1. Cyberbullying Deterrence Effort Raises Questions
READ/LISTEN: A New York City principal told students they’d face suspension and loss of recommendation letters if they followed anonymous social media accounts accused of bullying students. The move received quick criticism from free speech advocates, who said students have the right to speak and receive information anonymously. One student suggested the school’s announcement inadvertently served as free account promotion:
“I haven’t heard much about the account at all,” the student said. “I think the big deal he’s making of it actually made it more popular.” Canceling events, the student added, made students angrier with the principal than whomever is behind the Instagram accounts.
The student said it’s not the first time the school has grappled with anonymous social media accounts, noting that school administrators have raised concerns about them in the past.
Read more from Alex Zimmerman at Chalkbeat here. Rikki and I also discussed alternative approaches to this issue on Lost Debate this week. Listen here.
2. Democrats Should Champion Choice
READ: U.S. Secretary of Education Miguel Cardona has hit the campaign trail, and public schools are on the ballot. Faced with a continued decline in public school enrollment and a wave of historic school choice laws passed in red states, can Cardona convince the country that the Democratic Party has a strong vision for K-12 education? Juan Perez Jr. at Politico spoke with Keri Rodrigues, president of the National Parents Union, and Jorge Elorza, CEO of Democrats for Education Reform, who both say success is possible if the party embraces school choice:
Rodrigues said focusing on disputes between traditional schools, charters or other public options risks “totally missing the moment, and missing where parents are.”
“We’re in a moment where Democrats should be really embracing school choice as a tool of equity and empowerment, instead of holding tight to this antiquated neighborhood boundary model,” Rodrigues said.
Read more here.
3. Teachers Caught in Culture War Crossfire
READ: Hannah Natanson wrote about the backlash Mary Wood has faced in her South Carolina hometown since teaching Ta-Nehisi Coates’s “Between the World and Me” as part of her AP English Language and Composition course. School administrators told the 14-year veteran teacher that she could no longer use the book after White students complained to school board members that it made them feel uncomfortable and ashamed. Wood says the fallout serves as a reminder that teaching has become an increasingly challenging profession:
“Teachers are afraid,” she wrote. “Teachers are silent. Teachers cave.”
South Carolina is among 18 states to restrict teachings on race since 2021. Read more in The Washington Post here.
4. New Jersey School District Punishes Students With Lunch Debt
READ: Melanie Burney at The Philadelphia Inquirer reported on a South Jersey school district’s decision to impose strict penalties on any student behind on school meal payments. Elementary school students who owe $50 or more will receive a peanut butter or cheese sandwich instead of the regular lunch, while middle and high schoolers will not receive a meal at all. The announcement sparked outrage in the district, where 19% of students and their families have an outstanding balance:
A single mother of three, Candice Elsesser said she struggled to pay off a balance of $400 for her two school-age children left over from the 2022-23 year. A human resources manager, she didn’t qualify for reduced or free meals.
“I don’t feel that it’s fair that you’re going to punish my children,” said Elsesser. “All of us parents are struggling in this economy right now.”
Eight schools have passed free school breakfast and lunch laws, but New Jersey is not one of them. Read more here.
5. Topic Choice May Be Key To Productive Parent-Teacher Relations
READ: Strong relationships between parents and teachers can help students thrive. But what constitutes a strong relationship? Sarah Chaves took to the pages of The Atlantic to opine about why teachers have started to cite parental involvement as a core contributor to stress and burnout. The Massachusetts-based teacher says tensions reached a boiling point during the pandemic as conversations shifted from academic performance and classroom behavior to broader cultural topics:
The loudest parents seemed focused on issues I couldn’t control, and the strained parents I had always struggled to reach had even more on their plate, during what was likely one of the biggest disruptions to their children’s educational career. When my district opted for remote-only schooling in the fall of 2020, some parents complained to me that we were acting against our governor’s advice and caving to “woke” culture. Tensions with certain parents escalated further after the global racial reckoning sparked by George Floyd’s murder. My students were eager to express their opinions, but as parents listened in on these virtual discussions, some told me that they didn’t think we needed to be talking about these topics at all.
Read more here.
6. A Fond Farewell to the Scantron
READ: Matteo Wong wrote for The Atlantic about the rise and fall of the Scantron, calling the machine the innovation that has fundamentally shaped American education over the past 50 years. The advent of AI means SAT, ACT, and AP exams will all be administered digitally by 2024, and some testing companies say the development will allow for more creative forms of assessment:
After having subject-matter experts annotate a huge number of essays, for instance, an AI program trained on those human evaluations could grade tests on its own, with its final output still being verified by a person. Computers might similarly be used to grade oral assessments or foreign-language exams, such as whether a student asked to translate “apple” into Spanish has pronounced manzana correctly.
Read more here.
7. To Learn More, Choose AI
READ: Education Next invited eighth grader Daphne Goldstein to share her insights on various online learning tools this week. Goldstein reviewed the “regular” Khan Academy (no AI) and Khanmigo (GPT4 AI) and ranked each platform based on its efficiency, effectiveness, and enjoyability. The 13-year-old said Khanmigo was the clear winner, thanks in large part to the tool’s ability to help her learn more than its predecessor:
To conclude, [Khan]Migo is like a teacher, and regular Khan Problem Sets are like homework. So obviously you learn more from the teacher, but occasionally the teacher can ramble on. But homework that serves merely as practice for topics you already learned in class is admittedly a decent tool with its own perks, even if you might be learning less and the quality is lower.
Read more here.