RSS FEEDS
Recent Research
JANUARY 11, 2012 | Commentary by MATTHEW BROUILLETTE
A Decade Left Behind
My first career started a few decades ago in the classroom as a high school history teacher. While much has changed since then – including the use of technology and smaller class sizes – the one constant is the need for "reform" to improve our education system.
DECEMBER 22, 2011 | Commentary by NATHAN BENEFIELD
Why Gov. Corbett Didn't Get His Christmas Wish List
For Christmas this year, Gov. Tom Corbett hoped the legislature would gift wrap three things he could tie a bow on: An education reform package that included school vouchers, state liquor store privatization and legislation addressing gas drilling in the Marcellus Shale.
DECEMBER 13, 2011 | Policy Points by COMMONWEALTH FOUNDATION
Charter School Reform
Pennsylvania charter school enrollment grew from 982 students in 1997 to 91,000 in 2010, as more parents exercised choice in their children's education. On average, charter schools receive and spend only about 83 percent of what school districts spend for each student. Allowing alternative charter school authorizers would increase opportunities
Recent Blog Posts
FEBRUARY 1, 2012
Happy Digital Learning Day
Today is national Digital Learning Day, during which groups across the country will commemorate how technology is changing education for the better. So what exactly IS digital learning?
Digital learning occurs when students use online programs—guided by teachers—to learn math, science, English and every other subject they would study in a regular classroom. Most importantly, it allows students to control the pace and location of their study, meaning they can learn as slowly or as quickly as they need. We tracked the trend in Commonwealth Foundation's latest report on digital learning, The Learning Revolution.
In Pennsylvania, digital learning has exploded in popularity, with nearly 28,000 children now enrolled in cyber schools (from zero when they began about 10 years ago). Children learn at home but are in constant contact with their teachers, and also participate in "real-life" sports and arts programs. The flexibility especially helps students who are sick, have demanding sports or performing arts schedules, are gifted, or who are struggling academically. Take 14-year-old Caela, from Lake Ariel, Pa., for whom cyber school has been a lifesaver:
Between kindergarten and sixth grade she was hospitalized 16 times from bronchitis, pneumonia, allergies and asthma. In fifth grade, she missed 83 days of school; in sixth, 67. In 2010, Caela enrolled in Pennsylvania Cyber Charter School and completed a full year's worth of English and science courses in just five months.
Best of all, her mother says, Caela is off all her medications and has not been sick since starting cyber school. Thanks to digital learning, students like Caela don't have to give up good schooling, and having online tools that help teachers adapt means we can tailor education to every student's needs.
posted by PRIYA ABRAHAM | 00:11 PM | 0 comment
JANUARY 31, 2012
Not a Joke: Learn from Louisiana
Here in Pennsylvania, we like to think we're better than states like Louisiana. Those folks used to have slaves, but our founder was a Quaker. They're poor, but we're rich. Their schools are infamously bad, but around here we've got districts like Garnet Valley (where I grew up), Cumberland Valley (which is much in the news here in the midstate), and North Allegheny (which I always hear about while traveling out west).
Here's the rub, though: We're fat, happy, and languishing while and Louisiana is turning itself around. Over the last twenty years, Pennsylvania ranks 41st in the nation in job growth, 46th in population growth, and 48th in personal income growth. Those are the kind of numbers you'd normally associate with...well, Louisiana! Meanwhile, as I've written before, the Pelican State has a governor, Bobby Jindal, who's mustered a 70-percent approval rating and two-thirds election majority while aggressively cutting the state budget, privatizing services, and giving parents educational choices.
Now, Gov. Jindal is doubling down on his past success. He just proposed what the Wall Street Journal is calling "America's largest school voucher program, broadest parental choice system, and toughest teacher accountability regime—all in one legislative session." And he understands that the way you respond to bogus charges is by speaking the truth loud and clear: When union bosses in his state attacked poor families, saying they can't make good choices for their kids, he went on national television to defend them.
The lesson of Louisiana is clear: Boldness begets boldness and turns states around, whereas milquetoast satisfies no one and perpetuates mediocrity. The question is: Are Pennsylvania pols paying attention?
posted by CHARLES MITCHELL | 00:45 PM | 0 comment
JANUARY 25, 2012
Bill Cosby Explains How to Really Educate a Child
We're in the middle of National School Choice Week, which means the word "education" is hot on the lips of its advocates across our state and country. Schooling is a concern of the Pennsylvania Senate Democratic Caucus, too, as Sen. Jay Costa (D-Allegheny) claimed today: "Education funding has been driven back to 2006 levels. We are no longer investing in education."
Hold up, Senator. Public education funding in Pennsylvania has doubled in the last 15 years to $26 billion a year. Meanwhile, public schools have added nearly 36,000 employees—all while student enrollment has declined by almost the same number.
While funding has skyrocketed, student performance has largely stagnated. About 82,000 students suffer the worst of it, trapped in the commonwealth's persistently failing schools, where some two-thirds cannot read or do math at grade level. The problem isn't a lack of education funding—it's a public education system that lacks incentives to improve. And that's why school choice has attracted supporters from across the political spectrum.
Supporters include veteran comedian and education advocate Bill Cosby, who last night discussed the "State of American Education" before President Obama tackled the State of the Union. "Cuts, cuts, cuts, that is what we hear, but education is not a thing that big bucks happens to be the answer [to]," Dr. Cosby—a Philadelpia native—said. "The answer is—with education comes teaching children to respect and love questions, looking for the answer, reading."
Other school choice supporters echoed Cosby's doubts about dollars at a school choice panel at Pennsylvania's State Capitol today. Sen. Anthony Williams (D-Phila.) noted that increases in funding for some school districts don't necessarily reach the classroom: "Spending more money doesn't result in spending more money on teaching the child."
In the end, we should measure the effectiveness of American—and Pennsylvanian—public education by whether our children learn and are equipped to compete for jobs in an increasingly competitive world. School choice restores the responsibility to parents and teachers for educating children, and forces public schools to improve as they compete with charter, cyber and private schools. That's an investment in education worth making.
posted by PRIYA ABRAHAM | 05:01 PM | 0 comment
