Tip: Be sure to check out our “Guide to the NNERPP EdWeek Blog” page for a topical overview of all of the Urban Education Reform blog posts.
ENGLISH LANGUAGE LEARNERS
San Francisco
Can Summer School Help English Learner Students Succeed?: The Stanford-SFUSD Partnership (@StanfordSFUSD) looks at the potential of summer programs to close English Language Learner achievement gaps. Because English Learners are often required to take multiple language development classes, they miss out on other academic content crucial for college and career success, such as advanced math, science, and social science classes. A San Francisco Unified School District summer school model aims to address this problem — with success, as the research presented here shows.
Summer Learning for Immigrant Youth: A Model from San Francisco: The San Francisco Unified School District (@SFUnified) shares how its summer school model helps English Learners in San Francisco earn credits toward graduation, describing the program components that help make the model successful.
Houston
Exercising Choice: English-Language Learners and School Choice: The Houston Education Research Consortium examines English Language Learners’ participation in and barriers to school choice, finding that current English Language Learners were much less likely than their peers to participate in school choice, while former English Language Learners were just as likely as non-English Language Learners to do so.
- Toward Equity in Access to School Choice: The Houston Independent School District (@HoustonISD) describes how it implemented new policies and practices in response to research findings showing significant gaps in the number of former, current, and never English Learners enrolling in schools outside their designated school zone and thus taking advantage of Houston’s choice system.
EARLY CHILDHOOD EDUCATION
New Orleans
Charter Schools, Pre-K, and the Question of Coordination, Part I and Charter Schools, Pre-K, and the Question of Coordination, Part II: The Education Research Alliance for New Orleans (@ERA_NOLA) outlines research on changes to New Orleans’ early childhood education landscape as the school district shifted to a majority-charter system. Specifically, the lack of central coordination was associated with a drop in the number of schools offering pre-K and the number of school-based pre-K seats, pointing to a broader issue of decentralized school governance.
Should Increasing the Availability of Public Pre-K be a Priority in New Orleans?: The Superintendent of Schools in Orleans Parish, Louisiana, shares his thoughts on the research findings.
Atlanta
From Age 3 to Grade 3: How Atlanta Promotes School Readiness and Achievement: The Urban Child Study Center, a cross-sector partnership based in Atlanta, introduces its work on developing the data infrastructure and research agenda required to support Atlanta’s preschool to third grade system.
Using Data and Research to Strengthen Early-Learning Efforts in Atlanta: Atlanta Public Schools (@apsupdate) outlines its vision for and work towards improving early education, including collaborative work to develop a longitudinal database and create citywide strategies.
TEACHER EQUITY GAPS
Massachusetts
Partnering to Assess Teacher Equity Gaps in Massachusetts: The Center for Analysis of Longitudinal Data on Education Research (@caldercenter) summarizes research findings prepared for the Massachusetts Department of Elementary and Secondary Education (@MASchoolsK12) on unequal access to effective teachers in Massachusetts. The research finds that low income students are systematically exposed to less experienced and less effective teachers than their peers, echoing similar findings from other states.
Why Teacher Equity Gaps Matter for Massachusetts, and How Research Helps: A state department leader describes how this research on teacher equity gaps helps drive state-level policy conversations.
TEACHER SHORTAGE
Idaho
Tackling Teacher Recruitment and Retention Challenges in Idaho: About 1 in 5 Idaho teachers did not return to their school the following year in each year of a recent REL Northwest (@relnw) study, and the teacher workforce is becoming less experienced. This post shares how a meeting brought together representatives from school districts, state education agencies, and institutions of higher education in Idaho to discuss these research findings and address teacher recruitment and retention.
Finding Common Ground Through Data to Improve Idaho’s Teacher Pipeline: The Homedale School District superintendent writes about the importance of the convening and how this evidence has helped the district.
Michigan
Exploring the Potential of Teacher Residencies: REL Midwest (@RELMidwest) shares about a partnership with the Michigan Department of Education (@mieducation) designed to tackle statewide teacher shortage problems through exploring the potential of a teacher residency approach. Teacher residencies are usually partnerships between a school district and a local university, whereby teacher candidates apply learned concepts in a classroom under the supervision of an experienced mentor teacher as part of their training.
Challenges and Opportunities in Building a Teacher-Residency Program: Saginaw Valley State University College of Education (@SVSU) describes the creation and implementation of an accelerated teacher residency program to respond to teacher shortage problems.
TEACHER PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT
Multnomah County (OR)
Here’s What Works Best in Teacher Professional Development: The Multnomah County Partnership for Education Research explores teacher professional development best practices and reviews one district’s offerings at the district’s request.
Becoming a Teacher-Researcher: A personal account of how work with the Multnomah County Partnership for Education Research influenced a doctoral student’s journey.
SCHOOL CLIMATE AND CULTURE
Chicago
How Do Principals Influence Student Achievement?: Principals are often seen as the primary drivers of improvements in student achievement, but given their complex role expectations and responsibilities and the myriad leadership strategies at their disposal, what strategies matter most for student improvement? The UChicago Consortium on School Research (@UChiConsortium) outlines research on how principals are most effective at achieving higher learning gains, describing how fostering strong learning climates and encouraging teacher leadership emerged as key drivers.
Building a Strong School Climate to Support Student Achievement: A school principal shares firsthand some strategies that have helped the school create a strong learning environment.
Cleveland
Why School Climate Matters: The Cleveland Alliance for Education Research writes about ongoing research examining the association between students’ perception of school climate and their educational outcomes, outlining preliminary findings suggesting that improved perceptions of safety, teacher expectations and support, and peer relationships are associated with improved student achievement.
Research Helps Make the Case for School Climate Initiatives: The Cleveland Metropolitan School District (@CLEMetroSchools) weighs in on the impact of research on district efforts around improving and measuring school climate.
SOCIAL-EMOTIONAL LEARNING
New York City
How New York City Is Working to Improve Students’ Social-Emotional Learning: Researchers from the Research Alliance for NYC Schools (@RANYCS) are working together with practitioners from the Student Success Network to improve social-emotional learning measurements, helping build more valid and reliable SEL measures for a SEL student survey and supporting member organizations in utilizing the information that the survey elicits as part of a continuous improvement process.
A New Approach to Social-Emotional Learning Research: Putting Practitioners and Youths in the Driver’s Seat: The Student Success Network (@SuccessNYC), a community of 50 education and youth development organizations in New York City collaborating to improve student outcomes, describes how leveraging practitioner, researcher, and youth expertise drives improvement in social-emotional learning measurement and programming across the network.
COLLEGE ACCESS
Baltimore
Learning About Post-High School Pathways of Baltimore Youths: The Baltimore Education Research Consortium (@BaltimoreBERC) examines college enrollment and employment outcomes of Baltimore high school graduates to help inform policies and supports needed to improve graduates’ career and college access.
Using Data and Research to Promote Youth Success: Baltimore City Public Schools (@BaltCitySchools) outlines how data and research findings on their graduates’ post high-school pathways helps the district address challenges and how the district shares such research findings with students, families, and principals.