Schools should be safe places for young people, educators, school staff, and community members, and policies and practices can help create learning environments where kids thrive. Gun violence in U.S. schools has prompted calls for increased school safety measures; however, which policies contribute to safe school environments is often a topic of…

Exclusionary discipline practices differentially harm young children of color. As early childhood education systems seek to close these gaps to ensure all young children have access to high quality early learning experiences, the field requires more evidence-based approaches that can be scaled and replicated. Infant and early childhood mental…

The COVID-19 pandemic has brought unprecedented challenges to the schools, the economy, and the nation's families, exacerbating racial inequities and placing a disproportionate burden on communities of color throughout the country. While physically opening schools at the beginning of the 2020--2021 school year is the goal of most districts, the…

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…

Whole-school or whole-class programs designed to promote positive behavior can enhance the likelihood that effective teaching and learning occur for all students. This practice guide is intended to help elementary education educators, as well as school and district administrators and parents, implement and support effective prevention-focused…

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…

As states develop their accountability and improvement systems under the Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA) they can choose high-leverage measures of school progress that, when combined with effective policies, hold promise for supporting success for the youth most marginalized by the education system. This paper suggests that to promote equity and…