New research from the Urban Institute finds that limited English proficient (LEP) students are highly concentrated in a small share of America’s public schools. In fact, 70 percent of LEP students in kindergarten through fifth grade are enrolled in only 10 percent of the country’s public elementary schools. Among the findings: most LEP students were born in the U.S. And the share of students in kindergarten through 12th grade with a foreign-born parent tripled from 6 percent in 1970 to 19 percent in 2000.

Researcher Michael Fix has called NCLB “one of the most important pieces of immigrant integration legislation in the past decade” because it forces schools to pay attention to LEP students by requiring schools to report these students’ test scores and holds schools accountable for the results.

CFK reports from: Forum, Maximizing Civic and Academic Outcomes: Understanding What Works in Service- Learning
Organized by: The American Youth Policy Forum
Where/When: Washington DC, Friday, November 4th

Researchers, teachers and students discussed how service-learning is being implemented in various schools nationwide. They described positive results such as increasing student test scores and graduation rates in high schools across the country.

While nearly 4 million immigrant families in the United States are low income, virtually all of them have working parents, and 72 percent have a parent who works full-time, year round. A new National Center for Children in Poverty series shows these children have scant access to important government supports. When these families do have the same access to benefits as their non-foreign-born counterparts, they are more likely to be stable and secure.

One in ten non-Hispanic black children in first through third grade has repeated a grade, compared with 1 percent of Asian or Pacific Islander children, 4 percent of non-Hispanic white children, and 6 percent of Hispanic children of the same age. Other new data points include an analysis of receipt of special education services by gender (boys are more than twice as likely as girls in K-3rd grade to get services through an Individualized Education Plan), and the impact of neighborhood poverty on Head Start attendance.

To engage girls in the study of science and technology, educators need to convey the right message about the roles these fields play in society and the skills they require--and they also need to provide more hands-on activities that have some social value. These were the main lessons imparted during a Webcast hosted by the National Science Foundation's Information Technology Experiences for Students and Teachers program. E-School News reports.

Here's a clear, accurate and easy-to-use manual for parents, teachers, and advocates working to eliminate persistent vestiges of racial discrimination in American schools, fifty years after the landmark Brown v. Board of Education decision.

The mission of this organization is to inspire girls with the highest ideals of character, conduct, patriotism, and service they they may become happy and resourceful citizens.

It's the ultimate back-to-school story: about 80 middle-aged Virginians are heading back to the classroom--more than four decades after their educations were derailed by the state's "massive resistance" campaign, which led some Virginia communities to shut down their public schools rather than integrate them. Connect for Kids Editor Susan Phillips spoke to recipients of Virginia's new Brown v. Board of Education scholarships.

Hampered by petticoats and immobilized on a pedestal, the Southern lady of our imagination seems an unlikely activist. But historian Peter Bardaglio says that several essays in a new book, Before the New Deal: Social Welfare in the South, 1830-1930, demonstrate how Southern women built lasting programs for children and families in communities deformed by slavery and devastated by war.

"What can you do to stay strong in a world that isn't always girl-friendly?" asks Jeanette Gadeberg, author of Brave New Girls: Creative Ideas to Help Girls Be Confident, Healthy, & Happy. Acknowledging the difficult realities of being a pre-adolescent girl in today's world, full of pressures from peers, the media, family, and self, this guide offers frank discussions of these issues and practical suggestions for trusting oneself and staying strong.