Education

“There Is Always More We Can Learn”: Jefferson County Memorial Project Finds More Lynching Victims, Documents Systematic Racial Oppression

The Jefferson County Memorial Project on Tuesday released “Jefferson County’s Broken Systems,” its second report about lynchings that took place in Jefferson County between 1883 and 1940. The report provides more details about the history of Jefferson County’s 30 documented lynching victims who are memorialized at the Equal Justice Initiative’s National Memorial for Peace and Justice, discovered four more lynching victims and examined what systems allowed racial terror to continue. “There is a larger system of terror that institutions from government to law enforcement to business were complicit in. What this report tries to do is to draw out that larger picture of how an entire community is implicated in this system of racial terror,” said Abigail Schneider, JCMP director. Read more. Read More About the JCMP

Jefferson County Memorial Project Efforts Continue Into the Next Decade

Morgan County Tax Dispute Will Have Statewide Impact

MONTGOMERY — The Morgan County Commission and the county’s school districts went head-to-head in a Montgomery County Circuit Court hearing on Tuesday in their fight over who should receive online sales taxes, and now they must await a decision from the judge. As they wait, the stakes continue to rise in their tussle over whether a local law was effective in prying money from the County Commission’s general fund and distributing the bulk of it to the three public school systems in the county. The crux of the legal dispute is whether the local law, sponsored by state Sen. Arthur Orr, R-Decatur, conflicts with the statewide Simplified Sellers Use Tax law. Read more.

Shelby County Public Meeting on Lay Lake Toll Bridge Set for Today

The Shelby County Commission has set a public involvement meeting about a proposed private toll bridge over Lay Lake on the Coosa River for Tuesday, Feb. 18, from 5 p.m. to 8 p.m. at the Shelby County Arts Center Grande Hall. If built, the bridge would be 1,600 feet long and connect Shelby and Talladega counties at Perkins Landing at Shelby County 28. Read more.

Poll: Alabamians Want Lottery, Many Undecided on Board of Education Amendment

New polling shows that Alabamians overwhelmingly want a statewide lottery and a significant percentage are undecided on how to vote on the March 3 constitutional amendment to reorganize the state board of education. Read more.

Longer Summer Break Proposal Draws Opposition

MONTGOMERY — An Alabama lawmaker says public schools should extend their summer breaks through Labor Day to help workforce development. Rep. Steve Hurst, R-Munford, said he’ll sponsor legislation to require that school summer breaks run at least from Memorial Day to Labor Day. If Hurst’s proposal were in effect this year, students would have a 15-week break. He said the current summer breaks don’t give older students enough time to get summer jobs and work experience. While some business leaders support the move, other school leaders oppose it, saying it takes local control away from school systems and could cause hardship for students and families. Read more.

Business Education Alliance: High-Level Skills and Education Needed to Meet Workforce Needs

Alabama faces a shortage of 200,000 highly skilled workers to fulfill industry job predictions by 2025 unless it aligns workforce development programs and collaborations between business and education with what employers will need, said the Business Education Alliance in a report released today. As Alabama shifts away from an industrial-based to knowledge-based economy, the BEA report stated, 60% of the working population will need to attain college-level degrees or credentials to qualify for jobs in 2025. Data for 2017 showed that 43% of the Alabama workforce possessed a college degree or other post-secondary education. Read more.

Small Fraction of Students Qualify for Birmingham Promise University Scholarships

For urban students interested in college, tuition can be a major barrier. So when it was announced recently that the Birmingham Promise would offer a full tuition scholarship to the University of Alabama at Birmingham, many praised the partnership as a way to give eligible Birmingham graduates a much-needed financial boost. But there’s just one problem: most students aren’t eligible to apply for the scholarship. Read more.

Birmingham and UAB Partner to Offer Free Tuition to City Graduates

The University of Alabama at Birmingham will offer full tuition scholarships to some graduates of Birmingham City Schools as part of a new partnership with the City of Birmingham. The city and UAB announced the scholarship program Thursday morning at a press conference. “It makes a down payment on our city’s economic competitiveness,” Mayor Randall Woodfin says. The Birmingham Promise Scholarship is part of a city initiative that plans to offer graduates of Birmingham schools full tuition to all in-state public universities and colleges. UAB is the first academic partner to support the Birmingham Promise with a scholarship. UAB estimates it’ll contribute $250,000 the first year, according to a spokesperson for the city. The Birmingham Promise Incorporated does not yet have an estimate on how much it’ll contribute. Read more.

Education Town Hall Set for Jan. 15

A town hall meeting on the status of education in Birmingham has been set for Jan. 15, 6-8 p.m. State Reps. Mary Moore and John Rogers, both D-Birmingham, set the town hall, called "Where Do We Go From Here." Moore said a number of local and state Board of Education members as well as local and state elected officials have been invited to speak.

Court Says Gardendale Must Pay Opponents’ Legal Fees in Failed School System Breakaway

The NAACP Legal Defense Fund got an early Christmas present this week, at the expense of the city of Gardendale. In what may be the last act in the six-year-long saga of the city’s abortive attempt to break away from the Jefferson County Schools, U.S. District Judge Madeline Hughes Haikala ruled on Monday that Gardendale must reimburse the LDF and attorney U.W. Clemon for costs and legal fees incurred in their effort to stop the breakaway. That effort was victorious for Clemon and his team when the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that Gardendale could not split from JefCoEd because the proposed split was motivated by racial animosity. Haikala ruled that Gardendale must pay almost $850,000 in fees and expenses because their effort was in bad faith, and that awarding those fees to the LDF and Clemon “…hopefully will prompt more respectful arguments in the future.” Read more.