Three months ago we sought to put some hard numbers on how many students with disabilities are enrolled in Florida charter schools. We had no idea how elusive that data is. First, we’ll skip to the end and tell you what our investigation uncovered: More than 86 percent of Florida charter schools have no students […]

A StateImpact Florida/Miami Herald investigation shows most charter schools in Florida are failing to serve students with severe disabilities. Statewide, 86 percent of charter schools do not have any students classified as severely disabled.

Update: Here’s a link to the story. For the past three months, StateImpact Florida has been working on an investigation of charter schools. Wednesday morning, the truth comes out — both here and on NPR’s Morning Edition. The question: How many of Florida’s charter schools serve children with severe disabilities? Here’s a hint: surprisingly few. […]

Gov. Rick Scott sees a brighter future for Floridians through higher education. In a letter to newspaper editorial boards around the state, Scott said education pays off through “higher earnings and lower unemployment rates.” Then he addressed the money issue. For the school year beginning next fall, he wrote that Florida’s student population is expected […]

The Florida Department of Law Enforcement is now investigating the death of a Florida A&M University (FAMU) student who had reportedly been hazed by his fellow band mates. 26-year-old Robert Champion died shortly after he collapsed on a bus in Orlando, where he and other members of FAMU’s famed Marching 100 were performing. Governor Rick […]

We’ve heard about Governor Rick Scott’s proposed “parent trigger law,” which would give parents the power to shut down low performing schools and transform them into charter schools.  Now we’re hearing from some of the people who would be impacted by the change. Maria Mendoza’s daughter attends an underperforming elementary school in Ft. Myers. She […]

A survey that tracks the way states use data to improve the quality of education finds progress across the board. The data could be anything from individual standardized test scores to the performance of whole school districts. The Data Quality Campaign is in its seventh year. More than fifty organizations around the country are now […]

The Brown Center on Education Policy at Brookings has released its inaugural Education Choice and Competition Index. The interactive web application scores the nation’s 25 largest school districts based on 13 categories. The index focuses on the concept of school choice, which has been popular with Florida Gov. Rick Scott and the Republican-controlled Florida Legislature. […]