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Urban and Rural Poverty and Student Achievement in Massachusetts
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This paper explores the extent and distribution of poverty in Massachusetts's schools and then examines the performance of low-income-students in urban and rural areas.
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Rhode Island Jewish Day Schools and Scholarship Tax Credits
This is the third in a series of Pioneer Institute policy briefs on scholarship tax credit programs. The first, in 2007, was a groundbreaking study of scholarship tax credit programs in Florida, Minnesota, and Arizona. The second report, published in 2010, built on that research in assessing Rhode Island's Corporate Scholarship Tax Credit (CSTC) program, which became law in 2007. That study provided a review of the CSTC program's legislative history, program design and impact and offered recommendations to policymakers based on Rhode Island's experience.
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Four Models of Catholic Schooling in Massachusetts
Thought leaders in education, especially in Massachusetts, rarely acknowledge the precedent that Catholic education sets and the model that it has long provided in offering high quality educational options to students of all backgrounds. This could be because many Catholic schools serve poor and minority students with great success, thus revealing the comparatively low quality of too many public schools that do not.
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Regulating Virtual Schools
This paper discusses the issues surrounding the regulating of full-time online schools and draws on research conducted in Massachusetts and other states. It includes commentary from educators, academics, government officials and non-profit researchers. It is presented at a time when still more than one-third of the states do not offer a full-time virtual school option and there are no national policies for their oversight.
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One-Page Primer on Common Core: Legality
Despite three (3) federal laws that prohibit the federal government from directing, supervising or controlling elementary and secondary school curricula, programs of instruction and instructional materials, the U.S. Department of Education (USDOE) has placed the nation on the road to a national curriculum.
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One-Page Primer on Common Core: Cost
Significant new costs are projected in three key areas of standards-based reform: assessment, professional development, and textbooks and instructional materials. In addition, states and local communities are expected to face substantial new expenditures for technology infrastructure and support.
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Summary: National Cost of Aligning States and Localities to the Common Core Standards
All but five (5) states have committed to adopting the Common Core State Standards (CCSS) in English language arts and mathematics and are participating in one of the federally-sponsored consortia developing aligned assessments (see Figure I ). Few of the participants, however, have carefully analyzed the costs involved.
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The Serpent in Finland’s Garden of Equity
About four decades ago, Finland introduced major reforms to grades 1-12 and teacher education, with noteworthy results. In 1970, less than 10% of its students graduated from high school. By 2010, most high school-age students attended high school and most of these students graduated.
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National Cost of Aligning States and Localities to the Common Core Standards
It is the purpose of this study to stimulate an informed policy dialogue about the likely costs of implementing the Common Core standards. The nationwide calculations are intended to encourage similar, more detailed efforts in individual states that take into account additional local considerations.
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The Road to a National Curriculum
Kent D. Talbert is a co-founder of Talbert & Eitel, PLLC. His practice includes legal services to colleges and universities, accrediting agencies, the K-12 education sector, charter school organizations, professional and trade organizations, and others in the education sector. Prior to establishing the firm, he served as General Counsel of the U.S. Department of Education from 2006-2009, where he acted as the chief legal adviser to Secretary of Education Margaret Spellings.
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Virtual Schools, Actual Learning
This paper is intended to provide background information for those exploring MI-time virtual schools and online learning. It draws on interviews with education officials, virtual school directors, district superintendents, researchers and non-profit executives, as well as data generated by previous studies on the topic.
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METCO Merits More
Massachusetts' METCO program (Metropolitan Council for Educational Opportunity) enables about 3,300 students who live in Boston and Springfield to attend opportunity-rich suburban schools. Since the vast majority of the students in METCO are either African American or Latino and most suburban districts remain overwhelmingly white, METCO fulfills two goals: it creates a degree of racial and ethnic diversity and provides students who'd otherwise attend challenged school districts the opportunity to attend schools with reputations for rigor and excellence.
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Houses of Learning
This paper is intended to act as a guide for charter school founders and directors to accomplish what has been called the "devilishly difficult" task of financing a charter school, finding a location, assembling a development team and building the facility, among other requirements. It draws on interviews with charter school administrators, trustees and policy leaders in Massachusetts and other states, as well as data generated by previous studies on the topic.
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Testimony to the Joint Education Committee
"Testimony to the Joint Education Committee" was provided in May 2011.
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The Anti-Aid Amendments and School Choice
"The Anti-Aid Amendments and School Choice" was presented by Michael Wolf in 2011.
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Be Not Afraid: A History of Catholic Schooling in Massachusetts
The overall aim of this policy paper is not only to reveal the urgency of the problem in Catholic education; it also strives to explain why Catholic schools in Massachusetts and in the city of Boston should be considered essential partners in education. It does so by presenting academic data on the successes of Catholic schools in the Archdiocese of Boston and the state and nationwide; it makes comparisons to surrounding public school systems, such as the Boston. Finally, this paper outlines current efforts on the part of the Catholic community and the Archdiocese of Boston especially, to reverse the discouraging trend of Catholic school closures in Boston and beyond. The report concludes by providing recommendations for the perpetuation of Catholic schools in Massachusetts.
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Contracting for Performance
The results of this study show that factory model contracts are more likely to be found in the Commonwealth's lowest-performing school districts, many of which serve disproportionate numbers of poor and minority students. This policy brief concludes with six recommendations for actions that school districts can take to ensure that teacher collective bargaining contracts in the state of Massachusetts become better aligned with the professional model.
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Education Tax Credits – A Review of the Rhode Island Program and Assessment of Possibilities in Massachusetts
The first part of this brief presents a detailed description of Rhode Island's Corporate Scholarship Tax Credit (CSTC) program, summarizing the key institutional features of the program. The second part of the brief extracts lessons learned from Rhode Island's tax credit program and assesses the possibility of the adoption of a similar tax credit funded scholarship program in Massachusetts.
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Charter School Caps and Strings Attached
This white paper attempts to fill that void and outline the pros and cons of the new legislation. It does so by taking a close look at the language of the law, the conditions attached to the charter school cap raise, and the recent politics of charter schooling in the state.
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Review of Common Core Math Standards: Testimony to the California Academic Content Standards Commission
Testimony to the California Academic Content Standards Commission provided in July 2010.
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National Standards Still Don’t Make the Grade
The case for national standards rests in part on the need to remedy the inconsistent purposes and inferior quality of many state standards and tests in order to equalize academic expectations for all students. The argument also addresses the urgent need to increase academic achievement for all students.
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The Emperor’s New Clothes
The academic and economic implications of Common Core's definition of college and career readiness standards in ELA and mathematics should be receiving extensive examination by every local and state school board in the country, by editorial boards in all major media, and by the U.S. Congress before cash-strapped states are coerced by the USED's criteria for RttT funds, membership in test consortia, or Title I funds into committing themselves to Common Core's standards. That they have not is perhaps the most serious matter of all.
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Fair to Middling: A National Standards Progress Report
The purpose of this April 2010 progress report is to indicate how Common Core's March drafts have addressed the deficiencies and limitations in its September and January drafts, and to spell out major areas needing further work. The analysis we present in this progress report shows that, although progress has been made, considerably more work is needed, particularly at the secondary level, to enable Common Core's mathematics and English language arts (ELA) standards to be internationally benchmarked and to serve as the basis for valid and reliable high school exit level assessments.
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Beyond Demographic Destiny
This report analyzes achievement gaps for African-American and Hispanic minority students in selected Massachusetts school districts. It examines the gaps in English Language Arts and Mathematics achievement on the state assessment, MCAS, between each minority group and White students.
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Writing Instruction in Massachusetts
This new Pioneer Institute policy brief on student writing in our schools will be helpful if it highlights the understanding that students will need to write often and at length in college and beyond.
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Why Race to the Middle?
In short, the rush to move from 50 state standards to a single set of standards for 50 states in less than one year, as well as the lack of transparency in CCSSI’s procedures, have excluded the kind and extent of public discussion merited by the huge policy implications of such a move.
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Lowering the Bar to Get a Passing Grade
Southern New England School of Law (SNESL) is a regionally accredited law school located in North Dartmouth, Massachusetts. It was founded in 1981 and unsuccessfully sought American Bar Association (ABA) accreditation in 1997 and again in 1999.
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Debunking the Myths About Charter Public Schools
Charter public schools have existed in Massachusetts since 1995, after enabling legislation was included in the landmark Massachusetts Education Reform Act (MERA) of 1993. Originally conceived as laboratories for educational innovation that could offer choice for families and competition for traditional district schools, charters are public schools that may not discriminate as to whom they accept.
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Putting Children First: The History of Charter Public Schools in Massachusetts
The story of charter schooling in Massachusetts is, by and large, the story of an idea that took hold at the local level and was quickly adopted by legislators who saw charter schools as one key to addressing devastating problems with the state's urban school districts. It is also the story of diverse groups of constituents—politicians, businesspeople, parents, and concerned citizens—coming together to create innovative schooling options for the Massachusetts students that need them most.
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Follow the Money: Charter School and District Funding in Massachusetts
Charter public schools operate under five-year charters from the Massachusetts Board of Elementary and Secondary Education (BESE) and are not part of traditional local school districts. Charters often organize around a core mission, curriculum, or teaching method. They are free from district management and local collective bargaining agreements, and they control their own budget and hire teachers and staff separately from the local school district.