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  • Parents, Medical Providers, Vaccine Experts Brace for RFK Jr.’s HHS Takeover – The 74

    Parents, Medical Providers, Vaccine Experts Brace for RFK Jr.’s HHS Takeover – The 74


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    While Robert F. Kennedy Jr. ‘s Senate confirmation to head the Department of Health and Human Services was not unexpected, it still shook medical providers, public health experts and parents across the country. 

    Mary Koslap-Petraco, a pediatric nurse practitioner who exclusively treats underserved children, said when she heard the news Thursday morning she was immediately filled with “absolute dread.”

    Mary Koslap-Petraco is a pediatric nurse practitioner and Vaccines for Children provider. (Mary Koslap-Petraco)

    “I have been following him for years,” she told The 74. “I’ve read what he has written. I’ve heard what he has said. I know he has made a fortune with his anti-vax stance.”

    She is primarily concerned that his rhetoric might “scare the daylights out of people so that they don’t want to vaccinate their children.” She also fears he could move to defund Vaccines for Children, a program under the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention that provides vaccines to kids who lack health insurance or otherwise wouldn’t be able to afford them. While the program is federally mandated by Congress, moves to drain its funding could essentially render it useless.

    Koslap-Petraco’s practice in Massapequa Park, New York relies heavily on the program to vaccinate pediatric patients, she said. If it were to disappear, she asked, “How am I supposed to take care of poor children? Are they supposed to just die or get sick because their parents don’t have the funds to get the vaccines for them?” 

    And, if the government-run program were to stop paying for vaccines, she said she’s terrified private insurance companies might follow suit. 

    Vaccines for Children is “the backbone of pediatric vaccine infrastructure in the country,” said Richard Hughes IV, former vice president of public policy at Moderna and a George Washington University law professor who teaches a course on vaccine law.

    Kennedy will also have immense power over Medicaid, which covers low-income populations and provides billions of dollars to schools annually for physical, mental and behavioral health services for eligible students.

    If Kennedy moves to weaken programs at HHS, which experts expect him to do, through across-the-board cuts in public health funding that trickle down to immunization programs or more targeted attacks, low-income and minority school-aged kids will be disproportionately impacted, Hughes said. 

    “I just absolutely, fundamentally, confidently believe that we will see deaths,” he added.

    Anticipating chaos and instability

    Following a contentious seven hours of grilling across two confirmation hearings, Democratic senators protested Kennedy’s confirmation on the floor late into the night Wednesday. The following morning, all 45 Democrats and both Independents voted in opposition and all but one Republican — childhood polio survivor Mitch McConnell of Kentucky — lined up behind President Donald Trump’s pick.

    James Hodge, a public health law expert at Arizona State University’s Sandra Day O’Connor College of Law, said that while it was good to see senators across the political spectrum asking tough questions and Kennedy offering up some concessions on vaccine-related policies and initiatives, he’s skeptical these will stick.

    “Whatever you’ve seen him do for the last 25 to 30 years is a much, much greater predictor than what you saw him do during two or three days of Senate confirmation proceedings,” Hodge said. “Ergo, be concerned significantly about the future of vaccines, vaccine exemptions, [and] how we’re going to fund these things.”

    Hodge also said he doesn’t trust how Kennedy will respond to the consequences of a dropoff in childhood vaccines, pointing to the current measles outbreak in West Texas schools.

    “The simple reality is he may plant misinformation or mis-messaging,” he said.

    During his confirmation hearings, Kennedy tried to distance himself from his past anti-vaccination sentiments stating, “News reports have claimed that I am anti-vaccine or anti-industry. I am neither. I am pro-safety … I believe that vaccines played a critical role in health care. All of my kids are vaccinated.”

    He was confirmed as Linda McMahon, Trump’s nominee to head the Department of Education, was sitting down for her first day of hearings. At one point that morning, McMahon signaled an openness to possibly shifting enforcement to HHS of the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act — a federal law dating back to 1975 that mandates a free, appropriate public education for the 7.5 million students with disabilities — if Trump were to succeed in shutting down the education department.

    This would effectively put IDEA’s $15.4 billion budget under Kennedy’s purview, further linking the education and public health care systems.

    In a post on the social media site BlueSky, Randi Weingarten, president of the American Federation of Teachers, wrote she is “concerned that anyone is willing to move IDEA services for kids with disabilities into HHS, under a secretary who questions science.”

    Keri Rodrigues, president of the National Parents Union and a parent of a child with ADHD and autism, told The 74 the idea was “absolutely absurd” and would cause chaos and instability. 

    Kennedy’s history of falsely asserting a link between childhood vaccines and autism — a disability included under IDEA coverage — is particularly concerning to experts in this light.

    “You obviously have a contingent of kids who are beneficiaries of IDEA that are navigating autism spectrum disorder,” said Hughes, “Could [we] potentially see some sort of policy activity and rhetoric around that? Potentially.”

    Vaccines — and therefore HHS — are inextricably linked to schools. Currently, all 50 states have vaccine requirements for children entering child care and schools. But Kennedy, who now has control of an agency with a $1.7 trillion budget and 90,000 employees spread across 13 agencies, could pull multiple levers to roll back requirements, enforcements and funding, according to The 74’s previous reporting. And Trump has signaled an interest in cutting funding to schools that mandate vaccines.

    “There’s a certain percentage of the population that is focused on removing school entry requirements,” said Northe Saunders, executive director of the pro-vaccine SAFE Communities Coalition. “They are loud, and they are organized and they are well funded by groups just like RFK Jr.’s Children’s Health Defense.”

    Kennedy will also have the ability to influence the makeup of the committees that approve vaccines and add them to the federal vaccine schedule, which state legislators rely on to determine their school policies. Hodge said one of these committees is already being “re-organized and re-thought as we speak.”

    “With him now in place, just expect that committee to start really changing its members, its tone, the demeanor, the forcefulness of which it’s suggesting vaccines,” he added.

    Hughes, the law professor, said he is preparing for mass staffing changes throughout the agency, mirroring what’s already happened across multiple federal departments and agencies in Trump’s first weeks in office. He predicts this will include Kennedy possibly asking for the resignations “of all scientific leaders with HHS.” 

    Kennedy appeared to confirm that he was eyeing staffing cuts Thursday night during an appearance on Fox News’s “The Ingraham Angle.”

    “I have a list in my head … if you’ve been involved in good science, you have got nothing to worry about,” Kennedy said.


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  • White House barring AP from press events violates the First Amendment

    White House barring AP from press events violates the First Amendment

    A widening gulf has opened between the Trump administration and the Associated Press. 

    Which gulf?

    Precisely.

    On Tuesday, the AP said the White House blocked one of its reporters from attending an event in the Oval Office because the outlet continues to use the name Gulf of Mexico in its reporting. This, despite President Donald Trump’s recent executive order renaming it the Gulf of America.

    After Trump signed that order, the AP announced it would continue referring to the gulf by its original name “while acknowledging the new name Trump has chosen.” It did so in part because the gulf borders other countries that don’t recognize the name change. (The AP did update its Stylebook to reflect Trump’s separate decision to revert the name of North America’s highest mountain, which President Obama changed to the native moniker Denali, to Mount McKinley because that “area lies solely in the United States.”)

    In a Wednesday briefing, Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt confirmed the AP’s allegations:

    I was very up front in my briefing on day one that if we feel that there are lies being pushed by outlets in this room, we are going to hold those lies accountable. And it is a fact that the body of water off the coast of Louisiana is called the Gulf of America.

    The standoff continues — and has escalated beyond Oval Office events. Last night, the White House blocked the AP from an open press conference featuring Trump and Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi. 

    FIRE issued a statement condemning the administration’s actions, which have drawn criticism from press freedom groups, pundits, and politicians across the political spectrum.

    In a letter to White House Chief of Staff Susie Wiles, AP Executive Editor Julie Pace called the administration’s actions “viewpoint discrimination based on a news organization’s editorial choices and a clear violation of the First Amendment.” 

    She’s right.

    To be sure, the First Amendment does not require the White House to open its doors to the media or hold press conferences. Nor does the president have to do a one-on-one interview with CNN just because he did one with Fox News. But court decisions spanning decades make clear that once the government grants media access, it has to play by constitutional rules. 

    That doesn’t mean the White House has to allow every reporter in the world into the Oval Office or briefing room. Space constraints obviously make that impossible, and not every journalist will manage to secure a press pass. But the reason for denying access matters. When the government shuts out journalists explicitly because it dislikes their reporting or political views, that violates the First Amendment.

    As one federal court proclaimed, “Neither the courts nor any other branch of the government can be allowed to affect the content or tenor of the news by choreographing which news organizations have access to relevant information.”

    And because denying press access involves the potential deprivation of First Amendment rights, any decision about who’s in or out must also satisfy due process. That means the government must establish clear, impartial criteria and procedures, and reporters must receive notice of why they were denied access and have a fair opportunity to challenge that decision.

    The AP — a major news agency that produces and distributes reports to thousands of newspapers, radio stations, and TV broadcasters around the world — has had long-standing access to the White House. It is now losing that access because its exercise of editorial discretion doesn’t align with the administration’s preferred messaging. 

    That’s viewpoint discrimination, and it’s unconstitutional.

    This isn’t the first time the White House has sent a journalist packing for reporting critically, asking tough questions, or failing to toe the government line. During Trump’s first term, the White House suspended CNN reporter Jim Acosta’s press pass after he interrogated the president about his views on immigration. After the network sued, a federal court ordered the administration to restore Acosta’s pass.

    But court decisions spanning decades make clear that once the government grants media access, it has to play by constitutional rules.

    Democratic administrations have also unacceptably targeted disfavored outlets for exclusion. The Obama administration tried to exclude Fox News from a press pool because of displeasure with its coverage. Obama’s deputy press secretary Josh Earnest said at the time, “We’ve demonstrated our willingness and ability to exclude Fox News from significant interviews.”

    Similar attacks on press freedom happen at all levels of government. In 2022, FIRE filed an amicus curiae — “friend of the court” — brief in a First Amendment lawsuit challenging vague and arbitrary press pass rules that Arizona elections officials used to block a Gateway Pundit journalist from press conferences. The officials didn’t like the conservative journalist’s political views or negative coverage, including his “inflammatory and/or accusatory language.” After the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit initially ruled in favor of The Gateway Pundit, the outlet received a $175,000 settlement.

    The current spat over naming conventions for a body of water may seem trivial. But it sends a chilling message to all journalists that White House access hinges on whether the president approves of their reporting. Left unchecked, such a precedent opens the door to broader efforts to manipulate public discourse and undermine press freedom. What other “lies” might the Trump administration hold media outlets “accountable” for? Could scrutiny of its immigration policies, economic performance, or claims about election integrity be next?

    The characterization of the AP’s editorial style choice as a “lie” shows the danger of empowering the state to police mis- or disinformation. The Chinese government might say the same about anyone who calls a certain territory “Taiwan” instead of the “Republic of China” or “Chinese Taipei.” To a government official with a misinformation hammer, every deviation from official messaging looks like a nail. We saw enough misguided attempts to police “misinformation” during the Biden administration. Let’s leave that behind. 

    In an executive order signed the same day as the one renaming the gulf, Trump promised to “ensure that no Federal Government officer, employee, or agent engages in or facilitates any conduct that would unconstitutionally abridge the free speech of any American citizen.” That’s a good policy, and the administration should stick to it — the First Amendment requires no less.

    Any government attempt to control the flow of information strikes a blow at the First Amendment. A free press performs a vital democratic function — gathering, curating, and delivering information, which we can then evaluate for ourselves. Without the Fourth Estate acting as a crucial check on government power, we’ll know less about what our elected officials are up to, and face greater difficulty holding them accountable.

    The beauty of this country’s ideologically diverse media landscape is that if you distrust a particular source, countless others are available offering different information and perspectives. Preserving this rich information ecosystem demands constant vigilance against any threats to free speech and a free press, regardless of who the target is. The alternative — no matter what name you give it — is censorship.

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  • FIRE opposes Virginia’s proposed regulation of candidate deepfakes

    FIRE opposes Virginia’s proposed regulation of candidate deepfakes

    Last year, California passed restrictions on sharing AI-generated deepfakes of candidates, which a court then promptly blocked for violating the First Amendment. Virginia now looks to be going down a similar road with a new bill to penalize people for merely sharing certain AI-generated media of political candidates.

    This legislation, which has been in SB 775 and HB 2479, would make it illegal to share artificially generated, realistic-looking images, video, or audio of a candidate to “influence an election,” if the person knew or should have known that the content is “deceptive or misleading.” There is a civil penalty or, if the sharing occurred within 90 days before an election, up to one year in jail. Only if a person adds a conspicuous disclaimer to the media can they avoid these penalties.

    The practical effects of this ban are alarming. Say a person in Virginia encounters a deepfaked viral video of a candidate on Facebook within 90 days of an election. They know it’s not a real image of the candidate, but they think it’s amusing and captures a message they want to share with other Virginians. It doesn’t have a disclaimer, but the person doesn’t know it’s supposed to, and doesn’t know how to edit the video anyway. They decide to repost it to their feed.

    That person could now face jailtime.

    The ban would also impact the media. Say a journalist shares a deepfake that is directly relevant to an important news story. The candidate depicted decides that the journalist didn’t adequately acknowledge “in a manner that can easily be heard and understood by the average listener or viewer, that there are questions about the authenticity of the media,” as the bill requires. That candidate could sue to block further sharing of the news story.

    The First Amendment safeguards expressive tools like AI, allowing them to enhance our ability to communicate with one another without facing undue government restrictions.

    These illustrate the startling breadth of SB 775/HB 2479’s regulation of core political speech, which makes it unlikely to survive judicial scrutiny. Laws targeting core political speech have serious difficulty passing constitutional muster, even when they involve false or misleading speech. That’s because there’s no general First Amendment exception for misinformation, disinformation, or other false speech. That’s for good reason: A general exception would be easily abused to suppress dissent and criticism.

    Wave of state-level AI bills raise First Amendment problems

    News

    There’s no ‘artificial intelligence’ exception to the First Amendment.


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    There are narrow, well-defined categories of speech not protected by the First Amendment — such as fraud and defamation — that Virginia can and does already restrict. But SB 775/HB 2479 is not limited to fraudulent or defamatory speech.

    For laws that burden protected speech related to elections, it is a very high bar to pass constitutional muster. This bill doesn’t meet that bar. It restricts far more speech than necessary to prevent voters from being deceived in ways that would have any effect on an election, and there are other ways to address deepfakes that would burden much less speech. For one, other speakers or candidates can (and do) simply point them out, eroding their potential to deceive.

    The First Amendment safeguards expressive tools like AI, allowing them to enhance our ability to communicate with one another without facing undue government restrictions.

    We urge the Virginia General Assembly to oppose this legislation. If it gets to his desk, Virginia Gov. Glenn Youngkin should veto.

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  • New accommodation scholarship for UK-bound Indian students

    New accommodation scholarship for UK-bound Indian students

    Student accommodation platform University Living and the National Indian Students and Alumni Union (NISAU) have launched the Living Scholarship – worth £12,000 (INR 13,10,832). 

    The scholarships will be provided to 10 “outstanding students” from India, who are planning to pursue higher education in the UK.

    “Accommodation is the second-largest expense after tuition for students studying abroad, and we believe financial challenges should not be a barrier to achieving academic dreams,” said Saurabh Arora, founder and CEO, University Living. 

    “Through this scholarship, we are committed to providing meaningful support to Indian students so they can focus on their education and future careers with greater confidence.”

    Beyond financial assistance, recipients will benefit from exclusive mentorship, participation in student ambassador programs, and access to internship opportunities, through the organisations, all aimed at fostering their professional growth and future career success.

    Accommodation is the second-largest expense after tuition for students studying abroad, and we believe financial challenges should not be a barrier to achieving academic dreams
    Saurabh Arora, University Living.

    “NISAU has long worked to ensure Indian students in the UK are set up for success, and the Living Scholarship is a vital step in reducing financial stress for them,” said Sanam Arora, chairperson, NISAU UK. 

    “Together with University Living, we aim to empower students with not just financial aid but also networking and professional growth opportunities.”

    The Living Scholarship will open for applications on February 14, 2025, with more information available on www.universityliving.com.

    Indian students and alumni are recognised as an integral part of the UK higher education system, with organisations like NISAU celebrating their achievements annually through events such as the India-UK Achievers Honours and Conference, which took place in central London on January 13.

    Despite the UK emerging as one of the most sought after study destinations among students from India, in recent years poor job prospects, and stricter rules on students bringing dependents into the country with them have led to falling numbers. 

    As per a report by the Times of India, students from India have seen the largest drop, falling from nearly 140,000 in 2022/23 to 111,329 in 2023/24 – a decrease of over 20%. 

    Applications from other major sending countries such as Bangladesh and Nigeria have also fallen.

    However, new data from the UK Home Office reveals that 28,700 sponsored study visa applications were submitted in January 2025 – a 12.5% increase compared to the 25,500 applications recorded in January 2024.

    Though there are encouraging signs, Home Office data continues to show a broader downward trend over the past year with applications from main applicants totalling 411,100 in the year ending January 2025 – a 13% decrease compared to the previous year.

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  • Leverage expands services to Türkiye

    Leverage expands services to Türkiye

    “The Turkish young, sitting at the centre of Europe and Asia, are true globalists. Their appetite for winning on the international stage is a delight to watch,” said Akshay Chaturvedi, CEO of Leverage Edu announcing the news that the edtech firm, which specialises in study abroad services, will be launching its services in Türkiye.

    “To fuel those dreams, we are incredibly excited to launch LeverageTürkiye — starting with our AI tools for counsellors, the Leverage Edu consumer app for students, Student-ops 360 for partners, and a line-up of special exclusive products tailored to meet that ‘education to career’ arc.”

    With over 50,000 Turkish students pursuing higher education abroad in 2024 – a number that continues to climb – the country has emerged as a critical player in the global education landscape.

    Leverage Edu CEO and founder, Akshay Chaturvedi with Ali Can Cirak, regional manager, business development.

    Factors fuelling this growth include Türkiye’s youthful population, where more than 50% of its citizens are under 30, and an increasing demand for globally recognised degrees in fields such as engineering, medicine, and business.

    The Turkish young, sitting at the centre of Europe and Asia, are true globalists
    Akshay Chaturvedi, Leverage Edu

    “Türkiye represents a very dynamic opportunity, just given where it sits on our planet,” said Chaturvedi. “As a country with a vibrant young population and increasing global mobility, it not only offers immense potential for growth but also serves as a bridge linking two of the most dynamic educational ecosystems in the world – the East and the West – hence an important first-level brick on top of which we’d like to build much more.” 

    To support its Turkish students and partners, Leverage is deploying a dedicated team on the ground in Türkiye, including a country manager to oversee operations and drive business success in the region. Additionally, several university representative desks will be dedicated to Turkish students.

    In the coming months, Leverage’s ancilllary services Fly Finance and Fly Homes will also be available in Türkiye.

    “We are committed to creating many win-wins, for students and institutions alike,” Chaturvedi added.

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  • Can regional leaders help bring peace to DR Congo?

    Can regional leaders help bring peace to DR Congo?

    Critics abroad and in Congo accuse DRC president Tshisekedi and his government of being distant, corrupt and ineffective and continually failing to meet promises or even talk to the rebels. 

    “I am exhausted with Tshisekedi’s governance,” said one Congolese citizen.

    There have been strong and repeated accusations by the United Nations and others that the M23, which is now part of the broader Alliance Fleuve Congo (AFC), receives both funding and tangible support from Rwanda and its army, that it has been responsible for excessive violence — including reports of rape in a Goma prison last week — and that it has benefited from the increasing control of lucrative mineral mines in the region.  

    A multinational push for peace

    The actual truth is much more complex, nuanced and difficult to distinguish, especially given the direct involvement of national army soldiers on the ground, not just from the DRC and Rwanda but from other countries, such as Burundi, South Africa and Tanzania. 

    There are also about 14,000 UN peacekeeping forces in the region, as well as more than 100 other militia groups and even mercenaries from Eastern Europe. Rwanda recently ensured the safe repatriation of 300 of them back to Romania.

    And then there are powerful political and business leaders in the United States, Europe, Russia and China who somewhat cynically want to ensure the continued supply of precious minerals — such as cobalt, coltan and tantalum — for their cars, cellphones and computers. 

    On a more personal level, I live with my Rwandan wife and young son in a newly-built house just south of Rwanda’s capital city of Kigali, which lies only 150 kilometres away from the current conflict zone and which has been repeatedly threatened by DRC president Tshisekedi and leading government officials.

    Just last week, Rwanda’s ambassador to the UN in Geneva, James Ngango, accused the DRC of amassing a stockpile of weapons — including rockets, kamikaze drones and heavy artillery guns — that are pointed straight at Rwanda.

    Fears that violence will cross borders

    My wife Merveille — whose father and three brothers may well have been murdered by some of the current FDLR militia fighters in eastern DRC — still has nightmares about them possibly attacking or even taking back Rwanda.

    A Rwanda security expert texted me that the threat to “attack Rwanda immediately” was real before the M23 rebels took over Goma and there are still concerns about large weapon stockpiles in South Kivu province. He added that if the M23 can now secure the regional capital of Bukavu and the nearby Kavumu airport “all security risks against Rwanda will be reduced/mitigated.”

    This will allay our personal concerns but we are still worried about the security of some close friends in Goma, who fell silent for five whole days after the M23 rebels took control of their city in late January but thankfully got back in contact right after power and WiFi service were restored.

    Daily life in Goma has returned to something like normal over the last week or so but the nighttime is different.

    One of our friends texted me on Tuesday: “Safety in Goma is degrading day in, day out. Getting armed looters at night. From this night alone we register more than seven deaths. A friend was visited as well. He let them in and his life was spared and his family. He said this morning that it was hard to determine their identity because they had no military uniforms but we all suspect they are they are the Wazalendo or prisoners who escaped from Munzenze prison. They come in to steal, rape and kill who ever shows resistance.”

    The Wazalendo — meaning “patriots” or “nationalists” — are a group of irregular fighters in North Kivu province, who are allied with the Congolese army and opposed to the M23.

    Our friend in Goma said that he still has enough security in his house but when asked about the potentially revitalised multilateral peace process, he said: “I am actually speechless right now, I don’t know what to think about all this. So much has happened.” 

    The weekend summit’s joint communiqué did call for an immediate end to the violence and for defense ministers to come up with concrete plans for sustainable peace measures, such as the resumption of “direct negotiations and dialogue with all state and non-state parties,” including the M23 that DRC president Tshisekedi has long tried to resist.

    Observers see this as a positive sign and there are renewed hopes — along with lingering doubts after so many earlier failed initiatives — that this unusual and timely degree of coordinated Africa-based action and support at the highest levels could mean that the fighting, killing and disruption may wane soon and a long-lasting, peaceful solution can be reached.

    In the words of the sadly-departed Rabbi Lord Jonathan Sacks of the UK: “The greatest single antidote to violence is conversation, speaking our fears, listening to the fears of others, and in that sharing of vulnerabilities, discovering a genesis of hope.”

     

    Three questions to consider:

    1. Why is the situation in Eastern DRC so difficult to sort out?
    2. Think of a time when you, someone you knew or someone you respected used “direct negotiations and dialogue” to achieve a positive outcome to a challenging problem.
    3. What would you say or do if you were one of the regional African leaders trying to achieve a sustainable, non-violent solution to the Eastern DRC crisis?

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  • Reaching peak engagement in K-12 science education

    Reaching peak engagement in K-12 science education

    Key points:

    More than half of science teachers believe the most important value of science education is how it contributes to students’ curiosity, critical thinking, and creativity, according to a new report from LEGO Education. But are today’s students truly engaging with science education?

    LEGO Education’s State of Classroom Engagement Report: Science Edition surveyed more than 6,000 global teachers, parents, students, and U.S. administrators to gather data that can offer insight to support educators as they strive to engage their students in science learning.

    Science learning builds life skills students will use even if they do not pursue the science in college or as a career. It also increases student engagement and well-being, but here’s the catch: Students have to feel connected to the material in order to build these skills.

    Just over half of global science teachers say their students are engaged in science, which points to a critical need to boost engagement in the subject, according to the report. Interestingly, students say they are more engaged in science than they are in school overall. Only one-third of teachers worldwide indicate that their students are engaged in the classroom. Schools could leverage students’ interest in science to build schoolwide engagement–a key factor tied to student well-being.

    When students aren’t engaged in science, what’s behind that lack of engagement? Often, they’re intimidated before they even learn the material, and they assume the topics are too challenging. Students lose confidence before they even try. Of students who say science is their least-favorite topic, 45 percent say science is too hard and 37 percent say they are bad at science. What’s more, 77 percent of global teachers say they believe students struggle because of complex concepts and curricula, and they’re searching for for impactful resources that support every student’s success.

    “If students think they’re not good at the subject or avoid it, we risk losing an entire generation of innovators and problem solvers,” said Victor Saeijs, president of LEGO Education, in the report.

    How can educators reach students who struggle to engage with science? Hands-on science learning is the key to piquing student curiosity, prompting them to engage with learning material and build confidence as they explore science concepts. Sixty-two percent of science teachers say hands-on activities drive student engagement in science. Seventy-five percent of science teachers who do incorporate hands-on activities believe this approach leads to higher test scores and grades.

    More students need access to hands-on science learning. Only 55 percent of students say they regularly get hands-on experiences–these experiences usually require extra time and resources to plan and execute. Eighty-two percent of science teachers say they need more ways to teach science with play and hands-on methods.

    Having access to hands-on science learning experiences increases students’ confidence, giving them the boost they often need to tackle increasingly tough-to-learn concepts:

    • 73 percent of students with access to hands-on learning opportunities report feeling confident in science
    • Just 52 percent of students who do not have access to hands-on learning report feeling confident in science

    Hands-on experiences in science drive:

    • Learning outcomes: 71 percent of science teachers who incorporate hands-on, playful learning believe the methodology supports higher test scores and grades
    • Engagement for all learners: 84 percent of U.S. teachers and 87 percent of administrators think that hands-on experiences help all types of learners engage with science concepts
    • Love of science: 63 percent of students who love science credit their passion to regular hands-on experiences
    • Confidence: 79 percent of students who have hands-on science experiences are confident in the subject

    Administrators and science teachers are short on time and need hands-on tools and resources to quickly engage students in learning:

    • 59 percent of U.S. administrators and 54 percent of science teachers say they need more tools to engage students in science
    • Nearly one-third of U.S. students do not get hands-on science experiences.
    Laura Ascione
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  • Denver Public Schools sues over Trump policy allowing on-campus ICE raids

    Denver Public Schools sues over Trump policy allowing on-campus ICE raids

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    Dive Brief:

    • Denver Public Schools has issued the latest salvo in the battle over the Trump administration’s controversial new policy allowing immigration raids on school grounds with a lawsuit filed Wednesday in federal court. 
    • In Denver Public Schools v. Noem — believed to be the first lawsuit against the policy from a school system — the district seeks to undo the Trump administration’s Jan. 21 decision to allow immigration enforcement actions at “sensitive” locations such as schools, places where children gather, medical facilities and places of worship.
    • In the interim, Denver Public Schools is asking for a temporary restraining order to prohibit U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement and Customs and Border Protection enforcement of the policy.

    Dive Insight:

    The new Trump policy lifted the practice of avoiding immigration enforcement activities at places where students gather. Versions of the protected areas guidance have been in place for more than 30 years, according to the Denver system’s 25-page lawsuit, which was filed in the U.S. District Court for the District of Colorado.

    According to the lawsuit, school attendance has dropped “noticeably” across all schools in the Denver district — and particularly in schools with “new-to-country families and where ICE raids have already occurred” — since announcement of the new policy.

    The suit alleges that the policy is hurting the district’s ability to provide education and life services to children who aren’t attending school out of fear of immigration enforcement action. Colorado’s largest district, Denver Public Schools enrolls more than 90,000 students across 207 schools.

    In rescinding 2021 Biden administration language on the topic, the U.S. Department of Homeland Security said in a press release that the reversal would empower Customs and Border Patrol and Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents to enforce immigration laws and catch criminals who are in the country illegally.

    “Criminals will no longer be able to hide in America’s schools and churches to avoid arrest,” the statement read. “The Trump Administration will not tie the hands of our brave law enforcement, and instead trusts them to use common sense.”

    In its lawsuit, however, Denver Public Schools alleges that the new policy “gives federal agents virtually unchecked authority to enforce immigration laws in formerly protected areas, including schools. As reported to the public, the sole restraint on agents is that they use their own subjective ‘common sense’ to determine whether to carry out enforcement activities at formally safeguarded locations such as schools.”

    The lawsuit further claims that the DHS directive has not been backed up with formal written guidance and seeks for such a policy to be made “available for public inspection.”

    In a Thursday statement to CBS News Colorado, Tricia McLaughlin, assistant secretary of public affairs at DHS, said officers “would need secondary supervisor approval before any action can be taken in locations such as a church or a school. We expect these to be extremely rare.”

    The Denver Public Schools lawsuit comes the same week as a challenge filed by 27 religious groups — including the Mennonite Church, Episcopal Church and Central Conference of American Rabbis — that accuses the new immigration policy of infringing upon their congregations’ religious freedoms. Another lawsuit filed in January and led by the Philadelphia Yearly Meeting of the Religious Society of Friends, a Quaker organization, also alleges the policy infringes upon religious freedoms.

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  • A virtual reality, AI-boosted system helps students with autism improve social skills

    A virtual reality, AI-boosted system helps students with autism improve social skills

    Key points:

    This article and the accompanying image originally appeared on the KU News site and are reposted here with permission.

    For more than a decade, University of Kansas researchers have been developing a virtual reality system to help students with disabilities, especially those with autism spectrum disorder, to learn, practice and improve social skills they need in a typical school day. Now, the KU research team has secured funding to add artificial intelligence components to the system to give those students an extended reality, or XR, experience to sharpen social interactions in a more natural setting.

    The U.S. Office of Special Education Programs has awarded a five-year, $2.5 million grant to researchers within KU’s School of Education & Human Sciences to develop Increasing Knowledge and Natural Opportunities With Social Emotional Competence, or iKNOW. The system will build on previous work and provide students and teachers with an immersive, authentic experience blending extended reality and real-world elements of artificial intelligence.

    iKNOW will expand the capabilities of VOISS, Virtual reality Opportunity to Integrate Social Skills, a KU-developed VR system that has proven successful and statistically valid in helping students with disabilities improve social skills. That system contains 140 unique learning scenarios meant to teach knowledge and understanding of 183 social skills in virtual school environments such as a classroom, hallway, cafeteria or bus that students and teachers can use via multiple platforms such as iPad, Chromebooks or Oculus VR headsets. The system also helps students use social skills such as receptive or expressive communication across multiple environments, not simply in the isolation of a classroom.

    IKNOW will combine the VR aspects of VOISS with AI features such as large language models to enhance the systems’ capabilities and allow more natural interactions than listening to prerecorded narratives and responding by pushing buttons. The new system will allow user-initiated speaking responses that can accurately transcribe spoken language in real-time. AI technology of iKNOW will also be able to generate appropriate video responses to avatars students interact with, audio analysis of user responses, integration of in-time images and graphics with instruction to boost students’ contextual understanding.

    “Avatars in iKNOW can have certain reactions and behaviors based on what we want them to do. They can model the practices we want students to see,” said Amber Rowland, assistant research professor in the Center for Research on Learning, part of KU’s Life Span Institute and one of the grant’s co principal investigators. “The system will harness AI to make sure students have more natural interactions and put them in the role of the ‘human in the loop’ by allowing them to speak, and it will respond like a normal conversation.”

    The spoken responses will not only be more natural and relatable to everyday situations, but the contextual understanding cues will help students better know why a certain response is preferred. Rowland said when students were presented with multiple choices in previous versions, they often would know which answer was correct but indicated that’s not how they would have responded in real life.

    IKNOW will also provide a real-time student progress monitoring system, telling them, educators and families how long students spoke, how frequently they spoke, number of keywords used, where students may have struggled in the system and other data to help enhance understanding.

    All avatar voices that iKNOW users encounter are provided by real middle school students, educators and administrators. This helps enhance the natural environment of the system without the shortcomings of students practicing social skills with classmates in supervised sessions. For example, users do not have to worry what the people they are practicing with are thinking about them while they are learning. They can practice the social skills that they need until they are comfortable moving from the XR environment to real life.

    “It will leverage our ability to take something off of teachers’ plates and provide tools for students to learn these skills in multiple environments. Right now, the closest we can come to that is training peers. But that puts students with disabilities in a different box by saying, ‘You don’t know how to do this,’” said Maggie Mosher, assistant research professor in KU’s Achievement & Assessment Institute, a co-principal investigator for the grant.

    Mosher, a KU graduate who completed her doctoral dissertation comparing VOISS to other social skills interventions, found the system was statistically significant and valid in improving social skills and knowledge across multiple domains. Her study, which also found the system to be acceptable, appropriate and feasible, was published in high-impact journals Computers & Education and Issues and Trends in Learning Technologies.

    The grant supporting iKNOW is one of four OSEP Innovation and Development grants intended to spur innovation in educational technology. The research team, including principal investigator Sean Smith, professor of special education; Amber Rowland, associate research professor in the Center for Research on Learning and the Achievement & Assessment Institute; Maggie Mosher, assistant research professor in AAI; and Bruce Frey, professor in educational psychology, will present their work on the project at the annual I/ITSEC conference, the world’s largest modeling, simulation and training event. It is sponsored by the National Training & Simulation Association, which promotes international and interdisciplinary cooperation within the fields of modeling and simulation, training, education and analysis and is affiliated with the National Defense Industrial Association.

    The research team has implemented VOISS, available on the Apple Store and Google Play, at schools across the country. Anyone interested in learning more can find information, demonstrations and videos at the iKNOW site and can contact developers to use the system at the site’s “work with us” page.

    IKNOW will add resources for teachers and families who want to implement the system at a website called iKNOW TOOLS (Teaching Occasions and Opportunities for Learning Supports) to support generalization of social skills across real-world settings.

    “By combining our research-based social emotional virtual reality work (VOISS) with the increasing power and flexibility of AI, iKNOW will further personalize the learning experience for individuals with disabilities along with the struggling classmates,” Smith said. “Our hope and expectation is that iKNOW will further engage students to develop the essential social emotional skills to then apply in the real world to improve their overall learning outcomes.”

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  • Trump’s transgender sports ban challenged in expanded New Hampshire lawsuit

    Trump’s transgender sports ban challenged in expanded New Hampshire lawsuit

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    Dive Brief:

    • Two transgender high school athletes are challenging in federal court President Donald Trump’s Feb. 5 executive order banning transgender girls and women from participating in sports aligned with their gender identity.
    • Originally filed against a New Hampshire state law that bars transgender girls in grades 5-12 from playing school sports, the lawsuit filed by Parker Tirrell and Iris Turmelle, is expanding to include Trump and the federal departments of justice and education among the defendants.
    • Tirrell and Turmelle, represented by GLAD Law and the ACLU of New Hampshire, allege Trump’s executive order is discriminatory and violates their federal equal protection guarantees under the 14th Amendment and their rights under Title IX. 

    Dive Insight:

    Henry Klementowicz, deputy legal director at ACLU of NH, said in a Wednesday statement that every child in the state deserves “a right to equal opportunities at school.”

    “We’re expanding our lawsuit to challenge President Trump’s executive orders because, like the state law, it excludes, singles out, and discriminates against transgender students and insinuates that they are not deserving of the same educational opportunities as all other students,” Klementowicz said. 

    The U.S. District Court for the District of New Hampshire previously ordered in September that the two students could play sports on teams corresponding with their gender identities while Tirrell and Turmelle v. Edelblut advanced. 

    Trump’s “No Men in Women’s Sports” executive order, which is now being targeted by the lawsuit, calls for a recission of all federal funds from educational programs that allow transgender girls and women to participate in girls’ sports. The order also directs the U.S. secretary of education to zero in on Title IX enforcement against K-12 schools and colleges where girls and women are required “to compete with or against or to appear unclothed before males.”

    The day after Trump issued that executive order, the U.S. Department of Education opened Title IX investigations into a middle and high school athletics association in Massachusetts, as well as two universities, on the basis that they allowed transgender girls and women to play on teams aligned with their gender identity. 

    Trump’s order further directs the U.S. Department of Justice to abide by the nationwide vacatur from a recent court order by a federal judge who struck down the Biden administration’s Title IX rule in January. The Biden-era Title IX rule was the first time protections were codified for LGBTQI+ students and employees at federally funded schools under the anti-sex discrimination law. 

    After that January court decision, the Education Department said it would enforce the Title IX regulations finalized in 2020 during the first Trump administration.

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