Commentary
State Innovation Priorities for State Testing Programs
John W. Oswald and Theodor Rebarber, AccountabilityWorks and the Education Leaders CouncilJune 2002
Commentary
Model Contractor Standards & State Responsibilities for State Testing Standards
S.E. Phillips and Theodor Rebarber, AccountabilityWorks and the Education Leaders CouncilJune 2002
Commentary
Independence of federal education data at risk
Diane Ravitch and Checker Finn warn that a House-passed bill to overhaul the Department of Education's office of educational research and improvement would damage the federal government's ability to report on the condition of education.
Commentary
Foundations withdraw grants to Pittsburgh school district
Convinced that the leadership battles between board and superintendent were creating a crisis for the Pittsburgh school district, three major local foundations announced that they were indefinitely suspending all funding to the district.
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Commentary
Attending a top high school hurts admission chances at selective colleges
It's not often that a study published in the journal Sociology of Education makes the front page of The Washington Post, but that's what happens when the study's findings suggest that sending junior to Andover may not have been such a good idea after all.
Commentary
Block scheduling lowers test scores
Block scheduling caused the test scores of high school students in Iowa to drop, according to a new study by Iowa State University. The popular reform, which ordinarily divides the school day into four 80-to-90 minute classes instead of the traditional schedule of eight classes of 45-to-50 minutes each, led to "markedly lower" ACT scores.
Commentary
Commentary
Efficiency, Accountability, and Equity Issues in Title I Schoolwide Program Implementation
edited by Kenneth K. Wong and Margaret C. Wang2002
Commentary
AFT argues for curricular coherence
The summer 2002 issue of American Educator, the A.F.T.'s flagship publication, now edited by Ruth Wattenberg, continues this quarterly's fine record of serious, thoughtful, constructive and nicely presented work.
Commentary
Who benefits from the Zelman decision?
On the Newsweek website last week, Jonathan Alter tried to debunk the notion that the Supreme Court's ruling will turn the educational and political tides in favor of vouchers and Republicans who favor them. ("America still hates vouchers") Mickey Kaus quickly refuted Alter in his Kausfiles column on Slate.
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Why vouchers can't be taken to scale
According to school choice critic Richard Kahlenberg, private school vouchers will never work because successes with small pilot-level voucher programs (which help some students at the expense of others) cannot be replicated when taken to scale.
Commentary
Public school choice provisions of No Child Left Behind Act kick in
Students in approximately 8,600 schools across the country must be given the option to attend a higher-performing school this year because the school they currently attend has failed to make adequate yearly progress, U.S. Secretary of Education Rod Paige announced last week.
Commentary
Reinventing special education
After nine months of labor, the President's Commission on Excellence in Special Education has given birth to a stunning report.
Commentary
Evaluating World History Texts in Wisconsin Public High Schools
Paul Kengor, Wisconsin Policy Research Institute ReportJune 2002
Commentary
Private School Racial Enrollments and Segregation
Sean Reardon and John Yun, The Civil Rights Project, Harvard UniversityJune 2002
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Commentary
In the wake of Zelman, where are the private schools?
The Supreme Court's voucher decision last Thursday produced cheers from many quarters, some of them expected (Institute for Justice, Senator Voinovich), others less so (President Bush, New Republic legal specialist Jeffrey Rosen).
Commentary
More training isn't the key to better teachers
When the Department of Education recently reported to Congress on the state of teacher quality and teacher training in America, Secretary Paige concluded that teacher licensure today depends too heavily on training in pedagogy, and recommended that pathways into teaching be created for individuals who lack coursework in education (
Commentary
Court says New York is meeting its obligation to prepare citizens for basic duties
A New York state appeals court last week reversed a lower court ruling that the state was not meeting its obligation to provide students in New York City with a sound, basic education.
Commentary
Initiative to help states, schools ensure that No Child is Left Behind
While the newspapers have abounded with reports of state and school-district concerns about the implementation of the No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB), the Department of Education last week announced the launch of a demonstration project aimed at helping states put the principles of NCLB into action.
Commentary
Class Size Reduction, Teacher Quality, and Academic Achievement in California Public Elementary Schools
Christopher Jepsen and Steven Rivkin, Public Policy Institute of California2002
Commentary
Beating the Odds II: A City-by-City Analysis of Student Performance and Achievement Gaps on State Assessments (Spring 2001 Results)
Council of the Great City SchoolsJune 2002
Commentary
School choice crossroads
In a forceful editorial the day after the Zelman decision, The Washington Post hailed the ruling, restated the need for experimentation, and urged choice opponents not to become fixated on blurring of church-state lines. "We don't belittle the dangers. But the dangers of vouchers are hypothetical ones at this stage.
Commentary
All Over The Map: State Policies to Improve the High School
Monica Martinez and Judy Bray, National Alliance on the American High SchoolMay 2002
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Commentary
A Consumer's Guide to Teacher Quality: Opportunity and Challenge in the No Child Left Behind Act of 2001
National Council on Teacher QualityMay 31, 2002
Commentary
Looking for leaders to run schools and districts
Last weekend, two dozen accomplished men and women-mid-career professionals from outside the education establishment-spent a weekend in boot camp training to become superintendents of urban school districts in a program aimed at funneling highly talented people into those key roles.
Commentary
Choice in Cleveland-and Beyond
The Supreme Court's Zelman ruling is plainly good for poor children in Cleveland. It also proves beyond dispute that policymakers can, if they want to, craft a school-voucher program that will pass (federal) constitutional muster. Somewhere in America, there are bound to be a few legislators who had been wavering on the voucher issue who will now lend it their support.
Commentary
Education philanthropy with a view to the bottom line
After selling Netscape for $700 million, former president and CEO Jim Barksdale and his wife Sally pledged $100 million to help children in Mississippi learn to read.