It's been a rough time for the image of K-12 virtual education. Studies in Colorado and Minnesota have suggested that full-time online students are struggling to match the achievement levels of their peers in brick-and-mortar schools. Articles in "The New York Times" questioned not only the academic results for students in virtual schools, but…

While policymakers and researchers alike have focused on improving students' transition into high school, a new study of Florida schools suggests the critical transition problem may happen years before, when students enter middle school. The study, part of the Program on Education Policy and Governance Working Papers Series at Harvard University,…

States seeking waivers under the No Child Left Behind (NCLB) Act are hoping to replace what is widely considered an outdated, but consistent, school accountability regime with a hodgepodge of complex school grading systems that are as diverse as the states themselves. That's the picture that emerged from an "Education Week" analysis of waiver…

Until the past decade, college wasn't much of an option for students who have significant intellectual impairments. Vanderbilt University's Next Steps program is one of many created for students with severe cognitive disabilities in the last 10 years. The programs have grown in number from about 15 in 2002 to almost 170 now, as tracked by Think…

In the continuing debate about American competitiveness in the global economy, politicians and educators alike have pointed not to students' test scores, but to their creativity and ingenuity, as models for the rest of the world. Teaching creativity has been a hot-button topic this fall, from the National Academy of Education's annual meeting in…

If the job of a traditional superintendent is hard, imagine the complexities involved in building a school system from scratch--especially one composed of schools with some of the most intractable educational challenges. That's the task facing education leaders in Michigan and Tennessee, which are building special districts to take over…

Where their teacher-quality proposals are concerned, the fates of the 11 states that have bid for waivers of core principles of the No Child Left Behind (NCLB) Act appear to depend largely on how the peer reviewers--and, ultimately, U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan--interpret their applications. The U.S. Department of Education's criteria…

In the 21 months since U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan stood on an iconic bridge in Selma, Alabama, and pledged to aggressively combat discrimination in the nation's schools, federal education officials have launched dozens of new probes in school districts and states that reach into civil rights issues that previously received little, if…

ConscienceRebels are women of African descent who align themselves with the struggles of working class/working poor black communities and intentionally counter and re-script exclusive, dominant discourses. Any self-identified black female college student who focuses on the black poor or working class in their writing forms the basis of this study…

This study examined the effects of professional development on teachers' assessment literacy between two groups of teachers: (1) teachers who were involved in ongoing and sustained professional development in designing authentic classroom assessment and rubrics; and (2) teachers who were given only short-term, one-shot professional development…

This narrative inquiry examines how one Latina novice teacher articulates and implements a vision of teaching for social justice within the contexts of her teacher education program and her practice as a bilingual resource teacher. Informed by Latino/a critical race (LatCrit) theory, the analysis traces connections between stories of self and…

This article describes the programmatic ways in which the Children's Defense Fund Freedom Schools[R] program develops culturally responsive teaching practices amongst its summer interns, particularly in the area of developing sociopolitical consciousness. This paper places specific focus on the role that historical knowledge, the acknowledgement…

This study examined the perspective of a cohort of 60 Chinese EFL pre-service teachers with regards to microteaching. Reflective paper writing was employed to explore the student teachers' perceptions of the experience. The study results show that microteaching was a useful tool for the pre-service teachers' professional development; however, the…

Set in the context of a teacher education program, this study examined how three White pre-service teachers participate in book club discussions of children's literature. We asked: When White pre-service teachers are in a context that enables talk about race, racism and anti-racism, what do they talk about? What conceptual and discursive tools do…

Pre-service teachers spend an inordinate amount of time observing teaching and learning in classrooms with the goals of understanding the complexities of that space and impacting their teaching. Consequently, teacher educators are responsible for scaffolding pre-service teachers in the use of appropriate and effective observational skills and…