Valerie Strauss of the Washington Post reports that Georgia will be the first state that will pursue a federal testing waiver for the 2020-21 academic year due to the coronavirus pandemic. This school year, Education Secretary Betsy Devos approved a one-year waiver that suspended “federally...
School spending by the states is the latest issue to garner criticism from the U.S. Department of Education, as Andrew Ujifusa writes for Education Week. Information on school spending is mandated under ESSA and, so far, 17 states have reported it, with a lot more...
ESSA “was designed to remedy the wrongs” of NCLB, Andrew Saultz, Jack Schneider, and Karalyn McGovern write in the Phi Delta Kappan. But the law has failed to live up to its promise. The trio argue that this is the result of the U.S. Department...
“Kentucky education officials had to scramble after learning a new state law ran afoul of federal education law, putting funding in jeopardy,” writes Olivia Krauth for the Louisville Courier Journal. “During the legislative session this year, state lawmakers passed a bill changing how schools are identified...
Kayleigh Skinner reports for Mississippi Today that the state’s Department of Education is considering eliminating the state’s U.S. history assessment. However, student performance on this test “is one component used in Mississippi’s accountability model, which assigns an A-F rating to schools and districts.” So, if...
According to The 74, this spring, when Indiana released a “bleak report” regarding educational outcomes for students in foster care, it “broke new ground in making public the state’s troubling statistics.” And the “same Indiana law that called for the first-ever release of the distressing...
In Education Week, Megan Duff and Priscilla Wohlstetter provide an overview of a recent study conducted by them and their colleagues regarding the ESSA planning process, which concludes that the process has “veered off course.” How so? ESSA, contrary to NCLB, reverts much of the...
The U.S. Department of Education has approved New Mexico’s changes to its school accountability plan under the Every Student Succeeds Act. Federal approval was necessary for state education officials to move forward with the planned changes. “Following the PED’s initial request from early March, a...
While states “frequently and successfully flexed their muscles” when negotiating the details of their Every Student Succeeds Act plans with the U.S. Department of Education, the question of “whether Secretary of Education Betsy DeVos was smart to let them take that approach or often just...
“Even when state education agencies ignored or went against feedback from the U.S. Department of Education (ED) in their plans to comply with the Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA), their plans were still approved,” writes Linda Jacobson regarding the same Duff and Wohlstetter report. The new...
