School Bullying Council

http://www.washingtonpost.com/local/education/in-silver-spring-suspension-of-6-year-old-student-is-reversed-by-school-officials/2013/01/04/4dcbb0d8-561e-11e2-bf3e-76c0a789346f_story.html

At Pitzer College, a student used the example of the Ponzi schemer Bernard L. Madoff to take a philosophical look at how much money people truly need to be happy.

As the economy has suffered in recent years and college costs have risen, high school seniors have grappled with the fallout in their own families and channeled their feelings into an increasing number of memorable college application essays about sacrifice, social policy and affluence or its opposite.

“Students never used to write about this stuff,” said Angel Pérez, vice president and dean of admission and financial aid at Pitzer, which is in Claremont, Calif. “I think there is this new consciousness. It’s unlike anything I’ve ever seen.”

Given the Your Money team’s long-standing endorsement of raising the financial consciousness of the younger set, we wanted to see these writings for ourselves. So we’re asking high school seniors who are applying for college this year to send us application essays that have anything at all to do with money, working, class, the economy and affluence (or lack thereof).

We’ll read them all and publish the best on our Bucks personal finance blog.

There is more on our editorial criteria and the logistics down below, but if you’re trying to figure out what counts as a money essay, think broadly, as many applicants have in recent years. “An essay ought to try to fill in the gaps, to tell us things that we don’t know about you,” said Erica Sanders, managing director of the office of undergraduate admissions at the University of Michigan.

Your guidance counselor and teachers who are writing letters of support for your application may not know about or think to write about your family’s financial status, good or bad. “Maybe a parent had to move out of town for work, and the student writes about taking on more responsibility, that it allowed them to take on more leadership and to contribute to their family in a way that they didn’t even know was possible,” she added, echoing essays she’s read in recent years.

Even if your family has not struggled or become fabulously wealthy, an essay about your part-time job certainly qualifies. “Many of our engineering students will talk about building something and the costs of putting it together,” Ms. Sanders said.

Aside from the Madoff essay, Mr. Perez has read other Pitzer applicant essays and had other conversations with applicants about money and the economy in recent years that have stuck with him.

“One student last year was very affected by the whole conversation about the 1 percent,” he said. “He sent us his proposal for the tax code. The committee thought that this is someone who is clearly thinking about this in a critical way, is informed about what is going on the world and has done some dissecting of the information, and that’s the kind of student we’re looking for.”

The college essay is always a bit of a high-wire act. Harry Bauld, the author of “On Writing the College Application Essay,” which I credit with helping me get into college, paints a visceral, frightening picture of haggard admissions officers reading dozens of essays each day. Then, he asks readers to imagine that their application is 38th in the pile. How are you going to excite that person?

Writing about money can offer a bit of voyeuristic thrill in this regard, but it also poses its own particular challenges. “Most of my students are absolutely brilliant,” said Mr. Bauld, a high school English teacher at Horace Mann School in New York City and a former admissions officer at Columbia and Brown. “But they cannot see their own relationship to economic culture. It’s not comprehensible.”

The more affluent ones, if they do understand it, struggle further when trying to put it into words. “When it becomes visible, it comes accompanied with a U-Haul full of guilt that they’re towing behind them,” he said. “Then, it forces them into various clichés.”

Twitter: @ronlieber

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/01/05/your-money/an-invitation-to-high-school-seniors-to-write-about-cash.html

http://www.washingtonpost.com/local/education/in-silver-spring-suspension-of-6-year-old-student-is-reversed-by-school-officials/2013/01/04/4dcbb0d8-561e-11e2-bf3e-76c0a789346f_story.html

Image: xMizLitx/Flickr

By Ian Steadman, Wired UK

A study of school design has discovered that school layouts can influence a child’s development by as much as 25 percent — positively or negatively — over the course of an academic year.

The 751 pupils using 34 classrooms across seven primary schools in Blackpool were studied over the 2011-12 academic year by the University of Salford’s School of the Built Environment and architecture firm Nightingale Associates. Standardised data — such as age, gender and academic performance — were collected on each child at the start and end of the year, while each classroom was rated for quality on ten different environmental factors, such as orientation for natural light, shape, colour, temperature and acoustics.

The results, published in Building and the Environment, revealed that the architecture and design of classrooms has a significant role to play in influencing academic performance. Six of the environmental factors — colour, choice, connection, complexity, flexibility and light — were clearly correlated with grade scores.

Architect Peter Barrett, the study’s lead author, said: “This is the first time a holistic assessment has been made that successfully links the overall impact directly to learning rates in schools. The impact identified is in fact greater than we imagined.” According to the results, once the differences between the “worst” and “best” designed classrooms looked at in the study were taken into account, it was found the be the equivalent to the progress a typical pupil would be expected to make over a year.

The results are particularly interesting as the coaltion U.K. government has introduced a controversial range of standardised templates for new school buildings, with the expressed purpose of reducing the costs of hiring architects. An insistence on a range of strictly-defined design features — including a ban on curved walls and certain kinds of insulated wall and ETFE roofs, sticking to one size for windows and doors, encouraging stacking of blocks on top of each other, and an emphasis on “basic” finishes to interior decorations like balustrades — replaces the previous Labour government’s more architecturally extravagant Building Schools for the Future programme, which was cancelled by education secretary Michael Gove.

He has claimed that his department’s new Priority School Building Programme, and its basic plans, will put an end to a situation which he believes existed only to “make architects richer”.

Unsurprisingly, the design proposals have been met with disapproval from architects. The Royal Institute of British Architects issued a statement criticising the templates for introducing a “one size fits all” format that ignored the needs for flexibility in modern teaching environments. It also worried that the standard corridors would be too small for large numbers of students, the environmental impact of the buildings would be higher than expected, and that the templates ignored the statutory requirement to be accessible for students and teachers with disabilities.

Source: Wired.co.uk

Butler Business School Closes, Students Stunned (Connecticut Post): Business school students in Connecticut returning from their holiday break were dealt a rough blow this week when they found that the Butler Business School had abruptly closed. The closure of the school, a private, non-degree-granting occupational institution, leaves many students in the lurch, especially those who had taken out more than $20,000 in loans to attend the program and have not yet graduated. Connecticut’s Office of Higher Education, which has regulatory oversight over these types of schools, said it is contacting students to collect their information and find ways to help them complete their studies at other occupational schools in the state.

MBA Graduates Put Their Best Foot Forward (Financial Times): MBA women increasingly are becoming big players in the world of online fashion, with a number starting their own e-commerce companies during or right after business school. They’re following a path blazed by Alexis Maybank and Alexandra Wilkis Wilson, two Harvard Business School MBAs who founded the popular online shopping site Gilt Groupe back in 2007. Two of the latest are Quincy Apparel, launched in September by two Harvard MBA graduates, and The Fold, established by two London Business School MBA alums. Both companies are looking to provide women with stylish and affordable outfits for the workplace.

Business Schools Build Courses on Wal-Mart’s Sustainable Strategy (Sustainable Plant): Business School students in the International MBA program at the University of South Carolina’s Moore School of Business this spring will get a firsthand look into Wal-Mart Stores’ (WMT) corporate sustainability practices through a series of new case studies written by Andrew Spicer, a professor at the Moore School, and David Hyatt, a professor at the University of Arkansas Walton College of Business. The two professors were given access for three years to current and former Wal-Mart executives and employees to assess how effectively the retail giant was implementing its new sustainability strategy and meeting such goals as creating zero waste and selling sustainable products. The researchers wrote seven case studies on the topic, all of which they say can be used as tools to teach business students and executives about sustainability and business development.

MBA Graduates Plan to Return as Entrepreneurs (African Business Review): The vast majority of African MBA students who are studying at leading business schools in the U.S. and Europe plan to return to Africa after graduation, according to a new study by Jacana Partners, a Pan-African private equity firm that invests in small and midsize businesses. Of the 70 percent of those surveyed who said they plan to head back to Africa, about half said they anticipate becoming entrepreneurs. More than one-third said they expect to start their companies in the growing consumer-goods and financial-services sector, the study found.

MBA Courses Boom in Russian Business Schools (The Telegraph): MBA students in Russia can expect to fork over anywhere from $60,000 to $90,000 to get an MBA degree from a top business school. About 10,000 people in Russia are pursuing business education, most of whom are mid- to senior-level managers hoping to advance their careers and are paying for the degrees out-of-pocket. Some of the most well-respected MBA programs today are at schools affiliated with large universities such as Moscow State University, St. Petersburg State University, and the Academy of National Economy.

Join the discussion on the Bloomberg Businessweek Business School Forum, visit us on Facebook, and follow @BWbschools on Twitter.

http://www.businessweek.com/articles/2013-01-03/b-school-news-roundup-for-profit-b-school-shuts-down

After weeks of unspeakable tragedy, funerals and muted holiday celebrations, Thursday was about normalcy for Sandy Hook Elementary School students — at least as much as was possible.

About 500 students and their teachers were back in class for the first time since a gunman slaughtered 20 children and six adults at their Newtown, Conn., school three weeks ago.

They returned to a school that bore the Sandy Hook name but is located about seven miles away from the building where their classmates died. News reports said a large number of police greeted the students and teachers, while several officers guarded the school’s entrance, checking IDs of parents who came to drop off their children.

The building — until recently nearby Monroe’s shuttered Chalk Hill School — has been refurbished to help make the transition as smooth as possible. Many students were greeted by their old desks and classroom furniture.

Thursday was designed to be a “regular schedule” day, Newtown School District Superintendent Janet Robinson said.

“All of our desks are there,” 9-year-old Ben Paley told CNN.

Julian Ford, a clinical psychologist at the University of Connecticut who helped counsel families in the days immediately following the shooting, told the Los Angeles Times on Thursday that the feel of familiarity is important for the children.

“When they see the classroom, it is not going to take them right back to the terrible incidents that happened,” he said, “but to all the experiences in the prior part of the school year — most of which will be very reassuring and positive for them.”

There have been other reassurances as well. The father of a third-grader said his 8-year-old daughter received a stuffed animal during Wednesday’s open house at the new school, one she picked out herself.

“I’m not worried about her going back,” Vinny Alvarez told the Associated Press after the Wednesday event. “The fear kind of kicks back in a little bit, but we’re very excited for her and we got to see many, many kids today. The atmosphere was very cheerful.”

Backpacks and other items left behind the day of the shooting have been saved. A few days before Christmas — while on a visit to the Monroe school building — a young boy recovered the e-reader he left in his desk, Monroe First Selectman Steve Vavrek told the Los Angeles Times on Wednesday.

“He was just so happy to see he didn’t lose his possession,” Vavrek said. “He came in and saw it and it was like he never left.”

Donated “snowflakes,” crafted by people from around the world, greeted returning students.

And Robinson, the superintendent, said teachers were “creative” in putting together their new classrooms, many of which she said are physically quite different from the rooms students fled Dec. 14 as Adam Lanza shot his way into Sandy Hook Elementary, killing 26 there, including 20 children, before killing himself.

Despite the efforts to make the new school comfortable, signs of the tragedy were unavoidable. Counselors were on hand Thursday for staff, parents and students. Parents were allowed to stay in a lecture room for “as long as they wished” and to accompany their children to class to help them adjust. 

Although the police presence around the school has been increased, Monroe Police Lt. Keith White said Wednesday that officials don’t want “overburden” students.

“We want this to be a normal school where they can go and enjoy themselves and learn throughout the day,” White told reporters.

As the students return, the parents of Sandy Hook children are grappling with how to help their children adjust.

“There is no real playbook for this,” one mother, Denise Correia, told CNN. “We are kind of just kind sensing our child and trying to meet the needs that we can and just support them.”

ALSO:

More Oregon bus crash victims are identified

Evidence against Aurora shooting suspect to be revealed in court

At grounded Alaska oil rig, response crews remain on tense standby

After weeks of unspeakable tragedy, funerals and muted holiday celebrations, Thursday was about normalcy for Sandy Hook Elementary School students — at least as much as was possible.

About 500 students and their teachers were back in class for the first time since a gunman slaughtered 20 children and six adults at their Newtown, Conn., school three weeks ago.

They returned to a school that bore the Sandy Hook name but is located about seven miles away from the building where their classmates died. News reports said a large number of police greeted the students and teachers, while several officers guarded the school’s entrance, checking IDs of parents who came to drop off their children.

The building — until recently nearby Monroe’s shuttered Chalk Hill School — has been refurbished to help make the transition as smooth as possible. Many students were greeted by their old desks and classroom furniture.

Thursday was designed to be a “regular schedule” day, Newtown School District Superintendent Janet Robinson said.

“All of our desks are there,” 9-year-old Ben Paley told CNN.

Julian Ford, a clinical psychologist at the University of Connecticut who helped counsel families in the days immediately following the shooting, told the Los Angeles Times on Thursday that the feel of familiarity is important for the children.

“When they see the classroom, it is not going to take them right back to the terrible incidents that happened,” he said, “but to all the experiences in the prior part of the school year — most of which will be very reassuring and positive for them.”

There have been other reassurances as well. The father of a third-grader said his 8-year-old daughter received a stuffed animal during Wednesday’s open house at the new school, one she picked out herself.

“I’m not worried about her going back,” Vinny Alvarez told the Associated Press after the Wednesday event. “The fear kind of kicks back in a little bit, but we’re very excited for her and we got to see many, many kids today. The atmosphere was very cheerful.”

Backpacks and other items left behind the day of the shooting have been saved. A few days before Christmas — while on a visit to the Monroe school building — a young boy recovered the e-reader he left in his desk, Monroe First Selectman Steve Vavrek told the Los Angeles Times on Wednesday.

“He was just so happy to see he didn’t lose his possession,” Vavrek said. “He came in and saw it and it was like he never left.”

Donated “snowflakes,” crafted by people from around the world, greeted returning students.

And Robinson, the superintendent, said teachers were “creative” in putting together their new classrooms, many of which she said are physically quite different from the rooms students fled Dec. 14 as Adam Lanza shot his way into Sandy Hook Elementary, killing 26 there, including 20 children, before killing himself.

Despite the efforts to make the new school comfortable, signs of the tragedy were unavoidable. Counselors were on hand Thursday for staff, parents and students. Parents were allowed to stay in a lecture room for “as long as they wished” and to accompany their children to class to help them adjust. 

Although the police presence around the school has been increased, Monroe Police Lt. Keith White said Wednesday that officials don’t want “overburden” students.

“We want this to be a normal school where they can go and enjoy themselves and learn throughout the day,” White told reporters.

As the students return, the parents of Sandy Hook children are grappling with how to help their children adjust.

“There is no real playbook for this,” one mother, Denise Correia, told CNN. “We are kind of just kind sensing our child and trying to meet the needs that we can and just support them.”

ALSO:

More Oregon bus crash victims are identified

Evidence against Aurora shooting suspect to be revealed in court

At grounded Alaska oil rig, response crews remain on tense standby

http://www.latimes.com/news/nation/nationnow/la-na-nn-sandy-hook-students-return-to-school-20130103,0,2371438.story

http://www.washingtonpost.com/local/education/dc-parents-develop-alternatives-to-chancellors-school-closure-plan/2013/01/01/3e58f9e4-4b92-11e2-b709-667035ff9029_story.html

SACRAMENTO — Gov. Jerry Brown will push this year to upend the way schools are funded in California, hoping to shift more money to poorer districts and end requirements that billions of dollars be spent on particular programs.

Brown said he wants more of the state’s dollars to benefit low-income and non-English-speaking students, who typically are more expensive to educate.

“The reality is, in some places students don’t enjoy the same opportunities that people have in other places,” the governor said in an interview. “This is a way to balance some of life’s chances.”

He would also scale back — and possibly eliminate — dozens of rules that districts must abide by to receive billions in state dollars. Some of those requirements, such as a mandate to limit class size, have been suspended amid Sacramento’s recurrent budget problems but are set to resume by 2015.

Brown and his aides are keeping most details under wraps. But advisers say his proposals, part of the budget blueprint to be unveiled early this month, will amount to the most extensive changes in decades in the relationship between school districts and state government.

His intentions are already raising concerns among school administrators, district officials and labor unions. The governor postponed earlier plans to push for the changes when the discord threatened to distract from his campaign for higher taxes. Voters approved the tax hikes in November, averting billions of dollars in education cuts.

Now, the transformation of school funding is at the top of his agenda. He says his goal is more local control.

“What the state has done for 40 years is develop one new program after another to compensate for underperforming” schools, he said. “What we have now is command and control issuing from headquarters in Sacramento.”

Scores of programs set up by state mandate — for smaller classes, bilingual education and summer school, for example — have their own pots of money sent from Sacramento to pay for them. ¿The Public Policy Institute of California found that nearly 40% of every dollar sent to schools from both the state and federal governments is earmarked for such a purpose.

The programs vary in size and scope: $4.5 million to meet the needs of Native American students, $10 million to improve school Internet access, more than $618 million set aside for school buses, etc.

According to Brown’s Department of Finance, 56 such programs received a total of $11.8 billion in state funds last year. ¿The result, the governor says, is a bloated school bureaucracy that takes money away from core instruction.

“You have to have administrators at the state level, district level and at the school level who are engaged in making sure this money is used for what it’s supposed to be used for,” Brown said. “This constant articulation of rules is a world unto itself that is not directly supporting the teacher in the classroom.”

But many of the programs are popular with parents and various interest groups and have staunch defenders in the Capitol. They say lifting restrictions on how schools spend their money could hurt struggling students.

In recent years, state lawmakers have offered districts some flexibility to cope with rounds of budget cuts. The results, some say, have not always been good, leading to larger classes and sharp reductions in programs for adults trying to earn a high school degree.

Since 2008, the average class size in kindergarten through third grade has grown from 20 to 23, among the largest in the nation, according to a study from the Public Policy Institute of California. During the same period, the average class size elsewhere in the country remained at around 15 students.

In addition, “since schools have been given greater flexibility, adult education … has been decimated throughout the state,” said Jeff Freitas, secretary-treasurer of the California Federation of Teachers. “You can’t just give the locals carte blanche with the money.”

Shifting money to poorer schools at the expense of wealthier ones is also certain to stir protest.

Under a similar proposal the governor floated last year, the Department of Finance estimated that Compton Unified schools would see an uptick of more than $4,700 per pupil by the 2017-18 school year. Manhattan Beach Unified would get a per-student increase of just $681.

Those who have met with Brown’s top education aides expect the governor to propose a similar formula in January, asking districts to account for the expenditures to make sure the funds serve higher-needs students.

Adonai Smith, a lobbyist for the Assn. of California School Administrators, said his members would not support a plan that amounts to a “redistribution of resources.”

The governor says that even if funding is tweaked to favor more poor students and English learners, all schools will receive more money now that state revenue is on the uptick.

“I want to align more closely the money schools receive with the problems that teachers encounter,” Brown said. “When somebody’s teaching in Compton, it’s a much bigger challenge than teaching in Beverly Hills.”

anthony.york@latimes.com

http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-brown-education-20130102,0,2969868.story

The students and staff of Sandy Hook Elementary School will return to school on Thursday for the first time since the shooting rampage that left 20 young students and six adults dead. The students will be in a new building where their old classrooms have been completely recreated.

Instead of returning to the halls of Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Conn., they will be going to the building that used to be the Chalk Hill Middle School in Monroe, about six miles away.

Sandy Hook school was shut since Adam Lanza carried out his massacre shortly before Christmas.

Since principal Dawn Hochsprung was one of the victims of the shooting, the school will be led by interim principal Donna Page. Page was the school’s prior principal who retired in 2010.

“Please know the inspiration you and your children have been to my staff and me as we connect with you at Chalk Hill,” Page wrote in a letter posted on the school’s website. “Be assured that the towns of Monroe and Newtown are working night and day to ensure the facility is safe, secure, and fully operational for our return,” Page wrote.

The school will host a walk-through for families on Wednesday and “Opening Day” will be Thursday.

“I want to reassure you that we understand many parents may need to be near their children on their first day(s) of school and you will be welcome,” Page wrote.

The school is encouraging students to take the bus in order to help them return to familiar routines and said parents may come to the school’s classrooms or auditorium throughout the day after the 9:07 a.m. opening. They are asking that no more than one adult family member accompany each child in order “to ensure a safe and secure environment.”

In addition to a parental presence at the school, comfort dogs will be returning to brighten the day. Small armies of golden retrievers spread out all over Newtown in the days following the shooting to comfort mourners young and old.

Chicago’s Lutheran Church Charities’ K-9 Parish Comfort Dogs were in Newtown after the shooting and are traveling back to Connecticut today. Nine dogs and their handlers gathered at their building at 1 a.m. this morning to board a caravan of one RV and two vans heading to Connecticut.

“The community of Newtown will be going through the healing process for a very long time,” the group wrote on their website. “The LCC K-9 Comfort dogs will be returning to Newtown…They will be there to greet children as they return to school.”

The rest of the Newtown school district resumes classes on Wednesday.

Furniture and supplies from Sandy Hook were moved to Chalk Hill in order to recreate the classrooms just as they were.

Teachers photographed their classrooms at Sandy Hook in order to replicate everything about them, from the pictures on the walls to the crayons left on the students’ desks. This is all part of an effort to make the students feel as comfortable as possible.

Workers completely retrofitted the former middle school to fit the needs of its young students, including tearing out bathrooms that were made for teenagers and rebuilding them for elementary-aged kids.

New security systems are being installed at Chalk Hill school, and Newtown Councilman Steve Vavrek told ABC News that the school will be “the safest school in America.”

For a school that has gone through so much, moving forward does not mean forgetting.

“I want parents and families enduring the loss of their precious children to know their loved ones are foremost in our hearts and minds as we move forward,” Page wrote. “Your strength and compassion has been, and will continue to be an inspiration to me and countless others as we work to honor the memory of your precious children and our beloved staff.”

http://abcnews.go.com/US/sandy-hook-school-recreated-crayons-desk-building/story?id=18107267

http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/the-nras-faulty-school-security-proposal/2012/12/30/b5b73fc0-5054-11e2-950a-7863a013264b_story.html

http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/the-nras-faulty-school-security-proposal/2012/12/30/b5b73fc0-5054-11e2-950a-7863a013264b_story.html

A group of American pediatricians is telling school districts that children need recess and free time during the school day, and it should not even be taken away as punishment.

“We consider it essentially the child’s personal time and don’t feel it should be taken away for academic or punitive reasons,” said Dr. Robert Murray, who co-authored the new policy statement for the American Academy of Pediatrics.

The statement, published Monday in the journal Pediatrics, says recess is a “crucial and necessary component of a child’s development.”

Recess helps students develop communication skills, such as cooperation and sharing, and helps counteract the time they spend sitting in class, according to the statement.

“The cognitive literature indicates that children are exactly as we are as adults. Whenever they’re performing a complicated or complex task, they need time to process the information,” said Murray, a professor at Ohio State University in Columbus.

“Kids have to have that time scheduled. They’re not given the opportunity to just get up and walk around for a few minutes,” he added.

Previous research, according to the statement’s authors, found children pay closer attention and perform better mentally after recess.

Last January, a review of 14 studies found kids who get more exercise from – among other things – recess and playing on sports teams tend to do better in school.

But a 2011 survey of 1,800 elementary schools found about a third were not offering recess to their third grade classes.

Murray told Reuters Health that schools in Japan offer children about 10 minutes of free time after every 50 minutes of class, which he said makes sense.

“I think you can feel it if you go to a lecture that after 40 to 50 minutes of a concentrated activity you need to take a break,” he said.

Currently, the American Heart Association calls for at least 20 minutes of recess every day, but Murray said recess needs depend on the child.

“Most schools – on average – are working on the framework of 15 to 30 minute bursts of recess once or twice a day,” he said.

There is, however, consensus on when in the day children’s recess should take place.

The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the U.S. Department of Agriculture both recommend schools schedule recess before lunch.

Previous studies have found that children waste less food and behave better for the rest of the day when their recess is before their scheduled lunch, the pediatricians’ statement notes.

The statement also says schools should not substitute physical education classes for recess.

“Those are completely different things and they offer completely different outcomes,” said Murray. “(Physical education teachers are) trying to teach motor skills and the ability of those children to use those skills in a bunch of different scenarios. Recess is a child’s free time.”

The pediatricians also warn against a recess that is too structured, such as having games led by adults.

“I think it becomes structured to the point where you lose some of those developmental and social emotion benefits of free play,” said Murray.

“This is a very important and overlooked time of day for the child and we should not lose sight of the fact that it has very important benefits,” he added.

http://www.foxnews.com/health/2012/12/31/pediatricians-say-kids-need-recess-during-school/

A group of American pediatricians is telling school districts that children need recess and free time during the school day, and it should not even be taken away as punishment.

“We consider it essentially the child’s personal time and don’t feel it should be taken away for academic or punitive reasons,” said Dr. Robert Murray, who co-authored the new policy statement for the American Academy of Pediatrics.

The statement, published Monday in the journal Pediatrics, says recess is a “crucial and necessary component of a child’s development.”

Recess helps students develop communication skills, such as cooperation and sharing, and helps counteract the time they spend sitting in class, according to the statement.

“The cognitive literature indicates that children are exactly as we are as adults. Whenever they’re performing a complicated or complex task, they need time to process the information,” said Murray, a professor at Ohio State University in Columbus.

“Kids have to have that time scheduled. They’re not given the opportunity to just get up and walk around for a few minutes,” he added.

Previous research, according to the statement’s authors, found children pay closer attention and perform better mentally after recess.

Last January, a review of 14 studies found kids who get more exercise from – among other things – recess and playing on sports teams tend to do better in school.

But a 2011 survey of 1,800 elementary schools found about a third were not offering recess to their third grade classes.

Murray told Reuters Health that schools in Japan offer children about 10 minutes of free time after every 50 minutes of class, which he said makes sense.

“I think you can feel it if you go to a lecture that after 40 to 50 minutes of a concentrated activity you need to take a break,” he said.

Currently, the American Heart Association calls for at least 20 minutes of recess every day, but Murray said recess needs depend on the child.

“Most schools – on average – are working on the framework of 15 to 30 minute bursts of recess once or twice a day,” he said.

There is, however, consensus on when in the day children’s recess should take place.

The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the U.S. Department of Agriculture both recommend schools schedule recess before lunch.

Previous studies have found that children waste less food and behave better for the rest of the day when their recess is before their scheduled lunch, the pediatricians’ statement notes.

The statement also says schools should not substitute physical education classes for recess.

“Those are completely different things and they offer completely different outcomes,” said Murray. “(Physical education teachers are) trying to teach motor skills and the ability of those children to use those skills in a bunch of different scenarios. Recess is a child’s free time.”

The pediatricians also warn against a recess that is too structured, such as having games led by adults.

“I think it becomes structured to the point where you lose some of those developmental and social emotion benefits of free play,” said Murray.

“This is a very important and overlooked time of day for the child and we should not lose sight of the fact that it has very important benefits,” he added.

http://www.foxnews.com/health/2012/12/31/pediatricians-say-kids-need-recess-during-school/

A U.S. flag displaying the name of the 26 victims killed in a mass shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School stands at a makeshift memorial in Newtown, Conn., on Dec. 20, 2012

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AP Photo/Julio Cortez

(CBS/AP) HARTFORD, Conn. – The body of Adam Lanza, the 20-year-old gunman who killed 26 people at a Connecticut elementary school, has been claimed for burial, anonymously.

PICTURES: Conn. elementary school shooting
PICTURES:  Mass shootings in 2012

Connecticut Medical Examiner Wayne H. Carver II told the Hartford Courant that Lanza’s remains were claimed several days ago by someone who wanted to remain anonymous.

Lanza killed 20 first-graders and six educators at the Sandy Hook Elementary School on Dec. 14. He also killed his mother in their Newtown home before going on the rampage and then later committing suicide. Police have not offered a motive for the killings.

A private funeral was held earlier this month in New Hampshire for his mother, Nancy Lanza.

Complete coverage of the Sandy Hook Elementary School massacre

http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-504083_162-57561337-504083/connecticut-school-shooting-gunman-adam-lanzas-remains-claimed-for-burial/

A U.S. flag displaying the name of the 26 victims killed in a mass shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School stands at a makeshift memorial in Newtown, Conn., on Dec. 20, 2012

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AP Photo/Julio Cortez

(CBS/AP) HARTFORD, Conn. – The body of Adam Lanza, the 20-year-old gunman who killed 26 people at a Connecticut elementary school, has been claimed for burial, anonymously.

PICTURES: Conn. elementary school shooting
PICTURES:  Mass shootings in 2012

Connecticut Medical Examiner Wayne H. Carver II told the Hartford Courant that Lanza’s remains were claimed several days ago by someone who wanted to remain anonymous.

Lanza killed 20 first-graders and six educators at the Sandy Hook Elementary School on Dec. 14. He also killed his mother in their Newtown home before going on the rampage and then later committing suicide. Police have not offered a motive for the killings.

A private funeral was held earlier this month in New Hampshire for his mother, Nancy Lanza.

Complete coverage of the Sandy Hook Elementary School massacre

http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-504083_162-57561337-504083/connecticut-school-shooting-gunman-adam-lanzas-remains-claimed-for-burial/

A New Haven attorney is asking permission to sue the state for $100 million on behalf of a student who survived the mass shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Connecticut. 

The Hartford Courant reports that attorney Irving Pinsky filed notice Thursday with Claims Commissioner J. Paul Vance Jr. The state has immunity against most lawsuits unless permission to sue is granted.

On the morning of Dec. 14, Adam Lanza shot his mother, Nancy Lanza, four times in the head, authorities said.

He then drove to the elementary school in her car with four guns, including a shotgun that was left in the back of the vehicle, and shot up two classrooms killing 20 students and six adults around 9:30 a.m., police say. Police added that multiple 30-round magazines and hundreds of bullets were also found at the scene.

The rifle used was a Bushmaster .223-caliber, according to an official with knowledge of the investigation who was not authorized to speak about it and talked on condition of anonymity. The gun is commonly seen at competitions and was the type used in the 2002 sniper killings in the Washington, D.C., area. Also found in the school were two handguns, a Glock 10 mm and a Sig Sauer 9 mm.

Pinsky said the 6-year-old student, identified as “Jill Doe,” was in her classroom when “the horrific confrontation” with Lanza came over the loudspeaker. “She was in her classroom, and over the loudspeaker came the horrific confrontation between the fellow who shot everybody and other people,” Pinsky told the Hartford Courant. “Her friends were killed. That’s pretty traumatic.”

A custodian ran through the halls, warning of a gunman on the loose, and someone switched on the intercom, alerting people in the building to the attack — and perhaps saving many lives — by letting them hear the hysteria going on in the school office, a teacher said. Teachers locked their doors and ordered children to huddle in a corner or hide in closets as shots echoed through the building.

Pinsky said the student has been traumatized by the killings, and accused the state of failing to protect students from “foreseeable harm.” 

Connecticut Gov. Dannel Malloy said Lanza committed suicide when he heard first responders coming. A Connecticut official said Lanza killed himself with a single bullet to the head from the10 mm gun, and the bullet was recovered in a classroom wall.

Sandy Hook Elementary School has close to 700 students.

Newtown is in Fairfield County, about 45 miles southwest of Hartford and 60 miles northeast of New York City.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

http://www.foxnews.com/us/2012/12/29/connecticut-attorney-asks-to-sue-state-after-elementary-school-shooting/

A New Haven attorney is asking permission to sue the state for $100 million on behalf of a student who survived the mass shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Connecticut. 

The Hartford Courant reports that attorney Irving Pinsky filed notice Thursday with Claims Commissioner J. Paul Vance Jr. The state has immunity against most lawsuits unless permission to sue is granted.

On the morning of Dec. 14, Adam Lanza shot his mother, Nancy Lanza, four times in the head, authorities said.

He then drove to the elementary school in her car with four guns, including a shotgun that was left in the back of the vehicle, and shot up two classrooms killing 20 students and six adults around 9:30 a.m., police say. Police added that multiple 30-round magazines and hundreds of bullets were also found at the scene.

The rifle used was a Bushmaster .223-caliber, according to an official with knowledge of the investigation who was not authorized to speak about it and talked on condition of anonymity. The gun is commonly seen at competitions and was the type used in the 2002 sniper killings in the Washington, D.C., area. Also found in the school were two handguns, a Glock 10 mm and a Sig Sauer 9 mm.

Pinsky said the 6-year-old student, identified as “Jill Doe,” was in her classroom when “the horrific confrontation” with Lanza came over the loudspeaker. “She was in her classroom, and over the loudspeaker came the horrific confrontation between the fellow who shot everybody and other people,” Pinsky told the Hartford Courant. “Her friends were killed. That’s pretty traumatic.”

A custodian ran through the halls, warning of a gunman on the loose, and someone switched on the intercom, alerting people in the building to the attack — and perhaps saving many lives — by letting them hear the hysteria going on in the school office, a teacher said. Teachers locked their doors and ordered children to huddle in a corner or hide in closets as shots echoed through the building.

Pinsky said the student has been traumatized by the killings, and accused the state of failing to protect students from “foreseeable harm.” 

Connecticut Gov. Dannel Malloy said Lanza committed suicide when he heard first responders coming. A Connecticut official said Lanza killed himself with a single bullet to the head from the10 mm gun, and the bullet was recovered in a classroom wall.

Sandy Hook Elementary School has close to 700 students.

Newtown is in Fairfield County, about 45 miles southwest of Hartford and 60 miles northeast of New York City.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

http://www.foxnews.com/us/2012/12/29/connecticut-attorney-asks-to-sue-state-after-elementary-school-shooting/

http://www.washingtonpost.com/local/education/prince-georges-county-has-a-shortage-of-school-nurses/2012/12/29/76cc4ca6-43d4-11e2-8e70-e1993528222d_story.html