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EDUCATION

LETTERS
Blue Hills Regional Technical School in Canton has hands-on learning that is crucial to many of their vocational programs, from automotive technology and electrical to cosmetology and culinary arts.
What determines ‘fairness’ in vocational school admissions?
Readers respond to the March 28 editorial, “Fighting for fairness in vocational-ed admissions.”

JEFF JACOBY
People passed through the New England Holocaust Memorial in Boston, in January.
The problem with Holocaust education
Classroom instruction about the Nazi genocide has proliferated. So has the cancer of anti-Semitism.

LETTERS
A METCO school bus outside Bedford High School on the first day of school in September.
Decades-old problem of segregated schools persists
How about envisioning a world in which our primary intention is to ensure that our public education system is a quality public good for all?

LETTERS
Principal Sebastian LaGambina walks down a hallway in Somerville's new high school.
MCAS is a distraction we don’t need this year
As a parent of kids in elementary school and middle school, I have been witnessing firsthand how teachers and schools have adapted in a pandemic and have developed assessment techniques that meet the moment.

LETTERS
In this Sept. 9, 2020, file photo, the letters A and B are placed on desks at the Mildred Avenue K-8 in Mattapan for students to alternate on separate days during the week to keep a social distance.
Drawing universities into the pull of magnet schools
Readers react to an Ideas story on universities and local districts joining forces to create powerhouse schools.

EDITORIAL
Decades of research show the costs of segregation are enormous. Academic performance suffers. Adult earnings, too. And students of all races miss out on vital opportunities to prepare for life in an increasingly multicultural society.
Time for state lawmakers to act on school integration
A decades-old problem is still a problem. And possibly worse.

LETTERS
A classroom at the Pickering Middle School in Lynn as seen in October 2019.
In spending federal stimulus money, state’s schools will need transparency and oversight
Other than some nebulous language in the federal grant calling for general reporting of expenditures after the fact, there are no requirements for public input, transparency, or even oversight of spending decisions by elected or appointed school committees.

Abdallah Fayyad
Though Harvard offered him a pay raise, an endowed chair position, and a 10-year contract earlier this year, tenure review was not on the table — that is, until his negotiations with the school spilled into the news.
Cornel West, Harvard, and the need for more transparency in tenure review
West’s feud with the university underscores why transparency is a key tool in preventing systemic employment discrimination.

LETTERS
Christopher Alcimbert in cosmetology class at Blue Hills Regional Technical School in Canton in September 2020.
An educational voilà: Merge the best of academics, voc-tech in single schools
The construct of separating eighth-graders entering high school into future tradespeople vs. professionals is both antiquated and limiting.

Marcela García
It’s a huge challenge for the public schools to effectively spend these new federal dollars, which amount to about one-third of BPS’s annual budget. That comes down to an astonishing $9,500 extra per student, with few strings attached.
Boston Public Schools are getting more than $400 million in stimulus dollars — how should the money be spent?
With a return to full-time in-person instruction on April 26, how well prepared is the district to do the more difficult work that lies ahead? And where exactly is all that money going?