Education

Knoxville’s ABC News affiliate reports: Dollywood’s parent company is picking up the education tab for all of its employees, beginning this year. Herschend Enterprises is the operating partner of Dollywood and the nation’s largest privately-owned themed attractions corporation. This week the company announced it will cover 100% of employees’ tuition, fees and books for employees who wish to further their …

The Washington Post reports: A school board outside Denver voted to fire the district’s superintendent Friday night in a controversial move that came amid accusations that the newly elected conservative majority had violated state open-meeting laws. The Douglas County, Colo., school board voted 4 to 3 in a special meeting Friday night to fire Corey Wise without cause, dismissing the …

St. Louis Public Radio reports: Two local organizations are partnering to distribute free copies of controversial books in response to the recent increase in attempts to remove titles from school libraries. In Purpose Educational Services and the St. Louis bookstore EyeSeeMe will deliver free copies of “The Bluest Eye” by Toni Morisson to Missourians who request it. The organizations raised …

Kansas City’s ABC News affiliate reports: A Gladstone man, who recently spoke in support of banning books from North Kansas City School District libraries that depicted sexual acts, is facing a felony charge of second-degree child molestation and a misdemeanor charge of fourth-degree domestic assault. Ryan Utterback, 29, is also facing a misdemeanor charge of furnishing pornographic material or attempting …

NBC News reports: Virginia Gov. Glenn Youngkin clearly thought a tip line (read: snitch line) that would allow conservative parents to rat out educators accused of teaching critical race theory would go over well. In light of recent news, I have to agree. After Youngkin on Monday announced a new email address for parents to send in their complaints, zealous …

CNBC reports: A Tennessee school board has voted to remove the Pulitzer Prize-winning graphic novel “Maus” from an eighth-grade language arts curriculum due to concerns about profanity and an image of female nudity in its depiction of Polish Jews who survived the Holocaust. The Jan. 10 vote by the McMinn County School Board, which only began attracting attention Wednesday, comes …

Media Matters has the transcript: TUCKER CARLSON (HOST): Well, a new bill just passed the state Senate in Mississippi that would ban public schools from teaching racism, in other words, from teaching that any one race is superior to or inferior to any other. Now, you would think the other 49 states would have similar laws on the book because, …

The Washington Post reports: Virginia Gov. Glenn Youngkin on Monday invoked the biblical call to “love your neighbor” as school systems around the state struggled with strong reactions to his ban on local mask mandates, but the Republican also fanned the flames of partisan division in the face of court challenges and protests. In the interview, Youngkin also touted a …

ABC News reports: The U.S. Supreme Court on Monday said it would take up a pair of cases that could decide the future of affirmative action in college admissions. The justices will hear appeals from a conservative student group that has been challenging the use of race as a factor in undergraduate admissions at Harvard University, the nation’s oldest private …

The Houston Chronicle reports: Gov. Greg Abbott has announced plans to amend the Texas Constitution with a Parent Bill of Rights if he is re-elected. The proposal follows Abbott’s introduction of a Taxpayer Bill of Rights this week. Abbott, who is running for reelection, has made it a point to target inappropriate content in schools. In November, he directed the …

Washington DC’s ABC News affiliate reports: Page County Public Schools in Luray, Virginia will increase police presence at schools Monday after a mother made a perceived threat during a school board meeting Thursday night. Amelia King was upset about the school mask mandate and said her children would not be wearing masks on Monday and she would “bring every single …

Reuters reports: The U.S. Supreme Court on Friday agreed to hear an appeal by a Christian former high school football coach who was suspended from his job at a high school in Washington state for refusing to halt his practice of praying at mid-field after games – a case that could expand the religious rights of employees of public institutions. …

The Wall Street Journal reports: Sixteen major U.S. universities, including Yale University, Georgetown University and Northwestern University, are being sued for alleged antitrust violations because of the way they work together to determine financial-aid awards for students. According to a lawsuit filed in Illinois federal court late Sunday by law firms representing five former students who attended some of the …

The Chicago Sun-Times reports: Chicago Public Schools classes are canceled Wednesday as the Chicago Teachers Union voted to refuse in-person work, defying district plans because of post-holidays COVID-19 concerns. The cancellation came despite a last-minute proposal from city leaders that introduced improved testing and safety measures but wasn’t enough to avoid upending in-person schooling for about 290,000 students at non-charter …

The Hill reports: A federal judge on Wednesday rejected a lawsuit from two Nevada parents seeking to challenge the state’s public school mask mandate, saying in her ruling that parents did not have the constitutional right to dictate school policies. In their lawsuit filed in August, two Nevada parents claimed that the mask mandate, as well as their exclusion from …

The Washington Post reports: The Biden administration announced Wednesday it will extend a pause on student loan payments through May 1 as the omicron variant threatens to hurt the U.S. economy. President Biden depicted the move as an essential step to help millions of borrowers at a moment of ongoing public health challenges. Until now, the payment moratorium had been …

New York Magazine reports: The Supreme Court on Wednesday heard a case involving just 4,800 students in rural Maine. But because of the way the Court seems certain to rule, the case will affect everyone in America. The reason is a single word: discrimination. At one point, Justice Kavanaugh said that “discrimination against all religions, as opposed to secular, is …

CNN reports: The American Library Association says it has provided legal guidance and support to a number of libraries impacted by the “dramatic uptick” of attempts to remove books concerning LGBTQ issues and people of color. Since June 1, the ALA’s Office for Intellectual Freedom has tracked 155 incidents across the country and has provided support and consultation in 120 …

The Tennessean reports: The complaint, the first directed to the state under the new law passed this spring, was filed by Robin Steenman [photo], chair of the Moms for Liberty Williamson County chapter, a conservative parent group sweeping the nation. The 11-page complaint alleged that the literacy curriculum, Wit and Wisdom, used by Williamson County Schools and at least 30 …

Issues In Higher Education reports: According to Dr. Joel Mittleman, an assistant professor of sociology at Notre Dame and author of the study, 52% of gay men in the U.S. have a bachelor’s degree, a total of 16 percentage points higher than the national average. Putting that number into a global perspective, Mittleman writes, “If America’s gay men were considered …