Home

Blog: School Choice

Education
June 2, 2012

Falling short on the Lawrence school turnaround

In November 2011, the Board of Education decided to put the city of Lawrence’s public schools into receivership. With that announcement the power to install a receiver for the district was given to the state’s education commissioner. The January appointment of Jeffrey...
Education
June 2, 2012

A big test at Madison Park Vocational

Over the past decade, while there has been incremental success in most suburban schools, and limited incremental success raising achievement in a few urban school districts, the big stories in raising student achievement have come in the state’s 70 or so Commonwealth...
Education
May 24, 2012

Perspectives on the Romney education plan

A round-up of various perspectives on Governor Romney’s education policy announcement yesterday. I’ll post later on today to help you navigate through the noise, but it is always good to have a broad set of perspectives when big announcements are made. Here...
Education
May 9, 2012

Massachusetts' Katrina Moment

In a previous job, I spent a lot of time in major Massachusetts cities outside of Boston. Cities like New Bedford and Fall River, with their stunning coastal views, and cities at the edge of Boston with so much potential like Lynn...
Education
May 8, 2012

Not grateful about "charter cap lift"

The 2010 Achievement Gap bill that was passed by both the House and the Senate and signed into law by Governor Patrick lifted the limits on charter schools and the number of students in them in districts that were failing to see...
Education
May 5, 2012

How are the Rural Poor Doing at School?

Massachusetts is a wealthy place. We are among the wealthiest states in the country, and the educational attainment of Massachusetts parents is well beyond that of parents in every other state. All this should point to high-powered students and schools in the...
Education
February 23, 2012

Are Turnaround Schools Just Spin?

The waiver from the federal No Child Left Behind Act will, as noted yesterday, have a number of effects, with three big ones being: It moves the goalposts for accountability back years (at least 2017, more likely 2024) and weakens the accountability...
Education
January 24, 2012

Chipping away at charters

Charter school approvals are granted in February. They shouldn’t be. They should have been granted on January 16th this year–Martin Luther King Day–for one simple reason: No education policy change has done more in Massachusetts to alleviate achievement gaps than charters. None....
Education
December 18, 2011

The wrong strategy to fix Lawrence public schools

With a wondrous display of British understatement, the state’s education commissioner recently announced his “concern” about Lawrence schools. Commissioner Mitch Chester noticed that the Lawrence Public Schools might have “a potential leadership gap” and that “[o]verall, the district is not yet where...
Education
August 30, 2011

Parent Power

(image from DropOutNation.net) Used to be that Massachusetts was the epicenter of most of the innovations occurring in education. We had the best standards in the nation. The best student tests, best teacher tests, a standout accountability office, the most advanced charter...