Education

As the chancellor of Washington, DC, public schools in 2007, implemented a variety of changes that made her a controversial figure in the education reform movement.

Is science sexy? Public radio and TV journalist Ira Flatow thinks so. Every week, he turns scientific discoveries into conversation pieces on his radio program Science Friday. In his talk “Science is Sexy,” he argues that museums, zoos, TV shows and films have overtaken formal education as the main ways people learn about science. Whether it’s the Mars rover or the Large Hadron Collider, scientific research is a hot commodity. Is popular science good for science as a whole?

With high school graduation ceremonies just three months away, nearly 15,000 Washington high school seniors have yet to pass the newest addition to the state's graduation requirements.

Summer school will be back in session on a limited basis in Seattle Public Schools after it was cut from the budget two years ago.

Last November, voters approved Initiative 1240 to establish charter schools in Washington state and today the governor announced who is going to sit on the commission that will review and approve charter schools applications. Ross Reynolds sits down with newly appointed commission member and former Seattle School Board member Steve Sundquist about how the commission will work.

KUOW has learned that the U.S. Department of Education has launched an investigation into discipline rates in Seattle Public Schools. In an email, agency spokesman Jim Bradshaw told KUOW that its Office for Civil Rights is looking into whether black students in Seattle are disciplined "more frequently and more harshly" than white students for the same infractions.

The first members of Washington state’s new Charter School Commission are due to be appointed Wednesday. The commission will be able to approve some of the 40 charter schools allowed under the law voters passed last fall.

A new study shows a convincing link between sugar consumption and diabetes. It’s the latest in a line of research that shows processed sugar is bad for our health. We talk with one of the study's authors, Dr. Robert Lustig of the University of California San Francisco, and Dr. David Katz of Yale University’s Prevention Research Center.