Tenure Woes

Tenure Granted to 58% of Eligible Teachers in City - NYTimes.com

Another interesting article... there's always something cooking about education.

Chinese couple arrested after selling their children for MMO money

I Heart Chaos — Chinese couple arrested after selling their children for MMO money

Hi again! I've been crazed this week, but it's time to get down and dirty with a couple of articles. Ready to jump in the mud?

Free market principles at work in education

At Best Schools Competing for Best Performers, Students May Be Left Behind - NYTimes.com

A pretty interesting article... thoughts after you hit the jump, jump (Kriss Kross style)

Museum resources in NYC

Given the last post, I thought I'd leverage some cultural institutions in our great city. Want to take students somewhere? Here's info for many of the museums in our great city. At the bottom are all the ones free for NYC students. Enjoy!

WWJD...D?

What Would John Dewey Do?

Beth Taylor (shout out!) recently sent me an article (click to read) about Charlotte, NC principals engaging in the cultural institutions of the city. What was interesting was they were having a blast getting educated about the resources in their backyard. And why not? Education should be fun.

One metric of a highly effective teacher

Okay - before I get into today's topic, I just want to give a big shout out to all the people who have enthusiastically emailed or posted regarding my food challenge. The last two days have shown a lot of energy and I'm excited to focus this into some real concrete actions. I'll update later regarding where this boat is heading.

Curious about a metric for highly effective teachers? See that button there? Click it.

Cooking challenge on a Food Stamp budget

Hi all,

I have a rather unusual request for you... I'm a teacher in the Bronx and my kids are suffering from really bad diet choices. Parents are overworked and have little time to put together a healthy, nutritious meal for breakfast and dinner. I recently revamped my diet based on how little time I have to spend on cooking and found myself healthier and happier in just a few months. Turns out it was also cheaper than what I used to pay. I ultimately want to slate these into a calendar to be a resource for the parent coordinator at our school. Not only will recipes be readily available, but also a hassle free schedule of great food so time (such a precious commodity for parents holding down 2-3 jobs and raising kids) is even less an issue.

What I'm looking for:

Simple, healthy meals that provide tons of nutrients, are filling, and can feed a family for a few days. I'm thinking if a parent only needs to cook once or twice a week they will be more likely to cook healthy (I certainly am!). Further, simple meals might be able to be made by high schoolers getting a feel for the kitchen, which can boost self esteem!

The challenge: a family of four on food stamps in NYC gets $668 a month to eat. Let's call this $620 for the family after incidentals. Break that down into four weeks and you get $155 to provide breakfast and dinner.

Based on this, can you cooking gurus out there with families or expertise cooking big come up with some meals so I can create a recipe master list? The more the better. Some can last a week, others can last a few days. The idea is to cook cheap, nutritious, yummy food that lasts a few days. Let's keep it simple and say there are two adults and two kids (both late elementary-high school age: 10-18 yrs) and there are no dietary restrictions. 

So, get to cooking and any feedback/recipes would be greatly appreciated.

Cook on,

-ian

An overhaul to the evaluation systems.

I've been travelling and recovering from a long (but good!) year... so lots of blog posts are brewing...

Saw this article today and it got me thinking.

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/07/16/nyregion/deal-on-teacher-evaluations-reached-by-union-and-new-york-city.html?ref=education

Want to know what I was thinking? Hit the jumpity jump jump.