Live Free or Die: Curriculum Edition
The New Hampshire GOP primary is overshadowing an important new Granite State law that allows parents to have their children exempted from elements of the curriculum they find objectionable.
The New Hampshire GOP primary is overshadowing an important new Granite State law that allows parents to have their children exempted from elements of the curriculum they find objectionable.
Why education needs to learn a few lessons from Apple about evolving and improving over time.
Chris highlights a great resource for educators.
Editor Kathleen Porter-Magee introduces Fordham's new center for commentary and analysis on standards, curriculum, and instruction: the Common Core Watch blog.
Let's not gloss the challenges of transitioning to Common Core
The Proficiency Illusion, science edition
America: Take notes
Peter Meyer reflects on Tom Friedman's column about parents and education.
To improve student learning in Ohio, and in other states, we need to improve the quality of our teaching force.
To what extent have Ohio's leaders met the challenges and opportunities before them in K-12 education? What needs to happen next?
Statewide survey of Ohio school district superintendents (and other education leaders) on the most critical issues facing K-12 education in the Buckeye State, including budgets, school effectiveness, and troublesome laws.
In this policy brief, Fordham gives its advice to Governor-elect Kasich and the incoming leaders of the Ohio House and Senate as it relates to the future of K-12 education policy in the Buckeye State.
Congratulations to Andrew Boy, the co-director and founder of Columbus Collegiate Academy, one of the six charter schools Fordham authorizes.
Despite the overall dismal performance of schools serving Ohio's poor, urban youngsters, there are a handful of schools that buck these bleak trends and achieve significant results for their students. This report examines eight of these schools.
The superintendent of Ohio's Twin Valley Community Local School District has come under fire in his first year on the job from the local teachers union for, among other grievances, trying to mak
The 2009 NAEP reading scores were released this morning with little fanfare for Ohio. There has been virtually no growth in the Buckeyes State's NAEP reading results, with only 36 percent of fourth graders and 37 percent of eighth graders in Ohio proficient or above in reading.
Brookings' Brown Center on Education Policy just released a proposal for ???America's Teacher Corps,??? a federally funded program that would recognize highly effective teachers in Title I schools, award them a salary bonus ($10,000), and give them a ???portable credential???
This week's edition kicks off with a great piece by Terry discussing the unprecedented move by the Ohio Department of Education to close a charter school sponsor (aka authorizer) for fiscal mismanagement.
It's no surprise that Ohio's economy is in crisis, but you might be amazed at the price tag for some of Gov. Strickland's new education mandates. Terry points out the implications of decreasing class size in grades K-3 alone (to 15:1), which will cost $784 million per year by 2014.
???Teacher effectiveness??? has made its way to the top of the education policy agenda, supplanting the focus on ???highly qualified???
This week The New Teacher Project (TNTP) unveiled its Cincinnati-focused report on human capital reform.
Video is now available from our recent event, World-Class Academic Standards for Ohio, which was held October 5 in Columbus, Ohio.
Ohio is on board with the NGA/CCSSO Common Core State Standards Initiative, ostensibly agreeing to adopt 85 percent of the standards that result from the effort.????
A Core Knowledge blog this week criticizes the concept of "learning styles" and educators' acceptance of this "unquestioned dogma." Specifically under critique is Michelle Rhee, whose DC Public Schools
Our friends at the State of Ohio Education blog rightly call Ohio's recent move to eliminate social studies tests in grades five and eight a "short-sighted decision," not just because a basic understanding of history, geography, civics, and current events is critical, but because Ohio students h
Don't miss this week's special edition of the Ohio Education Gadfly! One year ago, the Fordham Institute released a report titled Accelerating Student Learning in Ohio.
The media is awash with stories about Ohio's brain drain: in 2007, the Buckeye State saw 6,981 more residents between the ages of 25 and 34 leave the state than migrate into it. What's worse, the more education these young people have, the more likely they are to leave. The Thomas B. Fordham Institute seeks to shed light on this important problem--and explore solutions--with this study by the Farkas Duffet Research Group.
Ohio Governor Ted Strickland's education plan calls for modernizing Ohio's K-12 education system, including the state's school-funding system, but the plan's so-called "evidence-based" approach would actually scuttle any modernizing efforts, argues this study issued by the Thomas B. Fordham Institute.
As Gov. Ted Strickland concludes his 12-city "Conversation on Education" tour to gather ideas for reforming public education in Ohio, the Thomas B. Fordham Institute has put forth a report of five recommendations designed to keep improvements in the Buckeye State's public schools on track toward three critical goals: 1) maximizing the talents of every child; 2) producing graduates as good as any in the world; and 3) closing the persistent academic gaps that continue between rich and poor, and black and white and brown.