This past fall, the Center on Reinventing Public Education (CRPE) released a second State of the American Student, a report that provides basic data on U.S. students’ progress toward academic recovery and mental wellness, as well as indicators of the overall health of the system, including data on teachers, enrollment, and finances.
Yesterday we focused on the current state of America’s public school students, as reported in the CRPE report. Today we’ll look at how our K-12 responses have worked, or not, and what our future actions might look like.
The authors of the State of the American Student report write,
“K-12 responses have been inadequate. Strategies for catching students up are falling short. Only two in 100 students are receiving the kind of high-impact tutoring that makes a difference, according to researchers at USC. One in 5 students graded their schools D or F in mental health supports, individualized instruction, and feeling excited about learning, according to Gallup’s Spring 2023 survey. Teachers, who have a daily presence in the lives of young people, reported rates of stress that were nearly two times pre-pandemic levels. A recent report from CRPE found that not only did student learning regress during the pandemic, so did the quality of teaching and the ability for the school systems studied to simultaneously hold high instructional expectations and provide strong support for all students.”
“Why we must act now. The challenges are likely to get more difficult for at least four reasons. First, nearly $200 billion in federal pandemic relief funding will expire in January 2025, while student enrollment has plummeted, which means local schools will have less funding.”
“Second, this fiscal cliff will come on top of an already challenging environment for educators, which has worsened since the pandemic, including an uptick in teacher turnover in the 2022-23 school year and steep declines in the number of people training to become teachers.”
“Third, societal changes are ratcheting up the demands on the next generation of students. Employment opportunities will shift quickly, requiring adaptability and constant retooling. Automation (including AI) will affect everyone, but middle-class jobs will be harder to find, making it more difficult to overcome the disadvantages of poverty.”
“Four, most parents and the public are alarmingly unaware of the severity of these challenges, which makes it tougher for policymakers to respond with the necessary boldness. For example, a survey by Learning Heroes showed that about 90% of parents believe their child is performing at grade level or above, despite reams of data to the contrary.”
“There are some bright spots. Some schools, school systems, states, and postsecondary institutions are demonstrating what’s possible when leaders are willing to rethink outdated approaches and center instruction and support on what students need most. The full report profiles schools that provide competency-based education to pregnant, parenting, and underserved students, that help students explore career interests and non-college options, and that offer AI-themed curricula, more project-based learning, and dual enrollment with local colleges, among other innovations. Colleges such as Arizona State University, City University of New York (CUNY), and New York University are rethinking how to better serve their students, while states such as Colorado and Virginia have bold plans to ensure that every high school student graduates with an associate degree and an industry-recognized credential – part of a deliberate strategy to blur the lines between high school and postsecondary success.”
Here are the recommendations the report suggest:
“Offer transparency regarding the effectiveness of schools in ensuring that every child is on track to master core skills. Otherwise, there’s no urgency and little trust. Connecticut, Indiana, Louisiana, Mississippi, North Carolina, and Virginia are leading the way.”
“Invest in a national youth intervention strategy that develops, tests and promotes new interventions (such as strengthening adult-student relationships) and innovative methods (such as AI technology) for struggling adolescents and young adults. Invest, too, in scaling already proven interventions, like high-quality tutoring and mentoring.”
“Invest in high school and college master programs to ensure disruptions wrought by the pandemic and the youth mental health crisis do not derail any young person’s aspirations. Community colleges that have lost enrollment in recent years might offer tuition-free (state and federally subsidized) gap-year programs that allow students to finish their high school degree and begin earning college credits or industry credentials. States, cities, and school districts could invest in outreach programs like CUNY Reconnect, as well as provide funding and flexibility to support working students while they complete their degrees.”
“Support research to track the Covid generation’s progress. The United Kingdom offers a good model and Gallup has a new poll that tracks student views on education, but more data is needed.”
“Rethink high school to career pathways. We need to go beyond pilots for more career-relevant high schools that blur the lines among high school, college, and careers, taking cues from Colorado and Virginia. An essay by Colorado Governor Jared Polis shows how such a ‘blurring strategy’ is central to his state’s education and workforce approach. Two other promising approaches: New York City’s Urban Assembly offers students multiple pathways to postsecondary success, and EmployIndy supports a modern apprenticeship program and other efforts to engage Indianapolis youth.”
“Invest in a New American High School. As CRPE’s Robin Lake argues in her essay, ‘Rather than seek to provide a comprehensive set of learning experiences under one roof, the New American High School would connect students to meaningful work in their communities and expert knowledge around the globe. It would support young people to do meaningful work that makes real contributions and leads to meaningful credentials in the adult world. Rather than sorting students into tracks or marshaling all of them toward a single objective, it would provide every student adult guidance and technological support to understand their own conception of a good life, as well as the support, connections, knowledge, and skills to pursue that life – and change course where necessary. It would prepare students to thrive, collaborate, and innovate in a rapidly changing world. Yes, students would still study Sophocles, Shakespeare, and Newton, but in a more relevant, contemporary context.’”
Again and again, it’s hard to see how the traditional public education system can make the changes necessary to meet the call for change that is embedded in the CRPE report or otherwise. It seems like we need to create a different system, maybe a system that concurrently stands beside today’s traditional system, allowing young learners and their families to choose what delivery strategy works for them best.
A Better Path to Learning has been around since April of 2022. It’s fair to say that positive reports on how our public school system is working have been few and far between over nearly two years, compared to the calls of changing our learning system for something that works better for our young people.
Friday News Roundup tomorrow. Til then. SVB
A Better Path to Learning 
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