School districts across the country are tackling the toughest challenges in education, from kindergarten readiness, to family engagement, to school redesign. To address these challenges, we need to understand how they are experienced in different settings — from small, rural districts to large, urban districts — and we need to Read more
Thomas Arnett, senior research fellow at the Christensen Institute, recently summarized his new research paper for The 74. Excerpts appear below: Recently, my colleagues and I released a research paper that unveils common misconceptions about change management in schools. Given that many school initiatives falter for lack of teacher buy-in, Read more
If students are going to get the most out of school, they need to be engaged. Research shows, for example, that disengaged students are more likely to suffer a range of bad consequences, such as failing a course, repeating a grade, and dropping out. Yet however much rhetoric we may Read more
Knowing how the brain receives new information, creates memories, and accesses stored knowledge can help educators plan memorable lessons for their students. In a new report, Student Learning that Works: How Brain Science Informs a Student Learning Model, McREL CEO and author Bryan Goodwin reviews the science of memory and Read more
In recent years, public officials have sought to determine the quality of our nation’s teacher preparation programs, both the traditional programs at colleges and universities, as well as alternative preparation programs like Teach for America. One proposed way to do this is to track graduates into the classrooms where they Read more
Recently, Carolyn Jones, writing for California’s EdSource, shared the findings of a recent research report that focuses on equitable access to math and science courses for students of color. Excerpts of her piece appear below: African-American and Latino students were less likely to attend schools that offer advanced math and Read more
The National Center for Education Statistics has released The Condition of Education 2018, a congressionally mandated report that summarizes important developments and trends in education using the latest available data. This year’s report provides new analyses on a wide range of issues, including the cost of early childhood care arrangements Read more
Kevin Mahnken, writing for The 74, recently reviewed a new working paper by the Center for Analysis of Longitudinal Data in Education Resear (CALDER). The study, conducted by CALDER director and University of Washington professor Dan Goldhaber, synthesizes two separate research topics: the influence of teacher quality on student achievement, Read more
In October 2017, American Institutes for Research (AIR) convened a panel of more than 30 teacher educators, researchers, and school and district leaders to present interdisciplinary research study designs that would break ground on new ways to better prepare teachers. These innovative designs, and the conversations they sparked, represent the Read more
The Data Quality Campaign has released Education Data 101, a primer on the most important concepts and research related to education data. The purpose of this publication is to bring policymakers up to speed, but it also provides a nice summary of talking points for anyone involved in education. The Read more
Every year, education researchers force us to re-examine our cherished assumptions about education. In 2017, we started thinking differently about the importance of high-quality preschool. We began talking about the boon to minority students of a more diverse teacher workforce. We questioned the country’s skyrocketing high school graduation rates. And Read more
Sam Larson, James W. Dearing and Thomas E. Backer of the Wallace Foundation recently worked with 45 diverse nonprofits to discover successful strategies for scaling successful programs. “Strategies to Scale Up Social Programs: Pathways, Partnerships and Fidelity,” examines how successful organizations address how to scale up, whom to involve Read more
For the last 18 months, the Office of Educational Technology at the U.S. Department of Education, in partnership with the Institute of Education Sciences (IES) at the Department, has been working with Mathematica Policy Research and SRI International to build the Rapid Cycle Evaluation Coach (the RCE Coach). The RCE Read more
Minorities continue to be largely underrepresented among elementary and secondary teachers relative to the racial and ethnic composition of the nation’s student body, and tend to be concentrated in urban, high-minority schools. This means that many nonwhite or Hispanic students who attend schools with few minority teachers lack valuable role Read more
We know that students learn more when they receive high-quality instruction. We also have findings suggesting that some teacher preparation programs produce graduates that are more capable than others. These two pieces of evidence have led many teacher educators, researchers, and stakeholders to conclude that we need better studies of Read more
Among high school students who consider dropping out, half cite lack of engagement with school as a primary reason, and 42 percent say that they don’t see value in the schoolwork they are asked to do. In What Teens Want from Their Schools: A National Survey of High School Student Read more