This report describes the establishment and delivery of Illinois career and technical education (CTE), the existing condition of Illinois CTE based on fiscal year 2021 data, and the future developments and recommendations for CTE in the state as required by Illinois School Code 105 ILCS 435/2e. Illinois CTE focuses on providing equitable…

States use their accountability systems to identify low-performing schools, which can receive added support and are expected to improve. Alternative schools serve students whose needs are not met in a regular school. They often serve at-risk students who are struggling academically or behaviorally. Given this unique population, the Government…

This policy brief is part of a larger research report, "Making ESSA's Equity Promise Real: State Strategies to Close the Opportunity Gap," that describes how states are using opportunities in ESSA [Every Student Succeeds Act] to better support historically underserved students through the thoughtful selection of specific equity measures…

It is well-documented that students of color, and other historically underserved students, have had less access to an equitable and supportive learning environment, perpetuating school failure and, too often, a school-to-prison pipeline that is difficult to escape. This report shows how a number of states are taking advantage of opportunities in…

The "Illinois Charter School Biennial Report" for the 2019-20 and 2020-21 school years was originally published in January 2022 but was incomplete. The COVID-19 pandemic interrupted the normal administration and reporting of statewide student performance data during this time period. More specifically, ISBE received a statewide waiver of…

In this study, the outcomes of No Child Left Behind (NCLB), as implemented in Illinois, are evaluated in terms of high school standards testing results between 2003-2013. NCLB was a policy dedicated to closing the gap in schooling outcomes nationally in the space of a decade. There have been few systematic examinations of its macro-level results…

Our country has been trying to address the graduation crisis in many ways. We are seeing the impact of the efforts to improve graduation rates over the past twenty years including agreement among states to implement a common cohort-based graduation rate, research-based efforts to improve the transition to 9th grade, increased academic and social…

Education Sector commissioned an earlier version of this collection of essays in conjunction with a March 2012 event "Getting to 2014: The Choices and Challenges Ahead." This updated version includes new essays and a revised introduction. The aim of these essays is to present ideas, elicit feedback, and encourage productive dialogue…

Illinois has set an ambitious target: 60% of working adults will hold a college degree or credential by 2025, as research suggests that at least 60% of jobs will require some type of educational credential past high school. Today, only 50% of the state's working adults hold college credentials. This report takes a snapshot of Illinois state's…

Opportunity to learn via public education has origins in the mid-nineteenth-century as a response to Horace Mann's argument that educating girls as well as boys would build a collectively more prosperous society. Over the years, educational reform through the judicial and legislative branches of government has continued to balance opportunity to…

Performance funding in higher education ties state funding directly to institutional performance on specific indicators, such as rates of retention, graduation, and job placement. One of the great puzzles about performance funding is that it has been both popular and unstable. Between 1979 and 2007, 26 states enacted it, but 14 of those states…

Graduation rates are a fundamental indicator of whether or not the nation's public school system is doing what it is intended to do: enroll, engage, and educate youth to be productive members of society. Since almost 90 percent of the fastest-growing and highest-paying jobs require some postsecondary education, having a high school diploma and the…

A year ago, Arne Duncan was known as a long-serving urban district chief who had used his collegial management style to push innovation and close failing schools in Chicago. This week, he enters his second year as U.S. secretary of education pursuing a similar national policy agenda that could place him among the most influential leaders in his…

It's a familiar refrain in American education: African-American children score lower on standardized tests, graduate high school at lower rates, and are considerably more likely to be suspended or expelled than the general population. Two recent reports, one from the Council of the Great City Schools and one from the American Institutes for…

In today's economy, employers increasingly demand that workers have a high school diploma, yet America's graduation rates are unacceptably low, particularly among poor and minority students. Nationally, only about 70 percent of students graduate from high school on time with a regular diploma; for African American and Hispanic students, this…