How the switch from paper to computer tests impacts student achievement
Despite the expansion of computer-based testing in schools over the last decade—and ongoing concerns about negative impacts
Despite the expansion of computer-based testing in schools over the last decade—and ongoing concerns about negative impacts
As school accountability systems reset following pandemic disruptions, an opportunity arises to improve their accuracy and make sure the intended responses to data resulting from them are properly tuned. A new study from the U.S.
This school year was supposed to mark the beginning of the comeback. Largely free from pandemic-related disruptions and with coffers flush with Uncle Sam’s Covid cash, states could finally turn their attention toward clawing back what students have lost.
Districts that lose students to charter schools can and ultimately will adjust their behavior. And indeed, recent research implies that, while charters marginally reduce districts’ total revenues per pupil, they also make them more efficient. The challenge for policymakers is managing whatever transition costs may be associated with moving to a more choice-based system in a way that is fair to students and taxpayers.
Within a few years of their 2010 rollout, the Common Core State Standards for math and English became a popular scapegoat for a host of perceived ills in K–12 education.
When I started Instruction Partners and began working deeply and regularly with multiple school systems, I was surprised by some patterns. The same motivational quotes were in almost every school hallway. Many teachers' lounges had the same air freshener. There was a similar tension between certain departments in almost every district.
Almost everyone wants to raise teacher pay. The push comes in various forms and from various places—mostly recently a proposal by Congressional liberals to create a $60,000 floor under teacher salaries. Yet we’d have far more generous teacher pay today if we hadn’t opted to hire more teachers and support staff over the years rather than raising salaries.
Recently, Jo Boaler—a Stanford professor and one of the country’s foremost scholars of mathematics—took to the Hechinger Report to write about pandemic learning loss
School transportation problems have been big news
Mississippi’s model for improving early literacy has been a standout since 2019, based on its nation-leading achievement growth on the fourth grade NAEP reading test.
The claim that the SAT and ACT drive inequities in higher education feeds the movement against standardized testing and has been at the heart of successful court cases, but this new brief argues that, whether colleges decide to go “test optional” or not, the implications for equity are actually minimal. Read more.
Dear Checker,
In an effort to expand educational opportunity, several large urban school districts—including Boston, Chicago, New York City,
The SAT and ACT hold a controversial place in American education. This brief challenges the notion that college admissions exams drive inequities in college admissions and higher education attainment, as well as worsen broader social disparities.
In the fast-moving, highly energized world of school choice and parent-empowerment advocacy, education savings accounts are the hottest thing since vouchers, maybe even hotter. Ten states already have them in some form, and a dozen more legislatures are weighing bills to create them. But Finn is wary, particularly of the free-swinging, almost-anything-goes version known as “universal” ESAs.
Recent news stories have pushed the narrative that parents are using education savings accounts to buy items of questionable educational value and relevance, including chicken coops, trampolines, and tickets to SeaWorld. But perhaps ESAs’ permissiveness is a feature, not a bug—and perhaps officials would be wise to go one step further and give teachers their own accounts.
What does it cost to retain a less-than-proficient student and provide him or her with remediation and additional support?
From 2015 to 2018, the start of spring meant I could expect to hear from parents across Florida. At the time, I worked for Step Up Students, the Florida-based organization that administers the nation’s largest education scholarship (i.e., voucher) program. My job was not in customer service. I was the editor of a blog focused on school choice issues.
So many of our debates about paying for higher education hinge on conflicting views of what’s the taxpayer’s responsibility and what’s the recipient’s. These days, that’s also true of pre-schooling and it also arises, albeit in different form, when we fight over vouchers, tax credits, ESAs and such. Is it society’s responsibility to pay for private schooling or is it the family’s?
Editor’s note: This was first published by The 74.
I have held firm to this belief since my early days of teaching: Getting students to proficiency and above in reading and math is a commitment to social justice and democracy. Education can empower students to change the world, especially when it counters cycles of poverty.
The release of “The Nation’s Report Card” on October 24, 2022, created shock waves though out the country’s education and policy establishments.
We were glad to function in that capacity for Virginia as we’ve done for many other states over the years. But it’s also been implied by some that we tried to inject the draft standards with conservative bias, even to “whitewash” history, and that is completely false.
For the vast majority of America’s children, going to school has changed little from their parents’ generation, even their grandparents’: Where you live is where you learn, in a school run by your local public school district.
School closures are awful. I won’t argue otherwise.
By now the unfinished learning that resulted from the Covid-19 pandemic is old news.
In the wake of dismal NAEP reading scores released earlier this year,
On this week’s special, year-end Education Gadfly Show podcast, Mike Petrilli looks back on 2022’
A FutureEd report released earlier this year analyzes the problems facing early childhood education offerings across the country and how some states have tackled them.
Recent news articles have heralded a long-term decline in the U.S.