The federal "Every Student Succeeds Act" (ESSA) has stimulated states to revisit school improvement. Previously, the Center analyzed ESSA and the related consolidated state plans using the lens of how the federal legislation and state plans address barriers to learning and teaching and re-engage disconnected students. Such analyses…

This report presents key findings from "Learning in the Fast Lane: The Past, Present, and Future of Advanced Placement," by Chester E. Finn, Jr. and Andrew E. Scanlan, and published by Princeton University Press in 2019. American education has long been plagued by excellence gaps among the young people who make it into the highest levels…

The second year of California's statewide administration of the Smarter Balanced assessment allows parents, educators, and policymakers a second look at achievement and a first look at growth for K-12 students as measured by this standardized test. This report describes how California's students performed on the second year of the assessment…

Despite the American promise of equal educational opportunity for all students, persistent achievement gaps among more and less advantaged groups of students remain, along with the opportunity gaps that create disparate outcomes. However, the recent passage of the Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA) represents an opportunity for the federal…

This report provides a new resource for understanding the state of urban public schools in the U.S. Geared specifically toward city leaders who want to evaluate how well traditional district and charter schools are serving all their city's children and how their schools compare to those in other cities, the report measures outcomes for all public…

American public higher education is in trouble. Besieged by declining state and Federal support for more than 30 years, public colleges and universities are facing a "game-changing" set of challenges that threaten to alter the very nature of the institutions. As two recessions withered state budgets in the first decade of the 21st…

Focusing on student proficiency in reading and math from 2003-04 to 2006-07, this report compares gaps in performance on state achievement tests between grade 8 American Indian and Alaska Native students and all other grade 8 students in 26 states serving large populations of American Indian and Alaska Native students. In response to a request by…