Yesterday we wrote about a National Center on Education and the Economy study which argued students were learning a lot of math they won’t end up using in their career. And schools were not spending enough time on more fundamental concepts in elementary and middle school which were more likely to be used by workers. [...]
Community college students are needlessly assigned to remedial math classes to learn lessons they won’t use during their studies, according to new research from a Washington, D.C. group. And the study also found that many high school graduates are not learning subjects they will need to use in their careers. The study was produced by [...]
University of Arkansas education professor Jay P. Greene has weighed in on the BIll and Melinda Gates Foundation’s conclusions about its teacher evaluation study. Greene says the foundation’s conclusions were based on the politics of convincing teachers and school districts of the merits of evaluations, and not data. He takes particular aim at classroom observations, [...]
A new report says college remedial education programs are not working, often have no bearing on a student’s field of study and should be scrapped. Instead, researchers from Complete College America argue, most students should have to take a set of core classes to prepare them for college. These courses should match up with the [...]
Florida’s policy of retaining third graders based on state standardized test scores has a positive long-term impact on those students, according to a new study from the Brookings Institute. Retention only works when the students who are held back are provided with extra instruction and the money to fund those programs, according to Harvard University [...]
Students who spend more time in class will perform better in class and on standardized tests. But schools must focus on individual student needs, assessment and staff training. That’s the conclusion of a National Center on Time and Learning report looking at programs in 30 schools which add time to the school day or extend [...]
A team of economists says a new study shows teachers are motivated by performance pay and produce better student results. That’s contrary to a handful of prior pay-for-performance studies which showed little to no improvement among students. The difference this time? Teachers were given the money up front and told they would lose it if [...]
A report on Tennessee teacher evaluations could have big implications in Florida as well. The report found Tennessee schools “systematically failed” to identify low-performing teachers through a combination of student test score improvement and principal evaluations, according to The Tennessean. Often, a principal’s evaluation and the teacher’s student testing score did not match. Three-quarters of [...]
Nearly four in ten Florida 4th graders say their math class work is too easy, according to an analysis of student survey data by the Center for American Progress. The survey also found 30 percent of Florida 8th graders read five or fewer pages in class or for homework each day. And more than two-thirds [...]
Yesterday we told you about a new study tabulating the often hidden cost of absenteeism. But it isn’t hidden in Florida, which is one of a handful of states which tracks chronic absenteeism. Florida considers students who miss 21 or more days of schools as chronically absent. Rural school districts tend to have higher rates [...]
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