Education briefs

Advertiser Staff

Board's committee looks at bus fares

The state Board of Education's Support Services Committee decided yesterday that it's time to reassess school bus fares.

Board spokesman Greg Knudsen said the committee will likely recommend a fare increase from 25 cents to 40 cents in a few weeks. Any increase in fares must go through public hearings.

"We've been losing money big-time on bus transportation," said Knudsen. "This has been in the works for over a year, and we have to think about the costs all around while still being sensitive to the burdens on families."

Knudsen said the committee has also discussed whether monthly passes should be issued.

Hawai'i is one of the few school districts nationally that require parents to help pay for busing. Student fares pay for part of the cost of busing students. The state pays another $2 per student daily.

Top teachers go to Space Camp

Hawai'i's Teacher of the Year, Derek Minakami, has joined the nation's other top teachers in a series of events at International Space Camp this week.

Through tomorrow, the U.S. Space and Rocket Center and NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Ala., are serving as hosts to the nation's outstanding teachers, providing them with a notion of what it's like to live and work in space. There are 51 U.S. teachers participating this year and 22 educators from other countries.

Minakami, a physics teacher at Kailua High School, was recently a finalist for the National Teaching Award.

While attending Space Camp, educators participate in simulations of shuttle and space station missions and attend workshops to learn innovative techniques for teaching students about the U.S. space program.

The teachers also attend lectures and labs organized by the University of Alabama in Huntsville, meet members of the local aerospace community and tour Marshall, the National Aeronautics and Space Administration's lead center for space transportation.