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President Joe Biden hosted a conference on hunger, nutrition and health on Wednesday, at which he pushed to expand access to free school meals for 9m more children by 2032. “In every country in the world, in every state in this country, no matter what else divides us, if a parent cannot feed a child, there’s nothing else that matters to that parent,” Biden said during the event Wednesday. “If you look at your child and you can’t feed your child, what the hell else matters?” In July, a group of Congressional Democrats introduced the Healthy Meals, Healthy Kids Act. In addition to reauthorizing the expired USDA waivers that allowed all students to eat meals for free regardless of income status, the bill would expand access to free school meals by lowering the threshold for what’s known as the Community Eligibility Provision for those programs. That allows schools or clusters of schools to offer free meals if 40% or more of the student population qualifies for free or reduced-price meals. Under the bill, that threshold would be lowered to 25%. Through the USDA, the administration also plans to expand student access to meals in the summer, provide more resources to school meal programs serving Native American students, and advance a new initiative to support schools’ efforts to improve the nutritional quality of meals. Nonprofit group FoodCorps is working with the administration on this, and is committing $250m to its Nourishing Food Initiative. Crystal FitzSimons, director of school and out-of-school time programs at the Food Research & Action Center, said she is excited about the plan, calling it "a key strategy to ending hunger and supporting health, but then also to really support educational achievement and all the positives that are linked to participation in school breakfast and school lunch." “A healthy school meal is integral to the school day, and no child should go without due to inability to pay,” said Lori Adkins, president of the School Nutrition Association. “Research shows school meals support academic achievement and are the healthiest meals children eat.”

 

The Hill

Education Week

K12 Dive

Wall Street Journal

The U.S. Department of Education has announced Stronger Connections grants totaling nearly $1bn, to help schools provide all students with safe and supportive learning opportunities and environments that are critical for their success. State education agencies (SEAS) must award these funds competitively to high-need local educational agencies (LEAs), as determined by the state, to fund activities allowable under section 4108 of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA). As part of the announcement, U.S. Secretary of Education Miguel Cardona sent chief state school officers a Dear Colleague Letter outlining three principles that SEAs are strongly encouraged to consider when designing a competitive grant competition and providing LEAs with direction for how they use these funds: to implement comprehensive, evidence-based strategies to to create positive, inclusive and supportive school environments; to engage with students, families, educators and staff on the deployment of these strategies; and to ensure that they are responsive to underserved students, protect student rights, and demonstrate respect for student dignity and potential. The Texas Education Agency will receive $94m under the program.

 

Dallas Morning News

US Department of Education

Accelerate Language, Accelerate Literacy

Bilingualism is an advantage and something our students should be proud of—they speak hundreds of different languages with different syntax, grammar, and vocabulary, and this diversity means they each have unique needs when it comes to literacy.

Join us for the third annual Emergent Bilingual Week, October 17-21, 2022! Lexia Learning presents a series of expert-led webinar sessions that explore important aspects of supporting multilingual students, including the acceleration of English language learning, the role of oral language in literacy instruction, language learning efficacy and research, how educators can leverage artificial intelligence, and much more!

The webinars are free. Attendees will earn CE certificates for PD hours and teacher license renewal.

Register today!

 

The first major lawsuit has been filed over the mass shooting at Robb Elementary School by the families of three surviving students. Defendants in the federal lawsuit include Uvalde Consolidated ISD, the city of Uvalde, former school district Police Chief Pedro “Pete” Arredondo, suspended Uvalde Police Lt. Mariano Pargas and then-Robb Principal Mandy Gutierrez. “The horrors of May 24th, 2022, were only possible because so many in positions of power were negligent, careless, and reckless,” Stephanie B. Sherman, the lead attorney in the case, said in a statement. The 81-page lawsuit, filed in Del Rio, accuses most defendants of negligence, inaction or defective products or systems that enabled the gunman to acquire the firearm, ammunition and gun accessories he used to kill 19 students and two teachers. He wounded 16 others. The suit seeks undetermined compensatory damages against all defendants and punitive damages against all the defendants except the school district and the city.

 

Houston Chronicle

Fort Worth ISD is applying for a waiver allowing it to exceed maximum class sizes set by state law at 22 students for grades pre-K through fourth grade. More than 120 classrooms spread across every elementary school are above that limit, ranging from classes with 23 students up to 30 students. Existing staff were reallocated during the fall leveling process in order to meet the student-teacher ratio of 22:1 to the greatest extent possible, according to board documents. “Despite the reallocation of staff, there are still classrooms over the established 22:1 class size ratio in grades PK-4,” district staff said in the documents. Chief of schools Jerry Moore said the move is necessary in order to ensure all students are receiving the highest-quality education, especially as teacher shortages continue to impact the district.

 

Fort Worth Star-Telegram

San Benito Consolidated ISD has signed a Memorandum of Understanding with the Texas A&M Experiment Station that will see it offer NASA’S High School Aerospace Scholars program to students. “This is the first time that we are going to have this partnership with Texas A&M and NASA representatives,” said Alex Salinas, higher education coordinator for the district. “Through this program they will be able to learn different science, technology, engineering and mathematics-related fields of study.” The program is a huge opportunity for high school students said Shelley Tornquist, director of Spark! PK-12 Engineering Education Outreach for Texas A&M. “The High School Aerospace Scholars program has been around for about 22 years,” she said. “It has been an online course for Texas juniors and they go through four modules in about four months. If they do well in those they get invited to the Johnson Space Center in the summer for an engagement.”

 

The Monitor

Construction firms are set and land purchases have been approved as Montgomery ISD moves ahead with several projects planned from its $326m May bond election, the largest that the district has ever passed. It plans to build a new elementary school, a new agriculture center, and a new career and technical education center. The year-long design process for the latter two facilities will start this week. While the facilities will be separate, it is likely that they will be built on the same property. Kris Lynn, assistant superintendent of finance and operations, said the district is still looking for a site for the facilities but hopes to announce the decision within the next month. Together, the projects are expected to cost around $80m and the district plans on opening both for the 2025-26 school year. 

 

Houston Chronicle

 

US Department of Education

Charles Russo, a research professor of law at the University of Dayton in Ohio, outlines several best practices for school leaders to consider when crafting policies to determine the use of technology in education. Speaking at the Association of School Business Officials International’s Annual Conference & Expo in Portland, Oregon, Russo, also director of the Ph.D. program in educational leadership at the University of Dayton, suggested that acceptable use policies should restrict school-issued computer use to only academic, instructional or administrative purposes, and students, parents and teachers should all sign agreements at the start of each school year. Policies that explain when students can use cellphones in school, he added, should be considered on a district-by-district basis. If a school community is likely to support such a policy for example, a committee of stakeholders, including school board members, teachers, lawyers, administrators, parents and students, should be created to craft guidelines.

 

K12 Dive