| Schoolcraft Meeting Tonight 1/12/06; Superintendent Meeting | |
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| Tweet Topic Started: Jan 12 2006, 12:07 PM (437 Views) | |
| 2boys | Jan 12 2006, 12:07 PM Post #1 |
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Principal
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State Senator Bruce Patterson (R - Canton), is sponsoring an Educational Town Hall with Michigan schools Superintendent Mike Flanagan, local school officials and parents, January 12 at Schoolcraft College. The forum will be from 7 - 8:30pm in the Presentation Room of the VisTaTech Center, next to Schoolcraft's north parking lot at 18600 Haggerty Rd., between 6 & 7 Mile Rds. This is open to the public. It would be great to get a whole bunch of Livonia citizens to attend this meeting. |
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| Administrator | Jan 12 2006, 12:10 PM Post #2 |
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Administrator
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Thanks 2boys, I was just about to add this! I'm going to hit the "transition" meeting, then head over to Schoolcraft. See you there! |
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| Administrator | Jan 12 2006, 09:41 PM Post #3 |
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Administrator
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An interesting meeting tonight. The discussion was mostly on the new requirements for high school graduation. My first conclusion was that this is a great idea. My second conclusion is that schools are being asked to do more with less again. My third conclusion was that this state has no idea what it is doing. It seems to me that in this new global economy, we need to educate our kids more than ever before, but how can you really do that when everyone is cutting back? My last conclusion was that my head and a brick wall seem to make a better match than the state and education. From what I could see, no one from LPS attended. |
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| Tyler_Parent | Jan 12 2006, 10:15 PM Post #4 |
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Principal
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My thought is that there are 2 great things about this high school plan. First, it replaces the MEAP with the ACT. I would be even happier if they replaced the MEAP in all grades with respected standardized tests. Second, is that all high school students will now take the ACT, and the $75 fee will be paid for by the State. |
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| Cindi | Jan 13 2006, 07:25 AM Post #5 |
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Principal
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I agree.........When I compared LPS to Plymouth Canton I noticed that P/C had higher ACT results than LPS (not by much)---however, P/C percentage of participants was quite a bit higher than the participants from LPS. I questioned Dr. Liepa why he thinks this is the case? Are students encouraged and guided to take the tests? I would like to think they are. The average household income is $20K more in P/C than Livonia, and the percentage of college degree holders is higher in P/C than that of Livonia....that could play a part in it. Is the high school plan adopted or is it still in the development stages? |
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| Elisa | Jan 13 2006, 08:41 AM Post #6 |
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Principal
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The State BOE has approved the increased high school graduation requirements. http://www.michigan.gov/mde/0,1607,7-140--132123--,00.html |
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| Momforone | Jan 13 2006, 11:29 AM Post #7 |
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Principal
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I did get a lot out of the meeting last night. I'm very worried that our state is in really big trouble. I was shocked that only 23% of our parents in the State of Michigan think that post high school education is neccessary. I spoke with Dr. Flannigan after the meeting. I told hiim I thought changes for teaching math @ the elementary level needed to be done now. Why are they only going to train our college students. Our elementary teachers in our state need to be trained now so that the kids will be able to handle the math requirements @ the high school level. We can't wait for future teachers. Young adults with teaching degrees will probabaly leave our state anyway since there aren't many teaching positions available. Sometimes I think that some people are so involved in make changes that they don't think clearly. Waters seem to be muddied everywhere. Livonia and Lansing. Where's the logic? |
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| NFarquharson | Jan 13 2006, 11:38 AM Post #8 |
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Principal
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Thank goodness for these new standards! As someone who works in HR in the health care industry, this is good news for our state. We are one industry that will continue to grow as the population ages and we can't send most of our work out of the local community, as medicine is a hands-on field. Having spent many years trying to recruit talent into my organization prior to my current role, it has been clear to me that we have a problem for so very long. Many high school graduates can't even write a sentence without grammar and spelling mistakes. It's just so sad that we aren't doing better than this. There are shortages in many fields within health care, most notably nursing and radiology technology (17% national shortage, including general, sonography and most of all nuclear rad techs.) Both fields require a strong science and math background, at least 2 years of training after high school... and salaries in these fields are moving up by leaps and bounds! Nursing is not at all what it used to be and there are so many career choices for nurses now. Rad Techs are using the most incredible sophisticated equipment and computers and hospitals have been scrambling and offering all kinds of sign-on and retention bonuses to find more of them. If any of you have children who are thinking about future careers, you might want to have them consider health care. Working in health care is so rewarding and the jobs will definately be there. |
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| Anna Krome | Jan 14 2006, 11:27 AM Post #9 |
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Principal
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Thanks, N-- What a great idea--to post occupations, which are actually "hot" right now. But, I must say, when a member of our group tried to speak to the State's Top Super after the meeting, the man's reaction was... Shock? Dismay? Get-me-the-hell-outta-here! Believe me, this is huge. It was obvious that what is happening in Livonia is a "heads up" to the folks running our schools in the entire state. They do not like this at all. There were several Livonia citizens in that audience. Anna |
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| NFarquharson | Jan 14 2006, 11:35 AM Post #10 |
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Principal
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And not one Livonia board member or administrator... |
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| Administrator | Jan 14 2006, 12:55 PM Post #11 |
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Administrator
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When it comes to education, I think it might be time to start looking at models outside the United States. Many other countries are simply kicking our...asymptote's! Anyone read or speak Japanese??? Chinese??
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3:38 AM Jul 11