The excellence gap opens early
Last week, I provided sobering evidence of the “excellence gap” among twelfth grade students—the sharp divides along lines of race and class in achievement at the highest levels.
Last week, I provided sobering evidence of the “excellence gap” among twelfth grade students—the sharp divides along lines of race and class in achievement at the highest levels.
Many state teacher pension systems are woefully underfunded, impose significant costs on teachers and schools, and shortchange tho
Calls are rising for America’s aging high-school model to modernize, in part by accommodating work experience through hands-on internships or actual employment for students.
Scholars and testing companies have been following grade inflation for decades. The first ACT study on the topic dates to the mid-1990s, while researchers have used SAT data to study grade inflation since the 1970s.
America’s education system suffers from a variety of “excellence gaps”—sharp disparities in performance by race and class at the highest levels of academic achievement. These gaps explain why college administrators turn to various forms of affirmative action in order to create freshmen classes that more closely represent the nation’s diversity—actions that may soon be declared unconstitutional. But when do these gaps start?
As I write this, representative samples of fourth and eighth graders are taking National Assessment of Educational Progress tests in math and English.
Reams of research have reported contradictory outcomes for students with disabilities (SWDs) who are taught in general education classrooms alongside their non-disabled peers versus learning in settings with only SWDs. A new report focuses on teacher certification as a possible mechanism to explain the variations in outcomes.
Throughout the pandemic, we encountered much speculation about the impact that remote learning would have on student performance. The expected learning loss was a concern not just of American parents and educators, but of citizens all around the world.
NAEP is by far the country’s most important source of information on student achievement, achievement gaps and so much more, even though it’s invisible to most Americans. Yet NAEP is far from perfect—and could do so much more than it does. It’s time to wrestle with its challenges, shortcomings, and possible future scenarios.
One common refrain in debates around education is that standardized exams negatively impact applicants from disadvantaged backgrounds.
Just over thirty years ago, the first public charter school law was passed in Minnesota. One year later, City Academy Charter School opened its doors in St. Paul. The charter sector now boasts more than 7,700 schools serving over 3.4 million students nationwide.
The money is pouring in, but so are the education challenges. The Covid-19 pandemic has dramatically affected student achievement, particularly for poorer students and students of color.
The nationwide surge in violent crime, which preceded the pandemic but accelerated in 2020, has prompted a range of policy responses, from expanding