Education Research Report

THIS WEEK 
Education Research Report

When Equity Is Optional: School Accountability Systems Fail to Help Most Vulnerable Students Under ESSA

by Jonathan Kantrowitz / 23h

Five years into the federal Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA), states are doing a wildly varied job of serving vulnerable students and closing persistent gaps required by the law, new analyses from the Alliance for Excellent Education (All4Ed) show. With the Biden administration taking office next month amid the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, the data in All4Ed’s When Equity Is Optional reports shows

Teacher Preparation's Diversity Problem

by Jonathan Kantrowitz / 4d

Closing the teacher diversity gap is one of the most important steps we can take to make public education more equitable. But as many school systems across the country have prioritized the issue, one institution has largely escaped scrutiny: teacher preparation programs. This report uses data from the U.S. Department of Education to compare the demographics of each state's teacher preparation pro

Postsecondary enrollments declined 2.5 percent

by Jonathan Kantrowitz / 4d

Complete report Overall postsecondary enrollments declined 2.5 percent in fall 2020, nearly twice the rate of enrollment decline reported in fall 2019. Undergraduate enrollment was the primary driver for this decline, decreasing 3.6 percent or over 560,200 students from 2019. Most notable is the public two-year sector, which suffered the most from enrollment decline this fall while all other majo

School Closures During the 1918 Flu Pandemic

by Jonathan Kantrowitz / 4d

The COVID-19 pandemic has reignited interest in responses to the 1918-19 influenza pandemic, the last comparable U.S. public health emergency. During both pandemics, many state and local governments made the controversial decision to close schools. This study examines the short- and long-run effects of 1918-19 pandemic-related school closures on children. The authors find precise null effects of

Lead Exposure Reduces Academic Performance

by Jonathan Kantrowitz / 4d

This study leverages a natural experiment, where a large national automotive racing organization switched from leaded to unleaded fuel, to study how ambient lead exposure and nutrition impact learning in elementary school. The average race emitted more than 10 kilograms of lead — a quantity similar to the annual emissions of an airport or a median lead-emitting industrial facility in the United S

African American youth who receive positive messages about their racial group may perform better in school

by Jonathan Kantrowitz / 9d

SHARE PRINT E-MAIL Youth of color represent over half of the school-aged population (kindergarten through twelfth grade) in public schools in the United States. This creates a need for evidence-driven approaches that address the pervasive Black-White achievement gap. A new longitudinal study shows that African American youth who receive positive messages about their racial group in school achieve

COVID-19 turned parents into proxy educators: research re stress it caused

by Jonathan Kantrowitz / 9d

When the emerging COVID-19 pandemic caused most U.S. schools to close and transition to distance learning last spring, many parents were forced into new roles as proxy educators for their children. A study published today in 

 Education Research Report