NJ Education Report

The Wall St. Journal reports that students at Ardsley High School in Westchester, NY, and also Norther Valley Regional School District in Bergen County, are experimenting with new iPad software aligned with the Common Core State Standards.  From the article:

Companies such as Pearson, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt HMHC +1.10% and Amplify, the education subsidiary of News Corp., which owns The Wall Street Journal, are expanding efforts to create Common Core-aligned curricula for tablets as districts fully implement the new standards and as many schools experiment more with the gadgets.

Ardsley’s technology push comes as several other suburban districts in the region have ramped up their spending on tablets, including the Northern Valley Regional High School District in Bergen County, N.J., Mamaroneck Union Free School District in Westchester and East Hartford Public Schools in Connecticut.

Followers of Education Commissioner Chris Cerf’s resignation last week (see my related columns in NJ Spotlight and WHYY’s Newsworks) will notice the reference to the education technology company, nee Wireless Generation and now Amplify. Cerf is leaving the NJ DOE to head a division of Amplify called Amplify Insight. His boss will be Joel Klein. Rupert Murdoch’s News Corp. controls both the Wall St. Journal and Amplify.