Education for a Changing World

What the recent NAEP scores show is that, despite Gavin Newsom’s claims, California public education is failing students from all demographics—Black, Brown, White, poor and non-poor.  Until politicians and educators are held accountable for this failure, expect more of the same in the future, which will be a tragedy for the state’s children. By Lance…

BY CAROLYN JONES (Republished from Cal Matters – calmatters.org) At Pinedale Elementary in Fresno, there’s almost no classroom aides, after-school tutors or behavioral counselors. Literacy activities and parent workshops are scarce. Field trips? Almost non-existent. The school survives on one of the lowest per-pupil expenditures in the state: $16,700 a year, nearly $5,000 below the state…

BY ALEJANDRA REYES-VELARDE (Republished from CalMatters –  Sign up for their newsletters) In 2020, California gave schools an enticing opportunity: A ratepayer-funded grant program would let them assess the condition of their heating and cooling systems, then pay for upgrades based on that review. But in 2024, the California Energy Commission, which administers the California Schools Healthy…

Why turn to artificial intelligence rather than a friend? For young people, it often comes down to not having to worry about what a peer or a parent thinks. That’s one takeaway from a new report by San Francisco-based Hopelab and the Harvard Graduate School of Education, which surveyed 30 people between 14 and 22 and…

Your child’s report card may be sending the wrong signal. Grades and GPAs increasingly reflect institutional incentives rather than academic achievement. Hannah Frankman Hood The Epoch Times (epochtimes.com) Commentary As recently as 1995, a child’s straight-A report card meant something specific. Still relatively rare, the feat indicated that a child had worked hard and was…

Researchers say shrinking classrooms are a sign of something much larger By Madilynne Medina, News Reporter The first sign was the empty desks that slowly started to appear. Then there were fewer kindergartners in San Francisco. Shrinking graduating classes in San Jose. An Oakland elementary school that lost so many students it was forced to close. Across California, signs like these have proliferated as…

More teens are experiencing anxiety and depression, taking medication, and struggling with the fallout of drugs—problems that can carry into adulthood. Sofia never really felt like she fit in as a preteen, so she turned to a place where she could get lost and go numb. She sat scrolling on her smartphone, hour after hour,…