Hundreds of U.S. schools will supplement fire drills and tornado training next fall with simulations of school shootings. In response to the December shootings by an intruder at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Connecticut, several states have enacted or are considering laws that require more and new types of school safety drills, more…

Dozens of schools are slated for aggressive interventions over the next three years under a new, multistate effort that aims to clear hurdles that have hindered previous attempts to improve underperforming schools. Education officials in Colorado, Delaware, Illinois, Louisiana, Massachusetts, and New York have agreed to partner with Mass Insight…

A strike last week by some 29,000 teachers in Chicago pushed long-simmering tensions over deeply divisive school improvement ideas--including changes in teacher evaluation and the takeover or closure of underperforming schools--into the national spotlight. A framework for a tentative agreement emerged last Friday, and the union's house of…

The school district in Anne Arundel County, Md., this spring entered into what appears to be a unique contract with the local teachers' union over struggling Annapolis High School: Teachers will work year-round and make a commitment to stay at the school for three years. Designed by Superintendent Kevin Maxwell to fend off a state takeover, 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…

Many students at the Edward Coles Model for Excellence World Language Academy or the Rachel Carson Elementary School in Chicago--schools that takes part in the Striving Readers program--say they came to enjoy reading for the first time or became better readers through the program, now in its fourth year. The federal program supports the…

States jockey for position as the U.S. Education Department readies billions of dollars in "Race to the Top" awards--the stimulus program's grand prize. Even before they've finished spending their first block of federal stimulus aid, states are getting a head start in a national "race to the top" for better public education,…

This article describes one community-based nonprofit group that provides free tutoring to poor children under the No Child Left Behind (NCLB) law. Unlike most other tutoring sessions under the law, the one at Erie Neighborhood House, a social-services agency in Chicago, is not happening in a school building or at a corporate tutoring outlet. Those…

This article reports the concerns in using college-entrance tests for school accountability. A growing number of states are requiring high school students to take college-admission tests and even making the exams a core part of their own testing systems. Proponents argue that having all teenagers take the exams will encourage more young people to…

Less than six months after the nation's governors gathered for a summit on high schools in February 2005, at least half a dozen states have already enacted policies that require students to complete tougher academic programs to earn a diploma. This flurry of activity is evidence that demands for making high school more rigorous, which state and…

This article reports the delayed release of information by many states about whether schools and districts have made adequate yearly progress under the federal No Child Left Behind Act until after September 8. Among the states that delayed their release of complete information include Illinois, Kansas, Louisiana, Maine, and Massachusetts. State…

This article reports that educators and experts across the country who work with English-language learners (ELLs) are moving toward a consensus that the federal Reading First program needs to be refined to become more effective for children acquiring English. Administrators in several big-city districts with large numbers of such students are…

From President Bush on down, the pressure is on to fix America's high schools. Despite a broad consensus that something is seriously wrong with the institution, deep fault lines remain about the remedies. Part of the reluctance to address high schools has been their complexity. The sheer size, departmental structure, mission creep, and other…