Business Week -  Jane Porter

“With the release of a new report Dec. 14 on the future of the U.S. educational system, the Commission on the Skills of the American Workforce has created a controversial blueprint for school reform that it says is crucial if the U.S. is to maintain its competitiveness. With India and China churning out highly skilled, low-cost workers, the group says the U.S. must train the next generation of college graduates to produce the next big wave of money-making ideas. If it can be done at all, it will take 15 years and cost billions in new and reallocated funds, but the U.S. has no choice, according to the report. “There is a real sense of urgency at this point,” says Caroline Hoxby, Harvard economist and director for the National Bureau of Economic Research’s Economics of Education Program. “We don’t have any time to waste.”“ (more)

Time - Wallace/Steptoe

“There’s a dark little joke exchanged by educators with a dissident streak: Rip Van Winkle awakens in the 21st century after a hundred-year snooze and is, of course, utterly bewildered by what he sees. Men and women dash about, talking to small metal devices pinned to their ears. . .”(more)

Panama City Living - Juliann Talkington

“Think it’s OK for your kids to slip through school without a good understanding of math? You might want to reconsider. According to Jennifer Ehrlich with the Business Higher Education Forum, ‘the U.S. Department of Labor predicts that, over the decade ending in 2008, jobs requiring science, engineering ,and technical training will increase by 51%, a rate four times faster than overall job growth. . .’” (more)