Tag: national

  • Catapult Learning is Awarded Tutoring Program Design Badge from Stanford University’s National Student Support Accelerator

    Catapult Learning is Awarded Tutoring Program Design Badge from Stanford University’s National Student Support Accelerator

    Organization recognized for excellence in high-impact tutoring design and student achievement gains

    PHILADELPHIA, Aug. 25, 2025 – Catapult Learning, a division of FullBloom that provides academic intervention programs for students and professional development solutions for teachers in K-12 schools, today announced it earned the Tutoring Program Design Badge from the National Student Support Accelerator (NSSA) at Stanford University. The designation, valid for three years, recognizes tutoring providers that demonstrate high-quality, research-aligned program design.

    The recognition comes at a time when the need for high-impact tutoring (HIT) has never been greater. As schools nationwide work to close learning gaps that widened during the COVID-19 pandemic and accelerate recovery, Catapult Learning stands out for its nearly 50-year legacy of delivering effective academic support to students who need it most.

    “Catapult Learning is honored to receive this prestigious national recognition from the NSSA at Stanford University,” said Rob Klapper, president at Catapult Learning. “We are excited to be recognized for our high-impact tutoring program design and will continue to uphold the highest standards of excellence as we support learners across the country.” 

    Each year, Catapult Learning’s programs support more than 150,000+ students with nearly four million in-person tutoring sessions, in partnership with 2,100 schools and districts nationwide. Its tutors, many of whom hold four-year degrees, are highly trained professionals who are supported with ongoing coaching and professional development.

    Recent data from Catapult Learning’s HIT programs show strong academic gains across both math and reading subject areas:

    • 8 out of every 10 math students increased their pre/post score
    • 9 out of every 10 reading students increased their pre/post score

    These results come from programs that have also earned a Tier 2 evidence designation under the Every Student Succeeds Act, affirming their alignment with rigorous research standards. 

    The Badge was awarded following a rigorous, evidence-based review conducted by an independent panel of education experts. The NSSA evaluated multiple components of Catapult Learning’s program – including instructional design, tutor training and support, and the use of data to inform instruction – against its Tutoring Quality Standards.

    “This designation underscores the strength and intentionality behind our high-impact tutoring model,” said Devon Wible, vice president of teaching and learning at Catapult Learning. “This achievement reflects our deep commitment to providing high-quality, research-based tutoring that drives meaningful outcomes for learners.”

    Tutoring is available in person, virtually, or in hybrid formats, and can be scheduled before, during, or after school, including weekends. Sessions are held a minimum of three times per week, with flexible options tailored to the needs of each school or district. Catapult Learning provides all necessary materials for both students and tutors.

    To learn more about Catapult Learning’s high-impact tutoring offerings, visit: https://catapultlearning.com/high-impact-tutoring/.

    About Catapult Learning

    Catapult Learning, a division of FullBloom, provides academic intervention programs for students and professional development solutions for teachers in K-12 schools, executed by a team of experienced coaches. Our professional development services strengthen the capacity of teachers and leaders to raise and sustain student achievement. Our academic intervention programs support struggling learners with instruction tailored to the unique needs of each student. Across the country, Catapult Learning partners with 500+ school districts to produce positive outcomes that promote academic and professional growth. Catapult Learning is accredited by Cognia and has earned its 2022 System of Distinction honor.  

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  • The findings against Harvard are a blueprint for a National Campus Speech Code

    The findings against Harvard are a blueprint for a National Campus Speech Code

    Last month, the Department of Health and Human Services accused Harvard of violating Title VI, which bans discrimination based on race or nationality at any school that takes federal funding. Last week, it was reported that Harvard is nearing a $500 million settlement with the administration to end legal battles.

    In the past two years alone, HHS noted, Harvard has accepted nearly $800 million from the government. But the threat to Harvard’s funding is just the headline. The sweeping theory of “harassment” HHS used to justify its claim has the potential to cause huge damage, not just at Harvard but across the nation, by collapsing protected speech and misconduct into a single charge that could turn campus protest into a civil rights violation.

    There’s nothing new about the idea that we need to ban the expression of certain opinions in order to fight discrimination — that’s the reasoning behind a vast number of speech codes that FIRE has fought since 1999. The new, destructive twist on this is what we at FIRE call the cumulative theory of harassment. That’s the notion that while myriad individual instances of expression by unrelated individuals may be fully protected under the First Amendment, they can together create a cumulative harm, even to those not present and not targeted by the speech, that justifies overriding the Constitution.

    By using the cumulative theory of harassment, the government can smear those following the law with the actions of those breaking it.

    In Harvard’s case, HHS has determined that since the October 7, 2023, Hamas attack on Israel, the accumulation of antisemitic and anti-Israel rhetoric constitutes a “hostile environment on its campus for Jewish students.” HHS claims Harvard failed to “take appropriate corrective action” to end this hostile environment, thus violating Title VI.

    At first glance, this finding may seem justified, or at least not worth worrying about. After all, most Americans are not exactly enthusiastic about their tax dollars going to fund campuses that are hostile environments for Jewish or Israeli students, or anyone else, simply because of their race, color, or national origin. Still, there are several major problems with interpreting the law in the way HHS does here.

    Cumulative theory conflates protected expression with unprotected conduct

    First and foremost, the government has deemed that a hostile environment exists at Harvard by conflating constitutionally protected expression — including core political speech, which gets the highest level of protection — with unprotected conduct such as vandalism, blocking entrances and exists, even acts of physical violence.

    A single paragraph provided an illuminating look at how HHS blurs the line between protected speech and unprotected conduct in order to accuse Harvard of violating federal law:

    Harvard student groups and faculty groups posted to Instagram an antisemitic cartoon that included the Star of David, dollar signs, and nooses. The image depicted “a white hand, marked with a dollar sign inside a Star of David, tightening nooses around the necks of a Black man [Muhammad Ali] and an Arab man [Gamal Abdel Nasser].” This incendiary image was subsequently reposted on Instagram by Harvard Faculty and Staff for Justice in Palestine.

    It’s not hard to see why Jewish and Israeli students (and many others) would find this cartoon offensive. But it is undoubtedly political speech, which lies at the very core of what the First Amendment protects. In fact, the cartoon in question was originally published in 1967 by the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee, one of the best-known organizations of the civil rights movement of the 1960s. As the Los Angeles Times pointed out, it was controversial then as well, but this history only serves to clarify that it is indeed political speech. The Harvard groups’ use of the cartoon to make points about “apartheid and occupation” only reinforces the fact that it is political in nature.

    Furthermore, there’s no question that, in a country where the First Amendment continues to protect even the likes of the Westboro Baptist Church holding signs saying “God Hates Fags” and “Thank God for Dead Soldiers” outside military funerals, the government simply cannot take action against others for merely for posting a political cartoon on social media.[1]

    The next sentence in HHS’ paragraph reveals that some or all of these groups (the letter does not specify) apologized for posting the cartoon, but suggests the apology was insincere:

    The apology for these postings came with a photo of a figure known for saying, “The only good Zionist is a dead Zionist.” 

    Indeed, the Harvard groups eventually replaced the cartoon in the infographic with a picture of civil rights activist Kwame Ture (Stokely Carmichael), who was known for his anti-Zionist views and who famously echoed the “dead Zionist” remark during a 1990 speech at the University of Maryland. But the revised post from the Harvard groups did not quote his remark directly, despite HHS implying that the Harvard groups were trying to associate themselves with Ture’s remark from 35 years ago. Besides, even if they had, it would still be protected speech both under the First Amendment and Harvard policies. 

    Then comes the paragraph’s conclusion, where HHS mixes all of that protected speech just discussed with unprotected acts:

    A “series of anonymous acts” occurred on campus, including posters of Israeli citizens taken hostage by Hamas being vandalized with messages such as “Israel did 9/11.” There were also “instances of vandalism on campus and the posting of swastika stickers near Harvard Hillel’s Rosovsky Hall.”

    Unlike the expression in the rest of the paragraph, vandalism, even when expressive, is not protected by the First Amendment. Defacing posters or putting stickers on them, especially if their removal damages the underlying surface, can be and often is prohibited both by law and by university rules. But that’s because it damages or destroys the vandalized item, not because of the content of the speech. Defacing hateful signs with stickers saying “I love everyone!” is still vandalism, and prohibited. Posting political cartoons on Instagram is speech, and is protected. But by using the cumulative theory of harassment, the government can smear those following the law with the actions of those breaking it. 

    Cumulative theory of harassment creates a general civility code

    Another problem with the cumulative theory of harassment is that it holds current speakers responsible for creating a “hostile environment” based on the previous statements and activities of people to whom they may be entirely unrelated. This means anyone can find themselves in the position of perpetrator of hostile environment harassment without himself or herself actually engaging in harassing behavior. 

    Consider, for example, the following account said to “highlight the hostile environment created for Jewish and Israeli students at Harvard,” according to HHS:

    On May 12, 2024, a crudely drawn image of Interim President Garber was also displayed [during an encampment protest] depicting him as a devil with horns and a tail, recalling “medieval antisemitic tropes of Jews as Satan’s minions.” 

    Like posting a political cartoon to Instagram, simply displaying such a picture simply cannot be deemed harassment by any rational measure, let alone be taken as serious enough to deny the person seeing it “equal access to an educational program or activity.” The Supreme Court’s decision in Davis v. Monroe County Board of Education established the standard for peer harassment under Title IX, holding schools liable only when they are deliberately indifferent to harassment that is severe, pervasive, and objectively offensive, and even warns of “the amount of litigation that would be invited by entertaining claims of official indifference to a single instance of one-on-one peer harassment.”

    Under the cumulative theory of harassment, that’s out the window. A school like Harvard must consider each individual student’s choice to display this picture as part of a pattern of behavior that consists of everything everyone else is doing on campus during some undefined period of time, whether or not the student knew anything about it.

    HHS doesn’t tell us who displayed the picture, how long it was displayed, whether others at the protest somehow signed off on it or objected to it, how many people saw it, whether it was intended to be antisemitic, or whether HHS or Harvard knows the answers to any of these questions. It requires no coordination or organization. It doesn’t even matter whether the person who displayed the picture is hostile towards Jewish or Israeli students — maybe the artist just hates President Garber!

    But using the cumulative theory of harassment, even the message the speaker intended to communicate doesn’t matter. The speaker becomes a harasser who the school has a duty to stop, solely because of what other people, who need not even be present, might have thought about the expression that took place before the current speaker arrived. There’s only one sure way to prevent such “offenses”: you must prevent people from expressing certain opinions when and where those opinions might offend members of a protected class.

    Courts struggle to apply the cumulative theory of harassment

    While HHS’s OCR was able to draw the conclusion that the words and actions of a number of unrelated perpetrators somehow added up to a hostile environment on a given college campus, it has proved far less successful when analyzed by courts. 

    Just last month, a federal court dismissed a hostile-environment claim by a coalition of plaintiffs at Haverford College, which sued the institution using the cumulative theory of harassment. As Judge McHugh of the Eastern District of Pennsylvania wrote, the plaintiffs sought to establish their hostile environment claim “by citing some 25-plus incidents purportedly impacting the collective consciousness of 50-plus mostly unnamed individuals comprising Jews at Haverford. But such gestalt pleading cannot be employed as a strategy to avoid scrutiny by the Court.”

    McHugh noted, “several of Plaintiffs’ allegations involve protected political expression, and cannot be regulated under the guise of nondiscrimination,” later adding that “[m]any of Plaintiffs’ allegations fall into the category of pure, protected speech. Although Plaintiffs may have found much of this speech reprehensible, there is no legal cause of action for upset feelings.” 

    Among the examples of speech the plaintiffs cited as harassing, but which the court found to be protected, were a lecture on the “weaponization of Covid,” a student handing out Palestinian flags, a campus organization changing its name to “Bi-Co Students for the Liberation of Palestine,” and a number of posts disparaging Israel made by Haverford students and faculty members on their private social media accounts. 

    The court recognized each of these as instances of political expression protected by the First Amendment. In particular, the court said, “Plaintiffs do not attempt to explain how Haverford could regulate students’ and faculty’s private social media content, offering no basis on which it could assert such invasive authority,” calling into question how HHS could require Harvard to do exactly the same thing. 

    The Haverford students also complained that Haverford had not done enough to communicate its disapproval of the Hamas attack or antisemitism on campus and (with what appears to be good reason) that it had not followed all its own rules in dealing with protests. But the court did not find this to be a violation of Title VI either, noting that “government coercion of speech to adhere to a particular message tampers with First Amendment protections” and that courts “may not compel administrators to make any specific statement on any particular topic,” citing the 1943 landmark Supreme Court decision in West Virginia State Board of Education v. Barnette. (In that case, the Supreme Court found that the government could not force students to say the Pledge of Allegiance, even against the unprecedented backdrop of World War II.)

    Judge McHugh was careful throughout the brief not to discount the discomfort Jewish students at Haverford might have felt during the past year’s pro-Palestinian protests, saying they might have a legal claim that the school didn’t follow its own policies, so that part of their case can move forward. The question, he noted, was not “whether Haverford could have handled each situation better.” Rather,

    Under Title VI, the question is whether Haverford was so indifferent to known acts of harassment that it caused students to undergo harassment or made them more vulnerable to it, and thereby undermined the students’ education. Davis, 526 U.S. at 644-45. And even taking all these allegations as a whole, Plaintiffs’ pleading does not plausibly support a finding of deliberate indifference, especially where countervailing First Amendment concerns are considered in evaluating the often-fragile balance college administrators must strike.

    In another recent case, Gartenberg v. Cooper Union for the Advancement of Science and Art, Judge John Cronan of the Southern District of New York similarly found that much of the expression the plaintiff cited was “pure speech on matters of public concern,” and while some of that speech could be considered to determine intent, “it cannot itself support a claim for an objectively hostile educational environment under this Court’s interpretation of the statute.” On the other hand, the incident that headlined Gartenberg’s complaint was considered to have sufficiently alleged a violation of Title VI to allow the case to proceed to discovery. As Judge Cronan summarized the complaint:

    After first attempting to locate Cooper Union’s president, the mob descended on the building’s library, where a group of students wearing recognizably Jewish attire were sheltering behind locked doors. The demonstrators surrounded the library and proceeded to bang loudly on the library’s doors and on its floor-to-ceiling glass windows, shouting demands to be let in and continuing to direct anti-Israel slogans and wave a Palestinian flag at the Jewish students inside the library. During the roughly twenty-minute ordeal, Cooper Union’s administrators did nothing to disperse the protestors and instead directed law enforcement to stand down, even as the college’s president had just escaped the building through a back exit. None of the protestors subsequently faced any discipline.

    There is a stark difference between that sequence of events and the kinds of expression that courts have consistently protected under the First Amendment. 

    Real discrimination deserves a real response. True threats, vandalism, and violence are not protected speech and schools should act when they occur. But they must do so with the precision the Constitution requires.

    HHS claims Harvard may have been deliberately indifferent to patterns of harassment that violated Title VI. And it does identify potentially troubling incidents, as did Harvard’s own task force studying the issue of campus antisemitism. But because it has mixed and conflated incidents of protected expression with unprotected discriminatory acts, the federal government has made it impossible to separate any objective case that Harvard has violated Title VI as written and intended from an exercise in political speech-policing.

    A bipartisan error

    Given the level of partisan acrimony in American politics, and the Trump administration’s aggressiveness towards Harvard in particular, one might think that this is a right-wing or Republican problem. Unfortunately, though, this is one of the rare issues in which the Biden and Trump administrations are in substantial agreement.

    In the middle of 2024, the Department of Education under President Biden began to issue findings in a number of Title VI complaints filed in the wake of campus activity after the October 7 Hamas-led attack on Israel. As should surprise no one, the letters did highlight some pretty concerning problems at schools like the University of Michigan and (especially) CUNY’s Brooklyn College. But it made these diagnoses using the same cumulative theory of harassment that the Trump HHS is now applying to Harvard. 

    The findings it announced with regard to a third college, Lafayette College, illustrates just how absurd this approach can become. Despite Lafayette’s (apparently) responding to every complaint of antisemitism, including those that were vague or purely based on expression, the Department of Education still found it in violation of Title VI. Why? Because it failed to assess whether “social media and off-campus conduct individually or collectively created or contributed to a hostile environment.” Translation: Lafayette didn’t treat constitutionally protected speech as evidence of actionable harassment.

    As I remarked at the time, 

    If anything, Lafayette was a bit heavy-handed: Most students would think twice about posting on Instagram after being called on the carpet by the college chaplain to “discuss” their political opinions… It’s hard to see what else Lafayette could have done to try to address the allegedly hostile environment on its campus without actually descending into censorship.

    The resurrection of “group libel”

    FIRE has long explained that the U.S. has no legal category called “hate speech.” That’s still true. But the cumulative theory of harassment is starting to look a lot like an attempt to revive the old concept of group libel, a legal relic rightly abandoned decades ago.

    Group libel laws once aimed to ban statements that defamed not individuals, but entire groups. The idea: if you can’t spread lies about a person, why should you be allowed to malign a racial or ethnic group? As University at Buffalo law professor Samantha Barbas details, the press, civil liberties advocates, and even the NAACP frequently warned against these laws as Trojan horses for censorship. In 1935, when New Jersey passed an “anti-Nazi” group libel law, newspapers worried it could be used to ban criticism of Nazis. The ACLU rightly called it a sweeping threat to free speech, and described the law as “more sweeping in its threat to free speech than any measure ever passed in any state,” and in a pamphlet claimed that the law could even be used against Jews for criticizing Nazis.

    The evil of Nazi Germany soon provided the best imaginable example for group libel law advocates, and during World War II, Congress proposed a bill that would have banned sending material through the mail that exposed people to “hatred, contempt, ridicule, or obloquy” based on race or religion. While a number of labor unions supported the bill, the NAACP testified against it, concerned that it would impair constitutional rights and “lead to an aggravation of race and religious tensions.” Thankfully, the bill never got a floor vote, though some states maintained laws regulating group libel.

    While prosecutions appear to have been few and far between, in the 1952 case Beauharnais v. Illinois, the Supreme Court narrowly affirmed the constitutionality of a group libel statute, upholding a 1917 Illinois statute that outlawed making public any material that “portrays depravity, criminality, unchastity, or lack of virtue of a class of citizens, of any race, color, creed or religion [and] exposes the citizens of any race, color, creed or religion to contempt, derision, or obloquy or which is productive of breach of the peace or riots.”

    As is often the case, bad facts made for bad law. Joseph Beauharnais, president of the “White Circle League of America,” had distributed a pamphlet demanding the Chicago government “halt the further encroachment, harassment and invasion of white people, their property, neighborhoods and persons, by the Negro,” asserting that “If persuasion and the need to prevent the white race from becoming mongrelized by the negro will not unite us, then the aggressions . . . rapes, robberies, knives, guns and marijuana of the negro, surely will.” He was convicted and fined $200. 

    But if the Supreme Court’s upholding the Illinois law was group libel’s biggest moment in the sun, it was also its last. Justice Frankfurter couched his majority opinion with caveats, proving that even then, the Court seemed uncomfortable. And they had reason to be. Beauharnais didn’t age well. Legal scholars blasted it. Thurgood Marshall and the ACLU tried to get it overturned. The Supreme Court never cited it again. Even Illinois repealed the law nine years later. By 1969, Brandenburg v. Ohio effectively buried Beauharnais, by making clear that even advocating flatly illegal conduct is protected unless it incites imminent lawless action.

    Conclusion

    Real discrimination deserves a real response. True threats, vandalism, and violence are not protected speech and schools should act when they occur. But they must do so with the precision the Constitution requires — punishing conduct, not ideas, and respecting the robust political debate that higher education exists to nurture. 

    Harvard’s case should be a warning. Unless we properly respect the line between speech and misconduct, Title VI risks becoming not a shield against injustice, but a sword for enforcing the orthodoxy favored by whatever political forces wield it, now or in the future.

    [1] And while, as a private university, Harvard could legally limit freedom of speech in ways the government may not, the government also may not launder demands for censorship through a private organization, campus or not. Furthermore, just like the vast majority of private universities, Harvard promises to provide a great deal of free political expression. While such promises are frequently ignored by those universities, they are nonetheless both legally and morally binding.

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  • National Science Foundation Suspends Grants at UCLA

    National Science Foundation Suspends Grants at UCLA

    The Justice Department this week accused UCLA of failing to protect its Jewish students.

    Frederic J. Brown/AFP via Getty Images

    (This article has been updated with comment from UCLA.)

    The National Science Foundation said Thursday that it’s suspending grant awards at the University of California, Los Angeles. 

    An NSF spokesperson said that the university’s awards “are not in alignment with current NSF priorities and/or programmatic goals,” though they didn’t offer more specifics. NSF changed its priorities in April and, as a result, cut off funding to programs related to diversity, equity and inclusion and those aimed at combating misinformation

    Freelance journalist Dan Garisto wrote on BlueSky that nearly 300 grants at UCLA are now suspended. That includes a $25 million grant that supports the university’s Institute for Pure and Applied Mathematics. (In 2022, UCLA had about 450 grants from the NSF, totaling more than $350 million.)

    UCLA chancellor Julio Frenk wrote in a letter to the campus community that the freeze extended beyond NSF to include grants from the National Institutes of Health and other federal agencies.

    “This is not only a loss to the researchers who rely on critical grants,” Frenk wrote. “It is a loss for Americans across the nation whose work, health, and future depend on the groundbreaking work we do.”

    Frenk noted that UCLA was prepared for a grant freeze and has developed contingency plans. “We will do everything we can to protect the interests of faculty, students and staff—and to defend our values and principles,” he pledged.

    The Associated Press reported that the freeze affected $339 million in federal grants.

    The grant suspension comes as UCLA finds itself the Trump administration’s latest target in its growing war with higher education. Earlier this week, the university settled a lawsuit in which a group of Jewish students alleged that UCLA enabled pro-Palestinian activists to cut off Jewish students’ access to parts of campus. On the same day the settlement was announced, the Justice Department accused UCLA of violating the federal civil rights law that bars antisemitism and race-based discrimination.

    Frenk said the government claimed “antisemitism and bias as the reasons” for the freeze. But he argued that Trump’s “far-reaching penalty of defunding life-saving research does nothing to address any alleged discrimination.” 

    He added that UCLA shares the goal of eradicating antisemitism, detailing the steps the university has taken in the last year to address the issue, including establishing new policies for campus protests.

    UCLA has until Aug. 5 to respond to the DOJ’s notice of violation; DOJ officials threatened that the university would “pay a heavy price for putting Jewish Americans at risk.” The Justice Department is also investigating the admissions practices at UCLA, but that inquiry hasn’t wrapped up yet.

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  • The details behind the first national school voucher program

    The details behind the first national school voucher program

    After decades of trying, conservatives this year succeeded in creating the first national school voucher program.

    The Republican megabill that President Donald Trump signed into law in July will establish new tax credit scholarships for families to use at private schools, including religious ones — a long-held goal of school privatization advocates who argue parents should get taxpayer support if they want to opt out of their neighborhood school.

    Under the “big, beautiful bill,” donors can receive dollar-for-dollar tax credits of up to $1,700 for contributions to scholarship-granting nonprofits. Those groups then distribute the money to families seeking help paying for private school, tutoring and other educational expenses. 

    The program, while significant, is less expansive than in earlier drafts of the legislation. Previous versions gave donors larger tax credits — a match up to $5,000 or 10 percent of their income, whichever is greater — and mandated that all states participate rather than allowing them to opt in. 

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

    Here are 10 things to know about the program. If you have other questions or there’s more you’d like to know, write to us: [email protected].

    When does it start?

    Jan. 1, 2027. Families have until then to research where they might want to spend a scholarship — and if the school in mind even plans to accept one. Taxpayers who want to contribute to support the scholarships can do so beginning in late 2026.  

    How will the scholarships work?

    The law opens the door to churches, universities, education nonprofits, rotary clubs and potentially even public schools (more on that below) to accept and distribute donations for the program. These “scholarship-granting organizations,” or SGOs, can keep up to 10 percent of the donations for administrative costs.

    In some states with existing scholarship programs, families apply with a third-party contractor that works with eligible schools and selects students for awards. Other states allow religious groups and other nonprofits to create and manage their own scholarship funds. The federal bill gives states wide flexibility to make those sorts of decisions about how the program is administered, experts say.

    Who’s eligible for the scholarships?

    To qualify, students need to check these boxes: They must be eligible to attend a public school, their state must opt in to the program, and their families must earn no more than three times the area median income — a threshold that would include households with incomes nearing $500,000 in some parts of the United States.

    Students who already attend private school qualify, since they are eligible for public school, even if they don’t attend one. The scholarships also may cover home-schoolers. (Keep reading for more on that.)

    How much money will families receive? 

    While the bill set a $1,700 cap on how much individual donors can contribute through their taxes, it’s unclear whether it limits how much an individual student could collect in scholarships.

    In theory, a student could apply for several scholarships. An SGO might also offer a scholarship that reimburses a family for all costs associated with attending their preferred school. In states that already offer similar school choice programs, a student might be able to collect scholarships from both the new program and the existing state program. Still, the average cost of private school tuition is roughly $13,000, so even students who combine several scholarships may not receive enough to cover the full cost of attending.

    The Treasury Department is expected to issue regulations on the program, and we may not know these kinds of details until it does. 

    Related: Arizona gave families public money for private schools. Then private schools raised tuition

    What can the scholarship money be used for?

    Quite a lot. The legislation suggests that families could use the money not only to help pay for private school tuition, but also for room and board, services for students with disabilities, transportation, tutoring, and school supplies like books, computers and uniforms. 

    The rules may depend on the individual state and its definition of an “eligible school.” In some states, home schooling might qualify students for the scholarships, but in other states it might not, said Robert Enlow, president of EdChoice, a pro-school choice group.  

    It’s also possible that public schools could charge scholarship students — as some do with home-schoolers — for services like tutoring, special education or advanced courses. 

    So students can use the money at public schools? How would that work? 

    Yes, potentially. In some states, schools already charge activity or participation fees for non-enrolled students who want to join clubs and sports. Marguerite Roza, director of the Edunomics Lab at Georgetown University, said some states may write their own rules that allow schools to extend the menu of services they could charge for.

    Meanwhile, most school districts — roughly 4 in 5 — already partner with foundations that raise money to help students with transportation, school supplies and basic needs. Both Enlow and Roza said they expected nonprofits and districts to partner on finding ways to tap the federal scholarship dollars as well.

    “Imagine you could have a public school foundation going out and helping with transportation and books and computers and tutors and all sorts of stuff, right?” Enlow said. “The potential is huge.”

    Will all private schools accept the scholarships? 

    No, private schools are not required to accept the scholarships, and many states that offer school choice don’t require private schools to participate. Private schools generally can accept or reject a student for any reason, whether they have a scholarship or not.

    In Arizona, for example, the tax credit program provided scholarships to students at 348 schools last year. More than 400 private schools operated in the state as of 2022.

    Related: Tracking Trump: His actions to dismantle the Education Department, and more 

    Which states will participate?

    Roughly 21 states — including Arizona, Georgia and Montana — offer their own tax credit scholarships, according to the group EdChoice, so it’s expected they would opt into the federal program. Conservative lawmakers in North Carolina already introduced a bill to allow families there to take part in the federal scholarships. 

    If public schools can benefit too, even Democratic governors may consider joining the program, said Roza.

    “Ultimately if the state can open this to summer camp and tutoring, obviously there would be a lot of pressure to unlock so much money with this,” she said.

    How much will the scholarships cost the government?

    It depends on how many taxpayers claim the credit. 

    While an earlier version of the bill would have capped the tax credits at $10 billion a year, the final legislation contains no such limit — so the exact amount in lost revenue won’t be known until much later. That said, an analysis by the nonpartisan Joint Committee on Taxation found that the legislation would cost the Treasury up to $4 billion per year.

    Others think the cost will be higher. The Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy, a left-leaning research group, placed its projection closer to $51 billion, while Roza estimated the cost at $28 billion per year. Still, she hesitated to count that as a direct loss to K-12 funding. “It’s new money in the sense that it doesn’t go into or out of the federal pie,” Roza said.

    What’s been the reaction to the plan? 

    Critics, including teachers unions and many education experts, have been quick to raise alarms about the voucher program, arguing that it’s a handout for wealthy families and will harm public schools by reducing funding for them.

    “It’s the centerpiece of the Great American Heist — a privatization scheme wrapped in tax policy,” Denise Forte, president of the left-leaning nonprofit EdTrust, said at a hearing before the Senate Democratic Caucus in July. 

    Advocates for the separation of church and state worry about the program channeling money from government coffers to religious schools, while disability advocates note that private schools are not required to serve students with disabilities.

    Some supporters of school vouchers, meanwhile, wish the legislation had gone further.

    “This is a very positive program for taxpayers in America. You can help families get better education and claim a tax credit for it,” said EdChoice’s Enlow. “It’s going to benefit middle- and low-income families.” But he added, “It’s not as generous as we would like, which is universal.”

    Others are focused now on encouraging states to participate in the program. “The fight doesn’t end with the passing of the bill,” said Sydney Altfield, national director of Teach Coalition, which advocates for Jewish schools to get access to government funding. “States must opt into the program.”

    Contact staff writer Neal Morton at 212-678-8247, on Signal at nealmorton.99, or via email at [email protected].

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

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  • Beyond the Latest Data from the National Student Clearinghouse

    Beyond the Latest Data from the National Student Clearinghouse

    EducationDynamics Transforms Insights into Action for Higher Ed Leaders

    The higher education landscape is in constant motion. To truly thrive, institutions committed to student success must not just keep pace but anticipate what’s next. The National Student Clearinghouse (NSC) recently released two crucial reports in June 2025—one on “some college, no credential” (SCNC) undergraduates and another on overall undergraduate student retention and persistence. These aren’t just statistics. They are the roadmap for strategic action.

    At EducationDynamics, we don’t merely react to these insights. We proactively integrate them into data-driven solutions that empower our partners to excel. Our deep understanding of the higher education market, sharpened by years of proprietary research, allows us to translate these macro trends into micro-level strategies that deliver tangible results for your institution.

    Strategic Implications from the NSC June Update

    The latest NSC findings highlight several critical areas demanding immediate attention from higher education leaders:

    Persistence and Retention Gaps

    While overall persistence is at 78% and retention at 70%, a significant disparity exists. Bachelor’s and certificate-seeking students show much higher rates than those pursuing associate degrees. Generalized support isn’t enough. Tailored academic and financial aid advising, particularly for associate-degree pathways, is essential to prevent attrition at critical junctures.

    The Part-Time Student Paradox

    Persistence and retention rates for part-time students are a staggering 30% lower than their full-time peers. Part-time learners often juggle work and family. Institutions must design flexible and accessible support systems, including asynchronous learning, evening/weekend advising, and re-evaluating traditional program structures.

    Sectoral Disparities

    For-profit institutions demonstrate significantly lower retention and persistence rates compared to not-for-profit counterparts. Regardless of sector, consistent and proactive communication focused on evolving student needs is crucial. This means dedicated engagement strategies, not just reactive responses.

    Equity in Outcomes

    White and Asian students continue to exhibit the highest persistence and retention rates. Achieving equitable outcomes demands meticulously analyzing data by affinity group, identifying specific barriers faced by underserved populations, and then designing targeted, culturally competent support programs.

    The Power of Re-Engagement

    The share of re-enrollees earning a credential in their first year has increased by nearly five percent, with students who have at least two full years of credits being most likely to re-enroll and persist. Notably, 36% re-enroll at the same school. Your “stopped out” student population is a goldmine for re-enrollment. Proactive, personalized outreach, highlighting clear paths to completion, is a win-win for both institutions seeking to boost enrollment and students aiming to achieve their academic aspirations.

    The Online Advantage

    In almost all cases, a plurality of re-enrolling students chose primarily online schools. Even if your institution isn’t primarily online, a robust and well-promoted suite of online program options is vital. Flexibility in format and delivery is critical to meet the diverse needs of today’s learners.

    Certificate Pathways as Catalysts

    Nearly half of re-enrolled SCNC students who earned a credential in their first year attained an undergraduate certificate. Expanding and actively promoting undergraduate certificate programs, especially those aligning with in-demand skills or acting as stepping stones to degrees, can significantly boost completion rates among the SCNC population.

    How EducationDynamics Turns Insights into Action for Our Partners

    Tailored Support for the Modern Learner

    We partner with institutions to develop AI-powered communication workflows and personalized engagement platforms that proactively address the specific needs of part-time, non-traditional, and diverse student populations. For instance, our work with one regional university saw a 15% increase in part-time student retention within two semesters by implementing automated check-ins and flexible advising scheduling based on our Engaging the Modern Learner report findings.

    Optimizing Re-Engagement Pipelines

    Our “Education Reengagement Report: Inspiring Reenrollment in Some College No Credential Students” anticipated the NSC’s findings on the SCNC population. We’ve since refined our “Lost Student Analysis” methodology, which identifies high-potential stopped-out students and crafts targeted re-enrollment campaigns. For a recent partner, this resulted in re-enrolling over 200 SCNC students in a single academic year, directly contributing to enrollment growth.

    Strategic Program Portfolio Development

    Understanding the demand for online and certificate options, we guide institutions in developing and promoting flexible program offerings. This includes comprehensive market research to identify in-demand certificate programs and optimizing their visibility through targeted marketing. Our expertise helps institutions strategically align their offerings with what NSC data shows students are seeking.

    Equity-Driven Enrollment & Retention

    We help institutions implement data segmentation and predictive analytics to identify students at risk of stopping out based on various demographic and academic factors. This enables early intervention and the allocation of resources to underserved groups, fostering a more equitable and supportive learning environment.

    Proactive Market Intelligence

    Our partners gain an unparalleled advantage with early access to our market research reports and bespoke analyses. These reports, often preceding or complementing national findings like the NSC’s, provide actionable recommendations that allow institutions to adapt their strategies ahead of the curve, rather than playing catch-up.

    Your Partner in Data-Driven Student Success

    EducationDynamics is more than a service provider. We are a strategic partner dedicated to empowering higher education leaders with the insights and tools needed to navigate an evolving landscape and maximize student success. We combine cutting-edge market intelligence with proven strategies, transforming data into actionable plans that boost retention, drive re-enrollment and foster a truly student-centric institution.

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  • National AI training hub for educators to open, funded by OpenAI and Microsoft

    National AI training hub for educators to open, funded by OpenAI and Microsoft

    This story was originally published by Chalkbeat. Sign up for their newsletters at ckbe.at/newsletters.

    More than 400,000 K-12 educators across the country will get free training in AI through a $23 million partnership between a major teachers union and leading tech companies that is designed to close gaps in the use of technology and provide a national model for AI-integrated curriculum.

    The new National Academy for AI Instruction will be based in the downtown Manhattan headquarters of the United Federation of Teachers, the New York City affiliate of the American Federation of Teachers, and provide workshops, online courses, and hands-on training sessions. This hub-based model of teacher training was inspired by work of unions like the United Brotherhood of Carpenters that have created similar training centers with industry partners, according to AFT President Randi Weingarten.

    “Teachers are facing huge challenges, which include navigating AI wisely, ethically and safely,” Weingarten said at a press conference Tuesday announcing the initiative. “The question was whether we would be chasing it or whether we would be trying to harness it.”

    The initiative involves the AFT, UFT, OpenAI, Microsoft, and Anthropic.

    The Trump administration has encouraged AI integration in the classroom. More than 50 companies have signed onto a White House pledge to provide grants, education materials, and technology to invest in AI education.

    In the wake of federal funding cuts to public education and the impact of Trump’s sweeping tax and policy bill on schools, Weingarten sees this partnership with private tech companies as a crucial investment in teacher preparation.

    “We are actually ensuring that kids have, that teachers have, what they need to deal with the economy of today and tomorrow,” Weingarten said.

    The academy will be based in a city where the school system initially banned the use of AI in the classroom, claiming it would interfere with the development of critical thinking skills. A few months later, then-New York City schools Chancellor David Banks did an about-face, pledging to help schools smartly incorporate the technology. He said New York City schools would embrace the potential of AI to drive individualized learning. But concrete plans have been limited.

    The AFT, meanwhile, has tried to position itself as a leader in the field. Last year, the union released its own guidelines for AI use in the classroom and funded pilot programs around the country.

    Vincent Plato, New York City Public Schools K-8 educator and UFT Teacher Center director, said the advent of AI reminds him of when teachers first started using word processors.

    “We are watching educators transform the way people use technology for work in real time, but with AI it’s on another unbelievable level because it’s just so much more powerful,” he said in a press release announcing the new partnership. “It can be a thought partner when they’re working by themselves, whether that’s late-night lesson planning, looking at student data or filing any types of reports — a tool that’s going to be transformative for teachers and students alike.”

    Teachers who frequently use AI tools report saving 5.9 hours a week, according to a national survey conducted by the Walton Family Foundation in cooperation with Gallup. These tools are most likely to be used to support instructional planning, such as creating worksheets or modifying material to meet students’ needs. Half of the teachers surveyed stated that they believe AI will reduce teacher workloads.

    “Teachers are not only gaining back valuable time, they are also reporting that AI is helping to strengthen the quality of their work,” Stephanie Marken, senior partner for U.S. research at Gallup, said in a press release. “However, a clear gap in AI adoption remains. Schools need to provide the tools, training, and support to make effective AI use possible for every teacher.”

    While nearly half of school districts surveyed by the research corporation RAND have reported training teachers in utilizing AI-powered tools by fall 2024, high-poverty districts are still lagging behind their low poverty counterparts. District leaders across the nation report a scarcity of external experts and resources to provide quality AI training to teachers.

    OpenAI, a founding partner of the National Academy for AI Instruction, will contribute $10 million over the next five years. The tech company will provide educators and course developers with technical support to integrate AI into classrooms as well as software applications to build custom, classroom-specific tools.

    Tech companies would benefit from this partnership by “co-creating” and improving their products based on feedback and insights from educators, said Gerry Petrella, Microsoft general manager, U.S. public policy, who hopes the initiative will align the needs of educators with the work of developers.

    In a sense, the teachers are training AI products just as much as they are being trained, according to Kathleen Day, a lecturer at Johns Hopkins Carey Business School. Day emphasized that through this partnership, AI companies would gain access to constant input from educators so they could continually strengthen their models and products.

    “Who’s training who?” Day said. “They’re basically saying, we’ll show you how this technology works, and you tell us how you would use it. When you tell us how you would use it, that is a wealth of information.”

    Many educators and policymakers are also concerned that introducing AI into the classroom could endanger student data and privacy. Racial bias in grading could also be reinforced by AI programs, according to research by The Learning Agency.

    Additionally, Trevor Griffey, a lecturer in labor studies at the University of California Los Angeles, warned the New York Times that tech firms could use these deals to market AI tools to students and expand their customer base.

    This initiative to expand AI access and training for educators was likened to New Deal efforts in the 1930s to expand equal access to electricity by Chris Lehane, OpenAI’s chief global affairs officer. By working with teachers and expanding AI training, Lehane hopes the initiative will “democratize” access to AI.

    “There’s no better place to do that work than in the classroom,” he said at the Tuesday press conference.

    Chalkbeat is a nonprofit news site covering educational change in public schools.

    For more news on AI training, visit eSN’s Digital Learning hub.

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  • PBLWorks Announces its 2025 Award Winners

    PBLWorks Announces its 2025 Award Winners

    Novato, CA – The Buck Institute for Education (dba PBLWorks), a national provider of professional development and curriculum for high-quality Project Based Learning (PBL), has announced the recipients of its 2025 PBL Champions and John Larmer “JL” Lifelong Learning Awards.

    The recipients were honored during the organization’s 2025 PBL World conference in Napa Valley, California.

    The 2025 PBL Champions

    The PBL Champions program recognizes an individual, a school, and a school district that have demonstrated a commitment to PBL; have done quality, lasting work; and have shown evidence of impact on students. The 2025 recipients are:

    • District PBL Champion: Lynn Public Schools in Lynn, Massachusetts

    This 16,000-student district is transforming teaching and learning through its implementation of PBL. In a little over a year, the team at Lynn established high-functioning district and school leadership teams and trained a cadre of educators who have designed more than 70 projects for students. The district has implemented PBL at all seven of its secondary schools with a goal of having all students participate in two or more high-quality PBL experiences per year by the end of the 2029-30 school year.

    • School PBL Champion: University Prep Academy (UPA) High School in Detroit, Michigan

    University Prep Schools (UPrep) stands among Detroit’s earliest and longest-running charter school networks. Known for its unwavering commitment to student success, UPrep (UPA) has proudly upheld its signature “90/90 promise”—ensuring that at least 90% of students graduate from high school and 90% of those graduates go on to enroll in college. UPA teachers and leaders have leveraged PBL as a way that empowers students to be a part of the future of their city – from working on keeping their unhoused population warm in the winter through a physics project on heat transfer, to urban gardens that allowed students to provide farm-to-table food to local food pantries and shelters. PBL has opened their eyes to the challenges students face, encouraged them to see and explore those challenges through the lens of solutionists, and has brought UPA closer to the community it serves.

    • Individual PBL Champion: Kim Mishkin, Head of School at the Hudson Lab School (HLS) in Hastings, New York

    Kim Mishkin has been instrumental in embedding Project Based Learning as the foundation of the school’s curriculum. As both an educator and school leader, she has built structures, cultivated partnerships, and championed interdisciplinary, real-world learning experiences that empower students and educators alike. Through her leadership, HLS has become a model for how schools can integrate PBL at every level, ensuring that learning is not just about content, it is about empowering students to be problem-solvers, leaders, and changemakers.

    The John Larmer “JL” Lifelong Learning Award

    The John Larmer “JL” Lifelong Learning Award, named after PBLWorks’ Senior Fellow John “JL” Larmer, recognizes educators who are impacting and expanding the work of Project Based Learning. A significant advocate and thought leader in the field, JL has dedicated decades to advancing high-quality PBL and is the author of several foundational books that have shaped how educators design and facilitate high-quality PBL. This award celebrates those who carry forward that legacy with passion, purpose, and an unwavering commitment to deeper learning. The 2025 recipients are:

    • Rue Graham, Project Based Learning lead advisor and coach at the Pagosa Peak Open School, Archuleta County School District in Pagosa Springs, Colorado
    • Stephanie Tuttle, fourth grade teacher at Fairfield Elementary School, Rockbridge County Public Schools in Rockbridge, Virginia

    “Project Based Learning is an incredibly powerful way to engage students and ignite their passion for learning – and it all starts with having administrators and teachers who are committed to its success,” said PBLWorks CEO Bob Lenz. “Our awards programs recognize the incredible passion and hard work demonstrated by schools, districts, and individuals in implementing PBL. Congratulations to our 2025 award recipients!”

    About PBLWorks

    The Buck Institute for Education/ PBLWorks believes that all students, especially Black and Brown students, should have access to high-quality Project Based Learning to deepen their learning and achieve success in college, career, and life. Its focus is on building the capacity of teachers to design and facilitate high-quality Project Based Learning, and on supporting school and system leaders in creating the conditions for these teachers to succeed with all students.

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  • Organization of Educational Historians National Conference, September 26-27th Online

    Organization of Educational Historians National Conference, September 26-27th Online

    Save the date – September 26-27! As a non-profit educational organization, we hope you will join us at our annual conference! If you are looking for a conference that includes sharing histories of education to help define present processes and inform the development of future responses, we hope you will join us and attend our annual conference. This year’s conference will include at least one panel on aspects of how artificial intelligence will impact educational history, but there will be many other panels. While the final conference schedule is still in development, this poster features examples of previous topics at the annual conference, so we can’t guarantee sessions on all these topics yet, but they demonstrate our past conference topics and may be indicative of what will be in this year’s conference. Our conference being offered online ensures low cost as we seek to invite many scholars into the organization by keeping travel costs low – and a full year’s membership, complete with the journal and attendance at the conference, remains affordable with a student rate ($60) and a regular rate (non-student) ($120)! With a peer-reviewed journal, an annual conference attendance complete with a noted keynote speaker, and a membership, we are dedicated to ensuring as many people as are interested can attend our conference. As you look to the fall, save the date and register here to attend: http://www.edhistorians.org/annual-meeting.html

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  • Project POTUS 2025 Middle School Winners Announced

    Project POTUS 2025 Middle School Winners Announced

    Indianapolis, IN — Project POTUS, a national middle school history initiative from the Benjamin Harrison Presidential Site, has named winners for this year’s competition. 

    Since the founding of our nation, there have been nearly half a billion American citizens. Of those, over 12,000 of us have served in Congress. Just 115 have become Supreme Court Justices. Only 45 citizens have become President of the United States. There’s something exceptional about each POTUS — good, bad, or otherwise. Project POTUS? challenges students in middle school to research an American president and create a video, 60 seconds or less, representing the POTUS chosen in a way that is creative, supported by good history research, and fun. A Citizen Jury made up of nearly 100 people reviewed all qualifying submissions and selected this year’s winners.

    Grand Jury’s Grand Prize and Spotlight Award Selections  

    Grand Prize Winner ($500 award) 

    • 6th grader Peter Gestwicki from Muncie, Indiana won grand prize for his video about Theodore Roosevelt. Watch his winning video  here.

    Spotlight Award  Winners ($400 award winners) 

    • 8th grader Grace Whitworth from St. Richard’s Episcopal School in Indianapolis, Indiana won for her video about President Thomas Jefferson. Watch her winning video  here.
    • 8th grader Izzy Abraham from Sycamore School in Indianapolis, Indiana for her video about President Calvin Coolidge. Watch his winning video  here.
    • 8th grader Clara Haley from St. Richards Episcopal School in Indianapolis, Indiana for her video about President George W. Bush. Watch his winning video  here. 
    • 8th graders Delaney Guy and Nora Steinhauser from Cooperative Middle School in Stratham, New Hampshire for their video about President James Polk. Watch their winning video  here.

    37 students throughout the country each won their Presidential Category and received $100 awards. Check out all of their videos  here.

    The 2026 Project POTUS competition begins Election Day, November 4, 2025 and all submissions must be entered by Presidents Day, February 16, 2026. Learn more  here.

    Project POTUS is made possible by the generous support from Russell & Penny Fortune. 

    About the Benjamin Harrison Presidential Site

    The Benjamin Harrison Presidential Site is the former home of the 23rd U.S. President. Now celebrating its 150th anniversary, it is a stunningly restored National Historic Landmark that shares the legacy of Indiana’s only President and First Lady with tens of thousands of people annually through guided tours, educational programs, special events and cultural programs. Rated “Top 5 Stately Presidential Homes You Can Visit” by Architectural Digest, the Harrison’s 10,000 square foot Italianate residence in downtown Indianapolis houses nearly 11,000 curated artifacts spanning more than two centuries of American and presidential history. Recently expanded and restored through a $6 million campaign, the Benjamin Harrison Presidential Site is also consistently ranked a Top 5 Thing To Do in Indianapolis by TripAdvisor. Signature programs and initiatives include: Future Presidents of America; Project POTUS, Candlelight Theatre; Juneteenth Foodways Festival; Wicket World of Croquet; and Off the Record. Founded in 1966 as a private 501c(3) that receives no direct federal support, the Benjamin Harrison Presidential Site is dedicated to increasing public participation in the American system of self-government through the life stories, arts and culture of an American President. Find out more at PresidentBenjaminHarrison.org. 

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  • National Student Survey 2025 | Wonkhe

    National Student Survey 2025 | Wonkhe

    After a few years of rapid changes and exogenous shocks we are pretty much back to normal on the national student survey.

    The 2025 results tell an overall tale of graduate improvement – of students being generally content that they are getting what they have been led to expect (or, for the cynics, having modulated their expectations appropriately), and of a sector where the majority of students are content with pretty much every area of their academic experience.

    The positivity is always worthy of noting as it balances out a popular image of unhappy students, poor quality courses, and failing universities. The inconvenient truth is that UK higher education as a whole is pretty good, and remains so despite the efforts and fervent wishes of many.

    Overall

    The main utility of the National Student Survey is to draw gentle but persistent external attention to the kind of internal problems that decent providers will already be aware of. If you know, for example, there is a problem with students receiving timely feedback on your undergraduate architecture course, the temptation in these times of budgetary restraint may be to let it slide – a negative NSS finding focuses attention where it is needed.

    Michelle Donelan (where is she now?) famously took against the framing of students being “satisfied” in her jeremiad against the old NSS – but the NSS has, since inception, acted as a tool to get students some satisfaction.

    [Full screen]

    Our first chart looks at the four home nations and the UK as a whole – you can examine subject areas of interest at three levels, choose to see registered or taught students, of all undergraduate levels and mode, and filter out areas with low response numbers. From this we learn that food and beverage studies is probably the most challenging course in the UK, with 94.8 per cent of respondents responding positively to question 4 (“how often does your course challenge you to achieve your best work”).

    In Wales, medical technology students were least likely to be positive about the fairness of marking and assessment. In England, maritime technology students are least likely to feel their student union represents them. To be clear, at CAH3 we are often looking at very small numbers of students (which may pertain to a single course in a single provider) – cranking things up to CAH1 means we can be much more confident that veterinary science students in Scotland find their course “intellectually stimulating”.

    By provider

    It gets interesting when you start comparing the national averages above to subject areas in your provider, so I’ve built a version of the dashboard where you can examine different aspects of your own provision. I’ve added a function where you click on a subject dot it updates the bar chart on the right, offering an overview of all responses to all questions.

    [Full screen]

    This helps put in perspective how cross your computer games and animation students are with your library resources – it turns out this is a national problem, and perhaps a chat to a professional body might be helpful in finding out what needs to be done

    Of course, there’s a whole industry out there that uses NSS results to rank providers, often using bizarre compound metrics now we don’t have an “overall satisfaction” question (if you’ve ever read nonsense about nursing students in a provider being the most satisfied among modern campus universities in the East Midlands then this is how we get there).

    There is a value in benchmarking against comparators, so this is my gentle contribution to this area of discourse which works in the same way as the one above (note that you need to select a subject area as well as a subject level). For the people who ask every year – the population sizes and response numbers are in the tooltips (you can also filter out tiny response numbers, by default I do this at fifty).

    I’ve not included the confidence intervals that OfS’s dashboard does because it simply doesn’t matter for most use cases and it makes the charts harder to read (and slower to load). You should be aware enough to know that a small number of responses probably doesn’t make for a very reliable number. Oh, and the colour of the dots is the old (very old) TEF flags – two standard deviations above (green) or below (red) the benchmark.

    [Full screen]

    Characteristics

    Beyond national trends, subject level oddities, and provider peculiarities the student experience is affected by personal characteristics.

    While there may be a provider level problem, many of these could equally be a national or UK-wide issue: especially when linked to a particular subject area. We get characteristic statistics up to CAH level 1 (very broad groups of subjects) in public data, which may be enough to help you understand what is going on with a particular set of students.

    For instance, it appears that – nationally – students with disabilities (including mental health struggles) are less likely to feel that information about wellbeing support is well communicated – something that is unlikely to be unique to a single provider, and (ideally) needs to be addressed in partnership to ensure these vulnerable students get the support they need.

    [Full screen]

    Conclusion

    If you take NSS at face value it is an incredibly useful tool. If we manage to leave it in a steady state for a few more years time series will add another level to this usefulness (sorry, a year-on-year comparison tells us little and even three years isn’t much better.

    As ammunition to allow you to solve problems in your own provider, to identify places to learn from, and iterate your way to happier and better educated students it is unsurpassed. It’s never really convinced as a regulatory tool, and (on a limb here) the value for applicants only really comes as a warning away from places that are doing outstandingly badly.

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