Category: STEM

  • How professional learning transformed our teachers

    How professional learning transformed our teachers

    Key points:

    When you walk into a math classroom in Charleston County School District, you can feel the difference. Students aren’t just memorizing steps–they’re reasoning through problems, explaining their thinking, and debating solutions with their peers. Teachers aren’t rushing to cover content, because their clear understanding of students’ natural learning progressions allows them to spend more time exploring the why behind the math.

    This cultural shift didn’t come from adopting a new curriculum or collecting more data. Instead, we transformed math education by investing deeply in our educators through OGAP (The Ongoing Assessment Project) professional learning–an approach that has reshaped not only instruction, but the confidence and professional identity of our teachers.

    Why we needed a change

    Charleston County serves more than 50,000 students across more than 80 schools. For years, math achievement saw small gains, but not the leaps we hoped for. Our teachers were dedicated, and we had high-quality instructional materials, but something was missing.

    The gap wasn’t our teacher’s effort. It was their insight–understanding the content they taught flexibly and deeply.

    Too often, instruction focused on procedures rather than understanding. Teachers could identify whether a student got a problem right or wrong, but not always why they responded the way they did. To truly help students grow, we needed a way to uncover their thinking and guide next steps more intentionally.

    What makes this professional learning different

    Unlike traditional PD that delivers a set of strategies to “try on Monday,” this learning model takes educators deep into how students develop mathematical ideas over time.

    Across four intensive days, teachers explore research-based learning progressions in additive, multiplicative, fractional, and proportional reasoning. They examine real student work to understand how misconceptions form and what those misconceptions reveal about a learner’s thought process. It is also focused on expanding and deepening teachers’ understanding of the content they teach so they are more flexible in their thinking. Teachers appreciate that the training isn’t abstract; it’s rooted in everyday classroom realities, making it immediately meaningful.

    Instead of sorting responses into right and wrong, teachers ask a more powerful question: What does this show me about how the student is reasoning?

    That shift changes everything. Teachers leave with:

    • A stronger grasp of content
    • The ability to recognize error patterns
    • Insight into students’ conceptual gaps
    • Renewed confidence in their instructional decisions

    The power of understanding the “why”

    Our district uses conceptual math curricula, including Eureka Math², Reveal Math, and Math Nation. These “HQIM” programs emphasize reasoning, discourse, and models–exactly the kind of instruction our students need.

    But conceptual materials only work when teachers understand the purpose behind them.

    Before this professional learning, teachers sometimes felt unsure about lesson sequencing and the lesson intent, including cognitive complexity. Now, they understand why lessons appear in a specific order and how models support deeper understanding. It’s common to hear teachers say: “Oh, now I get why it’s written that way!” They are also much more likely to engage deeply with the mathematical models in the programs when they understand the math education research behind the learning progressions that curriculum developers use to design the content.

    That insight helps them stay committed to conceptual instruction even when students struggle, shifting the focus from “Did they get it?” to “How are they thinking about it?”

    Transforming district culture

    The changes go far beyond individual classrooms.

    We run multiple sessions of this professional learning each year, and they fill within days. Teachers return to their PLCs energized, bringing exit tickets, student work, and new questions to analyze together.

    We also invite instructional coaches and principals to attend. This builds a shared professional language and strengthens communication across the system. The consistency it creates is particularly powerful for new teachers who are still building confidence in their instructional decision-making.

    The result?

    • Teachers now invite feedback.
    • Coaches feel like instructional partners, not evaluators.
    • Everyone is rowing in the same direction.

    This shared understanding has become one of the most transformative parts of our district’s math journey.

    Results we can see

    In the past five years, Charleston County’s math scores have climbed roughly 10 percentage points. But the most meaningful growth is happening inside classrooms:

    • Students are reasoning more deeply.
    • Teachers demonstrate stronger content knowledge and efficacy in using math models.
    • PLC conversations focus on evidence of student thinking.
    • Instruction is more intentional and responsive.

    Teachers are also the first to tell you whether PD is worth their time…and our teachers are asking for more. Many return to complete a second or third strand, and sometimes all four. We even have educators take the same strand more than once just to pick up on something they may have missed the first time. The desire to deepen their expertise shows just how impactful this learning has been. Participants also find it powerful to engage in a room where the collective experience spans multiple grade levels. This structure supports our goal of strengthening vertical alignment across the district.

    Prioritizing professional learning that works

    When professional learning builds teacher expertise rather than compliance, everything changes. This approach doesn’t tell teachers what to teach; it helps them understand how students learn.

    And once teachers gain that insight, classrooms shift. Conversations deepen. Confidence grows. Students stop memorizing math and start truly understanding it.

    Latest posts by eSchool Media Contributors (see all)

    Source link

  • The schools where even young children change classes 

    The schools where even young children change classes 

    by Ariel Gilreath, The Hechinger Report
    January 13, 2026

    BATON ROUGE, La. — About two dozen second graders sat on the carpet at the front of Jacquelyn Anthony’s classroom, reviewing how to make tens. “Two needs eight!” the students yelled out together. “Six needs four!” 

    “The numbers may get a little trickier,” Anthony told them next. “But remember, the numbers we need to make 10 are still there.” The students then turned confidently to bigger calculations: Forty-six needs four ones to make a new number divisible by 10; 128 needs two to make 13 tens. 

    At the end of the hour, the second graders slung on their backpacks, gathered their Chromebooks and lined up at the door before heading to English and social studies class across the hall. While most schools wait until middle school to transition students from one class to another, kids at Louisiana’s Baton Rouge Center for Visual and Performing Arts do so starting at age 6 or 7. It’s part of a strategy known as departmentalizing, or platooning. 

    Anthony, rather than teaching all four core subjects, specializes in math. The school’s new facility, built in 2025, was designed with departmentalizing in mind: The classrooms have huge glass windows, so teachers can see their next class preparing to line up in the hallway.

    “Teaching today is so different than it was a long time ago, and there are so many demands on them. And the demand to be an expert in your content area is very high,” said Sydney Hebert, magnet site coordinator for the art-focused public school in the East Baton Rouge Parish school district. “We want to make sure that our teachers are experts in what they’re teaching so that they can do a good job of teaching it to the kids.”

    As schools contend with a decades-long slump in math scores — exacerbated by the pandemic — some are turning to this classroom strategy even for very young students. In recent years, more elementary schools have opted to departmentalize some grade levels in an attempt to boost academic achievement. The share of fourth and fifth grade classrooms operating on this schedule has doubled since the year 2000, from 15 percent to 30 percent in 2021. Often, that means educators will specialize in one or two subjects at most, such as fourth grade English language arts and social studies, or fifth grade math and science. The theory is that teachers who specialize will be more familiar with the content and better able to teach it. 

    That may be particularly important for math: Studies have shown that some early elementary school teachers experience anxiety about the subject and question their ability to teach it. Educators also say that the curriculum and standards for math and English in the early grades are changing rapidly in some districts and have become more complicated over time. In a departmentalized setup, it’s also far less likely that math instruction will get shortchanged by an educator who prefers spending time on other subjects.  

    Related: A lot goes on in classrooms from kindergarten to high school. Keep up with our free weekly newsletter on K-12 education. 

    But while some schools swear by this model, the research on it is mixed.

    One prominent 2018 study on the practice in Houston public schools found it had a negative effect on test scores, behavior and attendance. The study doesn’t explain why that was the case, but the researcher said it could be because teachers on this schedule spend less time with individual students.

    Another study published in 2024 analyzing Massachusetts schools had different outcomes: Researchers found moderate gains in academic achievement for ELA and a significant boost to science scores for students in departmentalized classes. The results in math, however, showed few gains. 

    Generally, teachers specialize in the subject they are most comfortable teaching. When a school departmentalizes for the first time, principals typically look at each educator’s test score data over time to determine whether they should specialize in math or reading.

    “There are some arguments that, at least if it’s someone who likes the subject, who is passionate about the subject, you have a greater chance of them doing a better job of delivering instruction,” said Latrenda Knighten, president of the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics. “But you’ll find mixed reviews.”

    Yet there are a few reasons why the strategy is typically reserved for students in older grades, according to school leaders: Spending all day with one teacher increases the bond between the teacher and student, which is important for younger children. In Baton Rouge, Anthony teaches 50 students throughout the day instead of the same 25 students all day.

    “Teachers want to get to know their students,” said Dennis Willingham, superintendent of Walker County Schools in Alabama. The district departmentalized some fifth grade classrooms decades ago, but recently added third and fourth grade classes on this schedule. “You tend to see less departmentalization below third grade because of the nurturing element.” 

    It’s also generally more challenging for young students to quickly change classrooms, even for electives, which means lost instructional time. Smaller elementary schools may also struggle to hire enough teachers to schedule all of them on a departmentalized setup. 

    Related: These school districts are bucking the national math slump

    But increasingly, schools that are satisfied with this approach for older grade levels are trying it out with their younger grades, too. 

    After the pandemic, the San Tan Heights Elementary School in Arizona changed its curriculum to one that was more rigorous, and it became harder for the third grade educators to master the standards of all four subject areas, said Henry Saylor-Scheetz, principal at the time.

    He proposed that third graders be taught by separate math, English language arts and reading teachers. “I told them, let’s try it for a semester. If it doesn’t work at the end of the year, we’ll go back,” Saylor-Scheetz said.

    Ten days into the experiment, teachers told him they never wanted to return to the old schedule. In the subsequent years, the school added more classrooms on this model until, by 2023, all K-8 students were departmentalized. For the last few years, teacher retention at the school was 95 percent, according to Saylor-Scheetz.

    Saylor-Scheetz, who last year became principal of a nearby middle school, credited the change for helping the school improve from a C rating on its state report card — a rating it had stagnated at every year since 2018 — to a B rating as of 2022. Since then, more schools in his Arizona school district have shifted to this schedule. 

    “I’d love to see this become something we do as a nation, but it is a paradigm shift,” Saylor-Scheetz said. “There’s merit in doing it, but there has to be a commitment to it.”

    At Baton Rouge Center for Visual and Performing Arts, students in first through third grades have two partner teachers, one for math and science and another for ELA and social studies. The school has been operating on this schedule for third through fifth grade students for more than a decade. Eight years ago, its leaders decided to try it for first and second grade students, too, and were pleased with the results. 

    On a December morning at the school, young students talked quietly with each other in the hall as they lined up to go from math class to English language arts. All told, the switch took less than five minutes. “We’re at the end of the second nine weeks, so we’ve had a lot of practice,” said GiGi Boudreaux, the assistant principal. 

    The strategy has not always been successful, though.

    During the pandemic, administrators also attempted to departmentalize its kindergarten classes. It didn’t work as they’d hoped: It was a challenge to get the 5-year-olds to quickly change classes and focus on classwork again once they did. Parents also didn’t like it. The school then tried moving teachers from classroom to classroom instead of moving students, but the educators hated it. 

    “It was too much, so we didn’t do it after that,” said Hebert.

    The Baton Rouge school doesn’t have comparison data to show that students perform better in a departmentalized setup, but most educators in the school prefer it, Hebert said. Third grade test scores from 2015 — before the school departmentalized its younger grade levels — showed 73 percent scored “advanced” and “mastery” level on the state ELA test, and 56 percent scored advanced or mastery on the math test. In 2025, 80 percent of third grade students scored advanced or mastery in ELA and 55 percent in math.

    “I know that the teachers like it better, and the kids have adapted to it,” Hebert said. 

    Teachers meet weekly with their partner teachers and grade-level counterparts to discuss their classes and progress on the state standards. Once a quarter, all of the math teachers across the grades meet to talk about strategies and student performance. 

    Related: Teachers conquering their math anxiety 

    At Deer Valley Unified School District in Arizona, departmentalizing some classrooms has helped reduce teacher turnover, said Superintendent Curtis Finch, particularly for early career educators, who can find it challenging to master the content and standards of all four subjects.

    “If you’re not confident in your subject, then you don’t have good examples off the top of your head. You can’t control the room, can’t pull the students in,” Finch said. 

    There are drawbacks though, Finch acknowledged. In a self-contained classroom, teachers can more easily integrate their different lessons, so that a math lesson might refer back to a topic covered in reading.

    And even though Anthony, the second grade math and science teacher in Baton Rouge, loves teaching math, she also misses the extra time she could spend with each student when she had the same 25 children in her class all day for the entire school year. 

    “It was a joy for me to be self-contained and to build that little family,” Anthony said. “I think the social emotional needs of students are best met in that type of environment. But being solely a math teacher, I do get to just dig in and focus on the nuance of the content.” 

    For Anthony’s partner teacher across the hall, Holley McArthur, teaching 50 students ELA and social studies is easier than having to teach 25 students math. 

    “This is my thing: reading books, comprehending and finding answers, meeting their goals,” said McArthur, who has taught in both kinds of classrooms over three decades in education.  

    While McArthur’s kids were at recess this mid-December day, the veteran teacher was grading their reading worksheets. A new student had transferred in from out of state midyear, and she was still evaluating his reading skills. 

    “I think you still get to know the kids, even if you just have them for three hours a day, because I’m not doing the hard math with them.” 

    Contact staff writer Ariel Gilreath on Signal at arielgilreath.46 or at [email protected].

    This story about departmentalizing was produced by The Hechinger Report, a nonprofit, independent news organization focused on inequality and innovation in education. Sign up for the Hechinger newsletter.

    This <a target=”_blank” href=”https://hechingerreport.org/the-schools-where-even-young-children-change-classes/”>article</a> first appeared on <a target=”_blank” href=”https://hechingerreport.org”>The Hechinger Report</a> and is republished here under a <a target=”_blank” href=”https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/”>Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License</a>.<img src=”https://i0.wp.com/hechingerreport.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/06/cropped-favicon.jpg?fit=150%2C150&amp;ssl=1″ style=”width:1em;height:1em;margin-left:10px;”>

    <img id=”republication-tracker-tool-source” src=”https://hechingerreport.org/?republication-pixel=true&post=114257&amp;ga4=G-03KPHXDF3H” style=”width:1px;height:1px;”><script> PARSELY = { autotrack: false, onload: function() { PARSELY.beacon.trackPageView({ url: “https://hechingerreport.org/the-schools-where-even-young-children-change-classes/”, urlref: window.location.href }); } } </script> <script id=”parsely-cfg” src=”//cdn.parsely.com/keys/hechingerreport.org/p.js”></script>

    Source link

  • A new approach to driving STEM workforce readiness

    A new approach to driving STEM workforce readiness

    Key points:

    STEM workforce shortages are a well-known global issue. With demand set to rise by nearly 11 percent in the next decade, today’s students are the solution. They will be the ones to make the next big discoveries, solve the next great challenges, and make the world a better place.

    Unfortunately, many students don’t see themselves as part of that picture.

    When students struggle in math and science, many come to believe they simply aren’t “STEM people.” While it’s common to hear this phrase in the classroom, a perceived inability in STEM can become a gatekeeper that stops students from pursuing STEM careers and alters the entire trajectory of their lives. Because of this, educators must confront negative STEM identities head on.

    One promising approach is to teach decision-making and critical thinking directly within STEM classrooms, equipping students with the durable skills essential for future careers and the mindset that they can decide on a STEM career for themselves.

    Teaching decision-making

    Many educators assume this strategy requires a full curriculum overhaul. Rather, decision-making can be taught by weaving decision science theories and concepts into existing lesson plans. This teaching and learning of skillful judgment formation and decision-making is called Decision Education. 

    There are four main learning domains of Decision Education as outlined in the Decision Education K-12 Learning Standards: thinking probabilistically, valuing and applying rationality, recognizing and resisting cognitive biases, and structuring decisions. Taken together, these skills, among other things, help students gather and assess information, consider different perspectives, evaluate risks and apply knowledge in real-world scenarios. 

    The intersection of Decision Education and STEM

    Decision Education touches on many of the core skills that STEM requires, such as applying a scientific mindset, collaboration, problem-solving, and critical thinking. This approach opens new pathways for students to engage with STEM in ways that align with their interests, strengths, and learning styles.

    Decision Education hones the durable skills students need to succeed both in and out of the STEM classroom. For example, “weight-and-rate” tables can help high school students evaluate college decisions by comparing elements like tuition, academic programs, and distance from home. While the content in this exercise is personalized and practical for each student, it’s grounded in analytical thinking, helping them learn to follow a structured decision process, think probabilistically, recognize cognitive biases, and apply rational reasoning.

    These same decision-making skills mirror the core practices of STEM. Math, science, and engineering require students to weigh variables, assess risk, and model potential outcomes. While those concepts may feel abstract within the context of STEM, applying them to real-life choices helps students see these skills as powerful tools for navigating uncertainty in their daily lives.

    Decision Education also strengthens cognitive flexibility, helping students recognize biases, question assumptions, and consider different perspectives. Building these habits is crucial for scientific thinking, where testing hypotheses, evaluating evidence objectively, and revising conclusions based on new data are all part of the process. The scientific method itself applies several core Decision Education concepts.

    As students build critical thinking and collaboration skills, they also deepen their self-awareness, which can be transformative for those who do not see themselves as “STEM people.” For example, a student drawn to literacy might find it helpful to reimagine math and science as languages built on patterns, symbols, and structured communication. By connecting STEM to existing strengths, educators can help reshape perceptions and unlock potential.

    Adopting new strategies

    As educators seek to develop or enhance STEM education and cultures in their schools, districts and administrators must consider teacher training and support.

    High-quality professional development programs are an effective way to help teachers hone the durable skills they aim to cultivate in their students. Effective training also creates space for educators to reflect on how unconscious biases might shape their perceptions of who belongs in advanced STEM coursework. Addressing these patterns allows teachers to see students more clearly, strengthen empathy, and create deeper connections in the classroom.

    When educators come together to make STEM more engaging and accessible, they do more than teach content: they rewrite the narrative about who can succeed in STEM. By integrating Decision Education as a skill-building bridge between STEM and students’ everyday lives, educators can foster confidence, curiosity, and a sense of belonging, which helps learners build their own STEM identity, keeping them invested and motivated to learn. While not every student will ultimately pursue a career in STEM, they can leave the classroom with stronger critical thinking, problem-solving, and decision-making skills that will serve them for life.

    Creating that kind of learning environment takes intention, shared commitment, and a belief that every student deserves meaningful access to and engagement with STEM. But when the opportunity arises, the right decision is clear–and every school has the power to make it.

    Latest posts by eSchool Media Contributors (see all)

    Source link

  • Teaching math the way the brain learns changes everything

    Teaching math the way the brain learns changes everything

    Key points:

    Far too many students enter math class expecting to fail. For them, math isn’t just a subject–it’s a source of anxiety that chips away at their confidence and makes them question their abilities. A growing conversation around math phobia is bringing this crisis into focus. A recent article, for example, unpacked the damage caused by the belief that “I’m just not a math person” and argued that traditional math instruction often leaves even bright, capable students feeling defeated.

    When a single subject holds such sway over not just academic outcomes but a student’s sense of self and future potential, we can’t afford to treat this as business as usual. It’s not enough to explore why this is happening. We need to focus on how to fix it. And I believe the answer lies in rethinking how we teach math, aligning instruction with the way the brain actually learns.

    Context first, then content

    A key shortcoming of traditional math curriculum–and a major contributor to students’ fear of math–is the lack of meaningful context. Our brains rely on context to make sense of new information, yet math is often taught in isolation from how we naturally learn. The fix isn’t simply throwing in more “real-world” examples. What students truly need is context, and visual examples are one of the best ways to get there. When math concepts are presented visually, students can better grasp the structure of a problem and follow the logic behind each step, building deeper understanding and confidence along the way.

    In traditional math instruction, students are often taught a new concept by being shown a procedure and then practicing it repeatedly in hopes that understanding will eventually follow. But this approach is backward. Our brains don’t learn that way, especially when it comes to math. Students need context first. Without existing schemas to draw from, they struggle to make sense of new ideas. Providing context helps them build the mental frameworks necessary for real understanding.

    Why visual-first context matters

    Visual-first context gives students the tools they need to truly understand math. A curriculum built around visual-first exploration allows students to have an interactive experience–poking and prodding at a problem, testing ideas, observing patterns, and discovering solutions. From there, students develop procedures organically, leading to a deeper, more complete understanding. Using visual-first curriculum activates multiple parts of the brain, creating a deeper, lasting understanding. Shifting to a math curriculum that prioritizes introducing new concepts through a visual context makes math more approachable and accessible by aligning with how the brain naturally learns.

    To overcome “math phobia,” we also need to rethink the heavy emphasis on memorization in today’s math instruction. Too often, students can solve problems not because they understand the underlying concepts, but because they’ve memorized a set of steps. This approach limits growth and deeper learning. Memorization of the right answers does not lead to understanding, but understanding can lead to the right answers.

    Take, for example, a third grader learning their times tables. The third grader can memorize the answers to each square on the times table along with its coordinating multipliers, but that doesn’t mean they understand multiplication. If, instead, they grasp how multiplication works–what it means–they can figure out the times tables on their own. The reverse isn’t true. Without conceptual understanding, students are limited to recall, which puts them at a disadvantage when trying to build off previous knowledge.

    Learning from other subjects

    To design a math curriculum that aligns with how the brain naturally learns new information, we can take cues from how other subjects are taught. In English, for example, students don’t start by memorizing grammar rules in isolation–they’re first exposed to those rules within the context of stories. Imagine asking a student to take a grammar quiz before they’ve ever read a sentence–that would seem absurd. Yet in math, we often expect students to master procedures before they’ve had any meaningful exposure to the concepts behind them.

    Most other subjects are built around context. Students gain background knowledge before being expected to apply what they’ve learned. By giving students a story or a visual context for the mind to process–breaking it down and making connections–students can approach problems like a puzzle or game, instead of a dreaded exercise. Math can do the same. By adopting the contextual strategies used in other subjects, math instruction can become more intuitive and engaging, moving beyond the traditional textbook filled with equations.

    Math doesn’t have to be a source of fear–it can be a source of joy, curiosity, and confidence. But only if we design it the way the brain learns: with visuals first, understanding at the center, and every student in mind. By using approaches that provide visual-first context, students can engage with math in a way that mirrors how the brain naturally learns. This shift in learning makes math more approachable and accessible for all learners.

    Latest posts by eSchool Media Contributors (see all)

    Source link

  • Effective tools to foster student engagement

    Effective tools to foster student engagement

    Key points:

    In my classroom, students increasingly ask for relevant content. Students want to know how what they are learning in school relates to the world beyond the classroom. They want to be engaged in their learning.

    In fact, the 2025-2026 Education Insights Report vividly proves that students need and want engaging learning experiences. And it’s not just students who see engagement as important. Engagement is broadly recognized as a key driver of learning and success, with 93 percent of educators agreeing that student engagement is a critical metric for understanding overall achievement. What is more, 99 percent of superintendents believe student engagement is one of the top predictors of success at school.

    Creating highly engaging lesson plans that will immerse today’s tech-savvy students in learning can be a challenge, but here are two easy-to-find resources that I can turn to turbo-charge the engagement quotient of my lessons:

    Virtual field trips
    Virtual field trips empower educators to introduce students to amazing places, new people and ideas, and remarkable experiences–without ever leaving the classroom. There are so many virtual field trips out there, but I always love the ones that Discovery Education creates with partners.

    This fall, I plan to take my K-5 students to see the world’s largest solar telescope, located in Hawaii, for a behind-the-scenes tour with the National Science Foundation and Sesame. For those with older grades, I recommend diving into engineering and architecture with the new Forging Innovation: A Mission Possible Virtual Field Trip.

    I also love the virtual tours of the Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History. Together as a class or individually, students can dive into self-guided, room-by-room tours of several exhibits and areas within the museum from a desktop or smart device. This virtual field trip does include special collections and research areas, like ancient Egypt or the deep ocean. This makes it fun and easy for teachers like me to pick and choose which tour is most relevant to a lesson.

    Immersive learning resources
    Immersive learning content offers another way to take students to new places and connect the wider world, and universe, to the classroom. Immersive learning can be easily woven into the curriculum to enhance and provide context.

    One immersive learning solution I really like is TimePod Adventures from Verizon. It features free time-traveling episodes designed to engage students in places like Mars and prehistoric Earth. Now accessible directly through a web browser on a laptop, Chromebook, or mobile device, students need only internet access and audio output to begin the journey. Guided by an AI-powered assistant and featuring grade-band specific lesson plans, these missions across time and space encourage students to take control, explore incredible environments, and solve complex challenges.

    Immersive learning content can be overwhelming at first, but professional development resources are available to help educators build confidence while earning microcredentials. These resources let educators quickly dive into new and innovative techniques and teaching strategies that help increase student engagement.

    Taken together, engaging learning opportunities are ones that show students how classrooms learnings directly connect to their real lives. With resources like virtual field trips and immersive learning content, students can dive into school topics in ways that are fun, fresh, and sometimes otherworldly.

    Latest posts by eSchool Media Contributors (see all)

    Source link

  • A gender gap in STEM widened during the pandemic. Schools are trying to make up lost ground

    A gender gap in STEM widened during the pandemic. Schools are trying to make up lost ground

    IRVING, Texas — Crowded around a workshop table, four girls at de Zavala Middle School puzzled over a Lego machine they had built. As they flashed a purple card in front of a light sensor, nothing happened. 

    The teacher at the Dallas-area school had emphasized that in the building process, there are no such thing as mistakes. Only iterations. So the girls dug back into the box of blocks and pulled out an orange card. They held it over the sensor and the machine kicked into motion. 

    “Oh! Oh, it reacts differently to different colors,” said sixth grader Sofia Cruz.

    In de Zavala’s first year as a choice school focused on science, technology, engineering and math, the school recruited a sixth grade class that’s half girls. School leaders are hoping the girls will stick with STEM fields. In de Zavala’s higher grades — whose students joined before it was a STEM school — some elective STEM classes have just one girl enrolled. 

    Efforts to close the gap between boys and girls in STEM classes are picking up after losing steam nationwide during the chaos of the Covid pandemic. Schools have extensive work ahead to make up for the ground girls lost, in both interest and performance.

    In the years leading up to the pandemic, the gender gap nearly closed. But within a few years, girls lost all the ground they had gained in math test scores over the previous decade, according to an Associated Press analysis. While boys’ scores also suffered during Covid, they have recovered faster than girls, widening the gender gap.

    As learning went online, special programs to engage girls lapsed — and schools were slow to restart them. Zoom school also emphasized rote learning, a technique based on repetition that some experts believe may favor boys, instead of teaching students to solve problems in different ways, which may benefit girls. 

    Old practices and biases likely reemerged during the pandemic, said Michelle Stie, a vice president at the National Math and Science Initiative.

    “Let’s just call it what it is,” Stie said. “When society is disrupted, you fall back into bad patterns.”

    Related: A lot goes on in classrooms from kindergarten to high school. Keep up with our free weekly newsletter on K-12 education.

    In most school districts in the 2008-09 school year, boys had higher average math scores on standardized tests than girls, according to AP’s analysis, which looked at scores across 15 years in over 5,000 school districts. It was based on average test scores for third through eighth graders in 33 states, compiled by the Educational Opportunity Project at Stanford University. 

    A decade later, girls had not only caught up, they were ahead: Slightly more than half of districts had higher math averages for girls.

    Within a few years of the pandemic, the parity disappeared. In 2023-24, boys on average outscored girls in math in nearly 9 out of 10 districts.

    A separate study by NWEA, an education research company, found gaps between boys and girls in science and math on national assessments went from being practically non-existent in 2019 to favoring boys around 2022.

    Studies have indicated girls reported higher levels of anxiety and depression during the pandemic, plus more caretaking burdens than boys, but the dip in academic performance did not appear outside STEM. Girls outperformed boys in reading in nearly every district nationwide before the pandemic and continued to do so afterward.

    “It wasn’t something like Covid happened and girls just fell apart,” said Megan Kuhfeld, one of the authors of the NWEA study. 

    Related: These districts are bucking the national math slump 

    In the years leading up to the pandemic, teaching practices shifted to deemphasize speed, competition and rote memorization. Through new curriculum standards, schools moved toward research-backed methods that emphasized how to think flexibly to solve problems and how to tackle numeric problems conceptually.

    Educators also promoted participation in STEM subjects and programs that boosted girls’ confidence, including extracurriculars that emphasized hands-on learning and connected abstract concepts to real-life applications. 

    When STEM courses had large male enrollment, Superintendent Kenny Rodrequez noticed girls losing interest as boys dominated classroom discussions at his schools in Grandview C-4 District outside Kansas City. Girls were significantly more engaged after the district moved some of its introductory hands-on STEM curriculum to the lower grade levels and balanced classes by gender, he said.

    When schools closed for the pandemic, the district had to focus on making remote learning work. When in-person classes resumed, some of the teachers had left, and new ones had to be trained in the curriculum, Rodrequez said. 

    “Whenever there’s crisis, we go back to what we knew,” Rodrequez said. 

    Related: One state tried algebra for all eighth graders. It hasn’t gone well

    Despite shifts in societal perceptions, a bias against girls persists in science and math subjects, according to teachers, administrators and advocates. It becomes a message girls can internalize about their own abilities, they say, even at a very young age. 

    In his third grade classroom in Washington, D.C., teacher Raphael Bonhomme starts the year with an exercise where students break down what makes up their identity. Rarely do the girls describe themselves as good at math. Already, some say they are “not a math person.” 

    “I’m like, you’re 8 years old,” he said. “What are you talking about, ‘I’m not a math person?’” 

    Girls also may have been more sensitive to changes in instructional methods spurred by the pandemic, said Janine Remillard, a math education professor at the University of Pennsylvania. Research has found girls tend to prefer learning things that are connected to real-life examples, while boys generally do better in a competitive environment. 

    “What teachers told me during Covid is the first thing to go were all of these sense-making processes,” she said. 

    Related: OPINION: Everyone can be a math person but first we have to make math instruction more inclusive 

    At de Zavala Middle School in Irving, the STEM program is part of a push that aims to build curiosity, resilience and problem-solving across subjects.

    Coming out of the pandemic, Irving schools had to make a renewed investment in training for teachers, said Erin O’Connor, a STEM and innovation specialist there.

    The district last year also piloted a new science curriculum from Lego Education. The lesson involving the machine at de Zavala, for example, had students learn about kinetic energy. Fifth graders learned about genetics by building dinosaurs and their offspring with Lego blocks, identifying shared traits. 

    “It is just rebuilding the culture of, we want to build critical thinkers and problem solvers,” O’Connor said.

    Teacher Tenisha Willis recently led second graders at Irving’s Townley Elementary School through building a machine that would push blocks into a container. She knelt next to three girls who were struggling.

    They tried to add a plank to the wheeled body of the machine, but the blocks didn’t move enough. One girl grew frustrated, but Willis was patient. She asked what else they could try, whether they could flip some parts around. The girls ran the machine again. This time, it worked.

    “Sometimes we can’t give up,” Willis said. “Sometimes we already have a solution. We just have to adjust it a little bit.” 

    Lurye reported from Philadelphia. Todd Feathers contributed reporting from New York. 

    The Associated Press’ education coverage receives financial support from multiple private foundations. AP is solely responsible for all content. Find AP’s standards for working with philanthropies, a list of supporters and funded coverage areas at AP.org.

    The Hechinger Report provides in-depth, fact-based, unbiased reporting on education that is free to all readers. But that doesn’t mean it’s free to produce. Our work keeps educators and the public informed about pressing issues at schools and on campuses throughout the country. We tell the whole story, even when the details are inconvenient. Help us keep doing that.

    Join us today.

    Source link

  • Creative approaches to teaching math can help fill AI talent gap

    Creative approaches to teaching math can help fill AI talent gap

    Key points:

    Not surprisingly, jobs in AI are the fastest growing of any in the country, with a 59 percent increase in job postings between January 2024 and November 2024. Yet we continue to struggle with growing a workforce that is proficient in STEM. 

    To fill the AI talent pipeline, we need to interest kids in STEM early, particularly in math, which is critical to AI. But that’s proven difficult. One reason is that math is a stumbling block. Whether because of math anxiety, attitudes they’ve absorbed from the community, inadequate curricular materials, or traditional teaching methods, U.S. students either avoid or are not proficient in math.  

    A recent Gallup report on Math Matters reveals that the U.S. public greatly values math but also experiences significant gaps in learning and confidence, finding that: 

    • 95 percent of U.S. adults say that math is very or somewhat important in their work life 
    • 43 percent of U.S. adults wish they had learned more math skills in middle or high school. 
    •  24 percent of U.S. adults say that math makes them feel confused  

    Yet this need not be the case. Creative instruction in math can change the equation, and it is available now. The following three examples from respected researchers in STEM education demonstrate this fact. 

    The first is a recently published book by Susan Jo Russell and Deborah Schifter, Interweaving Equitable Participation and Deep Mathematics. The book provides practical tools and a fresh vision to help educators create math classrooms where all students can thrive. It tackles a critical challenge: How do teachers ensure that all students engage deeply with rigorous mathematics? The authors pose and successfully answer key questions: What does a mathematical community look like in an elementary classroom? How do teachers engage young mathematicians in deep and challenging mathematical content? How do we ensure that every student contributes their voice to this community? 

    Through classroom videos, teacher reflections, and clear instructional frameworks, Russell and Schifter bring readers inside real elementary classrooms where all students’ ideas and voices matter. They provide vivid examples, insightful commentary, and ready-to-use resources for teachers, coaches, and school leaders working to make math a subject where every student sees themselves as capable and connected. 

    Next is a set of projects devoted to early algebra. Significantly, research shows that how well students perform in Algebra 2 is a leading indicator of whether they’ll get into college, graduate from college, or become a top income earner. But introducing algebra in middle school, as is the common practice, is too late, according to researchers Maria Blanton and Angela Gardiner of TERC, a STEM education research nonprofit. Instead, learning algebra must begin in K-5, they believe. 

    Students would be introduced to algebraic concepts rather than algebra itself, becoming familiar with ways of thinking using pattern and structure. For example, when students understand that whenever they add two odd numbers together, they get an even number, they’re recognizing important mathematical relationships that are critical to algebra. 

    Blanton and Gardiner, along with colleagues at Tufts University, University of Wisconsin Madison, University of Texas at Austin, Merrimack College, and City College of New York, have already demonstrated the success of an early algebra approach through Project LEAP, the first early algebra curriculum of its kind for grades K–5, funded in part by the National Science Foundation.  

    If students haven’t been introduced to algebra early on, the ramp-up from arithmetic to algebra can be uniquely difficult. TERC researcher Jennifer Knudsen told me that elementary to middle school is an important time for students’ mathematical growth. 

    Knudsen’s project, MPACT, the third example of creative math teaching, engages middle school students in 3D making with everything from quick-dry clay and cardboard to digital tools for 3D modeling and printing. The project gets students involved in designing objects, helping them develop understanding of important mathematical topics in addition to spatial reasoning and computational thinking skills closely related to math. Students learn concepts and solve problems with real objects they can hold in their hands, not just with words and diagrams on paper.  

    So far, the evidence is encouraging: A two-year study shows that 4th–5th graders demonstrated significant learning gains on an assessment of math, computational thinking, and spatial reasoning. These creative design-and-making units are free and ready to download. 

    Math is critical for success in STEM and AI, yet too many kids either avoid or do not succeed in it. Well-researched interventions in grade school and middle school can go a long way toward teaching essential math skills. Curricula for creating a math community for deep learning, as well as projects for Early Algebra and MPACT, have shown success and are readily available for school systems to use.

    We owe it to our students to take creative approaches to math so they can prepare for future AI and STEM professions. We owe it to ourselves to help develop a skilled STEM and AI workforce, which the nation needs to stay competitive. 

    Latest posts by eSchool Media Contributors (see all)

    Source link

  • A government climate website teachers rely on is in peril

    A government climate website teachers rely on is in peril

    For the last 15 years, science teacher Jeff Grant has used information on climate change from the federal website Climate.gov to create lesson plans, prepare students for Advanced Placement tests and educate fellow teachers. Now, Grant says, he is “grabbing what [he] can” from the site run by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s Climate Program Office, amid concerns that the Trump administration is mothballing it as part of a broader effort to undermine climate science and education.

    “It’s just one more thing stifling science education,” said Grant, who teaches at Downers Grove North High School in the Chicago suburbs. 

    Since early May, all 10 editorial contributors to Climate.gov have lost their jobs, and the organization that produces its education resources will soon run out of money. On June 24, the site’s homepage was redirected to NOAA.gov, a change NOAA said was made to comply with an earlier executive order on “restoring gold standard science.” Those steps follow many others the president has made to dismantle federal efforts to fight climate change, which his administration refers to as the “new green scam.”

    Former employees of Climate.gov and other educators say they fear that the site, which will no longer produce new content, could be transformed into a platform for disinformation. 

    “It will make it harder for teachers to do a good job in educating their students about climate change,” said Glenn Branch, deputy director of the nonprofit National Center for Science Education. “Previously, they could rely on the federal government to provide free, up-to-date, accurate resources on climate change that were aimed at helping educators in particular, and they won’t be able to do so if some of these more dire predictions come to pass.”

    Such concerns have some foundation. For example, Covid.gov, which during the Biden administration offered health information and access to Covid-19 tests, has been revamped to promote the controversial theory that the coronavirus was created in a lab. The administration has also moved aggressively to delete from government sites other terms that are currently out of favor, such as references to transgender people that were once on the National Park Service website of the Stonewall National Memorial, honoring a major milestone in the fight for LGBTQ+ rights.

    Kim Doster, director of NOAA’s office of communications, declined to answer specific questions but shared a version of the statement posted on the NOAA website when Climate.gov was transferred. “In compliance with Executive Order 14303, Restoring Gold Standard Science, NOAA is relocating all research products from Climate.gov to NOAA.gov in an effort to centralize and consolidate resources,” it says.  

    Related: Want to read more about how climate change is shaping education? Subscribe to our free newsletter.

    Climate.gov, founded in 2010 to support earth science instruction in schools, had become a go-to site for educators and the general public for news and information about temperature, sea level rise and other indicators of global warming.

    For many educators, it has served a particularly key role. Because its resources are free, they are vital in schools that lack resources and funding, teachers and experts say. 

    Rebecca Lindsey, Climate.gov’s lead editor and writer, was one of several hundred NOAA probationary employees fired in February, then rehired and put on administrative leave, before being terminated again in March. The rest of the content production team — which included a meteorologist, a graphic artist and data visualizers — lost their jobs in mid-May. Only the site’s two web developers still have their jobs. 

    A screenshot of the Sea Level Rise Viewer, an interactive NOAA that’s listed as a resource on Climate.gov, a government climate website. Credit: NOAA Office for Coastal Management

    Lindsey said she worries that the government “intended to keep the site up and use it to spread climate misinformation, because they were keeping the web developers and getting rid of the content team.”

    In addition, the Climate Literacy and Energy Awareness Network, the official content provider for the education section of the site, has not received the latest installment of its three-year grant and expects its funds to run out in August. 

    “We won’t have funding to provide updates, fix hyperlinks and make sure that new resources are being added, or help teachers manage or address or use the resources,” said Anne Gold, CLEAN’s principal investigator. “It’s going to start deteriorating in quality.” 

    CLEAN, whose website is hosted by Carleton College, is now searching for other sources of money to continue its work, Gold said. 

    With the June 24 change redirecting visitors from Climate.gov to NOAA.gov/climate, the website  for the first time falls under the purview of a political appointee: Doster. Its previous leader, David Herring, is a science writer and educator.

    Melissa Lau, an AP environmental science teacher in Piedmont, Oklahoma, said the relocated site was “really difficult to navigate.”

    As someone who lives in Tornado Alley, Lau said, she frequented CLEAN and NOAA sites to show her students localized, real-time data on storm seasons. She said she is concerned that teachers won’t have time to track down information that was shifted in the website’s move and, as a result, may opt not to teach climate change. 

    The executive order on “restoring gold standard science” that appears to have triggered the shift gives political appointees the authority to decide what science information needs to be modified to align with its tenets. 

    While the disclaimer posted to NOAA.gov seems to imply that Climate.gov did not meet this requirement, educators and researchers said that the site and its CLEAN education resources were the epitome of a gold standard.

    “I want to stress that the reason why CLEAN is considered the gold standard is because we have such high standards for scientific accuracy, classroom readiness and maintenance,” Gold said. “We all know that knowledge is power, and power gives hope. … [Losing funding] is going to be a huge loss to classrooms and to students and the next generation.”

    Related: One state mandates teaching climate change in almost all subjects — even PE

    This is only the latest attack by the Trump administration on education around climate change. This month, the U.S. Global Change Research Program’s website, GlobalChange.gov, was shut down by the administration, after the program was defunded in April. The website once hosted an extensive climate literacy guide, along with all five iterations of the National Climate Assessment — a congressionally required report that informed the public about the effects and risks of climate change, along with local, actionable responses. 

    The Department of Commerce, which oversees NOAA, has cut other federal funding for climate research, including at Princeton University, arguing that these climate grant awards promoted “exaggerated and implausible climate threats, contributing to a phenomenon known as ‘climate anxiety,’ which has increased significantly among America’s youth.” 

    Studies, though, suggest that if young people have a greater understanding of why weather is changing and how to take action, they are less likely to feel anxious. 

    “The more you know [about climate change], the more it’s not a scary monster in the closet,” said Lauren Madden, professor of elementary science education at the College of New Jersey. “It’s a thing you can react to.” She added, “We’re going to have more storms, we’re going to have more fires, we’re going to have more droughts. There are things we can do to help slow this. … I think that quells anxiety, that doesn’t spark it.”

    And climate education has broad public support — about 3 in 4 registered voters say schools should teach children about global warming, according to a 2024 report from the Yale Program on Climate Change Communication. Similarly, 77 percent of Americans regard it as very or somewhat important for elementary and secondary school students to learn about climate change, according to a 2019 study. And all but five states have adopted science standards that incorporate at least some instruction on climate change.

    Yet few teachers have received training on climate change. There is also not much professional development for climate educators, and textbooks tend to downplay the effects of climate change. 

    As a result, many science teachers rely on federal tools and embed them in their curriculum. They are worried that the information will no longer be relevant, or disappear entirely, according to Lori Henrickson, former climate integration specialist for Washington state’s education department. Henrickson, who lost her job this June as the result of state budget cuts, was in charge of integrating climate education across content areas in the state, from language arts to physical education.

    The .gov top-level domain connotes credibility and accessibility, according to Branch: “It is also easier for teachers facing or fearing climate change denial backlash to cite a reliable, free source from the federal government.”

    Related: How Trump is disrupting efforts by schools and colleges to combat climate change

    With Climate.gov’s future uncertain, educators are looking to other resources, like university websites and tools from other countries. 

    “I’m sure there will continue to be tools, and there will be enough people who will be willing to pay to access them,” Madden said. But, she added, “they probably won’t be as comprehensive, and it won’t feel like it’s a democratic process. It’ll feel like: If you or your employer are willing to chip in for it, then you’ll have access.”

    Madden, along with many other educators, frequently used the Environmental Protection Agency’s environmental justice toolkit, but the site was taken down earlier this year. 

    “I feel like with all the federal websites, I’m constantly checking to see what’s still up and what’s not,” Madden said. 

    Bertha Vazquez, education director for the Center of Inquiry, an organization that works to preserve science and critical thinking, said she worried that the disappearance of climate information could leave U.S. students behind. 

    “The future of the American economy is not in oil, the future of the American economy is in solar and wind and geothermal. And if we’re going to keep up with the international economy, we need to go in that direction,” she said. But while the U.S. should be leading the way in scientific discovery, Vazquez said, such work will now be left to other countries.

    Lau said she felt helpless and frustrated about Climate.gov’s shutdown and about the “attack on American science in general.” 

    “I don’t know what to do. I can contact my legislators, but my legislators from my state are not going to be really open to my concerns,” she said. “If students next year are asking me questions about [science research and funding], I have to tell them, ‘I do not know,’ and just have to leave it at that.”

    Contact editor Caroline Preston at 212-870-8965, via Signal at CarolineP.83 or on email at [email protected].

    This story about the government climate website was produced by The Hechinger Report, a nonprofit, independent news organization focused on inequality and innovation in education. Sign up for the Hechinger climate and education newsletter.

    The Hechinger Report provides in-depth, fact-based, unbiased reporting on education that is free to all readers. But that doesn’t mean it’s free to produce. Our work keeps educators and the public informed about pressing issues at schools and on campuses throughout the country. We tell the whole story, even when the details are inconvenient. Help us keep doing that.

    Join us today.

    Source link

  • Let’s remove the roadblocks to four-year STEM degrees for community college transfer students

    Let’s remove the roadblocks to four-year STEM degrees for community college transfer students

    In the nearly two years since the U.S. Supreme Court struck down race-conscious admissions, there have been repeated calls for universities to address the resulting decline in diversity by recruiting from community colleges.  

    On the surface, encouraging students to transfer from two-year colleges sounds like a terrific idea. Community colleges enroll large numbers of students who are low-income or whose parents did not attend college. Black and Latino students disproportionately start college at these institutions, whose mission for more than 50 years has been to expand access to higher education. 

    But while community colleges should be an avenue into high-value STEM degrees for students from low-income backgrounds and minoritized students, the reality is sobering: Just 2 percent of students who begin at a community college earn a STEM bachelor’s degree within six years, our recent study of transfer experiences in California found.  

    There are too many roadblocks in their way, leaving the path to STEM degrees for community college students incredibly narrow. A key barrier is the complexity of the process of transferring from a community college to a four-year institution. 

    Related: Interested in innovations in higher education? Subscribe to our free biweekly higher education newsletter. 

    Many community college students who want to transfer and major in a STEM field must contend with three major obstacles in the transfer process: 

    1. A maze of inconsistent and often opaque math requirements. We found that a student considering three or four prospective university campuses might have to take three or four different math classes just to meet a single math requirement in a given major. One campus might expect a transfer student majoring in business to take calculus, while another might ask for business calculus. Still another might strongly recommend a “calculus for life sciences” course. And sometimes an institution’s website might list different requirements than a statewide transfer site. Such inconsistencies can lengthen students’ times to degrees — especially in STEM majors, which may require five- or six-course math sequences before transfer.  

    2. Underlying math anxiety. Many students interviewed for the study told us that they had internalized negative comments from teachers, advisers and peers about their academic ability, particularly in math. This uncertainty contributed to feelings of anxiety about completing their math courses. Their predicament is especially troubling given concerns that required courses may not contribute to success in specific fields. 

    3. Course scheduling conflicts that slow students’ progress. Two required courses may meet on the same day and time, for example, or a required course could be scheduled at a time that conflicts with a student’s work schedule. In interviews, we also heard that course enrollment caps and sequential pathways in which certain courses are offered only once a year too often lengthen the time to degree for students. 

    Related: ‘Waste of time’: Community college transfers derail students 

    To help, rather than hinder, STEM students’ progress toward their college and professional goals, the transfer process needs to change significantly. First and foremost, universities need to send clear and consistent signals about what hoops community college students should be jumping through in order to transfer.  

    A student applying to three prospective campuses, for example, should not have to meet separate sets of requirements for each. 

    Community colleges and universities should also prioritize active learning strategies and proven supports to combat math anxiety. These may include providing professional learning for instructors to help them make math courses more engaging and to foster a sense of belonging. Training for counselors to advise students on requirements for STEM pathways is also important.  

    Community colleges must make their course schedules more student-centered, by offering evening and weekend courses and ensuring that courses required for specific degrees are not scheduled at overlapping times. They should also help students with unavoidable scheduling conflicts take comparable required courses at other colleges. 

    At the state level, it’s critical to adopt goals for transfer participation and completion (including STEM-specific goals) as well as comprehensive and transparent statewide agreements for math requirements by major. 

    States should also provide transfer planning tools that provide accurate and up-to-date information. For example, the AI Transfer and Articulation Infrastructure Network, led by University of California, Berkeley researchers, is using artificial intelligence technology to help institutions more efficiently identify which community college courses meet university requirements. More effective tools will increase transparency without requiring students and counselors to navigate complex and varied transfer requirements on their own. As it stands, complex, confusing and opaque math requirements limit transfer opportunities for community college students seeking STEM degrees, instead of expanding them. 

    We must untangle the transfer process, smooth pathways to high-value degrees and ensure that every student has a clear, unobstructed opportunity to pursue an education that will set them up for success. 

    Pamela Burdman is executive director of Just Equations, a California-based policy institute focused on reconceptualizing the role of math in education equity. Alexis Robin Hale is a research fellow at Just Equations and a graduate student at UCLA in Social Sciences and Comparative Education.  

    Contact the opinion editor at [email protected]. 

    This story about community college transfers was produced by The Hechinger Report, a nonprofit, independent news organization focused on inequality and innovation in education. Sign up for Hechinger’s weekly newsletter. 

    The Hechinger Report provides in-depth, fact-based, unbiased reporting on education that is free to all readers. But that doesn’t mean it’s free to produce. Our work keeps educators and the public informed about pressing issues at schools and on campuses throughout the country. We tell the whole story, even when the details are inconvenient. Help us keep doing that.

    Join us today.

    Source link

  • Release of NAEP science scores

    Release of NAEP science scores

    UPDATE: After this story was published, the Education Department issued a press release Monday afternoon, July 7, announcing that Matthew Soldner will serve as acting commissioner of the National Center for Education Statistics, in addition to his role as acting director of the Institute of Education Sciences. The job of statistics chief had been vacant since March and had prevented the release of assessment results.

    The repercussions from the decimation of staff at the Education Department keep coming. Last week, the fallout led to a delay in releasing results from a national science test.

    The National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) is best known for tests that track reading and math achievement but includes other subjects, too. In early 2024, when the main reading and math tests were administered, there was also a science section for eighth graders. 

    The board that oversees NAEP had announced at its May meeting that it planned to release the science results in June. But that month has since come and gone. 

    Why the delay? There is no commissioner of education statistics to sign off on the score report, a requirement before it is released, according to five current and former officials who are familiar with the release of NAEP scores, but asked to remain anonymous because they were not authorized to speak to the press or feared retaliation. 

    Related: Our free weekly newsletter alerts you to what research says about schools and classrooms.

    Peggy Carr, a Biden administration appointee, was dismissed as the commissioner of the National Center for Education Statistics in February, two years before the end of her six-year term set by Congress. Chris Chapman was named acting commissioner, but he was fired in March, along with half the employees at the Education Department. The role has remained vacant since.

    A spokesman for the National Assessment Governing Board, which oversees NAEP,  said the science scores will be released later this summer, but denied that the lack of a commissioner is the obstacle. “The report building is proceeding so the naming of a commissioner is not a bureaucratic hold-up to its progress,” Stephaan Harris said by email.

    The delay matters. Education policymakers have been keen to learn if science achievement had held steady after the pandemic or tumbled along with reading and math. (Those reading and math scores were released in January.)

    The Trump administration has vowed to dismantle the Education Department and did not respond to an emailed question about when a new commissioner would be appointed. 

    Related: Chaos and confusion as the statistics arm of the Education Department is reduced to a skeletal staff of 3

    Researchers hang onto data

    Keeping up with administration policy can be head-spinning these days. Education researchers were notified in March that they would have to relinquish federal data they were using for their studies. (The department shares restricted datasets, which can include personally identifiable information about students, with approved researchers.) 

    But researchers learned on June 30 that the department had changed its mind and decided not to terminate this remote access. 

    Lawyers who are suing the Trump administration on behalf of education researchers heralded this about-face as a “big win.” Researchers can now finish projects in progress. 

    Still, researchers don’t have a way of publishing or presenting papers that use this data. Since the mass firings in mid-March, there is no one remaining inside the Education Department to review their papers for any inadvertent disclosure of student data, a required step before public release. And there is no process at the moment for researchers to request data access for future studies. 

    “While ED’s change-of-heart regarding remote access is welcome,” said Adam Pulver of Public Citizen Litigation Group, “other vital services provided by the Institute of Education Sciences have been senselessly, illogically halted without consideration of the impact on the nation’s educational researchers and the education community more broadly.  We will continue to press ahead with our case as to the other arbitrarily canceled programs.”

    Pulver is the lead attorney for one of three suits fighting the Education Department’s termination of research and statistics activities. Judges in the District of Columbia and Maryland have denied researchers a preliminary injunction to restore the research and data cuts. But the Maryland case is now fast-tracked and the court has asked the Trump administration to produce an administrative record of its decision-making process by July 11. (See this previous story for more background on the court cases.)

    Related: Education researchers sue Trump administration, testing executive power

    Some NSF grants restored in California

    Just as the Education Department is quietly restarting some activities that DOGE killed, so is the National Science Foundation (NSF). The federal science agency posted on its website that it had reinstated 114 awards to 45 institutions as of June 30. NSF said it was doing so to comply with a federal court order to reinstate awards to all University of California researchers. It was unclear how many of these research projects concerned education, one of the major areas that NSF funds.

    Researchers and universities outside the University of California system are hoping for the same reversal. In June, the largest professional organization of education researchers, the American Educational Research Association, joined forces with a large coalition of organizations and institutions in filing a legal challenge to the mass termination of grants by the NSF. Education grants were especially hard hit in a series of cuts in April and May. Democracy Forward, a public interest law firm, is spearheading this case.

    Contact staff writer Jill Barshay at 212-678-3595, jillbarshay.35 on Signal, or [email protected].

    This story about delaying the NAEP science score report was written by Jill Barshay and produced by The Hechinger Report, a nonprofit, independent news organization focused on inequality and innovation in education. Sign up for Proof Points and other Hechinger newsletters.

    The Hechinger Report provides in-depth, fact-based, unbiased reporting on education that is free to all readers. But that doesn’t mean it’s free to produce. Our work keeps educators and the public informed about pressing issues at schools and on campuses throughout the country. We tell the whole story, even when the details are inconvenient. Help us keep doing that.

    Join us today.

    Source link