Tuesday Tidbits - Oct. 9, 2007

Here's today's Tuesday Tidbits in K-12 education with a decidedly tech theme:

• The Los Angeles Unified School District has launched a new campaign to lower dropout rates by using the Internet -- particularly sites like YouTube and MySpace. According to the state of California, one in four of the district's 200,000 high school students dropped out of school in 2006.
  
• In a related note, the Toppenish School District has also launched an online school program, also aimed at dropouts. According to the article in this morning's Yakima Herald-Republic, the program will offer a free online curriculum aligned to state standards and will include home visits and tutoring from state-certified teachers.
  
• Let's just keep the online theme going: Walla Walla Public Schools' online grade program is giving families one more way to connect with schools. The online service allows parents to log in and view middle and high school grades, including information about how students performed on specific assignments. Today's Union-Bulletin praises the tool in an editorial.