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"Two local school districts are missing the mark when it comes to meeting the achievement needs of low-income and minority students, according to a report issued by an education advocacy group this week. San Luis Coastal Unified and Lucia Mar Unified were the only two local school districts ranked in the study by the Oakland-based Education Trust-West."

"Montgomery County has developed an action plan to help more low-income kids succeed in school that doubles as an application for a national award."

"The Kalamazoo County Board of Commissioners unanimously voted Tuesday night to endorse the Kalamazoo Regional Educational Service Agency's bid to administer the county's Head Start program, which provides preschool services for about 600 children from low-income families."

"These teachers know that under such a system, they will rank lower if they spend time teaching ideas that, while important to students, aren't included on the crucial test. They will rank lower if they accept the challenge of teaching troubled children or working in a high-poverty area where students' academic performance is suppressed by fewer opportunities to learn outside school."

"On a chilly morning, some 20 low-income parents convened on the city's Southwest Side to hear a presentation on how reading to their children enhances brain development and school readiness. Hardly unusual -- except most of the prospective "students" were all younger than 6 months."

"After high school graduation, when he turned 18 and was too old to live in a foster home, Macias knew exactly where he was headed: the streets. 'There weren't a lot of options with no money and no job, I was pretty sure I'd be homeless,' he says. But before he could pack his duffel bag, Macias received some happy news. A foster care worker told him about the Utah Youth Mentor Project, a program that matches teens who have aged out of state care with volunteers who provide friendship, advice and help with everything from finding an apartment to balancing a checkbook. "

"Georgia added a fourth category, 'alert' schools, to make sure it could offer assistance to schools that, unlike those with the priority, focus or reward designation, may not receive federal Title 1 assistance given to schools with a high percentage of low-income students."

"If passed, the measure would establish a pilot program to give $10,000 annual bonuses and other incentives to highly rated teachers who transfer to high-needs schools, where at least 75 percent of students qualify for free or reduced-price lunch, the schools indicator of poverty, and where fewer than 40 percent of students are proficient in math and reading."

"When Head Start was launched in 1964 as a piece of President Lyndon Johnson's War on Poverty, Bill Ferzacca traveled as a national consultant, informing people about how the new federal law would help disadvantaged children get better prepared for kindergarten."

"'If all our neighborhoods were racially and economically integrated, it'd certainly be more convenient to have a system based on neighborhood schools,' said Richard D. Kahlenberg, a senior fellow at the Century Foundation and the editor of the new book."

"A new dual language class, iPads for third-graders and an initiative aimed at boosting learning for children in poverty are all coming to Bruce Drysdale Elementary School, but school board members have stopped short of merging the school with its higher-performing neighbor."

"Early language and literacy skills are powerful predictors of a child's future success in school. Abundant research exists that attests to the challenges faced by children who enter kindergarten lacking basic early literacy skills. These skills are developed when adults read to children regularly beginning at birth."