Commentary
Topics
Commentary
What we're reading this week: September 7, 2023
Science of reading policies and curricula have spread across the country, but the science of proper implementation is less clear.
Commentary
Curriculum & Instruction, Governance, Advanced Education
The essential state role in educating advanced learners
Getting advanced learners (a.k.a. “gifted” students) the education they need, and ensuring that this works equitably for youngsters from every sort of background, is substantially the responsibility of state leaders.
Commentary
Curriculum & Instruction, Governance, Teachers & School Leaders
Texas’s controversial takeover of Houston’s schools
If you believe the media, it seems a dark lord has come to cut down the educational Eden that is the Houston Independent School District. He’s closing libraries to open detention centers.
Commentary
Evidence-Based Learning
Searching for mobility in K–12 achievement
Many Americans believe that the foremost mission of public education is to provide a pathway to success for every student, even in the face of considerable life obstacles. Yet persistent achievement gaps along dimensions of race, income, family education level, and other factors call this earnest expectation into question.
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What we're reading this week: August 31, 2023
Micro-schools, private institutions that serve five to twenty students, are rapidly growing in popularity across the U.S.
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Evidence-Based Learning, Advanced Education
America’s highest-achieving students are disproportionately Asian. Let’s not be afraid to investigate why.
Fordham’s latest study finds that fewer Black and Hispanic students from the highest-SES group are achieving at NAEP’s Advanced level than we would expect, given their socioeconomic status. That disparity clearly commands our attention. But so do the findings on Asian American high achievers—who deserve our attention for a different reason.
Report
Excellence Gaps by Race and Socioeconomic Status
This study uses NAEP data on eighth graders over the last two decades to trace the performance of America’s highest-achieving students by both race/ethnicity and socioeconomic status.
Commentary
Governance, Teachers & School Leaders
The hill that public education dies on: Transgender policies’ utter contempt for parents
Enshrining into policy and practice ideological views on student gender to which a majority of Americans do not subscribe could easily be fatal to support for public education. Indeed, there are no words adequate to capture this level of hubris.
Commentary
Accountability & Testing, Curriculum & Instruction, Governance, Teachers & School Leaders
How districts are gaming graduation rates by letting students cheat
For at least a decade, schools have been using online credit-recovery (OCR) courses to award bogus credits that satisfy graduation requirements, and thus inflating graduation rates.
Commentary
Evidence-Based Learning, Curriculum & Instruction, Governance, Teachers & School Leaders
Seven ways state leaders can rigorously implement the science of reading
Ohio recently passed a historic state budget that includes, among other components, ambitious literacy reforms that require schools to follow the science of reading—an instructional approach that emphasizes phonics for building foundational lit
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Evidence-Based Learning, Curriculum & Instruction
Long term outcomes of a home- and community-based literacy program
Future Forward began in Milwaukee in 2005 as SPARK—a small-scale, local effort to combine family engagement with intensive tutoring to help low-income elementary-age students improve their literacy skills. It has since expanded significantly, rebranded, and moved under the aegis of national nonprofit Education Analytics, Inc.
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Commentary
Curriculum & Instruction
Why AI hasn’t made coding skills obsolete
Many states now require high school students to learn coding before they can graduate, and a host of organizations encourage students to build coding skills. Is this all a waste of time and energy now that chatbots can code? In a word, no.
Commentary
Evidence-Based Learning, Curriculum & Instruction, Teachers & School Leaders
Stop using learning stations
Can we stop with the learning stations already? My teacher prep endorsed them. My first instructional coach trained me in them. Every school that I’ve ever worked at has incorporated them. Look them up on Teachers Pay Teachers and you’ll find scores of activities for various literacy stations, each one promising that they are proven effective.
Commentary
Rethinking gifted coverage in the media
High-achieving students who are also disadvantaged by class, race, or ethnicity may be the most overlooked group in American education. Education reporters, ask yourself: The last time you visited a high-poverty elementary school, did you query the principal or teachers about how they serve children who are a year or more above grade level?
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Evidence-Based Learning, Curriculum & Instruction, Teachers & School Leaders
How effective are programs that encourage mindfulness in schools?
School systems have long been interested in supporting students’ mental health as a means to improve behavior, decrease absenteeism,
Commentary
Evidence-Based Learning, School Finance, Governance
Examining the role of property assessment in education funding
Accurate property assessments are a basic requirement for many school funding systems to function properly.
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Commentary
What we're reading this week: August 17, 2023
Researchers found that a Florida retention policy that increased resources and support for retained students had spillover benefits for younger siblings.
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Curriculum & Instruction
Hard lessons from a veteran homeschooler
In the last three years, the families of 1.8 million children switched to homeschooling, bringing the nationwide total to 4.3 million in 2022. But glib calls for parents to join those ranks gloss over some persistent challenges inherent in homeschooling. Phillips discovered these challenges firsthand when her family moved to rural upstate New York and began homeschooling their kids.
Commentary
Evidence-Based Learning, Curriculum & Instruction, Governance, Teachers & School Leaders
Mike Schmoker’s achievable vision for education reform
I must admit, I’d become something of an education fatalist. I know the research about direct instruction. I know the power of a knowledge-rich, well-sequenced curriculum and the promise of school choice. I know that individual schools and even whole charter systems can achieve amazing results. But I always wonder: Is it all for naught?
Commentary
Curriculum & Instruction
Learning by going: Springfield, Illinois
After a millennium or so in the world of ed policy, I nearly always think of education as stuff schools do that produces results on various metrics that (one hopes) enables education leaders and policymakers to make better decisions about what schools should do tomorrow.
Commentary
Evidence-Based Learning, Curriculum & Instruction, Governance, Teachers & School Leaders
Early College High Schools boost degree attainment, especially for marginalized students
Early College High Schools are designed to be rigorous programs that partner with higher-education institutions to help teens earn college credit before graduation, with the aim of improving their chance of success after graduation.
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Commentary
What we're reading this week: August 10, 2023
Georgia withdrew from a testing pilot program after federal regulations stymied their ability to innovate effectively.
Commentary
Advanced Education
Screen time during the pandemic and twice-exceptional children: What parents should know
The use of screens increased substantially during the Covid-19 pandemic. For the twice exceptional population—those identified as gifted with coexistent learning differences like ADHD, dyslexia, Autism, or processing disorders—this “epidemic within the pandemic” resulted in deeper isolation and greater parent frustration.
Commentary
School Finance, Charter Schools, Governance, Teachers & School Leaders
Fair funding finally flows to charters—but the window won’t stay open forever
A remarkable increase in charter school funding across a number of states—and not just red—is finally addressing some of the deepest spending inequities in American education. But with Covid money drying up, declining student enrollment, and an aging population, tougher times lie ahead.
