Students and families in Chicago are increasingly taking up school choice options offered by the school district. Prospective high school students and their families have 160 high schools to choose from. These options include a broad variety of schools in governance, size, academic approach, and programs offered. To streamline the school…

The 35th edition of the Annie E. Casey Foundation's "KIDS COUNT"® Data Book examines the unprecedented declines in student math and reading proficiency brought on by the COVID-19 pandemic's effect on education. The latest data from the National Assessment of Educational Progress reveals that between 2019 and 2022, fourth-grade reading…

There is ongoing debate in the United States about just how diverse, inclusive, and equitable the opt-out movement--and grassroots education activism more broadly--has been over the past decade. Today, a prevailing stereotype holds that the opt-out movement predominantly mobilizes white, middle-class, and suburban parents and is therefore a force…

Background: Ability grouping has resurged in U.S. schools despite long-standing debates over its consequences for educational equity. Proponents argue that it is the best response to variation in academic skills because it allows teachers to customize the content and pace of instruction to students' diverse needs. Critics answer that this practice…

Project OCCAMS (Online Curriculum Consortium for Accelerating Middle School) is a collaboration between the Center for Talent Development at Northwestern University, the Center for Gifted Education at The College of William & Mary, and Columbus Public Schools with a goal of providing accelerated learning in language arts aimed at increasing…

Drawing on interviews with 88 middle school counselors tasked with implementing New York City's high school choice policy, we show that counselors largely question the policy's legitimacy and the equity of the high school assignments it produces. By highlighting issues of transparency and procedural fairness that threaten counselors' acceptance of…

Adolescents in the United States live amid high levels of concentrated poverty and increasing income inequality. Poverty is robustly linked to adolescents' mental health problems; however, less is known about how perceptions of their social status and exposure to local area income inequality relate to mental health. Participants consisted of a…

We examine access to effective teachers for low-income students in 26 geographically dispersed school districts over a 5-year period. We measure teacher effectiveness using a value-added model that accounts for measurement error in prior test scores and peer effects. Differences between the average value added of teachers of high- and low-income…

Ethnoracial inequality in educational achievement and attainment is a long-standing feature of the American education system. For example, national reading assessments show that White fourth graders scored nearly a standard deviation higher than Black or Hispanic students on average in 2015 (NCES, 2015). The measurement and analysis of differences…

We draw on novel district-level test score data to describe novel approaches for measuring ethnoracial achievement gaps and assessing trends toward achievement equity from 2009 to 2016. Using SEDA data, we estimate gap trends for each grade over time in each district. We measure trends in both within-district gaps--comparing Black or Hispanic to…

Although there is substantial research that has guided middle school reform, there is insufficient support of Latinx students during their normative secondary transition (middle school to high school). Current research emphasizes that students who are not prepared when entering high school will face grim academic futures. The study explores the…

This autoethnographic narrative explores the challenges and successes of employing critical pedagogy in an eighth-grade history classroom. Using the threads of teacher, scholar, and individual, the author shares the intellectual and emotional progression through hope, frustration, humility, and growth that this endeavor demanded. Further, this…

This study examined contributions of academic ability tracking, disciplinary attitudes (science anxiety and self-efficacy), and discipline-specific literacy skills (science and academic vocabulary knowledge) to students' science achievement in a sample of 104 Grade 8 students (78% current or former English learners [ELs]) enrolled in high- versus…

Over the past three decades, children from low-income families and those from more affluent families have increasingly been attending different public schools. While recent work has helped us understand patterns of income segregation between districts and schools within districts, we know very little about segregation of students as they…

Using data from a large urban district, this study investigated whether racial inequality in access to eighth-grade algebra is a reproduction of differences in prior opportunities to learn (as evidenced by grades, test scores, and level of prior mathematics course) or whether patterns reflect an increase in inequality such that racial differences…