REACH (Rewarding Achievement program), a philanthropic group, is giving cash to students for doing well on AP tests. For a 5 score (which is the highest), students get $1,000; for each 4 score, they get $750 and $500 for each 3. and over 1,000 students from select high schools (ones with high percentages of black and Hispanic students as well as AP class takers) participated, with about $1 million handed out. The Post notes this......

More on that student prank gone horribly wrong: The Daily News has it that seniors at the Brooklyn School for Global Studies who served their teachers cake laced with laxatives got the idea from watching MTV’s prank-reenactment show High School Stories. Two teachers ended up in the emergency room last week after eating the tainted cake, which was prepared by a straight-A student and her two friends, and ultimately sickened a grand total of two......

Teachers at the Brooklyn School for Global Studies in Boerum Hill were on the receiving end of a student prank that resulted in arrests and hospitalizations last week. When three seniors at the high school offered their teachers some slices of homemade cake, nobody suspected the students, which included a straight-A student, of filling the baked goods with laxatives as a zany end-of-the-year gag. Teacher Danilo Dungca took a bite, and tells the Daily News......

The total annual cost (including room and board) of NYU has gone up 65% in the past decade and next year it will reach an all-time high of $50,182 – a 5.9% increase from last year. The Washington Square News notes that the university is cash poor, drawing 60 percent of its resources from tuition. In an attempt to soften the blow, NYU plans to increase need-based aid to "more than $150 million" total. This......

In upholding the city's controversial ban on cell phones in public school, a Manhattan appeals court suggested adults are partially to blame. The opinion included, "If adults cannot be fully trusted to practice proper cell phone etiquette, then neither can children." The city has been fighting with parents and students for about four years about the right to bear a cell phone. Parents says cell phones are critical for keeping in touch with kids (especially......

Photo via Ricky Van Veen Looks like store owners have started keeping tabs on how many pesky students are in their shop at one time. At the very least they're using scare tactics with printed out signs to let the lil' rascals know to keep it to a minimum. Sorry number 5, you're out in the cold. The question is: does this include NYU students, or just high school punks?......

The fight over the right for school children to bear cell phones in schools moved to the Appellate Court, where lawyers for NYC and public school students' parents appeared before a five-judge panel. This comes after the City Council passed a bill allowing cell phones in schools, which the Mayor vetoed. Many parents believe cell phones are critical for keeping in touch with their children, in case of an emergency or just to check in......

The Columbia University students' hunger strike to protest Columbia's non-inclusive attitudes about redevelopment and curriculum continues with one less striker. Just after midnight on Sunday, a post went on up on the Columbia Hunger Strike website saying, "This evening, one hunger striker was admitted to St. Luke's hospital. She will not continue the strike for personal medical reasons." The student, Aretha Choi, who attends Barnard, later wrote:...my disappointment increases as I remember the bitter......