Podcast
Advanced Education
#944: More equitable advanced education programs, with Brandon Wright
On this week’s Education Gadfly Show podcast, Brandon Wright, Ford
Report
Advanced Education
Think Again: Are Education Programs for High Achievers Inherently Inequitable?
This brief challenges the notion that marginalized students of high ability are harmed by advanced education, with implications for better screening measures and expansion of programs.
Commentary
Accountability & Testing, Evidence-Based Learning, Charter Schools, Curriculum & Instruction, Governance, Teachers & School Leaders
Once a hedgehog, now a fox: Ten lessons from six decades in the struggle to improve schools
The Greek poet Archilochus wrote that “the fox knows many things, but the hedgehog knows one big thing.” Finn’s experience has made him more like the fox: as keen as ever to overhaul and revitalize American education, but having come to “knows many things” about that enterprise, is more a wary realist regarding its difficulty.
Commentary
Accountability & Testing, Governance
American students underperform, but our economy overachieves
There is a large literature linking the quality of education to economic growth, and numerous economists and development agencies, including the
Commentary
Charter Schools, Curriculum & Instruction
Is it time for a second look at virtual education?
I confess I approach the question of virtual education with more than a little skepticism. Kids spend enough time staring at screens, and I’ve developed a reflexive distrust bordering on cynicism for all things ed tech, which has a reliable history of overpromising and underdelivering. And, of course, student outcomes from virtual schools have been awful.
Commentary
Charter Schools, Curriculum & Instruction, Governance, Teachers & School Leaders
Charter schools’ virtuous improvement cycle betters our K–12 system
“Charter school laws have been arguably the most influential school reform efforts of the past several decades,” write economists
Commentary
Evidence-Based Learning, Charter Schools, Governance, Teachers & School Leaders
Student enrollment is dropping. The charter sector should keep growing anyway.
The macro trend that will have the greatest impact on the American education system over the next decade or two is our declining birth rate and the resulting enrollment crisis facing many public schools. We have too many schools for too few kids and, as a result, thousands of schools are going to need to close. But what we don’t have are enough excellent schools, and therefore the charter sector should keep growing anyway.
Commentary
Charter Schools, Governance, Private School Choice
Calling for a constitutional right to school choice in Colorado
As the clock winds down towards Election Day, Colorado voters—myself included—face an important decision beyond the presidential contest: whether to amend the state constitution to enshrine a “right to school choice.” To be clear, the Centennial State has a long and proud record on the issue.
Commentary
Accountability & Testing, Evidence-Based Learning, Curriculum & Instruction, Governance, Standards, Teachers & School Leaders
7 thoughts about elite college students who can’t read books
Rose Horowitch’s article in The Atlantic is getting lots of buzz.
Commentary
Accountability & Testing, Evidence-Based Learning, Charter Schools, Governance, Private School Choice
The “à la carte education” accountability conundrum
Of the school choice options available to many U.S. families today, few embody the spirit of “power to the parents” quite like education savings accounts (ESAs).
Commentary
Accountability & Testing, Evidence-Based Learning, Governance
Most schools in America are off track. Virginia is no different.
Governor Glenn Youngkin is under fire again from Virginia’s education establishment, this time because a new school accountability system his administration is promoting refuses to put lipstick on a pig.
Commentary
Accountability & Testing, Evidence-Based Learning, Charter Schools, Curriculum & Instruction, Governance, Teachers & School Leaders
3 ways to increase choice and decrease polarization in U.S. schools
Editor’s note: This was first published by The 74.
Commentary
Evidence-Based Learning, Curriculum & Instruction, Advanced Education
Broader access to advanced coursework: An interview with Jefferson Pestronk, Executive Director of Modern States
Modern States Education Alliance is a non-profit that makes college-level courses and college credit free to any learner anywhere, including high school students interested in advanced coursework. It offers thirty-two online courses free of charge at www.modernstates.org, including all the necessary textbooks and readings.
Commentary
Accountability & Testing, Evidence-Based Learning, Governance
When was American education’s best decade? And how can we tell?
This summer, the Washington Post’s (fantastic) “Department of Data” columnist, Andrew Van Dam, ran a fun feature about “America’s best decade,” according to public opinion.
Commentary
Accountability & Testing, Evidence-Based Learning, Curriculum & Instruction, Governance, Teachers & School Leaders
It’s time for tough love to address chronic absenteeism
Despite an unprecedented infusion of resources, the latest data show that American students are struggling to recover
Commentary
Evidence-Based Learning, Charter Schools
Charter schools outperform traditional public schools on average. Here's why.
High-quality studies find that charter schools boost achievement by more than their traditional-public-school counterparts—an advantage that is particularly large for students of color in disadvantaged urban communities, and one that has only grown larger as the charter sector has expanded and matured.
Commentary
Evidence-Based Learning, Charter Schools, Governance
Does competition from charter schools help or hurt traditional public schools?
It’s widely acknowledged that a bit of healthy competition is a good thing in most contexts. Among other things, it pushes businesses to create better products and athletes and musicians to train longer and harder. But what about in education?
Podcast
Charter Schools
#935: How the charter sector can thrive under Trump or Harris, with Starlee Coleman
On this week’s Education Gadfly Show podcast, Starlee Coleman, newly named President and CEO of the Natio
Commentary
Accountability & Testing
A timely evaluation of Massachusetts’s test-based graduation requirements
In 2003, as part of a broader education reform package, the Commonwealth of Massachusetts began requiring high school students to pass Massachusetts Comprehensive Assessment System (MCAS) exams in math, English language arts, and science in order to earn a diploma.
Commentary
Accountability & Testing, Curriculum & Instruction, Governance, Teachers & School Leaders
The complicated interplay between race, poverty, and schooling
Fordham’s new study by Paul L. Morgan and Eric Hengyu Hu, "Explaining Achievement Gaps: The Role of Socioeconomic Factors," raises as many questions as it answers. Among them: How can we explain the different patterns for the Black-White achievement gap for reading, on the one hand, and math and science, on the other? Why does SES explain so much more of the Hispanic-White gap than the Black-White gap? And what’s the role of family structure in explaining the Black-White and Hispanic-White gaps?
Commentary
Evidence-Based Learning, Charter Schools, Curriculum & Instruction, Teachers & School Leaders
Inside the classical school renaissance: An interview with Dr. Kathleen O’Toole
Classical education is undergoing a renaissance. According to a recent analysis by Arcadia Education, the classical sector is growing by 5 percent annually with a total projected enrollment of 1.4 million students by 2035.
Commentary
Accountability & Testing, Evidence-Based Learning
RoadMAP to success: Using state assessment data to predict postsecondary success
A recent CALDER study by Darrin DeChane, Takkako Nomi, and Michael Podgursky utilizes test data from Missouri’s state assessment, known as MAP, to assess how well these test scores predict
Commentary
Curriculum & Instruction, Advanced Education, Teachers & School Leaders
I got caught teaching advanced students
“Come see me in the office.” Uh oh. I probably got caught teaching again.
Commentary
Evidence-Based Learning, Career & Technical Education, Curriculum & Instruction, Governance, Advanced Education, Teachers & School Leaders
Threading the needle on selective enrollment public schools
A recent article in the Boston Globe dug into a controversy that is dogging Massachusetts’s highly-regarded system of regional career and technical education (CTE) high schools.
Podcast
Accountability & Testing
#932: Yes, AP exams are getting easier, with Checker Finn
On this week’s Education Gadfly Show podcast, Fordham’s Checker Finn joins Mike and David to discuss the changes in how the College
Commentary
Accountability & Testing, Evidence-Based Learning, Curriculum & Instruction, Governance, Teachers & School Leaders
The case for standardized testing
By now, we’re well familiar with critiques of standardized testing opponents: tests rob schools of critical instructional time, encourage teaching to the test, place undue pressure on students and educators to perform, are educationally irrelevant, only provide a snapshot of student achievement at a specific moment in time, and are largely driven by family income levels, parents’ education, and
Podcast
Accountability & Testing, School Finance
#931: No, school closures aren’t racist, with Vlad Kogan
On this week’s Education Gadfly Show podcast, Vlad Kogan, a professor at Ohio State University, joins Mike and David to discuss what ro
Commentary
Evidence-Based Learning, Charter Schools, Governance, Teachers & School Leaders
“Everything, everywhere, all at once” solutions to chronic absenteeism
Read the winning entry in Fordham’s 2024 Wonkathon, which asked contributors to answer this question: “How can policymakers and practitioners radically reduce chronic absenteeism—at least below pre-pandemic levels and preferably much further?”
Commentary
Evidence-Based Learning, Curriculum & Instruction, Advanced Education
Are AP exams getting easier?
Three decades ago, the College Board “recentered” the SAT. Now it’s “recalibrating” Advanced Placement. Though both adjustments in these enormously influential testing programs can be justified by psychometricians, both are also probable examples of what the late Senator Daniel P.
Commentary
Accountability & Testing, Evidence-Based Learning, Curriculum & Instruction, Governance
Is “credit recovery” as bad as they say?
For several years now, critics have been blaring klaxons about the questionable quality and increasing
