FutureEd is an Independent, Solution-oriented Voice for American Education.


 
Greetings,
 
The District of Columbia Public Schools has been an engine of school reform over the past decade, so it was disheartening to learn that students were graduating despite excessive absences and bogus make-up classes. But do the revelations negate years of reform?
 
In a piece published in Education Next and on our website , we argue that dismissing the district's reforms discounts real improvements, ignores the tremendous challenges facing some of the city's secondary schools, and distracts from the hard work required to graduate students truly qualified for what comes next.
 
Also this month, researcher Dan Goldhaber spells out one of the biggest human capital challenges in D.C. and beyond: ensuring that disadvantaged children have access to the best teachers. In a FutureEd interview about his latest research, Goldhaber of the University of Washington explains how exposure to lower-quality teachers hurts math performance for disadvantaged students and reduces their enrollment in advanced math courses. Knowing who's doing a good job with students in the classroom--and who isn't--is important, Goldhaber concludes.
 
On the non-academic side of student success, Brian Stecher and Laura Hamilton of the RAND Corporation explore the challenges of measuring non-cognitive competencies, sharing their plans for a repository of assessments. Chris and Teresa Hulleman from the University of Virginia's Motivate Lab tell us about an important piece of the student motivation puzzle.
 
Candace Webb, a Georgetown University colleague at the Center for Children and Families, addresses the health barriers that keep children from learning. And one of our newest senior fellows, Latinos for Education President Amanda Fernandez, writes about the dearth of Latino education leaders, from the classroom to the board room and beyond.
 
Our interviews include a conversation with FutureEd research advisory board member and Northwestern University professor Kirabo Jackson about his recent study linking education spending cuts during the Great Recession to declines in student achievement. Senior fellow Morgan Polikoff of the University of Southern California discusses his latest--and surprising--research on the Common Core.
 
And you can find the latest comings and goings in the Trump administration, the think tank world, philanthropy, and major reform organizations at The Churn.
 
Follow us on Twitter and Facebook and visit us at www.future-ed.org; we are eager to continue the conversation.
 
Thanks and best wishes,
 
Tom
 
Thomas Toch
Director, FutureEd
McCourt School of Public Policy
Georgetown University
ttoch@future-ed.org
@thomas_toch



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