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Final push to save expanded child tax credit as Senate hopes dim
The last time Congress increased the child tax credit — during the pandemic — Sarah Izabel used the extra cash to enroll her son in an afterschool program so she could apply to graduate school. “If my son was home, then I would be taking care of him,” said the Stanford University student, who’s...
By Linda Jacobson | March 28, 2024
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Gas, food, lodging for homeless students in jeopardy as funding deadline looms
For the past two months, home for Lori Menkedick and her family has been the Evergreen Inn, a Los-Angeles area motel just off Interstate-210. They’ve bounced between similar establishments east of downtown for almost three years. But room rates consume most of the $650 a week her husband earns from construction. The family depends on...
By Linda Jacobson | February 26, 2024
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As relief funds expire, Harvard’s Kane says ‘whole generation’ still needs help
Harvard University researcher Tom Kane stood before a captive audience at Washington’s Omni Shoreham hotel last Wednesday, just hours after dropping the report everyone was talking about. Offering the best look yet at students’ recovery from pandemic learning loss, the report showed that students actually made impressive academic gains last school year. But achievement gaps grew wider...
By Linda Jacobson | February 12, 2024
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Report: Schools won’t recover from COVID absenteeism crisis until at least 2030
The rate of students chronically missing school got so bad during the pandemic that it will likely be 2030 before classrooms return to pre-COVID norms, a new report says. But even that prediction rests on optimistic assumptions about continued improvement in the coming years. For some states, it could take longer. In Louisiana, Oregon and...
By Linda Jacobson | February 7, 2024
Schools After COVID: 6 Ways For Districts to Better Engage Parents Amid Concerns About COVID Learning Loss
74 Interview: Why Social Media is Being Blamed for the Youth Suicide Crisis
Thousands of Schools at Risk of Closing Due to Enrollment Loss
Free New AI Tool to Help Americans Search and Compare Student Test Scores Across All 50 States
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Road Scholars: When these families travel, school comes along for the ride
Palm Desert, California Jon and Sam Bastianelli looked on patiently as their oldest son, the “history buff,” examined the axes, shovels and old farming tools displayed in a blacksmith shop at the Coachella Valley History Museum. His younger siblings crushed pumpkin seeds with a mortar and pestle in an exhibit honoring the Cahuilla tribe, the...
By Linda Jacobson | January 29, 2024
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Experts give Biden high marks on student achievement agenda. But what about parents?
The Biden administration received high marks for elevating key strategies to help students rebound from pandemic learning loss — addressing chronic absenteeism, offering high-impact tutoring and extending learning afterschool and during the summer. “These three strategies have one central goal — giving students more time and more support to succeed,” U.S. Education Secretary Miguel Cardona...
By Linda Jacobson | January 22, 2024
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A rose-colored recovery: Study says parents don’t grasp scope of COVID’s academic damage
Last week, as leading education experts gathered — again —to ponder the nation’s sluggish recovery from pandemic learning loss, one speaker put the issue in stark relief. “This is the biggest problem facing America,” Jens Ludwig, a University of Chicago professor, said flatly. Nonetheless, he told those assembled at the Washington, D.C., event sponsored by...
By Linda Jacobson | January 9, 2024
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Oakland study finds parents as effective as teachers in tutoring young readers
A new report finds that a parent-led tutoring effort in Oakland produced similar gains in reading for young students as instruction from classroom teachers — a nod that could fuel similar efforts in other districts. “The more the children know you and trust you, the more they’re willing to engage in what you’re trying to teach them,”...
By Linda Jacobson | December 7, 2023
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First civil rights data since COVID reveals racial divide in advanced classes
About 2.9 million high school students took at least one Advanced Placement course in the 2020-21 school year, according to the latest federal data measuring access to educational opportunity. But Black and Latino students were significantly underrepresented in those college-level math and science courses. And schools in which at least 75% of students are Black...
By Linda Jacobson | November 20, 2023
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Despite slight reprieve, districts still struggle to find teachers, staff
Post-pandemic staffing challenges have eased up slightly this fall, but many school leaders report that they still have crucial vacancies to fill. The latest federal data on the public education workforce, released Tuesday, shows 45% of leaders said they were understaffed as the new school year began. That’s down from just over half last year....
By Linda Jacobson | October 25, 2023