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"'We try to get them in as early as possible to see what a school district of high poverty looks like - what kinds of things the kids do, what kinds of needs they have - before they ever come to us as student-teachers,' Aldine Superintendent Wanda Bamberg said."

"Two state lawmakers are taking the Maine Department of Education to task for rescinding nearly $1 million in grant money that had been awarded to four districts, a decision one local school official said tarnishes the department's credibility."

"More importantly, would both of those children emerge from high school equipped with the mental agility and technological capabilities needed to progress through higher education or job training and into the workforce?"

"Allenbrook, an urban school with high levels of poverty, had become too used to poor performance, outside evaluators of the school determined. Low expectations for students were pervasive, according to the district's "Quality Review Report" on the school."

"The latest proposal on the table calls for creating 25 to 30 rental units: four one-bedrooms; 22 two-bedroom and four three-bedroom units. To be financed through low-income tax credits, the units would be rented to families earning 60 percent of the area's median income; to qualify, a family of four would have to earn $60,000. Rents would be $907 for a one-bedroom unit and $1088 for a two-bedroom unit, with the tenant paying all utilities."

"More than half the district's black males, 55 percent, had one or more of those red flags, according to the researchers at Urban Strategies Council, an Oakland-based nonprofit that focuses on improving conditions in low-income communities."

"Under the program, students from low-income families attending schools with low performance scores can have their tuition at private schools paid by the state. The Department of Education released a list of participating schools Tuesday for the program, which included St. Frances Cabrini in Alexandria, Cenla Christian Academy in Pineville, St. Mary's Assumption in Cottonport and BeauVer Christian in DeRidder."

"The nonprofit that administers the District's program of federally funded school vouchers held two open houses to solicit interest from low-income families for the upcoming school year. The response was overwhelming; nearly 1,200 new applications were received."

"School districts will be able to submit proposals for innovative educational programs this year to compete for federal grants of up to $25 million under a new national contest, part of the three-year-old Race to the Top program. Rules for the competition were to be announced on Tuesday by the Department of Education. Like the department's state-level competition for federal grants that preceded it, the program will require systems for measuring student progress and assessing teachers and administrators and will target low-income communities."

"When the Georgia legislature passed a private school scholarship program in 2008, lawmakers promoted it as a way to give poor children the same education choices as the wealthy [...] That was the idea, at least. But parents meeting at Gwinnett Christian Academy got a completely different story last year."

"Many child advocates say the state's children are still struggling to keep from falling through the cracks in the state's education, health-care and public-safety systems, and that Florida simply isn't doing enough."

"Comparison of the figures for U.S. schools with poverty rates of less than 10 percent with those of higher poverty rates makes the connection between poverty and test performance clear."