Colleges Rally to Help Students in Louisiana
Helping Hurricane’s Victims (Students) Get Back To Normal
By Dr Catherine Cook-Cottone
While Louisiana and Mississippi residents struggle to evacuate, to relocate and—above all else, to survive—many of the youngest among them face years of recovery from a variety of traumas Hurricane Katrina has dispersed upon them....READ MORE

CEO Kurt Landgraf of Educational Testing Service (ETS) Helps Students of Disaster
Staff of ETS’s San Antonio office are collecting money, food, and personal hygiene items for the estimated 25,000 victims who have begun arriving at Kelly Air Force Base and area schools. ETS President and CEO Kurt Landgraf also announced the company will make a $100,000 corporate donation to the Hurricane Katrina disaster relief effort....READ MORE

College of Staten Island CUNY Opens Doors to “Katrina Students”
College of Staten Island President Dr. Marlene Springer announced that CSI will admit immediately any students who had planned to attend colleges now closed due to Hurricane Katrina....READ MORE

The Mayor Sends Help
Doing Our Part to Aid the Victims of Hurricane Katrina
By Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg
Four years ago, after 9/11, people across the country helped New York City get back on its feet. Some came here to work with us in the recovery effort; many, many more donated to relief organizations while staying in their home communities and going about their daily lives....READ MORE

COLLECTED FEATURES

International Youth Day at The United Nations
By Liza Young
With a boundless supply of ideas from adults regarding the education and future of youth, it’s not often that voices of young people are heard in a public, powerful forum. The gala opening of the photographic exhibit at International Youth Day at the UN, “Chasing the Dream,” focused on eight students from around the world who shared their innermost feelings via photographs and writings....READ MORE

Photojournalist Diego Goldberg Chases the Dream
By Pola Rosen Ed.D.
Diego Goldberg, an Argentinian, is a renowned photojournalist, one of the creators of the UN photo exhibit, entitled “Chasing the Dream,” which includes 141 photos, chronicling the struggles and the hopes of eight youngsters from Brazil, Cambodia, India, Jamaica, Uganda, Morocco and other nations....READ MORE

Guests at the Event
Pictures of UN Secretary General Kofi Annan, Roberta Flack , & More. VIEW

CCNY, NASA & DoD Outreach Programs Train Young Scientists from Middle School to College
By Dr. Robert R. Alfano
City College is the site of several major research centers, institutes and a consortium that have placed CCNY at the forefront of photonics and laser technologies research and development. Two of these are the NASA Center for Optical Sensing and Imaging (NASA-COSI); and the DoD Center for Nanoscale Photonics (DoD-CNP)....READ MORE

Languages
Reflections on Language
By Alfred Posamentier, Ph.D.
When I opened a package from Istanbul, I was flattered to learn that my two most recent mathematics books were translated into Turkish. While I was clearly familiar with the contents, I could not read a single word....READ MORE

Teaching American Sign Language To Hearing Children
Developed for hearing children ages 3-11, SIGN-A-LOT is a DVD series where American Sign Language vocabulary is woven into the storyline through an exciting, entertaining world of animated characters, magical lands and playful child performers....READ MORE

SPOTLIGHT ON SCHOOLS

A Season of Hope Denied
By Randi Weingarten
The start of school is usually a season of hope as students, parents and educators look forward to building on the gains of the previous school year. New York City’s teachers certainly had reason to be hopeful because of statements Mayor Bloomberg made at a town hall meeting just last month....READ MORE

Corporate Contributions to Education
George “Vanilla” Weiss: Say Yes to Education
By Joan Baum, Ph.D.
“My kids.” The phrase recurs often as the founding member of SayYes To Education starts talking about what his nationally known program has been doing for inner-city youngsters over the years, and it seems possible the first couple of times that he means his own family... READ MORE

Independent Colleges and TIAA-CREF Offer Unique College Savings Plan
By Joan Baum, Ph.D.
For sure, customers who can’t remember what TIAA CREF stands for—and most can’t (for the record it’s: Teacher Insurance Annuity Association / College Retirement Equities Fund) but who regularly receive reports from this 85-year old, 350 billion-dollar financial services company...READ MORE

Profile: Susan Kent, Director & Chief, NY Public Library
By Joan Baum, Ph.D
It sounds apocryphal, but the new Director and Chief Executive of The Branch Libraries for the New York Public Library (NYPL) swears it’s true, and she beams in the retelling: there she was last year in LA, where, as City Librarian for the Los Angeles Public Library...READ MORE

Profiles in Education
Chris Whittle, CEO, Edison Schools
By Joan Baum, Ph.D.
At 58 Chris Whittle, communications entrepreneur, remains totally committed to the project that has claimed his heart and head for the last 16 years—The Edison Schools, a for-profit company he runs as CEO with Benno Schmidt, Chairman of the Board, and that now boasts some remarkable numbers...READ MORE

More “Intelligent” Challenges to Evolution
By Martha McCarthy, Ph.D.
Historically, several states barred public school instruction that conflicted with the Genesis account of creation, and the Tennessee Supreme Court upheld such a law in the famous Scopes “monkey trial.”...READ MORE

The Dean’s Math Column
Perfection in Mathematics
By Alfred S. Posamentier, Ph.D.
What is perfect in mathematics, a subject where most think everything is already perfect? Over the years various authors have been found to name perfect squares, perfect numbers, perfect rectangles, and perfect triangles....READ MORE

The Cathedral School
The Cathedral School has been nurturing the hearts and minds of its students since 1949. We are a co-educational, independent school serving families from a variety of backgrounds. Featuring small classes and caring teachers, our “neighborhood” dimensions make us a community in which each child is known well by many adults...READ MORE

Claremont Preparatory School
Claremont Preparatory School is the first independent on-going school to open in Manhattan in the last 50 years and the first nonsectarian K-8 school below Canal Street....READ MORE

The Greenwich House
The Greenwich House Preschool is the city’s first day-care program for children. It opened at Greenwich House in 1920 and our tradition as caregiver and educator of the city’s children continues today...READ MORE

GUEST EDITORIAL

The Decade of Science at CUNY
By CUNY Chancellor, Matthew Goldstein
In his 2005 book, The World Is Flat, Thomas Friedman called “the steady erosion of America’s scientific and engineering base” a “quiet crisis.” Indeed, since 1990, U.S. bachelor’s degrees in engineering have dropped by eight percent and degrees in math by 20 percent...READ MORE

METROBEAT

Improving New York City’s Middle Schools
By Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg
Our Administration’s public school reforms are producing real results for our students; we’re clearly moving in the right direction. The four-year high school graduation rate, while still too low, is the highest it’s been in 20 years...READ MORE

The Heavy Hand of Autocracy
By CSA President Jill Levy
What does one call a governance structure or governing body that does not respect dissent, discourse and the free flow of ideas and information? Several months ago the media was bombarding the union with requests for access to Principals and Assistant Principals in their schools without DOE orchestration....READ MORE

Double Testing by State and City Must be Stopped
By Assemblyman Steven Sanders
Whatever one thinks of the frenzy of standardized testing brought on in part by the federal No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB), and regardless of one’s view of high-stakes testing, almost everyone can agree that subjecting students in the same grade to two sets of standardized tests is plain wrong....READ MORE

SPECIAL EDUCATION

Group for ADHD
Group for ADHD is a private mental health clinic in Manhattan, founded by Lenore Ruben, LMSW, CHT, EMDR, and Orly Calderon, Psy.D., a NYS licensed psychologist....READ MORE

The Joys but Mostly the Pains of New Motherhood
By Carrie Masia-Warner, Ph.D.
Having a new baby can be one of the most joyous experiences in a woman’s life. It is a time to fall in love in a way understood only by others who have experienced it....READ MORE

Communicating Feelings Effectively
By Dr Brian Brown
All of us from time to time have difficulties effectively communicating our feelings. When emotions run high we may become overwhelmed by a given situation and walk away thinking to ourselves, “I should have done this or said that to this person”...READ MORE

COLLEGES

College President’s Series:
President Amy Gutmann, University of Pennsylvania
By Joan Baum, Ph.D.
In her inaugural address last October as the University of Pennsylvania’s 89th president, Dr. Amy Gutmann articulated a tripartite “vision” she believed could turn Penn from “excellence” to “eminence.”...READ MORE

Talking with Inspirational Teacher Andrew Gardner
By Liza Young
At the age of 29, Andrew Gardner has already been a first grade teacher for seven years. With passion and dedication to the field, Gardner has developed a teaching style that is creative and innovative, fostering an enjoyment of learning for his six-year-old students....READ MORE

Bank Street’s Infancy Institute Helps the Smallest Among Us
By Julie Ronneburger
The Graduate School of Bank Street College of Education presented its eighteenth annual Infancy Institute in June 2005. The three day event, titled “Infants, Toddlers, Families: Supporting Their Growth,” involved thirty-seven nationally renowned professors and experts in fields such as psychiatry, occupational therapy, music therapy, and nutrition....READ MORE

New Hudson River Ecology Course Piloted by 14 Universities
Barnard College is Leader
By Emily Sherwood, Ph.D.
Although many New Yorkers’ only hands-on experience with the Hudson River has been on a Circle Line cruise, all that will change for a lucky group of college students if some visionary educators realize their dream....READ MORE

New Dean of Hunter College School of Education Expands Intellectual Options
By Joan Baum, Ph.D.
Though it’s been 25 years since Dr. David Steiner was last in Manhattan, when he worked for a short time in finance on Wall Street, this Oxford-educated student of the humanities, who completed his graduate study at Harvard in political philosophy, still remembers his first and brief sojourn in the city as a twelve year old at P.S. 41...READ MORE

MUSIC ART & DANCE

The Salzburg Festival: La Traviata Sets New Gold Standard
By Irving Spitz, Music Editor
Special from Salzberg: Verdi’s La Traviata is performed so often that it’s a challenge to present something new. Producer Willy Decker and director Wolfgang Gussmann achieved this in a dramatically coherent and visually compelling way....READ MORE

CHILDREN'S CORNER

Education and Fun in the Bath
By Pola Rosen, Ed.D.
From ages three to nine, children will clamor for and enjoy bath time with ArtFoams, a creative assortment of rubberized shapes that stick to the tiles of a tub....READ MORE

Language Dolls Provide Great Way to Learn Foreign Languages
By Pola Rosen, Ed.D.
Did you ever think about teaching your child foreign languages before they started school? Language Littles provide the perfect venue for learning Spanish, Chinese, Italian, French, Greek or Hebrew from ages 3 to 12....READ MORE

Attention All Elementary School Students
Emily Wertheimer’s Recipe
Emily is a 2nd grader in Millburn, New Jersey....READ MORE

MOVIES & THEATER

Movie Review
A Well-Tailored Tale: Balzac and The Little Chinese Seamstress
By Jan Aaron
That good literature has a significant impact on one’s life is certainly the view held by educators throughout the free world. So, this movie Balzac and the Little Chinese Seamstress, set during China’s repressive Cultural Revolution, makes us realize how fortunate we are to be able read books and learn from them and how books can change lives....READ MORE

LETTERS

Dr. Alexandra Levine: Caring, Humanistic Physician
To the Editor:
It was my great fortune to have been a patient of Dr. Levine. There is no more caring and supportive individual and she was totally responsible for giving me the courage and strength to tackle my condition....READ MORE

TECHNOLOGY

Product Review
Teaching Edge’s Ragtime 5
By Mitchell Levine
Now that what was once exotic technology has become commonplace, many of us have become uncritical about the tools we use: although there are a few alternatives, it seems like almost everyone in the tech rank and file, keep using applications software from the big-time players...READ MORE

Product Review
Smartroom’s Beyond Question System
By Mitchell Levine
If there’s anything that the technology ramp-up process that’s occurred over the last several years in the New York Schools has proven, it’s that just spending money on products alone will accomplish nothing to improve student learning in itself....READ MORE

Product Review
TSFS’s Technology Integration Kit
By Mitchell Levine
To successfully implement a technology program for your school that will actually impact learning, you need more than just hardware...READ MORE

BOOKS

Logos Bookstore’s Recommendations
Come celebrate the end of summer at Logos this September...READ MORE