July - 2022

Joanne Jacobs

Jul 31, 2022
3 min

Beware the college aid scam

College financial aid is based on what the customer can pay -- not financial need or academic excellence, writes Kevin Carey in Slate. It's a "sham." He tells the tale of two cousins with similar high school records: "Ethan," with parents earning more than $200,000 a year was offered more financial aid than "Ashley," who was raised by a low-earning single mother. . . . In December, Ursinus had offered Ethan a “Gateway Scholarship” of $35,000 to offset the college’s listed pri

2 comments

AI will do the writing -- and the thinking -- for students

Joanne Jacobs

Jul 30, 2022
2 min

AI will do the writing -- and the thinking -- for students

Clear writing requires clear thinking. If bots do the writing, will students still do the thinking? New software is very sophisticated, writes John Symons, who teaches writing-intensive philosophy courses, on Return. He worries that artificial intelligence will "make us less intelligent." "Learning to write has helped generations of students to improve their ability to think," he writes. Grades in humanities classes depend heavily on the quality of written work. Jasper AI is

6 comments

Joanne Jacobs

Jul 29, 2022
1 min

Why it's hard to close learning gaps

Student behavioral issues are a major barrier to closing learning gaps, say 67 percent teachers in a Khan Academy survey, reports Lauraine Langreo on Ed Week. Another 57 percent chose "student mental health." Khan Academy's blog stresses teachers' support for mastery learning to help address learning loss. Most teachers would like to let students advance at their own pace and retake tests until they can show competency in a subject. However, many say rigid pacing guides make

23 comments

Joanne Jacobs

Jul 29, 2022
1 min

No phones, no problems?

Schools from New York to Nebraska are trying to ban cell phones in hopes of keeping students focused in class and discouraging the use of phones to set up and record fights. In Hopewell, Virginia, middle and high schoolers will have to put their phones in a magnetized pouch at the start of the school day, report Elizabeth Holmes and Jacob Phillips of WTVR. The pouches "can only be unlocked by special magnets placed at the entrances of school buildings at the end of the day."

3 comments

Joanne Jacobs

Jul 28, 2022
2 min

If the house is haunted, get out

Absurd "racial equity" policies are hurting students who need help the most, writes a self-described left-wing teacher on Wesley Yang's Substack. He's teaching in a Kafka-designed summer program that enrolls children, six to 12, whose teachers think they need academic help. Most parents agreed -- it's free -- but attendance is very low. By the end of the first week, the teacher had one student attending consistently, one withdrawal and eight children who'd never shown up. He

1 comment

Joanne Jacobs

Jul 27, 2022
2 min

Merit is not a myth

If I wanted to prevent disadvantaged or "marginalized" students from doing well in school, succeeding in college, learning a career or holding down a job, what would I do? I'd set very low expectations for their achievement and effort. I'd tell them the system is designed to ensure their failure, "merit" is a myth and working hard, meeting deadlines, building competence and taking responsibility are only for white people. Why do the people who talk the most about "equity" do

6 comments

Joanne Jacobs

Jul 26, 2022
1 min

When teachers know their students well

When teachers know their students well, they can teach more effectively, writes Fordham's Nathaniel Grossman. When teachers and students are together for two or more years -- intentionally or accidentally -- students learn more, concludes a new study of Tennessee students from 2007 to 2017. Only 2 percent of elementary teachers are "loopers," moving with the same group to the next grade, writes Grossman. However, "a high school math teacher might teach algebra to freshmen,

0 comments

Joanne Jacobs

Jul 26, 2022
1 min

Why teachers quit

Student misbehavior is a key reason that teachers leave their jobs, writes Chalkboard Review's Tony Kinnett, who surveyed teachers in the Midwest on June 10. He asked for "the largest reason you're leaving your position," offering various choices. "Student behavior is poor and left unchecked" was cited by 319 of the 615 responders, followed by 138 for “progressive political activity (Diversity/Equity/Inclusion, Critical Race Theory, Gender Identity, etc.) required by administ

6 comments

Joanne Jacobs

Jul 25, 2022
2 min

Only reconnect

Rebuilding student's connections with schools, teachers and each other is critical to recovery from school closures, says Doug Lemov of Teach Like a Champion in a FutureEd interview with Phyllis Jordan. School culture is the subject of a Reconnect, a forthcoming book by Lemov, Hilary Lewis, Darryl Williams and Demarius Frazier The pandemic eroded students' social skills, especially for those out of school for a year and a half or more, says Lemov. But this is "a pandemic ins

3 comments

Grading 'reforms' teach kids they can 'do nothing, get something'

Joanne Jacobs

Jul 25, 2022
2 min

Grading 'reforms' teach kids they can 'do nothing, get something'

Teachers are complaining to Washington Post columnist Jay Mathews about grading reforms, he writes. A teacher in the high-performing Montgomery County, Maryland district fears that students are learning they can get good or good enough grades without doing the work. Teachers can't give a zero for a missed assignment, unless they document their efforts to contact a parent about the problem. It takes a lot of time to send multiple emails, the teacher says. So he just gives stu

8 comments

Joanne Jacobs

Jul 24, 2022
2 min

'Queer all school year'

Boys and girls, today we're going to learn that there is no such thing as boys and girls. Los Angeles Unified, the nation's second-largest school district, is training teachers in how to implement a "radical gender-theory curriculum," writes Christopher F. Rufo, a senior fellow at the Manhattan Institute, in City Journal. He links to documents on the effort, which encourages teachers "to work toward the 'breakdown of the gender binary,' to experiment with gender pronouns suc

5 comments

Joanne Jacobs

Jul 23, 2022
2 min

It's too noisy for kids to learn

It must be 45 years ago that I visited my first classroom as a reporter. I was shocked at the change from my school days. Students got up from the desks and wandered around, he teacher buzzed from one group of students to the next, everybody was talking and nobody was listening. It's hard for students to focus on learning in noisy classrooms, writes Natalie Wexler in Forbes. The average elementary classroom is a hub of activity, distraction and noise. Teachers are told that s

1 comment

Joanne Jacobs

Jul 22, 2022
3 min

'R' is for reading -- and race

K-2 teachers won't be switching to a new research-backed, phonics-based literacy curriculum this fall, reports Dana Goldstein in the New York Times. The revised version of Lucy Calkins' Units of Study, used in as many as one in four elementary schools, has been delayed by the publisher because edits made to satisfy curriculum laws in conservative states angered progressives. The publisher, Heinemann was looking at changing advice in teacher materials "for educators to remain

4 comments

Joanne Jacobs

Jul 21, 2022
2 min

The 'dumbest' education

"Teachers are trained in the dumbest parts of the dumbest colleges said Larry Arnn, president of Hillsdale College, at an event with Tennessee Gov. Bill Lee. He's not the first to criticize education schools, points out Larry Sand, president of the California Teachers Empowerment Network. "The average ed school . . . is nothing more than a politically correct fad factory that gloms onto the latest good-sounding tripe and forces it down the throats of its students." “Schools o

8 comments

Joanne Jacobs

Jul 20, 2022
1 min

It's a 'long road to recovery'

When students returned to school, they began learning again, but the recovery was hampered by "high absenteeism, quarantines and short-term closures," writes Linda Jacobson on The 74. Overall, the findings — from 8.3 million students in 25,000 schools — “point to a long road to recovery still ahead,” wrote researchers from nonprofit testing provider NWEA. . . . Test data shows that it could still take three to five years — in the middle grades, more than five — to return to p

0 comments

Joanne Jacobs

Jul 20, 2022
2 min

Normal in the fall?

San Diego schools have reimposed indoor mask mandates for summer school students, reports Domenick Candelieri. The city is seeing a flare-up of Covid cases. District leaders don't seem to care if the rules accelerate enrollment loss, writes Matt Welch on Reason. San Diego Unified Board President Sharon Whitehurst-Payne told KUSI News that summer students can drop out if they don't want to wear masks. If the mandate remains in the fall, those who object can take online classes

1 comment

Joanne Jacobs

Jul 19, 2022
2 min

Good math teaching may not be fun

When it comes to fourth- and fifth-grade math, there's often "a tradeoff between 'good teaching' where kids learn stuff and 'good teaching' that kids enjoy," writes Jill Barshay on the Hechinger Report, citing a newly posted working paper. Researchers found that "teachers who were good at raising test scores tended to receive low student evaluations," while "teachers with great student evaluations tended not to raise test scores all that much" Teachers whose students earned h

3 comments

Joanne Jacobs

Jul 19, 2022
2 min

Data science vs. calculus

California's proposed math guidelines claim to promote equity by offering a data-science alternative to the traditional algebra-to-calculus track. The State Board of Education delayed approval after critics charged it would lure disadvantaged students off the track to STEM success. In an Education Next forum on math education, University of Chicago economists Steven Levitt and Jeffrey Severts argue for teaching data literacy to all students, while Boaz Barak, a Harvard comput

12 comments

Joanne Jacobs

Jul 18, 2022
1 min

Putin orders pro-war classes

Russian schools are watching war movies, taking "virtual tours" through Crimea and "celebrating Russia's 'rebirth' under President Vladimir V. Putin, writes Anton Troianovski in the New York Times. "All Russian children will be encouraged to join a new patriotic youth movement in the likeness of the Soviet Union’s red-cravatted 'Pioneers' -- presided over by the president himself," he reports. It will not be called Putin Youth, however. Putin has ordered Russian schools to h

1 comment

Joanne Jacobs

Jul 18, 2022
2 min

Teaching patriotism in Florida

Florida's civics standards are -- gasp! -- "overtly patriotic," reports Ileana Najarro. Summer training sessions for civics teachers focus on how to teach about "the country’s founding ideals and religion’s role in that foundation," she writes. "We’re not talking about jingoism, we’re not talking about an uncritical sense of patriotism,” said Stephen S. Masyada, director of the Florida Joint Center for Citizenship at the University of Central Florida, which helped develop the

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