The National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) results have long displayed student achievement in two ways: as points on a stable vertical scale that typically runs from 0 to 300 or 500 and as the percentages of test takers whose scores reach or surpass a trio of "achievement levels." These achievement levels--dubbed…

The Current Generation of American public-school students has grown up in the era of centralized, standardized data. Anyone curious about how local schools were doing could look at pass rates on annual exams in math and reading, the foundation of federally mandated, test-based accountability. New rules are poised to change this system. The federal…

Calls for schools to pay heed to children's social and emotional learning have proliferated in recent years. Is the current enthusiasm for educating the "whole learner" a much-needed correction to the narrow concentration on academic skills in the modern reform era? Or is it a misguided retreat from academic rigor and an attempt to…

In October 2018, when Tom Boasberg stepped down as superintendent of Denver Public Schools (DPS) after 10 years on the job, he was no doubt frustrated to see his longtime critics rejoice. What likely disappointed him most, though, was that some of his strongest supporters abandoned him, too. This article discusses how Boasberg redesigned Denver's…

An independent watchdog agency, the Office of Inspector General (OIG), from the U.S. Department of Education, is charged with ferreting out waste and abuse of taxpayer dollars in both K-12 and postsecondary education. OIG's official mission is to "promote the efficiency, effectiveness, and integrity of the [Education] Department's programs…

In this article, the authors look at the evidence that external motivation can encourage middle-school and high-school students to work harder and learn more. They then identify a number of state and local policies that could put constructive pressure on students to exert effort in their academics. Such policies include instituting external,…

With the cost of college soaring and the national six-year completion rate below 60 percent, the federal government's support for higher education is facing heightened scrutiny. What kind of regulation and accountability should Congress impose on what might be termed the world's largest voucher program--Washington's hefty funding of Pell grants…

The federal government currently provides more than $150 billion each year to students and their families in the form of grants, loans, work-study funds, and tax credits to help make college more affordable. This sizable public investment in higher education has indeed made college attendance possible for a larger share of Americans. However,…

A privatization extremist. A religious zealot. A culture warrior. The new Secretary of Education, Betsy DeVos, was painted as any or all of these things in the fevered weeks between the 2016 presidential election and her confirmation hearing. In the days following that hearing, tens of thousands of people flooded the lines of congressional…

For some time, research has indicated that charter schools, on average, provide a superior education to students living in poverty, Black students, and Hispanic students. Now, research also shows charter schools are improving at a faster rate than district schools. To accelerate the achievement of all children in all types of schools, it may help…

After decades of slow growth, the share of young Americans completing college has increased to 48 percent in 2019, from 39 percent 10 years earlier. What accounts for the rise? Are more students clearing a meaningful bar for graduation, or are colleges and universities engaging in credential inflation and lowering their academic standards? This…

Completing a college degree, or failing to, is a major factor in determining whether a person will have an economically stable future. While it might have been possible a few decades ago to graduate from high school, enter the job market, and find a career that enabled one to earn a solid middle-class life, that path to success has been almost…

When the District of Columbia's city councilors handed Mayor Adrian Fenty control of the city's public schools in 2007, they were hoping for salvation. Or maybe just absolution. Fenty appointed Michelle Rhee, then-president of The New Teacher Project, as chancellor. She and her longtime colleague and eventual successor Kaya Henderson spent the…

With the cost of college soaring and the national six-year completion rate below 60 percent, the federal government's support for higher education faces heightened scrutiny. What kind of regulation and accountability should Congress impose on Washington's hefty funding of Pell grants and subsidized loans? As legislators turn their attention to…

Kevin Carey, vice president for education policy and knowledge management at New America, notes that lawmakers charged with writing a new Higher Education Act (HEA) face a dilemma. Innovation in the higher-ed marketplace is badly needed to improve student learning and break the relentless cycle of increasing cost that puts college out of reach for…