Today, corporate users are not the only ones rapidly embracing mobile tablets for daily use--this transition has spilled over into the education sector. Schools have begun incorporating mobile devices such as iPads and other tablets into their curriculum. While this trend brings new and exciting educational opportunities, administrators and…

Cheating has become a major issue for schools and leaders across the country. While plagiarism and cheating are not new, the proliferation of technologies available to students enables new forms of cheating. In addition, recent studies demonstrate an interesting level of moral flexibility among students as they often are motivated to cheat simply…

To platoon or not to platoon? That's the question facing Irving Hamer, Deputy Superintendent of Academic Operations, Technology and lnnovation for the Memphis City Schools. This year for the first time, the state's achievement test, Tennessee Comprehensive Assessment Program (TCAP), will include algebraic concepts on the 5th-grade test. Of the…

For lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, or questioning (LGBTQ) students, school is rarely a safe space, much less an environment conducive to learning. Seventy-five percent of gay students report being verbally abused at school, and more than a third say they are physically harassed. And research shows that LGBTQ students are five times more…

Although bullying and relational aggression among students are longtime concerns, the elusive nature of cyberbullying compounds the difficulty of identifying harmful behavior and intervening to stop it. Principals across the country are struggling to determine their authority over cyberbullying that technically may occur outside of school but for…

In an era where some parents seem unwilling or unable to draw the "clothes" line with their children, where pop culture influences kids' clothing choices as never before, and school safety--including gang violence--is at the top of everyone's minds, school uniforms and dress codes can play a significant role. What that role should be,…

Pediculosis, or head lice infestation, has been a public health nuisance for thousands of years. Since most affected children are under 12 years of age, head lice is an elementary school issue. The question then becomes how schools should handle cases of head lice. Some organizations advocate immediately sending children home from school, while…

Unfiltered--and some would say inaccurate--blogs are the Wild West of the Internet, where mostly young citizen journalists (more than half of all bloggers are under age 30) routinely ignore mainstream media niceties like fact checking, multiple sourcing, and balance. Conversational in tone, blogs represent a new and powerful form of special…

In the current climate of school improvement, no one feels more pressure than a high school principal. A principal bears responsibility not just for the organization's daily functioning but for the performance of its students in high school and beyond. However, high school students perceive principals as individuals who held the lion's share of…

The biggest risk to children's health is one which happens incrementally as students move through the school grades and into adulthood. Obesity has reached such proportions that today's children could end up living two to five years less than they might otherwise, according to a 2005 study in the New England Journal of Medicine. According to the…

Most institutions aren't aware of their valuable intellectual property, and some believe they have intellectual property when they don't, which can lead to expensive lawsuits or licensing fees. "Intellectual property" generally consists of copyrights, trademarks, and patents. Most familiar is copyright, the statutory protection mechanism for…

Report on Texas schools and relevant court cases. (SP)

Though they play the least active role, bystanders are a critical element in bullying. With peers looking on and providing at least tacit support, the bully is no longer acting alone. The bystanders have become allies to the point of magnifying the supposed negative attributes of the target. If the bullying cycle is to be broken, the role of the…

IT is one of the most common (and unsettling) occurrences in today's classrooms--the ringing of a cell phone, often punctuated by some silly tune or sound effect that announces to everyone that a call is coming in. Inevitably, educators say, it happens during an important part of a lecture or discussion, just when a critical point is being made,…