Can the nation's schools meet today's challenge of providing all students with the skills they will need to thrive in the rapidly changing economy and society of the 21st century? The authors point out in this article that a large percentage of children, overwhelmingly from low-income families, end their formal schooling without the…

Raising academic standards while eliminating achievement gaps between advantaged and disadvantaged students are among America's primary national educational goals. According to a growing body of research, America will attain its goals of equity and preparing students to function effectively as citizens and productive workers only through a…

Renaissance School is part of a network of Expeditionary Learning (EL) schools that was borne of a collaboration between the Harvard Graduate School of Education and Outward Bound, USA. The EL model is centered on the Outward Bound ethic of having youth work together to achieve a task. EL schools take an approach to teaching and learning that…

A large-scale, nationwide analysis of Teach For America teacher turnover presents a deeper picture of which TFAers stay, which ones leave the profession and some suggestions about why they leave. The authors learned that nearly two-thirds (60.5%) of TFA teachers continue as public school teachers beyond their two-year commitment; more than half…

High-quality prekindergarten programs not only are important for decreasing the school-readiness gaps between low-income and middle-income children, they also benefit wealthier children and decrease dropout and retention rates. Thus, in the last decade, many states have committed resources to providing high-quality preK programs for all children,…

U.S. education is at a transformational moment. The choices we make will determine whether our schools become collaborative and democratic or prescriptive and authoritarian. The policies proposed by the federal government for the reauthorization of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act will create some good schools for some students while…

School readiness is a quality that adults believe exists within the child, but it actually is an artifact of age-graded schools. Even in a single grade, there will be a one-year spread in ages and, therefore, in development. Instead of sorting children into those who are ready to learn and those who are not, schools should provide opportunities…

The U.S. has a powerful weapon in its educational arsenal: its community colleges. Yet these institutions, according to the author, are so often overlooked in discussions of the future of U.S. society and the U.S. work force that they might as well be deemed "top secret." More than 1,200 community colleges enroll some 47% of all undergraduates.…

After-school learning, summer learning, and family involvement in learning are major predictors of children's development, educational achievement, and school success. The United States will not achieve its national goals of equal educational opportunity without addressing the importance of and inequities in out-of-school learning opportunities.…

As students move up through the grades, the academic demands on them increase, and a great many of those increases come in the form of reading. The academic tasks students encounter in the upper elementary grades, and even more so in secondary school, involve a great deal of reading in support of learning new and complicated content. As the…

In this article, the author argues that teaching "technological literacy" at the expense of hands-on skills training is wrong for the students, wrong for the economy, and wrong for the nation. Students need not only the opportunity to explore a variety of trade skills but also the opportunity to learn a skill well. It is in the teaching…

Describes the successes of the Career Opportunities Program before it was deleted from the federal budget. (IRT)

Rather than encourage massive federal or State funding for day care centers, it would be fairer and wiser to use the funds to establish a generous family assistance program. Parents could then exercise their own discretion, using or passing by day-care facilities. (Author)

With the current pressures on teachers to increase academic achievement for all students, high-quality teacher training is more important than ever. Elementary teachers are faced with high expectations for their students to achieve literacy proficiency, and these expectations became law with the No Child Left Behind Act. With or without this…

Attempts to put the current controversy over affirmative action in perspective by reviewing the relevant legislation. (IRT)