In theory, the market was supposed to act as its own accountability measure; competition would mean that low-quality schools would close, said Jonas Vlachos, an economics professor at the University of Stockholm who has studied free schools. This story also appeared in PBS Newshour “The tension that you see is that if you’re very … […]
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What 2018 PISA international rankings tell us about U.S. schools
In 1967, on the first international comparison of educational achievement in math, the United States ranked 11 out of 12 nations. Students in Germany, England, France and Japan all scored ahead of students in the U.S.. The only country behind the U.S. was Sweden. No one was surprised. A Washington Post news article explained that […]
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Congress gets a proposal to spend $400 million on creating more apprenticeships
WASHINGTON, D.C. – While the Covid-19 virus was shuttering on-campus classes and emptying dorms at colleges across the U.S., it wasn’t the only education topic under discussion in Congress. Lawmakers were working on solutions to some of higher education’s pressing problems – voting to block a rule from the Department of Education that would have […]
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OPINION: ‘There are policy solutions that can end the war on childhood, and the discussion should start this campaign season’
President Lyndon B. Johnson introduced his “war on poverty” during his State of the Union speech on Jan. 8, 1964, citing the “national disgrace” that deserved a “national response.” This story also appeared in Brookings Institution Today, many of the poor children of the Johnson era are poor adults with children and grandchildren of their […]
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OPINION: When it comes to vouchers, equity and equality are not the same
Betsy DeVos, the U.S. Secretary of Education, continues to insist that private-school vouchers are the magic wand that the nation can wave to create equity for disadvantaged children — especially disadvantaged children of color. Last year she proposed to fund vouchers by cutting $1 billion from federal spending on various elements of public K– 12 education, […]
Posted inElementary to High School
Giving parents more freedom to choose doesn’t guarantee better schools
Before she was appointed U.S. Secretary of Education, Betsy DeVos was one of the wealthiest advocates of the charter school and school choice movement in the country. After assuming her role in the Trump Administration, she became one of the most powerful. At her 2017 Senate confirmation hearing, DeVos began by asking the senators, “Why […]
Posted inElementary to High School
OPINION: Did Betsy DeVos just suggest that schools roll back students’ civil rights?
Education Secretary Betsy DeVos’ testimony during Congress’ first oversight hearing in nearly a year and a half of her tenure confirmed the crisis moment at which the nation now teeters with respect to civil rights in education. After repeated past failures even to commit that the federal Department of Education would enforce federal civil rights […]
Posted inJill Barshay
Counting DACA students
How many students are affected by President Trump’s decision to end the program that shields young, undocumented immigrants, ages 15 and up, from deportation? Counting students who have received approval for Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) isn’t easy. The reason is that schools, both high schools and colleges, generally don’t ask students if they […]
Posted inHigher Education, News
While U.S. struggles, Sweden pushes older students back to college
UPPSALA, Sweden — When the instructor in her teacher-training course invited students to share some music they remembered from their childhoods, Ingela Theorin played Ace of Base. This story also appeared in The Atlantic Her classmates, she said, “didn’t know who that was.” During the years it topped the Swedish charts, the synthesizer-heavy pop group […]
Posted inElementary to High School
Can freeing struggling schools from red tape help them improve?
This story was produced by EdNC, an online, daily, independent newspaper, and reprinted with permission. This story also appeared in EdNC Emily Alejo, 9, had a choice to make. Her school, Haw River Elementary in Alamance County, was offering students after-school clubs once a week. Would she choose volleyball, music, yoga, newspaper, Harry Potter crafts […]
