This year marks the twentieth edition of Education Week’s annual “Quality Counts” report, but not much has changed from the nineteenth—or other editions of recent vintage. Massachusetts is still the tops—with a handsome 86.8 out of a possible hundred points—and the nation’s only B-plus state for education. Maryland, New Jersey, and Vermont are next in line, each earning a B.
The ink is dry on the bill, the interest groups are mollified, and the lobbyists have made the first payments on their tastefully appointed condominiums. Now that the Every Student Achieves Act has become the law of the land, it’s time to examine its implications for our federal education bureaucracy.
Officials at the Department of Education have requested public comments by January 21 about areas in the new Every Student Succeeds Act where regulation might be “helpful or necessary.” My recommendation to the feds: Tread ver
Let’s just stop pussyfooting around and say it out loud: The “historic” peak in the country’s high school graduation rate is bullshit.
This week, teachers’ unions continued their battle over mandatory “agency fees” in the Supreme Court case Friedrichs v.
In a recent blog post, Jason Bedrick of the Cato Institute attributes the apparently troubling results of a recent study on Louisiana’s private school voucher program to the theory that “[r]egulations intended to guarantee quality might well have had the opposite effect.
Lessons from Ohio’s best charter schools
Tomorrow in Columbia, South Carolina, the Jack Kemp Foundation will receive a coterie of scholars, policy mavens, and politicos at its Kemp Forum on Expanding Opportunity.
A new study from the National Bureau of Economic Research examines how Louisiana’s statewide voucher program affects student achievement. The Pelican State expanded its program statewide in 2012; by 2014, twelve thousand students had applied for more than six thousand slots to attend 126 private schools.
I encountered a bit of advice this week that my dear mother would have welcomed during her brief and inglorious career as my pre-Algebra tutor: When it comes to assisting kids with their math assignments, parents can afford to do less.
Both ranking and grades have dropped for Ohio
The miseducation of Donald Trump voters, a brave and bold take on sex education, student pressure in a New Jersey district, and the effectiveness of school vouchers in Louisiana.
By Robert Pondiscio
I re-read about fifty major articles, blog posts, and other missives about ESSA over the break, since this written record will serve as the foundation for years of commentary and analysis. Below are the five major themes that jumped out (along with gobs of the supporting links).1. The diminished role of Uncle Sam in schools
As everyone knows, the Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA)—the long-overdue reauthorization of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act—was approved by overwhelming bipartisan majorities in the House and Senate and signed into law by the president in December.
Money to expand high-performing charters should not be jeopardized by bad actors
As 2015 was coming to a close, I compiled a list of my fifty favorite reads of the year. You can find them all here.
Editor's note: This post was first published on Flypaper on May 5, 2015.
Spending time with nieces and nephews this holiday season—teenagers who are making decisions about where to go to college, what to study, and which vocations to pursue—has reminded me of just how lucky I am to have one of the best jobs in the world.
This year has been one of the most consequential for education reform in quite some time.
Fourteen states have seen positive policy changes since NACSA’s inaugural report last year. By Jamie Davies O’Leary
In time for Christmas, a how-to book for philanthropists who want to bring new life to Catholic schools. By Kate Stringer
The importance of making history an academic priority once again. By Robert Pondisico
The best compliment I can pay a fellow education blogger is to confess professional jealousy. By Robert Pondiscio
Celebrate National School Choice Week in Columbus on January 27
