Author - The Durango Herald

Rankin: Our schools are moving in the right direction

School is underway, and a highlight of the August State Board of Education meeting was to review students’ achievement measures from last year and to assess how teachers might proceed to mov...

DATE: Sep 14, 2018 | CATEGORY: Joyce Rankin

Rankin: What’s a teacher to do?

When I went off to college to learn to be a teacher, the responsibility of an elementary school teacher was mostly teaching “reading, ’riting, and ’rithmetic,” the three R’s. Soc...

DATE: Aug 18, 2018 | CATEGORY: Joyce Rankin

Education legislation up for 2018

The legislative session ended May 9, and I have since reread some of the legislation that passed and failed during the 2018 Legislative session. There were 71 education bills of ...

DATE: Jul 14, 2018 | CATEGORY: Joyce Rankin

Rankin: Colorado’s charter schools outperformed all public schools nationally

Have you wondered how students, in Colorado, compare academically to students in other states? There is a nationally recognized test given every other year to fourth and eighth graders that ...

DATE: May 10, 2018 | CATEGORY: Joyce Rankin

Rankin: Civics, being a good citizen, should be the foundation of our education system

Thoms Jefferson said, “An informed citizenry is the heart of a dynamic democracy.” Civics is the study of the rights and duties of citizenship. The United States Citizenship Civi...

DATE: Apr 24, 2018 | CATEGORY: Joyce Rankin

Rankin: Testing is just around the corner

Do you remember the Iowa Test of Basic Skills? Yikes, was it that long ago? ITBS, developed in 1935 by the University of Iowa, was administered as a tool for improving K-8th-grade education....

DATE: Mar 27, 2018 | CATEGORY: Joyce Rankin

Rankin: Teacher to class: “Can you hear me now?”

“It’s just common sense.” How many times have you heard this phrase and thought “If only more people would just use common sense”? I was thinking that during a conversation with Dan Snowberg...

DATE: Jan 16, 2018 | CATEGORY: Joyce Rankin

Rankin: Preparing Colorado’s students for an unforeseen future

I attended the Summit on Education Reform in Nashville, Tennessee. Jeb Bush opened the conference and repeated a quote from the first conference in 2008: “The country’s school system is an 8...

DATE: Dec 21, 2017 | CATEGORY: Joyce Rankin

Rankin: Watching local elections, observing online schools and superintendents’ meeting

Congratulations to all candidates who ran for their local school boards and to those winning their elections earlier this month. Now the hard work begins. Since my last column, I’...

DATE: Nov 30, 2017 | CATEGORY: Joyce Rankin

Rankin: Schools turning challenge into opportunity

Teacher shortage, continuing education, parent participation, technology and students unqualified to satisfy workforce needs. These are just some of the challenges our public sch...

DATE: Oct 21, 2017 | CATEGORY: Joyce Rankin

Rankin: High stakes testing

During the August board meeting of the State Board of Education, the Colorado Department of Education released the Scholastic Aptitude Scores (SAT) for 2016-17. The SAT is a stan...

DATE: Sep 16, 2017 | CATEGORY: Joyce Rankin

Rankin: What is Colorado doing for its high-achieving students?

Have you ever asked a question and been given the answer, “It’s complicated?” Me, too. It’s a frequently used phrase around the Colorado Department of Education. ...

DATE: Aug 12, 2017 | CATEGORY: Joyce Rankin