Fifth graders at Excel Academy, a Washington charter school, which was visited this month by Education Secretary Betsy DeVos and Melania Trump, the first lady.
Credit Al Drago/The New York Times
WASHINGTON — For more than a decade, House Republicans led by the former Speaker John A. Boehner have used school children in the nation’s capital as an experiment for school choice, funding a far-reaching voucher program to send poor children to private schools over the opposition of local teachers and unions.
Now, with Betsy DeVos, one of the country’s fiercest advocates of school choice, installed as education secretary, that experiment is poised to go national. But Ms. DeVos’s own department this week rendered judgment on the Washington school choice program: It has not improved student achievement, and it may have worsened it.
The examination of the D.C. Opportunity Scholarship Program, the only federally funded voucher […]
Credit: Diana Ofosu
Donald Trump’s surprise victory last November swept a climate science denier into the nation’s highest office. And he’s not alone: in this new Washington, there are 180 members of Congress who deny the science behind climate change and have received more than $82 million from fossil fuel industries, according to new analysis from the Center for American Progress Action Fund.
The majority of Republican members of Congress are still ignoring public opinion, but as members of Congress increasingly face resistance in their districts with constituents calling for climate action, some deniers are starting to shift their tone.
While 2016 became infamous for its electoral consequences in America, it also marked the third straight year that earned the title of hottest year on record globally. Last week, the earth reached record levels of carbon dioxide, and so far, […]
Michelle Obama in the White House Garden — a lasting tribute to the food movement.
Credit: Chip Somodevilla
Trump brags about eating fast food. Michelle Obama planted a vegetable garden at the White House. Now it seems the President is quietly trying to overtake the former First Lady’s vision for the future of food in America.
Michelle Obama had a strikingly successful record of fighting the obesity epidemic and improving nutrition — both symbolically and through advocacy for legislation. But many Obama-era efforts to push the food industry in a healthier direction are now under threat.
Over the last couple of weeks, a number of reports have surfaced suggesting that the food industry is trying to capitalize on Trump’s anti-regulation agenda and push back on reforms aimed at making our food supply healthier. The food lobbyists, emboldened by the current White House, are reportedly pushing back on recent healthy food and transparency mandates that would hurt their bottom line.
Some of the key battlegrounds — school lunches, […]
56% say Trump is performing about as they expected- Nearly one in four say he is doing worse than they expected
- More think he will improve than worsen on the job
WASHINGTON, D.C. — As President Donald Trump nears his 100th day in office, a slight majority of Americans (56%) say his performance in office so far has been about what they expected. The rest are closely split between saying he has done worse (23%) versus better (19%) than they expected.
Worse than expected
As expected
Other/No opinion
%
%
%
%
U.S. adults
19
23
56
3
Republicans
37
5
57
1
Independents
18
25
53
4
Democrats
4
38
57
1
Gallup, April 21-22, 2017
Majorities of Republicans, Democrats and independents say that Trump is meeting their expectations — although that is clearly not a positive statement from Democrats, most of whom disapprove of the job Trump is doing.
There is a strong relationship between Americans’ views of Trump’s overall job performance as president and whether he is meeting their expectations.
- Most of those who approve of […]
An Iowa nursing home threw away these unused aripiprazole pills, which are used to treat psychiatric conditions. The nonprofit SafeNetRx recovered them and will donate them to a needy patient.
Credit: Rachel Mummey/ProPublica
Every week in Des Moines, Iowa, the employees of a small nonprofit collect bins of unexpired prescription drugs tossed out by nursing homes after residents died, moved out or no longer needed them. The drugs are given to patients who couldn’t otherwise afford them.
But travel 1,000 miles east to Long Island, New York, and you’ll find nursing homes flushing similar leftover drugs down the toilet, alarming state environmental regulators worried they’ll further contaminate the water supply.
In Baltimore, Maryland, a massive incinerator burns up tons of the drugs each year — for a fee — from nursing homes across the Eastern seaboard.
If you want to know why the nation’s health care costs are among the highest in the world, a good place to start is with what we throw away. Across the country, nursing homes routinely toss large quantities of perfectly […]
Remote Viewing the Year 2060
