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nytimes.com — Shanghai and Beijing are becoming new lands of opportunity for recent American college graduates who face unemployment nearing double digits at home. Even those with limited or no knowledge of Chinese are heeding the call. They are lured by China’s surging economy, the lower cost of living and a chance to bypass some of the dues-paying that is common to first jobs in the United States. And the Chinese economy is more hospitable for both entrepreneurs and job seekers, with a gross domestic product that rose 7.9 percent in the most recent quarter compared with the period a year earlier. Unemployment in urban areas is 4.3 percent, according to government data.

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usatoday.com — States that want a piece of the Obama administration's $4.35 billion Race to the Top Fund for schools must hew to internationally benchmarked academic standards and let schools pay teachers and principals more if they work in hard-to-staff schools — or if student scores improve on basic skills tests. In detailed draft guidelines being released today in Washington, President Obama and Education Secretary Arne Duncan lay out their most forceful proposals on public schools. States won't be eligible for the money unless they get rid of legal barriers that prohibit tying teacher pay to test scores — a bid aimed directly at California. Duncan says the state has erected a legal "firewall" that keeps schools from paying educators more for improved performance.

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washingtonpost.com — A bill that cleared a House committee would largely remove private lenders from the federal student loan industry, generating an estimated $87 billion savings over 10 years to fund more government grants and loans. The Student Aid and Fiscal Responsibility Act of 2009 would eliminate an entire category of student loans issued by private lenders and subsidized by the federal government, vastly expanding direct lending by the government starting next July. Democrats would use the savings to fund a $40 billion increase in federal Pell Grant scholarships over 10 years, $10 billion in community college upgrades and $8 billion in pre-kindergarten changes, among other uses.

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msnbc.msn.com — Despite unprecedented efforts to improve minority achievement in the past decade, the gap between black and white students remains frustratingly wide, according to an Education Department report. There is good news in the report: Reading and math scores are improving for black students across the country. But because white students are also improving, the disparity between blacks and whites has lessened only slightly. On average, the gap narrowed by about 7 points from 1992 to 2007, so that black students scored about 28 points behind white students on a 500-point scale. The divide between minority and white students is considered one of the most pressing challenges in public education. Experts say it stems from entrenched factors that hinder learning. More black children live in poverty, which is linked to an array of problems.

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usatoday.com — President Obama is expected to announce a $12 billion proposal today that will put the nation's community colleges front and center in his economic recovery plan. Among his goals: to modernize community college facilities, to increase the quality of online courses and to ensure that more students complete their programs. Obama, who in February urged every American to obtain at least one year of training past high school, is scheduled to speak this afternoon at Macomb Community College in Warren, Mich., which has been hit hard by the collapse of the automobile industry. In Sunday's Washington Post, he offered a brief overview of his plan, which he said aims to "ultimately meet the goal of graduating 5 million more Americans from community colleges by 2020."

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nytimes.com — College life may look different in the not-so-distant future: Students squinting out dirtier windows, faculty offices with full wastebaskets and no phones, sporting events in which opponents never meet, and paper course catalogs existing only as artifacts of the wasteful old days. While colleges and universities slashed their spending this year with wrenching layoffs, hiring freezes and halts in construction projects, they whittled away at costs with smaller, quirkier economies, too.

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usatoday.com — School systems nationwide are trimming lunch menus, buying more food in bulk and delaying purchases of kitchen equipment to offset the costs of serving free or reduced-price lunches to millions of newly eligible students from cash-strapped families. Record enrollment in subsidized meal programs has school systems large and small stretching already paper-thin budgets to ensure that students are well-fed and ready to learn. No region seems immune.

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msnbc.msn.com — Across the nation, school staffers privy to teen problems say more students are having a hard time footing the costs of graduation. From Florida and Texas to Indiana and California, education officials are soliciting donations, recycling old gowns and, in some cases, ponying up the money themselves. Certainly, there always have been students who need assistance with graduation expenses, officials say. Many schools have long kept special funds for just such emergencies, small coffers that can make up the price of a prom ticket, a college test fee or other costs in special circumstances. But now, with unemployment rising nationwide and family incomes stretched farther than ever, some schools say the demand for those resources is rising.

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npr.org — The economic downturn has prompted many school districts to reduce funds for summer school. That's bad news for students who need remedial work and for those who are taking summer classes to advance a grade.

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— The new G.I. bill takes effect Aug. 1. The law, which could potentially more than double the amount covered in the current GI Bill, could open college doors to thousands of veterans, many of whom would not otherwise have considered college because of the expense. The law provides the equivalent of in-state tuition at the highest-priced public college in the state where the veteran lives, based on undergraduate tuition and fees. There is also a monthly housing allowance and a $1,000 stipend for books and supplies. Today's wars are being fought by a much smaller volunteer military than previous wars had. The Pentagon is working to keep the forces it has by issuing bonuses and other incentives.

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