Weekend To-Do List

1/27 - 1/28

and

Jan 27, 2024

1. Biden Announces 2024 Education Agenda

READ: President Biden announced the “Agenda for Student Achievement,” which includes the education issues he’s asked the government to prioritize in 2024. On this week’s episode of Lost Debate, I break down the plan, its focus on tackling chronic absenteeism, offering more tutoring services, and extending learning time, and how I’d advise the administration on the next steps.

Read the announcement from the White House here and listen to my response on Lost Debate here.

2. The Broken Promise of a Suburban Education

READ: Greg Toppo spoke with Benjamin Herold about his new book, Disillusioned, which examines post-World War II suburban growth and its impact on producing so-called “disposable communities” across the country. Herold spent four years following five families in suburban Atlanta, Chicago, Dallas, Los Angeles, and Pittsburgh. While many families initially fled to suburbs in search of superior schools, Herold says the promise of a strong public school is no longer a guarantee, especially for non-white families:

Suburbia worked great for my middle-class white family and millions of others like us who received guaranteed mortgage loans, massive tax breaks and sparkling new infrastructure, including public schools we got decades to mold in our own image. But all that was made possible by trading short-term wealth for massive debts and liabilities that we pushed off on to future generations. Eventually, the bills come due. That’s what we’re seeing now.

3. The Next Era of Education

READ: Michael Q. McShane took to the pages of Education Next to applaud the rise of new school models such as micro-schools, hybrid homeschools, and online schools and warn about what could happen if challenges like financial sustainability and access to quality instruction aren’t resolved quickly:

Venture capital does not provide an unlimited runway. Parents willing to enroll their child in a new environment do not have limitless patience. Policymakers may cut and run if constituents are not satisfied with the options available from newly passed private-school-choice programs. And that is more likely to happen before programs grow very large.

4. Top Universities Pay Millions in Admissions Lawsuit

READ: Brown, Columbia, Duke, Emory, and Yale have agreed to pay $104.5 million to settle a lawsuit accusing them of weighing financial ability when admitting students. While the five elite universities maintain no wrongdoing, the choice to settle will limit risks such as financial exposure and damaging revelations.

Read more from Alan Blinder in the New York Times here.

5. Michigan School Board Calls for Ceasefire in the Middle East

READ: Heidi Pérez-Moreno at The Washington Post covered the Ann Arbor Board of Education’s passage of a resolution calling for a bilateral ceasefire in the Israel-Gaza war. The resolution, proposed by 16-year-old high school junior Malek Farha, marks one of the first times a public school district has made a statement on the conflict. Board President Rima Mohammad hopes the move will help students and educators in Ann Arbor, a town with large Jewish and Arab American communities, feel supported:

“This resolution does say that kids who have names like mine are seen, heard and valued and that their life’s important, too,” Mohammad said. “All kids deserve to feel valued and heard.”

6. Eric Adams Puts Big Tech on Notice

READ: New York City Mayor Eric Adams says social media is a public health threat for young people and promised to commit city resources to addressing the issue. The declaration was made during the mayor’s annual State of the City speech this week:

“We’re treating social media like other public health hazards,” Adams said, mentioning TikTok, YouTube, and Facebook. “We must ensure that tech companies take responsibility for their products.”

Read more from Alex Zimmerman in Chalkbeat here.

7. From Forests to Families: Washington Considers Natural Resources to Support Child Care Gaps

READ: Laurel Demkovich at The 74 spoke with officials in Washington earlier this week as they began discussion of a bill that proposes using state forest revenue to fund child care centers in underserved areas of the state. Rep. Kristine Reeves says the bill would support the 72% of Washington children under five who need care but lack access to a licensed provider in their area:

“Our natural resources can fund our social equity needs,” Reeves said. “We can do both.”

While the state’s Commissioner of Public Lands says the proposal is a natural extension of the work of the Department of Natural Resources, some lawmakers have concerns about how the funds and land would be acquired and managed. Read more here.