In a sea of bad news, Dick Startz, writing for the Brown Center Chalkboard at Brookings, reflects on the good news in American education: Graduation rates are up Over the last fifteen years, high school graduation rates have risen. The vast majority of adults have a high school diploma. White, Read more
The percentage of students completing high school and enrolling in college has increased over time for all racial and ethnic groups, according to a newly released report. However, despite these gains, the rate of progress has varied among groups, and gaps persist on key indicators of educational performance. The National Read more
The National Center for Education Statistics has released The Condition of Education 2016. Listed below are several interesting highlights in this data: 1. Kindergartners’ Approaches to Learning, Family Socioeconomic Status, and Early Academic Gains First-time kindergartners who demonstrated positive approaches to learning behaviors more frequently in the fall of kindergarten Read more
In “Mind the Gap: The Case for Re-Imagining the Way States Judge High School Quality”, Chad Aldeman argues that new, more multidimensional ways of judging high school quality are essential. Current state and federal policies on high schools tend to reward schools that perform well on measures like test scores Read more
Don’t Quit on Me: What Young People Who Left School Say about the Power of Relationships examines, from the perspective of young people themselves, the roles that relationships with adults and peers play in decisions about staying in, leaving, and returning to high school. Building on previous studies, including last Read more
The U.S. is on track for a 90 percent high school graduation rate by 2020 after hitting a record high 81 percent this year. That’s according to the GradNation campaign’s sixth annual report released by America’s Promise Alliance, the Alliance for Excellent Education and others. The 10 largest states, including Read more
Achieve’s ninth annual “Closing the Expectations Gap” report, released recently, shows the progress that states have made in advancing college and career readiness while also revealing that much work remains to be done to ensure that all students are academically prepared to succeed in college and careers after high school. Read more
A coalition of education organizations has set a goal of 90% graduation by 2020, and the government recently released a report suggesting that the U.S. may in fact get there. The Institute of Education Sciences, the U.S. Department of Education’s research arm, just released data showing that the four year Read more
IES has recently released its Projections of Education Statistics to 2022. This edition of the report provides projections for key education statistics, including enrollment, graduates, teachers, and expenditures in elementary and secondary public and private schools, as well as enrollment and degrees conferred at postsecondary degree-granting institutions. Included are national Read more
A new report released by CompetencyWorks, titled Progress and Proficiency: Redesigning Grading for Competency Education, helps education leaders think through how to design grading policies that communicate academic performance to students and parents. As more schools and districts begin to develop competency-based pathways that allow students to progress based on Read more
More than a dozen states are on track to assign A-F letter grades to schools, among the trends highlighted in a first-of-its-kind database published by the Education Commission of the States. The online database shows which indicators states are considering in gauging school performance and how state leaders are publicly Read more
A new paper from Bellwether Education Partners argues that the “college for all” debate is beside the point because students are already flocking to colleges. The real question, they say, is how to find low-income students with high potential and how to better inform students so that they’re “smart shoppers” Read more
With all 50 states having adopted college- and career-ready standards (CCR) in English language arts/literacy and mathematics, Achieve‘s eighth annual “Closing the Expectations Gap“ report shows how all states are aligning those standards with policies to send clear signals to students about what it means to be academically prepared for Read more
Various education-focused organizations, as well as government officials, have been questioning the recent policy of Education secretary Arne Duncan and the Obama Administration to provide waivers to those states who have not been able to meet the standards laid out by the No Child Left Behind Act of 2001. Originally, Read more
At 69 percent, the United States ranks twenty-eighth in the percentage of four-year-olds in early childhood education, according to Education at a Glance 2012: OECD Indicators, released earlier this month by the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD). The report also finds that the odds of a young person Read more