STOLEN VOUCHER FUNDS: Maya Dennard, director of a private school in Pinellas, is arrested for taking more than $250,000 in voucher money intended for poor and disabled students.

TACKLING LOW GRAD RATES: Pinellas superintendent Clayton Wilcox instructs his administration to figure out why Hillsborough's high school graduation rate is so much higher than Pinellas' and then to do something about it - ASAP.

HELP FOR DISABLED STUDENTS: Tampa Transitional School of Excellence, a new charter school in downtown Tampa, places older students with disabilities into the work force, getting them skills and the confidence to use them in the "real world."

A MATTER OF GOVERNANCE: Twenty Florida school districts plan to appeal the State Board of Education's denial of their request for exclusive authority over charter schools. District lawyers are gathering in Tampa today to discuss strategy. "This is not really as much about charter schools as what does it mean
when the state Constitution says an elected school board shall run the
local schools," says Ron Meyer, lawyer for the Florida School Boards Association.

MORE CONTROL: The State Board of Governors requires all 11 public universities to create a plan of short-term, measurable goals. These compacts are to let the Board better oversee the system it's charged with running.

NICE TRY: The Pasco school district should give teachers better pay, not offer them affordable housing because they can't afford the market prices on their current salaries, columnist Andrew Skerritt writes.

MORE ON DIPLOMA MILLS: A Palm Beach County police officer faces trouble over claims of three degrees received on the same day from a school called Hamilton University, the Palm Beach Post reports.

21ST CENTURY MODEL: The new Boca Ciega High gets touted as a model for the future at the Florida School Boards Association conference in Tampa, Channel 10 in Tampa reports.

NOT ON THE SITE: When teachers get punished by the state, the information goes online. Apparently not so for administrators. The state's recent action against Putnam superintendent David Buckles didn't make its way onto the web, the Florida Times-Union reports.

NO RULING: The Florida Supreme Court refuses to consider a case involving a boy who was kicked out of Jupiter Christian School after administrators learned he is gay, the Palm Beach Post reports.

BACK TO WORK: Manatee's Head Start program brings back its laid off workers after finding some money left over from 2005, the Bradenton Herald reports.