The Hechinger Report

11/30/2021

Happy #GivingNewsDay! (That's journalism-speak for #GivingTuesday.) Please support our nonprofit mission to serve the public with high-quality, truth-seeking education journalism. Help us reach our goal of raising $5,000 today!
https://buff.ly/3I9OI6s

Happy #GivingNewsDay! (That's journalism-speak for #GivingTuesday.) Please support our nonprofit mission to serve the public with high-quality, truth-seeking education journalism. Help us reach our goal of raising $5,000 today!
https://buff.ly/3I9OI6s

11/29/2021

Prisoners hope that education can erase a stigma

Revamping career-tech education in prison with the goal of reducing recidivism

New prison education courses that provide a credential are especially important in getting future employers to set aside their prejudices.

11/22/2021

PROOF POINTS: The number of college graduates in the humanities drops for the eighth consecutive year - The Hechinger Report

PROOF POINTS: The number of college students graduating with a humanities major has fallen for the eighth straight year to under 200,000 degrees in 2020.

When the economy is growing, people are generally more willing to take risks. That’s true for college students too. In the post-war boom of the 1950s, college students were confident of their…

11/19/2021

Retraining an entire state’s elementary teachers in the science of reading

North Carolina passed a law to make every school replicate how reading is taught in its most successful classrooms

North Carolina is attempting to fix the varied approaches schools take to reading with a law based in science.

11/18/2021

College payment plans run help for-profit companies stay in business

Tuition-financing firms create another path for students to plunge into college-loan debt

Tuition financing firms facilitate billions of dollars of private student debt at for-profit colleges through college payment plans.

11/16/2021

‘The Reading Year’: First grade is critical for reading skills, but kids coming from disrupted kindergarten experiences are way behind

After 18 months of untraditional learning, students are showing up for first grade lacking fine motor, academic and social skills.

Early elementary school is when kids learn basic math and reading skills and important social-emotional skills.

11/12/2021

A surprising number of new colleges are opening as enrollment falls

“We have to rebuild this system from the ground up.” At a time when many higher education institutions are closing or merging because of a decline in the supply of high school graduates, a surprising number of new ones are opening.

Some of these new, largely overlooked colleges are focused on market needs, while others cater to students who have long been overlooked.

11/11/2021

Reading Remedies - The Hechinger Report

Before Covid, our schools were in crisis over how to teach kids to read. The pandemic made it much worse. Seven newsrooms joined together to find solutions for America’s reading problem.

Read our #readingremedies series:

Even before Covid, our schools were in crisis over how to teach kids to read.Six newsrooms joined together to report on the problem and find solutions for America’s reading problem.

11/09/2021

A small, rural district makes virtual schools permanent

A small, rural district in South Carolina where where 90 percent of families live in poverty and 50 percent lack high-speed Internet made virtual learning permanent

Fairfield leaders hope that live classes, an application process and the after-school activities can help their virtual schools.

11/05/2021

It’s ‘unconscionable’: We depend on child care workers to provide high-quality care to our children. But many of those workers can’t afford food and rent

Child care workers are facing ‘significant challenges’ of food insecurity, eviction and emotional distress, report finds

Food insecurity was an issue for 23 percent of child care providers pre-pandemic, that rose to an average of 29 percent between February and July 2021, according to the report.

11/04/2021

Women have been marginalized in the building trades. The infrastructure bill could change that

Advocates say the infrastructure bill – along with workforce funding in Democrats’ domestic spending proposal – present an opportunity to bring down barriers that have long kept women and people of color from construction jobs

Women and people of color have been excluded from the building trades, but the infrastructure and domestic policy bills could change that.

11/02/2021

A surprise for Americans switching careers: They need to go back to school

Rapid change in work means a need for more training, even in jobs that didn’t previously require it

Economists have said people switching careers would need to get additional education have not always previously required it.

11/01/2021

PROOF POINTS: Many young adults choose work over college, report shows - The Hechinger Report

PROOF POINTS: All but the most selective colleges see the largest plunge in students in 50 years

Colleges are seeing a 6.5 percent undergraduate college enrollment decline in the fall of 2021, compared with the fall of 2019 before the pandemic.

10/28/2021

10 ways for schools to gain traction with social-emotional learning

Federal funding, parent demand and evidence of payoff fuels support for SEL in the classroom, but continuation may hinge on rebranding and local investment

Years of research linking social-emotional learning programs to academic success demonstrate its value, giving schools reason for investment.

10/26/2021

Deep inequities explain why the American child care system is in shambles

“Women of color have been subsidizing the entire system by taking very low wages. We’ve long exploited their labor.”

The racist and sexist roots of child care in America explain why the system is in shambles.

The pandemic highlighted the vast gulf in America that separates K-12 teachers from many child care providers when it comes to pay, job protection, and respect.

10/25/2021

Federal school funding could expand government’s role in education

Education Secretary Cardona thinks harnessing the positive energy left over from surviving 2020 — and adding cash — may be the way to solve longstanding problems

Education Secretary Miguel Cardona thinks he can use teacher energy and federal cash to fix public education in the U.S.

10/22/2021

How to support informal caregivers who fill a critical child care gap

How to support informal caregivers who fill a critical child care gap

Nationwide, an estimated 7 million children from newborns to age 5 are watched in home-based child care each day, making it the most common form of regular, nonparental child care.

10/21/2021

Escasean los fondos y la capacitación cuando quienes cuidan a tus hijos son amigos y vecinos - The Hechinger Report

Cómo apoyar a los proveedores informales que llenan un hueco crítico en el cuidado infantil

Un martes, poco después de las 6 p.m., 10 proveedores de cuidado infantil en el norte de California se conectaron a Zoom para educarse sobre los logros de desarrollo. En algunas pantallas se asomaban…

10/19/2021

420,000 homeless students went missing from schools’ rolls

Schools can help homeless students fight eviction, find a backpack or even deal with a funeral. But first educators have to find them.

Educators charged with supporting homeless students may not be able rely on the ways that usually work to find and enroll these kids.

10/18/2021

PROOF POINTS: What research tells us about gifted education - The Hechinger Report

PROOF POINTS: What research tells us about gifted education

After years of discussion, New York City announced in October 2021 that it is overhauling gifted and talented programs, eliminating the testing of thousands of 4-year-olds and the city’s separate…

10/17/2021

Undocumented students turn to each other for support post graduation

Undocumented students graduating from college are forming alumni support groups

Facing post-graduation challenges and uncertainty about DACA’s future, undocumented alumni turn to each other for support

10/16/2021

Racial segregation is one reason some families have internet access and others don’t, new research finds

Researchers say ‘digital’ redlining exacerbates broadband access

In a new paper on digital redlining, researchers link disparities in current broadband access to redlining policies that prevented people in majority-Black neighborhoods from getting mortgages…

10/15/2021

Vaccine mandates could make it harder to find child care workers

Public health experts say child care workers should get vaccinated, but with so many leaving the field, increased pay may have to come first

Public health experts say child care workers should get vaccinated, but pay raises may have to come first.

10/14/2021

How one high-demand job shows education system’s failings

Home health aides deal with pricey training for low pay and few formal chances at advancement

The plight of home health aides is an example of how job training in the United States is flawed on several different levels.

10/13/2021

OPINION: Home-based child care providers deserve better

It’s time to recognize this undervalued and underfunded sector

All sectors of the care economy need more resources, but caregivers working as home-based child care providers, who are disproportionately women of color, need the most.

10/13/2021

College parents suffer as more campus child care centers close

For college students who are also parents, a population that makes up more than 20 percent of undergraduates, one of the most important supports is access to child care.

Parents who rely on campus-based care on public universities and community colleges have encountered another barrier to earning a degree.

10/12/2021

Girl Scouts against the world - The Hechinger Report

Now that STEM and girls’ empowerment are mainstream — and Boy Scouts is coed — is there a place for Girl Scouts?

Girl Scouts of the USA has lived long, and it has prospered. But now, it is threatened by multiple factors.

10/12/2021

Why racial graduation gaps exist across the nation

Remedial education, financial challenges and even just a jarring campus culture can stymie students. https://hechingerreport.org/%e2%80%8b%e2%80%8bwhy-white-students-are-250-more-likely-to-graduate-than-black-students-at-public-universities/

Remedial education, financial challenges and even just a jarring campus culture contribute to racial graduation gaps.

10/12/2021

Why college graduation rates are measured over six years instead of four

As the White House proposes spending billions to improve completion rates, colleges measure successful graduation rates at six and even eight years

Fewer than half of college students graduate within four years. They likely won’t find out about these long odds from the colleges themselves.

10/12/2021

‘Just let me play sports’

Facing a record-breaking year of bills targeting trans student athletes, one girl wonders if she will ever get her turn.

Adelyn Vigil wants to play sports. But lawmakers have made sports participation by trans students like her a hot-button political issue.

10/08/2021

Girl Scouts against the world - The Hechinger Report

Now that STEM and girls’ empowerment are mainstream — and Boy Scouts is coed — is there a place for Girl Scouts?

Girl Scouts of America has lived long, and it has prospered. But now, it is threatened by multiple factors.

10/07/2021

How one high-demand job shows education system’s failings

The need for home health aides is projected to grow by 34 percent between 2019 and 2029. But home health aides deal with pricey training for low pay and few formal chances at advancement.

The plight of home health aides is an example of how job training in the United States is flawed on several different levels.

10/05/2021

Many students received a surprising pandemic respite from cyberbullying

Some experts predicted a huge surge in cyberbullying as learning migrated online. For many students, that might not have been the case.

Researchers and educators believe cyberbullying decreased during the pandemic, even as children spent more time online.

10/05/2021

PROOF POINTS: Focusing on glasses in schools - The Hechinger Report

A Baltimore study found limited academic gains with free glasses for students

An argument for providing social services in schools is that students will learn better when their basic needs are met. The national lunch program exists because children don’t learn well on an empty…

10/05/2021

Colleges are spending billions on marketing and advertising

Marketing and branding are getting big budgets and advertising is setting new records.

Record amounts are being spent on higher education marketing and advertising as enrollment numbers fall and competition among colleges rises.