Fears over lack of scrutiny for key sectors as health editor position also to go in cuts aimed at saving £5.5m
The BBC will no longer have a dedicated education editor as part of a cost-cutting drive in which 100 jobs are to go across BBC News under a plan that school leaders described as “deeply regrettable”.
BBC staff have been told that the roles of education editor and social affairs editor are to be combined into a single position as part of a round of changes that will save £5.5m. However, prominent unions and campaigners are saying the reform will dilute scrutiny of two specialisms that are too important to go without a dedicated BBC role.
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© Photograph: Jeff Gilbert/Alamy
© Photograph: Jeff Gilbert/Alamy
© Photograph: Jeff Gilbert/Alamy
Schoolchildren in the 4th and 6th years (mainly from ages 9-11) “have a lot of difficulty in understanding and producing texts in Portuguese, and also in reasoning and the resolution
The post “Horrible results” in Portuguese tests for 9-11-year-olds appeared first on Portugal Resident.
SALT LAKE CITY â Education Secretary Linda McMahon told Fox News Digital that the United States is due for a "reset" of public education after spending $3 trillion over decades while national reading scores have consistently declined.
"We've spent this $3 trillion that you referenced, and we've watched scores continue to come down. So we're doing something wrong. We need to reset," McMahon said in an interview with Fox News Digital.
"We know that the president believes, as do I, that the best education is the one that's closest to the child with parental involvement," McMahon added. "Our goal is to make sure that we move administrative programs that focus more on adults out of Washington, D.C., so that we can get all of those dollars back into education in the states."
TRUMP ADMINISTRATION TOUTS 'HARD RESET' FOR AMERICAN SCHOOLS, VOWS TO PUT PARENTS 'BACK IN CHARGE'
McMahon visited Utah on Tuesday to highlight the Trump administration's progress in reforming K-12 education. Delivering a speech titled "The Next 250: K-12 Education," the secretary emphasized returning education authority to the states, investing in proven academic interventions and expanding school choice for families.
"In every decision we make, we are not asking what's better for growing government power, ideological agendas or bureaucrats' careers. We are returning education to its most basic obligation: to nurture the God-given potential of our children," McMahon told a crowd of students, parents and teachers at American Preparatory Academy in West Valley City.
The Utah event marked the 47th stop on the department's 50-state tour aimed at decentralizing federal education authority. According to Department of Education officials, more than $3 trillion in federal taxpayer money has been spent over the decades, while national test results show that only about three in 10 students perform at or above the proficient level in math and reading.
Speaking with Fox News Digital following her address, McMahon said parental involvement in education increased during the pandemic.
"Parents, for the first time, could see what was going on with education, with the curriculum that was being taught to their children," McMahon said. "They became involved, they became concerned, and they started going to school board meetings. I think that really started to change the focus. And that, in conjunction with looking at the fact that NAEP scores â our national report card â have simply gone down since the Department of Education was established."
McMahon pledged upon taking office to work toward dismantling the federal agency, including hiring leaders tasked with phasing out their own offices. The push aligns with President Donald Trump's broader education initiative, which he highlighted at a White House Rose Garden event promoting school choice. Trump also pledged to eliminate "far-left extremism" from classrooms and argued that federal education spending has failed to deliver acceptable academic results.
As part of the administration's broader effort to downsize federal oversight, the Department of Education announced an interagency agreement with the Treasury Department in March. Under the agreement, Treasury will take on certain responsibilities for managing federal student loans, including collections on defaulted loans, as part of the administration's effort to transfer administrative duties away from the Education Department.
The student loan transfer is one of nine interagency partnerships designed to serve as a "proof of concept" for Congress to show that federal education tasks can be reallocated.
"I've asked Congress, with this proof of concept and these interagency agreements: Let me prove to you that it works," McMahon told Fox News Digital. "I know, ultimately, Congress has to vote if we do close the Department of Education and if I, in fact, am able to fire myself. Hopefully, they will vote for it because I believe the outcome will be better for students â and that is the goal."
McMahon said that the federal agency functions largely as a "pass-through" for funding rather than controlling local school curricula, a distinction she noted is frequently misunderstood by the public.
"The goal is to get rid of the bureaucracy of education that seems to focus more on adults and not on children's performance," she said.
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Following her Utah visit, McMahon's four-part speaking series will continue with upcoming stops in Nevada, Arizona and Tennessee to address rising higher education costs and workforce Pell grants. Her final keynote in Tennessee later this month will focus on restoring accountability and standards in higher education.
A friend was recently startled to find a Soviet-style hammer and sickle prominently displayed at a farmers market just a block from a monument to those who sacrificed their lives fighting totalitarianism. It's particularly jarring for immigrants from former communist countries to see these hateful symbols cheerfully displayed alongside fresh greens, organic honey and homemade pies.
When my friend engaged the affable twentysomething about her advocacy for communism in America, the conversation quickly became absurd. "Don't you know about the Gulag, the torture chambers, the Tiananmen Square massacre, the murder of 100 million men, women and children?" to which she replied, "I'm not sure what you're talking aboutâ¦"
The young woman then parried, "All I know is that America has a shameful past and we should try to atone for the crimes of capitalism."
LIBERAL HOT SPOT RESIDENTS CANâT AGREE ON WHAT SOCIALISM MEANS AS FAR-LEFT MOVEMENTS GAINS STEAM
"What âcrimes of capitalism?â"
"Iâm not sure about the specifics â¦" She then went on to deliver a short address on how communism will deliver a high standard of living by redistributing the obscene wealth of the rich.
When pressed about the historical record, either of communismâs brutality or specifics about so-called American imperialism, the young womanâs friendly smile never faltered. She really couldn't name any of the crimes of capitalism.
Calling for the overthrow of the system that allows for a peaceful Saturday at a farmer's market made the entire conversation seem absurd.
JONATHAN TURLEY: SOCIALISM IS BACK IN STYLE AND DEMOCRATS ARE BUYING THE PITCH
Conversations like this one, between average Americans and self-styled communists and socialists, break down due to differences of content and perspective.
When it comes to perspective, many of the 62% of young Americans, aged 18-29, that think that socialism or communism is a good idea have been educated with a simplistic neo-Marxist lens: U.S. history is a story of oppressor versus oppressed (i.e., patriarchy, race, religious bigotry). The Marxist model can be found in everything from "The 1619 Project" to the platform of the Democratic Socialists of America. Neo-Marxist critical theories attack the perspectives once widely held by most Americans regarding the American Dream and Americaâs exceptional service to humanity.
SOCIALISM LOOKS APPEALING WHEN SCHOOLS REFUSE TO TEACH ITS HORRIFIC, REAL-WORLD COST
The part of these conversations that's the most flummoxing, however, is not ideological. It is the part of the conversation that is about content: cold, hard facts. Anti-communists of all stripes typically point to the overwhelming evidence of the past and present crimes of communism. At 100 million men, women and children murdered, one would think that the evidence âprovesâ that this is not just an inefficient system, but a diabolical one.
We have survivor testimony, government records, and some photographic evidence of the concentration camps (e.g., Soviet Gulag, China's Laogai), torture, extermination of minorities, deportations and forced starvation. The violence continues in todayâs communist and communist-legacy regimes, from Belarus to Cuba and Eritrea to North Korea.
The young person at the farmers market will blankly stare when you recite the crimes of communism. She has no point of reference. The crimes of communism are largely unknown; they are untaught and unchallenged in todayâs university and high school settings. She has never heard of these things and she is not sure they are believable. Indeed, she will counter, these atrocities have likely been exaggerated and were undoubtedly justified self-defensive measures against capitalist imperialism.
When one does not feel (perspective) that the evidence of communism's crimes demands a verdict, and even disregards that there is evidence of wrongdoing (content), one is living in a different reality than that of most Americans born in the twentieth century. What is to be done?
WANT TO STOP SOCIALISM? A MODERN CIVIC EDUCATION NEEDS A LOT MORE THAN YOU'D THINK
First, we need to work hard to return all of the institutions of our civic life â media, schools, houses of worship, the business sector, K-12 and higher ed and especially the family â to the basics. That is where we educate the rising generation with the facts and values of what we are for and what we are against. We adhere to the principles found in the Declaration of Independence, representative government, free-market economics, personal and local responsibility and democratic institutions.
Second, we need to transmit the facts: the personal stories and larger historical narratives of communismâs crimes and Americaâs valiant, sacrificial efforts at self-defense and global freedom: the Berlin Airlift, the creation of NATO and the United Nations, the defense of Koreans, Vietnamese and many other oppressed peoples, Cold War victory and post-Cold War friendship (i.e., Eastern Europe) and Americaâs stunning philanthropic giving.
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Accurate content and right perspective should also reinforce what we are against: all ideologies and regimes that are anti-human, anti-freedom and anti-family. Communism in any form is a political fantasy rooted in envy and a political program rooted in brutality. We need to make it clear to the rising generation of citizens that communism in any form has not been good for others and will not be good for them.
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How does one talk to a communist? Our best hope lies in inoculating our young against communism at the very youngest age with right perspective and accurate content.
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Nation’s favourite play makes London comeback amid renewed debate about future of humanities teaching
The History Boys is to return to the West End for the first time in two decades, with a warning from its director of an “almost terminal decline” in humanities teaching in state schools.
Nicholas Hytner, who directed Alan Bennett’s play at the National Theatre and its 2006 film adaptation, said the themes of education, history and the value of literature for its own sake felt especially relevant amid renewed debate about what schools should teach.
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© Photograph: REX/Donald Cooper
© Photograph: REX/Donald Cooper
© Photograph: REX/Donald Cooper
© Jordan Gale for The New York Times
In this segment of Free Media, Reason Senior Editor Robby Soave and Daily Caller Editor in Chief Amber Duke discuss the ongoing violent protests in France.
If you enjoy Free Media, come watch Robby debate at our upcoming Reason Versus in D.C. Tickets are available here.
The post France's Protests Descend Into Looting and Property Destruction appeared first on Reason Magazine.
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