To combat crime, San Francisco will enforce teen curfew

Naming a growing crime problem as the cause, San Francisco police will start enforcing teen curfew laws.

Arguments against homework growing

Homework has been a part of American schools for as long as they have existed, but arguments against it are growing, according to a Washington Post article.

Athletes now taunting each other on-line

It's another one of those problems schools did not have just a few years ago.
Massachusetts school officials are concerned because athletes from rival schools are trash talking each other on-line.

List of school supplies continues to grow

There was a time when all parents had to buy to prepare for the school year was clothes, pencils and paper.
The list now includes everything from glue sticks to disposable cameras, according to an article in today's Washington Post.

White school bus driver suspended for putting black students at the back of the bus

Each year in third quarter in communication arts in Room 210 we research the American civil rights movement, including such important developments as the Brown v. Board of Education decision and the Freedom Riders.
One event many have researched is the Montgomery Bus Boycott, led by Rev. Martin Luther King Jr., and started by Rosa Parks' refusal to move to the back of a bus.
Apparently, the kind of racism that required Mrs. Parks to give up her seat at the front of a bus to an able-bodied white male still exists. Associated Press reports a white school bus driver ordered nine African American students to move to the back of the bus:

One of her children, Jarvonica Williams, 16, said the bus driver allowed many white students to have seats all to themselves while some blacks were forced to stand or sit in others' laps.

Iva Richmond, whose 14- and 15-year-old children were on the bus, said Thursday that they previously had a black bus driver, but their bus assignment changed this year. When school started this month, the white driver told them she had assigned them seats, with the black children at the back of the bus.

(Photo information: Janice Williams, left, was one of the mothers who complained to school leaders about the bus driver. Photo by Associated Press)

New driving restrictions for teens become law in Missouri

More restrictions for teen drivers go into effect Monday, Aug. 28:

Starting today, for the first six months a teen has an intermediate license they may carry no more than one passenger younger than 19 who is not a member of their immediate family. After the first six months, the maximum number allowed increases to three.

Website allows students to rate teachers

Teachers are not going to be happy about this, but a website, ratemyteachers.com, allows students to rate their teachers.
According to an article in today's Houston Chronicle, many students are finding out about their new teachers by going online.

Hoodies banned in Boston schools

Saying that they hide the faces of those who wear them, Boston-area schools have banned hoodies.

Students return to school with more gadgets than ever

Laptops, calculators, you name it, students are carrying it back to school as the 2006-2007 school year begins. For more, check out the New York Times article below:

Back to School, With Cellphone and Laptop
By JEFFREY SELINGO
It used to be that getting ready for another school year meant buying a few new No. 2 pencils, spiral notebooks and a lunchbox. Not anymore. Young children and teenagers, as well as college students, are going to school with more electronic gadgets than ever.

“Tech-based products are so much less expensive that the price point now allows kids to nag their parents to buy a particular product or buy one themselves,” said Peter Grunwald, president of Grunwald Associates, a consulting firm in Bethesda, Md., focusing on school technology.

As a result, the back-to-school season is one of the busiest for electronic retailers like Circuit City or Best Buy, rivaling only Christmas. “Purchases are more necessity-based at this time of year,” said Stephanie Gooch, product process manager for Best Buy. At Christmas, purchases “tend to be more gaming, entertainment-based,” she said.

Another change is that the newest tech devices are not aimed at just older students anymore. While laptops are still most useful for those going off to college, Mr. Grunwald says that as prices drop on a wide variety of products once meant for an older crowd, younger students start using them as well. “Kids are aging up,” he said.

Elementary/Middle School

Preteenagers are increasingly asking for cellphones of their own. While cellphones give parents a sense of security and help them keep track of their children’s busy lives, adults often resist buying them, concerned that younger children will use them as their older siblings do: to talk to friends, send text messages and play games.

The LG Migo VX1000 from Verizon Wireless ($49.99 with a two-year contract) addresses most of those worries. It is a child-friendly, simple phone: no text messaging, no games and no camera. It is also very small and light, well suited for child-size hands. The Migo has only four numbered buttons, which can dial four preprogrammed phone numbers. Those numbers cannot be changed without a password. To place a call, the child simply presses one of the numbered keys and the talk button. In the middle of the phone pad is a large key for emergency calls.

One Migo feature attractive to parents is the Chaperone service offered by Verizon Wireless ($9.99 a month extra). Using the phone’s Global Positioning System receiver, parents can keep track of their children through a Web site or on their own Verizon phones. For an additional $10 charge, the Chaperone service comes with a feature called Child Zone, which notifies parents when a child arrives in or leaves the vicinity of a specified location, like school or a playground.

Catherine Poling, the assistant principal at Kemptown Elementary School, near Frederick, Md., suggests that students also get a flash drive for portable storage of their computer files. “With the volume of files that students work on, including video and images, it would be helpful if they all had a mass storage device to transport files between home and school,” Ms. Poling said. One inexpensive option is the 512-megabyte Lexar JumpDrive FireFly ($29.99).

High School

The Hewlett-Packard 39gs graphing calculator, which is to go on sale this fall ($79.99), is likely to appeal to image-conscious teenagers with its sleek silver-and-gray design. The calculator offers an infrared option to share data with other H.P. devices, a U.S.B. port to download files to a computer, and a double screen that allows users to see two sets of information at the same time.

Teenagers were among the early adopters of cellphone cameras. Now they have the option of using a better camera — cellphone not included — to take photos and share them quickly with their friends: the Nikon CoolPix P1 ($549.95 suggested retail price, but much lower prices can be found online). It has Wi-Fi capability, allowing users to transmit high-quality photos through a wireless network. That means users need to be within range of a wireless hot spot, which is not as easy — at least not yet — as snapping a photo on a cellphone and sending it to a friend. It also takes some time to set up the wireless connection, because the device is not able to join a network automatically, as laptops can.

Of course, photos can still be shared the old-fashioned way — through prints. An all-out price war among retailers and online companies on photo printing has meant that fewer people have favored doing it themselves at home in recent years. But high school students typically like to fiddle with the look of their photos before printing them.

The Hewlett-Packard Photosmart 3310 All-in-One Printer ($349.99 after rebate) not only allows users to manipulate images, but also lets them play digital video clips on the printer’s image display, freeze a favorite scene and print it. Like many other H.P. printers, the model contains six separate ink cartridges, which saves replacing a single color cartridge regularly.

College

“You can’t go to college without a computer, and anymore that means a laptop,” said Ms. Gooch, the Best Buy manager.

Among the popular options this year are laptops that flip around to turn into tablet PC’s, like the Gateway CX210X convertible notebook ($1,299). The stylus that comes with the laptop can be used like a pen. For those unfamiliar with tablet PC’s it can take a little time to become comfortable with the smooth display, however, and the screen is sometimes difficult to see under certain lighting conditions. But the laptop could prove to be a big timesaver for students putting together study guides. For example, students could download a professor’s lecture notes to the laptop, write their own notes in the margins using the tablet PC, then print out a set to study.

For the Apple crowd, all MacBook models (starting at $1,099) feature not only a 13-inch wide-screen display, but also a built-in iSight camera for video chats over the Internet. By simply starting the iChat software and clicking on an icon to turn on iSight, homesick college freshmen can see and talk with relatives and friends anywhere who either have the same software or AOL Instant Messenger. The best part for cash-starved college students is that iSight is free with a broadband Internet connection.

Mr. Grunwald, the education consultant, also suggests that college students going off to a new campus — and a new city — might find a portable Global Positioning System device useful. Several manufacturers make the devices for mounting on the dashboard of a car, but add-ons to hand-helds are the best bet for college students, Mr. Grunwald says, since many students may already have the devices.

Earthcomber offers free, downloadable maps and directories on the Internet at www.earthcomber.com. For users with a G.P.S. unit, Earthcomber provides maps and other information. Those without a G.P.S. must tell the hand-held device where they are located. The Web site provides access to a range of information based on location: about movie showtimes, bars, teller machines, Wi-Fi hot spots, restaurants, live music and more. Free maps are also available for every city and county in the United States.

With cellphones nearly everywhere on college campuses, several mobile providers have services that provide most of the features of a navigation system. Cingular, for instance, offers access to Mapquest for data-enabled phones (normal data charges apply).

While some high school students are accustomed to having their own rooms at home, as freshmen in college they often have roommates in tight quarters. To save on space with all the electronics that students bring with them these days, Ms. Gooch at Best Buy recommends the Insignia combination TV/computer monitor ($320). The 15-inch television is handy for small spaces because it also has a built-in PC input that lets users connect a computer.

Back-to-school spending on the increase

Back to school spending continues to increase, according to an article from the National Retail Federation. It's not like the old days, however. Nowadays, lists don't just include clothing, but everything from graphic calculators to chalk.

CDC study shows fewer students are having sex

A study released Thursday by the Center of Disease Control shows fewer American high school students are having sex.

Study says teens who listen to raunchy music have sex sooner

Teens whose I-Pods feature songs with raunchy lyrics start having sex sooner, according to a newly-released study.

Students should learn to change diapers, bathe babies

The Professional Association of Teachers in England is hearing a proposal that students should become prepared for life experiences by learning to change diapers and give babies baths, according to a BBC article.

Study links teen sex, depression

A University of California-San Francisco study is linking teen sex and depression.

There are many possible reasons why teens with symptoms of depression might be more likely to take sexual risks, study author Dr. Jocelyn Lehrer noted. "Youth who are both emotionally distressed and socially isolated may be more likely to seek or be successfully pressured into sexual activity, in the name of some kind of shared intimacy, or to maintain relationships that they value," she told Reuters. Teens may also use sex as a way to cope with their symptoms of depression, Lehrer added.

New York City schools ready to punish students for MySpace comments

If New York City students plan to write about their fellow students, teachers, or principals they had better be careful. In what is sure to become a First Amendment showdown, new rules have been put in place that would regulate what students can put on their websites, even when they are doing their writing from home.

British school reinstalls mirrors

A British school is reinstalling mirrors after removing them to keep girls from spending time fixing their makeup. Wouldn't it be nice if that were the major problem facing our schools?
Find out more by checking out this link from the BBC.

Cairo, Ill., students to be tested for drugs, alcohol

Students who plan to participate in extracurricular activities will have to undergo drug and alcohol testing at a Cairo, Ill. High School.
The school also plans to go to school uniforms for everyone.
Please read the Cape Girardeau Southeast Missourian article.

Schools expanding number of students being tested for drugs

A USA Today article indicates that testing for students is growing to include more and more of the student body, not just those who are involved in extracurricular activities.

Lawsuit says cell phone ban violates students' rights

A lawsuit has been filed in New York saying that the schools' ban of cell phones violate students' rights.

The parents argue, in papers filed in State Supreme Court in Manhattan, that the ban is so broad and blunt that it violates their constitutional right as parents to keep their children safe and to raise them in the way they see fit. The ban violates their due process right to personal liberty under both the state and federal constitutions, they said, because it interferes with the relationship between parents and their children, without a compelling education reason for doing so.

Edgar Ray Killen to stay in prison

A federal court judge ruled Friday that convicted killer Edgar Ray Killen will not be freed while appealing his conviction on the 1964 murders of civil rights activists James Chaney, Michael Schwerner, and Andrew Goodman.
Killen, 81, was convicted of the murders last year.