Michigan Police Grants $2 Million for School Safety

The Michigan State Police will distribute $2 million in funds from its Competitive School Safety Grant Program to 52 schools across the state. Funds are allocated to improve campus security and safety. The grant recipients included 24 nonpublic schools, 25 public school districts, and three charter schools. 

The police said more than 62,500 students will benefit from security technology and equipment purchases as a result of the grants.

20 Percent of L.A. High School Students Report Being Bullied

There seems little doubt that bullying is a major high school issue in the United States. It certainly is in Los Angeles. One in five Los Angeles high school students said they were bullied last school year, according to a survey conducted as part of a report released by the Los Angeles Unified School District’s Office of the Inspector General. 

Although schools were supposed to keep bullying complaint logs, nearly every campus audited showed they were either not in use or were not up to date, according to the report. “Most teachers and staff did not receive high-quality training on bullying prevention on an annual basis,” the report says. Schools try to address bullying, but fall short to varying degrees, the study concluded. 

Tennessee District Launches Google Classroom Platform

Tennessee’s DeSoto County Schools, which introduced Google Classroom at the beginning of the 2016–17 school year, now has 40 teachers and 4,000 students using the platform.

The platform allows for assignment and lecture posting, student progress tracking, deadline notifications, and grading. The district has appointed two technology coaches to assist with the implementation, one of whom says the system is particularly accessible for users of Facebook and Gmail.

Coding Counts for Foreign Language Requirement?

Florida lawmakers are considering a bill that would allow two coding classes to count for two foreign language credits. 

State Sen. Jeff Brandes (R-St. Petersburg) says the measure will prepare students for in-demand jobs. Other proponents, such as multilingual robotics engineer Elizabeth De Zulueta and Miami-Dade Superintendent Alberto Carvalho, think each discipline has individual merit. 

One caveat is that while public Florida universities would begin accepting the credits as equivalent, students applying to private and out-of-state schools may unknowingly reduce their scholarship and admission chances by studying coding in lieu of a foreign language.