Displaying 871-900 of 1135 results
Commentary
8.12.2020
Governance, Teachers & School Leaders

Reopening decisions are mostly a matter of trust

Michael J. Petrilli

Many low-income parents and parents of color are in solidarity with most teachers in not wanting their children to return to school buildings until the pandemic has passed. One obvious explanation is that low-income communities and communities of color have been much harder hit by the virus than their more advantaged peers. But there’s likely something else: Many low-income and working-class parents simply don’t trust their kids’ schools to keep them safe.

Commentary
8.12.2020
Curriculum & Instruction, Teachers & School Leaders

Another indictment of America’s approach to reading instruction

Dale Chu

The tremor that you felt last week was the dropping of a new Emily Hanford radio documentary, “What the Words Say: Many kids struggle with reading—and children of color are far less likely to get the help they need.” Since she started reporting on reading several years ago, Hanford has kept up the pressure on the

Commentary
8.12.2020
Curriculum & Instruction, Governance, Private School Choice, Teachers & School Leaders

Teacher unions vs. private schools

Chester E. Finn, Jr.

The private schools in Montgomery County, Maryland, where I live, are breathing a sigh of relief that, after much sturm und drang this past week, they’re back in charge of their own decisions about whether and how to re-open.

Commentary
8.12.2020
Curriculum & Instruction, Governance, Teachers & School Leaders

Schools’ responses to Covid-19 in spring 2020

Jeff Murray

Research on education during the coronavirus pandemic has been robust. Much of it is table setting for longer-term analysis on virtual curricula, teaching effectiveness, and student achievement. But there is also important ephemera being studied that will form a more immediate image of a difficult and chaotic time.

Commentary
8.7.2020
Facilities, Teachers & School Leaders

Seven steps to design safe and healthy school drop-off and entry routines

Eric Tucker, Sarah Haga, Aaron Daly, Sarah Pactor

As we prepare to reopen our schools, school administrators must examine our back-to-school rituals and upgrade plans for re-entry to account for the challenges presented by Covid-19. In particular, schools must create and clearly communicate the processes for school drop-off and arrival that support social distancing and wellness measures.

Commentary
8.5.2020
Curriculum & Instruction, Teachers & School Leaders

Evidence that high school students can overcome disadvantage

Adam Tyner, Ph.D.

In the first chapter of their 2018 book, The Coddling of the American Mind, Greg Lukianoff and Jonathan Haidt argue that a distinctive feature of many modern, wealthy cultures is a broadened impulse to protect young people from difficulties.

Commentary
8.5.2020
Curriculum & Instruction, Teachers & School Leaders

What do school boards think about the 1619 Project curriculum?

Robert Pondiscio

A new survey of parents and school board members finds significant resistance, particularly among the latter group, to many of the controversial claims and ideas advanced by

Commentary
8.5.2020
Curriculum & Instruction, Teachers & School Leaders

Balancing learning loss against social and emotional harm

Victoria McDougald

Few parents are thrilled at the prospect of more distance learning in the fall, but a majority of adults worry that school reopening will worsen the pandemic. Parents and educators are also rightly concerned about children falling behind academically, as well as the social and emotional consequences of prolonged isolation from peers and other adults. For advice on how to balance all this, we turned to two school-system leaders, Juan Cabrera and Eva Moskowitz.

Commentary
8.3.2020
Governance, Teachers & School Leaders

Building a stronger, more equitable education system

LaVerne Evans Srinivasan

A massive amount of lost learning If ever there were a reminder that today’s young people are growing up with unprecedented challenges, it is the events of the past six months. With unfathomable speed, practically every aspect of our lives has been turned upside down.

Commentary
7.31.2020
Curriculum & Instruction, Advanced Education, Teachers & School Leaders

Many students with the potential to excel in STEM fields struggle in school

Joni Lakin, Jonathan Wai

Students who have the kinds of talent scientists and engineers need to solve problems by visualizing how objects could be rotated, combined or changed in three dimensions often struggle at school.

Commentary
7.29.2020
Charter Schools, Curriculum & Instruction, Governance, Teachers & School Leaders

The cancellers come for charter schools

Robert Pondiscio

Almost exactly twenty years ago, in August 2000, CBS News’s 60 Minutes aired a segment about a pair of charter schools—one in the South Bronx; another in Houston, Texas—founded by a duo of twenty-something White male teachers. To see it now is to catch a time capsule glimpse of a more earnest and hopeful time.

Commentary
7.29.2020
Governance, Teachers & School Leaders

School districts could try harder to reopen

Dale Chu

As coronavirus cases continue to rise, Colorado’s two largest school districts, Denver and Jeffco, recently announced their intention to start the school year remotely.

Commentary
7.27.2020
Facilities, Curriculum & Instruction, Teachers & School Leaders

No easy choices except to be kind (and butt out!)

Erika Sanzi

If we are to survive the stress and uncertainty of this year’s school reopenings, we are going to have to learn how to lead from a place of grace and empathy. None of this is easy. There are not any good, let alone perfect, options. The conditions on the ground are changing daily, and the personal circumstances of each family—whether teacher or student—are different.

Commentary
7.22.2020
Curriculum & Instruction, Governance, Teachers & School Leaders

Tutoring as an effective strategy in our troubled times

Robert Slavin, David Steiner

As state and district leaders face the challenges posed by Covid-19, safely reopening schools within the current budgets is first, second, and third on their priority list.

teacher and principal survey SR image
Commentary
7.15.2020
Teachers & School Leaders

Teacher and principals’ views from the Covid battle zone

Jeff Murray

The coronavirus pandemic has upended many facets of K–12 education but not the regular surveys of public school teachers and principals conducted several times annually for the RAND Corporation’s American Educator Panels.

teacher and principal survey SR image
Commentary
7.13.2020
Curriculum & Instruction, Personalized Learning

Response to “Let’s rebuild special education when schools reopen”

Alice Parker, Christopher T. Cross

The Fordham Institute recently published an article called “Let’s rebuild special education when schools reopen,” by Anne Delfosse and Miriam Kurtzig Freedman. Reading it prompted both of us to offer our own thoughts, drawn from experience.

Commentary
7.8.2020
Curriculum & Instruction, Governance, Teachers & School Leaders

Pity the history teachers

Michael J. Petrilli

As the start of the school year rushes toward us, teachers across America are girding themselves for their new role as “essential workers” during a persistent pandemic. But one group of teachers has it particularly rough: U.S. history instructors, who must also perform their duties during a full-scale culture war over how to tell the American story, especially on the central issue of race. As tempting as it may be, they shouldn’t sidestep controversies or smooth the edges with bland, antiseptic readings. This would lead only to bored, disengaged students, and contribute to our woeful knowledge of our nation’s history.

Commentary
7.8.2020
Teachers & School Leaders

Schools’ role in detecting child maltreatment

Amber M. Northern, Ph.D.

Early reporting of suspected maltreatment is one key to mitigating the damage that abuse can inflict on a child. Yet with millions of school age children having their classroom time shortchanged due to the coronavirus, a primary source of detection for maltreatment has been cut off—teachers.

Commentary
7.6.2020
Governance, Teachers & School Leaders

What are we going to do about school?

Jonathan V. Last

Editor’s note: This post was first sent as an email in The Bulwark’s newsletter “The Triad: Three things to read, from JVL.” 1. School?

Commentary
7.1.2020
Curriculum & Instruction, Governance, Teachers & School Leaders

Why grades matter

Chester E. Finn, Jr.

Pass-fail ratings in schools are widespread this pandemic-stricken spring. But when “passing” denotes anything that’s not “failing,” what signifies excellence? What distinguishes a first-rate research paper or book review or math proof from one that’s barely serviceable? Where’s the recognition for a student whose class participation is well-prepared, attentive, thoughtful and articulate versus the pupil who yawns, smirks, whispers, peeks at his phone and responds to direct questions with surly, one-word answers? Grades surround us and we depend on them in one realm of our lives after another.

Commentary
7.1.2020
Curriculum & Instruction, Teachers & School Leaders

A snapshot of substitute teaching in the U.S.

Amber M. Northern, Ph.D.

Illness. Family emergencies. In-service training requirements. On average, classroom teachers in the U.S.

Commentary
7.1.2020
Governance, Teachers & School Leaders

Anti-bullying laws work for female students

Tran Le

In the past twenty years, every state and the District of Columbia has passed state-level anti-bullying laws (ABLs), requiring school districts to develop policies that define bullying, encourage students to report victimization, and punish offenders.

Commentary
6.29.2020
Governance, Teachers & School Leaders

The worst is yet to come

Robert Pondiscio

We’ve reached the mop-up phase at the end of the fractured school year, the worst that most of us have ever seen. The consensus view, unsurprisingly, has been that the past few months have been a disaster. School districts were caught flat-footed and unprepared for the pandemic.