Jal Mehta, assistant professor at the Harvard Graduate School of Education and co-editor of The Futures of School Reform (2012), offers a clarion call to systematic educational reform in the United States. Mehta makes three key points in his article for the American Enterprise Institute: 1. Many efforts to reform American schooling over the past Read more about From ‘Tinkering to Utopia’ to ‘Remaking American Education’[…]
Yesterday, Andrew Rotherham reflected in TIME magazine on the election results and their meaning for public education reform. From the presidential election to local elections and ballot questions, the picture of public support for education is murky, leaving newly elected politicians with no clear roadmap for reform. Rotherham writes about the meaning of the election Read more about Unclear Mandates & Uncertain Direction for Education Reform[…]
The results of the 2011-2012 Kentucky Performance Rating of Education Progress (K-PREP) test have recently been released, raising questions about the upcoming nationwide transition to tests geared toward the Common Core standards. Kentucky, in 2010, was the first state to officially adopt an educational curriculum determined by the Common Core Standards for English/Language Arts and Read more about First Results from Common Core-Aligned Testing[…]
Mario Marino of Venture Philanthropy Partners recently blogged on the importance of great people for the success of any education reform. Although his audience consists mostly of nonprofits and philanthropies, his reflections are appropriate for anyone working in the education sector. Marino writes: I’d be the last to discourage innovation, but our problem is not Read more about Great People over Great Models[…]
The results from the 6th annual Education Next survey have recently been released. Education Next is an education policy journal which, according to their website argues that “bold change is needed in American K–12 education” although they claim to partake “of no program, campaign, or ideology” and only to go “where the evidence points”. The Read more about 6th Annual Education Next Survey Results[…]
The Governing Board of the Partnership for Assessment of Readiness for College and Careers (PARCC) met on September 12, 2012, including a joint session with the PARCC Advisory Committee on College Readiness. The board meets quarterly to make major policy and operational decisions on behalf of the PARCC consortium related to the overall design of Read more about Will PARCC and Smarter Balanced Align?[…]
The Hope Street Group will soon be selecting educators to participate as National Teacher Fellows. Selected fellows will be classroom teachers and school coaches from around the country who are leaders among their peers and who want to contribute their ideas and expertise in helping shape national policy. They will participate in meaningful online and Read more about Hope Street Group Announces National Teacher Fellowship[…]
The Atlantic recently took a trip to San Jose, California to visit Rocketship Discovery Prep, one of seven schools run by Rocketship Education. Rocketship has been hailed as a model for future high-tech classrooms, and reformers have been impressed with their achievement outcomes with poor Latino youth. But is the secret to Rocketship’s success really Read more about High-Tech AND High-Touch[…]
The successful implementation of the Common Core State Standards (CCSS) represents a landmark opportunity for collaboration between the higher education and K-12 sectors. Delivering on the promise of college-ready standards means students are prepared for entry-level, credit-bearing college work, and that K-12 schools and higher education institutions are more aligned on the education they deliver. Read more about The Role of Higher Education in Common Core Implementation[…]
This second in a series of two-page briefs from the National Education Policy Center summarizes current research findings on the likely effects of the widespread adoption of the Common Core State Standards (CCSS). The brief, written by Dr. William Mathis, managing director of the National Education Policy Center, notes that there is no research directly Read more about Brief Explores Likely Results of CCSS[…]
A new report from the National Association of Elementary School Principals (NAESP) looks at the emerging policy focus of principal accountability. In 2011, NAESP and the National Association of Secondary School Principals (NASSP) created a joint Principal Evaluation Committee to develop a framework for principal evaluation for use as a guide to improving professional practice. Read more about Rethinking Principal Evaluation[…]
A recent report from the U.S. Department of Education’s What Works Clearinghouse identifies practices that can improve the performance of chronically low-performing schools — a process commonly referred to as “turnaround.” The report, Turning Around Chronically Low-Performing Schools, makes four recommendations based on current research into school turnaround efforts: Schools signal the need for dramatic Read more about What Works Clearinghouse: School Turnarounds[…]
In a recent blog post, John Merrow reflects on this year’s “Education Nation” summit, an annual conference organized and hosted by NBC News: NBC News put on its third iteration of Education Nation earlier this week and did an even better job this year. I suppose that could be considered faint praise, because year one Read more about Education Nation: Year Three[…]
Discussions about human capital and school improvement typically center on teachers. Yet the principals who select those teachers are a critical driver of school success. Just as states are beginning to address the weaknesses in their principal pipelines, a new report from the Center on Reinventing Public Education (CRPE) offers a set of powerful new Read more about CRPE Introduces Tools and Strategies to Help States Develop Great Principals[…]
Sara Mead of Bellwether Education recently wrote in an Education Week blog about her investigation into teacher evaluation legislation in 21 states that have passed laws in the last three years requiring teacher evaluations based in part on student achievement. Bellwether’s study finds that 12 states’ laws link tenure to teacher effectiveness, 16 explicitly give Read more about The Missing Piece in Teacher Evaluation Laws: Empowering Principals[…]
The Partnership for Assessment of Readiness for College and Careers (PARCC) recently released sample assessment items. They come complete with a new way of categorizing questions, both for mathematics — where the questions are of Type I, Type II or Type III — and in ELA, where they are EBSRs, TECRs and PCRs. For a Read more about PARCC Task and Question Types[…]