The Education Gadfly Weekly

The federal role in education dates to 1867 when President Andrew Johnson signed legislation creating the first “Department of Education” for the purpose of:

...collecting such statistics and facts as shall show the condition and progress of education in the several States and Territories, and of diffusing such information respecting the organization and management of schools and school systems, and methods of teaching, as shall aid the people of the United States in the establishment and maintenance of efficient school systems, and otherwise promote the cause of education throughout the country.

Which is to say what is now the Institute of Education Sciences (IES) within the modern U.S. Department of Education is responsible for the oldest and most fundamental of all federal activities bearing on “the cause of education throughout the country.” This at a time when nobody thinks that “cause” is functioning very well. IES is where we learn what is and isn’t functioning—and what might work better.

By no means is everything there worth doing. When I led its predecessor—the Office of Educational Research and Improvement—back in the late 1980’s, I tried with zero success to scrap or shrink the excessive portion of the agency’s budget that supported the largely useless but deeply entrenched “regional education laboratories,” as well as a gaggle of similarly-entrenched “research centers” in a bunch of universities. Yet the “labs and centers” persist to this day, and as far as I can tell, were spared from the meat-axe that DOGE swung through IES on Monday.

Yet the Education Sciences Reform Act (ESRA) of 2002, which established IES in its present form, corrected much of what was weak and wasteful in the previous arrangement—and the new agency got off to a strong start under the leadership of Grover (Russ) Whitehurst, who strove with considerable success to see that its work would be conducted as proper scientific research—controlled experiments, etc.—and data gathered and reported with objectivity and integrity.

Whitehurst’s successors, most recently Mark Schneider, serving six-year terms designed to avoid election cycles and maintain professionalism, carried on this pattern of rigor and respect for science while pushing for the reform of stodgy practices at IES, as well as faddism, jargon, and the featherbedding that takes place through in-grown, in-bred “peer review” and procurement practices.  

There’s still a way to go—and DOGE, if it actually sought the “government efficiency” in its name, could help modernize IES, perhaps even put out to pasture some sacred cows, such as the regional labs. But slashing and burning, as happened the other day, won’t improve matters. It’s just going to weaken the foremost truth squad in American education, the chief sponsor and funder of rigorous analysis, reliable data, and clear-eyed evaluations in a realm that needs more of those things, not less.

Editor’s note: This was first published by The 74.

The latest NAEP scores reveal a stark and troubling reality: Students remain far behind. This is especially true for those who were already behind, widening already large learning gaps. Too many of the country’s school systems are failing to equip young people with the knowledge and skills they need to succeed.

I would argue that the causes are dual problems that are not only intertwined, but sit at the very core of this crisis of stalled learning recovery: Far too many boards of education have abandoned accountability and failed to embrace innovation. Yes, the challenges education stakeholders — parents, educators, and policymakers alike — face are enormous, but the solutions are within reach if, collectively, we commit to a balanced approach. To recover lost ground, decisionmakers need to learn from bright spots in education, where accountability and innovation intersect to drive real results.

At the National Association of Charter School Authorizers we know high-performing charter schools can serve as models for driving meaningful results for students. Research shows how strong accountability practices from authorizers contribute to charter school success and how high-performing charters have increased the academic performance of surrounding district-run schools. NACSA’s own research has demonstrated the vast diversity of school models and approaches to learning that have found a home and are growing in the charter sector. Charter schools have consistently proven their ability to dramatically accelerate the learning of students furthest away from opportunity — a critical capacity, given the sobering NAEP outcomes for students academically behind.

Here are three big lessons, based on the successes we have seen from authorizing high-quality charter schools, that decisionmakers can use to ensure all students receive an excellent education:

Understand accountability, encourage innovation, and problem solving: For accountability to truly drive meaningful student results, there must be a shared understanding of what it is and is not. Accountability systems or frameworks ensure that all students meet high academic standards by defining expectations, creating conditions for innovation and accommodating the needs of families and communities to drive change when schools fall short. While accountability must impose consequences for failure — including making the tough decision to close schools that consistently fail to educate students well — it’s about so much more than that. It is about permitting excellent schools to expand so their successes can be replicated and, perhaps most importantly, ensuring that high and rigorous expectations for student learning are perpetuated.

When accountability is at its best, it fosters greater innovation. This is especially true in high-quality charter schools, where accountability and innovation are interwoven by design. These schools are given the flexibility to innovate and problem-solve in multiple ways — such as implementing evidence-based instructional models that draw from research-backed teaching strategies, finding creative ways of re-engaging students, and using technology in unique ways — while being held to rigorous performance standards, ensuring they deliver for their students. It is this balance that needs to be more broadly replicated, allowing accountability and innovation to compliment one another in service of student learning and growth.

Align rigor with clear guidance: In order for teachers and school leaders — and, ultimately, students — to excel, they need policies and practices that promote achievement, which includes explicit guidance around expectations and clear measures of success.

Charter school authorizers play a critical role in ensuring expectations are both rigorous and attainable. By using tools like school performance frameworks and reports, progress monitoring systems, site visits, consistent parent communications, and other evaluation and transparency systems, authorizers provide schools with the tools to understand how they’re performing and what’s expected of them. This alignment empowers educators to focus on what matters most: student learning.

Follow the excellence equation: High-performing charter schools have two important elements that drive their success: They are responsible for determining and executing their programmatic objectives, while their authorizers must set clear expectations and be transparent about performance. This clear delineation is the key to producing high-functioning schools where students are prepared for the next phase of learning and life.

At NACSA, we’ve observed that this excellence equation — balancing accountability for outcomes with freedom to innovate — is a common feature of the highest-performing schools. All schools should be empowered to tailor their programs to meet their students’ needs while accountability structures ensure their efforts are aligned with clear, rigorous goals.

As states and districts consider changes to their accountability systems, lowering standards and misleading students and families about the reality of academic progress is not the answer. The new NAEP results make it clear that now is the time to raise expectations and work together to leverage every tool available to advance learning.

The gender gap in education is less talked about than many other achievement gaps, but it persists. Girls and women are more likely to finish high school, more likely to go to college, more likely to complete college, and consistently score higher on verbal standardized tests than their male counterparts. Even on math assessments, females have mostly closed the gender gap: NAEP scores show similar fourth, eighth, and twelfth grade math scores going back to 1990, although boys had a slim edge in some years. Since boys and girls have similar average IQ scores, girls’ superior academic performance may be due to stronger non-cognitive skills, such as conscientiousness and discipline.

A new NBER working paper posits a policy mechanism that may improve non-cognitive skills in boys and help them close the college enrollment gap with girls. Using data for students who were enrolled in fifth grade in a large school district in Florida from 2003–2012, economists David Card, Eric Chyn, and Laura Guiliano show how advanced programs for students, often called “gifted” programs, can have outsized effects for boys.

The study focuses on the effects of gifted programs on students from low-income families and English learners. In the (unnamed) school district being studied, all students are screened for gifted programs via an IQ test, but the threshold for identification is lower for these disadvantaged students than for others: Students from low-income families and English learners must reach a score of 116, which is about the 85th percentile of the entire student distribution. (For other students, the threshold is an IQ of 130, limiting the programs to about 3 percent of students.) Identified students received a range of services, often including a few hours per week of special instruction, and many of the students were placed in specialized gifted classrooms in fourth and fifth grades.

The study’s main finding is that the gifted program has a large effect on boys’ college-going but no such effect on girls. Seventy-four percent of boys who met the IQ cutoff attended college, compared to just 46 percent of those who narrowly missed it. This is a powerful effect that eliminates the gender gap in college enrollment. To explain this long-term effect, the researchers examine shorter-term outcomes such as test scores, advanced course enrollment, disciplinary actions, and grades.

They divide these shorter-term outcomes into “cognitive” and “non-cognitive” outcomes. Test scores fall into the cognitive category, while course enrollment, suspensions, and GPA are measures of non-cognitive skills. This classification is somewhat simplistic, as both cognitive and non-cognitive skills likely contribute to all measured outcomes. Test scores, for example, are influenced by non-cognitive factors, while GPA and enrollment in advanced courses are typically at least somewhat related to students’ knowledge, as well as other cognitive factors.

When the researchers examine the effects of the gifted programs on these shorter-term outcomes, they find that while the program has a strong positive effect on boys’ advanced course enrollment and a small positive effect on grade point average (GPA), it has no discernible effect on student test scores, regardless of gender. None of the test scores the researchers examine, from elementary tests through the tenth grade PSAT, appear to rise as a result of being in the gifted program. That the gifted students earn similar grades even though they enroll in more advanced classes could indicate that they are outperforming their peers, although grade inflation in advanced courses could also be a factor. Based on their cognitive/non-cognitive dichotomy, the researchers interpret the unchanged test scores as evidence that the effect on boys’ college-going cannot be because of improving their cognitive skills, but instead must be influencing boys’ non-cognitive skills.

That argument is not entirely satisfying, especially if non-cognitive skills are understood to include traits like conscientiousness, grit, and self-discipline. After all, the strongest effects of the gifted program are on course selection, and there is no statistically significant effect on suspensions, which is the most obviously “behavioral” of the study’s intermediate measures. Moreover, we might expect increased non-cognitive skills to show up on the tests anyway, since test-taking requires such skills, including patience.

Alas, another explanation for increased college-going would suggest that this is not about “skills” at all. Instead, it’s possible that the gifted students are being socialized differently. Many of the boys who participate in the gifted program may be adopting a college-going mentality as they are exposed to college prep coursework, different teachers, and higher-performing—and likely more affluent—peers. The affluence gap in college-going is large, too: Students from the most affluent quintile attend four-year institutions at more than three times the rate of students in the least affluent quintile. If the low-income and English learner gifted boys end up taking AP courses alongside more affluent students, it may just result in them feeling like college is the obvious next step after high school, leading to their higher enrollment rates irrespective of their skills, cognitive or non-cognitive.

The paper demonstrates that this gifted program alters the academic trajectories of the boys who participate: They take special classes, continue in more advanced classes, earn slightly higher grades, have higher-achieving peers, and then go to college at higher rates than similar students who aren’t in the program. With so many boys adrift and failing to launch, this is certainly promising. Yet enrolling in college is not itself a measure of success. For college to be worth it, students need to gain valuable knowledge and skills and, ideally, complete a degree without taking on crushing debt. When the researchers are able to identify such success in college, no one will be able to deny that these programs can be truly life-changing.

SOURCE: David Card, Eric Chyn, and Laura Giuliano, Can Gifted Education Help Higher-Ability Boys from Disadvantaged Backgrounds? No. w33282, National Bureau of Economic Research, 2024.

While some aspects of the putative teacher shortage in America are matters of perspective, the dearth of teachers to staff special-education classrooms is real and growing. Could a cash bonus be enough to nudge potential recruits into these jobs? Many policymakers and pundits think so. A new report looks at the surprising outcome of one such effort.

In 2019, looking to fill persistent vacancies, education leaders in Hawaii instituted a plan to boost the annual salaries of special-ed teachers statewide in two ways: a flat $10,000 bonus for doing the job, and additional bonuses for working in the hardest-to-staff schools. Schools were placed into four tiers based on geographic isolation, student need levels, and previous staffing difficulties. Teachers working in Tier 1 schools received an additional $3,000; Tier 2 teachers received $5,000; Tier 3 teachers earned $7,500; and Tier 4 teachers, who worked in the hardest-to-serve schools, were given $8,000. These annual incentives, up to $18,000 over and above the regular salary (averaging about $68,000 at the time), went into effect with the 2020–21 school year.

A group of researchers, led by Roddy Theobald of the American Institutes for Research, examines how hiring for these positions changed in relation to general teacher hiring and across various school tiers before and after the incentives were implemented, as well as which specific mechanisms were driving these effects. And because the comparisons are between teachers in the same schools at the same time, the impacts of the coronavirus pandemic on hiring do not hinder the analysis. Data come from Hawaii Department of Education records and include all teaching positions at traditional districts between 2014 and 2023, excluding those in community schools for adults. The sample includes 115,000 teacher positions across nine school years in seven regions, fifteen complex areas (high schools and their K–8 feeders), and 261 school buildings.

Using a difference-in-differences model, Theobald and his team estimate that the bonus plan reduced the proportion of vacant special-ed teaching positions, relative to general education positions, by 32 percent and the proportion of special education positions that were vacant or filled by an unlicensed teacher by 35 percent. While it is a statistically-significant improvement, those percentages translate to a 1.2 percentage point reduction in overall special-ed vacancies and a 4.0 percentage point reduction in special-ed positions that were vacant or filled by an unlicensed teacher. Helpful, but not a solution to the problem. The largest impacts were seen in the hardest-to-staff schools, including reductions of 15 to 20 percentage points in the proportion of special education positions that were vacant or filled by unlicensed teachers in Tier 4 schools. While these findings do indicate that the additional bonuses were effective incentives for hiring at the higher-tier schools, it is also true that these schools had the most difficult time finding teachers prior to the bonus plan implementation (a.k.a. a greater “scope for change”).

Also notable is that the mechanism at work in driving the increase in special-education teachers was neither a boost in new teachers nor increased retention of existing teachers. It was the fact that general education teachers moved over to special education teaching positions to take advantage of the bonus, usually within the school where they already worked!

The researchers tout these findings as a “hidden in plain sight” solution to blunt Hawaii’s special education teacher shortage, although it is unclear from the discussion whether these switchers were already licensed to teach special education and weren’t doing so or took the opportunity of the impending bonus plan to get licensed in order to take advantage of the bonus. Either way, until big bonuses were on the table, it was more likely that special-ed classes would be overseen by unlicensed subs or other non-teaching staffers than by a gen ed teacher who chose to make the switch. In this light, the effectiveness of a $10,000 to $18,000 per year incentive to make that switch cannot be ignored, even if it didn’t really solve the problem. (You can check out another analysis of this report, including discussion of important limits to the generalizability of these findings, on a recent edition of the Education Gadfly Show.)

In the end, two big questions remain: Will the switchers stay in their special education roles long term, or will the lure of the bonuses prove insufficient to keep them in a more demanding job they had previously opted against taking? Surely it is just as easy for them to switch back to gen-ed at will…especially if vacancies remain (or grow) there. The other question is whether the bonuses will continue. They are currently approved through the 2024–25 school year, but must be re-authorized every year. Even the possibility of a pause or the threat of a reduction in payment could undo all of the impacts observed in an instant.

SOURCE: Roddy Theobald et al., “The Impact of a $10,000 Bonus on Special Education Teacher Shortages in Hawai‘i,” Educational Evaluation and Policy Analysis (January 2025).

Cheers

• A districtwide cellphone ban in Massachusetts led to a 75 percent drop in student discipline referrals, mirroring nationwide trends where schools report improved engagement and stronger classroom dynamics after restricting cellphone use. —EdWeek
• Louisiana performed remarkably well on recent NAEP results by emphasizing the science of reading, ending social promotion, and expanding school choice options. —The New York Post
• The Wall Street Journal’s editorial page applauds recent state actions to launch education savings accounts, while acknowledging that “school choice alone won’t rescue America’s failing K-12 education system.”—The Wall Street Journal
• When looking to address NAEP score declines, educators and policymakers should take a steady, evidence-based approach that includes adopting the Science of Reading, improving teacher preparation, and addressing chronic absenteeism. —Angélica Infante-Green, Education Week

Jeers

• A looming Chicago teachers' strike underscores the financial crisis in the city’s school district, as the union demands higher wages and staffing despite a massive deficit, internal dissent, and the risk of state intervention. —RealClearInvestigations
• Author Rebecca Haw Allensworth’s new book, The Licensing Racket, exposes how occupational licensing boards prioritize protecting their own members over consumers and impede upward mobility. —The Wall Street Journal
• As students fall further behind, states quietly mask the crisis by lowering standards and giving parents the illusion of progress while learners are left unprepared. —Frannie Block, The Free Press
• Emily Finley argues that the crisis of youth anxiety doesn’t just stem from technology; it’s the result of unrealistic dreams fueled by today’s culture of instant gratification rather than the wisdom found in classic books and music. —The Wall Street Journal

• Trump’s crusade against DEI aims to restore meritocracy—but to do so, he must also address disparate-impact theory, which prohibits “neutral” practices that disproportionately impact specific groups (e.g., testing requirements that disqualify black applicants at higher rates), but often ends up harming the groups it intends to protect. —Andrew M. Grossman and Kristin A. Shapiro, The Wall Street Journal
• Republicans and Democrats agree that student achievement is not where it should be. But disagreements over issues like federal education funding, achievement gaps, and “divisive ideologies” in schools are causing major tension between the two groups. —Cory Turner, NPR
• "Is Trump gutting education research a new beginning or just “slashing and burning”? —Greg Toppo, The 74
• The rise of male nurses in recent years, driven by decreased stigma and increased career opportunities, offers insights for attracting more men into teaching, highlighting the need for mentorship, career pathways, and targeted advocacy in education. —Education Week
• Nice White Parents oversimplifies the issue of racism in education by narrowly focusing on the behavior of white parents while ignoring broader institutional challenges, leading to progressive reforms (e.g., detracking) that have actually worsened outcomes. —Angie Schmitt, Kappan