Our schools have lost their sense of purpose
Editor’s note: A portion of this essay is excepted from the author’s Substack, The Education Daly.<
Editor’s note: A portion of this essay is excepted from the author’s Substack, The Education Daly.<
Congress is currently considering legislation to update the way that the federal government funds education research and development.
The findings of Fordham’s latest report, "Do Authorizer Evaluations Predict the Success of New Charter Schools?" suggest at least three takeaways: authorizers should pay close attention to applicants’ education and financial plans; should incorporate multiple data sources and perspectives; and must continue to hold approved schools accountable for their results.
This is the eighth in a series on doing educational equity right.
The hits just keep on coming: Earlier this month, a motley crew of former Colorado lawmakers helped spur the introduction of a grotesque piece of legislation aimed squarely at dismantling the state’s
When the TV salesman pitches a beauty product to eliminate wrinkles or a politician promises no new taxes, most of us raise a skeptical eyebrow. If only we afforded that same skepticism to education fads.
For many students and teachers, the pivot from in-person to remote learning in March 2020 was a sudden lurch from the known to the unknown. Writ large, research shows the academic impact of that move was devastating. But details matter—and so do exceptions.
On this week’s Education Gadfly Show podcast, Adam Kho, an assistant professor at the Rossier School of Education, and
As the sector’s gatekeepers, charter school authorizers are responsible for ensuring that schools in their purview set students up for success. But can authorizers predict which schools will meet that standard?
Editor’s note: This was first published on the author’s Substack, The Education Daly.
Many of the conditions that led to the prominence of “no-excuses” charter schools a quarter-century ago have returned. For students, teachers, and parents who have never lost their appetite for safe and orderly schools, it can’t come soon enough.
I recently watched a seventh-grade math lesson that did a better job than I ever did as a teacher asking kids relatable theoretical probability questions. How would you represent the probability of a six-foot-tall seventh grader? How would you represent the probability of getting a test in school in any given week? Making sense of where students were coming from was a fascinating puzzle.
Editor’s note: This was first published by The 74.
The way we grade student work is flawed—in some ways inequitable—and is in need of reform. But like so many things in American education, the push for “equitable grading” has often been implemented piecemeal, bringing along with it all manner of unintended consequences, the most important of which is lowered standards.
Late last year, researchers Sarah Cohodes and Susha Roy partnered with the MIT Department of Economics to release a paper summarizing the results of lottery-based charter studies. The topline conclusion is straightforward and promising:
There are, generally speaking, two ways to report students’ performance on tests. One is normative, and it compares a student’s performance to his peers. The second is criterion, and it compares a student’s performance to learning standards, indicating grade-level proficiency and is independent of peers’ test performance.