student achievement

Last week, the Education Law Center published “Making the Grade 2019,”  a report that focuses exclusively on three categories of public school inputs: funding levels, distribution, and effort using…

“North Carolina District Schools Are Thriving Fiscally Alongside Charter-School Growth” is a new peer-reviewed article published in the journal Political Economy in the Carolinas. Dr. Erik Root, an executive with the Roger Bacon…

Who could have predicted that North Carolina educators, lawmakers, and media would spend so much time disputing the reading software selected by the N.C. Department of Public Instruction (DPI)?  I…

On July 25, 2017, Governor Roy Cooper announced the creation of the Commission on Access to Sound Basic Education.  The name of the commission name references the ongoing Leandro…

North Carolinians will be hearing the name “Leandro” a lot more in the next few years. “Leandro” is the name of the lead plaintiff in Leandro v. State of…

While the media will be focusing on union activists at today’s teacher march, I’ll be thinking about a young man named Junior. In 2016, a sobering documentary titled “Raising…

On September 6, the State Board of Education and Department of Public Instruction released state test scores and other accountability measures for the 2017-18 school year.  Compared to the…

Despite hype to the contrary from state officials, the just-released 1997-98 ABC test results showed once again how poor the level of public education in North Carolina remains. Rating schools on the basis of student achievement, the Locke Foundation found that only 1 percent of public schools deserved an "A" for imparting grade-level skills to at least 90 percent of students. Fully half the schools received a "D" or "F."On average, only 66 percent of public school students tested at grade level — with far worse results on more rigorous national tests.