This story was originally published by Grist. Sign up for Grist’s weekly newsletter here. Jesika Gonzalez will tell you that she wasn’t the biggest fan of Porterville, California, while she was growing up. “When I was younger, I was very, like, angsty,” the 18-year-old said as she flicked her purple hair over her shoulder. “Whatever,...

It’s well established that chronic absenteeism has skyrocketed since the pandemic. But a new analysis of federal data shows the problem may be worse than previously understood. Two out of three students were enrolled in schools with high or extreme rates of chronic absenteeism during the 2021-22 school year — more than double the rate in 2017-18,...

Experts have spent years trying to quantify the pandemic’s toll on a generation of K–12 students. Some have focused on the months of incomplete or nonexistent learning opportunities while instruction was being delivered remotely in 2020 and 2021. Others were most disturbed by the deferred development of social-emotional skills for the youngest students, or the...

This nation’s economic security will be won or lost based on the ability of elementary schools to energize science education. That is because the country is at the start of a massive effort intended to bring semiconductor manufacturing to the Southwest, battery research and development to rural upstate New York and more. It’s an effort...

The Los Angeles Unified School District’s recent decision to drop its staff vaccine mandate sparked little concern among parents and health officials as COVID-19 enters an endemic phase. “We face vastly different circumstances,” LAUSD superintendent Alberto Carvalho said. “It is a decision based on scientific knowledge and current conditions, nothing more, nothing less.” Carvalho said...

When the Supreme Court delivered its landmark ruling prohibiting the consideration of race in college admissions, Richard Kahlenberg was the rare liberal intellectual who celebrated. A prolific researcher at Georgetown University’s Center on Education and the Workforce, Kahlenberg didn’t just welcome the end of affirmative action as we knew it — he served as an...

The back-to-school scene as I dropped my daughter off for her first day of school today was delightfully, if unnervingly, normal. For parents around the country, this is the first back-to-school season since the end of COVID-19 as a public health emergency, and that is something to celebrate. As the country emerges from a pandemic that...

The vibe in education these days is dark. Test scores are falling, students’ mental health needs are growing and educators are becoming more and more exasperated. Perhaps schools should focus on fun. This isn’t a fanciful wish that’s out of touch with the stark challenges facing many communities. Rather, it’s a strategy, a means to an end, a practical...

A new GPS system for L.A. Unified parents to track their children’s bus routes on the LAUSD app launched in May to share real-time updates and information about delays — but there have been glitches.   Several parents and bus drivers told LA School Report the feature is often inaccurate, creating confusion in what can already...

When the only two other girls in Rebecca Wang’s high school computer science class were absent, she felt uncomfortable.  “It’s not that the boys weren’t welcoming to me,” she said. “It was more that I didn’t see other girls in the classroom.” Rebecca, a 17-year-old from San Jose, California, decided to do something about it....