In Part 1, we looked at the legal definitions for equity, as codified by NCLB and ESSA. Today, we’re going to talk about why meeting the goals set forth in both those acts — that all students receive challenging curriculum and the instruction and the resources necessary to master it and that all are adequately […]
“Equitable treatment means we all end up in the same place.” – Kamala Harris, Vice President of the United States Equity is becoming a “trigger” word across the country. EdWeek asserts this is because the way equity is interpreted varies depending on where you are in the U.S. and who you’re […]
In Part 1 we looked at what Social Emotional Learning (SEL) is and why it’s important for kids. We talked about the five competencies of SEL and how each plays out in highly logical ways in classrooms – ways that are consistent with moral human behaviors like respect, kindness, patience, self-control, perseverance, responsibility, and so […]
In Part 1 we looked at what Social Emotional Learning (SEL) is and why it’s important for kids. We talked about the five competencies of SEL and how each plays out in highly logical ways in classrooms – ways that are consistent with moral human behaviors like respect, kindness, patience, self-control, perseverance, responsibility, and so […]
The Iowa Senate is advancing a bill out of committee that would ban Social Emotional Learning (SEL) for public school students. The bill was introduced by a Republican state senator in late January. The meat of the bill is this: “The department [of Education] shall not display on the department’s internet site or otherwise disseminate […]
In Part I, we discussed how the “intuitive” measures to address potential school shootings – more security, more armed personnel, more expulsions, more mental health resources – actually aren’t effective at preventing shootings. Instead, they mostly focus on dealing with shooters when they’ve already shown up with a gun. At that point, the risk of […]
School shootings are terrifying, both in their suddenness and their level of violence. The age of the victims makes them tragedies that are hard to forget. The worst ones in recent years – Uvalde, Sandy Hook, Parkland – have inspired a host of strategies meant to stop future shooters. This impulse makes a lot of […]
In Part 1, we explored how we might ‘moneyball’ education — apply some of the systematic, data driven principles pioneered by the Oakland A’s baseball team to maximize their ability to win in the face of budget constraints. The system required using objective means rather than human perception and tradition to make decisions that improved […]
The 2003 book Moneyball, by Michael Lewis, was a deep dive into the system the Oakland A’s developed to select the best baseball players they could with their limited budget. It was a system that got a lot of pushback initially because it seemed to violate all the canons of player selection favored by scouts. […]
It’s taken a while, but data crunchers are finally quantifying how the Covid-19 pandemic affected student learning. The results are detailed in a recent article from NPR , which offers 6 takeaways about pandemic learning loss. Debating Terms This isn’t a finding, but one of the points made by the article is that what students […]