When Washington state Gov. Christine Gregoire announced recently that she wants to take control of education policy in her state by creating a new, Cabinet-level schools position that answers to her, she set the stage for a political fight--and revived a perennial debate. Governors, elected state schools chiefs, and, to some extent, state boards…

In an election year dominated by the pitched battle for Congress and major governors' races, state ballot measures involving education are largely tied to a similar theme: the burden of funding K-12 programs when state finances are shaky. In some cases, initiatives, constitutional amendments, and other ballot measures seek to tap new sources of…

Virginia Gov. Bob McDonnell signed legislation this month promoting the growth of virtual schools. The new law requires the state to develop policies for approving and monitoring a wide array of private and nonprofit online education providers. The legislative action in Virginia is the most recent major policy move by a state to expand the…

With conversations about the best ways to evaluate teacher performance proliferating across the nation, preservice preparation could be the next stop on the teacher-quality continuum to receive a similarly high level of scrutiny. New models for preparing teachers, such as the yearlong apprenticeship or "residency" model, have received…

As debate continues around the development and adoption of common standards in English and mathematics, several states are independently wrestling with rewrites of standards in a content area largely absent from that national discussion--social studies--and encountering their own shares of controversy. Flash points in the social studies debates…

Education issues are poised to break through the din of presidential politics and economic anxiety in more than a dozen states next month, as voters confront ballot questions and constitutional amendments involving K-12 policy and school finance. High on the list are gambling referendums in six states--Arkansas, Colorado, Maine, Maryland,…

Across the U.S., urban school districts are losing students and shuttering schools. In Detroit, some 35,000 students have left the city schools in less than a decade, and the city will close 34 schools and reassign more than 10,000 students in 2006. However, the trend is not limited to Rust Belt cities like Detroit, although their problems tend to…