Patrick Riccards
10.12.2026
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Editor’s note: This essay is an entry in Fordham’s 2026 Wonkathon, which asked contributors to answer this question: “What rules should govern the uses of digital technology in schools—and who should set them?” Learn more.

I have come here to bury tech bans, not to praise them.

For too long, when we have talked about technology in the classroom, we have started the conversation with an adversarial construction. In doing so, we fail to recognize that every student today, from kindergarten through 12th grade, is a digital native. They have grown up with technology at their fingertips, whether it be watching their favorite educational programs on a tablet, playing a learning game on a parent’s phone, or doing a classroom lesson on a computer. The era of No. 2 pencils and papers with chunks of wood floating in it is over, no matter how much luddites may want to bring it back.

So when we call for cell phone bans, internet firewalls, removal of Chromebooks or tablets, or any other such all-or-nothing technological demands, we are ultimately seeking to unplug and deskill our students. We are taking away their primary information and learning tool because the adults in the room do not understand how to make the most of it in today’s learning environment.

Ultimately, the question is not what should or should not be allowed in a K–12 classroom in 2026. The question should be how we best use all of the learning tools we have at our disposal to improve teaching and learning, particularly in low-resourced classrooms or with those students who are struggling to achieve proficiency. We aren’t talking about replacing teachers with a computer or a robot. We are talking about equipping educators with everything we have so they can better connect with those digital native learners in their classrooms.

Yet we continue to see states, districts, and schools speak of technology from a deficiency mindset, as we shift from banning cell phones in classrooms to now blocking those same learners from understanding how to apply AI in the instructional practice. Why? We seek to reject that which we do not understand. And, unfortunately, most states, districts, and even those ed schools preparing all of those teachers for our public school districts, just do not understand that technology is just a tool to improve teaching—it isn’t the act of teaching itself.

So we must ask, instead of simply issuing a blanket NO every time the latest proven technology begins to make its way into the classroom, what exactly is the role of states, districts, and schools in supporting educators with effective tech use?

To answer that question, we need to recognize that SEAs, LEAs, and schools each have an important but different role in the process. The goal should not be to train educators to use technology, or to prevent them from using it entirely. It should be to help them use the right technology, for the right purpose, at the right time.

States should establish the broad conditions for effective practice. They can provide evidence-based technology standards, procurement guidance, student-data-privacy requirements, accessibility expectations, and high-quality professional-learning resources. States can also help their school districts avoid having to independently evaluate hundreds of competing products, just as they have with statewide adoptions in subjects like reading. We already know that state guidance can establish principles and guardrails that can empower LEAs to make their own decisions, rather than prescribe legislative bans or force a single technology model for every classroom to adhere to.

School districts should translate those principles into coherent instructional strategy. They should develop a limited, vetted technology ecosystem rather than allowing every classroom to become a collection of disconnected apps (since we’ve already seen how ineffective a collection of disconnected curriculum decisions is for student proficiency in subjects like reading, math, and science). LEAs should provide sustained professional learning—not one-time workshops—along with coaching, peer collaboration, model lessons, technical support, and time for teachers to experiment and reflect. Technology adoption should also be evaluated based on student outcomes (determined by quantifiable data), teacher experience, accessibility, cost, privacy, and whether it actually improves instruction.

Schools and school leaders are closest to the classroom and therefore have a particularly important role. Principals and instructional leaders should help teachers ask, “What learning problem are we trying to solve?” before asking, “What technology should we use?” They should create opportunities for teachers to share successful practices, observe one another, and discuss what is and isn’t working. They also need to protect teachers from the expectation that every new technological innovation must immediately become part of classroom practice.

Finally, teachers should remain the instructional decision makers. Effective technology integration requires professional judgment. A state can approve a platform, and a district can purchase it, but neither can determine whether it is the right tool for a particular lesson, student, or learning objective. Of course, this requires schools of education that have properly prepared novice teachers to make such determinations, lessons that the vast majority of ed schools simply are not teaching today.

The larger principle is that professional development should focus less on the mechanics of technology and more on pedagogy: how technology can deepen inquiry, personalize learning, strengthen feedback, increase student creation and collaboration, and develop critical thinking. Technology training should ultimately make teachers better teachers—not simply make them more proficient users of technology. If this pedagogy sounds familiar, it should. These are the same principles schools, LEAs, and states tried to instill in pursuit of both STEM skill and 21st century skill movements.  

For too many years, whether on the state or district level, those making policy on education technology have largely focused on “screen time” and the dangers of technology and virtues of ol’-fashioned learning. Instead, the more meaningful distinction for policy discussions should be between technology that deepens thinking and technology that displaces thinking. A cell phone in the classroom is not the problem. A cell phone being used for research or being used to examine digital copies of artifacts of the American Revolution is an effective use of technology. A cell phone being used to scroll TikTok during science class is not. It isn’t the tech. It’s how it is used and how the teacher applies the technology to the lessons of the day.

No matter at what level the policy is being considered, we need to stop asking the question, “Should we allow students to use this technology in our classrooms?” Instead, from the governor’s office down to the classroom teacher, we need to be asking, “Does this technology help students learn something more deeply, efficiently, creatively, collaboratively, or accessibly than they could otherwise?”

If the answer to that question is yes, it doesn’t matter if the lesson is coming from ancient parchment or a TikTok. If it is connecting with the learner and making the lesson stick, we should allow it to be in the teacher’s toolbox to use when she feels it is needed.

Policy Priority:
High Expectations
Thomas Briggs
10.12.2026
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Editor’s note: This essay is an entry in Fordham’s 2026 Wonkathon, which asked contributors to answer this question: “What rules should govern the uses of digital technology in schools—and who should set them?” Learn more.

Author’s note: These are my own views, not an official position of the Center for Educational Progress, where I’m Director of Operations. In the interest of disclosure: CEP is currently the plaintiff in a lawsuit against Curriculum Associates, the maker of i-Ready, challenging certain of i-Ready’s marketing claims. Nothing here should be read as commentary on that case, on any legislation CEP is involved in, or on any other product or vendor.

1. Frictionless surfaces

Much talk about how ed tech can or should be used in the schools reminds me of a particular type of high school physics problem. They’re the ones that begin with “Assuming a frictionless surface…,” and they often describe a scenario where an object’s velocity stays constant because it isn’t encountering any resisting forces. Despite describing conditions that do not exist in the real world, these models still work—i.e., produce close-enough answers—because the effects of the friction that they assume away are usually small, and so can be factored in afterward.

Popular arguments and programs in favor of ed tech adoption frequently make similar assumptions. The problem is that friction in the classroom, the home, and the schools is of a different kind than the forces assumed away in those basic physics problems. An ed tech product might show clear gains in a controlled setting: maybe it’s a supervised pilot, or a particularly motivated school or classroom adopting a device for a clear, limited purpose. Those results then get touted at trade shows or advertised to an Assistant Superintendent for Curriculum & Instruction, who usually exists in a procurement regime that incentivizes constantly adopting new technologies—mostly just software now—because the future of learning always had to be digital.

Yet all of these new software packages are getting loaded onto one-to-one laptops and tablets that students are now using in class and are expected to use at home. And neither in the classroom nor at home are those frictional forces as minimal as they are in the physics problems. Distractions, multitasking, and the glowing pull of machines that are literally built to do everything are the main forces acting on the object. They are the new learning environment we built.

2. Abstracting and idealizing

All reasoning abstracts: it leaves things out, and research (especially education research) has to as well. One way it can go awry, though, is through idealization: reasoning about agents by attributing capacities that real humans lack, and then treating those capacities as the standard.[1] Ed tech’s evidentiary habits do both. They (and we) frequently reason about a kind of student that doesn’t really exist and then appeal to implementation problems to explain why new learning software hasn’t worked. But the flaws are in the way we model ed tech generally.

What education policymakers need is a revolution in the old sense of the word: a turning back. Instructional software should have to prove it beats analog materials under conditions students actually learn in. And the decision whether it has or has not must sit with individual districts; not with vendors, nor outsourced to some state agency list of products keyed to ESSA evidence tiers that don’t have enough to say about real classroom conditions. What states should do is establish a clear standard—like “Any instructional software purchase must carry the burden of proof against an analog comparator under deployment conditions”—and then ensure that district-level adoption decisions follow it.

3. Software and noise

Why the special standard for ed tech, i.e., new educational software, when hardly any educational product, analog or digital, has been subject to such a regime?

Because laptops and tablets are different from textbooks and worksheets. The latter are designed to do one thing, but laptops and tablets are designed to do…everything.[2] The nature of the digital device is to not specialize for any particular task, but to maximize use cases across domains. So they’re good for answering emails, watching short-form videos, playing video games, browsing the web, and so on. Moreover, digital devices and the apps on them are designed to maximize how much each individual uses them. The essence of their design is to capture our attention, and so the frictions are latent in the products themselves. Attentional derailment devices, of a sort.  

The field of education already struggles to get clean signals. Multiple large meta-analyses have shown that education research, broadly speaking, suffers from serious epistemological problems. This ranges from the methods it uses to produce knowledge to the standards it holds peer-reviewed research to. The latter is part of a larger replication crisis in the social sciences, and the former also directly impedes getting better, more efficient practices to teachers and schools.

Now, more and more learning is being done through broader and more “personalized” learning software packages. Whatever that will ultimately mean for education research, I suspect the end result will be more noise and more opaque signals. When we consider current research into ed tech, however, the idealized student-user implicit in much of it frequently adds a layer of bias to the results. Where it might be possible to cut through noise with enough data, a bias resulting from an idealized model user will keep distorting results no matter how large the sample. All of this, to me, suggests the more reasonable attitude to take toward ed tech adoption is a default skepticism of any software’s claims to improve learning.

4. District decisions, state standards

So what would carrying the burden of proof look like? State education agencies could supply a common protocol for carrying out on-site pilots under real conditions: some classrooms could use the new software program, while comparable classrooms would use the analog materials that the ed tech claims to effectively replace. Every purchase request would have to name the analog comparator being replaced alongside the evidence that emerged from the classroom deployment trial. Lacking either, the request would be denied. A similar test could be required for any software contract renewal, too, which would prevent schools getting locked in to products that frequently get worse or bloated over time.

Districts could also start with weaker, more feasible versions of the analog standard by conducting the test during summer learning programs, or in supplemental instructional periods with students who are lagging or struggling more than their peers. (They could even start by comparing new ed tech products to ones they already use.) But because the standard would only apply to student-facing ed tech, it would not prevent teachers and administrators from using cutting-edge technologies to improve everything happening around and behind instructional time. AI-powered software obviously has immense potential to streamline administrative processes, and teacher-facing diagnostics and planning tools are already starting to arrive. The risk will be that these products get bundled with less-effective, flashy student-facing ones, locking schools into entire “systems” that end up eating budgets and employee time with few benefits to show. Districts should thus require student-facing components to be priced and bundled separately.

5. Slow progress is good progress 

Maybe the country is already too far down the ed tech rabbit hole to make a strict “analog comparator standard” feasible. But there are nearly 14,000 districts that are at least able to try some version of it. While the standard won’t undo years of one-to-one rollouts overnight, perhaps it does not need to. All that’s needed is to get the ball rolling in the right direction again, making sure to factor in the friction this time. That will be the first step toward restoring a healthy technological environment in the schools.

[1] O’Neill, “Abstraction, Idealization and Ideology in Ethics,” in J.D.G. Evans (ed.), Moral Philosophy and Contemporary Problems (Royal Institute of Philosophy Lecture Series 22, Cambridge University Press, 1987), pp. 55–69.

[2] Thanks to Laura Mazer for making this point clear to me.

Jessica Poiner
10.12.2026
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In Ohio, where policymakers and educators are working to boost student outcomes, ensuring that kids show up to school is critical. Students who have never been chronically absent[1] are six times more likely to read on grade level by the end of third grade and nine times more likely to graduate from high school on time. Being chronically absent, meanwhile, can negatively impact both academic and social-emotional development.

During the height of the pandemic, Ohio’s statewide chronic absenteeism rate skyrocketed to 30 percent. It has yet to return to pre-pandemic levels. Figure 1, which displays the statewide chronic absenteeism rate over time, shows that the biggest drop since the pandemic was just over 3 percentage points in 2022–23. Since then, Ohio has been stuck in the mud. Each year, the statewide rate ticks downward by roughly 1 percentage point. If progress doesn’t accelerate, Ohio won’t return to its pre-pandemic rate until 2033. That’s 11 years after the initial spike and nearly the entire length of a student’s K–12 career.

Figure 1. Ohio’s statewide chronic absenteeism rate, 2018–2026

Chronic absenteeism blog figure 1
*2019–20 has been excluded due to pandemic-related disruptions that impacted the data.

It’s deeply concerning that almost a fourth of Ohio students were chronically absent during the 2025–26 school year. But it’s especially worrisome that in some districts, absenteeism rates are even higher. Table 1 identifies nine locales that registered rates above 50 percent during the 2025–26 school year. These same districts also had rates above 50 percent during the two previous school years (with the exception of Mt. Healthy, which had a rate of 49 percent in 2023–24). That’s three straight years of more than half of the student population missing at least 10 percent of instructional time. Moreover, four of them actually got worse in 2025–26: Garfield Heights, East Cleveland, Columbus, and Mt. Healthy.

Table 1. Districts with chronic absenteeism rates above 50 percent in 2025–26

Chronic absenteeism blog table 1

To their credit, state leaders have attempted to address Ohio’s sky-high numbers. In 2024, the Department of Education and Workforce (DEW) published the Ohio Attendance Guide, which outlined district and school practices for early intervention. That same year, Ohio joined more than a dozen other states in pledging to cut chronic absenteeism by half. In 2025, policymakers revamped state law and required districts to update their absence policies accordingly. And earlier this year, DEW launched a new statewide attendance dashboard that helps local leaders and the public track attendance trends and chronic absenteeism rates by district, school building, and grade level.

It will take some time to determine if the more recent efforts have an impact. (The 2026–27 school year is the first full year of implementation for both the revamped law and the dashboard). In the meantime, lawmakers might be tempted to put chronic absenteeism on the back burner. But that would be a mistake. Although attendance is largely a local issue, state policymakers play a critical role in creating an environment where schools can successfully boost attendance. With that in mind, here are three proposals lawmakers should implement as soon as possible.

1. Beef up accountability for attendance.

State report cards currently include chronic absenteeism as one of several indicators on the Gap Closing component. There are two ways schools receive credit for this indicator: meeting the statewide target rate, or reducing their chronic absenteeism rate from the previous year. Although it makes sense to give schools credit for reducing their rates, the current bar for reduction is far too low. Districts with rates above 36 percent—more than one-third of their students are chronically absent—need only reduce their rate by just 1.1 percentage points. Under this standard, several of the districts identified in Table 1 received full credit from the state for “closing the gap” on absenteeism even though they posted rates above 50 percent for a third consecutive year. To improve Ohio’s attendance numbers, DEW should increase the required absenteeism reduction rate to 5 percentage points for a school or district to receive credit on the state report card.

2. Meet families where they are.

In 2024, researchers at Brookings found that less than half of caretakers with a child at risk of being chronically absent reported being concerned about it. Remember, research is clear that chronic absenteeism can negatively impact both academic and social-emotional development. If families aren’t worried about absenteeism, it’s likely because they don’t realize why they should be.

One way to get that message across is to go out into the community and meet families where they are. In the spring of 2021, state leaders in Connecticut launched a home-visit initiative called the Learner Engagement and Attendance Program. As part of the program, 15 high-need districts were provided with funding to pay for school staff and community organizers to visit nearly 8,700 chronically absent students in their homes. A mixed-methods evaluation conducted by the Center for Connecticut Education Research Collaboration indicates that the program had a meaningful impact.

Connecticut’s initial investment cost roughly $10 million.[2] Ohio could mirror this try-it-and-see approach by establishing a pilot project for a small number of districts. Asking interested districts to apply would ensure local buy-in. And using the state’s attendance dashboard to closely track absenteeism rates among all applicants—districts that were accepted into the pilot, as well as those who applied but didn’t receive funding—would allow for a genuine evaluation of the program’s effectiveness.

3. Help schools do the heavy lifting.

Another innovative way state leaders could combat chronic absenteeism is by investing in attendance coaches. As with the home-visit initiative, state leaders could establish a pilot program that invites interested districts to apply for a state-funded attendance coach to work in their district. Coaches could collaborate with administrators to analyze real-time data provided by the state’s dashboard, evaluate current prevention and intervention efforts, identify ways to improve, and train staff on effective implementation. They could support teachers by managing communication with the families of chronically absent students. And they could support students by building relationships with those who are frequently absent and working alongside them and their families to dismantle barriers to attendance. As part of its early literacy initiative, Ohio has sent more than 100 literacy coaches into schools to support science of reading implementation. Why not try something similar to boost attendance? 

***

It’s disheartening that Ohio has made so little progress on chronic absenteeism in recent years. But now isn’t the time to bury our heads in the sand and accept the much higher post-Covid absenteeism rates as the new normal. There are practical and innovative solutions available that could bolster efforts that are already underway. Now is the time for policymakers to act—Ohio kids and families deserve it.

[1] Chronic absenteeism is defined as missing at least 10 percent of instructional time for any reason.

[2] Initially, Connecticut designated just over $10 million in federal Covid-relief funding to support these 15 districts. State lawmakers went on to appropriate additional funds—$7 million in 2022 and another $7 million in 2023—to sustain operations through December 2026.

Policy Priority:
Standards & Accountability
Topics:
Governance
Jeff Murray
10.12.2026
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  1. Summer is over and the Anti-Voucher-Palooza tour has concluded. Now, apparently, we’re into the Season of Charter School Hate. Because that sentiment is everywhere all of a sudden. First up, an op-ed from the Akron Beacon Journal which attempts to lambaste the state’s ESSA amendment proposal that would increase the options for intervention in chronically-underperforming schools. Specifically, it is the option to close a district building and reopen it as a charter school which draws their particular ire. They prefer a “send more money with no strings attached” approach which, they say, is what helped the Helen Arnold Community Learning Center climb to the heights that it has currently reached. Given that school’s most recent report card, I feel like they should probably look for a different example. (Akron Beacon Journal, 10/11/26)

  2. Meanwhile, Signal Cleveland calls the state law which gives charter school operators right of first refusal on buying unused district buildings “tricky” for districts to get around. (Duh. That’s why they call them “laws”.) But it is apparently a district’s prerogative to do all they can in that regard because it’s totally OK to flout the law if it’s done to hose charter schools. It is clear from this piece, however, that Cleveland Metropolitan School District has shrunk so much and held on to so many nearly-empty buildings for so long that there is not enough non-charter entities to take all of the inventory off their hands…even with the zero-dollar sweetheart deals available. While charter buyers have been locked out up until now (even the rebellious Signal warns “that could change”), I see that some private school operators have already been allowed through without comment. So it seems CMSD is not fighting competition generally, but charter schools specifically—this season’s bêtes noirs. (Signal Cleveland, 10/12/26)

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Policy Priority:
School Funding
Topics:
Governance
Jeff Murray
10.9.2026
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More division in Indy

Indianapolis Public Schools continues to propose big operational changes that they say will save the cash-strapped district money, but also appear calibrated to cause division in a city attempting to build a new paradigm of educational cooperation. The latest: Discontinuation of the district/charter partnership called Innovation Schools. Shared services between IPS and the 30 non-district Innovation schools (facility use, transportation, etc.) will begin winding down soon, after more than 10 years of partnership. Brandon Brown, CEO of the Indy-based Mind Trust organization, responded to these moves in an op-ed this week. He reminds readers that the district shares more than just classroom space and school buses with charters in the Innovation partnership—they also share test scores and report cards. “Since 2021,” he writes, “independent and innovation charter schools have achieved significantly larger English language arts and math proficiency gains than IPS direct-run schools or the Marion County average across nearly every student group. For example, Black and Hispanic students at innovation charter schools achieved ELA gains at more than four times the rate of their peers at IPS direct-run schools.” Despite this fact, Indy district leaders still seem laser-focused on the money.

More drama in Oklahoma

The next step after a federal judge decided that Oklahoma cannot deny the application of a religiously-affiliated charter school solely because it would provide a faith-based education is set to take place next week. Ben Gamla Jewish Charter School’s application to start a virtual school will be back in front of the Statewide Charter School Board on Monday. There’s lots of inflammatory detail in this coverage, but the only thing that really matters is that the board is voting. It’s likely that legal wrangling will recommence immediately afterward, regardless of the tally.

New drama in North Carolina

A group of North Carolina charter schools whose state report card results were lower than expected due to changes in the way student retests are counted are trying to get some relief. They liken the situation to “changing the game midway through,” and note that many of the schools will face consequences from their authorizers if the lower scores stand. So far, they have been rebuffed by the Department of Public Instruction, but they and the North Carolina Charter Schools Review Board plan to persist in requesting changes.

Capital

The Progressive’s Public Schools Advocate project dug into the details of ACCEL Schools’ recent unsuccessful effort to buy a defunct college campus and launch a new charter school in Washington County, Wisconsin. They conclude that it was local residents’ fear of a connection between ACCEL and foreign private equity firms that supercharged their opposition to the move—rather than typical concerns about district competition—and that their opposition scuttled the deal. Hopefully that’s true, because competition is coming anyway: FaithRidge Christian School ultimately bought the college property and they are bringing their entire operation to the new site, planning to quadruple their enrollment.

Not all the news can be bad

We end this week with a nice profile of Portage Leadership Academy, a brand-new K-5 charter school in Ravenna, Ohio. “The biggest thing we really try to focus in on,” said principal Zack Penrod, “is the concept of leadership through character.” This approach comes honestly to Penrod, a retired U.S. Army captain. And while his staff is already on board, he knows that leading students in that direction is a work in progress. “Kids are kids,” he says. “They have emotions, they have feelings, and sometimes they don't make the right decision. Which is fair. It's my job to teach, coach and mentor them.” Here’s hoping for a successful inaugural year!

*****

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Policy Priority:
School Choice
Topics:
Charter Schools
The Education Gadfly
10.9.2026
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WHAT WE’RE READING

What began as a strike at a single high school over France’s inequitable education system has grown into a national wave of protests, some turning violent and many bringing instruction to a halt. Thomas Chatterton Williams believes the violent unrest reflects nihilistic resentment more than a push for school reform:

For some time now, there has been an existential crisis at the heart of French life, rooted in a pervasive sense that the future will never equal the past, that the state cannot achieve what its citizens expect. The national pie is often seen as zero-sum, which explains why so many constituencies, from retirees to high schoolers, refuse to give an inch. Their anger accumulates, then it boils over. And the government is either unwilling or unable to contain it.

—

Parents across the U.S. are coming together to protect or expand recess time. Emily Tate Sullivan describes the current legislative landscape for recess and why many adults believe unstructured play time is a critical part of the school day. Recess is great—but is there any limiting principle when it comes to state mandates anymore?

EXTRA CREDIT:

Chad Aldeman, “Philanthropy Once Built Schools. Today, It Could Build a New Way to Learn Math”

Thomas Arnett, “Why AI Tutors Aren’t Transforming Education”

Kirsten Baesler, “Stronger States, Stronger Outcomes: Building the Capacity for States to Lead”

Jeb Bush, “Trust in Education Has Fallen. It’s Time to Bring Back Strong Accountability”

Jay Greene, “School Choice, Not Test Scores, Produces Real Accountability”

Rick Hess and Ian Rowe, “Why Don’t We Talk More About Family Structure in Schooling?”

Colleen Hroncich, “Give Choice a Chance in West Virginia”

Joel Klein, “Nikole Hannah-Jones vs. Randi Weingarten”

John Moscatiello, “The Decline and Fall of Rigor in Advanced Placement”

Allison Dulin Salisbury and Sara Allan, “The Big Bets Education Needs in the Age of AI”

Megan Schopp, “The Other AI”

Andy Smarick, “Does Education Reform Have Regrets?” (and see Chris Stewart’s response below)

Isobel Stevenson, “Invisible Classrooms: What We’ve Learned About Education News Since the Nikole Hannah-Jones Essay”

Chris Stewart, “The war that ended multiracial ed reform”

Paul Vallas, “School Choice, Not Reparations, Is the Ticket to Success for Chicago’s Minority Families”

Rajiv Vinnakota, “Civic Skills Are Job Skills”

Natalie Wexler, “Yes, Writing Does Advance Thinking”

Daniel Willingham, “When Everyone Makes Sense and Nobody Learns”

Matthew Yglesias, “Why Schools Need a Phonics-Style Reckoning for Math” (repeated from last week but now without a paywall)

—

P.S. Want even more for your to-read pile? Our compilation of responses to the Nikole Hannah-Jones article is up to over 100 articles!

Editor's note: This was first published on Mike Petrilli's Substack, SCHOOLED, a free Substack and email newsletter restarting the education-reform conversation. Click here to subscribe for sharp analysis of the week’s biggest K–12 debates, curated commentary from across the ed-policy world, and lively discussion—including reader reactions and pushback.

The Education Gadfly
10.9.2026
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CHEERS

According to newly released data from the Congressional Budget Office, inflation-adjusted household incomes have steadily increased for decades. Reason’s Eric Boehm highlights how “poorer Americans have seen the largest relative gains over the past few decades—a fact that is particularly inconvenient for populists on both right and left.” He’s right that rising incomes are worth cheering, though they make our lackluster student achievement trends look even worse.

—

Ohio’s Department of Education and Workforce is seeking more power to intervene in chronically underperforming Title I schools. Districts and the teachers unions may not love it, as the Akron Beacon Journal’s Kelli Weir reports, but over half of the approximately 230 schools on the state’s comprehensive support and improvement list have sat there since 2022. My Fordham Institute colleague Aaron Churchill points out that “when local control has failed, the state has an obligation—on behalf of students—to take more aggressive steps to turn around a low-performing school.”

JEERS

“After the New York State Education Department denied a request from U.S. News for AP scores, perennially top-ranked schools plummeted,” explains Matthew Haag in the New York Times. Jeers to the state for its lack of transparency—especially if the point was to deny Success Academy its well-earned bragging rights.

Editor's note: This was first published on Mike Petrilli's Substack, SCHOOLED, a free Substack and email newsletter restarting the education-reform conversation. Click here to subscribe for sharp analysis of the week’s biggest K–12 debates, curated commentary from across the ed-policy world, and lively discussion—including reader reactions and pushback.