No Bull, No Fluff, No Smudges
Your news source for
Flagler, Florida and Beyond
FlaglerLive | July 11, 2012
All but one Flagler County public or charter school scored an A or a B. The exception was Palm Harbor Academy, a charter, which scored an F. The state’s teachers union cautioned against making much of the results absent a more reliable testing system.
FlaglerLive | July 3, 2012
Global Outreach Academy has been on the hunt for a building for months. The three-year deal at the Flagler County Airport fills a building on which the county has been paying $111,000 a year while having a terrible time keeping occupied since it built it for Embry-Riddle Aeronautic University in 2004.
FlaglerLive | June 28, 2012
Katie Hansen, president of Flagler County’s teachers union, forcefully argues against FCAT’s culture of high-stakes testing and false but pervasive notions that unions protect bad teachers and contribute only to Democrats.
FlaglerLive | June 19, 2012
Superintendent Janet Valentine told the school board this evening a deputy superintendent was critical to ensure a proper succession–and to fill in at a critical time, as she tends to her daughter, who was involved in a violent car wreck.
FlaglerLive | June 14, 2012
Jacksonville-based Florida International Language Academy has been on the hunt for a location in Flagler for its 364-student K-8, language-oriented school, opening in August. Talks in Bunnell and Palm Coast fell through, returning the company to the Food Lion location in Flagler Beach.
FlaglerLive | June 14, 2012
Sarah Jean Namdar-Yeganeh, 28, the daughter of Flagler Superintendent Janet Valentine, was ejected from her car in a two-vehicle wreck on I-95 Wednesday afternoon.
FlaglerLive | June 13, 2012
Facebook is blocked on Flagler County school district networks, though students and faculty access it anyway by bypassing the network on phones, and the district, which prides itself on technology uses, is considering lifting the ban during after-school activities.
FlaglerLive | June 8, 2012
The 2012 primary and general elections will be heavily contested in all but a handful of local and judicial district races. County Commissioner Revels, Tax Collector Johnston and Property Appraiser Gardner are among the automatic winners who faced no opposition.
FlaglerLive | June 8, 2012
County Commission Chairman Barbara Revels called the emergency meeting “ridiculous,” School Board member Colleen Conklin called it “nonsense,” but neither commission nor school board felt it had a choice but to comply with Supervisor of Elections Kimberle Weeks’s demand that meeting be held.
FlaglerLive | June 5, 2012
As reading and math scores improved statewide in most grades, despite tougher standards, Flagler County students lost ground over last year’s results, and struggled to keep up with state averages.
FlaglerLive | June 5, 2012
Jim Guines, who served nearly 13 years on the Flagler County School Board until 2007, was received the Founder’s Award at the mentor program’s annual banquet Monday evening.
FlaglerLive | May 31, 2012
I have covered an endless number of graduations in my career. Tonight, for the first time, my child–my daughter–was among the graduates. There was only one way to cover this one: in the first person.
FlaglerLive | May 24, 2012
Out of 988 students who took the test in Flagler County, 130, or 13 percent, scored only a 1 on a scale of 5, and will be held back, absent improvements in summer reading school, which the district offers free.
FlaglerLive | May 20, 2012
Flagler County high schools are encouraging more students to take Advanced Placement tests, which beef up a school’s profile. But when students fail the testm their teachers are penalized, now that their pay is tied to student performance.
FlaglerLive | May 18, 2012
As expected, Flagler County’s writing scores for 4th, 8th and 10th graders, released today, fell precipitously as the state imposed a new writing standard and a new passing grade, but itself failed to convey those standards clearly to teachers and principals ahead of time.
FlaglerLive | May 18, 2012
A Flagler County school bus on a run to three schools was rammed from behind by a Mitsubishi Friday morning, startling the 34 students on board but causing minor damage to the bus and no injuries.
FlaglerLive | May 16, 2012
A government entity is the largest employer in 51 of the state’s 67 counties, including in Flagler, where the school board 1,700 employees, and in every county in Florida government at least one of the top five largest employers.
FlaglerLive | May 15, 2012
Florida Public Schools Chancellor Pam Stewart’s 75-minute appearance before the Flagler County School Board, teachers and others Tuesday afternoon lent more PR than insights into the state’s latest FCAT fiasco, satisfying few locally.
FlaglerLive | May 14, 2012
The lower scores can have serious implications on school grades, students’ promotions and graduations, merit pay and evaluations for teachers. The state Board of Education called an emergency meeting for Tuesday to rethink its approach.
FlaglerLive | May 8, 2012
Sen. John Thrasher, at Flagler Palm Coast High School Tuesday morning, heard how legislation on testing and teacher evaluations is at odds with reality, vowed to study alternatives, and welcomed Flagler officials’ request to make public schools part of the reform game.
FlaglerLive | May 6, 2012
Every year during Teacher Appreciation Week (May 7-11), Matanzas’s Jo Ann Nahirny has her English students write thank you cards to teachers, and receives a few herself, which she’s always kept in what she calls her “don’t quit” file. She opens it up.
FlaglerLive | May 3, 2012
The school district and the Sheriff’s Office are beefing up security at Flagler Palm Coast High School in response to a rumored confrontation on campus Friday, spilling over from a confrontation at Ralph Carter Park last Sunday. The superintendent stressed that there was no hard evidence of such a confrontation.
FlaglerLive | May 2, 2012
As district officials said that something similar to a task force is already in place, Colleen Conklin said whatever is in place isn’t working, but she was less specific about what ought to replace it, and with what measurable aims.
FlaglerLive | May 2, 2012
Wesley Adams, who represented students on the Flagler County School Board this year, was named All-American by U.S. Lacrosse, the national governing board of the sport, after becoming one of FPC’s leading scorers in the last four years.
FlaglerLive | April 24, 2012
The Flagler County School Board didn’t want its initiative lost in the clutter of the November ballot, or see it compete against the county’s and cities’ similar initiative, but primary turnout will be heavily Republican–an unhappy prospect for any tax initiative.
FlaglerLive | April 18, 2012
FCAT testing began this week, and with a dozen tests administered by computer only, to save money, teachers in several Flagler schools are reporting students being arbitrarily logged off, losing work and time and worsening already stressful conditions.
FlaglerLive | April 10, 2012
Palm Coast and the county disagree over how to split $4 million in annual revenue from the a half-cent sales surtax. The county wants more than it’s been getting. A joint meeting Tuesday produced good will but no breakthrough.
FlaglerLive | March 28, 2012
Flagler school board members don’t want to go through what they did last year, nickel-and-diming small programs, so they’re looking at offering students and parents morte “school choice,” revamping the district’s health insurance, offering early retirement and other “big ideas.”
FlaglerLive | March 13, 2012
A seven-hour hearing ended in the Flagler County School Board voting 4-1 to uphold its decision to close Heritage Academy, whose CEO, Doug Jackson, and own board members were no-shows, leaving the school’s defense in the hands of its dean of students.
FlaglerLive | March 12, 2012
After recriminations and a particularly insulting whistle from the district’s lead negotiator, the two sides appeared headed for compromise over the one issue–how teachers are to be evaluated–keeping the district from approving the 2012-13 teachers contract.
Archive for The Live Wire »
|
|
|
|
