It's hard not to notice how attitudes around sexual orientation and gender identity (SOGI) have changed over the past two decades. In this article, Stewart Rudy compares his time as a public school student to his time as a public school educator. Rudy questions whether improvement in the school system has translated into improved experiences for…

There is great enthusiasm in Philadelphia and in districts across the country now for "data-driven decision-making" -- using the information from assessments of student learning to guide plans for what to teach and how to teach it. The core curriculum has been aligned with state standards in different content areas, and the mandated…

Schools with more targets to meet under NCLB were far more likely to be branded as in need of improvement. Some critics of the federal No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB) have argued that large schools and schools with a diverse student population are penalized by the law's provisions. School performance results from 2004 in Philadelphia appear to…