All of the conditions that have bedeviled students’ post-COVID learning recovery — high rates of absenteeism, school staffing shortages, academic setbacks and disruptions — have been worse for English learners and students with disabilities, according to the latest State of the American Student report. “The thing that really struck us as we looked across all of the...

For months, Wendy Rodas felt disempowered and silenced whenever she tried to reach out to her daughter’s Missouri elementary school. The El Salvadorian mother of three, who primarily speaks Spanish, struggled to communicate with teachers, administrators and district leaders. She made repeated requests for the interpretation services that she — and all public school parents who...

Parents from across the political spectrum report greater confidence in their kids’ teachers and schools than they do in the national education system at large, with the overwhelming majority (82%) giving teachers an ‘A’ or ‘B’ for how they’ve handled education this year. The results come from a survey that polled 1,518 parents of K-12...

Three high-profile education advocacy and research groups crossed political lines in Washington, D.C., Wednesday to announce an ambitious goal: cutting chronic absenteeism in half over the next five years. For the first time, the conservative American Enterprise Institute, the left-leaning Education Trust and the national nonprofit Attendance Works joined forces to confront an issue that...

When elementary school teacher Kimberly Papa gave birth to her daughter, Margot, a little over a year ago, she wasn’t expecting much in the way of paid maternity leave. She knew that the majority of Americans don’t have access to it and certainly not those in her state of Ohio. While she could take 12...

  In Natasha Sonia Alford’s newly released memoir, American Negra, she describes an early childhood memory of being the new kid at school: “What are you?” another student asked. “I’m Puerto Rican and Black,” she responded, noting these were “the only words I had at the time to explain my identity in terms that made...

This story first appeared at The 74, a nonprofit news site covering education. Sign up for free newsletters from The 74 to get more like this in your inbox. Parents from across the political spectrum support providing public funds directly to families for resources like tutoring, internet access and mental health care, according to a...