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The Daily Signal… Why Pulling ‘To Kill a Mockingbird’ From the Classroom Hurts Students, Daniel Davis - October 18, 2017 - This year, as in years past, eighth-graders in Biloxi, Mississippi, began reading the classic American novel “To Kill a Mockingbird.” And then, partway through and with little warning, they stopped. Why? Because, according to the school board vice president, it “makes people uncomfortable.” If you attended American schools... read more
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The Daily Signal… The False Ideas Intellectuals Peddle at College Campuses, Walter E. Williams
October 11, 2017 - As George Orwell said, “some ideas are so stupid that only intellectuals believe them.” Many stupid ideas originate with academics on college campuses. If they remained there and didn’t infect the rest of society, they might be a source of entertainment, much in the way a circus is. Let’s look at a few stupid ideas peddled by intellectuals.
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The Daily Signal… Many People Would Save Their Dog Over a Stranger, Dennis Prager
October 10, 2017 - A while ago a human-interest story from South Africa was reported internationally. As described in The Wall Street Journal: On Aug. 4, Graham and Sheryl Anley, while yachting off the coast of South Africa, hit a reef, capsizing their boat. As the boat threatened to sink and they scrambled to get off, Sheryl’s safety line snagged on.
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The Daily Signal… The Truth About Columbus, Jarrett Stepman
October 06, 2017 - Is this the last time we can celebrate Columbus Day? A wave of cities have decided to remove the holiday from the calendar and replace it with “Indigenous Peoples’ Day.” Christopher Columbus, the Italian explorer credited with discovering America, and his legacy are under attack figuratively and, increasingly, literally. Several Columbus.
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Washington Post… Why is Virginia, cradle of America, killing its U.S. history tests?
By Jay Mathews -- October 1 -- My entire life I have heard complaints about how little we Americans know about our history. So why is Virginia killing its annual U.S. history tests, while still requiring state exams in English, math and science? I always liked Virginia’s Standards of Learning tests, particularly U.S. History to 1865 in fifth grade, U.S. History 1865 to Present in middle school.
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NPR Ed… States Plan To Use Student Absences To Measure Success, Elissa Nadworny
How do you judge how good a school is? Test scores? Culture? Attendance? In the new federal education law (the Every Student Succeeds Act, or ESSA) states are asked to use five measures of student success. The first four are related to academics — like annual tests and graduation rates. The fourth measures proficiency of English language.
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Springfield News-Sun… Sexting and teens: Ohio looks to set up diversion program as problem grows; Sexting bill would require courts to set up juvenile diversion program, By Laura A. Bischoff -- September 24, 2017 -- Columbus — Sexting is rampant among teens, putting them at risk for criminal charges, school expulsion and images of their privates being displayed and shared in the digital world. The behavior is so common that Montgomery and Clark counties set up diversion... read more
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Zanesville Times Recorder… Driver got students safely off her bus when it caught fire, Shelly Schultz, Reporter - 'It's my job to protect them' - Sept. 20, 2017 - NEW CONCORD -  Marianne Hall starts each school year by explaining the rules for riding her bus, the consequences for breaking the rules and, of course, safety drills. On Sept. 13, days after completing the emergency evacuation drill with more than 100 students who ride her bus... read more
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The Daily Signal… Due Process Rights in Campus Sexual Assault Cases, Hans von Spakovsky, Elizabeth Slattery - September 08, 2017 - Education Secretary Betsy DeVos announced in a speech Thursday that she will roll back an Obama-era “guidance” document that drove colleges to implement Star Chamber-like tribunals to mishandle sexual assault cases. The guidance forced colleges to weaken already minimal due process protections for those accused of rape... read more
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The Daily Signal… The Mythical Constitution, by Joseph Postell
September 14, 2017 -- The nation marks the 230th birthday of our Constitution this weekend. On Sunday, many Americans of all political persuasions who are aware of Constitution Day will praise the Framers of that document and express gratitude that they live under its protections. They will celebrate the fact that we have a representative democracy, where the laws are written by people.
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NPR Ed… The Most Popular High School Plays And Musicals, Elissa Nadworny
September 15, 2017 - NPR Ed published the first-ever database of the most popular high school plays and musicals in the U.S. in July 2015. Today, the 2017 numbers are out, so we've updated our original story. The brilliant script, the "really fun" music and the exciting tech and staging feats were just a few of the reasons John Minigan decided.
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NPR Higher Education… 'You See In Their Eyes The Fear': DACA Students Face An Uncertain Future, Claudio Sanchez -- "You see in their eyes the fear, that's the heartbreaker," says Erazo, a high school counselor in Olathe, Kan. In recent months, Erazo says, he's had to be honest with students and their parents. He stopped encouraging them to apply for DACA, which stands for Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals, because of the likelihood the Trump administration would revoke it... read more
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The Daily Signal… Hollywood Wants This Profanity-Filtering Service Out of Business, Peter Parisi - August 18, 2017 - The ideological and philosophical divide between Republicans and Democrats has seldom, if ever, been broader and deeper, and the divide between partisans in the degree of their aversion to swearing in feature films is just the latest manifestation of that. A new Harris poll—commissioned by the makers of a forthcoming faith-based film... read more
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NPR Ed… Do Laptops Help Learning? A Look At The Only Statewide School Laptop Program, Robbie Feinberg -- August 18, 2017 -- It was the year 2000 and Maine's governor at the time, Angus King, was excited about the Internet. The World Wide Web was still relatively young but King wanted every student in the state to have access to it. "Go into history class and the teacher says, 'Open your computer. We're going to go to rome.com and we're going to watch... read more
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Washington Post… Getting into college was easy. Staying there is becoming harder. By Valerie Strauss - August 14 - However difficult getting into college may have been, it turns out, that may have been the easiest part of the transition to college life, admissions officials say. Inadequate preparation, unrealistic expectations and other issues that college freshmen don’t anticipate can become important obstacles to happiness and success. With about one-third... read more
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The Daily Signal… Get Involved Locally. You Might Just Save the Country, by Slade O’Brien
August 02, 2017 -- While much of the media focuses on lawmakers in Washington clunking heads and getting little done, the common narrative has been that change is a pipedream. But great change is afoot. They just need to look outside Washington to find it. At the local and state levels, citizen leaders, armed with a belief in economic freedom and individual liberty, have experienced historic.
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The Daily Signal… 5 Ways to Convince College Students That Free Speech Matters, Bruce Ashford - July 20, 2017 - In recent days, college students have shouted down, pepper-sprayed, punched, and otherwise shut down the campus guests whose ideas they considered offensive. The most prominent recent cases have included Milo Yiannopoulos (University of California, Berkeley), Charles Murray (Middlebury College), and Heather Mac Donald... read more
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NPR Ed…We're All Born With Mathematical Abilities (And Why That's Important), Julie Dependbrock - August 1, 2017 - As an undergraduate at the University of Arizona, Kristy vanMarle knew she wanted to go to grad school for psychology, but wasn't sure what lab to join. Then, she saw a flyer: Did you know that babies can count? "I thought, No way. Babies probably can't count, and they certainly don't count the way that we do," she says. But the seed... read more
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The Daily Signal… Passing Out Copies of Constitution Could Get You in Trouble at This College, Christine Roe - August 01, 2017 - A college policy that led to the arrests of a student and two supporters of a conservative group for passing out copies of the Constitution on a Michigan campus is getting its day in court. A lawyer with the First Amendment legal aid group Alliance Defending Freedom was set to argue in court Tuesday for suspension of the speech... read more
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The Daily Signal… Shapiro, Carolla Call on Colleges to Teach Civil Disagreement
By Elle Rogers - July 28, 2017 - Instead of disinviting controversial speakers, college administrators should model civil disagreement for students, say Ben Shapiro and Adam Carolla. Shapiro, editor-in-chief of The Daily Wire, and Carolla, a comedian and radio host, testified Thursday before a joint subcommittee of the House Oversight and Government Reform.
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The Daily Signal… Students File Lawsuit After School Denies Pro-Life Club Approval
By Grace Carr -- July 14, 2017 -- A religious nonprofit organization is suing Parkland School District in Lehigh County, Pennsylvania, after Parkland High School deemed a pro-life student club too controversial and subsequently refused to approve its charter. The national public interest law firm Thomas More Society filed a lawsuit against the school district, high school.
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The Daily Signal… Minimum Wage Hikes Are an Act of Cruelty, by Walter E. Williams
July 12, 2017 -- There are political movements to push the federal minimum hourly wage to $15. Raising the minimum wage has popular support among Americans. Their reasons include fighting poverty, preventing worker exploitation, and providing a living wage. For the most part, the intentions behind the support for raising the minimum wage are decent. But when we evaluate public policy, the effect.
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The Daily Signal… Meet the Colorado Woman Training Teachers to Use Guns to Stop School Violence, Katrina Willis - July 07, 2017 - This fall, some Colorado teachers will return to school armed with knowledge—and guns. Laura Carno, author of “Government Ruins Nearly Everything: Reclaiming Social Issues from Uncivil Servants,” is bringing advanced firearms training to school teachers. “Can government stop school shooting... read more
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NPR Ed… Think you can decipher fake news? Take the quiz.
Fake news has been on Maggie Farley's mind further back than 2016 when President Trump brought the term into the vernacular. Farley, a veteran journalist, says we've had fake news forever and that "people have always been trying to manipulate information for their own ends," but she calls what we're seeing now "Fake news with a capital F." In other words: extreme in its ambition for financial gain or political power.
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Heritage Foundation… Welfare Currently Punishes Work and Marriage. This Bill Would End That. Sen. Mike Lee - June 20, 2017 - There is much to celebrate in America today. Americans are, on average, wealthier, healthier, and better educated than we ever have been. We’ve made huge strides in civil rights and racial equality. And we have access to technology that would have awed past generations. But fundamentally, our culture and way of life has undergone... read more
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Getting the Opioid Epidemic Right, William Bennett
June 29, 2017 - The numbers are staggering. Until about a month ago, we had thought drug overdoses were responsible for some 52,000 American lives in 2015. Now the most recent reporting reveals that number may be closer to 60,000 in 2016. Think about that: We could now build the equivalent of one Vietnam Memorial Wall a year given the carnage we are wreaking.
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The Daily Signal… Were Confederate Generals Traitors? Walter E. Williams
June 28, 2017 - Some argued there should not be statues honoring traitors such as Robert E. Lee, Stonewall Jackson, and Jefferson Davis, who fought against the Union. Victors of wars get to write the history, and the history they write often does not reflect the facts. Let’s look at some of the facts and ask: Did the South have a right to secede from.
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How One Man Helped Propel the American Revolution, Lee Edwards
July 03, 2017 - That the brilliant wordsmith Thomas Jefferson was the principal author of the Declaration of Independence is indisputable, but a lesser-known fact is that the man who played the indispensable role in its adoption by the Continental Congress in July 1776 was John Adams of Massachusetts, our second president. Jefferson later confirmed.
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NPR ED… How To Pick Kids' Apps For The Backseat This Summer, Anya Kamanetz
It's summer vacation season and many families will be lucky enough to be heading off for at least a few days. At least half of parents say quality time together is the most important reason to take a family vacation, according to a national survey by the rental car company Alamo. Still, there will inevitably be downtime: at airports, on planes, trains or in the backseat. So one new travel necessity.
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The Daily Signal… How a Family Doctor Works With Police to Combat a Rural County’s Opioid Epidemic, Josh Siegel - June 07, 2017 - COLEBROOK, N.H.—Bruce Latham, a lanky, self-employed doctor, occupies a unique position in the depths of rural New Hampshire’s opioid drug addiction crisis. As part of his practice in Colebrook, a town of 2,300 in Coos County, Latham responds to pain by prescribing opioid painkillers. He says he empathizes... read more

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