Signs That Your School Might Be Failing

According to Wikipedia.org, "School choice is a term for K–12 public education options in the United States, describing a wide array of programs offering students and their families alternatives to publicly provided schools, to which the location of their family residence generally assigns students." Vouchers have been in the headlines for almost thirty years. So, this is not a new issue, although the media attention sometimes implies that vouchers are a new idea. A timeline is helpful when dealing with a controversial issue such as school vouchers. But before we do that, what are vouchers?

EdChoice describes vouchers as:

"School vouchers give parents the freedom to choose a private school for their children, using all or part of the public funding set aside for their children’s education. Under such a program, funds typically spent by a school district would be allocated to a participating family in the form of a voucher to pay partial or full tuition for their child’s private school, including both religious and non-religious options."

You will hear vouchers called various names, such as parental choice, education grants, scholarships, and tuition grants, to list but a few of the names you will encounter for vouchers.15 states and the District of Columbia currently offer 26 voucher programs. School Voucher Laws State-by-State Comparison offers a useful table comparing the voucher programs offered in states that have them.

Why are vouchers controversial?

Now that you have access to

When you send your child to a private day or boarding school, you might well assume that bullying is a non-issue. You have read the school's discipline code. You understand the consequences for major infractions of that discipline code. In the McCallie Student Handbook, "Hazing or mistreating another person, whether it is mental, physical, or emotional" is a major infraction. Private schools take discipline code infractions such as bullying, intimidation, harassment and so on, very seriously. Perhaps you still have concerns about what might happen if your child is bullied and nobody in the school community notices. Let's review five ways to protect your child from bullying.

Be able to identify the types of bullying.

Start by reading an informative article such as Sherri Gordon's 6 Types of Bullying Every Parent Should Know About If you grew up before computers and the internet flourished, you probably think that bullying is threatening somebody physically. But it is now much more than that. Bullying lurks in the digital corners of your child's online life. Learn about those dark spaces. Understand them. Talk about them with your child. Your child's well-being, indeed, her life, is at stake.

Know the warning signs of bullying.

Read Warning Signs of Bullying on Violence Prevention Works! I can speak from my personal experience because I was bullied when I was in 6th grade. What made it rough for me was that my neighbor across the street was the bullier. He was bigger than

The SSAT is probably unlike any test your student has ever taken. That’s because it’s designed to find the best students in a large pool of excellent students. The SSAT’s questions are significantly different—in their difficulty and their content—from questions on other standardized tests, to the point that your student isn’t even expected to know everything that’s on the test! This means that, in order for your student to have the best chance at getting a score that’ll help them get admitted to their school of choice, they’ll need to prepare for the test.

There are a lot of test prep options out there, from tutoring, to books, to online services. We’ve compiled a list of 5 of the best test prep options we’ve found. But first, here are some things to consider before choosing a prep solution:

• How does your student learn best? Some students learn best in a self-paced program where they are in control, while others may benefit from the more rigid prep plan that a tutor or a class can provide.
• Where are you now, and where do you want to go? It’s important to have an idea of your student’s score goals, and to know where they stand at the beginning of the preparation process. That means taking a full-length test that provides scores and quality feedback, and comparing that performance to where they need to be. If you don’t know what score your student needs to aim for, check out the

The questions which you will encounter in your job interview for a private school teaching job depend on the experience and skill of your interviewer. Most of the time the interviewer will be well-trained and experienced. She will ask questions which are legal. However, you should be aware that even the most experienced interviews can and do slip up occasionally and ask questions which are illegal according to the Civil Rights Act of 1964. The Civil Rights Act of l964 “prohibits employment discrimination based on race, color, religion, sex and national origin.” Put another way, you have rights and it is very important that you know and understand them.

Read Daniel Bortz' article on Monster.com, Illegal interview questions that employers shouldn't ask you. That will give you an overview of how things work in the corporate world as well as in small business like private schools. The problem with small organizations is that they don't always have the human resources professionals on staff to remind them of legalities such as what you can and cannot ask at a job interview.

Here are some of the things which are considered illegal for the interviewer to ask about. Incidentally, both federal and state laws consider questions about these issues illegal.

• Race, Color, or National Origin
• Religion
• Sex, Gender Identity, or Sexual Orientation
• Pregnancy status
• Disability
• Age or Genetic Information
• Citizenship
• Marital Status or Number of Children

So, what do you do when an interviewer asks about any of these things? Don't answer. Depending