Monthly Archives: June 2017

Here’s a suggestion that will help Florida’s school districts a bit in addressing their budgeting issues: Don’t have students take dual enrollment courses in algebra, precalculus, trigonometry, calculus, statistics and introductory college level science. Instead, have students take Honors Precalculus … Continue reading →

It’s something that everybody knows: K-12 student achievement and opportunity are strongly correlated with the socioeconomic status of students. But for STEM career preparation in Florida, it’s not that simple. Instead, choices made by school and district leaders – and … Continue reading →

Last spring, I wrote the piece below for publication in the Newsletter of the American Physical Society’s Forum on Education in a special issue about the physics departments cited in the J-TUPP report.  FSU was included in the report.  Somewhere … Continue reading →

Many Florida districts had substantial increases over last year in the number of 7th and 8th graders passing the spring administration of the Algebra 1 end-of-course exam. With a statewide increase of 16% in the number of middle school students … Continue reading →

Among numerous other things, the enormous education policy bill signed by Governor Scott yesterday (HB 7069) ended the life of Florida’s Algebra 2 end-of-course exam. Good riddance. The well-informed reader might be wondering why I would say that.  After all, … Continue reading →

Riding a wave of high-achieving 7th graders, mega-district Orange County passed traditional math and science powerhouse Seminole to become Florida’s best district for middle school performance on the state’s Algebra 1 end-of-course exam (EOC) this spring, according to an analysis … Continue reading →

The numbers of Florida students passing the state’s end-of-course exams in Algebra 1 and 2 this spring were sharply higher than last spring while the number of students passing the Geometry EOC declined. The number of students passing the Algebra … Continue reading →

This coming fall, Bay County’s Rutherford High School will have four times as many physics students as it did two years ago. Meanwhile, Bay High School has added a second physics teacher to its staff to handle growth in its … Continue reading →

If you are member of the Florida Board of Governors and you think the above picture is what my physics class looks like, you might be wondering why we can’t do as good a job (or better) at a smaller … Continue reading →

On Friday, Governor Scott signed HB 293, a bill that authorizes a $50,000 study of states that perform at a relatively high level in middle school math and reading, as measured by the 2015 National Assessment of Educational Progress.  In … Continue reading →