In recent months, as schools nationwide scrambled to respond to the challenges posed by COVID-19, state and local education leaders have reached out to ask us: What does research say about how to prevent learning loss? About how to prepare teachers for distance learning? About how to address the mental health and other needs of students and educators during a crisis? About how to reduce the impact of budget cuts?

This week, the UChicago Consortium on School Research (CCSR) released a new evaluation report on the early days of CAFÉCS (Barrow, Freire, & de la Torre, 2020). The report provides tremendous validation to our partners at the Chicago Public Schools Office of Computer Science, DePaul University, Loyola University, and UIC.

In an interview with the RoundTable on July 1, Dr. Devon Horton, School District 65’s new Superintendent, outlined a Miracles framework that he plans to implement this coming school year at the District. He said the District does not currently have a strategic plan, its five-year strategic plan ended last month, and he wants to start out with a “cohesive approach to improving the District.”

As educators across the country begin to plan for next school year, we are not only beginning to reckon with the logistics of creating a physically safe school environment, but also with the challenge of helping our students make meaning of their experience with a global pandemic, economic insecurity, attacks against Black bodies, and racial injustice. Amidst this uncertainty and tumult, many are grappling with their own role and the role of unjust systems in society.

If you’re a rising high school senior gearing up for the grueling college application process this fall, you might well breathe a sigh of relief at this recent news:

Your odds of sidestepping the 4-hour ACT or SAT are better than 50-50...

Key Insights:

• Learning losses are likely to show up differently across grades and subjects, with intensive recovery needs concentrated in the early grades and among already struggling students.
• Supportive school environments and strong teacher-student relationships speed recovery from learning loss.
• High-dosage tutoring that is directly tied to classroom content—helping students succeed in their coursework—can substantially accelerate learning in both math and reading for the most struggling students.

One of the most wide-ranging consequences of the COVID-19 crisis may be the demise of college admissions tests, a striking development that would help close the wide opportunity gaps in a key sector of American life.

While pressure to make the SAT and the ACT optional had been building before campuses closed early this spring due to the coronavirus crisis, the tests remained deeply embedded in the nation’s college-going culture, due in no small part to intensive lobbying by both ACT and the College Board, which sponsor the exams...

Three years after Superintendent Theresa Plascencia gutted the ranks of Waukegan High School’s administration in a redesign, Waukegan District 60′s school board is considering a request to add back two assistant principal positions.

With two more administrators being returned to the high school’s ranks, a handful of school board members questioned Tuesday why the district doesn’t return to the former structure...