Rural schools struggle with high and lows more commonly associated with urban schools, including high rates of poverty, low literacy rates, and low college attendance rates, a new report finds.

"Reshaping rural schools in the Northwest Region: Lessons from federal School Improvement Grant implementation" was written by Caitlin Scott and Nora Ostler at the Regional Education Laboratory At Education Northwest, and prepared for the Institute of Education Sciences.

Principals who also teach are a long tradition in a rural Maryland school system, where teachers and school leaders alike attest to the benefits. But some education leadership experts argue the double duty wouldn't work in all schools.

"Raising Bertie," about three African-American boys in Bertie County, N.C., airs on the PBS documentary series "POV" Monday night.

The new 50-state report from the Rural School and Community Trust, emphasizes early childhood education and college-and-career readiness.

From age 17, Ana Maria prayed to serve God in Switzerland. While she waited, she became a dance instructor with no idea dance would become her ministry.

Chelsea, Hertha, Montpellier, Midtjylland, PAOK, Sigma, Dinamo Zagreb and Dynamo Kyiv are into the play-offs.

Tickets are on sale for April's finals in Nyon – your chance to see the stars of tomorrow.

To view more press releases, please visit http://ir.wintrust.com/news.aspx?iid=1024452.

To view more press releases, please visit http://ir.wintrust.com/news.aspx?iid=1024452.

Fin24 took to the streets of Cape Town and Johannesburg asking people to share their views on Finance Minister Pravin Gordhan's Budget Speech.

With SA bonds now rated as junk or non-investment grade, life for ordinary South Africans just got worse.

Fin24 presenter Moeshfieka Botha talks to Grant Brown, MD of online fashion retailer Zando, about the benefits of online shopping and why you should draw up a #BlackFriday wish list.

Fin24 presenter Moeshfieka Botha talks to Abdulazeez Davids of Kagiso Asset Management about how ratings downgrades affect ordinary South Africans.

By Bishop Arthur Serratelli

In The Innocents Abroad, published in1869, Mark Twain humorously narrates his travels thorough Europe and the Holy Land. He goes out of his way to praise the great hospitality that Catholic priests offered to any pilgrim traveling through 19th century Palestine. They readily welcomed all, whether they came “in rags or clad in purple.” Twain was pleasantly surprised by this, because, as he readily confesses, he had been “educated to enmity toward everything that is Catholic.” Enmity toward everything Catholic! Not a thing of the past.

Most recently, the hatred was aimed at one of the most charitable and benevolent group of individuals in this country, the Knights of Columbus. During the Senate Judiciary Committee’s review of Omaha-based lawyer Brian C. Buescher for the position of judge on the United States District Court for the District of Nebraska, Senators Mazie Hirono, a democrat from Hawaii, and Kamala Harris, a democrat from California, grilled Buescher on his membership in the Knights of Columbus. In their questions, they boldly gave voice to an anti-Catholic prejudice in our society.

Hirono accused the Knights of having “taken a number of extreme positions.” And, what are those extreme positions to which she is so vehemently opposed? The Catholic teaching on marriage as a union established by God. The sanctity of human life. The rights of a child in the womb to take his or her place at the banquet of life. For many, when it comes to birthing a child, only a woman has rights. And, when it comes to marriage, only what an individual wants matters. In their eyes, God’s design for his creation cannot limit the freedom of anyone to choose as they wish. 

Holding to what the Catholic Church has always taught, according to their line of questioning, now disqualifies someone from public office. In effect, both senators were applying a religious test as a qualification for public office. Responding to this blatant attack on a man’s religion, on January 17, 2018, the United States Senate unanimously passed the resolution that disqualifying a member of the Knights of Columbus for a federal office actually violates the Constitution of the United States. Article VI of the Constitution states that “no religious test shall ever be required as qualification to any office or public trust under the United States.”

Sadly, this recent attack on Catholicism is not an isolated incident. Last September, Senator Dianne Feinstein expressed serious concern about the qualifications of Amy Barrett for a judgeship on the 7th Circuit. Feinstein is an unflinching supporter of abortion. It was no surprise that she zeroed in on Barrett’s position on Roe v. Wade. Because Barrett is a practicing Catholic who faithfully holds to Catholic teaching on this and other hot button issues, Feinstein remarked “in your case, professor…the dogma lives loudly within you, and that’s of concern when you come to big issues that large numbers of people have fought for years in this country.” Clearly, the Senator sees no place for what the Catholic Church teaches on major moral and societal issues. 

It is becoming more and more obvious that the Catholic Church is being targeted as the public enemy of our society. Talk shows and news media attack the Catholic position on the right to life as misogyny and the Catholic teaching on marriage as intolerance and hatred. One can only wonder why those States that are investigating the Catholic Church on its record of protecting children are not looking into other public institutions. Why is there not a comparable investigation into their own school systems or other religious groups? Is the terrible crime of child abuse limited only to Catholics? Today’s media would even have people believe that abuse of minors is becoming more frequent within the Church. Patently false. But, too often facts do not matter when a villain is needed.

Those who advocate for the radical autonomy of the individual find in the Church an indomitable opponent. The Catholic Church stands firm in her teaching on contraception, abortion, stem cell research, in-vitro fertilization, marriage and divorce. The Church teaches that every choice that touches on the gift of life and the beauty of marriage is judged by a law higher than the autonomy of the individual. And, for this reason, today’s secularists judge Catholics as public enemies to the good of the society they wish to construct. A society without God. A society without a future.

Almost every day, a politician or teacher or public speaker is lambasted for a statement that is judged to be homophobic, misogynistic, racist or anti-Semitic. In some cases, not even an apology can save their careers. Yet, a free pass is given by society to any anti-Catholic view or statement. Someone can make an insulting or slanderous remark about Catholics, Catholic teachings or the Church herself and emerge unscathed. In his essay on The Significance of Jacksonian Democracy, historian and Harvard professor Arthur Schlesinger, Sr., himself not a Catholic, made the often cited assertion that anti-Catholic prejudice is “the deepest bias in the history of the American people.” According to Baylor University professor Philip Jenkins, anti-Catholic prejudice is “the last acceptable prejudice.”
 

A searing report and federal oversight over Title IX enforcement in Chicago raises the question: Is it an outlier, or just the first to get caught?

One young woman gets the chance to learn to read and write when OM opens a school for children and adults in rural Bangladesh.

One man's encounter with an OM team leads to his son’s discovery of his talent as a tailor and desire to know God.

One father in Bangladesh struggles to find believing husbands for his two daughters, after all three have come to faith in Jesus.

Winning a rickshaw in a race sponsored by the OM sports ministry team in Bangladesh changes Anwar's life and his family's life.

A Bangladeshi woman sees God answer prayer in an unlikely way. Her new faith teaches her to trust that God hears her.

Massive distribution efforts by OM teams in Bangladesh over more than 10 years sowed gospel seeds and made the Bengali New Testament a #1 best seller.

OM worker Andrew is encouraged to see the vibrancy of Jesus followers in Bangladeshi villages as one changed life impacts others.

The Indianapolis archbishop has ordered Catholic high schools in the city to dismiss teachers who are married to someone of the same sex, or sever ties with the archdiocese.

Americans overwhelmingly believe civics should be taught in school, and almost 70 percent of them think it should be a requirement to graduate, a new survey finds.

From age 17, Ana Maria prayed to serve God in Switzerland. While she waited, she became a dance instructor with no idea dance would become her ministry.

Ultimately, the payment of municipal utilities and taxes is the responsibility of the property owner, explains an attorney.

The portfolio comprises three properties in the capital Bucharest, and one in Timisoara, a city in the west of the country.

These places give new meaning to the term "golden years". And no fewer than four of the five top retirement villages listed in the 2019 Estate Ratings report by New World Wealth are in the Western Cape.

Super-rich visitors to Cape Town over the holiday season have once again been willing to dig deep into their pockets for luxury rental accommodation.

Opting for a boutique wine farm might be the way to go, according to Kevin Layden, the Seeff Property Group' agent for farms in the Stellenbosch and Boland areas.

House prices in SA could increase on average by 2.3% this year, but a more pessimistic scenario could see them decline by 1.3%, according to analytics company Lightstone.

The Leonardo opened its doors on Tuesday 3 March. Developers of the 234-metre tall building said the 240-suite hotel and residences were ready for occupation and some residents were already in the process of moving in.

There are a wide range and selection of Infrastructure-as-a-Service (IaaS) solutions that are a key component to IT strategies. We test the top five IaaS solutions to help find the best fit for your business.

We've done the testing, and if you need to build an SMB-focused website, these are the best small business web hosting services for helping you get the job done.

When you meet someone in a professional setting, a well-designed business card helps make a lasting good impression. Here are the best business card printing services for making polished cards, even on a budget.

The pharmaceutical retailer says it was forced to increase prices of surgical masks because of suppliers' inflated quotes and to match competitors, while the commission says retailers could have been following Dis-Chem's lead.

The economic meltdown has seen the world's leading central bankers including the South African Reserve Bank come under pressure to bail out their respective economies in the form of interest rate cuts. They've been urged to fund governments, an idea that central bank governor, Lesetja Kganyago, says is tantamount to a client instructing their banker to do the same.

From bicycle culture to electric vehicles, the automotive industry is changing and Covid-19 may be accelerating the pace of change.

Mining giant Anglo American plans to exit coal mining in South Africa, in a major shift away from carbon-intense operations.

Section 189 notices commencing a consultation process over proposed retrenchments at SAA were procedurally unfair, the Labour Court found on Friday.

If you have lost your income due to the lockdown, your options are limited.

Microsoft hopes to improve its software through AI research while OpenAI can take full advantage of the Azure cloud.

Artificial intelligence consumes immense processing resources, so data centers have to be both more powerful and more energy efficient.

Only a few vendors are the best for routing your internet signals and storing your files at the office. Here are PCMag readers' top picks.

Microsoft realizes you can use the sea as a giant heatsink and save a small fortune in cooling costs.

The high-end discrete graphics cards will reportedly target the PC gaming market and data centers, putting pressure on AMD and Nvidia. Intel hired a former AMD exec to lead the effort.

The Heritage Foundation says current federal programs supporting things like after-school centers don't work and their funding should be redirected for education savings accounts.

A research-practice partnership examines how urban after-school programs can support positive youth development.