Podcast
Commentary
Commentary
What we're reading this week: May 6, 2021
The U.S. Supreme Court heard arguments last week in a First Amendment case about whether schools can police student’s off-campus speech.
Commentary
Evidence-Based Learning, Curriculum & Instruction, Teachers & School Leaders
Developing students’ social and emotional skills may be more important now than ever
Editor’s note: The Thomas B. Fordham Institute recently launched “The Acceleration Imperative,” a crowd-sourced, evidence-based resource designed to aid instructional leaders’ efforts to address the enormous challenges faced by their students, families, teachers, and staff over the past year.
Commentary
Accountability & Testing, Governance
Don’t let them make you do it, Haley!
You wouldn’t expect a conservative Republican like former Mississippi governor Haley Barbour to turn into a facsimile of Chairman Xi as muzzler of dissent and monitor of communications, but something of the sort has reared its head at the National Assessment Governing Board (NAGB), which Barbour chairs. (He’s a DeVos appointee, and last I looked, those terms run a year at a time.
Commentary
Curriculum & Instruction, Teachers & School Leaders
When all students return to class, elementary schools must protect instructional time for science and social studies
Editor’s note: The Thomas B. Fordham Institute recently launched “The Acceleration Imperative,” a crowd-sourced, evidence-based resource designed to aid instructional leaders’ efforts to address the enormous challenges faced by their students, families, teachers, and staff over the past year.
Commentary
School Finance, Charter Schools, Governance
Don’t believe the haters. The federal Charter Schools Program deserves full funding.
In the coming weeks, the House Appropriations subcommittee that decides on education spending will consider how much money to allocate to the federal Charter School Program (CSP).
Commentary
Curriculum & Instruction, Teachers & School Leaders
I believe “antiracism” is misguided. Can I still teach Black children?
Is a professed commitment to the tenets of “antiracism,” as defined by Ibram Kendi, now non-negotiable in the teaching profession? Are those of us who hold different views and ideals about student expectations, pedagogical practice, and school culture no longer welcome to lead classrooms with Black and Brown children? Read more.
Commentary
Curriculum & Instruction, Governance, Teachers & School Leaders
Three things to watch for in schools’ post-Covid recovery
Despite the progress schools and districts have made on returning fully to in-person instruction, some of the habits and apprehensions they’ve developed over the last thirteen months could impede their upcoming education recovery efforts.
Commentary
Evidence-Based Learning, Curriculum & Instruction, Governance, Teachers & School Leaders
How to pump the Acceleration Imperative up to full speed
Think of Michael Petrilli’s bold ideas and the Acceleration Imperative as newly designed Ford(ham) vehicles for K–12 recovery from the pandemic. Happily, there is much to admire in the showroom.
Commentary
Evidence-Based Learning, Governance
How parents determine childcare quality
Numerous studies have found that the quality of child care is too low and that we need to do more to
Commentary
Governance, Teachers & School Leaders
The bias toward complexity when humans attempt to solve problems
Problem solving involves a complex set of mental steps, even when it happens quickly. A group of researchers from the University of Virginia sought to test one specific aspect of the process—the types of solutions people consider—and uncovered what could be an important human attribute, with significant implications for public policy.
Podcast
Accountability & Testing, Governance
The Education Gadfly Show #767: The fight to get kids back in class five days a week
Commentary
Commentary
What we're reading this week: April 29, 2021
Yes, the pandemic affected the mental health of many young Americans, but the data don’t show a significant increase in suicides.
Commentary
Remembering Bob Slavin
Bob Slavin was a force of nature, a world-famous education researcher who was also far more than that.
Commentary
Evidence-Based Learning, Curriculum & Instruction, Teachers & School Leaders
How to adopt and implement a high-quality elementary mathematics curriculum
Editor’s note: The Thomas B. Fordham Institute recently launched “The Acceleration Imperative,” a crowd-sourced, evidence-based resource designed to aid instructional leaders’ efforts to address the enormous challenges faced by their students, families, teachers, and staff over the past year.
Commentary
Accountability & Testing, Evidence-Based Learning, Governance, Teachers & School Leaders
Testing, SpaceX, and the quest for consensus
A suite of technologies that are already widely used in some private-sector testing can and should be embraced by state and national assessments, as well as the private tests that aren’t yet making maximum use of them. Read more.
Commentary
Teachers & School Leaders
Schools need mental health services. Here’s how to fund them after Covid aid ends.
Editor’s note: This is the second in a two-part series advocating for schools to offer better mental health services for students—something that’s especially important after pandemic-related disruptions to schools and children’s routines.
Commentary
Evidence-Based Learning, Curriculum & Instruction, Teachers & School Leaders
Six principles for high-quality, effective writing instruction for all students
Editor’s note: The Thomas B. Fordham Institute recently launched “The Acceleration Imperative,” a crowd-sourced, evidence-based resource designed to aid instructional leaders’ efforts to address the enormous challenges faced by their students, families, teachers, and staff over the past year.
Commentary
Evidence-Based Learning, School Finance
How does money matter for schools?
The “Does money matter?” debate has been getting boring. The idea that increasing school spending wouldn’t make the schools work at least a little better probably never made much sense to begin with.
Commentary
Charter Schools, Curriculum & Instruction, Governance
Not all non-traditional schooling is created equal
When we imagine the typical school, at least one from the pre-pandemic era, generally the first thing that comes to mind is a teacher instructing a classroom full of students.
Commentary
Commentary
What we're reading this week: April 22, 2021
Seventy years ago, Prince Edward County closed public schools to deny Black students an education. Fixing inequities worsened by pandemic closures is this generation’s civil rights crisis.
Podcast
Accountability & Testing
The Education Gadfly Show #766: The U.S. Department of Education’s puzzling take on testing in 2021
Commentary
Governance, Teachers & School Leaders
Public schools must act before it’s too late to promote equitable vaccinations and address hesitancy
We’re more than a year into the Covid-19 pandemic, and finally, thanks to the power of science, vaccines are now widely available. But to reach herd immunity—which scientists say requires having 70–85 percent of the population vaccinated—we need to recalibrate our country’s vaccination strategy.
Commentary
Curriculum & Instruction, Governance, Teachers & School Leaders
Three important considerations for selecting and implementing an elementary ELA curriculum
Editor’s note: The Thomas B. Fordham Institute recently launched “The Acceleration Imperative,” an open-source, evidence-based resource designed to aid instructional leaders’ efforts to address the enormous challenges faced by their students, families, teachers, and staff over the past year.
Commentary
Curriculum & Instruction, Governance, Teachers & School Leaders
High-quality, knowledge-rich curriculum is essential
Editor’s note: The Thomas B. Fordham Institute recently launched “The Acceleration Imperative,” an open-source, evidence-based resource designed to aid instructional leaders’ efforts to address the enormous challenges faced by their students, families, teachers, and staff over the past year.
Commentary
Evidence-Based Learning, Curriculum & Instruction, Teachers & School Leaders
An ode to elementary schools
If I had to name the most important institution in American life, and the one with the most potential for changing the course of our country, it would be the humble elementary school. Especially the 20,000 or so high-poverty elementary schools in the nation’s cities and inner-ring suburbs, educating millions of kids growing up in poor or working-class families.
Commentary
Evidence-Based Learning, Curriculum & Instruction, Governance, Teachers & School Leaders
Can teaching be improved by law?
If there’s one lesson education policymakers might have learned in the last twenty-five years, it’s that it’s not hard to make schools and districts do something, but it’s extremely hard to make them do it well.
