Education

Untenable, harmful, devastating; three adjectives Nampa Education Association president Mandy Simpson uses in response to the school district's contract offer. That offer includes 14 furlough days.

Nampa teachers’ union representatives sat down this morning to negotiate with a district hired attorney. They were expecting to talk about furlough days and other ways to climb out of the district's budget hole.  The district took the offensive with a contract offer that includes 14 furlough days in the 2013 /2014 school year. The offer does not allow raises that would have come from increased experience.

Friday morning at 7:00 representatives from Nampa’s teachers’ union and the school district will sit down to negotiate next year’s labor agreement. These negotiations may be the last chance the district has to overcome a budget crisis that has dogged it all year.  

The Oregon teenager accused of plotting an attack on his high school has obsessive-compulsive disorder brought on in a rare way: a strep infection. That's according to his mother.

PANDAS, has nothing to do with the bear. It's a condition that's triggered by strep infections in children. Researchers aren't sure why the infections could cause the extreme obsessive-compulsive behaviors. The symptoms can last for weeks, then disappear and come back months later without warning. The medical community isn't entirely in agreement over whether PANDAS is a distinct condition.

What had been a sweeping lawsuit against Idaho over the constitutionality of its support for public schools is now much smaller.

A judge has ruled that retired educator Russell Joki and a group of parents cannot sue every school district in the state over charging fees for things like science classes or school registration.

District judge Richard Greenwood says Joki can only sue the Meridian School District where he paid his grandchildren's fees.  Joki says charging fees for classes violates Idaho’s constitutional requirement for free and uniform education.

Each May the U.S. Department of Agriculture gives grants to elementary schools to provide healthy snacks. This year 113 Idaho schools received the awards. The program teaches kids at low income schools about nutrition and introduces them to unfamiliar foods.

Most Idaho schools are days away from summer vacation. Boise, Meridian and Kuna school districts will end the year this Friday.

May 31st is the most common last day this year. Nampa students finish a day earlier and Caldwell schools are already finished. 

Other districts like Blaine County and McCall-Donnelly continue classes through the first week of June. Twin Falls will go home halfway through next week.