Education Week - November 2, 2016 - 4

NEWS IN BRIEF
LGBT Groups File Suit
Over School Speech Limits
A Utah lawsuit filed last week
seeks to open a new front in LGBT
rights after the U.S. Supreme Court
ruling on same-sex marriage by challenging laws it says discriminate
against LGBT students by restricting
talk about homosexuality in schools.
The suit by the National Center for
Lesbian Rights and Equality Utah
contends the law blocked teachers in
Weber County from helping a 7-yearold boy targeted by bullies for wearing girls' clothes because it prevented
them from saying it's OK to be gay.
The rule is one of several similar
measures around the country, said
a lawyer with the center, which may
bring similar suits in such states as
Alabama, Arizona, Louisiana, Mississippi, South Carolina, and Texas.
-ASSOCIATED PRESS

A Maryland state school board
member has quit in the wake of Gov.
Larry Hogan's executive order requiring schools to start after Labor Day.
S. James Gates Jr., a University
of Maryland professor, resigned last
week, saying the order has the potential to damage students. He also suggested that Hogan's order challenges
the independence of the board.
Hogan signed the order in August,
requiring all public schools to start
classes after Labor Day and end
by June 15. The Republican later
amended the order, narrowing the
conditions under which most districts
could get a waiver from the mandate.
Hogan called local school board
officials who have raised concerns
"whiny."
-AP

Pa. to Recalculate
School Report Cards
The Pennsylvania education department will issue updated report
card scores for some high schools
after identifying an inaccuracy that
could change their overall results.
The department was alerted last
month to a problem with value-added
assessment-system scores, a component of the School Performance Pro-

Ramon Espinosa/AP

Md. Board Member Resigns
Over Opening-Day Order

file formula, which provides information about student academic growth.
The faulty information, provided
by the department's data-reporting
contractor SAS-EVAAS, only affects
schools where Keystone end-ofcourse exams are administered in
algebra, literature, and biology.
-TRIBUNE NEWS SERVICE

Wash. Reports High Number
Of State Students Restrained
New data from Washington state
school districts show that, from January through June, thousands of students were involved in incidents that
resulted in school employees' use of
restraints or isolation to get behavior
under control.
The data, released last month by
the state superintendent's office for
the first time under a 2015 law, also
reveal that the procedures resulted
in more than 300 injuries to students and nearly 1,000 injuries to
school staff members. The new data

Fearing Election Day Trouble,
Some Schools Cancel Classes
Rigged elections. Vigilante observers. Angry
voters. The claims, threats, and passions surrounding the presidential race have led communities around the country to move polling places
out of schools or cancel classes on Election Day.
The fear is that the ugly rhetoric of the
campaign could escalate into confrontations
and even violence in school hallways, endangering students.
School officials point to the recent firebombing of a Republican Party office in North Carolina and the shooting-up of another with a
BB gun as the type of trouble they fear.
Some of those anxieties have been stoked by

include special-needs and general
education students.
Nearly a fourth of the state's districts did not comply with reporting
requirements.
State Rep. Gerry Pollet, who
sponsored the 2015 legislation,
pointed to disparities between districts statewide, such as Spokane
and Tacoma. Both are roughly the
same size, with about 30,000 students. But Spokane reported 1,174
incidents of isolation, while Tacoma
reported 840.
-TNS

Video Shows Miss. Teacher
Dragging Student by Hair
A Mississippi teacher has been
fired, the district superintendent has
been placed on paid administrative
leave, and state investigators are trying to determine whether the fired
educator should lose her teaching license, after video of the teacher dragging a student by the hair surfaced
on Facebook.

GOP nominee Donald Trump's repeated claims
that the election is rigged and his appeal to
supporters to stand guard against fraud at the
polls. Some administrators are worried about
clashes between the self-appointed observers
and voters.
Schools are popular polling places because
they typically have plenty of parking and are
usually centrally located. It's difficult to say
how many school-based polling places have
been moved this year, given how decentralized the voting process is. But state and local
officials say voting has been removed or
classes have been canceled on Election Day
at schools in Illinois, Maine, Nebraska, New
Hampshire, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Wisconsin,
and elsewhere.
"There is a concern, just like at a concert,

4 | EDUCATION WEEK | NOVEMBER 2, 2016 | www.edweek.org

The teacher, Linda WintersJohnson, was fired by the district
last month, according to the Delta
Democrat-Times.
The three-minute video taken at
the Greenville High School gym
appears to show the teacher pushing a metal thermos into the student's forehead, later holding her
down on the floor by her hair, and
then dragging her a few feet by her
ponytail.
The videos are believed to have
been recorded in late September. The
Greenville school board placed Superintendent Leeson Taylor II on leave
while the investigations continue.
-CHRISTINA A. SAMUELS

Probe Underway in Miss.
On Noose Allegations
A Mississippi high school student
has been disciplined following allegations that one or more white students
put a noose around a black football
player's neck, a lawyer for the Stone

sporting event, or other public gathering,
that we didn't have 15 or 20 years ago. What
if someone walks in a polling location with a
backpack bomb or something?" said Georgia
Secretary of State Brian Kemp, the co-chairman of the National Association of Secretaries
of State election committee.
John Reinhart, the schools superintendent in
Easton, Pa., wanted to get voting out of schools
altogether but was rebuffed by county election
officials. So the school board canceled classes.
Election officials say that removing schools
as polling places creates logistical headaches
and voter confusion.
"We wouldn't be able to conduct voting
without them," said Pam Anderson, the executive director of the Colorado County Clerks
Association.
-ASSOCIATED PRESS

FLOATING CLASSROOM
The U.S. tall ship Roseway
arrives at Havana's harbor
carrying 22 American high
school students for the
semester-at-sea program,
World Ocean School, last
week. The students from
Proctor Academy in
Andover, N.H., make
several stops during
their voyage.

County school district said last week.
Administrators determined that
Stone High School's conduct code
was violated in the Oct. 13 incident.
Mississippi NAACP President
Derrick Johnson called last week for
a federal hate-crimes investigation
and prosecution of the assailants, all
younger than 18, as adults. While
sheriff's deputies are investigating,
Sean Courtney, the district's lawyer,
says the behavior reported to staff
members gave no indication of a
crime or criminal intent.
The football coach said a player
was kicked off the team as soon as
school officials determined who was
involved.
-AP

Hawaii Board to Replace
State Schools Chief
Hawaii's board of education will
search for a new schools superintendent to succeed Kathryn Matayoshi
when her contract ends June 30,
even though she has expressed the
desire to stay.
Last month, the board gave Matayoshi, who took over as acting
superintendent in January 2010, a
positive annual performance evaluation, saying she exceeds expectations
in "overall rating" and in "overall

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Education Week - November 2, 2016

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