Commentary
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Commentary
Commentary
Accountability & Testing, Governance, Teachers & School Leaders
The assessment that does everything is too good to be true
More than a dozen states are designing, piloting, or implementing some form of through-year assessment as a replacement for the traditional end-of-year test used for federal accountability. But their enthusiasm rests on a shaky assumption: that a single assessment can simultaneously satisfy accountability requirements, improve instruction, provide timely feedback, reduce testing burden, preserve local flexibility, and produce valid statewide comparisons.
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Evidence-Based Learning, Curriculum & Instruction, Governance, Teachers & School Leaders
What a recent survey tells us about teachers and the science of reading
Editor’s note: This discussion between members of the Fordham research team and Kari Kurto, The Reading League’s National Director of Policy and Partnerships, comes in the wake of Fordham’s recent survey, From the Teacher’s Desk: A Science of Reading Progress Report.
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The future of education philanthropy
OpenAI, Anthropic, and SpaceX are all planning to go public in coming months, which will create a new crop of billionaires and centi-millionaires—and likely Earth’s first trillionaire. Here’s how Nan Ransohoff put it in a Substack post that’s been making the rounds:
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Evidence-Based Learning
How parents affect children’s college majors
Choosing a college major requires young people to balance their interests, academic ability, future job prospects, and expected financial return. Some majors pay off right away with solid employment outcomes and high earnings, while others take years to fully realize returns—if indeed they ever do.
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Governance, Standards, Teachers & School Leaders
A second wind for standards?
Recent weeks have brought a few encouraging signs that the decades-long effort to kill academic standards in the name of equity has wreaked enough havoc and that something of a counter-movement can be glimpsed.
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Evidence-Based Learning, Curriculum & Instruction, Teachers & School Leaders
How can states and systems help teacher preparation programs with the science of reading?
For the last several years, as more than 40 states have invested in evidence-based literacy instruction, national attention has understandably focused on the K–12 implementation efforts that have the most direct impacts on students, including widely discussed change efforts like that in Mississippi
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Evidence-Based Learning, Curriculum & Instruction, Governance, Advanced Education, Teachers & School Leaders
Mixed-achievement math classrooms are a net negative
It’s much disputed in England whether grouping students by achievement level or mixing them together is a more effective strategy for teaching in secondary schools. This practice resembles achievement grouping in the U.S., particularly when done in specific subjects like math.
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Evidence-Based Learning, School Finance, Governance, Advanced Education
Broad support, barely funded: The paradox of advanced education in America
For every dollar states spend on K–12 education, less than half a penny is earmarked for advanced learning. This surprising finding comes from our recent study of K–12 education spending in the U.S., generously supported by the Carina Initiative.
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Accountability & Testing, Evidence-Based Learning, Curriculum & Instruction, Governance, Teachers & School Leaders
Why is Gen Z obsessed with technology?
Editor’s note: This is the second in a three-part series written by Elainah Elkins and Jill Hoppe, born in 1999 and 2000, respectively. There is growing discourse surrounding Gen Z, but the voices of Gen Zers themselves are often missing from the conversation. This is their response.
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Governance, Teachers & School Leaders
The diminishing power of teacher unions
Our latest study gauges teacher union strength in every state. Those with the strongest are Vermont, California, Massachusetts, New Jersey, and Hawaii. The states with the weakest are Arkansas, Oklahoma, Tennessee, North Carolina, and Mississippi. There’s a clear red state/blue state divide, but that’s not the whole story.
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Evidence-Based Learning, Curriculum & Instruction, Teachers & School Leaders
Flawed curricular materials aren’t the only reason students aren’t reading enough whole books
For many of us born in the twentieth century, “English class” evokes memories of tattered copies of The Great Gatsby or Macbeth, chapter-a-night reading assignments, and that all-too-familiar sinking feeling when the next day’s pop quiz appeared.
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Curriculum & Instruction, Governance, Teachers & School Leaders
If school boards approve curriculum, they should understand it
School board members are possibly the most overlooked decision-makers in education, and they rarely dominate reform conversations. However, local school board members routinely approve one of the most important decisions school districts make: curriculum. As science of reading reforms accelerate across districts and states, this role is becoming more consequential—and more complicated.
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“The wise use of powerful tools”
Shortly after being elected Pope in 2025, Leo XIV explained that he chose his name as an homage to Pope Leo XIII, who is remembered for his historic 1891 Encyclical Rerum Novarum, which provided an enduring framework for tackling the enormous social and ergonomic disruptions
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Accountability & Testing, Governance
The Nation’s Report Card gets an overdue upgrade
The National Assessment Government Board made some very good news last week, albeit a decade or two late, when it voted to commence more frequent testing of civics and, especially, to make 12th grade results available at the state level.
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Curriculum & Instruction, Governance, Teachers & School Leaders
Everyone loves recess, but should states mandate it?
From Oklahoma to California, states across the political spectrum are moving to require
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Governance, Teachers & School Leaders
Does “a portrait of a graduate” downplay rigorous academic expectations?
It’s commencement season, including for my firstborn son, who graduates high school in less than two weeks. So it’s a good time to check in on the “portrait of a graduate” movement. If that term is unfamiliar to you, CASEL defines it as:
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Evidence-Based Learning
Can schools prepare graduates for an uncertain future?
High school graduation season is upon us. Across the U.S., graduation rates are up—whether through grade inflation, credit recovery programs, or genuine persistence—while interest in traditional four-year college attendance wanes.
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Evidence-Based Learning, Teachers & School Leaders
Can sports reduce chronic absenteeism? Evidence from Indiana
During the 2024–25 school year, more than 8.2 million students participated in high school sports, with varsity athletes representing an important subset of that group.
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Curriculum & Instruction, Advanced Education, Teachers & School Leaders
Sharing students is key to success for these 3rd grade educators
Editor’s note: This was first published by The 74. “We want to be good readers. We want to understand, not just get a good score on a test.”
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Evidence-Based Learning, Career & Technical Education, Governance
What do we know about the value of CTE credentials?
A new Fordham report estimates the value of earning industry-recognized credentials and certificates as part of high school CTE pathways. The study provides some of the best evidence to date on the economic value of technical education that students can earn during high school. Now, Shaun Dougherty, one of the nation’s leading CTE scholars, puts the Plasman study in the context of the larger research literature.
