Pomona Student Arrested on Drug Charges

A fellow student and I saw this go down on Friday around 3 p.m. The Claremont Police were there in full force.

Courtesy of The Inland Valley Daily Bulletin.

CLAREMONT - Police arrested a 19-year-old student at Pomona College last week on suspicion of possession of marijuana for sale.

Vinay Shah, 19, was arrested after school officials called police about marijuana found inside a student's dorm room in the 200 block of East Bonita Avenue, said police Lt. Paul Davenport.

Police were called about 3 p.m. Friday and searched the dorm room after they served a search warrant for marijuana, Davenport said.

Davenport said he did not know the amount of marijuana found.

Shah, of Weston, Mass., was booked at the Claremont police station before he was released on bail Friday, Davenport said.

Exit questions: Does this mean a greater crack down on the school? How did the police find out?

Harvey Mudd's Klawe Misses Mark on Math Money

Today's issue of San Jose's The Mercury News ran an op-ed by Harvey Mudd President Maria Klawe.

After decrying the poor state of mathematics education in America and reminding us of the post -Sputnik generation, Klawe writes in favor of Math for America, an expanding program in the New York and soon the Los Angeles public schools. Math for America Los Angeles will be operated by Harvey Mudd College, Claremont Graduate University and the University of Southern California. No word yet on when it will begin.

Math for America focuses on recruiting, training and rewarding teachers who specialize in teaching mathematics. Currently in New York, 100 MfA fellows and master teachers teach in 60 public schools, and by 2011, MfA will support at least 440 teachers. The program offers a stipend to fellows that supplements their salary and ensures they earn amounts comparable to other professionals with similar levels of education and training.

On the one hand, I rather like the idea of giving merit money to competent teachers. (My mother is a teacher and I sure appreciate trickle down economics.) I've always wondered why it is that we give combat pay to soldiers and not to some of the teachers working in the inner-city.

Still I question how that money is going to be spent and how it will affect teacher retention in the inner city. The stipend, according to Math for America's website, is only $90,000 for five years. Afterwards, the teachers presumably go back to getting paid the same as their peers.

After all, as Klawe probably knows, the per student expenditure in American public school education is among the highest.

What's more, this program may be poorly targeted. Public school teachers in the inner-city don't quit because of the pay. In fact, most inner city public school teachers make much more
than their suburban counterparts due in no small part to the power of the inner-city teachers' unions.

Teachers quit for all sorts of reasons: lack of gifted and talented programs for high achieving students and teachers, lack of administration and parents support, and lack of protection from gang activities. Teachers are often the victim of crimes, something no amount of money will help. In a phrase, teachers are simply burned out. No amount of money is going to change that. If anything, it may only create dependency.

I share Klawe's dream of another post-Sputnik generation, but we've first got to get our head out of the clouds.