Articles

GRAVES: Education is a partnership

Reading to children, attending school are both part of building a quality learning experience.

• Graves

GRAVES: Reading to kids matters, even if world really is flat

Recently, I was reading a short biography of the famed U.S. senator Daniel Webster. In it, the author described Webster’s childhood in a 19th Century New England village, a place in which books were so scarce that the future great man took to not just reading those that were available but memorizing them as well.

• Joe Graves

GRAVES: Rarity of ESD success proves new playoff system needed

One of the pitfalls of writing a timely piece for a daily newspaper is that on occasion, you must write about an event that will be over by the time the article is published but remains in the future as you write. Thus, as I write this, I am unaware of the outcome in the football playoff game between the Mitchell Kernels and Sioux Falls Washington.

• Joe Graves

GRAVES: Anti-bullying police are latest education fad

Bullying is a serious problem in America’s schools, as well as in its parks, friendships, families and everyplace else human beings come into contact. Unfortunately, as some have tried to help schools deal with this issue, they have also represented the problem in a very superficial, one-dimensional, way.

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OPINION: Time for Congress to admit failure

Education policy decisions should be handed back to states.

GRAVES: Wrong to not tell board, but it was no cover-up

I write in order to take exception to an article that appeared in The Daily Republic on May 24 and the staff editorial that appeared on May 25. In both cases, statements were made to the effect that I defended my inaction of not telling the school board of the boys’ basketball program probationary status assigned by the South Dakota High School Activities Association. The intended implication is that I was attempting to cover-up the probation or coach Munsen’s rule violation. Neither is true.

OPINION: Reading for the love of it

Over the last few months, scores of people have approached me to commiserate over the budget cuts facing schools these days. I have appreciated that though I must also admit that making budget cuts is often times more of a technical problem than an emergent one.

Opinion: Education should be given back to states

It is no particular secret that I have been opposed to the federal No Child Left Behind legislation from its inception a little more than 10 years ago.

Opinion: SD educators have had their say, with dignity

It is often said that the squeaky wheel gets the grease. There is even a parable that suggests as much about the tendency of friends to help us out at times not so much out of friendship but capitulation to our pesky persistence (LK 11: 5-8).

Opinion: School board’s recognition leaves little to whine about

When the great Swedish naturalist, Carolus Linnaeus, was busily classifying and organizing all the known species in the plant and animal kingdoms, his task became controversial for any number of reasons. One was the issue of humankind’s inclusion in the classification system in the first place. Another was the name that would be given to the human species.

Columns

GRAVES: Home school works well for some students

Requirements for parents to home school their children are very minimal, the ability of school boards to revoke permission to home school are very limited, and the quality of home school instruction and resulting student achievement are essentially unknown and even unknowable.

• Joe Graves

GRAVES: Directives to teachers not so easy to implement

The Common Core standards are, you may remember, a set of content standards for English/language and Mathematics that have been adopted now by 46 of the 50 states. This is a major shift in educational policy.

• Joe Graves

GRAVES: It's the second mouse that gets the cheese

At least two trends will radically reshape and improve education in the relatively near future.

• Joe Graves

GRAVES:The early arrival of spring, even faux summer, has superintendent sweating out some concerns

I have genuinely been trying to turn over a new leaf on one of my attitudes of late. Whenever I see something negative, I always try to find something good about it. That attitude is just fine. But, on the flip side, whenever something positive happens, I have this nasty tendency to wonder just what the cloud is that this silver lining is delineating. Do that enough and you start to become something of a pessimist.

• Joe Graves

GRAVES: City-school library talks continue tradition of cooperation

If one has built a strong relationship with another person or agency or whatever, issues are typically easy to resolve.

• Graves

GRAVES: NCLB highlights need for change

Chance should be taken to return education to states.

• Joe Graves

GRAVES: Nice weather need not mean bad weather

Groundhog Day has always held at least a small fascination with me, so I hung in there through the local dignitary bloviating to see just what Phil would or would not see. Alas, he saw his shadow and we are in for six more weeks of winter.

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GRAVES: Gov's education plan worth supporting

Tenure is and always has been a bad idea simply because for many people it is more difficult to stay motivated once you’ve been given a strong measure of job security.

• Joe Graves

GRAVES: Decisions ahead after second leg of laptop project

The other day while attempting to find some long-lost document in a file cabinet in my basement, I happened upon a paper I had written in the 1980s for my master’s degree. (This occurred because the cabinet’s filing system is entropy-based.)

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GRAVES: School budgets best viewed with low expectations

Mitchell is in relatively good shape for South Dakota schools. We have decent reserves and an opt-out that sits at half of its maximum level. And we kicked no deficit cans down the road. Other schools aren’t so lucky.

• Joe Graves