How Finance Reform May Alter Teacher and School Quality: California’s $23 Billion Initiative

Gains in school spending helped to lift achievement over the past half century. But California’s ambitious effort—progressively distributing $23 billion in yearly funding to poorer districts—has yet to reduce disparities in learning. We theorize how administrators in districts and schools, given organizational habits and labor constraints, may fail to move quality resources to disadvantaged students. We identify the exogenous portion of California’s post-2013 reform, finding that schools receiving progressively targeted funding tended to hire inexperienced teachers and disproportionately assign novices to courses serving English learners. New funding expanded the array of courses in high schools, as access to college-preparatory classes by English learners declined. These unfair mechanisms operated most strongly in high-needs schools serving larger concentrations of poor students.

Academic Collaborative Efforts to Promote STEM Equity in High Needs Schools

America is at risk of facing a shortage of workers in STEM fields in the near future because lack of interest by its youth. It is well known that providing early exposure for P-12 students to engaging science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) experiences can lead to lifelong learning and positively impact future career decisions. This manuscript describes one university’s collective efforts to bring equity to STEM education for an urban high needs school district in the northeastern part of the United States through various STEM initiatives over a five-year period. Through multiple projects and initiatives targeting both P-12 students and their teachers, descriptive results revealed a positive impact while pinpointing areas that still require attention. P-12 students indicated an increase in STEM knowledge and an increased interest in STEM careers following exposure to various STEM lessons and interactive experiences. P-12 teachers specified that Professional Development (PD) they received from university faculty as well as engaging in STEM experiences with their students enhanced their confidence in their ability to incorporate STEM lessons within their classrooms. An urban partner administrator viewed these various STEM initiatives as vital in their quest to bring equity for STEM education to their diverse student population.

Technology as a Facilitator in the Learning Process in Urban High-Needs Schools: Challenges and Opportunities

Innovations in educational technology have led to heightened expectations for both K-12 teachers and students. Now, more than ever, teachers are expected to develop 21st century skills, which creates a necessity to understand how urban teachers feel about the role of technology in their teaching practice. In addition, teacher perceptions are necessary to identify better ways to prepare students for success. Utilizing a quantitative approach, this study explored these perceptions among urban K-12 teachers. Results suggested urban teachers lag behind their counterparts related to perceived effectiveness of technology. In addition, respondents indicated technology is not utilized frequently. The results revealed personal trial and error as the most common way of new knowledge and skill acquisition. Participants reported lack of student access to Internet at home as the largest barrier to technology implementation, followed by financial cost. These findings suggest urban teachers may need more guidance and professional development on how to effectively integrate technology into the classroom. Through the development of more thorough understanding of urban teacher usage of technology, administrators may design more effective continued learning opportunities. It is recommended future investigation be conducted across multiple states to investigate technology usage by grade level and content area to best equip urban teachers to effectively implement technology in their teaching practices.

A Blueprint for Scaling Tutoring and Mentoring Across Public Schools

In this thought experiment, we explore how to make access to individualized instruction and academic mentoring more equitable by taking tutoring to scale as a permanent feature of the U.S. public education system. We first synthesize the tutoring and mentoring literature and characterize the landscape of existing tutoring programs. We then outline a blueprint for integrating federally funded and locally delivered tutoring into the school day. High school students would serve as tutors/mentors in elementary schools via an elective class, college students in middle schools via federal work-study, and 2- and 4-year college graduates in high schools via AmeriCorps. We envision an incremental, demand-driven expansion process with priority given to high-needs schools. Our blueprint highlights a range of design tradeoffs, implementation challenges, and program costs. We estimate that targeted approaches to scaling school-wide tutoring nationally, such as focusing on K–8 Title I schools, would cost between $5 and $16 billion annually.

Popular education and music education: Lessons from a strings program in Erechim, Brazil

In this exploratory study, we describe the learning experiences of adolescents from a social project called Orquestrando Talentos, which offered violin and viola lessons in two high-needs schools for low-income students in Erechim, Southern Brazil. Grounded on the central tenets of popular education, on Paulo Freire’s work, and on earlier studies on the experiences of students from community-based strings programs, in this article we share the voices of six violin students (aged 12–14), their parents, and teachers, particularly as they relate to students’ socioemotional learning and the social impact of the program on families, schools, and communities.

Computational thinking in classrooms: A study of a PD for STEM teachers in high needs schools

This study explores the influence of a professional development (PD) model aiming to build teacher capacities for K-12 schools. It examines the impact of this PD on teachers’ learning of content and pedagogical knowledge related to computational thinking. It also investigates the lessons learned during the implementation process. This mixed-methods study examined 25 teachers who participated in the PD. The pre- and post-tests analysis showed positive outcomes of this PD in helping teachers learn CT skills. The thematic analysis of the qualitative data identified themes to answer the second, third and fourth research questions. Learner-centered approaches, differentiated learning, and unplugged activities were three main themes identified in teacher-created lesson plans.

Getting Off the List: Leadership, Learning, and Context in Two Rural, High-Needs Schools

In this article, we report findings from two cases of rural, high-needs elementary schools in the Southeastern United States that successfully improved learning outcomes for their students. As illustrated by our findings, a combination of effective teacher professional development, focused student learning initiatives, and enhanced community and family involvement contributed to the removal of the schools from priority and below average designations. In addition to illustrating the leadership practices that positively influenced improvement efforts in these two schools, and expanding the nascent body of scholarship on context-responsive leadership, our findings serve as a starting point for a larger project centered on the nexus of school leader agency in increasingly diverse cultural contexts.