WIEGAND: School competition good for community
It’s vitally important to have innovative, competitive and successful
school options available to attract and retain middle-class families in the neighborhoods.
It’s vitally important to have innovative, competitive and successful
school options available to attract and retain middle-class families in the neighborhoods.
The George Washington Community High School football team played its season opener at a newly renovated field and stadium,
thanks to a joint effort of the National Football League, the Indianapolis Colts and Local Initiatives Support Corp.
Two local organizations are trying to outfit thousands of kids before Indianapolis-area schools begin classes in August.
This year will be our 18th year as IPS parents. My husband and I are college graduates, upper-middle
class. He is employed full time and I’m self-employed part-time. We chose to stay in IPS
and try to make a difference for the many classmates that have no one rooting for them at home.
A state budget was passed June 30, but it’s balanced on the backs of poor children. Legislators
deserve praise for at least slightly increasing overall education funding, but because of a flawed funding
formula, urban districts such as Indianapolis Public Schools actually will lose money in the next two
years.
The challenges facing Indianapolis Public Schools are daunting. The socioeconomic level of its students and their families,
fiscal constraints, and a necessary heightened focus on security issues are just a few, but all contribute to high dropout
rates, low academic achievement, achievement gaps between middle-class and low-income children and declining enrollment.
United Way is spending $114,000 to bring Project Seed, a program with specially trained math experts, to 11 Indianapolis Public Schools.
Ingersoll-Rand donated $35,000 worth of materials, $15,000 for engineering and labor, and future support to IPS 94.
Business leaders and educators agree on what’s needed to improve Indiana’s economic health and enhance its place in the global
economy: a larger pool of skilled workers. Toward that end, a group of notfor-profits is expanding a program to get more low-income
Indianapolis students to further their education after high school.
Indianapolis Public Schools Superintendent Eugene White, in his third year as head of the state’s
largest school district, is determined to reverse the long decline of the state’s largest school district. The status quo
is not an option.