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This isn't an education story, per se. But it's too important to ignore. The education angle to the recent tragedy in Tucson, Arizona is the fact that the apparent shooter recently attended a local community college. While I think it is unfair to hold Pima Community College responsible for Jared Loughner, this New York Times article and Sunday's Washington Post editorial does raise some smart questions about what could have been done differently, most notably having sought an involuntary mental evaluation of the suspect. Hindsight, of course, is 20/20. Currently, too much of the public conversation about Tucson is about culpability and about the role of political discourse in fueling the violence. Those are possibly irrelevant or overly simplistic conversations. It is unclear if political discourse had much bearing on Loughner's decision to do what he did. Sunday's New York Times story suggests that his twisted belief that "women should not be allowed to h...

The recent decision by the American Educational Research Association (AERA) to hold a news conference condemning Arizona's new immigration law was somewhat unpredictable, and according to at least a few observers, unwise. For example, Rick Hess told the Chronicle of Higher Education it wasn't "smart politics" to "baldly politicize the role of research." The Chronicle 's editors fanned the flames further by titling its article, "Education-research group puts itself on the border of advocacy." Oh, the horror--research and advocacy meeting, having coffee, perhaps even deciding to date. The children which could result are feared by PhDs everywhere, particularly those evil twins: Compromised Objectivity and Biased Conclusions. Of course academia trains us to think, like Hess, that research is worthy only when fully divorced from politics. Our research questions should be derived from theory, stemming only from the reading of great books and dusty...

So far in 2010, it appears that the state of Arizona's contribution to public policy is two-fold: (1) First, the Legislature and Governor said: "Show me your papers (unless you look like you'd fit in at a Tea Party rally)" and (2) Now, the Arizona Department of Education is asking teachers to " say 'toy boat' three times in a row -- or you'll be reassigned." Am I missing something? But, lest one gets too depressed, there is plenty of good work happening in Arizona, in places like the Arizona K-12 Center and Expect More Arizona . So, chin up, Arizonans!

ARIZONA: State could be in contention CONNECTICUT: State to lift charter cap? MICHIGAN: Promise of federal funds forges bipartisan agreement [ Update ] MISSOURI: In the Race NEW YORK: Gates and firewalls , Bloomberg, Duncan push Race NORTH CAROLINA: Gov. Purdue sees bigger picture in RttT; not just about $$$ RHODE ISLAND: State superintendent Gist leads RttT forums TEXAS: Gov. Perry is a human firewall WISCONSIN: 'Children's zones' a feature of state's application