Learn And Play

CNN
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It was a peaceful Friday morning for Murrisha Leon, who was asleep when she received a call from a fellow parent warning her of an active shooter at their children’s high school in Arkansas.

Immediately, Leon’s heart sank as images of worst-case scenarios flooded her mind. She might lose one of her kids today, she told herself.

“I jumped up in a panic and instantly threw up,” Leon told CNN. “I believed it and feared for my children’s lives. I called them, and when they didn’t answer the first time, I started crying.”

Leon’s son, 14, and daughter, 16, both attend Watson Chapel High School, which was put on lockdown immediately after the school received news of a possible active shooter on campus – another in a series of reported threats at US schools this week.

Leon soon received a text from her son, saying, “Mama please come

There were hopeful signs last week that reality might slowly be dawning on the tony Trinity School on the Upper West Side, when the board of trustees issued a statement subtly repudiating the headmaster’s clueless handling of the racist “Dexter” scandal.

In a statement to parents, David Perez, president of the board of trustees, did what headmaster John Allman failed to do the previous week when a senior teacher was caught on video saying that “we just need some vigilante Dexter” to get rid of the “horrible … white boys” at the school.

Since Dexter is a TV serial killer, Trinity teacher Jennifer Norris appeared to be advocating for white male students to be murdered when she was secretly recorded by gonzo journalism outfit Project Veritas.

Perez was lead author on last week’s revisionary statement assuring parents that he and Allman “categorically denounce the derogatory and antagonistic comments in the

A former elementary school principal was accused of abusing a 9-year-old student after video showed him shoving the child to the ground, officials said Thursday.

Brian Vollhardt, who resigned from Wolters Elementary School in Fresno after the school district launched an investigation into the June 7 altercation, faces a charge of willful cruelty to a minor, police and school officials said during a Thursday news conference.

Court records show Vollhardt is scheduled to be arraigned for the alleged crime, a misdemeanor, on Sept. 26.

“There’s no excuse for repugnant behavior such as this,” school district superintendent Bob Nelson told reporters.

A video of the incident was released by the Fresno Unified School District and Fresno police with some faces blurred.

Nelson said the incident occurred after Vollhardt joined a group of students eating breakfast. Fresno Police Chief Paco Balderrama described the boy as a “special needs” student, though he did

When Marisa Kossoy taught seventh graders in Saddle Brook, she used to ask them to write their own books. The activity was so popular that years later, former students who run into her tell her, “I still have my book!”

She eventually gave herself the same assignment, and in the process ticked an important item off her bucket list: She wrote a children’s book. Kossoy, now a longtime educator with experience as a teacher and a principal, titled it “Principal for a Day” and says she hopes the story helps readers make good decisions — while also having fun.

“Principal for a Day“ features Jackson, a troublemaker who’s known for knocking down chairs and playing pranks on his teachers, and who enters a principal-for-a-day lottery. Jackson doesn’t have any hopes of winning, but — surprise! — his name is chosen. Now this troublemaker has to discipline other troublemakers,

More bad news from the post-pandemic department: Snow days are canceled.

“There are technically no more snow days,” New York City School Chancellor David C. Banks announced ahead of the start of the 2022-23 school year this past week.

As a New York City parent I have one reaction: UGH.

Now students will miss out on one of the only good things about the cold weather. But it’s not just denying my family the magic of snow days that upsets me. It’s that school officials still don’t seem to understand that online classes can’t substitute for the real thing.

Across the snowbelt, school districts are eliminating snow days, cutting them back or weighing both options. This change to

• A group of Rhode Island middle schoolers thought their teacher was a “creep” toward girls in class.
• They kept a “pedo database” of his actions in class after adults ignored their complaints, per The Boston Globe.
• Now, the “database” is part of an investigation into whether the teacher stalked a middle school girl.

A group of Rhode Island middle schoolers thought their teacher was a “creep,” so they kept a log of all of his inappropriate interactions with girls in their class. Now, the teacher is on administrative leave and under investigation.

The group of Davisville Middle School boys in North Kingstown started the “pedo database” after watching their teacher ogle at girls in their class, giving them nicknames like “sweetheart” and “sunshine,” and asking them to dance for him, The Boston Globe reported.

When the group tried reporting the situation, adults didn’t take them

Before Minnesota banned school lunch shaming, children who owed money to the cafeteria might be handed a cold cheese sandwich for lunch. Or no lunch at all.

They might come home from school wearing a humiliating sticker or hand stamp to let their parents — and every other kid on the school bus — know they were in debt.

They might be banned from field trips or fun class activities until someone paid up.

But Minnesota did ban lunch shaming. State lawmakers, who don’t agree on much, came together across party lines on that one last year. Because a child’s biggest worry at lunchtime should be more along the lines of whether today is Pizza Day or not.

The law changed. Many school district policies did not.

As students head back to school, Mid-Minnesota Legal Aid — which has battled for years to identify and eradicate lunch shaming — went

The Iowa Hawkeyes opened up the 2022 college football season in less than stellar fashion. No, the Hawkeyes didn’t lose but everyone who tuned in to watch did.

In what is sure to be an instant classic, nearly on par with the 2004 masterpiece that saw the Hawkeyes defeat the Penn State Nittany Lions 6-4 (including willingly giving up a safety to avoid giving up a touchdown), Iowa’s offense welcomed fans back to historic Kinnick Stadium by giving them four quarters of nails on a chalk board. The Hawkeyes managed just 10 total first downs on 166 total yards against FCS South Dakota State. Starting QB Spencer Petras had a staggering QBR of 1.2 as he completed 11 of 25 passes for 109 yards (4.4 yards per attempt) with an interception while the rushing attack managed a mind -numbing 1.6 yards per carry.

But this is Iowa and none of

School districts across the country are grappling with teacher shortages — and communities with unaffordable housing are often hit the hardest.

“There’s been times when we didn’t have a math teacher, or we didn’t have a language teacher,” Megan Carey, the principal of Terra Nova High School, located just south of San Francisco, told CBS News.

The reason? “High cost of living — 100%!” she said.

Now, her school district is trying something new: affordable housing on school property. It’s a 122-unit apartment complex that was approved by local voters and built for teachers and staff on property owned by the Jefferson Union High School District.

“It’s very spacious,” said Michaela Ott, who teaches biology at Jefferson High School, which is also in the district. “Extremely roomy!”

Ott said that an average two-bedroom apartment in the neighborhood would cost more than $3,000 per month. Her rent is $1,600.