While the importance of early childhood education is well documented, a struggle continues around the world to adequately fund early childhood programs and provide access for all children, especially those living in precarious contexts. In this article, the author has constructed a posthumous interview with Katie-Jay Scott (1981-2021), a…

Play Africa, with over 40 innovative exhibits and/or programs since inception, was created as a means to address the inequalities and lack of high-quality experiences that affect the early development of children from birth to age 10 in South Africa. The results from the 2021 Progress in International Reading Literacy Study (PIRLS) paint a dire…

From the beginning of recorded time human beings have assigned blame to persons who misbehave. The first prominent person to make an alternative case was Father Edward J. Flanagan, the founder of Boys Town, who proclaimed there was "no such thing as a bad boy, only bad environment, bad modeling, and bad teaching" (Oursler & Oursler,…

The call to transform education must begin with the youngest children. The world is not on track in meeting Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) Target 4.2 committing countries to ensure that all girls and boys have access to quality early childhood development, care and pre-primary education by 2030. There is solid scientific evidence that early…

Involving students in policy debate is one of the most impactful academic interventions for secondary school students, according to a study, which between 2007 and 2017 followed about 3,500 students who were part of the Boston Debate League (BDL). The nonprofit supports debate teams in Boston Public Schools, which have a large concentration of…

Based in Lebanon, Jusoor's Refugee Education Program has supported out-of-school Syrian refugee children since 2013 with the aim of bringing them back on the path of formal schooling. In March 2020, the COVID-19 pandemic forced the closure of all schools and educational centers in Lebanon. To keep students learning, Jusoor switched to an online…

Upward Bound (UB), created in 1965 to provide educational enrichment for low-income youths, had to be racially integrated. In 1966, I was among three White northern teens sent to integrate UB at Xavier University in New Orleans. My family had lived in North Carolina in the early 1960s, participating in civil rights actions, so I had had some…

This brief shares learnings from the community of Learn and Earn to Achieve Potential (LEAP) organizations and partners as they continue to deepen their practices to enhance the positive impact and durability of programming while also scaling to reach greater numbers of young people in similar situations. After a brief description of the national…

Challenges associated with poverty, limited resources, and cultural norms affect both educational and life outcomes for learners in Zambia and other African countries. Many families cannot afford school fees, uniforms, or other educational expenses or requirements. Girls often face greater barriers to education than boys, as cultural norms…

School principals are critical to students' academic achievement, second only to teachers. They are the primary agents of change in their schools, fostering supportive learning environments that enhance student learning and teacher effectiveness. Moreover, they often design and oversee the initiatives and hiring to sustain the positive changes…

Education can be viewed as having both social and individual purpose, and our experience of it can be shaped by both a selective mindset and a comprehensive idea. The comprehensive idea is an expression of values of equality and solidarity which I argue is as relevant post-sixteen as pre-sixteen. England's college sector is vital but often…

To explore and identify gaps in students' opportunities to take and prepare for advanced math since the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic, RAND Corporation researchers conducted a nationally representative survey of teachers and principals in spring 2022. The researchers focused on two key ingredients that enable equitable student…

When using theatre as an educational tool many artist teachers spend unnecessary time on the artistic product, and forget that the transformational process is where the focus should be.

For decades, schools nationwide have collected household income data to identify those eligible for free and reduced-price lunch programs. State leaders have long used this information as a proxy for student economic disadvantage--yet this data is insufficient to understand and address students' needs. Measures based on FRL data lack critical…

Writing a college-application essay has become a rite of passage for high-school seniors in the United States, one whose importance has expanded over time due to an increasingly competitive admissions process. Various commentators have noted the disturbing evolution of these essays over the years, with an ever-greater emphasis placed on obstacles…