• Forty-four percent of Gen Z men say they had no romantic relationships as teenagers, compared to 32 percent of Millennial men, 23 percent of Gen X men, and 20 percent of Boomer men. —American Institute for Boys and Men
• “Wrong ideas about teacher pay, happiness may keep students from the profession” —Chad Aldeman, The 74

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1. Columbus City Schools’ new Facilities Taskforce had its first meeting yesterday. It was characterized as an evening for introductions and expectations, as well as “level setting”. In this brief coverage, we learn that members were told the district has too many buildings and not enough students—which I’m sure everyone already knew since it’s been true for years—and that the district is spending more money on building maintenance than on academics. Which could have been new information to some folks. All of these tidbits (and more—check out the first bullet point on that slide!) paint a picture of a big bureaucracy with a ton of income and two tons of expenses. Can they be controlled? We shall see. (ABC-6 News, Columbus, 2/13/24).
    
2. But honestly, it seems that many Ohio school districts could be characterized the same way. Here’s a look at how Youngstown City Schools spent $78 million in federal Covid-relief funds between 2021 and 2024. Kudos to the local TV news for putting all this together, but I think we know now that their suggestions of questionable spending amounts and recipients probably don’t add up to anything actionable. It is simply the way school district spending shakes out (more on maintenance/healthcare/materials than academics), especially in large urban areas. But it is probably good that we’re getting a better view of it today than ever before, thanks to the post-ESSER fiscal cliff…which could have been avoided if districts didn’t spend their one-time largesse the exact same way they spend their regular ton of dough. (WFMJ-TV, Youngstown, 2/13/24) Same vibe in Cleveland Metropolitan School District, where the fiscal cliff was addressed by new-ish CEO Warren Morgan earlier this week. “We got almost 500 million in COVID-19 relief dollars from the federal government,” he said, “that allowed us to do really extraordinary things during a really extraordinary period of time.” (I assume he’s talking about non-academic “extraordinary things” because all I am remembering on the schooling front is closed doors, no virtual school, zero instruction, and ungraded paper homework packets via snail mail for a long time.) But he also said that pandemic relief dollars simply masked financial problems that were already there. Quelle surprise. The district is facing a $168 million deficit and the first thing on the docket is cuts…the majority of which will hit summer and after-school programming in the immediate future. Morgan said a levy is probably on the cards as well. But he also said that in the future the district may have to “rethink its entire operating model in order to remain financially sound.” Can’t imagine why that option isn’t higher on the agenda. Can you? (Cleveland.com, 2/14/24)
   
   

3. Also complaining about their budget: The State Board of Education. There’s a lot of words here discussing the budget situation for the revamped board, all of which I think boils down to “you’ll be fine”. But YMMV. (Cleveland.com, 2/13/24) You know, one thing that could have helped lower the board’s budget was moving to cheaper office space (with free staff parking) in the suburbs. But they successfully fought against that for Very Important Reasons. So instead, the board and its staffers will move to another downtown building near DEW HQ. Too bad for visitors, too, I reckon. They could also have benefitted from cheap surface parking. (Cleveland.com, 2/12/24)
   
   

4. Staying put at DEW HQ will be inaugural director Steve Dackin and his staff. Director Dackin is interviewed by Patrick O’Donnell in this piece. (The 74, 2/12/24)

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One of the big stories in the wake of the pandemic has been the nationwide slump in public school enrollments. From fall 2019 to 2021, public school enrollment nationally fell by 1.2 million students, or a loss of 2.5 percent. Various factors explain the slide, including more parents opting for private schools or homeschooling, as well as continuing declines in the overall number of school-aged children given the recent baby bust.

As previously discussed on this blog, Ohio’s public school enrollments also fell sharply during the pandemic. This piece looks at the most recent numbers from the 2023–24 school year. Has enrollment continued to slip, or is it starting to turn upward? Are there differences in trends across various regions of the state, or by district and charter school sector? Student enrollment numbers and trends are important, as they offer a window into parents’ school preferences and impact key policy areas like school funding. 

Let us begin with a look at traditional districts, excluding public charter schools for now. Figure 1 displays annual changes in district K–12 enrollments from 2018–19 to 2023–24. Points on the negative side indicate an enrollment decline relative to the year prior; positives indicate an increase. The red line shows the statewide trend, while the thinner lines display trends by typology (rural, small town, suburban, and urban).

We first note the dip in enrollment during the pandemic-disrupted 2020–21 school year. But district enrollments have continued to slide, albeit not as steeply, in each of the following three years. According to the most recent data, statewide district enrollment fell another 1.2 percent between 2022–23 and 2023–24, a loss of 18,161 students. As for trends by typology, rural and urban districts suffered steeper losses during this five-year period, while suburban districts experienced smaller declines. For the current school year, small town and rural districts registered the largest declines relative to the year prior (-1.8 percent each).

Figure 1: Percentage change in district enrollment compared to the previous school year, by district type, 2018–19 to 2023–24

Adding public charter schools to the mix changes the picture dramatically. Figure 2 looks at the enrollment trend for Ohio’s site-based (a.k.a. “brick-and-mortar”) charter schools, thus excluding online charters. It shows that site-based charters not only avoided the enrollment drop that hit districts during 2020–21, but actually posted enrollment increases over the past two years. Between 2022–23 and 2023–24, site-based charter enrollments rose by an impressive 4.9 percent, a gain of 5,829 students. This annual increase easily topped districts overall (-1.2 percent) and that of districts in urban areas (-1.0 percent), which is where most site-based charters are located. Though not shown below, online charters have had even more robust growth during the time period. Their enrollments boomed in 2020–21 as families sought at-home instructional options, though they have somewhat fallen since then.[1]

Figure 2: Percentage change in enrollment compared to the previous school year, site-based charter schools versus districts, 2018–19 to 2023–24

Figure 3 displays the cumulative changes in K–12 enrollment from 2018–19 to 2023–24. As the red bar indicates, total public school enrollment—district and charter combined—declined 4.1 percent during this period. District-only enrollment fell 5.3 percent, while site-based charter enrollment climbed 7.4 percent. To some extent, charters’ enrollment gains represent district losses, but it must be noted that district losses—almost 81,000 students—far exceed the gains of charters (+14,584 students). Thus, a large fraction of district enrollment losses can be attributed to other factors, such as students exiting for other educational options or declining school-aged populations.[2]

Figure 3: Public school (district and charter) enrollment changes, 2018–19 to 2023–24

To close, we take a closer look at the trends in Ohio’s major cities where most site-based charter schools are located. Figure 4 shows some striking patterns. Of these locales, Cincinnati’s charter sector registered the largest enrollment increase (+22.5 percent), followed by Columbus (+11.4 percent). On the reverse side, Cleveland charters lost 10.3 percent of their enrollment during this period, a decline that is even steeper than the losses registered by the local district.

Figure 4: District and charter school enrollment changes in selected cities, 2018–19 to 2023–24

Though it has had a relatively small charter sector, Cincinnati’s impressive growth of late is partly attributable to the fall 2022 launch of the IDEA charter school, which has already scaled to serve nearly 1,000 students this year. This is great news for Cincinnati parents and students, as the school is affiliated with one of the nation’s top charter school networks. The other Cincinnati charter driving enrollment growth is Dohn Community, a dropout-recovery school that now serves more than 1,500 at-risk adolescents at multiple sites across the city.

Turning northward to Columbus, charter enrollment growth is led by KIPP Columbus, a perennial top-performer whose enrollment has increased by more than 600 students since 2018–19. The school now serves just over 2,000 students. (Fordham proudly sponsors both IDEA and KIPP Columbus.) Also notable are Cornerstone Academy and Columbus Bilingual Academy-North, whose enrollments are up by more than 200 students. With a new facility on the horizon (though just outside of the city), Cornerstone is poised for additional growth.   

* * *

Enrollment trends often tell us something about the types of schools that families are gravitating to or moving away from. In the post-pandemic era, districts appear to be losing their edge, despite their historical position as a monopoly educational provider and their higher levels of taxpayer resources. Yes, they continue to educate a large majority of Ohio students. But persistent enrollment declines signal increasing parental interest in other options—particularly in light of recent legislative changes that have expanded access to private-school choice.

On the other hand, the state’s public charter schools are appealing to an increasing number of families. And the sector is also looking to meet those rising demands, as some longstanding schools are expanding their capacity and promising new startups are getting off the ground. With significantly improved funding starting this year, site-based charters are well-positioned for additional growth that can ensure more families seeking public school alternatives have quality options in their community.

Enrollments provide more than insights into parental demand, though. They also have implications for policy—an issue that I’ll cover in a follow-up piece. But for now, let’s cheer the work that charters are doing to serve an increasing number of Ohio families and students.

A new report suggests that too much time spent on enrichment activities outside of school is a harmful double whammy for young people, as it stalls cognitive skill growth and induces a decline in non-cognitive skills. Perhaps even worse, there appears to be very little positive benefit associated with even modest amounts of enrichment. While the analysts’ math checks out, parents and pundits alike will still have questions.

Data come from the Panel Study of Income Dynamics (PSID), touted as the world’s longest running nationally representative panel survey, with almost fifty years of data on the same families and their descendants. University of Georgia researchers Carolina and Gregorio Caetano, along with Eric Nielsen of the Federal Reserve Board, focus on ten years of data from the PSID’s Child Development Supplement (CDS). Specifically, they zero in on the 1997, 2002, and 2007 waves of the CDS, which include time-diary data of students from pre-K through twelfth grade—reported by children or their parents, depending on age—as well as measures of cognitive and noncognitive skills. The robust data also allow the analysts to build controls related to child, family, and environmental characteristics.

The sample consists of 4,330 children ranging in age from five to eighteen years. We get no detail on how these children were specifically chosen. While the grade ranges of pre-K–5, 6–8, and 9–12 are roughly equally represented in the sample, with about one-third of the observations in each, other demographic details provided don’t seem particularly representative of the population at large. Approximately 40 percent of the children are Black, and 7 percent are Hispanic. Twenty-six percent attend a gifted program—far above the current 6 percent as reported by NAGC—8 percent attend a special education program, 1 percent are homeschooled, and 8 percent attend a private school.

Cognitive skills are measured by three assessments: the standardized letter-word, applied problems, and passage comprehension subtests of the Woodcock Johnson Revised Tests of Achievement, results of which are available for each CDS wave. Non-cognitive skills are measured in thirty-six different dimensions by parents’ answers to CDS survey questions and include things like “cheats or tells lies,” “argues too much,” “admired by other children,” and “does neat careful work.” Time diaries from CDS include full twenty-four-hour breakdowns of one random weekday and one random weekend day for each child. The original data coded activities into more than 300 categories. The present study aggregates these into eight: Class time, sleep, play and social activities, passive leisure, duties/chores, enrichment activities, broader enrichment activities, and a miscellaneous category for everything else.

The analysts define enrichment as “the kinds of activities that are typically considered to be investments in children’s skills” undertaken outside of school time. Their main enrichment category includes homework, reading for pleasure, before- and after-school programs, non-academic lessons (like cooking or violin), and other academic lessons (like tutoring or math camp). The “broader enrichment” category adds other familiar activities like structured team sports, art classes, museum excursions, and volunteering. While no two parents would likely break out these activities the same way, the analysts test their models with both enrichment categories and find similar results. They also perform robustness checks using different aggregations of the non-cognitive skills categories.

The model produces some attention-getting results. The full-sample analysis indicates that that enrichment time, when corrected for selection on unobservable factors that might influence the findings, has no significant effect on cognitive skills—the very goal for which the activities were undertaken—and a concurrent significant, negative effect on non-cognitive skills. These negative effects were visible and significant across all grade levels, but most pronounced at the high school level. On average, children in the sample spend about forty-five minutes per day on enrichment activities, but that adds up over a typical week, driving increasing the downward pressure on non-cognitive skills with each additional hour.

What’s going on with these counter-intuitive findings? The full answer is beyond the realm of this paper, but the analysts have some ideas. The simplest is that homework, the largest time use in the enrichment category (66 percent) and also tested by the analysts in isolation from all other activities in the category, doesn’t serve to increase cognitive skills as intended. One clear question here is whether the activities are perhaps disconnected from the cognitive skills tests given. Parents and pundits know that many enrichment activities are general in nature—aimed at developing well-rounded kiddos—but homework and tutoring are typically specific to classes and tests. Would the model show different results if actual class grades/GPAs/state test scores were used to indicate cognitive skills growth? Feels like a robustness check worth running! Less in question, though, seems to be the increase in negative aspects of measured non-cognitive skills. The more enrichment engaged in, the sadder, more irritable, and more inferior to peers the sample students felt. The higher homework load traditionally experienced by high schoolers would match the more pronounced effects seen at the 9–12 grade level.

Another suggestion is that it’s all a matter of time use substitution. Every time use in the enrichment category (but especially homework) is taking up hours that could be used for other activities—the analysts suggest socializing and sleeping—that research indicates are correlated with improved non-cognitive skills. Older children, with more demands on their time as they approach high school graduation, are apparently choosing to forgo these beneficial activities more than their younger brothers and sisters—which probably accords with parental experience outside the confines of a dataset—and are experiencing the negative effects more strongly.

It is unlikely that the authors were trying to antagonize parents working hard to do right by their children, but the results of this study are apt to dismay and alarm some parents. Questions may linger as to the sample and the methodology, but the main point stands: Finding the perfect balance of out-of-school activities to maximize cognitive and non-cognitive skill building for kids is not as simple as it seems. This research doesn’t give a solid answer as to what the balance should be, but the authors’ outcomes hint that it could be a different mix than many families have experienced.

SOURCE: Carolina Caetano, Gregorio Caetano, and Eric Nielsen, “Are children spending too much time on enrichment activities?” Economics of Education Review (January 2024).

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1. Fordham’s Chad Aldis is among the voices talking about vouchers in this piece. But honestly I feel like every voice except that of the hardest-core voucher detractors is drowned out following the opening sentence: “Ohio is paying more students to attend private schools than ever before − thanks to a change in state law and concerted marketing from non-public schools.” I mean, have you ever heard a more tightly-packed and heavily-weighted a thesis in your life? Epic. (Cincinnati Enquirer, 2/11/24)
   
   

2. Here’s more coverage of the free passes available for Ohio fourth graders to visit museums and historical sites across the state in preparation for the 250th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence. Sounds like there’s more to come, too. Nice. (Axios Columbus, 2/12/24)

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Time to stop

Ohio lawmakers have been trying for years make it easier for charter school operators to purchase underutilized school buildings. But districts—and latterly other bureaucrats with the same agenda—have continued to find new ways to disrupt and complicate the process. Fordham’s Aaron Churchill says it’s time for them all to get out of the way and let charter schools relocate, build, and grow.

Speaking of growing

Luckily for Utica Shale Academy, they have strong support in their community and from numerous state and local organizations looking to better serve students in Appalachian Ohio. USA has recently taken ownership of a vacant office building in downtown Salineville that will house classrooms, administrative offices, and space for career-tech programming. The best part: The school will now be expanding to junior high grades this fall. Awesome! A public open house is slated for May.  

Bright Horizons

Horizon Science Academy has operated in the former home of Lorain Catholic High School for 15 years, but has not fully utilized the massive space in that time. However, with enrollment growing in leaps and bounds, long-planned expansion into the former natatorium space is finally underway. Nice! Meanwhile, a former Horizon student from Toledo, aerospace engineer Tyrone Jacobs, Jr., was profiled in the Blade this week. He describes in detail a rough early life, how he defied all of the negative influences, and how he was able to focus on his education in science and engineering with the help of quality school choices. A great piece and an inspiring life story.

“Better Together”

A petition signed by over 1,000 city residents was delivered to the Indianapolis Public Schools board this week, calling for increased partnership between the district and several high-performing charter schools. While the charters are serving their students well, especially Black and Hispanic students who are outperforming their district peers in reading and math, they are not part of the Rebuilding Stronger partnership in which select charter schools share in an array of district resources. Here’s hoping the effort can expand to accommodate these worthy and enthusiastic new partners.

More data on competitive effects

A new report on the competitive effects of charter school expansion looks at data from the Sunshine State, where an increase in access to charters leads to improvement in reading performance and a decrease in absenteeism rates of students who remain in their district schools. The effects are modest but significant, and accord with numerous similar studies previously undertaken. You can access the full report at this link.

A complex view from Cincinnati

There’s a lot going on in this story from the Queen City—including discussion of public safety concerns downtown; youth violence in the community; and the sometimes-contentious transportation relationship among districts, charter schools, and public transit agencies—but the gist of the situation looks like this: Leaders at Dohn Community School, in an effort to take student transportation into their own hands in response to a myriad of concerns, spent $400,000 to buy used transit buses and outfit them for their use. However, their plan fell afoul of state regulations and they were forced by the Department of Education and Workforce to stop. Students are back to using district- and transit-provide transportation and the old troubling issues are rising again.

*****

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1. The elected school board of Columbus City Schools named the members of their latest facilities task force this week. (Columbus Dispatch, 2/6/24) I was tempted to go back and check the new names against the members of the 2018 facilities task force—the one whose recommendations were entirely ignored—to see if there were any repeats. But honestly who has the time? Besides, Alissa Widman Neese of Axios has done a nice job in this piece of plotting the history of the district’s enrollment slide over the years and pointing out the many lost opportunities to downsize/consolidate/right size/close buildings in that time. (Axios Columbus, 2/8/24)
   
   

2. Perhaps it’s just schadenfreude, but I was oddly pleased to learn that it’s not just charter schools that can fall afoul of zoning boards and NIMBYs. It happens to districts too, occasionally! (Toledo Blade, 2/8/24)
   
   

3. I don’t know if these guys know something we don’t, but two state reps don’t want Youngstown and East Cleveland City Schools to have to complete the exit plans to end their designations of Academic Distress. They want the remaining, minimal, in-name-only state oversight of these two districts to end now, and have recently introduced new legislation to do just that. (Chronicle-Telegram, 2/74/24)
   
   

4. Perhaps they’ll all find something to worry about as we get closer to the date, but as of now, most folks here in Ohio seem positively giddy about the upcoming 250th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence. To wit: Passes are now available to all fourth graders in the state to visit a long list of museums and historical sites free of charge to help boost youngsters’ interest in and knowledge of American history and Ohio’s place in it. Roll on 2026! (WKYC-TV, Cleveland, 2/8/24)

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This essay first appeared in an slightly different form as part of the Center on Reinventing Public Education’s 2023 State of the American Student report. CRPE enlisted the insights of 14 experts spanning diverse fields to present innovative ideas, solutions, or potential trajectories for education leaders grappling with post-pandemic education crises.

The American high school is broken. The pandemic underscored just how broken. American teens are—as a September 2023 Gallup poll shows—disengaged, stressed, and questioning the value of high school and college. At the same time, they are hungry to make a difference in the world and to use new technologies and ideas toward that end.

In 2013, Ted Sizer wrote a book called The New American High School. Large national foundations invested in smaller, more personalized high schools. The pandemic made clear it’s past time to finally remake high school, but with an eye toward the future.

Rather than seek to provide a comprehensive set of learning experiences under one roof, the new American high school would connect students to meaningful work in their communities and to expert knowledge around the globe.

Rather than dumb down concepts or activities to make them easier for teenagers, it would support young people to do meaningful work that makes real contributions and leads to credentials that hold weight in the adult world.

Rather than sort students into tracks or marshaling all of them toward a single objective, it would provide every student adult guidance and technological support to understand their own conception of a good life, and provide them with the support, connections, knowledge, and skills to pursue that life—and to change course where necessary.

Rather than focus on a centuries-old curriculum and memorization, it would recognize the transformative forces of AI technology, climate change, and geopolitics and prepare students to thrive, collaborate, and innovate in a rapidly changing world. Yes, students would still study Sophocles, Shakespeare, and Newton, but in a more relevant, contemporary context.

Arizona State University’s Michael Crow conceived something similar for the postsecondary world—the New American University. These institutions would be designed for access rather than exclusivity, and would develop knowledge that could improve student’s communities and address global challenges.

New career and technical education (CTE) programs popping up across the country provide a great starting point. They’re building tighter integrations between high school and postsecondary education, delivering industry-recognized credentials on the way to graduation, resourcing students through college via learn-and-earn programs, and developing students’ social capital to strengthen their support circles and professional networks.

Seamless and permeable pathways

It is key that the New American High School does not place students into tracks or find them in dead-ends. Instead of “tracks,” there should be a seamless and permeable set of pathways between high school, college, and career.

To provide a few examples:

• Colorado’s Homegrown Talent Initiative is a grant-funded program designed to help rural districts create career-relevant learning experiences aligned to the needs and aspirations of their local economies. Participating districts have redefined student graduation requirements, designed new courses, integrated career exploration into existing classes, and created new learning opportunities via internships with local industry and dual enrollment in local higher education institutions.

• Seckinger High School in Gwinnett County, Georgia, is the district’s first artificial intelligence themed high school and is part of a broader district vision to foster excellence and a sense of belonging in every school. Once the school opens, students will receive a college preparatory curriculum that is taught through the lens of artificial intelligence. Students will also be able to pursue an education in developing artificial intelligence.

• Indiana’s Purdue Polytechnic High School is a public charter school network designed to prepare students for careers in the STEM fields. The school implements hands-on and project-based learning, industry and higher ed partnerships, and a flexible and personalized approach. Students leave high school with college credit, in-demand industry credentials, as well as preferred admission to nine out of the 10 colleges at Purdue University.

• Another Indiana charter school, GEO Academies, offers a College Immersion Program, a hyper personalized dual enrollment program where high school students take college classes on the college campus of their choice beginning as early as the ninth grade. GEO pays for everything and provides the academic, social, and emotional supports so that kids learn real-life skills and grow the confidence necessary to earn college degrees—and a path to escaping poverty—before they graduate from high school. When they are on the high school campus, GEO students can engage in direct, teacher-led instruction, independent learning and practice, and teacher-assisted small group instruction.

• At the state level, Colorado, Delaware, Indiana, Louisiana, and Virginia are moving toward more coherent state-wide career pathways, using federal funds and industry partnerships to create a more permeable path between high school, college, and career. (Colorado Governor Jared Polis and Virginia Secretary of Education Aimee Guidera elaborate on their states’ work in essays elsewhere in CRPE’s original report.)

There is plenty of evidence that the current American high school is outdated and irrelevant. The best source of data is coming from students themselves. Adolescents report feeling isolated, bored, and disengaged in school. In this volume, we report plenty of evidence that they are calling for change and they are voting with their feet by failing to attend school or dropping out to get a job in larger numbers than ever.

Despite the very obvious need to update and refresh secondary education, high schools are notoriously resistant to change. Shifting existing curriculum, coursework, instructional strategies, counseling, industry partnerships, and teacher expertise are all onerous prospects. What’s more, the old model of high school is hard-wired: core graduation course requirements are geared toward a “college for all” mentality. Do students intent on pursuing a career in music, for instance, really need to take calculus? Schedules do not easily shift to accommodate a student who must leave during the day for an apprenticeship. If a student wants to take an online pre-engineering course in place of a course offered by their high school, they must pay for it themselves.

Much of schools’ inability to change stems from outdated state policy. State teacher licensing laws often prevent would-be teachers with industry expertise from teaching credit-earning classes. State graduation requirements often do not allow students to count industry credentials toward graduation. Funding models are outdated and assume high school students will receive all of their education in one building.

A New National Initiative

To overcome these and many other barriers, we need a new national initiative for the New American High School. We need more states to follow the lead of vanguard states such as Colorado and Virginia—and for these states to continue to push for lasting changes to the core aims and structures of their schools.

The growing movement to add or update career and technical education is a good start, but ultimately, career focus needs to grow rapidly from small, peripheral programs to a widespread, core element of all secondary education.

As the other essays in the CRPE report suggest, we need to start thinking, talking, and acting bigger. Career preparation in high school is essential for every student. At the very least, students should leave high school with a guarantee that they have mastered the core skills the business and nonprofit sectors say they will need for the middle-class jobs of the future.

We can do this, but the business community, philanthropies, governors, and state school chiefs must lead. Here are some first steps that could make a real difference:

• Create a national council on the New American High School to set national goals and guide federal and state funding strategies

• Support more state- and district-level initiatives for business-education partnerships like Colorado, Louisiana, and Virginia have done

• Incentivize every state to collect data across states on long-term outcomes like Indiana has done

• Build a global network of schools and school districts that are committed to the New American High School

• Create a national research center on the New American High School to amass evidence on innovations, best practices, and policies to support schools and states that want to re-tool their high schools

Tinkering around the edges of American high schools won’t ensure that every student graduates on a viable pathway to a family-sustaining career. We don’t need to remake career and technical education—we need to remake high school.

Skeptics will understandably ask: how is this possible when school systems are struggling just to keep their heads above water, grappling with record levels of mental health and behavior challenges and declining achievement?

My response to the skeptics: high schools across the country began this transformation before or even during the pandemic. They did so because they know there is no alternative but to shift toward the future. They know they must catch kids up, but they also know that the best way to do so is to engage them in deep, meaningful, and relevant ways. With the right help from the federal government, states, businesses, and philanthropies, this is doable.

But the first step on any road to recovery is to admit that there’s a problem. Given the reality of the past few years, can anyone really argue that the American high school has not reached its bottom?

Robin Lake is executive director of the Center on Reinventing Public Education, part of Arizona State University’s Mary Lou Fulton Teachers College.

It’s been nearly a year since Governor DeWine delivered a state of the state address previewing his administration’s early literacy agenda. Since then, lawmakers passed the state budget bill containing the majority of DeWine’s recommendations, and giving Ohio a new policy framework for reading instruction.

The revamped framework centers on the science of reading, an instructional approach that research has proven is an effective way to teach children how to read. It focuses on five main components: phonics, phonemic awareness, vocabulary, fluency, and comprehension. It also rejects debunked instructional methods like balanced literacy and three-cueing.

Under the revised policy, public schools will be required to use curriculum, instructional materials, and intervention programs aligned with the science of reading. To ensure schools select high-quality options, lawmakers charged the Department of Education and Workforce (DEW) with creating a list of approved curricula.

On February 1, DEW released its initial list. It used reviews from EdReports, a national nonprofit dedicated to facilitating the adoption of high-quality instructional materials, as an “initial gateway measure” to help determine which programs would make the cut. Using EdReports reviews as a gateway measure makes sense for Ohio, because DEW worked alongside EdReports to develop Ohio Materials Matter, a state-specific resource that helps districts identify and adopt materials aligned to the state’s learning standards. EdReports reviews are also linked to the Ohio Curriculum Support Guide, a framework intended to help district and school leaders adopt high-quality materials. Both Ohio Materials Matter and the Ohio Curriculum Support Guide pre-date last year's budget changes. That means EdReports is already familiar to many Ohio schools, and that familiarity could help smooth the upcoming transition.

Public schools are required to begin using state-approved materials at some point during the 2024–25 school year. But it’s important to note that the recently published list of approved materials is not the final one. The final list will be published in March. Phase two of the state's review process is already underway, and additional materials may be added to the approved list in March as a result of this review. For some districts, it may be prudent to check out the final approved list before jettisoning their current curriculum. But for districts that already know they’ll need to make a change because they’re currently using a curriculum that’s not aligned with the science of reading, this initial list provides several options to consider if they want to get a jump on the transition.

So which vendors made the cut? The department identified three categories of approved instructional programs for grades K–5.[1] These programs share the same names as the three formats EdReports uses to review ELA materials. They are:

Core comprehensive programs, which include high-quality instructional materials that are comprehensive in scope and aligned to state standards. They reflect the reading research, and integrate the “aspects of language that underlie the process of learning to read.” Eleven programs made the cut. They include Amplify Core Knowledge (2022, K–5), Wit & Wisdom (2016, grades 3–5), and Wonders (2020 and 2023, grades K–5).

Core no foundational skills[2] programs, which include high-quality instructional materials designed to deliver instruction in most grade level content areas. They are aligned to state standards. However, they must be used in conjunction with a foundational skills program, as they don’t sufficiently cover foundational skills on their own. Two programs made the cut: Fishtank Plus (2021, grades K–2) and Wit & Wisdom (2016, grades K–2).

Foundational skills only programs, which include high-quality instructional materials aligned to state standards for foundational reading skills. These programs are meant to be used in conjunction with a core program, as they only deliver foundational skills content. Five programs made the cut, including Foundations A–Z (2023, grades K–2) and Savvas Essentials: Foundational Reading (2023, grades K–2).

Districts are permitted to use a combination of programs. For example, they could pair a supplemental foundational skills program with either a core comprehensive or a core no foundational skills program to cover all their bases. However, DEW notes that starting with a high-quality core program should be the goal, as it will likely “reduce the need to introduce multiple supplements or ‘patch together’ a set of materials that are not coherent and aligned.”

It’s heartening that curricula that rely on weak instructional methods—programs like Fountas & Pinnell and Units of Study—are absent from this initial list. Let’s hope that they are absent from the final list, too. It’s also important to remember that when it comes to curriculum, implementation matters. Obviously, an approved list of high-quality materials is a necessary foundation. But effective professional development around these materials in every school, as well in-depth training for future teachers, will be the true determining factor as to whether Ohio improves its reading achievement.

This is the fifth in a series on doing educational equity right. See the introductory post, as well as ones on school finance, student discipline, advanced education, homework, grading, effective teachers, and a concluding post on doing educational equity wrong.

At the center of the modern framing around “educational equity” is the reality of racial and class disparities in virtually every aspect of the American school system. The “good stuff” disproportionately flows to White, Asian, and rich students (school funding, advanced education, high-quality career-tech opportunities) while the “bad stuff” disproportionately goes to Black, Hispanic, and poor students (exclusionary discipline, grade retention, special education identification).

One theme of this series on doing educational equity right is that we should work harder and smarter to make sure that more of the good stuff does indeed flow to Black, Hispanic, and poor students—by, for example, making our school funding system more progressive and using universal screening to identify more such students who could benefit from advanced education. I’ve also urged that we work harder and smarter to make sure less of the bad stuff goes to them, by, for example, finding alternatives to suspensions and expulsions while also reducing disorder in the classroom.

But another theme we must tackle is that sometimes what is seen as “bad stuff” isn’t actually so bad. Discipline is one example. To be sure, loads of studies link out-of-school suspensions with negative outcomes for affected students. We should declare that practice ineffective. But disciplining students can still be a good thing if it results in better behavior—in helping students learn how to comport themselves in a classroom setting, setting them up for future success, while (of course) also helping create classroom environments in which teachers can function and other needy kids can successfully learn.

Likewise with special-education placement. The conventional wisdom is that Black students are overidentified for special ed, and that label comes with stigma and lower expectations. That’s certainly been true at some times and places. But newer research indicates that Black students are actually underrepresented, at least in some special-ed categories such as “specific learning disabilities.” Were these students to be identified correctly and early, they would be eligible (legally entitled, really) to receive services to address their learning needs. Seen this way, being identified as a student with a disability isn’t necessarily “bad.”

Same with retaining students, especially those who reach the end of third grade but still can’t read (a topic we’ll cover in the weeks ahead). If mandatory retention policies mean that these students finally get the interventions they need (and should have had),  research indicates that a second year of third grade can be a valuable investment.

It is in that spirit that we now tackle school closures—not the temporary pandemic-era variety but the permanent shuttering of under-enrolled school facilities. Here, too, the conventional wisdom is that closures are bad—and that’s surely how parents and community members see them. Nobody wants to hear that the school board (or charter authorizer) is going to close “their” school, especially when the “they” always seem to be Black, brown, and poor neighborhoods.

So it’s little surprise that district leaders facing school closure decisions are under pressure to proceed equitably. Fair enough. But what should that mean? And what if school closures, though painful, can be made to be good—for students, at least? Let’s dig in.

America has too many school buildings, and some will need to close

This issue has been all over the media  of late. In short: Our schools are facing a dramatic enrollment decline driven mostly by the post-Great Recession Baby Bust, but also Trump- and pandemic-era declines in immigration. Some traditional public schools also lost students to charter or private schools during the Covid crisis, and not all came back. And some urban systems lost families to the suburbs (or to more distant environs) as the rise of remote work made urban living less attractive.

The recent surge across the southern border is blurring the picture a bit, but most school systems face long-term enrollment declines of ten percent or more—not surprising given that the number of babies born in the U.S. in a given year has dropped more than 15 percent since its 2007 high. In some districts it will be much worse—experts are predicting a decline of 30 percent for LAUSD!

I haven’t seen any demographers asserting that America’s birth rate is likely to bounce back anytime soon, if ever. In fact, as is the case for most of the developed world, it’s still heading down . Nor does there appear to be a national appetite for a large increase in immigration. All of which is to say that, outside of a handful of high-growth communities, districts must come to terms with shrinking enrollment for the foreseeable future. And that means closing schools.

The evidence on closures

Do students suffer when their schools are closed—either for low performance, as occasionally happened in the No Child Left Behind era, or for under-enrollment? This is a question that has been studied extensively over the past few decades, and the somewhat exasperating answer is: It depends. Specifically, it depends on whether the affected students land in higher-performing schools. If so, they tend to do better, at least in the long run. If not, they do worse. (That’s the case for charter school closures, as well.)

There’s also better-than-expected news for affected communities. While local residents understandably worry that a shuttered school will signal (continued) decline in their neighborhood, at least one study in Philadelphia found that crime,  especially violent crime, declined significantly when high schools with high rates of student misbehavior and low academic performance were closed.

Closing schools equitably

So what should the equity-minded school board member or superintendent do, in the face of this challenging and fraught situation?

Rather than promise that school closures won’t disproportionately affect low-income communities or communities of color, promise that all affected students will have access to higher-performing schools.

In other words, promise that, by closing schools, students will be better off than they are now, especially low-income students and students of color.

No doubt, keeping that promise will take considerable effort. It will mean:

1. Identifying the right schools to close—generally meaning the lowest performing ones, those whose students are achieving at extremely low levels and aren’t making much progress from year to year.

2. Ensuring an adequate number of seats in higher-performing schools nearby^[1], while working out any transition or transportation logistics that might keep students from accessing them. That might include enrollment preferences for displaced students, including in nearby charter schools.

3. Communicating effectively (and promptly) with students, families, educators, and the community, both about the process of identifying schools for closure and about how to ensure that students enroll in higher-performing schools. Tim Daly has lots of great suggestions on this front.

Closing schools is a wrenching process but ensuring that our most disadvantaged students land in more effective environments than they attend today is more than a silver lining. It should be the overriding goal, one that can narrow achievement gaps if done right. That’s real equity.