ReportWire

Tag: Schools

  • Preventing harm by connecting the dots in school safety

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    Key points:

    Swatting–false reports of school violence intended to trigger a police response–continues to increase across the country. During the 2022–2023 school year, nearly 64 percent of reported violent incidents in K–12 schools were linked to swatting. That’s over 440 incidents in one year–a more than 500 percent jump from just four years prior.

    Each call pulls officers from genuine emergencies, disrupts classrooms, and leaves students and staff shaken. While emergency protocols are essential, when swatting becomes routine, it’s clear that response plans alone won’t solve the problem.

    Unpacking the early signals

    Swatting rarely emerges out of thin air. It’s often the final act following a series of compounding behaviors, such as:

    • Online harassment
    • Peer conflicts
    • Risky social media challenges
    • Unaddressed behavioral concerns

    These warning signs exist, but are typically scattered across multiple school departments.

    Counselors might log escalating incidents. Teachers may notice changes in student behavior, and school resource officers (SROs) might track repeated visits involving the same individuals. Without a unified way to connect these observations, critical warning signs go unnoticed.

    Operationalizing early intervention

    Districts are reimagining how they capture and coordinate behavioral data. The goal isn’t surveillance or punitive action. It’s about empowering the right people with the right context to align and intervene early.

    When schools shift from viewing incidents in isolation to seeing behavior patterns in context, they are better positioned to act before concerns escalate. This can mean initiating mental health referrals, alerting safety teams, or involving families and law enforcement partners at the appropriate moment with comprehensive information.

    Technology that enables teams

    The process requires tools that support secure, centralized documentation and streamline communication across counselors, administrators, safety staff, and other stakeholders. These systems don’t replace human judgment, but create conditions for clearer decisions and more timely coordination.

    Swatting is just one example of how fragmented behavioral data can contribute to high-risk outcomes. Other incidents, such as escalating bullying, persistent mental health concerns, or anonymous threats often follow recognizable patterns that emerge over time. When schools use a centralized system to document and track these behaviors across departments, they can identify those patterns earlier. This kind of structured coordination supports proactive interventions, helping prevent larger issues before they unfold and reinforcing a culture of safety and awareness.

    Consider Washington State, where swatting affected more than 18,000 students last year, costing schools over $270,000 in lost instructional time. These figures illustrate the operational and human costs when coordination breaks down.

    Reducing risk, not just reacting to it

    Swatting is a symptom of a larger issue. Building safer schools means moving upstream from reactive emergency response to proactive coordination. It requires shared insight across teams, strengthened behavioral threat assessment protocols, and the right supports in place well before crisis calls occur.

    Early intervention isn’t about adding complexity. It’s about reducing risk, improving situational clarity, and equipping school communities to act with confidence–not simply responding when harm is imminent.

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    Amanda Lewis, Versaterm

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  • Mental health screeners help ID hidden needs, research finds

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    Key points:

    A new DESSA screener to be released for the Fall ‘25 school year–designed to be paired with a strength-based student self-report assessment–accurately predicted well-being levels in 70 percent of students, a study finds.  

    According to findings from Riverside Insights, creator of research-backed assessments, researchers found that even students with strong social-emotional skills often struggle with significant mental health concerns, challenging the assumption that resilience alone indicates student well-being. The study, which examined outcomes in 254 middle school students across the United States, suggests that combining risk and resilience screening can enable identification of students who would otherwise be missed by traditional approaches. 

    “This research validates what school mental health professionals have been telling us for years–that traditional screening approaches miss too many students,” said Dr. Evelyn Johnson, VP of Research & Development at Riverside Insights. “When educators and counselors can utilize a dual approach to identify risk factors, they can pinpoint concerns and engage earlier, in and in a targeted way, before concerns become major crises.”

    The study, which offered evidence of, for example, social skills deficits among students with no identifiable or emotional behavioral concerns, provides the first empirical evidence that consideration of both risk and resilience can enhance the predictive benefits of screening, when compared to  strengths-based screening alone.

    In the years following COVID, many educators noted a feeling that something was “off” with students, despite DESSA assessments indicating that things were fine.

    “We heard this feedback from lots of different customers, and it really got our team thinking–we’re clearly missing something, even though the assessment of social-emotional skills is critically important and there’s evidence to show the links to better academic outcomes and better emotional well-being outcomes,” Johnson said. “And yet, we’re not tapping something that needs to be tapped.”

    For a long time, if a person displayed no outward or obvious mental health struggles, they were thought to be mentally healthy. In investigating the various theories and frameworks guiding mental health issues, Riverside Insight’s team dug into Dr. Shannon Suldo‘s work, which centers around the dual factor model.

    “What the dual factor approach really suggests is that the absence of problems is not necessarily equivalent to good mental health–there really are these two factors, dual factors, we talk about them in terms of risk and resilience–that really give you a much more complete picture of how a student is doing,” Johnson said.

    “The efficacy associated with this dual-factor approach is encouraging, and has big implications for practitioners struggling to identify risk with limited resources,” said Jim Bowler, general manager of the Classroom Division at Riverside Insights. “Schools told us they needed a way to identify students who might be struggling beneath the surface. The DESSA SEIR ensures no student falls through the cracks by providing the complete picture educators need for truly preventive mental health support.”

    The launch comes as mental health concerns among students reach crisis levels. More than 1 in 5 students considered attempting suicide in 2023, while 60 percent of youth with major depression receive no mental health treatment. With school psychologist-to-student ratios at 1:1065 (recommended 1:500) and counselor ratios at 1:376 (recommended 1:250), schools need preventive solutions that work within existing resources.

    The DESSA SEIR will be available for the 2025-2026 school year.

    This press release originally appeared online.

    eSchool News Staff
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    ESchool News Staff

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  • Students face new cellphone restrictions in 17 states as school year begins

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    Jamel Bishop is seeing a big change in his classrooms as he begins his senior year at Doss High School in Louisville, Kentucky, where cellphones are now banned during instructional time.

    In previous years, students often weren’t paying attention and wasted class time by repeating questions, the teenager said. Now, teachers can provide “more one-on-one time for the students who actually need it.”

    Kentucky is one of 17 states and the District of Columbia starting this school year with new restrictions, bringing the total to 35 states with laws or rules limiting phones and other electronic devices in school. This change has come remarkably quickly: Florida became the first state to pass such a law in 2023.

    Both Democrats and Republicans have taken up the cause, reflecting a growing consensus that phones are bad for kids’ mental health and take their focus away from learning, even as some researchers say the issue is less clear-cut.

    “Anytime you have a bill that’s passed in California and Florida, you know you’re probably onto something that’s pretty popular,” Georgia state Rep. Scott Hilton, a Republican, told a forum on cellphone use last week in Atlanta.

    Phones are banned throughout the school day in 18 of the states and the District of Columbia, although Georgia and Florida impose such “bell-to-bell” bans only from kindergarten through eighth grade. Another seven states ban them during class time, but not between classes or during lunch. Still others, particularly those with traditions of local school control, mandate only a cellphone policy, believing districts will take the hint and sharply restrict phone access.

    Students see pros and cons

    For students, the rules add new school-day rituals, like putting phones in magnetic pouches or special lockers.

    Students have been locking up their phones during class at McNair High School in suburban Atlanta since last year. Audreanna Johnson, a junior, said “most of them did not want to turn in their phones” at first, because students would use them to gossip, texting “their other friends in other classes to see what’s the tea and what’s going on around the building.”

    That resentment is “starting to ease down” now, she said. “More students are willing to give up their phones and not get distracted.”

    But there are drawbacks — like not being able to listen to music when working independently in class. “I’m kind of 50-50 on the situation because me, I use headphones to do my schoolwork. I listen to music to help focus,” she said.

    Some parents want constant contact

    In a survey of 125 Georgia school districts by Emory University researchers, parental resistance was cited as the top obstacle to regulating student use of social and digital media.

    Johnson’s mother, Audrena Johnson, said she worries most about knowing her children are safe from violence at school. School messages about threats can be delayed and incomplete, she said, like when someone who wasn’t a McNair student got into a fight on school property, which she learned about when her daughter texted her during the school day.

    “My child having her phone is very important to me, because if something were to happen, I know instantly,” Johnson said.

    Many parents echo this — generally supporting restrictions but wanting a say in the policymaking and better communication, particularly about safety — and they have a real need to coordinate schedules with their children and to know about any problems their children may encounter, said Jason Allen, the national director of partnerships for the National Parents Union.

    “We just changed the cellphone policy, but aren’t meeting the parents’ needs in regards to safety and really training teachers to work with students on social emotional development,” Allen said.

    Research remains in an early stage

    Some researchers say it’s not yet clear what types of social media may cause harm, and whether restrictions have benefits, but teachers “love the policy,” according to Julie Gazmararian, a professor of public health at Emory University who does surveys and focus groups to research the effects of a phone ban in middle school grades in the Marietta school district near Atlanta.

    “They could focus more on teaching,” Gazmararian said. “There were just not the disruptions.”

    Another benefit: More positive interactions among students. “They were saying that kids are talking to each other in the hallways and in the cafeteria,” she said. “And in the classroom, there is a noticeably lower amount of discipline referrals.”

    Gazmararian is still compiling numbers on grades and discipline, and cautioned that her work may not be able to answer whether bullying has been reduced or mental health improved.

    Social media use clearly correlates with poor mental health, but research can’t yet prove it causes it, according to Munmun De Choudhury, a Georgia Tech professor who studies this issue.

    “We need to be able to quantify what types of social media use are causing harm, what types of social media use can be beneficial,” De Choudhury said.

    A few states reject rules

    Some state legislatures are bucking the momentum.

    Wyoming’s Senate in January rejected requiring districts to create some kind of a cellphone policy after opponents argued that teachers and parents need to be responsible.

    And in the Michigan House in July, a Republican-sponsored bill directing schools to ban phones bell-to-bell in grades K-8 and during high school instruction time was defeated in July after Democrats insisted on upholding local control. Democratic Gov. Gretchen Whitmer, among multiple governors who made restricting phones in schools a priority this year, is still calling for a bill to come to her desk.

    ___

    Associated Press writers Isabella Volmert in Lansing, Michigan, and Dylan Lovan in Louisville, Kentucky, contributed.

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  • Students face new cellphone restrictions in 17 states as school year begins

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    Jamel Bishop is seeing a big change in his classrooms as he begins his senior year at Doss High School in Louisville, Kentucky, where cellphones are now banned during instructional time.

    In previous years, students often weren’t paying attention and wasted class time by repeating questions, the teenager said. Now, teachers can provide “more one-on-one time for the students who actually need it.”

    Kentucky is one of 17 states and the District of Columbia starting this school year with new restrictions, bringing the total to 35 states with laws or rules limiting phones and other electronic devices in school. This change has come remarkably quickly: Florida became the first state to pass such a law in 2023.

    Both Democrats and Republicans have taken up the cause, reflecting a growing consensus that phones are bad for kids’ mental health and take their focus away from learning, even as some researchers say the issue is less clear-cut.

    “Anytime you have a bill that’s passed in California and Florida, you know you’re probably onto something that’s pretty popular,” Georgia state Rep. Scott Hilton, a Republican, told a forum on cellphone use last week in Atlanta.

    Phones are banned throughout the school day in 18 of the states and the District of Columbia, although Georgia and Florida impose such “bell-to-bell” bans only from kindergarten through eighth grade. Another seven states ban them during class time, but not between classes or during lunch. Still others, particularly those with traditions of local school control, mandate only a cellphone policy, believing districts will take the hint and sharply restrict phone access.

    For students, the rules add new school-day rituals, like putting phones in magnetic pouches or special lockers.

    Students have been locking up their phones during class at McNair High School in suburban Atlanta since last year. Audreanna Johnson, a junior, said “most of them did not want to turn in their phones” at first, because students would use them to gossip, texting “their other friends in other classes to see what’s the tea and what’s going on around the building.”

    That resentment is “starting to ease down” now, she said. “More students are willing to give up their phones and not get distracted.”

    But there are drawbacks — like not being able to listen to music when working independently in class. “I’m kind of 50-50 on the situation because me, I use headphones to do my schoolwork. I listen to music to help focus,” she said.

    In a survey of 125 Georgia school districts by Emory University researchers, parental resistance was cited as the top obstacle to regulating student use of social and digital media.

    Johnson’s mother, Audrena Johnson, said she worries most about knowing her children are safe from violence at school. School messages about threats can be delayed and incomplete, she said, like when someone who wasn’t a McNair student got into a fight on school property, which she learned about when her daughter texted her during the school day.

    “My child having her phone is very important to me, because if something were to happen, I know instantly,” Johnson said.

    Many parents echo this — generally supporting restrictions but wanting a say in the policymaking and better communication, particularly about safety — and they have a real need to coordinate schedules with their children and to know about any problems their children may encounter, said Jason Allen, the national director of partnerships for the National Parents Union.

    “We just changed the cell phone policy, but aren’t meeting the parents’ needs in regards to safety and really training teachers to work with students on social emotional development,” Allen said.

    Some researchers say it’s not yet clear what types of social media may cause harm, and whether restrictions have benefits, but teachers “love the policy,” according to Julie Gazmararian, a professor of public health at Emory University who does surveys and focus groups to research the effects of a phone ban in middle school grades in the Marietta school district near Atlanta.

    “They could focus more on teaching,” Gazmararian said. “There were just not the disruptions.”

    Another benefit: More positive interactions among students. “They were saying that kids are talking to each other in the hallways and in the cafeteria,” she said. “And in the classroom, there is a noticeably lower amount of discipline referrals.”

    Gazmararian is still compiling numbers on grades and discipline, and cautioned that her work may not be able to answer whether bullying has been reduced or mental health improved.

    Social media use clearly correlates with poor mental health, but research can’t yet prove it causes it, according to Munmun De Choudhury, a Georgia Tech professor who studies this issue.

    “We need to be able to quantify what types of social media use are causing harm, what types of social media use can be beneficial,” De Choudhury said.

    Some state legislatures are bucking the momentum.

    Wyoming’s Senate in January rejected requiring districts to create some kind of a cellphone policy after opponents argued that teachers and parents need to be responsible.

    And in the Michigan House in July, a Republican-sponsored bill directing schools to ban phones bell-to-bell in grades K-8 and during high school instruction time was defeated in July after Democrats insisted on upholding local control. Democratic Gov. Gretchen Whitmer, among multiple governors who made restricting phones in schools a priority this year, is still calling for a bill to come to her desk.

    ___

    Associated Press writers Isabella Volmert in Lansing, Michigan, and Dylan Lovan in Louisville, Kentucky, contributed.

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  • Moving to a new home or school can stress kids out. How to make it more manageable

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    NEW YORK (AP) — Summer can be a time of big transitions for kids. It’s often the season for moving to a new home or preparing for a different school. And that brings worry and stress.

    Parents and families can help make things feel more manageable. If kids feel supported, they might even look forward to some of the changes and gain confidence, experts say.

    “When routines, familiar places and even knowing where things are in the house are suddenly gone, it forces youth to relearn their daily lives from scratch,” which can be stressful, says Victoria Kress, a professional counselor and president of the American Counseling Association.

    At the same time, “this can invite exciting opportunities for growth,” she says.

    Author Nadine Haruni’s book “Freeda the Frog is on the Move” aims to help school-age kids deal with moving. Haruni, who guided her own family through moves and changes, tells the story of a mother frog who helps her little tadpoles adjust as they leave their hometown and settle in a new one.

    “It’s really important to recognize that transitions take time and that is totally normal. It’s OK to feel nervous and sad and anxious and maybe all of those things all at once, and even adults feel that way sometimes,” says Haruni.

    “If you listen, you might be surprised. What matters to a child is not always what you might think it is,” she says.

    This article is part of AP’s Be Well coverage, focusing on wellness, fitness, diet and mental health. Read more Be Well.

    Moves can be especially difficult if accompanied by other significant changes, such as a death, divorce or loss of family income.

    Haruni’s book was inspired by her family’s big, multifaceted transition. She was moving from Manhattan to New Jersey with her then-5-year-old daughter and 8-year-old son, and getting married all in the same week, a big transition for her kids and three teenage stepdaughters. In addition, the kids were starting at a new school the following week.

    “The kids were very sad and worried at first. Life is about change, and it’s really hard to address that sometimes. Luckily, the kids discovered that they loved having more space and, like the tadpoles in the book, they happily adapted,” she says.

    Here are some tips to reduce the stress of a move or other big transition for kids:

    Talk it out

    “Communicating and listening can alleviate a lot of anxiety,” Haruni says. “Let kids share their feelings and know that they are being heard, so they know that they matter. That really helps them feel like they have some control.”

    Explain why a move is necessary, and preview what’s ahead. Discuss the destination ahead of time, especially its good points. Familiarity can help kids feel more confident, the experts say.

    Even sharing some photos or a map is helpful in easing jitters.

    “Can they meet a few kids in the new neighborhood ahead of time?” Haruni asks.

    Involve kids in the move itself

    “Involving children in age-appropriate moving tasks — such as packing their own belongings or helping to choose new room decorations — can give them a sense of control and security during an uncertain time,” says Kress.

    Kids can help plan meals, organize their space or continue family traditions.

    “Frame it as an adventure,” says Haruni. “Let them help choose things for their new room if they are moving, but also bring a few items that feel familiar and comforting.”

    Keep up daily routines

    Sticking to some daily routines creates structure when things feel new and scary.

    “The thing with moves is they disrupt everyone’s life. Too much change at once discombobulates everybody, so keeping meals at the same time and bedtime rituals the same can really help a lot,” says George M. Kapalka, a clinical psychologist and professor at the California School of Professional Psychology, part of Alliant International University.

    Arrange common areas similarly to how they were before the move, says Kress. Place favorite toys, blankets or pictures where your child expects to find them.

    Consider getting help from a professional

    Adapting to change takes time, and patience. Let kids know that’s normal, that they will get through it, and that they are being heard and have some control over things, says Haruni.

    And know when to seek help.

    “Some sadness, worry, or adjustment difficulties are normal after a move. But if symptoms persist for more than a few weeks, worsen over time, or disrupt daily life, then counseling is advisable,” says Kress.

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  • Can President Trump Run a Mile?

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    Not to be fussy about it, but the Presidential Fitness Test, which Donald Trump plans to reinstate in schools, could use some shaping up of its own. The name promises so much. What is this, a fitness test for Presidents? We could do worse than election via athletic competition; that alone might alleviate the whole gerontocracy problem. And most of the good Presidents would’ve still won. George Washington was an accomplished collar-and-elbow wrestler. (Some wrestling scholars claim that, during the Revolutionary War, a forty-seven-year-old Washington took down seven Massachusetts militiamen in a row.) Nixon, meanwhile, was a football scrub—“cannon fodder,” a teammate called him. Most people think our most athletic President was Gerald Ford or Barack Obama, but they’re wrong. In his rail-splitting young-lawyer days, Lincoln is said to have gone 300–1 in free-for-all wrestling matches against tough guys across the Midwest. In 1992, he was inducted into the National Wrestling Hall of Fame; some credit him with inventing the choke slam. This would get more prominent billing in his biographies if the Presidential Fitness Test were what it sounds like, instead of what it actually is, which is a battery of physical assessments to evaluate the health of America’s schoolchildren. A better name would be the President’s Fitness Test, as in Lord Stanley’s Cup.

    The old test was phased out more than a decade ago. Trump hasn’t said what the new one will look like. Previously, it involved a mile-long race, a shuttle run, sixty seconds of sit-ups, pull-ups to exhaustion, and the sit-and-reach flexibility assessment. Participants who scored in the top fifteen per cent of all five tests got a Presidential commendation. Presumably, any changes would be up to the President’s Council on Sports, Fitness, and Nutrition (now, there’s a sound name), whose members Trump introduced, along with the revived test, at a White House press conference a couple of weeks ago. Trump stocked the council with his sports-world buddies—Bryson DeChambeau, Harrison Butker, Mariano Rivera, Jack Nicklaus, Paul (Triple H) Levesque, and Lawrence Taylor, among them—most of whom, in various ways, are ill-suited to oversee an athletic program for minors. None of them have a background in exercise science. Taylor, a former N.F.L. linebacker whom Trump has referred to as “an incredible guy” and “a friend of mine for a long time—too long,” pleaded guilty in 2011 to two misdemeanors after paying to have sex with a sixteen-year-old. After putting him on the council, Trump asked him to speak at the White House about the project. “I don’t know what we’re supposed to be doing,” Taylor said. “But I’m here to serve.”

    The new council probably can’t do worse than the original council. The fitness test has its origins in a 1954 study that found that American children failed a suite of physical benchmarks about fifty-eight per cent of the time, compared with just nine per cent for children in Italy, Switzerland, and Austria. President Eisenhower was alarmed about what this meant for the health of the nation and its military. He formed the council by executive order; it met at West Point and, in 1958, rolled out the test. The original looked similar to the most recent version, though it also included softball-throwing, which was a rough analogue for lobbing a grenade. (The White House says that the new test will also be, in part, about “military readiness.”) In addition to the test, the council issued a report warning that “the existence of press-button gadgets and other devices tending toward habits of inactivity” were fuelling a countrywide problem of “softness.” Softness was thought to be a grave national danger. In 1960, then President-elect John F. Kennedy published an article in Sports Illustrated called “The Soft American.” “Our struggles against aggressors throughout our history have been won on the playgrounds and corner lots and fields of America,” he wrote. “In a very real and immediate sense, our growing softness, our increasing lack of physical fitness, is a menace to our security.” He issued another public-fitness challenge, which required marching fifty miles in twenty hours. Boy Scouts marched, as did fraternities, high-school classes, postmen, and newspaper columnists. Robert Kennedy did it in oxfords. (The sixty-third annual march will be on November 22nd.) Subsequent Presidents, meanwhile, periodically updated the Presidential Fitness Test. Lyndon Johnson added a flexed-arm hang for girls; Ford swapped a straight-leg sit-up for a bent-knee sit-up.

    There were a few early critics of the test. One congressman from Missouri pointed out, in 1955, that the study that inspired the test purported that American kids were absurdly wimpy: it held that European kids were seven times more fit. “Simply on the mathematical surface, this is a ridiculous statement,” the congressman said. In fact, the study was investigating back pain among Americans, and was mostly a test of core strength and flexibility. It had little to do with over-all fitness. One exercise instructed participants to lie face down and lift their feet off the ground. Another had them reach down and touch their toes. European participants were drilled in exercises like these in school, which probably explained their superior performance. The council, anyway, showed little interest in finding out if the Presidential test was effective; they rarely collected any data to determine if kids were improving. There’s not much evidence to suggest that it promoted physical activity in the long term. Kids weren’t tripping over themselves to sit and reach in their free time. The Obama Administration gave this as a rationale for ending the program, in 2012. Few people complained.

    There was always something odd about a fitness test being set forth by the President, invariably an aging man who would lose miserably in his own competition if pitted against, for example, me. I hold a job that I perform mostly on the couch, and am otherwise a modestly skilled but enthusiastic recreational softball and tennis player, and yet I would destroy even the more youthful Presidents; I’ve seen Obama’s jump shot. Trump could beat me in golf, which is O.K. Golf—a sport you play only when age or incompetence prevents you from playing actual sports, and which few people, if they are being honest with themselves, actually enjoy—isn’t a proxy for how well someone might do on the test.

    Trump and the other modern Presidents would almost certainly fail their own fitness tests. The mile and the shuttle run would present problems, given their ages, but the real obstacle would be the pull-ups. Pull-ups are hard. At Michigan, Ford was the center on the football team, won two national championships, and was voted the team M.V.P., but he was sixty-one when he came into the White House and around two hundred pounds. Is he getting thirteen pull-ups, the threshold for seventeen-year-olds to qualify for the Presidential commendation? He is not. I’m not even convinced that he could’ve done so as a hundred-and-ninety-pound teen-age lineman. As for Trump, I would not bet on him running a mile in six minutes and six seconds at the moment, nor even in his physical prime, given his bone spurs.

    Fitness testing has been around almost as long as schools. One constant across societies is the belief, among the older generations, that the kids have gone soft. An early physical-education scholar noted that boys in Sparta went through similar assessments, including “what might be considered periodical tests of [the] capacity to endure, for at one of the annual festivals the flogging of youths was an essential feature, often carried to the drawing of blood.” Today, kids in Europe are tested in plate-tapping, hand-gripping, and something called the “flamingo balance test.” Some students in Australia are assessed on how far they can throw a basketball. No one needs an enumeration of all the positive effects of exercise, on health, on social connections, on self-esteem, or otherwise. Still, only a quarter of Americans get sufficient exercise, according to the C.D.C. Critics of the fitness test have pointed out that, by ritually humiliating a large portion of the kids involved, it probably discouraged exercise.

    Obama’s response was to eliminate the testing portion and to encourage activity in other ways. But testing has its virtues. We test in math or reading to make sure students have the minimum levels of proficiency necessary to thrive in society. We could do the same for physical activities. No one needs to be taught how to touch their toes, and everyone who can run knows how to. But why not allow students to pick a more technically difficult activity to be tested on, like swimming or skating? The idea is to leave school proficient in some activity that might make you happy. The ability to swim in the ocean or skate on a frozen lake is a gift, a license to partake in some of the joys of being alive. Kids could learn how to hit a baseball, or to fly a kite—or to fish or to play wheelchair basketball. For kids who like boredom and pain, Trump could even create a proficiency test for golf. This could be a bulwark of democracy, not, as Kennedy envisioned, as a defense against armies of ripped Italian teens but, rather, as fertilizer for areas of common interest. At least it might provide counterpoints to the phone, or a small source of contentment.

    This idea itself has actually been tested. Undergrads at Columbia have long had to swim seventy-five yards in order to graduate. A few years ago, Dartmouth replaced its swim test with a wellness requirement, which could be fulfilled through courses such as skiing, hiking, or kayaking. (There are also options for mini-courses on mindfulness, sleep, and reflective journaling.)

    Another, if lesser, idea would be to make the test finally live up to its name. Every year, Trump could perform each of the exercises in his own test. Kids could then compete to beat him. And why stop there? There are other types of fitness—mental, Darwinian—that present the opportunity for more tests. In his first term, Trump took a cognitive-fitness test, meant to assess signs of dementia. “It’s, like, you’ll go, ‘Person, woman, man, camera, TV,’ ” Trump explained. “They say, ‘Could you repeat that?’ So I said, ‘Yeah, it’s person, woman, man, camera, TV.’ ” He added, “It’s actually not that easy, but, for me, it was easy.”

    And then there’s fitness for office. The Constitution tried to define this with the Twenty-fifth Amendment—a President is unfit if he is “unable to discharge the powers and duties” of the Presidency. But that’s pretty vague. No one has developed a test for this yet, but apparently Lawrence Taylor is available. ♦

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    Zach Helfand

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  • Trump has won a second term–here’s what that means for schools

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

    On the campaign trail, Donald Trump pledged to get rid of the U.S. Department of Education, expand school choice, roll back new protections for LGBTQ students, and deport millions of undocumented immigrants.

    Now that the former Republican president is headed to a second term, the question becomes how likely Trump is to act on his most extreme or implausible proposals and what effects students, teachers, and parents will see in the classroom.

    Trump won a decisive victory, picking up nearly every swing state and gaining ground among young voters and voters of color who have been essential members of the Democratic coalition.

    Chalkbeat spoke to advocates, experts, and former education department officials about what to expect from the next administration. They widely agreed that President Joe Biden’s Title IX rewrite, which extended new protections for transgender students and is currently tied up in the courts, will be repealed, that civil rights enforcement will look very different, and that future education budgets will be more austere.

    But they disagreed on how likely it is that Trump would actually do away with the U.S. Department of Education and how much progress he might make toward federal support for school choice.

    A lot will depend on who controls Congress. Votes are still being counted in key races, but Republicans will control the Senate. Control of the House remains unclear and may not be known for days. A trifecta could clear the way for a broader Trump agenda. If Democrats take control of the House, Trump would have to rely more on his executive authority. But even on some key conservative priorities, Republicans are not unanimous, and some may balk at proposals they see as expanding the federal role or disadvantaging their constituents.

    Trump’s pick for education secretary — whether he opts for an experienced administrator or a dedicated culture warrior — will also shape his education agenda.

    Calls to abolish the Department of Education have new momentum

    Arguably this has been Trump’s most consistent promise on education policy but also the one that seems most far-fetched to some political observers. Conservatives have talked about getting rid of the department for almost as long as it’s existed, and Trump didn’t make any moves to dismantle it in his first administration.

    Fully dismantling the department would require an act of Congress. But Trump could limit its reach in other ways, such as eliminating or moving programs, removing career bureaucrats, and proposing much tighter budgets.

    But Jim Blew, who served in Trump’s education department in his first administration and went on to found the Defense of Freedom Institute, said Trump has been adamant that he wants to get rid of the department and that alone gives the idea more “heft.” Blew also believes public support for a federal role in education is changing. Many people don’t think the federal investment in COVID recovery yielded much, he said. At the same time, people see initiatives such as student loan forgiveness and protections for transgender students as examples of federal overreach.

    It would take months to take the department apart, Blew said, because every function mandated by Congress would need a new home. But that could be done, he said. Civil rights enforcement could move to the U.S. Department of Justice, for example, and Title I funding for high-poverty schools could become a block grant administered by the U.S. Department of Human Services.

    Trump has been clear that his priorities are economic recovery, immigration, and national defense, Blew said, but that doesn’t mean he won’t follow through on education promises.

    “It doesn’t need a lot of attention,” Blew said. “It needs political capital. And he can expend that while remaining focused on other priorities.”

    Immigration enforcement could ripple through school communities

    Trump made demonization of immigrants the centerpiece of his campaign, highlighting at every turn examples of crimes committed by undocumented immigrants or asylum seekers and the impact of immigration on American communities and schools.

    Trump has promised to carry out the largest deportation operation in American history. Some experts on immigration policy have said such an effort would be legally and logistically challenging, as well as very expensive. Nonetheless, most observers expect to see an increase in enforcement.

    Previous workplace raids have had widespread impacts on students whose parents were arrested, as well as on the broader community. An estimated 4.4 million American children have at least one undocumented parent, and some former Trump immigration officials have suggested that families be deported together.

    Mike Petrilli, president of the conservative education advocacy organization The Fordham Institute, believes Trump’s education policies won’t make much difference in American classrooms, but his immigration policy may be felt in dramatic ways.

    “It’s what he’s campaigned on, it’s what he’s promised to do, and he’d have a pretty free hand to do it,” said Petrilli, who has argued that American schools have a moral obligation as well as a legal one to educate all children who live here.

    “The chances that it’s a humanitarian disaster are quite high,” Petrilli said. “Is he going to put people in camps? Will that include families? Are there going to be schools in these camps? I don’t see any reason we should believe they won’t give that a try.”

    Even if enforcement is spotty, changes to federal policy have the potential to sow confusion and chaos in local communities, said Janelle Scott, a professor at University of California Berkeley. Some families may keep children home from school out of fear, she said. The messages that local law enforcement and school district officials send to families in this situation could make a difference.

    Transgender students could lose new protections as civil rights enforcement changes

    When the Biden administration issued new Title IX rules that clarified and strengthened protections for transgender students, Republican states and conservative groups, including Blew’s Defense of Freedom Institute, quickly filed lawsuits that led to the rules being blocked in a majority of states.

    Conservatives argued that the new rules eroded protections for cisgender girls because they might have to share bathrooms and locker rooms with transgender classmates and affected the free speech rights of teachers who might be forced to use pronouns and names they disagreed with. They also argued the Biden administration overstepped by defining discrimination on the basis of gender identity as a form of sex discrimination.

    Trump is expected to rescind the Biden rules, a move that would still require a lengthy bureaucratic process. But some observers have larger fears for a Trump administration. He has repeatedly accused schools of performing gender surgeries without parental permission — a false and baseless claim — and attacked the idea of gender-affirming care for youth, as well as participation in sports by transgender athletes.

    “There have been fantastical claims, but undergirding that is a deep hostility to queer kids as well as allegations that schools are engaging in child abuse if they protect the rights of queer kids,” said Scott, the UC Berkeley professor.

    Trump’s first administration also revoked Obama-era guidance on school discipline that aimed to reduce suspensions and expulsions for students of color and emphasized quick resolution of complaints. Some conservative groups have also used civil rights complaints to go after programs that aim to support Black student excellence or mentor teachers of color.

    Rick Hess, a senior fellow at the conservative American Enterprise Institute, said a Trump education department or justice department could make high-profile examples of a few school districts’ diversity initiatives and bring about more widespread change, similar to how the Obama administration targeted districts over school discipline.

    School choice gets a modest momentum boost

    Expanding taxpayer funding for private schools and home-schooling have topped the conservative education agenda in recent years. A proposed federal tax credit scholarship program backed by Trump’s first education secretary, Betsy DeVos, failed to get any traction. But during Biden’s presidency, Republican-led states have expanded or started private school choice programs, some of which offer money to nearly all interested families.

    On Fox News, Trump promised to sign school choice legislation that passed a House committee, and at a barbershop in the Bronx, he talked about the importance of school choice.

    Blew expects Trump to push for a tax credit scholarship proposal similar to the one drafted during his first presidency.

    Petrilli isn’t convinced that Trump cares that much. “It’s a stretch to say that he’s made it a priority on the campaign trail,” he said. “He has to be reminded to talk about it.”

    Petrilli is also not convinced there would be enough support even in a Republican-controlled Congress to send a bill to Trump’s desk. Some rural Republicans, whose constituents have few private school options, are skeptical. So are small government conservatives who don’t want to expand federal programs.

    Voters in three states — including two that Trump won by large margins — rejected school choice at the ballot on Tuesday, indicating that even many conservatives have qualms about spending public money on private schools.

    But Congress will have to reauthorize Trump’s tax cuts, and a tax credit that allows businesses and individuals to write off donations to private school scholarships could be included there. Observers also expect to see a push to allow families to use money in tax-favored 529 accounts to pay for homeschooling expenses, tutoring, and other educational needs. That money already can be used for private school tuition.

    This is a developing story and will be updated.

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

    Related:
    The purpose of a K-12 education: Who decides and how do we get there?
    Learn how to modernize your K-12 financial operations
    For more on education policy, visit eSN’s Educational Leadership hub

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    Erica Meltzer, Chalkbeat

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  • How to Reduce Chronic Absenteeism in Schools

    How to Reduce Chronic Absenteeism in Schools

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    Since the Covid-19 pandemic, the rate of students who are chronically absent—defined as missing just under one month of class—has doubled to 26 percent nationally, reaching crisis levels and threatening the educational foundation of our nation’s youth. Chronic absenteeism is estimated to be responsible for up to 27 percent of the overall decline in math test scores and a shocking 45 percent of the drop in reading scores between 2019 and 2022.

    To combat this problem, the company Edia recently unveiled an AI-powered platform aimed at school districts across America. Within minutes of an absence, Edia initiates personalized AI-driven conversations with families in more than 100 languages, enabling school districts to identify and tackle root causes of chronic absenteeism.

    “Today, nearly three-quarters of absences are unexplained, meaning no one called in ahead of time and districts don’t know where those children are,” said Joe Philleo, CEO of Edia. “With so many students missing school, staff don’t have the capacity to reach out to every single family and understand what is happening with their child.”

    “Every situation is different,” Philleo continues. “When staff don’t know the reason students are missing school, they can’t fix the root cause. One student may miss school because they don’t have reliable transportation, and another student may skip Math and English in the morning and just attend Computer and Welding at the end of the day because they find those classes more engaging.”

    By leveraging AI, Edia enables schools to identify and solve the root causes of chronic absenteeism. Its system ensures no absence goes unnoticed, helping to restore accountability, rebuild connections between schools and families, and resolve underlying challenges that keep students from attending class.

    Key features of the Edia AI platform include:

    1. AI Conversations within minutes of Absence: Personalized text message conversations in 100+ languages sent to parents within minutes of an absence, reducing unexplained absences by up to 80 percent.
    2. Analysis to understand why students are missing class: Texts, calls, and notes come together in a single profile to identify why students are missing school and enable teams to take the right set of action.
    3. Purpose-built workflows for MTSS interventions: Ability to launch, track, and coordinate personalized intervention plans for students at risk.

    Edia’s new solution is currently being used in K-12 school districts nationwide, including Raton Public Schools, Farmington Municipal Schools, and Hobbs Municipal Schools.

    “Chronic absenteeism is a significant issue in education and in the Raton Public Schools that can severely impact student achievement and the long-term success of a student,” Kristie Medina, Superintendent at Raton Public Schools. “It refers to students missing a substantial number of school days, typically defined as 10 percent or more of the school year, for any reason, whether excused or unexcused. The challenge of chronic absenteeism lies in its widespread impact, affecting not just individual students but the entire school community. Our district is committed to addressing chronic absenteeism because it is critical to ensuring every student has the opportunity to succeed and thrive in both school and life.

    Medina continued, “I’m genuinely excited for Raton Public Schools to implement Edia’s AI Attendance Solution! The integration of AI into tracking and improving attendance will be a game-changer, especially when tackling chronic absenteeism. By leveraging AI, the district can gain deeper insights into attendance patterns, identify at-risk students earlier, and tailor interventions more effectively.”

    Kevin Hogan
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    Kevin Hogan

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  • Colorado Big Brothers, Big Sisters guides kids, combats “epidemic of loneliness” – The Cannabist

    Colorado Big Brothers, Big Sisters guides kids, combats “epidemic of loneliness” – The Cannabist

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    When Towani Clarke met 12-year-old Antoniece, she’d been struggling with a way of living she describes as “blinkered,” moving through daily duties from her job at Nordstrom to the yoga classes she teaches to home.

    Clarke came to Colorado four years ago from Zambia, where she founded an Afro-chic women’s clothes company.  She missed the intergenerational contact common in Zambia. Her own children had grown.

    The Denver Post Season To Share is the annual holiday fundraising campaign for The Denver Post and The Denver Post Community Foundation, a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization. Grants are awarded to local nonprofit agencies that provide life-changing programs to help low-income children, families and individuals move out of poverty toward stabilization and self-sufficiency. Visit seasontoshare.com for more information.

    Read the rest of this story on TheKnow.DenverPost.com.

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    The Cannabist Network

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  • Creating esports programs with managed network services

    Creating esports programs with managed network services

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    Key points:

    Esports programs are continuing to grow in popularity, as evidenced by the widespread adoption by schools across the country. In fact, the global esports market is projected to grow to $4.8 billion by 2030. While esports programs are more commonly found on college and university campuses, high schools and even middle schools have started launching programs. 

    Participating in esports can help students develop teamwork and leadership skills, and may even lead to scholarship opportunities at certain colleges and universities, according to Scholarships.com. Technology serves as the underlying foundation for any scholastic esports program; however, organizers don’t need to have robust internal IT teams–the expertise of a technology partner can help get students into the esports arena. 

    Bringing an esports program to life 

    A modern digital infrastructure is the critical foundation for a successful esports program. In the world of online gaming, a few milliseconds can make the difference between a win or loss–with school pride, prizes, and potentially scholarships on the line. Latency or lag time in a school’s internet connection can significantly impact the outcome of a competition. Using a dedicated wired connection can provide optimal reliability and minimize latency. It is also helpful to consider service-level agreements (SLAs) from providers that not only guarantee reliability, but also include strong metrics for performance indicators such as latency. As the esports program grows, the digital infrastructure should be able to easily scale. The increased bandwidth required by adding more players and playing increasingly high-resolution games shouldn’t risk affecting other school operations on the network.  

    The Cannon School, a K-12 school in Concord, North Carolina, has created a successful esports program that serves both as a recreational league and a competitive varsity sport. The school opted for a co-managed system where its service partner installed fiber connectivity and manages the security of the network–unified threat management that includes a firewall, advanced malware protection, and intrusion prevention–while Cannon School’s internal IT team manages the content filtering to ensure that students are accessing only age-appropriate websites.  

    Approximately 60 students joined Cannon School’s esports program in its first two years of operating and about half compete on the varsity team. Tram Tran, the school’s Manager of Information Technology, credits its popularity to the simple fact that young people love computer gaming. Tran expects the school’s esports program to see a surge in participants over the next several years, and the implemented IT solution can easily scale to address the greater number of users on the system, as well as the ever-increasing data-intensive video games.  

    “With our esports program, we are building this pathway from high school to college and then from college to the pros,” Tran said. 

    Securing technology as the foundation for esports 

    Understanding and implementing the technology foundation necessary may be daunting for schools with limited internal IT resources, but working with an experienced technology partner can help. Technology partners not only offer the expertise and guidance needed for implementing an esports program, but also can provide ongoing support–through managed network services–to ensure that network operations are continually monitored and that competitions have the bandwidth needed to run smoothly.  

    According to the Consortium for School Networking (CoSN) on the 2023 State of EdTech Leadership, nearly half of respondents (45 percent) felt inadequately staffed to plan and implement new technology. Managed network services can offer schools peace of mind by monitoring for network performance and cybersecurity issues 24/7, freeing IT staff from day-to-day troubleshooting. Beyond supplementing staffing resources, managed services also offer the benefit of no upfront hardware ownership costs, and the fixed, regular expense offers predictability for schools’ budgets.  

    Next steps 

    For schools thinking about launching an esports program, a conversation with a potential technology solutions partner is a good place to start. An experienced partner can evaluate a school’s current IT network services, help identify what is required, and determine a realistic plan and timeline to establish a program. Schools equipped with a robust digital infrastructure can offer students unique opportunities to compete, collaborate, and thrive in the realm of esports, and leveraging managed network services for help with the technology performance can make things easier for the employees who are focused on the program’s execution and success.  

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    Mark Kornegay, Spectrum Enterprise

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  • Haworth & MiEN Announce Partnership

    Haworth & MiEN Announce Partnership

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    Haworth and  MiEN are announcing a partnership to grow both companies’ presence in the education market. MiEN will join Haworth as a  partner brand, offering specialized solutions that build on Haworth’s comprehensive suite of products for higher education and K-12 learning environments. 

    “Both Haworth and MiEN understand the landscape of innovative education spaces, how to support schools and how to create environments to drive more success for students. At our core, MiEN specializes in K-12 with products that seamlessly transition into higher education. With the Haworth partnership, we now have a stronger trajectory for those higher education environments.” Remco Bergsma, MiEN Founder and CEO.

    “Haworth and our dealership network are already serving the higher education market and having access to MiEN products will allow us to expand our solution set for those clients. We can now provide more robust solutions that meet the needs of the ever-changing K-12 market,” said Jack Cottrell, Haworth’s Vice President of Channel & Dealer Development. “It’s a mutually beneficial relationship based on a similar go-to-market position and organizational cultures.”

    This partnership allows each company, individually and collectively, to provide more complete solutions for students, faculty and staff. As Haworth continues to sharpen its focus on providing great spaces for learning, wherever they may be, expanding its presence especially within the K-12 segment is an obvious next step.

    Haworth and MiEN culturally align through core values – solving customer needs to create more effective spaces. Both partners have a deep desire to study and understand how to create learning environments that make a difference to students and faculty. It is also beneficial that Haworth and MiEN are both located in West Michigan, allowing for joint developments and operational efficiencies.

    About Haworth

    Haworth believes great spaces empower people to thrive and work their best. As a leading global furniture maker, the company partners with customers, dealers and influencers to create spaces that result in effective people and efficient real estate. Haworth’s customer-first approach comes from an entrepreneurial spirit, design-forward thinking and multicultural perspectives. Founded in 1948, Haworth is a privately-owned company operating in more than 150 countries through a global network of 400 dealers and 8,000 employees. Headquartered in Holland, Michigan, U.S.A., the company has sales of $2.57 billion USD.

    About MiEN 

    MiEN is a global company serving the education industry with innovative furniture products and services that promote and support active and interactive learning environments in engaging and functional ways. An American company with a strong European influence, its products and services represent the ideas and collaborative efforts of an expert team of suppliers, designers and engineers. Built strong and durable using eco-friendly, sustainable materials, its products rank high in the industry in meeting the demands of creating dynamic and collaborative learning environments.

    eSchool News Staff
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    ESchool News Staff

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  • Gen Z teens feel crushing pressure to be high-achievers. Here are 6 ways parents can help.

    Gen Z teens feel crushing pressure to be high-achievers. Here are 6 ways parents can help.

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    While I am years out of high school, my memories of crumbling under its demands remain sharp in my mind. After returning from cross-country practice in the evening and speeding through dinner to crack the textbooks awaiting me, tears would often fall on my pages under the pressure—self-inflicted, social, and familial—to be perfect by achieving the highest grades, exceeding in every class and extracurricular, and getting into the best college.

    Today, teens are under that same pressure—if not more, thanks to the added weight of social-media comparison—and we know much more about how detrimental that can be to their mental health.

    That obsession with success is a topic that piqued the interest of journalist Jennifer Breheny Wallace, mom to kids ages 19, 17, and 14. She began to research the topic when her eldest son was in eighth grade, and published her findings in a book published last year, Never Enough: When Achievement Culture Becomes Toxic—And What We Can Do About It.

    “Achievement is not the problem,” Wallace tells Fortune she learned. “It’s the way that we’ve come to talk about achievement.”

    In the most extreme cases, teens turn to substance abuse, isolation, depression, and suicidal thoughts when they feel under constant pressure to achieve and believe they cannot live up to it.

    But after doing two national surveys of over 6,000 parents and 500 young adults as part of her research, Wallace uncovered patterns crucial to ensuring kids can be successful, both academically and mentally, and on the path to becoming well-adjusted adults. Below, some of Wallace’s advice about how parents can provide shelter from the storm of toxic teenage pressures. 

    Show your kids the joy you feel from being their parent

    Wallace says one of the first things parents can do is make home a “haven” from the pressures they feel at school and on social media to constantly achieve.

    To do that, minimize criticism and prioritize affection, Wallace says. She uses the phrase “greet them like the family dog greets you” when they get home: In other words, show them the pure joy you get just from being their parent. Instead of immediately asking them how they performed on a test the moment they walk through the door, she says, ask them how they’re doing.

    That turns home into “a place our kids never feel like they have to perform a certain way to be lovable to us,” Wallace tells Fortune. 

    Help them see that they matter outside of achievement

    One of the biggest takeaways Wallace found in her research was the importance of “mattering.” This is when children feel like they are valued and that they add value to the world around them, she explains. That feeling should transcend test scores, where they go to college, what they look like, and what kind of accolades they receive.

    “We love our kids unconditionally, but they don’t always feel like we regard them unconditionally,” Wallace says.

    She noticed that kids who struggled most felt their purpose was contingent on performance—causing them to shy away from taking big risks out of a fear of failure that would take away their value.

    But how do you help your kids feel like they matter? By getting to know them, Wallace says. Show them that they add value to the world because of who they are at their core. She says even by noticing the little things about them—how funny they can be, little quirks about them that you love—you show them you value their whole person, not just their measurable achievements.

    When children feel like they matter, Wallace says, it acts as a “protective shield,” and often has the added benefit of allowing them to be more successful. They’re willing to strive for bigger goals knowing they matter outside of the outcomes of them, she says. 

    “Through mattering…we give our kids a kind of healthy fuel that propels them to achieve, and to achieve for things that mean more than just individual success and resume building,” Wallace says. “It sets our kids up to find purpose.”

    For help in getting to know your child, Wallace recommends the Values in Action survey, which can guide parents and kids to better understand their unique character strengths. 

    “Signal to kids that you believe they can do this,” Wallace says. And if they can’t, she adds, make sure they know your love doesn’t waver. “The primary job of a parent is to support a kid’s development of sense of self.”

    Be their biggest supporter

    Also crucial is to not let your own frustrations negatively impact interactions around their schoolwork.

    If your child is struggling, instead of getting frustrated with them, start to investigate any underlying reasons, Wallace suggests. Are they having a difficult time socially? Is their workspace at home too distracting?

    Wallace says parents can help kids focus on getting work done at home by creating a plan with them, rather than only focusing on the outcomes of their work. That is often easier when parents lean into their kids’ strengths while getting involved in the process. Parents are often wired to focus on what’s going wrong, she says, not what they are already doing well.

    But, Wallace says, it’s important to “let your child know you’re on their team,” and that means helping them focus on their strengths.

    Be mindful of how you share input

    How you communicate your frustrations is crucial, too. If you do get upset with them, Wallace says to make sure you “separate the deed from the doer.” You might not like what they did, but you have to make sure they know you still love them.

    “That is really one of the most challenging things for a parent,” Wallace acknowledges, especially when you’re tired, stressed, and lacking bandwidth. Take a beat and get yourself in the right frame of mind to express how you feel, so your kids know you don’t think they are bad, even if their behavior is.

    Be aware of status anxiety

    For millennials who felt the financial strain and economic uncertainty from the 2008 recession and are now parents themselves, Wallace says they have started “safeguarding” their children’s economic futures by pushing for them to go to prestigious colleges. That is what she calls “status anxiety,” in which parents impose pressure on their children out of fear that they will face economic hardship if they aren’t high-achievers.

    What that’s resulted in, Wallace says, is additional stress that kids don’t need.

    If you might be subconsciously externalizing status anxiety in how you talk to your children, the first step is to reflect and get aware, Wallace says. The next: Get clear on your values.

    Wallace says the best way to combat this is to make sure both you and your children are not surrounded by messages that activate status-seeking extrinsic values, such as finding worth in high test scores, a high income, and appearance-driven behaviors.

    She recommends taking a hard look at your own calendar first—are you prioritizing things that bring you intrinsic satisfaction, like family dinners and time with friends? Wallace says you want to model the behavior that ensures your children won’t prioritize the pursuit of extrinsic goals, which can lead to an absence of mattering and self-worth if values come from goals surrounding status over meaningful purpose.

    Take a look at their calendars too, she says, to see what sort of values they are spending their time on. 

    Don’t forget to take care of yourself

    Parents are under a lot of pressure too, says Wallace. The Surgeon General’s most recent advisory on parental well-being highlighted financial strain, isolation and loneliness, and cultural pressures as just a few of the factors causing the current mental health crisis for parents. 

    In Wallace’s survey conducted with Harvard (published in her book) of over 6,000 parents from early 2020, 83% of parents somewhat or strongly agreed that their children’s academic success is a reflection of their parenting. And now, they might be panicking as they try to balance worrying about their children’s futures with not being too overbearing in supporting their kids’ success.

    But if there’s one takeaway Wallace has for parents trying to manage their own stress, it’s this: “Never worry alone.”

    Instead, prioritize a strong support network, which can be built by getting clear on your values. Because not only will valuing meaningful relationships lessen parental isolation through a strong support system, says Wallace, it will model intrinsic values and healthy behaviors for your children.

    “It’s never been harder to be a parent,” she says. “You are worthy of support…of surrounding yourself with people who value you.”

    More on teens and mental health:

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    Ani Freedman

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  • California Is Flooding School Cafeterias With Vegan Meals—and Kids Like It

    California Is Flooding School Cafeterias With Vegan Meals—and Kids Like It

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    Student nutrition directors like Primer say the foundation that allows schools to experiment with new recipes is California’s universal free lunch program. She notes that, when school lunch is free, students are more likely to actually try and enjoy it: “Free food plus good food equals a participation meal increase every time.”

    Nora Stewart, the author of the Friends of the Earth report, says the recent increase in vegan school lunch options has also been in response to a growing demand for less meat and dairy in cafeterias from climate-conscious students. “We’re seeing a lot of interest from students and parents to have more plant-based [meals] as a way to really help curb greenhouse gas emissions,” she said. A majority of Gen Zers—79 percent—say they would eat meatless at least once or twice a week, according to research conducted by Aramark, a company provides food services to school districts and universities, among other clients. And the food-service company that recently introduced an all-vegetarian menu in the San Francisco Unified School District credits students with having “led the way” in asking for less meat in their cafeterias. The menu includes four vegan options: an edamame teriyaki bowl, a bean burrito bowl, a taco bowl with a pea-based meat alternative, and marinara pasta.

    Stewart theorizes that school nutrition directors are also increasingly aware of other benefits to serving vegan meals. “A lot of school districts are recognizing that they can integrate more culturally diverse options with more plant-based meals,” said Stewart. In the past five years, the nonprofit found, California school districts have added 41 new vegan dishes to their menus, including chana masala bowls, vegan tamales, and falafel wraps. Dairy-free meals also benefit lactose-intolerant students, who are more likely to be students of color.

    Still, vegan meals are hardly the default in California cafeterias, and in many places, they’re unheard of. Out of the 25 largest school districts in the state, only three elementary districts offer daily vegan options, the same number as did in 2019. According to Friends of the Earth, a fourth of the California school districts they reviewed offer no plant-based meal options; in another fourth, the only vegan option for students is a peanut butter and jelly sandwich. “I was surprised to see that,” said Stewart.

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    Frida Garza

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  • To start the school year off right, invest in literacy

    To start the school year off right, invest in literacy

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    Key points:

    As a country, we are at a pivotal time. Recent national test scores found that our country’s eighth graders are still a full school year behind pre-COVID levels in their reading and math achievements. This is tough news to swallow, but I’m choosing to view this as motivation. 

    As the executive principal at the Emma Donnan campus of Adelante Schools in Indianapolis, I want my students to be successful. My goal is for students to gain essential academic skills and build a robust social-emotional toolkit so they are set up to thrive in an ever-changing world. At Adelante Schools, one of the key ways we’re pursuing that goal is by going all in on literacy. Reading is foundational to everything in a young person’s life–in and out of the classroom. 

    This year’s Indiana IREAD scores proved that far too many students–about one in five–are struggling to hit their grade-level reading benchmarks. However, these scores also showed that Adelante’s investments in literacy are working: The percentage of our third graders who passed the assessment increased from 57.5 percent to 71.9 percent in a year. 

    I’m proud we have implemented initiatives that are proving effective for student achievement. Here’s what we have done, and what I implore other school leaders to explore so we can all work toward student success together.  

    Invest in early reading and the science of reading in a holistic manner. Students are struggling to read, and it’s a crisis. Working with support organizations like We Are Lit and Relay Graduate School of Education, we have developed a professional development system to provide teachers with deep dives into the cognitive science of reading, individualized support, ongoing coaching, real-time feedback, and practice clinics. It’s not enough just to provide some one-time workshops–we must continually invest in building teachers’ skills. Teachers also observe and track the minute data of student reading skills that often go overlooked.  

    Bring data to life and prioritize planning. It’s important to dive into annual test scores and national reports, but if we want to be effective educators we need to be conducting real-time data analysis and adjusting as we go.  As a member of the Relay Leadership Leverage Institute Fellowship, I have the privilege of meeting with school leaders from all over the country to learn from experts and hone in on our leadership priorities. This year, data and planning have been at the forefront. One poignant recommendation is to engage in deep analysis of student work weekly. Not quarterly, not yearly. Weekly. This is not about just pulling up test scores but rather, looking at what students authentically produce to get into the weeds of what they know and don’t know. This will allow leaders and teachers to effectively identify brights spots or gaps in student understanding, plan to reteach the gaps, and build on the mastered concepts. When you’re on the road and you hit a roadblock, do you stop and turn around? No; you find another way to reach your destination. That’s what we need to do with our teaching. To implement effective instruction, we must be checking in regularly and planning based on real-time needs.  

    Build your A-team. As a school leader, I know I need to delegate. We have created and invested in specialized roles; we have a dedicated Chief Literacy Officer who is responsible for overseeing and driving the school’s literacy initiatives. We also have a chief mathematics officer. We know we need the right people who are committed and knowledgeable–this is especially pertinent for our staff and leadership. When we have this strong bench in place, we are better set up to support our teachers. When teachers are better set up for success, that trickles down to students. And aren’t students what this is all about? 

    I call on school leaders to look under the hoods of their schools. The start of the school year allows you to model best practices to set your staff, teachers and students up for success with renewed energy for the year to come. As we model teamwork for our students, let us school leaders learn from each other to ensure that every single student knows their school is providing them with an excellent education. 

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    Kendra Randle, the Emma Donnan Campus of Adelante Schools

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  • OCPS Announces Closure of Schools Due to Hurricane Milton

    OCPS Announces Closure of Schools Due to Hurricane Milton

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    Orange County Public Schools (OCPS) announced the closure of Orlando schools due to Hurricane Milton, as the school system continues to monitor and track the storm.

    Based on the latest forecast, Orange County Public Schools announced that all after-school activities will be canceled beginning tomorrow, Tuesday, October 8th with the exception of after-school childcare. All OCPS schools and facilities will be closed on Wednesday, October 9th and Thursday, October 10th.

    This is due to the projected impact of the hurricane in Orange County and some schools will be used as shelters.

    Any decision on schools for Friday, October 11th will be determined by the impact on Orange County, according to officials.

    The local school district’s Safety and Emergency Management team works closely with the Orange County Office of Emergency Management and other Central Florida officials to ensure the school district’s decision-making is aligned with local partners.

    Many parents and families in Orange County were waiting for this announcement as Central Florida prepares for the incoming hurricane. While Florida’s west coast braces for impact, the National Weather Service in Melbourne has also issued several warnings and advisories for the Orlando area, adding “residents and visitors should be preparing for hurricane conditions across East Central Florida.”

    OCPS will communicate all additional Hurricane Milton updates with families and employees through Connect Orange phone calls/emails/text messages, posts to OCPS social media pages and online.

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  • 5 high school students from around the country have been named National Student Poets

    5 high school students from around the country have been named National Student Poets

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    NEW YORK (AP) — Five high school students, residing far from each other while sharing visions of community and self-expression, have been named National Student Poets.

    Each of the poets will represent different parts of the country. Robert Gao of University Laboratory High School in Champaign, Illinois, will cover the Midwest. Marcus Burns of Vermont’s St. Johnsbury Academy will be based in the Northeast. Nadia Wright of Murrah High School in Jackson, Mississippi, will be the poet for the Southeast. Sofia Kamal of Rancho Solano Preparatory School in Phoenix, Arizona, is the student poet for the Southwest and the West’s regional poet is Anya Melchinger of Mid-Pacific Institute in Honolulu.

    The National Student Poets Program (NSPP) is a partnership of the Institute of Museum and Library Services (IMLS) and the nonprofit Alliance for Young Artists & Writers, which presents the Scholastic Art & Writing Awards, whose winners helped form the pool of student poet finalists. The poets, each of whom will receive $5,000, will spend the next year engaging with young people through readings, workshops and other projects.

    “We proudly recognize the Class of 2024 NSPP poets, whose remarkable talent and artistry will shine throughout their year of service, inspiring communities across the nation,” IMLS Acting Director Cyndee Landrum said in a statement Thursday. “We celebrate the collective energy of libraries, museums, schools and communities, working together to create safe harbors where young artists can thrive and flourish.”

    Image

    In their own work, the students draw upon family background, the natural world and the struggles to endure.

    In Burns’ “Yiping’s Asian Market,” he remembers the hardship of his grandmother and how “Her sacrifice brought us to America, something to be grateful for,” while Gao’s “Risky Hand” evokes “our father, adorned with the waxen spit from colleagues, candied in teething denim and Marlboros in orbit.”

    Kamal, in the poem “Gas Station,” looks to the moon and finds it “lobed with/desire left unanswered, its edge rusted over/by centuries of eyes.” In Melchinger’s “sometimes i wonder how we sleep,” she shows is a house “where the ground breathes beneath us black soil expanding/and contracting with the rain sending cracks into the foundation rattling/our paper thin walls.”

    Wright’s “Where I’m going” is an ode to the country and her own “sweet and sour” upbringing in the American South. She dreams of “long hugs from strong women/whose never rest/whose souls never quit” and savors “rich German chocolate cake/sweet, sweet homemade lemonade/Oh, just the thought of it/makes my mouth water.”

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  • COVID money countdown: Schools exhaust pandemic aid as federal help winds down

    COVID money countdown: Schools exhaust pandemic aid as federal help winds down

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

    Over the last three years, an influx of pandemic aid has been transformative for many schools.

    Some were able to hire social workers or give every child a laptop for the first time. Others fixed up old buildings, tutored struggling students, or revamped summer school programs.

    But that era is quickly drawing to a close. And this month marks an important stop on the way toward the end of COVID relief.

    Schools have to say by the end of this month how they plan to spend the last of their $123 billion from the American Rescue Plan, the third and final batch of schools’ COVID aid from the federal government. Then they have until Jan. 28, 2025 to spend the money.

    The deadline at the end of September matters a lot: Schools that have any money not earmarked by then could eventually have to return the funds to the federal government. And some states have said they are concerned that schools may be at risk of not meeting that deadline.

    Schools can seek an extension to spend their remaining aid until March 2026. But that won’t give them more time to officially decide how to use it — leaving some scrambling to come up with a plan before the deadline in 11 days.

    “We have been in contact, in many cases multiple times, with districts and charters to remind them of their responsibility to obligate these funds,” Tom Horne, Arizona’s state superintendent, said in a news release earlier this week. “Most are showing the ability to do this, but a number of them are at great risk of reverting funds.”

    Some Arizona school districts or charter schools had yet to commit any of their funds to a specific purpose, Horne said, and many others have earmarked only a fraction of their aid.

    Michigan said it expected some federal aid would be returned by schools, but noted it had left less than 1% of the first two aid packages on the table.

    “We do anticipate that some school districts and subgrantees will not be able to obligate funds by the end of the month and may revert funds back to the federal government,” Jeremy Meyer, a spokesperson for the Colorado Department of Education, told Chalkbeat in an email.

    Still, federal officials told reporters on Thursday they were confident that little if any money was at risk of being returned by schools. Schools across the country have already spent and been reimbursed for 87% of their American Rescue Plan dollars, officials said. Much of the remaining money has been spent, too, but hasn’t yet shown up on spending trackers due to record-keeping lags.

    Schools can’t use the aid to pay staff salaries after this month. But they can continue using it to do things like pay tutors to work with their students, finish up a construction project, or contract with a community organization to help with attendance outreach.

    Federal officials have said they would look especially favorably on applications to spend the money beyond the usual timeline on Biden administration priorities, such as intensive tutoring, efforts to boost attendance, and extra instructional time.

    Delaware, Kansas, Kentucky, Nebraska, and Puerto Rico have already applied for and received spending extensions on behalf of some districts and schools. These extensions cover some $1.1 billion in aid, federal officials said.

    Several other states, including Colorado, Illinois, Maryland, Michigan, Mississippi, New Jersey, New York, Tennessee, and Washington, D.C., told Chalkbeat that they intended to apply for spending extensions in the coming weeks or months.

    Nationwide, schools have already spent about $1.5 billion beyond original deadlines after getting extensions on their first two aid packages, federal officials said.

    Schools have struggled for a number of reasons to spend down their pandemic aid, though often not for lack of need.

    Construction delays held up spending in Mississippi, where schools spent a large share of aid on building projects. Meanwhile, supply-chain issues slowed spending in Tennessee and Illinois.

    In Colorado, some schools had trouble filling certain educator positions amidst national shortages, or they planned to hire a company to provide training and were still waiting for that service to come through, Meyer wrote.

    In other cases, not as many students or staff showed up to certain activities like summer school or after-school programs as originally anticipated, so they ended up costing less than expected.

    Chalkbeat is a nonprofit news organization covering public education.

    Related:
    Federal COVID relief dollars improved student test scores, two new studies find
    As COVID relief spending deadlines loom, one district moves ahead with an uncommon tech plan
    For more news on pandemic aid, visit eSN’s Educational Leadership hub

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    Kalyn Belsha, Chalkbeat

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  • California becomes latest state to restrict student smartphone use at school

    California becomes latest state to restrict student smartphone use at school

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    SACRAMENTO, Calif. (AP) — School districts in California will have to create rules restricting student smartphone use under a new law Democratic Gov. Gavin Newsom signed Monday.

    The legislation makes California the latest state to try to curb student phone access in an effort to minimize distractions in the classroom and address the mental health impacts of social media on children. Florida, Louisiana, Indiana and several other states have passed laws aimed at restricting student phone use at school.

    “This new law will help students focus on academics, social development, and the world in front of them, not their screens, when they’re in school,” Newsom said in a statement.

    But some critics of phone restriction policies say the burden should not fall on teachers to enforce them. Others worry the rules will make it harder for students to seek help if there is an emergency or argue that decisions on phone bans should be left up to individual districts or schools.

    “We support those districts that have already acted independently to implement restrictions because, after a review of the needs of their stakeholders, they determined that made the most sense for their communities with regards to safety, school culture and academic achievement,” said Troy Flint, a spokesperson for the California School Boards Association. “We simply oppose the mandate.”

    The law requires districts to pass rules by July 1, 2026, to limit or ban students from using smartphones on campus or while students are under the supervision of school staff. Districts will have to update their policies every five years after that.

    The move comes after Newsom signed a law in 2019 authorizing school districts to restrict student phone access. In June, he announced plans to take on the issue again after the U.S. surgeon general called on Congress to require warning labels on social media platforms and their effects on young people.

    The governor then sent letters to districts last month, urging them to limit student device use on campus. That came on a day that the board for the second-largest school district in the country, Los Angeles Unified, voted to ban student phone use during the school day beginning in January.

    Assemblymember Josh Hoover, a Republican representing Folsom, introduced the bill with a bipartisan group of lawmakers who are also parents.

    Phones are restricted where Hoover’s children — ages 15, 12 and 10 — attend school. Many of the students don’t always like the policy, which is in part a reflection of how addictive phones can be, he said.

    “Anytime you’re talking about interrupting that addiction, it’s certainly going to be hard for students sometimes,” Hoover said. “But I think overall they understand why it’s important, why it helps them focus better on their classes and why it actually helps them have better social interaction with their peers face to face when they’re at school.”

    Some parents have raised concerns that school cellphone bans could cut them off from their children if there is an emergency. Those fears were highlighted after a shooting at a Georgia high school left four dead and nine injured this month.

    The 2019 law authorizing districts to restrict student phone access makes exceptions for emergencies, and the new law doesn’t change that. Some proponents of school phone restrictions say it’s better to have phones off in an active shooter situation, so that they don’t ring and reveal a student’s location.

    Teachers have reported seeing students more engaged since the Santa Barbara Unified School District began fully implementing a ban on student phone use in class during the 2023-24 school year, Assistant Superintendent ShaKenya Edison said.

    Nick Melvoin, a Los Angeles Unified board member who introduced the district’s resolution, said passing the policies at the district or state level can help prevent students from feeling like they’re missing out on what’s going on on social media.

    Before student cellphone use was banned during the school day at Sutter Middle School in Folsom, students had been seen recording fights, filming TikTok challenges and spending lunchtime looking at online content, Principal Tarik McFall said. The rule has “totally changed the culture” of the school so that students spend more time talking to one another, he said.

    “To have them put away, to have them power off and that be a practice, it has been a great thing,” McFall said.

    Teachers have become more reliant in recent years on technology as a learning tool for students, particularly since the COVID-19 pandemic, said Mara Harvey, a social studies teacher at Discovery High School in the Natomas Unified School District.

    The district, which is in Sacramento, provides students in the first through 12th grades with a Chromebook, where they can access online textbooks and Google Classroom, a platform where teachers share class materials. But if a student forgets their Chromebook at home, their smartphone becomes “the next viable choice for them to access the curriculum,” Harvey said.

    ___

    Austin is a corps member for The Associated Press/Report for America Statehouse News Initiative. Report for America is a nonprofit national service program that places journalists in local newsrooms to report on undercovered issues. Follow Austin on X: @sophieadanna

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  • This GOP Nominee Is Battling For Control Of North Carolina Schools — And Hurling Anti-Gay Attacks In The Process

    This GOP Nominee Is Battling For Control Of North Carolina Schools — And Hurling Anti-Gay Attacks In The Process

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    Michele Morrow, the Republican nominee for state superintendent of schools in North Carolina, repeatedly used anti-gay tropes last week to attack her Democratic opponent, Mo Green.

    On X, formerly known as Twitter, Morrow, who has no experience in public education, attacked Green, the former superintendent of Guilford County public schools, after he received an endorsement from Equality North Carolina, the state’s largest political advocacy organization dedicated to LGBTQ+ rights.

    Green “states he is ‘proudly endorsed’ by Equality NC, whose mission statement is to promote LGBTQ+ power,” she falsely claimed. “NEWSFLASH…the ‘+’ includes PEDOPH*L*A!!”

    The plus stands for other identities, such as nonbinary or gender-fluid, that are not encompassed by the letters.

    Then on Friday, Morrow, who would be in charge of the state’s schools if she wins, again used the group’s endorsement to further smear Green and malign the organization.

    “You should really get to know Mo and Equality NC. They are an organization which promotes allowing boys in girls’ sports and private spaces,” she wrote on Facebook on Friday afternoon. “They want schools to hide pronoun and even name changes from parents. They want to hide curriculum that discusses transgender and sexual activity with five-year-olds.”

    The following day, she claimed on Facebook that students and teachers in North Carolina were under attack and that a student was forced to discuss pornography with her classmates.

    In Wake County, a video of a speech by a high school student went viral when she claimed she’d been made to discuss a book that contained incest and sexual content. The student didn’t name the book, but news outlets are reporting that it was likely “Tomorrow Is Too Far” by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, which depicts a relationship between two cousins.

    Morrow claimed that Green supports the attacks and the discussion. She subsequently promised that if she won, “not one more penny of education $$$ will be spent on sexualizing our children.”

    Morrow’s attacks on Green and Equality North Carolina are a part of the GOP’s ongoing assault on gay and transgender rights. Smearing the LGBTQ+ community as child abusers is a homophobic trope that has regained popularity in the last few years as conservatives began organizing around homophobia and transphobia.

    Conservative culture warriors have sought to remove books with LGBTQ+ themes from classrooms and school libraries, falsely claiming that they’re sexually explicit or that they’re used to groom children. LGBTQ+ teachers and allies have also been baselessly accused of abusing children.

    Morrow first made national headlines when CNN discovered that after attending the Jan. 6, 2021, insurrection at the U.S. Capitol, she made a video saying former President Donald Trump, who incited the riot with his lies about mass voter fraud, should use the military to stay in power. (CNN reviewed videos that showed Morrow inside the restricted perimeter of the Capitol; there is no evidence she entered the building, and she has not been charged in the insurrection attempt.) She also called for the execution of prominent Democrats, including former President Barack Obama and North Carolina Gov. Roy Cooper.

    Last week, North Carolina’s Republicans were dealt a political blow when CNN reported that their gubernatorial candidate, Mark Robinson, declared he was a “Black Nazi” and made other antisemitic and racist comments on a porn website from 2008 to 2012. Morrow has supported his candidacy and posted a photo with a pro-Robinson sign on X last week before the story broke.

    Support Free Journalism

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    Thank you for your past contribution to HuffPost. We are sincerely grateful for readers like you who help us ensure that we can keep our journalism free for everyone.

    The stakes are high this year, and our 2024 coverage could use continued support. Would you consider becoming a regular HuffPost contributor?

    Thank you for your past contribution to HuffPost. We are sincerely grateful for readers like you who help us ensure that we can keep our journalism free for everyone.

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    Support HuffPost

    Morrow did not respond to HuffPost’s request for comment.

    Public schools have become a main focal point for right-wing activists as Republican candidates run for school board and superintendent posts, seeking to push conservative ideology into the nation’s schools.

    Fueled by the coronavirus pandemic school closures, several far-right groups, such as Moms for Liberty, have sprung up around the country. These culture warriors have railed against LGBTQ+ and racial justice-themed books, the teaching of accurate racial history, letting transgender students play sports and seeking equity in the classroom.

    Support Free Journalism

    Consider supporting HuffPost starting at $2 to help us provide free, quality journalism that puts people first.

    Thank you for your past contribution to HuffPost. We are sincerely grateful for readers like you who help us ensure that we can keep our journalism free for everyone.

    The stakes are high this year, and our 2024 coverage could use continued support. Would you consider becoming a regular HuffPost contributor?

    Thank you for your past contribution to HuffPost. We are sincerely grateful for readers like you who help us ensure that we can keep our journalism free for everyone.

    The stakes are high this year, and our 2024 coverage could use continued support. We hope you’ll consider contributing to HuffPost once more.

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    🗳️ 🇺🇸 Make your vote count! Learn more about how to register, important deadlines, and your state’s mail-in voting options here.

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  • Deadline looms for Maryland to obligate federal money for schools – WTOP News

    Deadline looms for Maryland to obligate federal money for schools – WTOP News

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    Maryland school officials said they are confident they will able to obligate almost $780 million in federal funds in the next 10 days – money that will have to be returned to the federal government if they don’t.

    This article was republished with permission from WTOP’s news partners at Maryland Matters. Sign up for Maryland Matters’ free email subscription today.

    Maryland school officials said they are confident they will able to obligate almost $780 million in federal funds in the next 10 days – money that will have to be returned to the federal government if they don’t.

    The funding is part of $1.95 billion Maryland received in use-it-or-lose-it pandemic-relief funds for schools from the American Rescue Plan’s Elementary and Secondary School Emergency Relief, or ESSER, program. As of this week, Maryland had spent 60.7% of the total, for $1.18 billion.

    Maryland’s rate of obligating its funds is one of the lowest in the nation, ahead of only Nebraska and the District of Columbia, according to a U.S. Department of Education dashboard.

    In a letter to all states dated Sept. 10, Laura Jimenez, director of state and grantee relations in the department’s ESSER Office, reminded grantees that they have until Sept. 30 to report on how they will commit to draw down the remaining money. States have until Jan. 28, 2025, to liquidate, or spend, the money, but can also request an extension to March 2026.

    That’s what Maryland has done and will do, said Krishna Tallur, deputy state superintendent for the state Department of Education’s Office of Finance and Operations.

    “We believe that all of the funds will be obligated by the deadline and liquated by the extended deadline,” Tallur said in an interview earlier this month.

    The federal dashboard still shows that Maryland spent 59.4% of its allocation, but Tallur said that the number as of July, the most recent available, was actually 60.07%.

    But if the state doesn’t obligate that money, then it goes back to the federal government.

    “At the end of the day, our kids cannot afford for this money to just disappear. This is tax money, right?” said Tracie Potts, executive director of the Eisenhower Institute at Gettysburg College, which released a report last month on ESSER funding.

    The pandemic-era relief money in this third and final round can be used for a variety of needs and services such as summer enrichment programs, upgrades to facilities and mental health support.

    “Federal funds just don’t come out of the air,” Potts said in an interview. “This is money that was designated for our kids to catch up. The question becomes, ‘What are we going to do with it?’”

    Her institute’s report, “Building America: Reinventing Education Funding Education in Maryland During and After the Pandemic,” was completed last fall with data updated through January 2023. The state Department of Education updated a source file last month on what districts spent in federal pandemic-era funding.

    The report offers recommendations for school district officials to invest and evidence-based strategies to address pandemic learning recovery such as community school and summer learning programs. It also highlighted high-impact tutoring, which will be done this school year in Baltimore City.

    Potts said research has shown it’s best for high-impact tutoring to take place during the school day in small groups and done several times a week.

    “Number one, more than likely you’ll be able to get the teachers because they’re already there,” she said. “There are additional costs when we keep kids after school and try to get them there before school. If transportation is not provided, then only the kids who have somebody at home and who’s not working…can pick them up. So that’s an equity issue.”

    Except for the District of Columbia, which had allocated just 44.4% of its funding, according to the federal dashboard this week, all of Maryland’s other neighbors had obligated or spent significantly larger share of their ESSER funding:

    • Delaware reported spending 83.1%, with $69.5 million left to obligate;
    • West Virginia has allocated 79.8%, with $153.9 million left;
    • Virginia spent 77.1%, and had $484.4 million left;
    • and Pennsylvania had spent 77% money, with $1.1 billion left to obligate.

    While Nebraska and D.C. were at the bottom among states, having allocated 56% and 44.4% respectively, Hawaii and Washington state had allocated the largest share among states. Hawaii has spent 93.7% of its $412.5 million, and has $26.2 million left, while Washington had $169.5 million left, having spent 90.9% of its $1.85 billion total.

    California received and spent the most, getting $15 billion and spending $12.3 billion, or 81.5%.

    Del. Bernice Mireku-North (D-Montgomery), who serves on the House Ways and Means Committee, said she didn’t know about the upcoming deadline, or amount left. But she said federal dollars have helped to address pandemic challenges such as food insecurity and laptops for children in her jurisdiction.

    “We will continue our commitment to a world-class education for our children, by making sure they have the resources they need around the state,” she said in an interview Aug. 30. “There’s going to be a point for us to consider how we’re going to fund them once federal money goes away. We’ll continue to work together as a legislature to find the right steps that the gains from those federal resources aren’t lost.”

    The Campaign for Grade Level Reading will host an online discussion Tuesday from what some state education officials learned in applying the ESSER funding to their schools as the “looming ESSER funding cliff” approaches.

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    Valerie Bonk

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