In a comprehensive action intended to change how the No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB) law is carried out, the U.S. Secretary of Education formally proposed a package of new regulations that would require state and local school officials to provide more and better information about high school graduation rates, student test performance, and the…

The reauthorization of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA) provides Congress with an opportunity to amend the Unsafe School Choice Option (USCO) provision to ensure that the intent of the law is met. Based on the experience the Office of Inspector General (OIG) gained through audits, they prepared this report to inform Department…

Six years after the passage of No Child Left Behind and midway to the nation's goal of having students on grade level or better in reading and math by 2014, more data than ever before has been collected about the academic performance of American students and schools. Information in this brochure charts student demographics, achievement-to-date and…

Despite its flaws, the USCO created the conditions for an unprecedented national statement on school safety. This study asks: How do states conceptualize school safety? While critics have denounced the dizzying assortment of states' persistently dangerous criteria, we argue that these differences have been grossly exaggerated. We contend that…

"Outlook" is the monthly newsletter for the Council for American Private Education (CAPE). Each issue contains information relating to private education such as: new legislation and regulations, the most recent research, court rulings, national trends, federal initiatives, private school news briefs, and more. This issue includes: (1)…

This article reports how President Bush's new blueprint for the No Child Left Behind Act will create a partisan debate on educational strategies. In its plans for NCLB, the administration said it wants private and charter schools to create competition that would spur improvement in substandard schools. Democrats, however, have their own priorities…

From tuition vouchers for private schools to charter schools to voluntary transfer programs within and between public school systems, school choice has been at the center of the school reform debate for two decades. But with the voucher movement unable to sustain much momentum, charter schools still serving a small percentage of the nation's…

The 2014 edition of the "Digest of Education Statistics" is the 50th in a series of publications initiated in 1962. The Digest has been issued annually except for combined editions for the years 1977-78, 1983-84, and 1985-86. Its primary purpose is to provide a compilation of statistical information covering the broad field of American…

This article highlights the contrasting views between presidential candidates John McCain and Barack Obama on school choice and teacher issues. Senator McCain, R-Arizona, has pledged to direct federal money to alternative teacher-certification programs, give parents more direct access to supplemental educational services, and expand private school…

While there are no reliable counts of single-gender schools in the first half of the 20th century, best estimates are that most were schools for white boys. Many of the girls' schools that did exist early on served as "finishing" schools rather than preparation for college. In the 1960s and 1970s, the civil rights and feminist movements…

The passage of the No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB) in 2001 brought new urgency to the task of turning around low-performing schools. While many schools have been identified as needing improvement under NCLB, only a small percentage have failed to make progress for long enough--six years--to be subject to restructuring, the most serious consequence…

In 2006, the George W. Bush Administration issued new Title IX regulations that allow for sex-segregated classrooms and schools in public, non-vocational elementary and secondary schools. These regulations provide schools with another condition that allows them to provide sex-segregated programs as long as they meet an "important governmental…

This report presents findings on the implementation of parental choice options from the first year of the National Longitudinal Study of "No Child Left Behind" (NLS-"NCLB") and the Study of State Implementation of Accountability and Teacher Quality Under "No Child Left Behind" (SSI-"NCLB"). The report uses…

The argument for national curriculum standards sounds simple: set high standards, make all schools meet them, and watch American students achieve at high levels. It is straightforward and compelling, and it is driving a sea change in American education policy. Unfortunately, setting high standards and getting American students to hit them is…

In this report, the author presents the results of the Heritage Foundation's 2007 parental choice survey of Members of Congress, conducted to determine the percentage of Members of Congress that practice private school choice. It was found that the percentage of Members of the 110th Congress who practice private school choice is disproportionate…