Guest Blogger

The following post was written by Guest Blogger Mazy Yap, a student at Boston University.

As I went online to cruise through my high school website reminiscing my youth, I discovered that each of the past graduating classes had a graduating rate of 99%. This means that in the past 10 years, only 10 of the approximately 1,000 total graduates have dropped out. Growing up in an international school environment that maintains such a low dropout rate, I was surprised by the relatively low graduation rate in Massachusetts last year. The 2009 report released by the Massachusetts Department of Elementary and Secondary Education indicates that only 81.5% of the 77,038 enrolled students in Massachusetts graduated last year. If my math didn't fail me, this means that roughly 14,252 students dropped out from school in 2009.  read more »

The following is a guest post by Lisa Palin, an attorney at Mintz, Levin, Cohn, Ferris, Glovsky, and Popeo, P.C. On September 15, Lisa participated in a United Way Poverty Simulation. The United Way Poverty Simulation aims to provide participants with a closer view into in the life of a family living at or near the poverty level in Massachusetts. Each participant takes on the role of a family member and are assigned tasks to accomplish to sustain their families – work, grocery shop, go to school, sign up for needed services, etc.

The experience is simulated, but participants get a sense of the real-life constraints, such as transportation, work and time, that many families face in trying to attain financial stability. In her guest post, Lisa walks us through her "role" in the simulation and what was going through her mind during and after the experience.  read more »

When toddlers leave toddlerhood, and continue to change in size and shape, it is at this time we begin to bid good bye to those beautiful chubby legs, and say hello to the taller independent child!

In our practicing of graduating Early Childhood Professionals we know that kindergarten teachers are grateful when young children are “aces” with self help skills, i.e. the ability to serve their own snack, pour their own juice, find and zipper their own jacket, successfully go to the bathroom, and are at an emotional level where they are past experiencing separation anxiety.  read more »

The following is the second in a series of guest blogger posts by Robin Carmody and Yana Lapaix of the Early Childhood Education Department at Bay State College. Robin is the program chair of the department and Juliane (Yana) Lapaix teaches several courses on the education and development of young children. Their series will focus on advice for parents and professionals working with young children  read more »

The following is a post from SpeakUnited's very first guest blogger. Katie is a 7th grader at Wellesley Middle School. She was introduced to Homelessness issues by her mother who helped to implement a program in London for homeless teens called Business Action on Homelessness. Katie also recently researched homelessness for a school assignment and interviewed United Way housing expert Liz Curtis. Click the headline to see her post.  read more »