Education Policy & School Reform News

This section covers K12 policy, school board elections, curriculum transparency, parental rights, school choice, charter and voucher programs, and state and federal rules that shape classrooms. The Daily Signal includes news reports, analysis, commentary, and opinion pieces to explain how these decisions affect students, families, and educators.
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  • news

    Parents ‘Furious’ Over School Board’s Decision to Give Teachers More Time Off to Relieve Stress
    A Maryland school board approved a calendar change to provide teachers more time off, which infuriated parents over concerns that it will set their children back academically. On Dec. 7, the Montgomery County Public Schools' school board approved a calendar change for the 2021-22 school year that will give Montgomery County Public School staff and…
    Kendall Tietz
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  • news

    Saint Louis University Threatens to Expel Student for Posting Flyers Promoting Conservative Speaker’s Event
    Saint Louis University is threatening to expel or suspend a student for posting flyers advertising the Daily Wire’s Matt Walsh’s off-campus speaking event, according to the Young America’s Foundation. The student, James Dowling, was told in a Dec. 9 videoconference with school administrators that he could face expulsion for his “inappropriate conduct” and “failure to…
    Bryan Babb
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  • opinion

    We Hear You: Parents Must Fight to Save Public Schools
    Editor's note: The Daily Signal's audience sounds like it's had enough with parents being marginalized or criminalized as the left seeks to transform public schools. Here's a sampling from the mailbag at [email protected].—Ken McIntyre Dear Daily Signal: It was appropriate for conservative congressmen such as Rep. Jim Jordan to grill Attorney General Merrick Garland during…
    Ken McIntyre
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  • opinion

    Students at Maryland High School Shown Thanksgiving Video Depicting Pilgrims as Oppressors
    The Howard Zinn-ification of American history has now been fully embraced by America’s institutions. It’s not just on college and university campuses where the late Marxist professor’s anti-American history is popular.  An anonymous tip to The Daily Signal on Monday revealed that a video depicting the Pilgrims as one-dimensional oppressors was shown to students at…
    Jarrett Stepman
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  • opinion

    Parents Across Country Sue Schools Over Clandestine Gender Transitions
    The lawsuit filed Nov. 17 by two public interest law firms against the Kettle Moraine School District in Wisconsin over the clandestine social transition of a 12-year-old girl marks the latest in a series of cases where school officials allegedly initiated social gender transitions without parental consent. The Wisconsin Institute for Law and Liberty, one…
    Harold Hutchison
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  • news

    ‘Education Lifted Me Out of Poverty’: Winsome Sears Wants to Reform Schools, Empower Parents
    Winsome Sears made education a centerpiece of her successful campaign for lieutenant governor in Virginia. Now, as she prepares to take office, the mother and Marine Corps veteran is promising to challenge the status quo and advocate for parents and children. “Education lifted me out of poverty and education will lift everybody,” Sears, a Republican,…
    Robert B. Bluey
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  • news

    Catholic University Celebrates Painting of George Floyd as Jesus Christ, Releases Report on Racism
    A painting depicting George Floyd as Jesus Christ hangs in two locations at The Catholic University of America, The Daily Signal has learned. The artist repeatedly has indicated that his painting depicts both Floyd and Jesus.  “It is just another symptom of the liberalization and secularization of our campus,” a junior at Catholic University tells…
    Mary Margaret Olohan
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  • opinion

    Homeschooling Is on the Rise. Here Are 4 Tips to Effectively Homeschool Your Children.
    I wish I had been given more advice about homeschooling when I first started about eight years ago. I didn’t know the first thing about home education. I felt unsure and nervous. The weight of responsibility on my shoulders was nerve-racking. I can’t say homeschooling is easy, but it is rewarding. If you are thinking…
    Eve Deborah
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  • news

    Connecticut Parents Claim Schools Teach Kindergarteners About Transgenderism
    Connecticut parents claimed a school district is indoctrinating elementary school students about transgenderism, including with a book for kindergarteners. Officials of the West Hartford Public Schools told parents that they could not opt out from the materials, according to a release from advocacy group Parents Defending Education. The reading list for kindergarteners included the book “Introducing…
    Harold Hutchison
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  • news

    Parent Activists Warn That Fight for Education Far From Over
    Parent activists, school board members, and a congressman gathered Monday in Washington to remind Attorney General Merrick Garland and the Justice Department that the fight for education is only just beginning.  “Whether it’s radical transgender policies in our schools, whether it’s putting masks on our children, which is paramount to child abuse, whether it’s forcing…
    Mary Margaret Olohan
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  • opinion

    The Rise of ‘Chief Diversity Officers’ at K-12 Schools
    Diversity officers slowly are corrupting K-12 education by bringing diversity, equity, and inclusion initiatives into schools and teaching children divisive topics such as critical race theory, a Heritage Foundation scholar says. A new report from Jay Greene, a senior research fellow in education at Heritage, highlights how harmful these diversity officers and their initiatives can…
    Douglas Blair
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  • news

    School Choice Denied to Most Rhode Island Families, but Not These Union Teachers
    A local chapter of the nation’s largest teachers union has acknowledged the importance of school choice, at least for its own members.  Thanks to an agreement quietly reached between the South Kingstown, Rhode Island, chapter of the National Education Association and the South Kingstown School Department, teachers there now have access to an exclusive school…
    Virginia Allen
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  • opinion

    How Montana’s Revamped Focus Makes for Better K-12 Civics Education
    Civics education has become a flashpoint in American politics. Many schools are asking how students should learn about themselves and their country in a way that fully encompasses American history, both good and bad. Montana Superintendent of Public Instruction Elsie Arntzen recently updated the state’s standards for social studies to better teach students about civics…
    Douglas Blair
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  • news

    Taxpayers Take School Board to Court for Trying to Silence Parents’ Criticism
    Four taxpayers in Pennsylvania have decided enough is enough after footing the bill for a school board attorney who told them that the school system could limit their First Amendment rights. The taxpayers filed a free speech lawsuit in federal court that could set a precedent for invalidating policies that shield both school administrators and…
    Kevin Mooney
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  • news

    Schools Chief Complained That Sheriff Rejected Request to Monitor Parents as ‘Extraordinary’
    A county schools superintendent in Virginia complained to the county sheriff’s office over its rejection of “extraordinary” security requests for school board meetings in August, documents reviewed by The Daily Caller News Foundation show. Loudoun County School Superintendent Scott Ziegler requested personnel, a K-9 sweep, and undercover presence from the Loudoun County Sheriff’s Office, which…
    Kendall Tietz
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  • opinion

    Left Thinks It Should Be in Charge of Education, Not Parents
    The left has a new message for parents concerned about critical race theory and similar ideologies being foisted on their children in public schools: Sit down and shut up. The left has already pretty much abandoned the “critical race theory is not in schools” narrative. Parents just aren’t buying this absurdity. It’s clear that ideas…
    Jarrett Stepman
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  • news

    ‘There Is No Rational Debate’: Loudoun County School Board Chair Trashes Parents
    Brenda Sheridan, chair of the Loudoun County Public Schools board, criticized parents protesting the use of critical race theory in schools, claiming “[t]here is no rational debate” on the issue. Sheridan made the comments during an interview with Chuck Todd during the Oct. 27 episode of “Meet the Press Reports,” a weekly podcast. “I’ll echo that we…
    Harold Hutchison
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  • news

    Mom to Sue After Son Vaccinated at School Without Consent
    A Louisiana mother is threatening to sue, claiming that her 16-year-old son was vaccinated for COVID-19 while at his Jefferson Parish high school without her consent. Jennifer Ravain alleged that during a visit by an Ochsner Health System mobile vaccination clinic to East Jefferson High School, her son was allowed to sign a consent form and receive…
    Harold Hutchison
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  • opinion

    We Hear You: Public Schools, Private Beliefs, and Rising Inflation
    Editor's note: The Daily Signal's audience isn't happy with how school system leaders in Loudoun County, Virginia, responded to a rape in a girls' restroom at one of its high schools, nor with the continuing rise in inflation, as evidenced by these letters from the mailbag at [email protected].—Ken McIntyre Dear Daily Signal: As a retired…
    Ken McIntyre
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  • opinion

    School Spending Up, Test Scores Down
    Thirteen-year-old children in American public schools were not quite as good at math and reading in 2019 and 2020 as they were in 2012. This is despite the fact that American taxpayers invested more money per pupil in the nation’s public schools in each of the last two fiscal years than they did in 2012….
    Terence Jeffrey
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