Thinking and Linking

Joanne Jacobs

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    ACT: Pandemic fueled grade inflation
    Joanne Jacobs
    • May 17
    • 2 min

    ACT: Pandemic fueled grade inflation

    High school grade inflation accelerated during the pandemic, according to ACT. “The findings echo a recent federal study that also showed...
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    Teaching about racism: Americans are divided
    Joanne Jacobs
    • May 9
    • 1 min

    Teaching about racism: Americans are divided

    Americans agree that schools should teach about historic racism and slavery, but divided on present-day racism, writes Matt Barnum on...
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    Joanne Jacobs
    • Jan 3, 2020
    • 1 min

    Tutoring, or Test Prep?

    I was well into this article before I realized that the British “tuition” must be the American “tutoring”. An east London secondary...
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    Grade inflation is expanding
    Joanne Jacobs
    • Sep 19, 2018
    • 1 min

    Grade inflation is expanding

    Grade inflation is expanding, especially at high schools with affluent students, concludes a Fordham’s newest study, Grade Inflation in...
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    Math licensing test is too hard, say teachers
    Joanne Jacobs
    • Aug 29, 2018
    • 1 min

    Math licensing test is too hard, say teachers

    Does a third-grade teacher need to know high school math? asks Ann Doss Helms in the Charlotte Observer. “Almost 2,400 North Carolina...
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    Testing basic skills leads to two-tier system
    Joanne Jacobs
    • Jul 31, 2018
    • 1 min

    Testing basic skills leads to two-tier system

    Schools serving mainly poor and minority students end up teaching the basic skills and schools serving more advantaged students, knowing...
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    Show me the test scores
    Joanne Jacobs
    • Jul 30, 2018
    • 2 min

    Show me the test scores

    You want my kids to go to your schools? Show me they’re learning, writes Citizen Stewart in a defense of test-based accountability....
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    Elite colleges drop SAT, ACT essay test
    Joanne Jacobs
    • Jul 19, 2018
    • 2 min

    Elite colleges drop SAT, ACT essay test

    The ability to write cogently, quickly and under pressure, helped me get into and through college. However, a growing list of selective...
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    Kids made honor roll, but aren’t at grade level
    Joanne Jacobs
    • Jul 12, 2018
    • 2 min

    Kids made honor roll, but aren’t at grade level

    “It’s no use if my kids are on the school’s honor roll if they are not proficient in reading and math,” a mother tells LA School Report’s...
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    More states rely on robo-graders for essay tests
    Joanne Jacobs
    • Jul 11, 2018
    • 2 min

    More states rely on robo-graders for essay tests

    Pearson’s “automated scoring program graded some 34 million student essays on state and national high-stakes tests last year,” she...
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    None dare call it tracking
    Joanne Jacobs
    • Jul 9, 2018
    • 2 min

    None dare call it tracking

    Well, it looks like tracking to me. And I’m fine with it. Jonathan Plucker, a Johns Hopkins education professor, sees “a subtle shift” in...
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    Equity and excellence
    Joanne Jacobs
    • Jun 18, 2018
    • 2 min

    Equity and excellence

    New York City’s elite high schools are filled with Asian-American students — many from low-income, immigrant families — who’ve aced the...
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    22% of Pomona students are ‘disabled’
    Joanne Jacobs
    • May 31, 2018
    • 2 min

    22% of Pomona students are ‘disabled’

    classified as disabled, largely because of mental-health issues such as depression or anxiety,” reports Douglas Belkin in the Wall Street...
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    Are test scores irrelevant?
    Joanne Jacobs
    • May 16, 2018
    • 1 min

    Are test scores irrelevant?

    Students defended their Providence, Rhode Island middle school in a panel discussion sponsored by Generation Citizen, reports the...
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    How to motivate students
    Joanne Jacobs
    • May 15, 2018
    • 2 min

    How to motivate students

    Many believe “extrinsic” motivators, such as incentives,  “decrease student effort by eroding students’ intrinsic desire to learn,” they...
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    Test-optional students are as likely to graduate
    Joanne Jacobs
    • May 1, 2018
    • 2 min

    Test-optional students are as likely to graduate

    At colleges that don’t require applicants to submit SAT or ACT scores, students admitted on grades alone are just as likely to graduate...
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    We’re teaching reading wrong
    Joanne Jacobs
    • Apr 15, 2018
    • 2 min

    We’re teaching reading wrong

    We’re teaching reading wrong, writes Natalie Wexler in The Atlantic. U.S. schools spend a lot of time on reading skills in the early...
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    Nation’s report card shows ‘lost decade’
    Joanne Jacobs
    • Apr 10, 2018
    • 2 min

    Nation’s report card shows ‘lost decade’

    Reading and math proficiency isn’t improving for fourth- and eighth-graders, according to the 2017 National Assessment of Education...
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    Test scores matter
    Joanne Jacobs
    • Apr 9, 2018
    • 1 min

    Test scores matter

    Test scores matter, writes Erika Sanzi on Good School Hunting. In deciding where to build its second headquarters (HQ2), Amazon is...
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    Teachers debate: Should students get retakes?
    Joanne Jacobs
    • Mar 28, 2018
    • 2 min

    Teachers debate: Should students get retakes?

    Baptiste Delvallé doesn’t let students retake quizzes and tests, he writes in Education Week. Here’s how I explain it to my students. If...
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