Displaying 1-30 of 569 results
Commentary
3.25.2022
Charter Schools, Governance

Biden administration’s proposed rules for charter school program empower districts at the expense of communities

Christy Wolfe

The Biden administration is proposing an unprecedented rewrite of the bipartisan federal Charter Schools Program (CSP): new regulations that are unprecedented not just for the CSP but for all federal K–12 programs. They would add pages of new requirements for applicants that are not in the statute and are unrelated to student outcomes. Instead, they focus on inputs.

Commentary
3.24.2022
Evidence-Based Learning, Curriculum & Instruction, Governance, Teachers & School Leaders

Why we should follow the science—to school

Michael J. Petrilli

A new edited volume, “Follow the Science to School,” aims to identify what science tells us about evidence-based practices in elementary schools, and describes what they look like in the real world of classrooms. Following the science into its application in this way—and sharing how it works on the ground—enables us to suggest workable answers to key questions rather than challenging every teacher, school, or district, to figure out those answers on their own.

Commentary
3.24.2022
Accountability & Testing, Governance

Lively days for NAEP

Chester E. Finn, Jr.

Those who pay attention to the “Nation’s Report Card” tend to take it for granted. In truth, most people heed it not at all.

Commentary
3.24.2022
Curriculum & Instruction, Governance, Teachers & School Leaders

Curriculum wars are inevitable and necessary

Daniel Buck

There is much to love in George Packer’s essay on the culture wars and education in The Atlantic. He castigates both sides of the partisan aisle for their follies: the left’s support for school closures “far longer than either the science or welfare of children justified” and the

Commentary
3.17.2022
Career & Technical Education, Curriculum & Instruction, Governance, Teachers & School Leaders

Work instead of school: A better approach for our lowest-performing students?

Michael J. Petrilli

High school-age Americans struggling mightily with academics aren’t well served by our current approach to secondary education. But there may be a better model that would give them a more worthwhile experience and lead to better long-term outcomes: Let them take jobs while still in high school—during the school day, during both their junior and senior years, full pay included, no strings attached.

Commentary
3.17.2022
Curriculum & Instruction, Governance, Teachers & School Leaders

Civic education and the battle for Ukraine

Chester E. Finn, Jr.

We’re all watching the news and hating what we’re seeing, the one big exception being the patriotic heroism of millions of Ukrainians (and the much smaller but still impressive collection of others who have been traveling to Ukraine to join the fight for freedom).

Commentary
3.17.2022
Accountability & Testing, Evidence-Based Learning, Curriculum & Instruction, Governance, High Achievers

San Francisco’s detracking experiment

Tom Loveless

Editor's note: This post was originally published on tomloveless.com.

Commentary
3.10.2022
Evidence-Based Learning, Curriculum & Instruction, Governance, High Achievers, Teachers & School Leaders

Keep fighting for selective high schools

Brandon L. Wright

In cities across the country, selective high schools are facing increasing pressure to change their admissions policies to make their incoming student populations more socioeconomically and racially diverse. Closing these gaps is a laudable and important goal. But the most common strategies for accomplishing it are racially discriminatory, misguided, and ineffective.

Commentary
3.10.2022
Curriculum & Instruction, Governance, Private School Choice, Teachers & School Leaders

Could Great Hearts Academy change the face of private education?

Robert Pondiscio

Remote learning is hard to love. The nation’s forced experiment in online education the past few years has been a disaster for kids. Educators and parents alike have come to view virtual learning as a necessary evil at best, an ad hoc response to a national crisis.

Commentary
3.10.2022
Evidence-Based Learning, Career & Technical Education, Curriculum & Instruction, Governance

The casualties of “college for all”

Arthur Samuels

A couple of weeks ago, I shared some ideas about how schools and districts can move away from the well-intentioned but deeply flawed “college for all” mindset that has permeated the education reform world and has, in turn, harmed many of the disadvantaged students whom the approach is m

Commentary
3.10.2022
Evidence-Based Learning, Curriculum & Instruction, Governance, Teachers & School Leaders

About that Tennessee pre-K study

David Griffith

It’s rare that a piece of social science makes you question the nature of your reality, but such was my reaction to the latest, much-discussed update on the performance of Tennessee’s pre-k program—or more specifically, on the fate of the 2,990 children from low-income families who applied to oversubscribed pre-K program sites across

Commentary
3.3.2022
Charter Schools, Curriculum & Instruction, Governance, Teachers & School Leaders

Smash-and-grab education reform

Dale Chu

Eight months out from a midterm election cycle that is shaping up to be a bloodbath for Democrats, Republican Senator Rick Scott recently released an “eleven-point plan to rescue America” that speaks volumes about the GOP’s posture on education. What’s most telling is what’s missing from Scott’s plan: a serious and good faith discussion of the most pressing issues facing our Covid-constrained education system.

Commentary
2.24.2022
Charter Schools, Curriculum & Instruction, Governance, Private School Choice, Teachers & School Leaders

The hypocrisy of school districts saying they’re “open to all”

Jessica Poiner

Opponents of school choice regularly criticize private schools for not taking all comers, contrasting them with traditional public schools, which they claim are open to all. But that’s not true in many places, especially wealthier suburbs, where public schools are typically restricted to students who live within geographic boundaries. Attending them requires a hefty mortgage and property taxes or sky-high rents that are out of the reach of low- and middle-income families.

Commentary
2.24.2022
Evidence-Based Learning, Career & Technical Education, Charter Schools, Curriculum & Instruction, Governance, Teachers & School Leaders

A principal explains how to repair the harm of “college for all”

Arthur Samuels

As Michael Petrilli wrote in these pages a few weeks ago, the education reform movement has come to the realization that its belief in “college for all,” while well-intended, was misguided.

Commentary
2.17.2022
Evidence-Based Learning, Curriculum & Instruction, Governance, Teachers & School Leaders

End school mask mandates

Daniel Buck

Thirteen states and D.C. still mandate face masks for students, as do myriad individual districts in places that defer to local leaders. In total, about half of American students have to wear a mask every day. But there’s little evidence that this mitigates the spread of Covid—a consideration that the Omicron variant has made less important anyway—and, more importantly, masking inflicts real educational and emotional harm on students.

Commentary
2.17.2022
Curriculum & Instruction, Governance, Teachers & School Leaders

Why I left the classroom during the Great Resignation

Nathaniel Grossman

Millions of Americans are quitting their jobs. “The Great Resignation” is causing a labor shortage in many industries, as workers leave for other jobs or simply stay home. The field of education is one that’s hurting.

Commentary
2.17.2022
Evidence-Based Learning, Curriculum & Instruction, Governance, Teachers & School Leaders

Incentivize individual agency to achieve upward mobility

Ian Rowe

Editor’s note: This testimony was given by Fordham Institute trustee Ian Rowe on January 20, 2022, to the U.S.

Commentary
2.11.2022
Charter Schools, Governance, Teachers & School Leaders

The plot to weaken New York City charters

Robert Pondiscio

If New York politics were sane and rational—if our elected officials were serious about the pursuit of educational excellence and what’s best for children—the city’s charter school sector would be a point of civic pride.

Commentary
2.10.2022
Evidence-Based Learning, Career & Technical Education, Curriculum & Instruction, Governance, Teachers & School Leaders

Of course there’s tracking in high schools. Get over it.

Michael J. Petrilli

Tracking in our high schools is simply a fact, and we would do well to stop pretending otherwise or believing that it could be any other way. At the very least, we should allow for diverging paths after tenth grade, and we need to completely rethink our approach for our lowest-performing kids.

Commentary
2.10.2022
Evidence-Based Learning, Curriculum & Instruction, Governance, Teachers & School Leaders

We’re teaching mediocrity in literature classrooms

Daniel Buck

Since the beginning of the common school movement in the 1800s, we have valued our institutions of public education for their unifying nature, and the creation of a literate populace is an essential element of that goal. But much modern-day English instruction accomplishes neither. These middle school and high school classrooms barely resemble what you or I remember from our school years.

Commentary
2.10.2022
Evidence-Based Learning, School Finance, Governance, Private School Choice, Teachers & School Leaders

What factors predict states’ embrace of private school choice?

Nathaniel Grossman

School choice is on the rise. In the last few decades, families have benefited from an explosion of educational options.

Commentary
2.10.2022
Evidence-Based Learning, Governance, Teachers & School Leaders

How did the pandemic affect school bullying?

Julia Wolf

When schools went online at the beginning of the pandemic, it was unclear how the sudden and disruptive shift would impact student behavior. Would cyberbullying, for example, increase with students spending more time on their devices? And would time away from other students increase bullying when students returned to buildings?

Commentary
2.3.2022
Accountability & Testing, Charter Schools, Curriculum & Instruction, Governance, Private School Choice, Teachers & School Leaders

Did public education have it coming?

Chester E. Finn, Jr.

In many ways, the educational failures of the past several years—including those caused by the pandemic—were far worse than they needed to be because of long-standing characteristics of American public education. Namely, the tendency to place employees’ interests first, the disempowering of parents, and the failure to innovate.

Commentary
2.3.2022
Curriculum & Instruction, Governance, Teachers & School Leaders

The Maus that roared: Who do you want to decide what’s best for kids?

Robert Pondiscio

The school board in McMinn County, Tennessee, voted 10-0 to remove Maus, a Pulitzer Prize-winning graphic novel by cartoonist Art Spiegelman, from its eighth grade curriculum last month, citing concerns about explicit language and disturbing illustrations.

Commentary
2.3.2022
Curriculum & Instruction, Governance, Teachers & School Leaders

The curriculum transparency trap

Dale Chu

Amid the raging culture fires engulfing our politics and schools comes a concerted push among some conservative groups to codify a “parents’ bill of rights.” House minority leader Kevin McCarthy rolled out

Commentary
1.27.2022
Evidence-Based Learning, Charter Schools, Curriculum & Instruction, Governance, Teachers & School Leaders

Charter school expansion narrows achievement gaps

Amber M. Northern, Ph.D., Michael J. Petrilli

Fordham’s new study, based on data from 400 metropolitan statistical areas and 534 micropolitan statistical areas, finds that an increase in total charter school enrollment share is associated with a significant narrowing of a metro area’s racial and socioeconomic math achievement gaps. With the country reeling from a pandemic that’s caused widespread learning loss, especially for disadvantaged students, getting more children into charter schools could help reverse those dire trends.