“I think I’ve never had a bad day in my 35 years of teaching,” Peritz remarked. “I made an effort to ensure that everyone else enjoyed themselves, and I always had a nice time. That still seems to me to improve learning. Peritz is still working to turn around a once-fantastic inner-city high school where…
This week, the State Board of Education is set to approve a nearly 1,000-page set of guidelines for math instruction, with the far-reaching and hotly debated aim of revolutionising math instruction in California, where just one-third of students—and one in five low-income students—met state standards in the most recent state standardised exam. Whether the updated…
When Louisville, Kentucky, elementary school teacher Brandon Graves discusses the events of September 11, 2001, he tells his children where he was that day—as a freshman at Howard University in Washington, D.C., where he smelled smoke coming from the Pentagon. “I compare it to the times when I was that age and my parents and…
A bill prohibiting school boards from rejecting textbooks because they educate about the contributions of people with diverse racial backgrounds, sexual orientations, and gender identities was signed into law by California Governor Gavin Newsom on Monday. The measure was deemed “long overdue” by Newsom. According to a statement released by Newsom, “fringe ideologues from Temecula…
When Aylah Levy started first grade this autumn, she had some catching up to do. Aylah, six, had to get used to being in a classroom after attending an alternative programme that met only outside throughout her kindergarten year. She was not typing her letters clearly and knew very few numbers. Her elementary school teacher…
On June 29, the historic report of the statewide task force investigating reparations for Black Californians will be delivered to the Legislature. This discussion was created for KQED’s Juneteenth reparations radio programme, which aired on June 17. Go to kqed.org/reparations to learn more about the task force and reparations. Margaret Fortune has advised two California…
The Biden administration is cracking down on college programs that don’t adequately prepare graduates for gainful employment. On Wednesday, the U.S. Education Department announced new federal regulations that aim to hold for-profit colleges accountable for student outcomes. “Higher education is supposed to be an invaluable investment in your future. There is nothing valuable about being…
California will now mandate that all K–12 students learn media literacy skills, such as identifying fake news and critically analysing what they come across online, in an effort to combat the spread of false information on the internet. Assembly Bill 873, which was signed into law by Governor Gavin Newsom last month, mandates that the…
Test results have been frustratingly stagnant for the majority of California’s K–12 student groupings ever since the outbreak. However, stagnating scores have been especially annoying for Black students: For the majority of grade levels last year, black children’ math and English language arts test results were declining, with some of the lowest scores of any…
California authorities and educators are looking to the health system to establish a statewide behavioural health effort in order to bridge the financing gaps in erratic, sometimes unpredictably changing school budgets and establish a stable mental health fund for the education system. “There is insufficient integration between the health and education systems to ensure that…
