama said on Monday that a free and open Internet was as critical to Americans’ lives as electricity and telephone service and should be regulated like those utilities to protect consumers. As reported in the New York Times:

“The Federal Communications Commission, Mr. Obama said, needs to adopt the strictest rules possible to prevent broadband companies from blocking or intentionally slowing down legal content and from allowing content providers to pay for a fast lane to reach consumers. That approach, he said, demands thinking about both wired and wireless broadband service as a public utility.

“For almost a century, our law has recognized that companies who connect you to the world have special obligations not to exploit the monopoly they enjoy over access into and out of your home or business,” Mr. Obama, who is traveling in Asia, said in a statement and a video on the White House website. “It is common sense that the same philosophy should guide any service that is based on the transmission of information — whether a phone call or a packet of data.”

The president’s move was widely interpreted as giving political support to Tom Wheeler, the F.C.C. chairman. Mr. Wheeler is close to settling on a plan to protect an open Internet, often known as net neutrality, and Mr. Obama’s statement could push him to adopt a more aggressive approach. Any set of rules needs three votes from the five-member commission, which now has three Democrats and two Republicans.

The debate may hinge on whether Internet access is considered a necessity, like electricity, or more of an often-costly option, like cable TV.

The proposal was hailed by Internet content companies like Netflix, Democrats in Congress and consumer advocacy groups. But the leading providers of Internet access, increasingly dependent on revenue from broadband subscriptions, quickly denounced the proposal. Republicans and some investment groups also spoke out against the plan, saying the regulation was heavy-handed and would kill online investment and innovation.

The F.C.C.’s previous rules for net neutrality wee struck down in January by a federal appeals court, leaving the commission in search of new rules. In May, the commission released a proposal that would maintain a light regulatory touch, which Mr. Obama said was not strong enough.”

This is a critical issue that calls for strong action on the part of President Obama. We cannot have one Internet for the rich and moneyed interests and one for everyone else.

Tony