During the summer the Class Clown Academy opens for twelve days to let class clowns brush up on their skills. The Class Clown Academy is a special place that keeps our educational system afloat, a unique institution that requires a steady supply of dedicated jokers-people who aren't afraid to propel a classroom of students out of their seats and onto the floor, howling with laughter. Could that be you? Would you like to be part of the next generation of class clowns? Are you dead serious about being ridiculously funny? Can you laugh hard enough to blow milk out of your nose? Build a paper airplane in under ten seconds? Do them both at the same time! In this book you'll get a first hand peek at what it takes to gain the school credits necessary to be an official class clown. Meet the students and the teachers, complete an application for the Class Clown Academy!

The past thirty years have seen dozens of otherwise successful investors try to improve education through the application of market principles. They have funneled billions of dollars into alternative schools, online education, and textbook publishing, and they have, with surprising regularity, lost their shirts. In Class Clowns, professor and investment banker Jonathan A. Knee dissects what drives investors' efforts to improve education and why they consistently fail. Knee takes readers inside four spectacular financial failures in education: Rupert Murdoch's billion-dollar effort to reshape elementary education through technology; the unhappy investors—including hedge fund titan John Paulson—who lost billions in textbook publisher Houghton Mifflin; the abandonment of Knowledge Universe, Michael Milken's twenty-year mission to revolutionize the global education industry; and a look at Chris Whittle, founder of EdisonLearning and a pioneer of large-scale transformational educational ventures, who continues to attract investment despite decades of financial and operational disappointment. Although deep belief in the curative powers of the market drove these initiatives, it was the investors' failure to appreciate market structure that doomed them. Knee asks: What makes a good education business? By contrasting rare successes, he finds a dozen broad lessons at the heart of these cautionary case studies. Class Clowns offers an important guide for public policy makers and guardrails for future investors, as well as an intelligent exposé for activists and teachers frustrated with the repeated underperformance of these attempts to shake up education.

In a world full of magic and wonder, there are bound to be some outcasts that don't fit in with the rest of the magical world. Whether they're petty criminals doomed to never achieve their full potential, don't have enough innate magic in them, or whatever the case, the magical world of Yuldor has deemed these outcasts as Clowns. The stigma of being stuck as a Clown is so dehumanizing and embarrassing that most would rather tell everyone that they aren't even going to magic academy instead of being honest about what unfortunate school they're stuck at. Things aren't all so terrible, though, as there is one bright-eyed teacher who is hopeful that she can change the way that the world views Clowns for the better. Mrs. Harmony seeks to do just that, and she won't let a single one of her students think that they're any less than amazing for being what they are! With five new first years arriving to start their journey through magic academy, she is determined to give them the best experience they could possibly ask for.

Leonardo can't stop being the class clown despite his teacher's protestations.

Original and ambitious poetry that makes readers pay attention to the current conversation about the nature of lyric and human relationships in the 21st century.

Nothing like an injury and a move around the world to crush your dreams. I should be training for the Olympics. Instead, I'm a comeback gymnast at Mount Rainier Legacy Academy. This school is known for two things: billionaires and grueling academics. Though I've mastered the art of focus, there's one distraction I can't ignore: Ryan Jacobs. He cracks jokes... Constantly chatters in class... And, wears a smile that says he's up to no good. His carefree view of the world annoys me just as much as his bent for being the center of attention. But he does have the most mesmerizingly perfect lips... And when I need help after a sprained ankle, he says he's my guy. I didn't mean to lead him on... I didn't mean to fall for him... I certainly didn't mean to kiss the class clown... But maybe it's too late for my heart to forget that magical moment. Maybe I've already fallen in love.

When Rudy the clown attends school for the first time, he is not appreciated by his teacher.