Burdened by demands to show outcomes and achievement, early education classrooms are often reduced to scripted lessons and meaningless craft work that imparts little learning. In her book The Importance of Being Little (Viking, 2016), Erika Christakis shows how the ever-increasing pressure to deliver has caused teachers to inadvertently stifle children’s natural sense of wonder […]

In their book, Transforming Ice Age Schools: A Practical Guide for School Leaders, Leighangela Brady and Lisbeth Johnson argue that, beyond superficial “fixes,” little has changed in the underlying structure of education. The result: students unprepared for the complex challenges that await them after high school. We’ve all heard the saying, “The more things change, […]

A Tale of Two School Principals: And the Superintendent Who Wanted to Lead Them is not your conventional leadership book. Told in a narrative form, the book is a journey of discovery as the characters learn to get to the deeper meaning and intent of a new district policy. A Tale of Two School Principals: […]

Former Washington Post reporter Dale Russakoff’s new book looks at what went wrong with Newark’s ‘Hemisphere of Hope’ and massive grant from Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg that supported the initiative. She says most funds went to hiring consultants, expanding charter schools, closing low-performing schools and subsequently firing teachers. In 2010, New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, Newark Mayor Cory […]

Politicians often express concern over the widening achievement gap between black and white students in this country. But there was a time when that gap was reduced by as much a half. The reason? Integrated schools. “Integration gets black kids in the same facilities as white kids, with access to the same things those kids […]

Once used to reflect successful memorization of facts and figures, the process of grading has transformed into a near meaningless code, often fogged by a variety of factors that have nothing to do with learning. Cathy Vatterott, a professor of education at the University of MissouriÁ¢†“St. Louis, says that over the years, grades have come […]

When Elizabeth Rose’s teaching job was cut, she was presented with two options: leave the profession or substitute in a different Manhattan public high school each week. Rather than give in, Rose—who’s also a musician, writer and actor—took on the substitute challenge. It was “a temptation no storyteller could resist,” she says. When Elizabeth Rose’s […]

Leslie T. Fenwick has been praised as “a fearless voice in education on behalf of communities of color.” As dean of the School of Education at Howard University in Washington, D.C., Fenwick has devoted her career to improving educational opportunity and outcomes for African-American and other underserved students from the elementary through graduate school levels. […]