STOCK INCREASES FOR VALUES EDUCATION
(March 1, 2001) The Chicago Tribune reported the “Character Counts” values-education program has caught the attention of the Bush White House. In the Chicago area alone, 126 schools have signed on to use the program, 60 in the last year. If Congress signs on to President Bush’s pledge to triple federal funding for values education, it could mean $25 million in grants for character education next year.

KINDERGARTEN COMES TOO SOON FOR BOYS?
(March 2, 2001) Dr. Leonard Sax, a Maryland family physician and psychologist published a report in the March issue of Psychology of Men and Masculinity that claims the kindergarten curriculum “has had the effect of emphasizing boys’ weaknesses and girls’ strengths.” Sax says “the average 5-year-old boy is performing at a level of verbal skill that is, on average, at least one year behind the average 5-year-old girl.” He considers the “high rates of Ritalin prescriptions for young boys and the fact nearly twice as many boys as girls are kept behind a year at some point in their education are evidence the system is not working for boys.”

STUDY CONCLUDES PETS INCREASE ASTHMA CASES
(March 6, 2001) The Arizona Republic, at reported a study showing that “asthma cases could drop nearly 40% among Americans younger than age 6 if susceptible children didn’t have pets or other allergy triggers in their homes. The study, conducted by Dr. Bruce Lanphear, associate professor of pediatrics at Children’s Hospital Medical Center in Cincinnati, appears in the March issue of Pediatrics. Based on an analysis of data on 8,257 children younger than 6, it found “children with pet allergies were 24 times more likely to have asthma than those without.”

STATE LIMITS RESTRAINTS IN CLASS
March 6, 2001) The Ottaway News reported the Massachusetts Board of Education new regulations now prohibit schools from using restraints on students for disciplinary reasons. Allowing restraints to be used only when students pose “imminent physical harm” to themselves or others, the new state regulations are still faulted by many for not banning prone, floor restraints.

RESEARCHERS FIND NO LINK BETWEEN VACCINE, AUTISM
(March 7, 2001) The San Jose Mercury News reported a study conducted by the California Department of Health Services that was published March 7 in the Journal of the American Medical Association. The study compared the number of autism cases in California with immunization records of kindergartners in the state from 1980 to 1994. “While cases of autism have risen sharply in the past two decades, the rates at which children received the measles, mumps and rubella (MMR) immunization have stayed the same or risen only slightly since the, leading researchers to conclude that there is no correlation between the vaccine and autism.”

STUDENTS MUST BE SCHOOL CITIZENS
(March 7, 2001) The Associated Press article run in the Arizona Republic quotes Jerome Freibert of the University of Houston saying “schools with student bodies of 2,000 or more increasingly turn out tourist students. Think of Paris. People come and go and don’t leave anything of themselves – they simply pass through. Students must be citizens in their schools rather than tourists.” He recommends creating programs that engage everyone in the school life, with “small unit organizations within the school, two years with the same teachers and time set aside to talk to adults - the role models.”

WASHINGTON POST SURVEY OF ADHD
(March 18, 2001) The Sunday Post Magazine at Washingtonpost.com published a survey of varying opinions about the diagnosis and medication protocol for ADHD, quoting for example, Peter Breggin, “the profession’s prickly conscience.” He is medical consultant in three separate class action lawsuits filed last September on behalf of children medicated with Ritalin, which accuse Novartis Pharmaceutical Corp, the American Psychiatric Association, and CHADD, an advocacy group for people with ADHD, of conspiring to poison America’s children. The article contrasts “two of the untestable hypotheses of psychology,” attributing ADHD either to flaws in the wiring of brain circuits” or to an “evolutionary mismatch in which alternate state of readiness represent a holdover from prehistoric times when extremely alert, impulsive people presumably had advantages in the struggle to survive.” The current theory is that “ADHD may derive from abnormal neural circuits linking the frontal lobes, the deep brain structures called the basal ganglia, and the cerebellum.”

BULLYING AN INTERNATIONAL CONCERN
(April 30, 2001) The School Daily, a New Zealand online site, reports studies that 60% of the students in New Zealand report being bullied. The comparable figures for Great Britain and the US suggest about one-third of the students report being bullied, and that “Australia has had at least one class action taken out against schools on behalf of pupils who have been bullied.”

MU PROFESSOR TO PROVIDE MENTAL HEALTH TRAINING FOR TEACHERS
(June 7, 2001) University of Missouri-Columbia professor, James Koller, is creating The Center for the Advancement of Mental Health Practices in the Schools. Its goal is to “ensure that teachers, school administrators, school psychologists and other school personnel are knowledgeable about mental health promotion, know how to identify and intervene in mental health problems, and understand how to work with the public mental health system in serving all children.” The center will offer a master’s degree program and help with undergraduate academic training, emphasizing, mental health awareness and prevention.

WISCONSIN NATL. GUARD CHALLENGE ACADEMY OFFERS 17 MONTH PROGRAM
(June 20, 2001) The National Guard’s Youth Challenge Program in Fort McCoy, Wisconsin, 608-269-4605 is designed to provide early intervention for at-risk youth. The 17- month program is divided into two phases. The 5-month residential phase of “high impact, quasi-military environment conducted at Fort McCoy,” is followed by a 12-month post-residential phase that provides a carefully selected, trained mentor who requires weekly contact and monthly reports. In the later phase, the cadet earns a stipend and must either be enrolled in an educational program and employed part time, or be employed fulltime in military service.

SHARPE FARMS WORKERS ARRESTED
(June 29, 2001) Yahoo! News, reported five workers at Sharpe Farms and Heartland Community Center near Monticello, Missouri, were “arrested Thursday on child abuse charges and released on bail.” The cause was “forcing children to stand in a manure pit as punishment.” The religious center “works with about 200 children and teen-agers from around the country who are sent there by their parents.” Woodbury Reports has never heard of Sharpe Farms, nor is it included in our extensive Local Resources listing. Also, the program apparently has never been interested in having skeptical independent educational consultants review their program which is what happens when a program contacts us.

ANOTHER BOOT CAMP DEATH
(July 3, 2001) The Arizona Republic, reported the death of a 14 year old outside Buckeye, Arizona in a program called America’s Buffalo Soldiers boot camp. The Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio shut down the camp and is launching investigations into what he called “horrific” allegations, including having to eat dirt. Boot camps for troubled youth are based on a harsh, para-military environment of punishment and drill sergeants. This is the latest in a series of boot camp deaths that started in the early 90s with a death at a Wilderness Challenger program in southern Utah that advertised itself as “Boot Camp for Troubled Teens.” It was followed by two additional deaths in spin off programs, and has continued with several deaths in publicly and privately owned programs since then.