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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    • Opinion

    Can Opposing Same-Sex Marriage Get You Fired at Marquette University?

    MADISON, Wis.—John McAdams remains in professional limbo at his Jesuit school. The long-time Marquette University political science professor at the center of one of the most controversial academic freedom cases in higher education continues to wait for a faculty hearing committee’s decision on his professional fate. Marquette has said it intends to fire McAdams because of his blog post a…
    M.D. Kittle
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    • Opinion

    How a 1800s Anti-Catholic Law Is Ruining Kids’ Chance at a Quality Education

    “Dismal.” “A train wreck.” That’s how people have characterized the results of this year’s National Assessment of Educational Progress. The NAEP assesses fourth and eighth-graders’ performance in reading and math every other year. Test results had been trending upward since the early 1990s, but the results released last month indicated a drop in both math…
    Mary Clare Amselem
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    • News

    They Claimed Giving All Students Free School Lunches Would Raise Test Scores. Here’s What Happened.

    In 2014, education leaders ranging from the U.S. secretary of education down to local school officials promised that kids would do better if districts adopted a federal program that provides no-cost lunches to students regardless of financial need. It hasn’t worked out that way in Chattanooga, Tenn. Board members in charge of the Hamilton County School System voted…
    Chris Butler
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    • News

    As School Meals Have Gotten Healthier, 1.4 Million Students Drop Out of School Lunch Program

    Michelle Obama’s healthy school meal standards have scored not too tasty. Over a span of three school years, 1.4 million children dropped out of the National School Lunch Program, reports the Government Accountability Office (GAO). While the first lady’s Healthy, Hunger-Free Kids Act has brought healthier items to lunch trays, sugary and salty foods that…
    Leah Jessen
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    • News

    How Dennis Prager’s Conservative Online University Reaches Millions

    Radio host Dennis Prager and his business partner Allen Estrin had a big problem on their hands. It was October, 2013. Several years earlier, the duo—friends for decades—co-founded PragerU, a small digital university for conservatives with a modest audience. Now, a stranger was suing them. The man, a photographer in Ireland, alleged through a Houston…
    Madaline Donnelly
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    • Opinion

    Is Planned Parenthood Targeting Schoolchildren?

    Why is Planned Parenthood interested in a local school board election in the battleground state of Colorado? That is what parents and voters are asking themselves in Jefferson County, Colo., this week after Planned Parenthood waded into a local recall election aimed at ousting three Republican school board officials in the middle of their terms….
    Jennifer Kerns
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    • Opinion

    This School District Is Standing Up to the Federal Government’s Bullying Over Transgender Students and Locker Rooms

    When it comes to locker rooms, does a public school have the right to say it should be restricted to of the students of the same physiological sex? Right now, a school district north of Chicago is squaring off with the federal government on that question. Township High School District 211, like many school districts,…
    Katrina Trinko
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    • News

    Boehner’s D.C. School Choice Program Passed by House: ‘We Owe the Kids in This City a Chance’

    Speaker John Boehner cinched victory Wednesday as House Republicans smoothly extended his linchpin private school voucher program for low-income students through 2021. The D.C. Opportunity Scholarship Program provides students in Washington’s struggling school districts with federally backed vouchers to attend a private school of choice. The House confirmed its reauthorization Wednesday evening in a near…
    Natalie Johnson
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    • Opinion

    It’s Time for a Change in Education Funding

    “We must provide a good education for every boy and girl—no matter where he lives,” President Lyndon B. Johnson declared in 1964. President Johnson sought and ultimately secured passage of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA), which would be a major element of the education component of his War on Poverty. Ineffective Title I…
    Blair Kacynski
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    • Opinion

    Cementing a School Choice Legacy in the Nation’s Capital

    I spend an enormous amount of time thinking (and worrying) about the children of Washington, D.C. Advocating for quality educational opportunities for them has been a priority in my life since the late 1990s. With Speaker John Boehner’s announcement of his decision to step down, I automatically began to reflect on the 10-plus years we…
    Virginia Walden Ford
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    • Opinion

    ‘You’re It’: School District Bans Tag During Recess

    Update: According to The Seattle Times, “[t]he Mercer Island School District reinstated the game of tag following an outcry from parents” on September 25, 2015. A school district in Washington state has banned tag, the popular game, because it’s too violent for today’s children. School district officials told a local television station that students are…
    Eric Boehm
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    • Opinion

    Boehner’s Final Push for Parental Choice in Education

    Speaker of the House John Boehner, R-Ohio, who will retire at the end of October, will not be leaving office without one final push for parental choice in education. Boehner has been a strong supporter of the D.C. Opportunity Scholarship Program (DCOSP), which was the first bill he presented to Congress as Speaker of the…
    Mary Clare Amselem
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    • News

    Seattle School District Concedes to Union, 53,000 Kids Return to School

    After a two-week standoff, Seattle Public Schools and the teachers union reached an agreement on a contract, putting an end to a strike that left 53,000 students out of class for six days. “This agreement signals a new era in bargaining in public education,” Jonathan Knapp, president of the Seattle Education Association, said in a…
    Kelsey Bolar
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    • Opinion

    Ahmed’s Clock and the Hysteria of American Schools

    Social media are ablaze with the story of 14-year-old Ahmed Mohamed, a student at MacArthur High School in Irving, Texas. On Monday morning, the amateur inventor brought a home-made clock to school to show to a teacher. Shortly later, he was led out by the police in handcuffs. I expect they will have more to…
    William Gribbin
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    • News

    Nonprofit Health System Executive Brings After-School Chess Program to Ferguson-Florissant Schools

    An after-school chess program for 20 elementary and middle schools in the Ferguson-Florissant school district started with a simple conversation between a father and his 10-year-old son. Nick Ragone, senior vice president and chief communications and marketing officer at Ascension, the nation’s largest Catholic nonprofit health system, says the idea came to him eight weeks…
    Leah Jessen
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    • News

    Report: Four-Day School Week Leads to Improved Academic Performance

    As Labor Day abruptly marked the end of summer, arguments for a four-day workweek roiled across the Internet as a conduit to improved health and a greater quality of life. But the question of students enjoying a shorter school week has remained largely off the table because of concerns that an extended weekend would hurt…
    Natalie Johnson
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    • Opinion

    This Case Could Open Up School Choice Options for 37 States

    On Sept. 2, the Douglas County School District Board of Education filed a request for extension to the Supreme Court of the United States asking for review of the Colorado Supreme Court’s ruling on its scholarship program earlier this summer. In June, the Colorado Supreme Court struck down the educational choice program on the state’s…
    Brittany Corona
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    • Opinion

    5 Worrisome Back to School Numbers

    It’s back to school time again, but before you start helping your kids out with their math homework, let’s look at some numbers that may be easier to digest—but difficult to believe: 53,000: Number of students in Seattle who did not go back to school on Wednesday as public school teachers voted to strike. This…
    Mary Clare Amselem
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    • News

    1,300 Students at Risk After State Court Invalidates Charter School Law

    A ruling by the Washington State Supreme Court overturning a 2012 voter-approved charter school law could leave about 1,300 students without a school next year. The ruling came Friday, just before Labor Day weekend. For now, the students are attending classes, but the fate of the schools is unclear. The Washington State Charter School Association has said it will find a…
    Mary Tillotson
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    • Opinion

    The Idiocy of the ACLU’s Lawsuit Against a New School Choice Option

    Another school year is underway, and more parents than ever are using school choice to ensure the best education for their children. Or should I say trying to use it? Some groups, after all, are trying to thwart them. Who, you ask? Just ask parents in Nevada. The Silver State is one of five nationwide…
    Ed Feulner
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