Public Policy Updates

MASC reports on Massachusetts public schools, education news, school committee issues and updates from the Department of Education.

This information has been compiled by MASC Field Director Tracy Novick.

Novick Reports: October 25 meeting of the Board of Education

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Published on Friday, 28 October 2016 07:34

This morning, the Board of Elementary and Secondary Education met in Malden. The agenda of this meeting and last night's meeting can be found here.
Last night's session, which I did not attend, was an update on the state's update of the ELA and math standards. All of the backups, including the full suggested standards, can be found from this link. At this point, the plan is for the Department to bring suggested standards back to the Board at their November meeting, for them to vote out for public comment. Comment would be due back in January, with final standards voted in the spring.

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Novick Reports: September 27 meeting of the Board of Education

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Published on Thursday, 13 October 2016 14:19

The Board of Elementary and Secondary Education met in Malden. This meeting followed Monday night's release of the 2016 state testing results and accountability levels, followed by the Monday night meeting on those results.

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Novick Reports: Healthy Food Fuels Hungry Minds

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Published on Friday, 03 June 2016 01:54

Earlier this week, I attended the Healthy Food Fuels Hungry Minds child nutrition conference, which MASC co-sponsored. The day’s schedule is here; you can also find a link to the presentations there. My liveblog of the day is here.

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Novick Reports: The Emerging Third Way - Blazing an Optimistic Path Ahead in K-12 Education

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Published on Wednesday, 01 June 2016 01:54

This morning, MassINC and Empower Schools co-hosted “The Emerging Third Way: Blazing an Optimistic Path Ahead in K-12 Education” at the ICA in Boston. For those on Twitter, the hashtag was #ThirdWayEd. The “Third Way” prior to the event was described as:

  • Convergence on "best practice" for which they cite school controlled hiring (and cite charter schools) and extended day (likewise, cited charter schools)
  • Collaborative alignment with charters (for example, a unified enrollment system)
  • "Empowerment Zone" as in Springfield, where the "charter-like" powers were cited as an example

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Novick Reports: May Meeting of the Board of Education

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Published on Tuesday, 24 May 2016 03:54

This morning, the Board of Education had their usual May meeting in Everett.

While only the Commissioner spoke during the opening comment period, there were a few things that I’d call to your attention.

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More Articles...

  1. Novick Reports: March Meeting of the Board of Education
  2. Novick Reports: Ways and Means Education Hearing
  3. Novick Reports: Board of Education - Charter Schools, Standards, Updates and more
  4. Novick Reports: Board of Education, Southbridge, Charter Schools and more
  5. Novick Reports: Rennie Center - Conditions of Education in the Commonwealth