FIRST DAY BACK: Pinellas struggles with a new busing system that has parents hot. • Forest Lakes Elementary, which had few buses, had few problems. • Hillsborough has a smooth-running return to classes. (Times photo, Skip O'Rourke)

PAY CUT: About 450 Pasco schoolteachers and employees who were placed on the wrong step of the pay scale last year see their salaries cut this year. 

TAKE IT AND GO: Hernando would pay superintendent Wayne Alexander $22,000 to leave the district a year early.

TOP OF THE CLASS: Their welcome mat has no border • Marchman student enjoys Bucs' Special Olympics training camp • Ridgewood High senior spent summer in the pathology lab 

FACE FACTS: Florida lawmakers need to find a way to adequately fund public schools before the class-size amendment kicks in and federal stimulus money disappears, the Times editorializes.

CHEAPER EDUCATION: Florida Virtual School offers a model nationally of how to efficiently educate children when money is tight, the Christian Science Monitor reports. 

KEEP IT OFF CAMPUS: Alachua considers a policy that would ban school district employees from advocating political positions, such as a local sales tax for education, while at school, the Gainesville Sun reports.

HALF THE CASH: Broward approves a construction budget that's half of the past year, with no plans for new schools, the Miami Herald reports.

JUST DO IT: Collier middle school students will have homework this year, but it won't be graded, the Naples Daily News reports. 

CONFIDENCE BUILDER: Brevard aims to implement the AVID program in all its secondary schools to help students with low self-confidence, Florida Today reports.

CHURCH CHALLENGES DISTRICT: A growing number of students who attend Dove World Outreach Center wear "Islam is of the devil" shirts to Alachua schools and get sent home, setting up a potential First Amendment battle, the Gainesville Sun reports.

*