In response, the national conversation has kicked into high gear. More than a dozen states have rewritten literacy laws, banning discredited instructional methods and mandating phonics-based curricula. Districts are overhauling materials. Parents are being urged to act in a multitude of ways: reading more at home, hiring a tutor, trying multiple apps.

I’ve spent decades as a classroom teacher, literacy coach, researcher, and now training future educators. I’ve worked with children who thrive and children who need extra support with reading. And I’ve seen how often parents are sent searching for complicated solutions while underestimating the impact of what happens in ordinary moments at home. That鈥檚 overlooking something both simpler and more immediate: Families already have powerful, evidence-based tools at their fingertips, and they don’t cost anything.

This isn’t a critique of schools. The evidence of what’s possible when schools commit fully is compelling: Louisiana became the only state to fully rebound in reading post-pandemic. Mississippi climbed from near the bottom of national rankings to the top ten in fourth-grade reading. Systematic, structured literacy instruction works when it’s implemented well. 

However, the best outcomes happen when classrooms and homes work together. The current reading crisis has exposed how much everyday language, attention and early habits have been neglected in shaping literacy, long before a child is ever formally tested.

Start with something deceptively simple: conversation. Reading is not just about decoding words on a page; it’s built on language. When parents narrate what they’re doing, ask questions and engage children in back-and-forth talk, they are building vocabulary and comprehension in real time. This isn’t enrichment. It’s the foundation strong readers stand on, and it happens in the car, at the kitchen table and at the checkout line.

Then there’s the way reading itself gets treated. Too often, it becomes something children think only “counts” as reading if it鈥檚 from a book. But literacy lives in the real world. A grocery list. A recipe. Street signs. Instructions. When children see that print carries meaning in daily life, they begin to understand why reading matters at all. 

And yet, in a culture saturated with screens and subscriptions, one of the most effective tools is analog: the public library. It’s easy to overlook because it’s free. But access to physical books 鈥� and the sustained attention they encourage 鈥� offers something many digital experiences do not. At a time when families are told to download more, the better advice may be to step into a quieter space and let a child linger with a book.

Honesty about the basics matters too. Letters and sounds are not outdated or trivial; they are essential. Helping children learn the alphabet, recognize letters in the environment or spell their own name is not busywork. It is preparation for the moment formal instruction begins and a base for whether that instruction sticks.

Perhaps most urgently, parents should stop being told to “wait and see” or 鈥渢hey鈥檒l grow out of it.鈥� These may sound reassuring, but in reading, it can be costly. Unlike spoken language, reading does not develop naturally without direct teaching. When a child consistently avoids reading, guesses at words, or becomes visibly frustrated, those are not quirks to outgrow. They are early warning signs. 

The earlier parents and educators respond, the easier the path forward, and the window for intervention narrows quickly. What looks like a behavioral problem in fourth grade often traces back to a foundational gap that could have been caught in kindergarten.

None of this will single-handedly reverse national test scores. But that’s not the point. The point is that in a moment when the literacy conversation is dominated by policy, programs and products, the most immediate and equitable intervention available risks being overlooked entirely: what families do every day.

The NAEP data tells a story of stratification: scores rising for high-performing students while struggling students fall further behind. That divide is not about capacity. It is, in part, about access to the kinds of early language experiences that wire children for reading before they ever enter a classroom. Debates about curriculum mandates and state laws are worth having. But while those debates unfold, children are sitting at kitchen tables tonight.

Parents are not a backup plan for struggling schools. They are a child’s first and most consistent teachers. The reading crisis is real. But so is the quiet, largely untapped power sitting in ordinary moments.

If better outcomes are the goal, the question shouldn’t stop at what schools will do differently next year. It should also demand answers about what’s already possible today 鈥� and why anyone has been told it isn’t enough.

A report released last month makes this even harder to ignore: New York State ranks among the most segregated in the entire country. That finding builds on a showing that deep school segregation in New York City has been the status quo since at least 2009. In some districts, the racial divide looks no different than it did in the 1930s.

Why have the state and the city failed to live up to the promise of excellent schools for all? Because a misconception persists: that building racially and economically diverse schools means lower quality and less academic rigor. Prospect Schools, a K-12 network of intentionally diverse charter schools in Brooklyn, was founded to challenge this notion, and I鈥檓 proud to have served as CEO since 2021. 

Brooklyn Prospect, our first campus, was the city鈥檚 first public charter school designed intentionally to be integrated along racial and socio-economic lines. Today, Prospect Schools serves almost 3,000 students across seven campuses, and is one of the few open enrollment public charter school networks offering the International Baccalaureate program to all high school students. Integrated schools benefit all students and raise performance across the board by spreading out resources and opportunity, expanding access to the best teachers and facilities, and preparing learners to thrive in a diverse world. 

The recent appointment of New York City Public Schools’ Chancellor Kamar Samuels and his policy agenda underscore that equity and excellence are not at odds. He garnered community support during previous leadership roles while  pursuing integration, an approach usually too controversial to touch. As superintendent of District 13 here in Brooklyn, he made the bold decision to replace exclusionary programs with school-wide IB enrichment. He understood that true equity isn鈥檛 about picking winners and losers; it鈥檚 about raising the ceiling for every child. 

Since taking office, Chancellor Samuels has signaled he is ready to hold this entire city accountable to a vision of education that is both radically inclusive and relentlessly rigorous. This is the right move for New York City. It also validates the approach to integrated education we rely on at Prospect Schools, where nearly two decades of work demonstrate that this vision can deliver meaningful results for students. 

We operate with a conviction that Samuels shares: that students learn best alongside peers who do not look, pray or live like them. At Prospect, we are 鈥渄iverse by design,鈥� which means we ensure that all of our classrooms reflect the vibrant diversity of the city through strategic recruitment, a weighted lottery, provision in our charter and a program that is inclusive and affirming. The result is a student body that is 29% White, 29% Black, 27% Hispanic and 10% multi-racial;  currently 44% of our students qualify for free and reduced-priced meals. 

We ensure all of our students have access to excellent teachers and rigorous academic curriculum which we model on the renowned IB Program. Through this globally recognized program, we raise the level of academic responsibility for all our students by cultivating curiosity, academic confidence, empowerment, global mindedness, community stewardship and life readiness. Further, we have proven that when you combine this intentional diversity with the high bar of the IB curriculum, the results are transformative.

Our students excel on state English language and math exams, most recently outperforming their city and district peers by 23 and 18 percentage points, respectively. This past year, over 80% of our graduating class was IB Diploma eligible, the highest in our history, and 100% of graduates were accepted into college. 

In Chancellor Samuels, I see a kindred spirit: a leader who understands that equity and excellence are not zero-sum competitors but twin pillars of a functioning democracy. Like Chancellor Samuels, I am the proud daughter of West Indian immigrants. I attended school in the Bronx and navigated the complexities of being a first-generation college student. Those experiences taught me early on that talent is distributed equally, but opportunity is not.

When I discovered the IB program, I saw a framework that didn鈥檛 just teach students what to think, but how to think. I knew then that this opportunity shouldn’t be reserved for private schools or select tracks of students 鈥� it belonged in every neighborhood and should be accessible to every child. 

We need this focus now more than ever. We are living in a time of deep polarization across our country, where echo chambers are solidifying into concrete walls. If NYC schools continue to remain segregated by race, class or academic tracking, we are merely preparing the next generation to perpetuate this divide. By championing integrated schools, academic excellence for all and global-mindedness of the IB, Chancellor Samuels is offering an antidote to this fragmentation. 

The cognitive load is identical: budgeting, resource allocation and risk management. The difference is the delivery mechanism. And that difference is costly.

The United States has a financial literacy problem that decades of classroom instruction have failed to solve. Fewer than 57% of American adults are considered financially literate, according to the S&P , placing the U.S. behind countries such as Canada, the United Kingdom and Germany. Meanwhile, has climbed to $18.8 trillion, and rose 11%, to 574,314 cases, in the year ending December 2025. The nation is producing high school graduates who might understand the Pythagorean theorem but cannot read a credit card statement.

The standard policy response has been to mandate more financial education in schools. now require completion of a personal finance course for high school graduation. That is progress, but it mistakes input for outcome. Adding a required course changes nothing if the instruction itself is broken. 

My experience as a student at Drexel University proved the point for me. Two of my finance courses, Applied Portfolio Management and Advanced Portfolio Management, were not textbook-based in the traditional sense. They were simulation-based. Students worked on Bloomberg terminals, learning through market-driven exercises that mirrored real financial environments. That hands-on experience made the material stick in a way lectures never could, and it helped me land a job in investment accounting because I could speak to real-world tools and decision-making, not just theory.

Now, I am developing an artificial intelligence-powered financial literacy tool for K-12 students who are natives of a gamified world. 

Instead of sitting through lectures on compound interest and credit scores, students could access an AI-driven financial simulator that could compress 30 years of compounding into 30 minutes of gameplay. They could make a risky investment, watch the market crash and lose their virtual homes, all within a single class period. The lesson would land not as an abstraction, but as a lived experience.

Such an approach would also give students the safety to fail. Just as in the traditional classroom, where failure is punished with grades, in the real financial system, failure is catastrophic: bankruptcy, foreclosure, destroyed credit. Mistakes are irreversible.

A simulator breaks that trap. Students might begin with a paycheck, fixed monthly bills, a savings goal and a credit card balance. Then the simulation forces tradeoffs. Do they spend on wants, pay down debt or build an emergency fund? What happens if a surprise medical bill appears, work hours get cut or interest starts compounding after a missed payment? Instead of reading about leverage and cash flow as abstract ideas, students experience the consequences of those choices in real time. They can fail safely, reset and try again with better judgment. That process builds what textbooks cannot: financial muscle memory.

At a time when teachers are competing with TikTok for students’ attention, policymakers, school districts and curriculum developers have a real opportunity to embrace approaches that work for this generation, rather than trying to solve a 21st-century problem with 20th-century tools. 

AI simulations that turn abstract financial concepts into actual experience 鈥� allowing students to practice budgeting, debt repayment, credit management and emergency spending decisions in interactive environments where consequences unfold in real time 鈥� can be a powerful solution to America’s financial literacy crisis. What is missing is the willingness to abandon the comfort of the familiar worksheet.

It is time to let students play the game.

As momentum for participating in the program (which in most cases requires governors to opt their states in) grows, Democratic governors in particular are now caught between a Scylla and Charybdis of policy choices. Signing on provides a new revenue stream for enrichment, tutoring and other public school activities. But some children may use the credit to attend private schools, and opting out 鈥� as teachers unions advocate 鈥� won’t necessarily prevent money from flowing toward such purposes across state lines. 

What are governors, and advocates, to do?

颁辞濒辞谤补诲辞鈥檚 Jared Polis, a Democrat, has been a leader on the issue, opting the Centennial State in to the program, and several of his Blue State colleagues have at least signaled they are willing to examine the opportunity, primarily for the benefits it offers their states鈥� public school families.

The political and financial realities of a program that turns taxpayers into philanthropists are quickly dawning on education reformers as well, both those who opposed it and those who simply weren鈥檛 paying attention. And with billions of new dollars in charitable donations potentially in play, conversations are now being held in earnest about how to implement the credit at the state level. By implement, what I really mean is regulate the program in a fashion that accomplishes traditional education reform goals in the best cases, or that blocks private school participation in the most cynical.

While the motivations in the former instance are laudable, they show a misunderstanding of what the program actually is and what can and cannot be 鈥渞egulated鈥� as a result.

First, the tax credit scholarship is not education policy and is not regulated by any educational entity. It is tax policy, regulated by the Internal Revenue Service, that accomplishes a charitable purpose tied to education. Some have that donations should be treated as the federal government treats education dollars it distributes to states. But the mechanisms are dissimilar, and there are no provisions for this in the law, which instead only structures the eligibility and use of the credit, the types of organizations that can collect it and the kinds of students (by income) and activities (fees, supplies, equipment) it can be used for. In fact, the program is more like the widely supported Child Tax Credit, which gives families broad discretion, than education tax credits that exist in most states. 

Secondly, while states must opt in (and 28 have at the time of writing), contributions are not state money; they are a credit to individual taxpayers who may or may not give them to a scholarship-granting organization, be it public or private, in their home state or another. Members of the Colorado legislature, ironically and perhaps tellingly, have proposed regulating the program as if they are its arbiter and fiduciary. Moreover, under the guise of non-discrimination, they seek to enforce uniform public school rules on a diverse set of charitable actors. While those who support school choice know such language is often used to make participation unpalatable to private schools (which feature communities built on choice and voluntary association, not zip code and compulsory attendance), this language would potentially also prohibit public schools from building affinity programming to support marginalized communities. Additionally, Colorado (and all states) already have rules that govern individual charitable contributions. If those have historically eluded such regulation, why should this credit be treated differently? 

While these issues are resolved, many advocates who focus on student achievement are left with an interesting question to answer: How could tax policy be regulated to ensure children receive high-quality opportunities, given the absence of traditional policy levers, like authorizing or similar criteria, for SGO participation? This is a new question that requires novel thinking, but it is not impossible to do. And currently, there are three tools at the disposal of advocates and politicos worth considering to accomplish this goal.

The first is the bully pulpit, specifically state executives. Governors, when opting in to the program, have the opportunity to assert their priorities for it, including whom they think it should prioritize (such as low-income students), how they鈥檇 like to see it measured (i.e. state assessments) and what kinds of SGOs, or even which ones specifically, they believe are worth contributing to. Governors can do this with their state’s entire communications apparatus at their disposal. This is a megaphone of the highest and loudest order.

The second is brands, which signal quality in all areas of life including education. Here, trusted community organizations and, of course, school districts themselves have the opportunity to set the market for what is possible. District of Columbia Public Schools, for instance, could start a Summer Enrichment SGO to provide extended learning opportunities for the city鈥檚 students, as could the Boys and Girls Club or an established charter network such as Success Academy. A current example of this is Bloomberg Philanthropy鈥檚 program, which pairs philanthropists and charter schools across the country to deliver high-quality summer programming and tutoring to students. The tutoring and enrichment camps of and 颁辞濒辞谤补诲辞鈥檚 are also worth emulating.

Lastly, states can build their own SGOs. Arizona鈥檚 pandemic summer effort, AZ On Track, which sought to catch kids up after COVID school closures, was one such example. And while started by philanthropy, the state-funded nonprofit , which delivers high-impact tutoring for K-8 students and now runs on both state education funding and charitable donations, is another. Together, they show how states can lead the way or partner to found an aligned SGO.

The Federal Scholarship Tax Credit provides new challenges for political actors and advocates, but also new opportunities for families, nonprofits, districts and others to support the country鈥檚 children. As a new revenue stream with lots of flexibility, it creates a rare chance to do both more and different things across the nation鈥檚 education landscape. Governors shouldn鈥檛 waste that opportunity. Advocates shouldn鈥檛 either.

This obligation is the heart of equal opportunity in our country 鈥� and private school vouchers were built to bypass it. Vouchers to a time when states fought federally mandated school desegregation. Funded by , today鈥檚 state voucher programs extend this legacy by diverting funds to unaccountable schools that pick and choose the students they enroll, and the in them. 

鈥淐hoice鈥� is a compelling slogan, but with private school vouchers, it鈥檚 the school鈥檚 choice, not the families. Participating private schools admissions and enrollment decisions, with little oversight of nondiscrimination compliance. Private schools can kick students out without any explanation or deny admission to students based on religious affiliation, LGBTQ+ status, language proficiency, and more. 

One on Washington, DC鈥檚 voucher program found that students most often did not use vouchers because participating schools lacked services for their learning or physical disabilities. 

This is what happens when public dollars flow into systems that are not built to serve every child. 

Now, the federal government wants to supercharge this exclusion. Last year鈥檚 One Big Beautiful Bill Act introduced the country鈥檚 first national school voucher program. Starting Dec. 15, governors can opt into the program, which allows the use of tax-credit-funded scholarships to underwrite private or religious schools as early as 2027. The program for students who themselves or their siblings have previously received a federal voucher, favoring families already using vouchers.  

Selective admissions isn鈥檛 the only way the federal voucher scheme fails the 鈥渃ivil rights test.鈥� Having data on student and school performance broken down by student subgroups is a necessary civil rights tool, allowing the public to track disparities and target resources. Yet participating private schools do not have to report, test, or be held accountable for the requirements that apply to public schools. 

Most school choice programs students to take state assessments. And not all require that the . It is no surprise that lower-quality private schools are participate in voucher programs than higher-quality ones. When outcomes are hidden families are in the dark about how schools are serving their children. 

Then there is the cost. The true cost of this program to taxpayers and public school budgets is likely underestimated. In states with existing voucher programs, expenses have well beyond expectations, draining and destabilizing state budgets. In one Florida alone, the state voucher program contributed to a $17 million budget shortfall. Duval County serves a majority of students of color, about 40% of students are Black and 17% Latino, underscoring who bears the cost of these funding losses.   

In many places, voters have also rejected efforts to divert public funds away from public school students. In 2024, voters in Colorado, Kentucky, and Nebraska voted against ballot measures that would have directed taxpayer dollars to private school vouchers. 

According to UnidosUS鈥� of the Hispanic Electorate, a plurality of Latino voters oppose diverting public school funds to pay for private or religious school tuition, while found that more than two-thirds of all voters choose funding for public schools over vouchers. 

Despite its clear drawbacks, some supporters argue the new federal program could unlock new dollars for purposes that could benefit public school students, such as tutoring, after-school programs, transportation or services for students with disabilities. The promise of expanded services is appealing, but this, too, ignores key realities. 

Under the new federal tax-credit scholarship program, donors give money to Scholarship Granting Organizations (SGOs), which then provide 鈥渟cholarships鈥� or vouchers to eligible students. It is up to the U.S. Treasury Department to determine whether states can screen and set guardrails for SGOs participating in the program, and the agency has not yet released their proposed regulations. Still early and suggest states won鈥檛 get a choice in which vendors are eligible, which services quality nor which non-discrimination protections SGOs have to uphold. 

That would mean governors couldn鈥檛 prioritize SGOs that serve public school students, ensure quality standards or bar those that offer private school vouchers.

Even if a state is allowed to pick the SGOs that participate in the program, guaranteeing transparency and quality is a complex, demanding and potentially costly endeavor. With new SGOs and vendors entering the market, weeding out bad actors has proven to be a major and costly undertaking for states.  

A state audit revealed that Florida failed to reliably track in voucher funds, making it easy for fraudsters to game the system with fictitious The same audit revealed scholarship granting organizations in the state kept large sums of taxpayer money in their accounts, leaving programs and parents waiting for voucher payments for months. 

The federal program is so convoluted and biased towards private school uses that it is unlikely to serve public school students in practice. Ultimately, the potential harm outweighs any hypothetical good. 

We call on governors and state leaders: Do not opt in. Put the focus on civil rights, strengthening public schools and the proven options within them: tutoring, after-school learning, special education services, dual-language programs, magnet programs, gifted-and-talented programs with fair access and career and technical education. 

The program only passed the U.S. Senate last year by one vote, and Democratic Sens. Mark Kelly of Arizona and Mazie Hirono of Hawaii recently introduced the to repeal the program.

Public dollars should expand civil rights, not shrink them. Public education is the backbone of equal opportunity. Leaders should protect it.

Responsible legislation could limit the dangers by requiring age verification before kids can sign up for social media accounts, making learning content easier to access and demanding that cellphone providers provide safety tools for families. Instead, a huge wave of poorly constructed bills is working its way through state legislatures that could cause unintended consequences and set young people back even further. 

For example, in Missouri, a recently passed the statehouse that will require 70% of elementary school assignments to be completed with pencil and paper and prohibit schools from assigning any homework that uses technology. In Tennessee, legislators passed to ban all technology in grades K-5 for students and teachers. A proposed Kansas would mandate that all K-5 instructional materials be 鈥減rint-based.鈥� Virginia鈥檚 Senate has legislation directing the state to cap instructional screen time by grade level. And in Utah, a package of signed by the governor will sharply curtail the use of technology to support learning.

There are two consistent problems in the current wave of bills. First, they treat distracting entertainment media and research-based educational technology as if they are the same. But not all screen time is created equal, and these bills completely ignore that distinction. Lumping TikTok together with a math tutoring app, or Instagram with a text-to-speech tool for a student with dyslexia, is a practice that has been repeatedly . 

Second, they assume that the best way to limit tech use is with a timer. But the issue is quality, not quantity. Many of these bills set a daily time limit (e.g., one hour of digital instruction), though any amount of time would be too much for a student who is not using the technology effectively. On the flip side, technology used thoughtfully to increase student engagement and creativity should not be constrained by an arbitrary time limit, especially when supporting evidence-based pedagogical practices. What鈥檚 worse, not one of the bills requiring paper-based worksheets to be used in place of technology imposes any quality standards on the types of activities assigned. According to these bills, a teacher could replace a highly effective math app with a dot-to-dot worksheet, and it would be totally fine. That’s an 鈥渙ut of the frying pan into the fire鈥� situation.

As a parent and former educator, I understand the desire for . Personal devices and non-learning apps that don鈥檛 support educational goals can hijack students鈥� attention and try any teacher鈥檚 patience. But when learning is not engaging, literally anything will become a distraction. Limiting instruction to filling out paper-based worksheets would be mind-numbing for any student.

In contrast, the key to get kids to love learning is to make it meaningful, and this is where ed tech can be a game-changer. Recently, I visited a school in Los Angeles that was transforming math instruction by having students play a research-based math game, which informed the teacher exactly who needed extra help with specific concepts. Other technologies adapt learning activities based on students鈥� interests or skill levels, let teachers know which kids need help before they fall behind and enable educators to meet each student鈥檚 needs in ways that would otherwise be impossible. The effectiveness of these tools is backed by decades of . A bill like Missouri鈥檚 would make this kind of data-informed teaching nearly impossible.

For children with disabilities, assistive technology 鈥� screen readers, text-to-speech software, adaptive learning systems and language translation tools 鈥� is not just a nice-to-have; it whose needs might otherwise go unmet. Today, in the U.S. receive special education services, many of which include technology as part of their individualized education plans. For students with dyslexia using a text-to-speech app, for example, technology isn鈥檛 a distraction 鈥� it鈥檚 how they access learning. Tennessee鈥檚 original proposal would have barred teachers from even using digital devices for instruction, meaning the very tools these students depend on could have been eliminated.

In today’s economy, there is no college or career path that doesn鈥檛 require the effective use of technology. Students who develop digital literacy skills early than those who don’t. Essentially all jobs 鈥� 鈥� now require applicants to have digital proficiency. Preventing K-12 students from learning to use technology for writing, research and collaboration would undermine their future employability and the nation鈥檚 economic competitiveness.

This is even more striking in a global context. While America’s state legislatures debate whether to let elementary students touch a keyboard, other countries are on teaching students how to use technology 鈥� including artificial intelligence 鈥攖o solve complex problems. They recognize that technology can enhance curiosity, critical thinking and other essential skills, ensuring their graduates can thrive in the workplace and beyond. 

With the emergence of artificial intelligence, the world is at the . If the nation’s goal is to prepare kids to thrive in a complex and modern economy, it cannot retreat to the tools of the last century.

There is no disputing the need for guidelines and guardrails for children using consumer technology. But by treating math software the same as Netflix, and assistive technology the same as TikTok, the ed tech bans gaining momentum in statehouses around the country guarantee that the students who can least afford to fall behind will be the ones hurt most. If these bills become law, America won鈥檛 have protected its children 鈥� it will have forced them to learn for a paper-based world that no longer exists.

Banning technology for learning doesn鈥檛 make us principled 鈥� it makes us negligent.

However, if state leaders are serious about improving outcomes for students, they need to make sure their policy plates are filled with the right solutions. Accountability is the broccoli on that plate. It may not be the first thing you reach for. You might not want to go back for seconds. But despite what my dad used to say, you need to eat it. 

Accountability leads to positive student academic progress through consistent implementation. When I was governor of Florida, we worked to put in place a built on clear standards, annual assessments, school grading, real consequences for persistent failure and financial recognition for success.  

It wasn鈥檛 the most popular thing my administration did, but over time, the approach created a culture of transparency and responsibility. Florida parents understood how their child鈥檚 school was performing, educators had clearer expectations and policymakers had the data they needed to make informed decisions. 

Over the next two decades, Florida became one of the for student proficiency in math and reading according to the National Assessment of Educational Progress. This was particularly true for Florida鈥檚 low-income students. To be clear, those proficiency gains were not the result of a single program or short-term investment; it was part of a broader education policy agenda that included high-quality literacy instruction, access to more schools  for families through scholarship programs and letter grades for schools.  

, similar agendas have emerged in states like Mississippi and Louisiana. Their gains reinforce a simple but important point: When states stick with the fundamentals, students benefit.  

At the national level, the picture is far less encouraging. The show too many students are struggling, with declines and stagnation in both math and reading. Right now, students in fourth and eighth grade are performing on average at a their counterparts from a decade ago.     

Minnesota is a prime example of a state that rested on its laurels. In 2013, Minnesota was coming off more than a decade of consistently in nearly every education category. Since then, despite billions of additional dollars invested, Minnesota students are now performing on par with the national average in fourth grade reading and math. They are now performing more than an entire grade level behind their 2013 peers.

These scores aren鈥檛 just numbers; they reflect lost earning potential for students and a weaker workforce ahead. from Stanford University finds that restoring academic performance to 2013 levels would boost the average student鈥檚 lifetime earnings by about 8%. In total, the Stanford study estimates learning loss over the past decade has cost our country more than .  

The news is even more grim for disadvantaged children, who saw the performance gap between high- and low-performing students . Because these students have suffered larger learning losses, their average lifetime incomes are expected to be than those of similar young people a decade ago. 

State education leaders and lawmakers who commit to with a focus on academics are more likely to see their states stick to those changes and more likely to see future leaders and lawmakers continue to raise the bar, ensuring lasting improvement. That kind of consistency is not easy, but it is necessary. Plenty of people would like to eat nothing but pizza 鈥� comfort food solutions with no substance 鈥� but any doctor will tell you humans need more green stuff to see healthier outcomes. 

Unlike Minnesota, mounted a commitment to transparent, rigorous, accountability during the 2010s. Mississippi鈥檚 fourth grade students are of their 2013 peers in reading and math, outperforming Minnesota kids in reading by half a grade level 鈥� all while spending far less money. 

That means state leaders must stay the course, even when the results are not immediately flattering and there is pressure to retreat. Lawmakers must resist the temptation of the better-tasting, less wholesome items on their plate that are more likely to make eye-catching headlines but not have as much effect on student outcomes. For the sake of America’s children, more states need to embrace accountability and stick with a simple solution: Eat your broccoli.

Leo鈥檚 wariness of Latin is understandable. When the “Habemus Papam” declaring him Pope was delivered in Latin, it encountered , reigniting debate about whether Latin is still useful in the modern era.

Rumors of Latin鈥檚 demise are greatly exaggerated, but school districts are planning its funeral. That needs to stop; the first step in planning for Latin鈥檚 continued life is to resist the elitist label that studying the language imparts. Latin is an equity tool, and we don鈥檛 acknowledge that enough. 

Latin programs across the country are being euthanized. In Needham, Massachusetts, a more than $2 million budget shortfall combined with declining enrollment led the public school district to eliminate its entire high school Latin program. Only 62 students were enrolled across four classes, compared to 945 in Spanish. Latin 1 had already been removed the prior year.

Over in Shaker Heights, Ohio, the district decided to Latin out of the middle school entirely 鈥� removing it grade by grade over three years 鈥� while technically keeping it at the high school for now. The high school Latin teacher warned it would be unsustainable: Without a middle school feeder, most students simply wouldn’t switch languages.

A t across Denver Public Schools put Latin at risk at Riverside High School, where the teacher noted that the lack of Latin in middle schools was already contributing to low high school enrollment. 

Cutting Latin off in middle school is the death knell for the language. Middle school Latin gets cut first due to low enrollment, which then makes high school Latin unsustainable, creating a self-reinforcing decline; about 80% of students who took Latin in middle school had been continuing it in high school.

That鈥檚 why the language is on life support. Only about 1,513 public high schools teach Latin, out of roughly 24,000 high schools total 鈥�  about of schools. That’s just public schools; private and Catholic schools push the number higher, but a comprehensive combined figure isn’t tracked precisely. Estimates put total K鈥�12 Latin enrollment at around 210,000 students, which is about of all students studying a foreign language.

This decline is not new: High school Latin students dropped from around 700,000 in , largely due to the post-Sputnik push toward math and science. More recently, Advanced Placement Latin exam takers fell from 6,083 in 2019 to 4,336 in 2025,suggesting continued erosion at the advanced level.

That鈥檚 bad for English speakers, as Latin forms the root of nearly two thirds of English vocabulary, especially the advanced words used in science, law and literature. For school-related vocabulary, the figure is 90%. Studying Latin can strengthen reading comprehension, which is why some schools still offer the course. 

It鈥檚 time to address the real reason why Latin studies have been declining without many scholars becoming too concerned: the elitism debate. 

Classics always had an elite image 鈥� classical knowledge was historically the hallmark of gentility 鈥� and parochial and private schools maintained classical standards longer than most public ones.This difference in offerings is most stark in the U.K.: only of private schools.

In the U.S., Latin is especially concentrated in certain types of schools: elite independent prep schools 鈥� such as Exeter, Andover and Groton 鈥� and Catholic secondary schools where it’s often required. 

But a third type of school is breaking that loop: charter schools. They demonstrate how to keep Latin alive. Classical Charter Schools in the South Bronx offer a tuition-free education in one of the most underserved congressional districts in the U.S., with Latin as a core part of the curriculum. Latin instruction starts in , framed not as prestige-building but as a practical tool: improving English grammar, spelling, vocabulary and readiness to learn other languages.The idea is to flip the script: give low-income kids the same linguistic tools that elite schools have always hoarded.

Latin critics have pointed out that no one speaks the language but that鈥檚 not exactly true.  Linguists like Tim Pulju argue that Latin never truly stopped being spoken 鈥� it continued in Italy, Gaul, Spain and elsewhere, g into the Romance languages over centuries.There鈥檚 an important distinction:  Classical Latin of Cicero and Virgil became fixed and may have died conversationally but Vulgar Latin 鈥� what ordinary Romans actually spoke 鈥� kept evolving into what we now call Italian, French, Spanish, Portuguese and Romanian. 

For Latino students especially, Latin can be framed as the root of their own language, not a foreign elite artifact but something ancestral and relevant. 

Latin is very much alive but it鈥檚 limping. Presenting it as an equity tool rather than a classical tradition can change who sees themselves as a potential Latin student and can change curricula 鈥� and lives.

This constriction did not emerge from a simple shortage, but from deliberate policy decisions made in the wake of . School closures, discriminatory placements and the mass dismissal and demotion of tens of thousands of Black educators occurred alongside formal compliance with desegregation mandates, all but dismantling the Black teacher pipeline. 

In the decades since these actions were taken, policymakers have enacted a range of initiatives 鈥� from grow-your-own teacher programs to financial incentives and certification reforms 鈥� to strengthen the Black educator workforce. However, because these efforts have largely taken a general approach, they have not been sufficient to repair the damage at scale. 

Rebuilding the Black teacher pipeline will require sustained, intentional investment in targeted pathways into the profession 鈥� particularly programs that provide early, hands-on teaching experience for Black students and aspiring educators.   

One example is the , a five-week summer program offered both virtually and in person at four elementary schools in Philadelphia. It brings together high school and college students who serve as apprentices in classroom- based teaching roles. College-aged Servant Leader Apprentices facilitate instruction, while high school students assist with small-group lessons and classroom activities as Junior Servant Leaders, all under the guidance of experienced educator-coaches who also provide professional development and structured feedback cycles. This builds instructional skill, leadership and a foundation in Black pedagogy. Together, participants gain hands-on experience while supporting students entering first through third grade.  

In 2025, 82 apprentices participated across the five sites. In Servant Leader Apprentice-led classrooms, apprentices delivered culturally responsive literacy instruction, academic enrichment and social鈥揺motional support to approximately 10 elementary students. Through this work, the apprentices experienced the demands of  planning, leading and supporting a classroom 鈥� helping many begin to see teaching as both a craft and a viable career.  

This shift in how participants view teaching is reflected in survey data: By the end of the five weeks, interest in teaching among Servant Leader Apprentices rose from 89% to 95%, and 77% of all participants indicated they plan to return the following year. One Junior Servant Leader said, 鈥淚 learned to be more confident 鈥� building bonds was my favorite part.鈥� A Servant Leader Apprentice shared something similar: 鈥淢y favorite part 鈥� was getting to know the scholars and building relationships in my classroom.鈥� In these moments, teaching shifts from an abstract profession to a commitment rooted in trust, care and a growing sense of responsibility.  

Student outcomes improved as well. Nearly nine in 10 scholars in the program met or exceeded literacy growth goals. Students reported increased confidence and a stronger sense of self, and 90% of participating families plan to return. For many students, even if only for the summer, the classroom became a place where academic growth and cultural affirmation went hand in hand 鈥� demonstrating the kind of learning environment that attracts and retains future educators.

While not every apprentice enters the classroom immediately, the academy serves as an entryway to a longer pathway into the profession, connecting participants to structured that provide academic support, professional development, financial assistance and ongoing guidance as prospective educators progress toward the profession.  

Taken together, these outcomes point to a larger conclusion: Rebuilding the Black teacher pipeline will require more than initiatives aimed at strengthening the overall educator workforce. It will need investments in opportunities that allow young Black people to experience teaching and see themselves reflected in it. Programs like the academy create those opportunities, helping aspiring educators build confidence in their ability to influence the futures of the students they serve. 

For policymakers, this means investing in early, structured pathways 鈥� such as summer learning programs, and 鈥� as a core strategy for expanding entry points into the teaching profession. Investments in these programs allow young people to discover, through practice, that teaching is not simply a job, but a form of freedom work, a commitment to the communities that shaped them and to the students who will shape what comes next.    

At a time when Pennsylvania鈥檚 Black educator pipeline remains constrained, failing to invest in these emerging educators will only reinforce the conditions that produced the historic gap.  

The question is not whether talent or interest exists 鈥� it does. The question is whether  legislators, school systems and advocacy organizations will build and invest in targeted pathways that directly address the specific harm done to the Black teacher pipeline in the wake of Brown v. Board of Education. 

Ironically, the announcement comes as the administration is aggressively inserting itself in state and local education decision-making through a little-known administrative process. 

A General Services Administration that would require almost all applicants for federal funds to certify compliance with federal laws, executive orders and regulations 鈥� including non-discrimination laws 鈥� would also mandate adherence to the administration鈥檚 interpretation of what is discriminatory. In doing so, the announcement suggests that the Trump administration is interested not just in enforcing the law, but in discouraging efforts to increase diversity in education and beyond. 

The document treats 鈥渄iversity, equity, inclusion and accessibility鈥� initiatives as potentially discriminatory, including, for example, statements used by many employers to encourage applicants from various backgrounds. It rejects what the administration calls 鈥渃ultural competence鈥� requirements, potentially imperiling teaching practices that connect instruction to students鈥� backgrounds. And it would likely ban questions asking applicants to describe how they have overcome obstacles, as colleges are increasingly doing in the wake of the 2023 Supreme Court ruling striking down affirmative action in admissions. States and school districts found in violation of the proposed requirements would be subject to funding reductions, civil liability or even criminal prosecution 鈥� stark consequences for refusing to conform to administration policy. 

The GSA鈥檚 proposal flies in the face of studies showing that teacher diversity benefits all students.

demonstrates that student and teacher diversity in schools and colleges helps Black, Hispanic and other traditionally underserved students achieve in school and beyond. As FutureEd noted in a , when students of color have teachers of color, attendance, academic achievement and college enrollment increase and disciplinary infractions decline. 

The research has an important bearing on the performance of the nation鈥檚 schools, given that students of color comprise more than 50% of public-school enrollment nationally, while nearly 80% of teachers in the country鈥檚 schools are white.

White students also benefit from having teachers of color. In a of four East Coast school districts, white students who studied under a teacher of color reported working harder and being more confident in their abilities than those who did not. Among the potential reasons for the greater engagement: Teachers of color were more likely to believe that student intelligence is malleable rather than fixed and to address student misbehavior in ways that didn鈥檛 damage classroom climate.

For their part, teachers value diversity in their ranks. In a national survey of K-12 teachers conducted for by the RAND Corp., 81% of participants said it is 鈥渋mportant or extremely important鈥� for students of color to be taught by teachers of diverse racial and ethnic backgrounds, and 79% said it is 鈥渋mportant or extremely important鈥� to have colleagues of diverse racial and ethnic backgrounds.

Of course, subject matter expertise and effective teaching experience should be paramount in hiring decisions. And anyone who receives federal funds should comply with non-discrimination law. But the GSA announcement would put at risk diversity initiatives that are valuable in schools and would seemingly pass legal muster. 

It鈥檚 the latest administration move against diversity in education. Weeks into President Donald Trump鈥檚 second term, the Department of Education canceled hundreds of millions of dollars in grants awarded under the previous administration that had already been distributed and sought in part to increase educator diversity. 

Then, the department issued a that sought to eliminate DEI programs in school districts and institutions of higher education. It was subsequently struck down by the courts, and the department of Education dropped its appeal in January, only weeks before GSA鈥檚 proposal was released. This suggests that the administration is trying to achieve through administrative means what it failed to accomplish with last year鈥檚 letter. 

If the Trump administration wants to ensure appropriate enforcement of anti-discrimination laws in education, it has the tools to do so through the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission and the Department of Education鈥檚 Office for Civil Rights. Unfortunately, the administration last year downsized OCR dramatically, leading a federal court to the reinstatement of hundreds of staffers so the agency could fulfill its duties. And staffing levels at the EEOC are down more than since the end of fiscal year .

The resulting cutback in civil rights enforcement under the Trump administration has been dramatic. As of December, OCR had , compared with 16,500 at the end of the Biden administration. 

Rather than staffing the federal government to enforce civil rights laws, the administration seems to be trying to weaken diversity efforts in schools by intimidating state and local educators with the threat of lost funding, criminal prosecution or civil liability into preemptively complying with its priorities, as it with its Dear Colleague Letter last year. 

But that tactic not only contradicts research on the value of educator diversity; it takes authority over teaching and learning out of the hands of the very leaders McMahon says she wants to empower. 

This bill would grant student members of the right to vote on the decisions the councils take. If passed, out of the 13 votes per council, students would hold two of them. 

CECs consist of elected community members who evaluate the efficacy of educational programs, recommend improvements, approve zoning lines and weigh in on all things related to public education. State law currently requires that two students, serving in student government and nominated by their superintendents, serve on each of the 32 councils and one on each of the four citywide councils.鈥� 

Students on these councils attend the meetings, offer feedback and consultation, share informed perspectives 鈥� perspectives that carry unique weight because of their lived experience 鈥� yet when the time comes to decide, they have no voting power. 

This dichotomy reveals how鈥� deeply shapes our civic relationship with young people. For decades, institutions have them from the democratic process or included them only in token ways.  

Ironically, CECs themselves perpetuate this pattern. Not only do they deny students voting power, but they have also failed to comply with state law requiring student representation. As of 2024, only 14 student seats were filled, leaving at least two-thirds vacant. An honest reflection of the law makes that not surprising. Would you sit on a council if you were the only non-voting member? 

This bill addresses both problems. It increases the number of students on each council and ensures that students not only inform decisions about policies affecting their daily lives but can cast votes on those decisions.鈥疘t also broadens access by removing a requirement that the student members serve in student government.

When considering the utilitarianism of this bill, it is easy to understand why it hasn’t generated a lot of attention 鈥� it seems like an obvious 鈥榊es.鈥� But pragmatism alone doesn鈥檛 guarantee success. Lawmakers introduced this bill in 2023 and three years later, it has yet to pass.  

This is particularly concerning as the new mayor and chancellor vow to improve our current governance model that gives the mayor control over our system. CECs are contingent on mayoral control and are expected to provide vital input to both the mayor and chancellor. Giving students a real seat at the table is a simple but important first step they could advocate for. 

The lack of traction likely stems from limited awareness, paired with to fully embrace the burgeoning movement for youth voice and enfranchisement.   

Fortunately, young people deserve the right to inform and influence the policies and practices that affect their daily lives.  

For those of us working in the youth civic and democratic ecosystem, we鈥檝e witnessed young people鈥檚 perspectives and impact on鈥痯olicy from communities to the . We trust their judgment and benefit when we listen. This bill asks lawmakers in Albany to extend that trust.  

Research on adolescent development reinforces this need. By their early teens, young people鈥檚 brains are developing in ways that heighten their focus on . 

Evidence from the field and research alone will not secure this bill鈥檚 passage. Advocates must also demonstrate what this looks like in practice. , the original author of this bill, demonstrates that reality better than anybody in the city. 

For three decades, BroSis has in New York City. These efforts show how capable young people are and how essential their voices remain in galvanizing change. Young leaders bring insight into systematic challenges in ways that very few decision-makers can fathom, such as longstanding racial disparities in education as well as emerging challenges like artificial intelligence. 

EdTrust-New York has seen the same impact. Through the developed in partnership with BroSis and Adelante Student Voices, students have shaped policy conversations on school discipline, suspension rates and equity across the state. Their contributions have improved both the quality and urgency of those discussions. 

Together we view this bill as a catalyst for better informed education policy and a mechanism to ensure direct student representation. It will also help build civic ownership among young people. 

The bill will ensure the education reflects what students actually need. It also signals to young people, who are growing from the lack of access to the democratic process, that New York City is committed to engaging them and elevating their civic power.鈥� 

The strength of this bill lies in its practicality, but we should not mistake simplicity for insignificance. As advocates and policymakers consider how to improve mayoral control, they should take this simple and meaningful first step. This bill deserves full-throated support from anyone in New York City who values young people鈥檚 perspectives and believes they must play a meaningful role in the civic process.鈥疞et鈥檚 give high school students, not just a seat at the table, but a vote.

The child care closure at UNO is reflective of a concerning trend: Across the country, universities, school districts and hospitals are shutting down affiliated child care programs at an alarming rate as the cracks in America鈥檚 child care system begin to widen into fissures.

Since the beginning of 2025, a growing number of institutions have closed or put forth plans to close on-site child care programs that serve employees and, in the case of universities, student parents. These include universities such as , , and the , along in Washington, Arizona, and Kentucky. During the same time, public K-12 districts 鈥� including in Michigan, in Missouri and in Colorado 鈥� have announced similar closures, as have hospital systems in , and .

In almost every case, administrators are pointing to rising costs as a key culprit. Indeed, absent public funding, large institutions cannot run a sustainable child care business, particularly as most institutionally-affiliated programs offer tuition discounts to employees. In the case of Baptist Health, a nonprofit health care organization in Arkansas, the system said it $2 million a year operating two of its child care centers.

While there may have been a time when such losses were manageable, these institutions are being buffeted by other headwinds. Many colleges, universities and school districts are dealing with declining enrollment numbers that have . A key federal funding program that helps colleges and universities subsidize child care for student parents 鈥� Child Care Access Means Parents in School (CCAMPIS) 鈥� has been held flat, which is a functional decrease in the face of inflation and rapidly rising child care costs.

Meanwhile, hospital systems are struggling with Medicaid cuts, rising labor costs, and tariffs increasing the costs of imported medicines and supplies; The American Hospital Association a 鈥減erfect storm of financial pressures.鈥� 

The rash of institutional closures should be a stark warning about the future of employer-sponsored child care. That term usually conjures the concept of private companies offering on-site centers or subsidies for child care as a workplace perk. But in practice, these institutions function similarly: They operate on-site child care for their community members, such as staff, students or patients 鈥� and in many cases, the programs have been around for decades. In a sense, we might consider institutionally-affiliated child care programs the best-case version of employer-supported care. The institutions are often anchored in public missions, subject to greater accountability and backed by generally reliable funding streams. Yet, even these programs are disappearing.

If institutions designed to serve the public can鈥檛 sustain employer-linked child care, it raises a larger question about how realistic it is to . 

It seems clear that, reluctant as the decision may be, child care quickly finds itself on the chopping block when budgets tighten. Often, it is viewed as a nice-to-have for institutions, even while it鈥檚 a must-have for families. When programs close and families lose subsidized care, they鈥檙e often forced into a wild scramble for a spot among scarce options. With the aforementioned headwinds only projected to worsen, more closures are, unfortunately, likely on the way. 

To be clear, the closures don鈥檛 signal that on-site child care is inherently flawed. In fact, the passionate reaction of families and providers show just how valued these programs are. The question is, how should such programs be funded? A model that relies on institutions themselves bearing the cost seems to be breaking down. Similarly, depending on a single funding stream, like CCAMPIS, is clearly risky, as it keeps programs in a constant state of vulnerability 鈥� just one unfavorable grant cycle away from collapse.

What鈥檚 needed, instead, is a way to wrap institutionally-affiliated child care into a broader publicly-funded system, as is done in nations like and . 

The child care sector may well be entering a phase where Band-Aids like incentivizing employers to offer child care benefits like on-site programs or stipends can no longer hold back the bleeding. If universities and hospital systems 鈥� to say nothing of Fortune 500 companies like and 鈥� are increasingly unable or unwilling to maintain their child care programs despite evidence of their positive impacts, then a course correction is needed. 

Policymakers are rushing to incentivize employer-sponsored child care at a moment when the American economy is slowing down and financial headwinds are picking up. If there鈥檚 any good news, it鈥檚 that about five thousand years ago humans invented a way to pool individual resources and redistribute them for collective benefit. In other words, the antidote to institutional child care closures is the same as the antidote to mom and pop child care closures: tax dollars. 

Traditional high-impact tutoring can cost upward of $2,000 per student a year, and staffing is the single biggest constraint. At the same time, shortages of qualified teachers persist, with districts struggling to recruit and retain the educators students need most.

These two crises, a tutoring access gap and a teacher pipeline shortage, are usually treated as separate problems, but they shouldn鈥檛 be. Among the full landscape of education interventions, high-impact tutoring is one of the most consistently effective, evidence-based strategies for accelerating student learning. The results are replicable, offering up a solution to both crises that is currently hiding in plain sight.

Each year, more than 600,000 aspiring teachers are enrolled in educator-preparation programs across the country. Another 600,000 college students are employed through as well as state programs, such as . We can, and must, activate these people as tutors for the students who need them most. To do that, policymakers should act on two fronts.

First, unlock Federal Work-Study dollars for tutoring. The infrastructure already exists. Work-Study employs 600,000 college students annually in federally subsidized campus jobs. Redirecting even a fraction of these positions toward high-quality tutoring would create one of the largest, most cost-effective tutoring workforces in the country without requiring new appropriations.

This is already happening. Step Up Tutoring engages college students paid through Federal Work-Study or College Corps at 40 colleges and universities across 15 states, making it one of the fastest-growing Work-Study鈥損owered tutoring programs in the country. Step Up delivers one-on-one virtual tutoring and mentorship to over 5,000 underserved students annually in more than 40 districts across four states. Its students are outperforming peers by wide margins; an independent evaluation found that students receiving tutoring with Step Up gained two to four additional months of learning in math compared to a control group.

Critically, this model both expands the tutoring workforce and strengthens the educator pipeline. This year, 73% of Step Up’s college and high school-aged tutors reported that they are somewhat to strongly interested in pursuing a career in education, and 82% said their Step Up experience increased that interest. As one tutor shared: “Step Up confirmed my desire to go into teaching. I wasn’t sure before, but working with my student has been the most fulfilling part of my week.”

Second, require tutoring experience as a core component of teacher preparation. Many aspiring teachers enrolled in prep programs don鈥檛 have an opportunity to regularly practice what they learn until a culminating student teaching experience or a year-long residency near the end of their program. Tutoring can be the lab where theory meets practice earlier in their preparation, allowing candidates to begin working directly with students to practice instructional skills and identify and use high-quality instructional materials in real time.

Deans for Impact’s partnerships with nearly 300 prep programs demonstrate that aspiring teachers grow more skilled, confident and effective when they have structured opportunities to engage in on-the-job learning early and often. Through a pilot designed to prepare aspiring-teacher tutors to identify and effectively use high quality materials, there was an average 20-plus percentage-point growth in instructional skills and knowledge among participants. Findings also showed an average overall increase of over 49% in tutors鈥� feelings of preparedness to teach.

When tutoring is embedded into preparation, and not treated as an add-on, aspiring educators build instructional skills earlier, with support, before stepping into the complexity of full-classroom teaching. Districts gain a steadier, stronger pipeline. And states produce teachers who know how to accelerate learning from day one.

There is another reason to be optimistic about the effectiveness of these novice tutors. Increasingly, AI-powered tools can provide real-time instructional guidance, helping tutors decide what to teach, how to explain concepts and how to respond when students struggle. This is not about replacing the human relationship at the center of effective tutoring; it is about ensuring that every willing tutor, regardless of prior experience, can deliver consistent, high-quality instruction.

If we act on these two priorities 鈥� unlocking Work-Study funding and embedding tutoring in teacher preparation 鈥� we can solve two critical problems at once. Students gain the academic support and human relationships they desperately need. And more young adults can build their confidence and skills in teaching from the start. In the process, they establish a habit of service that will shape the rest of their careers.

Despite the sunset of ESSER funds, the federal government has continued to foster momentum by elevating tutoring as a priority in existing and future grant competitions. In December 2025, the U.S. Department of Education awarded $256 million via the to scale tutoring and improve literacy. Also in December, a growing bipartisan, bicameral coalition of Congressional leaders re-introduced the PATHS to Tutor Act to scale local partnerships working to embed tutoring into teacher training. 

But the next step must be bolder: we need a comprehensive, national strategy that integrates tutoring into the fabric of teacher preparation and channels federal dollars toward improving academic outcomes while simultaneously cultivating the next generation of educators. 

Frederick Douglass鈥� advice is a blueprint for a brighter future for men in America. Unfortunately, fewer and fewer men are volunteering in the lives of young men, and the number of male educators has been dropping consistently over the past 30 years. According to the American Institute for Boys and Men, only 27% of men volunteered in 2023, five points lower than women. At the same time, the share of male teachers has dropped from 30% in 1988 to 23% in 2022. 

According to professor and author Scott Galloway, 鈥淭he single greatest point of failure when a young boy comes off the tracks is when he loses a male role model.鈥� With boys falling behind in schools while struggling with anxiety and depression at home, we are reaping the effects of the lack of male volunteers in our communities and schools. 

April is National Volunteer Month, an opportunity to celebrate the men and women who sacrifice their time to support a worthy cause. And as the world celebrates the 50th Anniversary of National Volunteer Month, we not only recognize the impact volunteers have on others, but we also appreciate the lasting benefit giving one鈥檚 time has on the volunteer. 

Americans increasingly support mandatory national service, with more than two-thirds of Americans backing it for 18-22 year-olds. Surprisingly, that support is even higher among young people ages 18-24, three-quarters of whom back mandatory national service. Parents support requiring their children to serve with such programs as the Big Brothers Big Brothers of America, AmeriCorps, Teacher For America, City Year or the United States Peace Corps. The largest group of parents with children expected to serve (ages 38 to 44) endorse mandatory national service at a rate of 62%. 

Volunteering also benefits the volunteers, especially for men who are reporting to be more lonely and less connected to their communities. The data is clear, volunteering will give men more social connection, positive health outcomes, and better mental health. The irony is that while young boys need male mentors and teachers, programs that offer volunteer opportunities are reporting less and less participation by men. 

In March, I celebrated Peace Corps Week and my time as an education volunteer in South Africa. Peace Corps Week honors how the service opportunity fosters connections and contributes to meaningful change 鈥� in the United States and around the world. Since 1961, over 240,000 American men and women have dedicated over two years of their life to serving in more than 60 developing countries around the world. Today more than 3,000 Peace Corps volunteers are serving: 56% of them are female, while about 44% are male. 

The shortage of men volunteering is not limited to international work; women are outpacing men at home too. Big Brother Big Sisters of America reports that more than 70% of children on their waitlist are boys because of a lack of Big Brothers. Similarly, only 32% of AmeriCorps volunteers, 34% of Teach For America members, and 39% of City Year volunteers are men. 

My time as a Peace Corps volunteer over 25 years ago sparked my career in education. My own experience makes me believe that targeting male volunteers could be the answer to closing the gap of male teachers in America. Nearly 40% of all Peace Corps volunteers are focused on the education sector in their host country, the largest group among all the programs. Men who serve as education volunteers are trained to teach subjects like English as a foreign language , math, science and special education in a foreign country. 

The experience these men gain serving in their host communities is often brought home and applied locally when they return. Nearly two-thirds of volunteers who serve as teachers in the Peace Corps work in the education section in America upon completion of their service. Similarly, more than half of the men and women who complete their City Year service work in education. 

States are already leading. Maryland requires 75 hours of community service for students to qualify for graduation and has just launched a “Young Men and Boys Initiative” to increase mentor recruitment and create pathways for young men. 

Other states have worked to promote volunteering as well, including: 

• California launched a statewide initiative seeking 10,000 men to serve as mentors, tutors and coaches to combat rising suicide rates, social disconnection and declining college attendance among young men.聽
• Washington enacted a National Mentoring Month campaign to address the need for male mentors.
• Virginia created a Boys to Men Mentoring Network with local chapters focusing on young men.
• Arizona partnered with Big Brothers Big Sisters of America to launch a statewide campaign to recruit male mentors.
• Wisconsin organized events to help recruit Black male mentors for young boys.

Nonprofits and male membership organizations have begun taking the lead as well. Big Brothers Big Sisters of America are partnering with greek letter membership organizations like Alpha Phi Alpha, Kappa Alpha Psi and Omega Psi Phi to increase the number of African-American male mentors.

In Georgia, the National Parents Union celebrates their NPU Parent Week of Action by encouraging men to volunteer in local schools. Through NPU and Black Male Educators, fathers and father-figures serve as bus monitors and crossing guards. The program has been a tremendous success leading to volunteers even becoming bus drivers. In other instances, these organizations are connecting fathers with opportunities to volunteer in classrooms reading to students. Introducing fathers into their children鈥檚 schools as volunteers could be the first step to them becoming teachers. 

We can do this, we can connect men with volunteer opportunities that give them meaning and purpose. For men who volunteer and find passion in mentoring young men and boys, opportunities to transition into teaching should be easier and less expensive. We need more male teachers; being laser focused on partnering with volunteer programs could be a silver bullet.

What gets discussed far less often is that this pattern rarely begins in third or fifth grade, when participation gaps become easier to see. It begins in children鈥檚 first classroom experiences, where they learn whether speaking feels safe, whether mistakes are survivable and whether the classroom has room for the way they enter language.

The problem is not simply that some children talk more than others. It is that schools often mistake fast, public participation for understanding and then build opportunity around that mistake. A child who speaks quickly and often is usually read as engaged, confident and capable. A child who hesitates, watches or offers little is more likely to be read as uncertain, underprepared or less able.

Yet speaking in front of others is not a simple measure of understanding. It requires children to process a question, organize language quickly, tolerate public attention and respond while everyone is listening. For multilingual learners, it may also mean searching across languages while monitoring pronunciation and trying not to make a visible mistake.

What can look like 鈥渏ust talking鈥� is often thinking under pressure.

When schools confuse reduced public response with reduced competence, they begin shaping a trajectory. That trajectory is rarely built through cruelty or obvious exclusion. More often, it emerges through small instructional decisions that seem reasonable on the surface. When participation in whole-group discussion decreases, teachers鈥攐ften out of care鈥攎ay call on certain students less, simplify questions or stop asking for elaboration. Meanwhile, other students are invited to explain, justify, extend and defend their thinking.

Each decision appears minor, but over time they accumulate. Opportunities to demonstrate complexity expand for some students and quietly contract for others. This is how underestimation takes root in schools 鈥� not through overt exclusion, but through a subtle redistribution of opportunity.

The problem deepens when educators collapse many different experiences into the single category of 鈥渜uiet.鈥� From the outside, quiet students can look similar, but the reasons beneath the silence are not. Some are fluent and expressive in low-pressure settings but constricted in public ones. Others understand directions in two languages and still shut down the moment speaking becomes public.

In everyday classroom moments 鈥� during snack, in play, or beside one trusted peer 鈥� these same children often become animated and engaged. Expression can expand quickly when pressure is lowered, home language is welcomed, or an adult creates space for response.

In one kindergarten classroom, a child who rarely spoke during group instruction began, almost invisibly, by moving his chair a few inches closer to the circle each day. The teacher noticed and named the shift without demanding more than he was ready to offer. 鈥淵ou came closer today,鈥� she told him, and later, 鈥淚 see you鈥檙e staying with us.鈥�

Within days, he began whispering answers to a partner, and within weeks he was participating in small-group discussion. His language had not suddenly changed. The environment had. That is the point schools too often miss: Participation begins before speech.

In early classrooms, many children participate long before they do so in polished verbal form. They move closer to the group, track the teacher鈥檚 face, point instead of answering, imitate actions, sort materials, whisper to peers or respond through gesture and gaze. These are not lesser forms of participation. They are participation in its earliest form.

Yet schools often reward only the most visible and verbally fluent version of engagement, while everything that comes before it is treated as secondary. For multilingual learners and other cautious children, this creates a profound mismatch: their bodies are already engaged while the classroom waits for a kind of public speech they are not yet ready to produce.

If schools want to turn this around, they do not need an expensive new program. They need to stop treating the fastest and most exposed form of response as the clearest proof of understanding.

That shift begins with classroom routines. Before asking for a public answer, teachers can build in real 鈥渢hink time鈥� 鈥�10 or 15 seconds that give students a chance to process before the quickest voices take over. They can let students rehearse with a partner before whole-group discussion, so the first public response is not also the first act of language formation.

They can ask students to point to evidence, sketch an idea, jot a sentence or sort materials before speaking aloud. They can return to a child after another voice has entered the conversation, instead of treating one missed moment as closure. And they can widen what counts as participation so that gesture, writing, peer explanation, and home-language processing are recognized as evidence of thought.

Teachers can also lower the social risk built into participation by slowing the pace when questions become more demanding, avoiding rapid-fire questioning that rewards only the quickest responders, and making hesitation less punishing. 鈥淭ake a second and think鈥� invites participation differently than 鈥淐ome on, you know this.鈥� 鈥淪how me first鈥� opens a door that 鈥淯se your words鈥� can close.

Just as important, teachers can look for patterns instead of drawing conclusions from isolated moments. A student who is silent in whole-group discussion but expressive in play, writing, small groups or in another language is not showing an absence of understanding. That variability is information: It shows that expression is conditional, not fixed, and that classroom conditions shape what becomes visible.

These moves do not lower rigor 鈥� they make it more accurate. Rigor is not how fast a child can speak in front of others. It is whether a classroom can recognize thought before it arrives in its most polished, public form.

When silence is misinterpreted early, the consequences extend far beyond one discussion. Expectations drift downward. Opportunities narrow. Referrals increase. Children acquire identities they did not choose: hesitant, low, disengaged, behind. What begins as a participation gap becomes an opportunity gap, and over time the system names what it helped create.

The student who lowers her hand is not always unsure, unmotivated or disengaged. She may be calculating whether the room is safe enough for the way she speaks, whether there is time to find language without being rushed, and whether what she is about to say will be met with patience or correction. If schools want more students to participate, they should stop treating voice as something children either have or do not.

Participation is not a trait 鈥� it is a condition. Quiet students do not need louder prompts. They need safer entry points. If schools understood that earlier, they might stop asking why some students do not raise their hands and start asking the more important question: What have we taught them participation will cost?

Once a month at Impact Puget Sound Elementary, I break it on purpose.

We call it Hallway Holler. About once a month, teachers nominate scholars who have embodied our school’s Core Values and Commitments in meaningful ways. Those students get to sprint down the hallway 鈥� full speed, arms pumping, sneakers squeaking 鈥� while their classmates line the walls, arms outstretched to form a tunnel, cheering as loud as they possibly can. Teachers run right alongside their kids. The noise is glorious. The joy is real.

I know how that sounds. But I’d argue it’s one of the most direct things I do to address one of American education’s most stubborn problems: getting kids to show up.

Hallway Holler started at our Tukwila campus, in a single ground-floor hallway, almost as a small experiment. The idea was simple: Take something we care deeply about 鈥� our core values 鈥� and make the recognition of it feel like the biggest deal in the building. It worked so well, so fast, that we expanded it to all four of our schools and moved it to monthly. Now it’s a founding pillar of who we are as a charter school network.

What I didn’t fully anticipate was what it would mean to the kids. One first grader told me: “My favorite part is that we get to run. When I am chosen to run, and people are cheering for me, it makes me feel proud of myself.” A fourth grader put it even more plainly: “I always want to be at school to see if I am running again. I want to work even harder.”

When we surveyed families about what they wanted as we expanded to middle school, Hallway Holler came up unprompted. Not from parents. From kids. Students told their families about it. That feedback loop 鈥� from a child’s excitement to a family’s sense of belonging 鈥� is not something I could have manufactured with a policy memo.

I want to be honest about what Hallway Holler is not. It is not a reward for perfect behavior or a prize for the most popular kids in class. Teachers nominate scholars who have embodied our values in meaningful ways: spreading kindness in the classroom, in common spaces, at recess and beyond. Recognition rotates, so that every child gets seen across the year for something real. 

 I think about one of our fourth graders who, just a year ago, struggled to find his footing. Third grade had been difficult: academically, socially and in how he experienced school. This year, he set a goal: to show up each day as his best self. He knew Hallway Holler wasn鈥檛 about perfection, but about growth. 

Over time, through small consistent choices like choosing kindness in the classroom, supporting peers at recess, and taking responsibility when things went wrong, he grew! He even stepped up as a buddy to a younger class. When his name was finally called for Hallway Holler, it wasn鈥檛 for being the loudest or the most polished. It was for that steady, daily effort.

Since then, he has grown more than 15 points in both reading and math, a reflection of what can happen when a student feels seen, valued and motivated to keep showing up.

The kids who aren’t running this month are forming the tunnel, dancing and cheering and sending love as their peers sprint past. They are part of it too. And they know their moment is coming.

That deliberateness matters. This isn’t about performance or perfection. It’s about the ongoing, daily work of noticing kids 鈥� and then making that noticing feel like the biggest deal in the building.

The joy work and the academic work are not in competition. They are the same work,and the field doesn’t talk about that enough.

Chronic absenteeism is one of the most stubborn problems in American public education, and the conversation around it tends to focus almost entirely on removing obstacles 鈥� calling families, connecting them to resources, offering transportation. All of that matters and we do all of that. But that framing treats attendance as a problem to be solved rather than a behavior to be motivated. What gets talked about far less is the other side of the equation: making school a place kids are genuinely, viscerally excited to return to. 

And when kids are in school, they’re learning. At Impact Puget Sound Elementary, 65.3% of our students meet grade-level standards in ELA and 65.8% in math 鈥� outpacing our local district, Tukwila School District, by 13.9 percentage points in ELA and 25.8 points in math. I don’t think that’s a coincidence. 

A child cannot learn on a day they are not here 鈥� and a child who wants to be here shows up. At Impact Puget Sound, we have over 90% average daily attendance which places us on pace with and slightly above the national average for all students. Nationally, schools where 75% or more of students qualify for Free and Reduced Lunch average attendance rates of 80% to 85%. At Impact Puget Sound, where 79% of our students qualify, we’re at 90.8% 鈥� a gap our team and families have earned.

But it requires knowing your community well enough to find the specific version of joy that lands for your specific kids. For us, it turned out to be something as elemental as permission to run in the hallways while your whole school cheers your name.

Some of my students don’t fully understand the data behind attendance yet. They don’t know what chronic absenteeism costs them in the long run. But they know the feeling of rounding a corner at full speed. They know their teacher is running beside them. They know that this 鈥� this specific, loud, joyful moment 鈥� only happens because they showed up and lived our values.

That’s enough. For now, that’s everything.

Pacheco is one of approximately 15,000 residents in what is known as America鈥檚 first solar-powered town, defined by its environmental vision, hurricane and strong sense of community. Since welcoming its first residents in January 2018, Babcock Ranch鈥檚 population has soared, with plans to reach 50,000 in the years ahead.

As this future-focused community grows, its K-12 education landscape is expanding alongside it, shaped by the same spirit of innovation. With a rising assortment of public schooling, homeschooling and micro-schooling options, Babcock Ranch offers a distinct snapshot of today鈥檚 evolving education offerings and the families who choose them.

鈥淚t鈥檚 kind of like choose your own education adventure,鈥� said Laura Felker, who moved to Babcock Ranch from Colorado last spring. She enrolled her son in kindergarten at the Babcock Neighborhood School, a public charter school that opened in 2017, just a few months ahead of the community鈥檚 first residents. Babcock High School, also a public charter school, launched in 2022.

Felker was attracted to the school鈥檚 commitment to project-based learning, which is embedded into the curriculum. Her son has excelled at Babcock Neighborhood School, but when she heard about a new school opening in Babcock Ranch this fall, she was intrigued. Her son is academically advanced and in need of a more challenging learning environment, while also thriving with project-based learning. 鈥淚 wanted some kind of meet-in-the-middle microschool,鈥� said Felker, explaining that she was looking for a school that would blend the flexibility of homeschooling with the structure of traditional schooling, while prioritizing hands-on, project-based learning.

鈥淧rimer is able to do that,鈥� said Felker, referring to the venture-backed K-8 private school network that is opening a Babcock Ranch location this fall. Founded in 2019 by Ryan Delk, expects to have 19 teacher-led campuses across Alabama, Arizona, Florida and Texas in the upcoming school year 鈥� including Babcock Ranch. The company did not disclose its network-wide enrollment numbers or current registration figures for Babcock Ranch, but Felker says that many of her neighbors are excited about this new model.

鈥淗ands-on learning is going to become incrementally more and more important,鈥� said Felker, who leads data and AI strategy for a Silicon Valley-based company. She sees first-hand how emerging technologies are impacting the workplace and shaping the jobs of the future, and she wants a schooling environment for her son, and his two younger siblings, that mixes core academics with ample time for creative, community-based projects. 鈥淚 want that to be part of his schooling, so when Primer came, I think I was one of the first people to reach out because this is the exact thing that I’m looking for,鈥� she said.

Emerging schooling models like Primer are taking root in communities across the country, as families look for more personalized education options. In states such as Florida, expanding school choice policies make these models financially accessible to more families. Felker expects most of Primer鈥檚 tuition to be covered by the state鈥檚 education savings account programs.

While some parents like Felker use ESA funding toward private school tuition, today鈥檚 programs often enable much greater customization of learning. In Florida, for example, families are eligible for funding through the state鈥檚 Personalized Education Program, an ESA enabling them to tailor their children鈥檚 education in myriad ways, including covering homeschooling expenses, tutoring services, curriculum resources, online learning and part-time school fees.

This flexible funding, averaging about $8,000 per student per year, is what Pacheco uses to educate her 13-year-old daughter, Bella. When the family moved to Babcock Ranch in the summer of 2024 following that enchanting Friday night visit, Pacheco began homeschooling Bella, who had previously attended a public elementary school from kindergarten through fifth grade. 

Pacheco liked the school, but she wanted something more for Bella as she entered her middle school years. 鈥淚 always felt like the public school wasn’t the best fit,鈥� said Pacheco, a nurse practitioner who helped to co-found a family medicine practice with three Florida locations, including a new one opening soon in Babcock Ranch. 鈥淚t’s like a one size fits all, but that’s not how people are,鈥� said Pacheco, who was particularly concerned about the frequent focus on standardized testing in the public schools and the anxiety it created for her daughter.  

When she moved into Babcock Ranch, Pacheco discovered a large and vibrant homeschooling community. 鈥淭here are so many homeschooling groups,鈥� she said, often gathering for park meet-ups, enrichment activities and field trips to the aquarium and similar spots. Parents also take turns hosting lessons at their homes, which supplements the online curriculum that Bella uses for her core academics. 鈥淚t鈥檚 like a little homeschool village here. I love it,鈥� said Pacheco, adding that Bella is much happier than she was in a conventional classroom.

Babcock Ranch was designed to be a modern-day village, where community life is intentionally built. That same intentionality is shaping how Babcock Ranch families choose to educate their children. From project-based charter schools to homeschooling to emerging models like Primer, families have a growing array of learning options to consider.  

In Babcock Ranch, this variety isn鈥檛 only reserved for K-12 education. options are sprouting, and the community recently a partnership with Florida Gulf Coast University to create a new sustainability-focused campus center at Babcock Ranch.

鈥淭here is a lot of educational opportunity here, and it just keeps evolving for every layer of education,鈥� said Felker. 鈥淚t’s cool to see that type of vibrancy.鈥�

This feeling of frustration is one that leaders at New York’s know well. Situated between Rochester and Syracuse, this rural district of 750 students is often seen as a stepping stone by educators. Many new teachers get a few years under their belt, then take off for higher-paying suburban schools. 

Even before the pandemic hit, Clyde-Savannah experienced a districtwide employee turnover rate of 25%. This churn, particularly among teachers and support staff, disrupted the continuity and quality of students鈥� learning. At the elementary level alone, six to seven teachers out of 21 would leave in any given year.

Experienced educators carry institutional knowledge about curriculum implementation, assessment practices, and effective strategies for meeting student needs. When a large portion of staff leaves each year, districts must repeatedly rebuild this expertise. While new teachers often bring enthusiasm and fresh ideas, their learning curve can affect the consistency of instruction and student outcomes, at least temporarily.

As superintendent for Clyde-Savannah, I knew the district could not compete on salary. Instead, school leaders and board members focused on what we were able to control: the district culture. Could we build a better workplace, where people felt genuinely supported? Could we reduce teachers’ stress, both inside and outside the classroom? Most importantly, could we create an environment where educators were excited to come to school each day?

By reimagining its approach to recruitment, the district increased its overall employee retention rate to 98% from 2023 to 2025 and made Clyde-Savannah a top choice for prospective teachers. Finalists who were speaking with neighboring districts or had received offers told our interviewers they had withdrawn those applications in order to accept positions at Clyde-Savannah. In addition, I have seen first-year teachers choose to relocate to the Clyde-Savannah community, which is key, as early-career educators typically move only when they view a district as a place to build both a career and a lasting home.

The district’s approach to changing its culture took several forms. First, through conversations with staff and teachers, district leaders discovered that a lack of accessible and affordable child care was often the biggest deterrent to employment. Many talented educators were leaving the classroom because the high cost of child care made working full time financially impractical.

To ease the burden on working families, the district opened a for all employees in 2023. Rather than contract services to outside caregivers, Clyde-Savannah became the first school system approved by the New York Office of Family and Child Services to operate a district-run child care center. Today, 18 children between the ages of 6 weeks and 4 years attend the program each day, providing families with much-needed support while ensuring their little ones will be ready for kindergarten.

For many employees, but especially support staff and teacher鈥檚 aides earning minimum wage, the program has been life-changing. For one, being relieved of the cost of child care means she was able to purchase a car for her family. Another teacher chose Clyde-Savannah because the availability of care made it possible for him and his wife to both pursue the careers they wanted.

For Clyde-Savannah teachers and staff, the cost savings and peace of mind of knowing their children are well cared for outweigh the lure of a modest salary bump a district away.

The second initiative involved filling a longstanding gap in what had been a coffee shop desert. As a small town, Clyde lacked a spot for teachers, staff and students to grab their daily caffeine fix. So the district turned a high school classroom into a caf茅 that rivals popular coffee chains. 

The coffee shop is staffed by trained student volunteers who earn community service hours toward graduation. In the process, these young baristas gain hands-on experience in food preparation, customer service and promotion, equipping them with marketable skills.

Students prepare drinks using standard coffee shop equipment, such as brewers, syrups and espresso-style machines. The cafe serves walk-in customers, makes deliveries to all district buildings during designated times of the day and stays open after school hours to accommodate staff, visitors, teachers and community members attending meetings or activities after 3 p.m.

Because many school bus drivers are on the road during the shop’s regular hours, the district created a drive-through option just for them. Drivers can pull up their bus outside the school doors, and students will bring out their coffee order 鈥� a small but meaningful way to include transportation staff.

When the caf茅 first launched, the district lacked the budget for paid staff. So, I stepped in as store manager, working at 6 in the morning to help get everything prepped for the day ahead. Eventually, because of the caf茅鈥檚 popularity, it earned enough money to pay for a full-time manager to run the shop. 

By creatively addressing a community need, Clyde-Savannah demonstrated that the district is actively listening and responding to its staff. Teachers value having a place in which to connect, collaborate and recharge. At the same time, prospective hires see this investment in staff well-being as an advantage when comparing offers from other districts. As competition intensifies for a shrinking applicant pool of qualified teachers, small districts must think creatively to set themselves apart. Higher salaries are important, but compensation does not always guarantee fulfillment. For many educators, job satisfaction comes from feeling happy, supported and genuinely appreciated 鈥� benefits that cannot be measured in dollars alone.

Every few years, education seems to discover something new that will finally fix schools 鈥� a new framework, a new approach, a new way of thinking about teaching and learning. It arrives with urgency and conviction, spreads quickly, reshapes professional development and classroom practice and then fades away, either replaced by the shiny new thing or layered on top of it. Twenty-first century skills, trauma-informed pedagogy, flipped classrooms, 1:1 devices 鈥� all promised to succeed where the last one fell short.

Ask veteran teachers to list the major instructional initiatives they鈥檝e been trained on over the past decade, and you鈥檙e likely to get a weary laugh before you get an answer. Discipline systems cycle from zero tolerance to restorative practices; 鈥渄ata-driven instruction鈥� yields to 鈥減ersonalized learning,鈥� which is now being rebranded yet again in the age of artificial intelligence. Each shift arrives with urgency and moral clarity. Each requires retraining, new materials and a reorientation of practice. Spend enough time in schools, and the pattern becomes impossible to ignore. Which raises an uncomfortable question:

Why is education so damn fad-prone?

The easy answer is also the most insulting 鈥� that educators are uniquely susceptible to trends, quick to abandon what works and too eager to embrace whatever comes next. But that answer is wrong. Classroom teachers are typically the least enthusiastic participants in these cycles, having learned through experience how quickly today鈥檚 鈥渢ransformational鈥� idea becomes tomorrow鈥檚 abandoned initiative.

Education isn鈥檛 fad-driven because the people in it lack judgment. It鈥檚 fad-driven because the system they work in makes churn not just common, but rational. Four structural forces, in particular, push schools toward constant reinvention:

Weak feedback loops. In most sectors, failure reveals itself quickly. Customers leave, revenue falls and performance problems become unmistakable. In education, by contrast, the signal is slow and noisy. Instructional changes may take years to show results. Student cohorts turn over annually. Outcomes depend on factors well beyond the classroom, such as attendance, family circumstances and peer effects. Even when results improve or decline, attribution is murky. There are too many moving parts to say with reasonable certainty that any single input was determinative. Under these conditions, it鈥檚 impossible to offer decisive proof that a given approach is or isn鈥檛 working. This makes education unusually vulnerable not just to bad ideas, but to the premature abandonment of good ones.

Leadership legitimacy requires visible change. School systems churn through leaders with striking regularity. The onus is on each new superintendent, principal and state chief to demonstrate that he or she is, in fact, leading. Many will come to the unfortunate conclusion that leadership is signaled not through stewardship, but through action: launching initiatives, unveiling strategic plans, introducing new frameworks, reorganizing priorities. Anyone who has spent time around school systems has seen the pattern: A new leader arrives, announces a bold vision, rebrands existing efforts and introduces a new set of priorities. Three years later, often before results are fully visible, that leader departs (school superintendents tend to a single contract cycle) and the wheel turns another revolution. A leader who says, 鈥淲e鈥檙e going to keep doing what we鈥檙e doing, but do it better,鈥� risks appearing passive or directionless, even if the system is performing well. It is a structural expectation. In education, visible change is how leadership signals its worth.

Low barriers to new ideas. In fields like medicine or engineering, new approaches must pass through layers of validation before they reach widespread adoption. Education has far fewer guardrails. A new framework can be published, marketed and adopted by districts in rapid succession. Professional development cycles spread new ideas quickly, consultants package innovations into turnkey programs and procurement systems often treat instructional approaches as interchangeable. The result is a highly permeable system 鈥� one in which ideas can enter and scale rapidly, often long before their effectiveness is firmly established.

Moral urgency. Education is not a typical service sector. It concerns children鈥檚 lives and futures, and that reality creates a constant sense of moral urgency. If a proposal claims it might help struggling students succeed 鈥� especially disadvantaged children 鈥� the pressure to act is immense. Waiting for perfect evidence can feel ethically unacceptable; trying something new, even with incomplete proof, feels compassionate. This isn鈥檛 foolish or irresponsible. It鈥檚 what happens when moral responsibility collides with uncertainty. But it creates a powerful bias toward action 鈥� and, by extension, toward constant change.

Taken together, these forces produce a system in which reform cycles are not accidental but predictable. Slow, ambiguous evidence makes it hard to know what is working. Leadership incentives reward visible change. New ideas face little resistance to adoption. Moral urgency pushes systems to act rather than wait. Under those conditions, stability is not the natural condition. Change is. Indeed, stability can easily be mistaken 鈥� and often is 鈥� for complacency or indifference.

The problem is not that education experiments with new ideas. Some experimentation is necessary and healthy. The problem is that the system struggles to sustain success once it finds it. Schools that improve often do so through unglamorous means: adopting a coherent curriculum, building teacher expertise, reinforcing consistent instructional routines and maintaining focus over time. None of this is flashy. None of it lends itself to prizes or glowing media profiles. And all of it is fragile.

Recent reforms in offer a useful contrast. Rather than chasing novelty, the district has focused on something far less glamorous: tightly specified lessons, routine checks for understanding and instructional systems designed for the teachers schools actually have 鈥� not the ones reformers wish they had. Whatever one thinks of the model (and its critics are many and voluble), its premise goes against the grain of the broader system.

Elsewhere, I鈥檝e that the real miracle in education is not that some schools succeed. It鈥檚 that any manage to keep succeeding. The four factors enumerated above help explain why.

The solution for breaking the cycle is not to scold educators for chasing new ideas. It is to realign incentives so stability and execution are valued as forms of leadership. That means treating implementation fidelity as an achievement, not an afterthought, and creating political and institutional cover for leaders who choose continuity over novelty. It means building systems that measure and reward long-term improvement, not short-term activity, and elevating professional norms that prize mastery over constant reinvention.

In short, we need to make competence visible. Because until we do, the system will continue to reward the appearance of change over the reality of improvement. So, yes, education is fad-prone, just not for the reasons we usually assume. We don鈥檛 chase reform because we forget what works, but because the system makes standing still look irresponsible 鈥� even when standing still is exactly what success requires.

Student demographics are shifting so that in just six years, districts have lost nearly 2 million students nationwide. Meanwhile, charter schools gained about half a million, private schools added thousands more, and homeschooling rates remain higher than pre-pandemic levels. These shifts look different depending on where you live, but almost no district is immune. The result: Traditional district schools are serving a shrinking share of a shrinking market. 

In many states, options that used to be considered fringe alternatives are now much more accessible. Policy shifts favor charter schools and open enrollment across district lines; and education savings accounts and tax credit scholarships incentivize alternative school options. 

This means the traditional assumption that most students in a district鈥檚 boundaries will attend its schools no longer holds. It also means districts need to rethink how they can continue to successfully serve their students and communities. And it means that it is more important than ever to think about how districts and states serve students with disabilities so they don鈥檛 fall through the cracks. 

Enrollment declines create immediate pressure. Districts still have to maintain buildings, transportation systems and central office functions even as student numbers fall. Political realities often make it difficult to close under-enrolled schools. And districts must continue to meet legal obligations, especially for students with disabilities.

Over time, this leads to hard tradeoffs. Resources shift away from classrooms just to keep systems running. Meanwhile, are often the first to leave. That can concentrate marginalized students and students with disabilities in the schools with the fewest resources and the least capacity to adapt. Staffing becomes harder. Financial strain grows. Academic outcomes can suffer.

Left unchecked, this becomes a downward spiral that, in some places, ends in state intervention or financial insolvency. States will increasingly face a choice: develop a new playbook for districts or manage the consequences of decline. 

Two paths districts must pursue at the same time

For decades, districts operated as vertically integrated systems: They ran the schools, delivered the services and served nearly every student in their area.

That model no longer reflects reality. Today鈥檚 districts face two distinct but connected challenges:

First, they must compete for students by offering schools and programs that families will actively choose. That means understanding what families want and building options that respond to those preferences.

Second, they must support a broader ecosystem of public education,finding ways to serve students, families and schools beyond those they directly operate. 

Districts that succeed will do both.

Competing today isn鈥檛 about marketing existing schools more effectively. It鈥檚 about rethinking what schools look like.

Some districts are already moving in this direction. Orange County, Florida, is facing enrollment declines for the first time in decades. To meet new demands, they鈥檙e exploring screen-free microschools and other specialized programs. Elsewhere, districts have launched classical education schools modeled on approaches gaining traction in the private sector. In Houston, a district-run virtual academy now serves more than 11,000 students, helping offset losses elsewhere.

The most effective efforts share a common thread: They start with understanding what families want and build new models from the ground up.

Other cities like Denver, New York City, Indianapolis and New Orleans have expanded school options while maintaining common enrollment processes, accountability frameworks and access to services like transportation and special education.

States can accelerate this work by removing barriers. Creating more flexibility around staffing, seat-time requirements and program rules can make it easier for districts to launch microschools, hybrid programs and career pathways that reflect how families want their students to learn.

At the same time, districts can no longer afford to disengage from families who choose other options.

In many places, families are piecing together education across multiple providers: a few district classes, an online program, tutoring or homeschooling. In Florida, more than half of districts now offer classes or services to students using scholarships or education savings accounts, often on a fee-for-service basis. This keeps districts connected to students and creates new revenue streams.

But doing this well requires clearer rules. Questions about pricing, accountability and safety are often unresolved. States can help by setting expectations for part-time enrollment and unbundled services, making it easier for districts to participate while protecting students.

There鈥檚 also an opportunity to simplify choice. Many families just want an education that works; they don鈥檛 want to have to navigate a complex marketplace of options.

Even as student enrollment declines, districts will continue to control significant assets: buildings, buses, food services and specialized expertise,especially in areas like special education. 

Those assets don鈥檛 have to sit underutilized. Districts that partner with charter schools offer a template for how to use these assets in new and novel ways. In places like Miami, Indianapolis, Camden and San Antonio, charter schools have been able to lease space, opt into transportation or food service or purchase maintenance and security services. This lowers barriers for new providers, improves use of taxpayer-funded infrastructure and creates revenue streams for districts. 

Districts can also play a larger role in delivering specialized services, particularly special education. Smaller schools often lack the capacity to provide comprehensive support for students with disabilities. With the right funding and flexibility, districts can offer these services across multiple schools and providers. 

States set the conditions for success

Districts didn鈥檛 become rigid by accident. State policies that impact funding formulas, staffing rules, accountability systems have shaped the current model. Now those policies need to evolve.

States can help districts adapt by:

• Funding students, not systems, while maintaining strong accountability
  
• Removing barriers that limit innovation and flexibility, such as seat time requirements or teacher certification rules
  
• Clarifying rules for part-time enrollment and shared services
  
• Ensuring districts are compensated for serving non-enrolled students
  
• Modernizing facilities policies to support shared use
  
• Stepping in when districts cannot or will not adapt

The era of school districts as monopolies is over. But their core mission remains: ensuring every student has access to a high-quality education.

The question is not whether districts will change. It鈥檚 whether they will change fast enough, in ways that strengthen, rather than weaken, public education.

Districts that embrace both being a competitor and a connector have a path forward. With the right support from states, they can remain central, trusted institutions in a more dynamic and diverse education landscape. 

Disclosure: Travis Pillow wrote this commentary while working as the director of thought leadership and growth at Step Up For Students. He has since taken on a new role as a spokesperson for the Texas Education Freedom Accounts program at the Texas Comptroller鈥檚 Office.

Instead of being asked to score at least a on tests of English Language Arts, mathematics, social studies, science and one optional exam, New York students will be assessed using standards. 

It is yet unclear as to who will be evaluating whether they can be considered:

• academically prepared
• creative innovators
• critical thinkers
• effective communicators
• global citizens
• reflective and future-focused

It is also unclear what the criteria for succeeding in each category will be.

When I asked parent subscribers to my mailing list how they felt about the shift, the answers split starkly into two camps.

There were those who cheered. Josh Kross, father of two high schoolers and one graduate, wrote, 鈥淩egents are outdated. Good riddance.鈥� Moria Herbst added, 鈥淥ther states don’t have them. Certainly not in Massachusetts, where I grew up. And Massachusetts does just fine!鈥�

鈥淚 am deeply in favor of moving away from a standardized testing model,鈥� said E.J., the Washington Heights parent of a first grader. 鈥淲hile Portrait of a Graduate is still being worked on as to how it will actually function, I’m encouraged by the idea and the possibility of it being a more complete picture of the human we’re sending out into the world.鈥�

Other parents, however, were less enthused.

鈥�Portrait of a Graduate is so fuzzy as to be meaningless,” wrote Rachel Fremmer, dismissively. “I didn鈥檛 think standards could be lowered any further, but they have been.鈥� 

鈥淚t seems like a process that will make things more subjective for teachers, and thus less fair for many students,鈥� opined Marina. 鈥淭his seems like a vague requirement that will allow parents with resources even more leverage.鈥�

Yiatin Chu, mom of a ninth grader, went even further, saying, 鈥淔or those who criticize the Regents as a low bar/waste of time, why aren’t we improving it and making it more rigorous instead? Portrait of a Graduate is aspirational 鈥� over 40% of eighth grade students are entering high school not reading at grade level. I see the change to these graduation metrics for HS graduation as a way for the system to push kids out the door.鈥�

New York City already faces the issues of straight A students being unable to perform equally well 鈥� or even pass 鈥� state elementary and middle school tests, not to mention high school Regents exams.

鈥淲ithout objective tests, there is no way to gauge what kids are actually learning,鈥� Diane Rubenstein predicted. 鈥淭his will allow the (Department of Education) to give kids nothing in the classroom. This will give (them) cover to not teach.鈥�

鈥淩emoving this requirement dilutes education standards even further,鈥� agreed AW. 鈥淚t plays very well into the current administration鈥檚 program of ‘equity,’ aka ‘mediocrity for all.’ It disincentivizes kids from learning and teaches them that if something is hard, just protest and it will be removed from your path, even to your detriment.鈥�

For many parents, the perceived lowering of standards will hurt city students when it comes to competing not just nationally, but internationally.

鈥淚f USA high schools become less competitive, that鈥檚 not good for the next generation,鈥� Jenny worried, while Ella added, 鈥淥ur kids will fall behind other countries. We are already falling behind in the world. My kids cannot compete with foreign students.鈥�

Of the that currently have high-school exit exams in place, New Jersey ranked No. 2 in the country for educational achievement for 2025, Virginia was No. 13, Ohio was No. 15, Florida was No. 19, Texas No. 31 and Louisiana No. 35. (Massachusetts, which got rid of its exit exams in 2025, is, as noted above, ranked No. 1. However, that ranking was achieved while the state still had its exit exam up through last year.)

In New York, while students will no longer be required to sit for Regents exams in order to graduate, they will still have the option of taking them in order to earn a .

This could have the effect of widening the gaps between students, rather than improving equity. Colleges and employers will be able to see who earned a Regents diploma and who opted to bypass established standards via a more subjective metric, which could imply less academic rigor.

Like those rejected from colleges that went SAT/ACT scores because they realized those were a reliable predictor of applicants鈥� capabilities, students who choose not to take the Regents exams could find themselves negatively perceived and penalized.

鈥淚 understand the growing pressure to move away from standardized testing, but we still need a meaningful way to measure student progress and evaluate our schools,鈥� ventured Stephanie Cuba, the mother of children in seventh and ninth grades. 鈥淓ducation policy should be deliberate and comprehensive, not a series of reactive decisions. If you鈥檙e going to dismantle the old system, you need a clear, credible plan to replace it. Without that, we鈥檙e operating without a compass.鈥�

Right now, with Profile of a Graduate details vague and , New York risks graduating multiple cohorts whose achievements will not be properly valued. The repercussions might follow them for years.

Within weeks of ChatGPT鈥檚 release, hard rules appeared almost overnight. AI tools were banned throughout departments. Teachers watched what seemed like an existential threat materialize in real time, and they responded the way institutions usually do under pressure: They drew a line and told everyone not to cross it.

Three years later, that line is still there. And at many places, nobody ever asked whether it should be, at least not the people most affected by it.

When I looked into how my Austin, Texas, high school鈥檚 AI policy was developed, I found that my administrators made the decision internally. There was no student committee, no open forum, no campuswide survey. The rulebook was simply handed down. In K鈥�12 education, require districts to develop and publish AI policies; when they are published, they鈥檙e often developed without proper consideration of all stakeholders, including students themselves.

It鈥檚 reasonable to counter that students are minors, that institutions need coherent governance and that not all decisions can go to a committee. But AI policy isn鈥檛 a routine curriculum adjustment. It governs what tools students are allowed to use to think, draft, research and communicate 鈥� tools that increasingly shape how knowledge is produced and evaluated outside school. Getting those rules wrong produces consequences for students.

Brittany Carr鈥檚 situation is a well-known example. In early 2023, the had three assignments flagged by an AI detector. She provided her revision history and explained her process writing deeply personal essays about her cancer diagnosis, her depression and her personal recovery. It wasn鈥檛 enough. Fearing that a second accusation could cost her financial aid, she began running every essay through an AI detector herself, rewriting any sentence it marked until her writing voice felt flattened and unfamiliar. By the end of the semester, she left the university.

Carr is not alone. The same NBC News investigation found that students across the country deliberately simplified their vocabulary and avoided complex sentence patterns 鈥� not to write better, but to write less like themselves. Creative writing assignments exist to help students find their voice, which they can鈥檛 do in fear of an algorithm. Carr鈥檚 case shows a student reshaping her writing, and ultimately her education, around a software system she had no role in approving, in a policy she had no voice in developing.

Student involvement would not necessarily have guaranteed a different outcome in Carr鈥檚 case. But it might have changed the structure that enabled it. Students could have brought up concerns about relying on automated detectors without corroborating evidence. They could have described how fear of false accusations pushes students toward simpler vocabulary, safer syntax and less intellectual risk. They could have asked what procedural protections exist before a software flag becomes an academic charge.

Instead, at many institutions, enforcement architecture was built first. Conversation came later, if at all.

It doesn鈥檛 have to work this way. In Los Altos, California, did more than sit in on policy meetings 鈥� they designed and ran community workshops, facilitated discussions between sixth graders and administrators, and built an AI chatbot to help other districts draft policies. 

A found that students overwhelmingly want to be part of decisions about how AI is used in their education 鈥� and that many already hold sophisticated views on its risks and potential. The fact that Los Altos made national news tells you how rarely that invitation is extended.

But there is a deeper reason students belong in these conversations: We know something policymakers don鈥檛.

At my high school, I鈥檝e witnessed 鈥� and experienced 鈥� a secret loop in the learning process: we use  large language model tools like ChatGPT and Claude to genuinely improve learning by unraveling concepts, studying for tests and brainstorming ideas. 

A few days ago, a student asked a question about a formula in my AP Physics C class 鈥� and nobody knew the answer. Another student opened his laptop and asked Claude, and after a few minutes of back-and-forth, we had completely straightened out our question, improving everyone鈥檚 understanding of how circuits worked. I used an LLM to compile notes from my Multivariable Calculus class, which helped me study and earn a near-perfect score on my test. My friend used ChatGPT to learn Java syntax for a project 鈥� not to write code, but to understand the language.

A found that 54% of U.S. teens now use AI chatbots for schoolwork, with the most common uses being research and brainstorming 鈥� not copying and pasting answers. But that message hasn鈥檛 reached the people writing the rules. This secret loop goes completely disregarded by schools, simply because it鈥檚 easier to blanket-ban the technology altogether. The generation that grew up with these tools understands their texture in a way no outside committee can replicate.

These AI policies directly affect students鈥� outcomes and futures. To exclude them from the conversation is simply undemocratic.

If educational institutions are serious about preparing students for democratic citizenship, that commitment must go beyond coursework and into policy-making. The time to invite students into these critical conversations is now. Will schools treat students as subjects of policy, or as participants in it?

Experts have raised a variety of factors contributing to this reality: learning loss due to the pandemic, increased screen time, the dissolution of long-form reading and teacher burnout. While each of these points are critical, there鈥檚 an even deeper, more fundamental issue facing students that a flurry of educational reforms haven鈥檛 fixed and may have worsened:

They are simply not spending enough time actually reading in school.

Practice makes perfect, but without the reps, there鈥檚 no room for growth. Research kids should have at least 15 to 30 minutes of uninterrupted reading time a day. The reality? Much worse. On average, middle school and high school kids are getting about, if that.

This poses an even greater challenge for students in poverty. Kids who have little to no reading opportunities at home depend on school to fill the gaps. When reading minutes are reduced, they’re hit the hardest.

So how do educators fix it?

It turns out, they already have the answers. Here鈥檚 what the research tells us.

First, schools must protect uninterrupted reading time 鈥� and make it non-negotiable.

Right now in school, kids are bombarded with interruptions: digital devices, announcements, visual distractions, visitors. In fact, a recent of the Providence Public School District revealed that classrooms are interrupted more than 2,000 times a year, resulting in the loss of between 10 and 20 days of instructional time. What鈥檚 more, administrators often underestimate or misperceive how these interruptions might be disrupting the learning process.

Students need to be given the space to focus. If educators want to make changes, they need to get intentional about providing stronger opportunities for kids to focus in school: rethink the physical environment to reduce visual noise, streamline communications for students and build in time for cognitive processing.

That means giving students the time and space to get their reading reps in.

Second, teachers must make the time kids are spending in school worthwhile.

Giving kids the time and space they need to read, requires that they know how to do it. And there needs to be accountability and checks that tell us the practice is worthwhile. That鈥檚 where a strong curriculum comes in.

Educators need to be asking ourselves whether the work we鈥檙e asking students to do is worthy of their time and intelligence. If our kids are spending 15,000 hours in school across K-12, it鈥檚 on us to ensure they鈥檙e getting out what they鈥檙e putting in. It starts with providing high-quality instructional materials that are comprehensive, coherent, evidence-based, knowledge-rich, and grade-appropriate.

shows students learning under a coherent curriculum gain an average of 1.3 months of additional learning 鈥� 1.8 months for struggling students. With the right instruction, kids who are hit the hardest finally have the opportunity to catch up.

Unfortunately, TNTP鈥檚 2018 multi-system study,, and its subsequent study revealed that students are rarely taught grade-level work, and they鈥檝e often seen the materials that are being covered in a previous class. As a result, while kids are getting As and Bs, they鈥檙e demonstrating mastery of grade-level standards just 17% of the time.

Bottom line? Kids are doing the work, but they aren鈥檛 being appropriately challenged. They鈥檙e caught in an incoherent moshpit of disconnected academic programming. Schools are underestimating students鈥� potential, and it鈥檚 backfiring on their ability to learn to read.

Schools need to prioritize a curriculum that is cohesive, knowledge-rich, and grade-appropriate to support true learning. If we鈥檙e going to ask kids for their time, let鈥檚 make it count.

Finally, schools need to be clear-eyed about how they are measuring success.

Today, the domain of English Language Arts is made up of three key areas that are interconnected: reading, writing and oral language. these areas work hand in hand to help students build their skills; writing improves reading comprehension, while oral language supports both reading and writing.

The problem? Most testing tools that are used for instructional decision-making focus on a small slice of what it means to be proficient in the higher order skills of ELA. They rely on limited data sets like from to draw conclusions around proficiency across the whole domain, sometimes with big consequences for kids and teachers and instructional programming. Often, these tests don鈥檛 measure grade-level proficiency, they measure recall. That鈥檚 why our children can get As and still not be proficient readers.

If schools want our kids to succeed in literacy 鈥� an imperative in the age of AI 鈥� there has to be a more advanced discussion about assessment. Schools need to adopt an assessment system that aligns with the domain of English Language Arts. That means moving away from single-point-in-time multiple choice testing strategies and adopting assessment practices that hold the bar for higher order reading, critical analysis, writing, speaking, communicating and collaborating.

Solving the literacy gap doesn鈥檛 require an overhaul of our education system or an innovation that is smarter than all humans combined. As educators, we can teach children to read who attend school for 15,000 hours. We need a collaborative, aligned effort to challenge the status quo. We need leaders who are willing to pull on the right levers for change: protect reading time, provide high-quality, grade-level materials and measure what actually matters

Since then, many school districts have indeed announced closures, including in the communities of and, where we live and work. More, unfortunately, are on their way.

School closure announcements can elicit the worst kind of deja vu. These feelings are well-founded. Atlanta plans to shutter schools in the south and west parts of the city, which is also where overwhelmingly live and where previous closures left several buildings vacant or underutilized for years. In Philadelphia, found that achievement gains occurred only when displaced students were moved into significantly stronger schools, while peers sent to schools of similar or lower quality did not benefit and, in some cases, saw setbacks.

It doesn鈥檛 have to be like this. Districts may have to close schools for financial or performance reasons, but they don鈥檛 need to exacerbate inequities along the way. By learning from past examples, we believe it鈥檚 possible 鈥� with thoughtful, comprehensive planning and deep and broad community engagement 鈥� for school closures to serve as a new opportunity for students, families and educators. 

The first of four steps to a more constructive, less harmful closure is about stabilization. The time between when a closure is announced and when students move out of the school can produce learning loss, staff instability and family stress. 

These in-between periods are not trivial lengths of time. Students at one Philadelphia school included in the district鈥檚 January announcement will . In other words, the students who are currently in kindergarten at this school are poised to spend their entire elementary years 鈥� through fifth-grade 鈥� in a school the district has said should close due to its low enrollment and poor facilities.聽

That鈥檚 a long time, especially considering students are impacted as soon as the closure is announced. found that the largest negative achievement effect occurred between the time when the closure was announced and when students actually moved to new schools. Students in schools that were being closed had scores that were lower than expected in the year of the closure: roughly in math.

To avoid this drop-off, districts can commit to maintaining through the school鈥檚 final year. They can also help reduce staff turnover by providing early clarity on placement processes, minimizing uncertainty about job security and offering retention support. 

The second step has to do with the building itself. Again, found that neighborhoods that experienced school closures led to and lower shared sense of capacity for neighbors to act together for the common good. Schools often serve as community anchors, and closing a school can make a community feel unmoored. Countering this outcome involves smart, collaborative planning to ensure buildings are invested in, not abandoned. By this measure, Philadelphia and Atlanta are off to a positive start; their closure plans include repurposing buildings for other uses, such as in Philadelphia and in Atlanta.聽

The third step is about student learning, particularly ensuring students leaving a closing school can attend a higher-quality alternative. This focus shifts the conversation from the non-academic factors that often drive closure decisions 鈥� like building utilization rates and the cost to repair aging facilities 鈥� and instead centers on student learning. Administrators must ask: Which local public schools could take in displaced students without reducing the quality of their education? 

This is not a quixotic exercise. Studies from multiple cities have when students are able to transfer to demonstrably stronger schools with higher achievement levels, more experienced teachers, richer course offerings and better facilities.聽

The fourth and final step is about the schools receiving new students. Especially with the months and, in many cases, years between when a closure is announced and when it takes place, there is no reason receiving schools should be caught flat-footed. These schools should have both academic and social-emotional support available for students, and districts should cap how many new students each school receives. The odds of giving individuals the support they need decrease with each additional student an institution takes in.

What we are calling for is a paradigm shift. District leaders need to begin shifting from announcing 鈥渨e鈥檝e decided to close schools鈥� to 鈥渨e鈥檝e decided to close schools and for preventing harm and maximizing student opportunity at every stage.鈥�

District leaders in Atlanta, Philadelphia, and elsewhere deserve credit for recognizing the trends and taking action. What鈥檚 important for these and other leaders to recognize, however, is that their work is just beginning. 

This social capital 鈥� the knowledge of how to forge connections that make opportunities visible and attainable 鈥� is the missing curriculum in American K-12 and postsecondary education. And it’s a shortcoming with consequences.

Young people from well-connected families absorb social capital almost by osmosis when it comes to learning things like how to ask for help, follow up and signal ambition without arrogance. Others, equally capable but from less-connected families, must figure this out alone. The result is unequal starting lines and unequal outcomes 鈥� a yawning between social wealth and social poverty. 

Social wealth means having not only knowledge and credentials, but relationships that open doors, including mentors who give advice, supervisors who challenge us when we need to grow and networks that surface opportunities. Social poverty is the absence of those assets. It is being a talented individual without advocates.

Research finds that students from higher-income families are far more likely to report having mentors who help them consider careers, internships and next steps than students from lower-income backgrounds, first-generation college-goers and young women, especially those without college-educated parents. They report thinner networks and fewer trusted adults to guide them through critical transitions.

One of the most schools and colleges can counter social poverty is through mentorship. It’s not just a “nice to have” experience; young people with mentors are more likely to persist in education and transition successfully into work than those who lack such guidance.

But schools treat mentorship as an optional add-on, something that happens only if a motivated teacher, counselor or employer goes above and beyond.

Psychologist David Yeager what young people need is not generic encouragement, but relationships combining high expectations and genuine support. Effective mentors don鈥檛 simply reassure students that they belong. They communicate that growth is expected and that effort will be taken seriously.

This builds trust and reinforces agency. Young people are more likely to persist when they believe that adults see their potential and are invested in helping them meet it.

Yeager suggests these dynamics can be designed and structured rather than left to chance. This doesn鈥檛 mean turning schools and colleges into networking factories or diluting academic rigor. It means recognizing that social development is educational development. 

Just as literacy requires instruction and practice, so does learning how to form professional relationships and networks, seek mentorship and navigate institutions.

What would it look like for schools and colleges to design a system that takes this responsibility seriously? Here are six principles to guide this effort.

1. Make mentorship universal, not exceptional. Mentorship shouldn鈥檛 depend on self-selection or teacher heroics. Schools and colleges should assign mentors, integrate advisory systems and partner with local organizations to ensure every student has sustained contact with at least one non-family adult mentor. 

2. Start early. Students should encounter mentors beginning in middle school, when identities and aspirations are still forming. These relationships should become more formal and structured as students progress through school and college. Mentorship should be framed as normal, not remedial.

3. Teach the skills of relationship-building. Social capital isn鈥檛 only about access 鈥� it鈥檚 about competence. Students need instruction and practice in how to ask for help, follow up after meetings, give and receive feedback, and navigate professional norms. These skills can be taught, rehearsed and assessed, just like writing or public speaking.

4. Connect learning to people and places. Career exploration should include visits to workplaces, not just abstract classroom discussions about careers. Opportunities to shadow professionals on the job, internships, project-based learning and alumni networks help students see how knowledge travels into the world, and who helps move it along.

5. Signal high expectations with high support. Mentorship programs should avoid coddling or coldness. Adults should communicate clearly that they expect students to grow, stretch and persist, and that they鈥檒l provide the guidance that makes growth possible.

6. Measure what matters. Schools and colleges track test scores and graduation rates but rarely monitor whether students graduate with mentors, references or professional networks. Simple measures, like verifying whether students can name adults who would help them find a job or write a recommendation, should serve as leading indicators of social wealth.

The remedy for this missing curriculum isn鈥檛 a mystery. It鈥檚 the will to treat social development as a core educational outcome rather than a byproduct. Reframing education around social wealth doesn鈥檛 diminish the importance of academic knowledge. It completes it. 

In a world where opportunity increasingly flows through relationships, schools and colleges that ignore social capital risk graduating students who are credentialed but stranded. Those that build it provide young people with the relationships and networks they need so they know that they are seen, supported and connected to a realistic future they can pursue.

That is the curriculum students need. And it鈥檚 one that schools and colleges can no longer afford to leave unwritten.