For many years, most of the problems of American public education have been described in terms of “achievement gaps.” This framing, and the education policy approaches that build from it, have much to recommend them. The framing begins from the incontrovertible premise that students from historically underserved demographic groups often have limited access to high-quality educational opportunities. This core, systemic inequity drives gaps in student achievement between students from these groups and privileged students.

Courtney: We are so excited to talk with you here at the Aurora Institute. So, would you share for our listeners a little bit about who you are and what you do, and what brings you to the Aurora Institute this here?

Arya Muralidharan is a third-year undergraduate student majoring in computational and applied mathematics at the University of Chicago. She is currently working at the UChicago Consortium as a Research Assistant. Previously, she worked as a Research and Data Analysis intern for the Texas-based non-profit CHILDREN AT RISK, focusing on public and early childhood education. She also tutored elementary and high school students in Chicago through Maroon Tutor Match.

New research from the University of Chicago Consortium on School Research (UChicago Consortium) shows the learning environments educators create can have a strong influence on students’ Academic Mindsets and Learning Strategies, and, ultimately, performance. Based on this research, we at UChicago Impact partnered with the UChicago Consortium to develop Cultivate, a survey and framework designed to support educators in creating the kind of learning environments that can change what students believe and how they perform.

Key Findings:

What is the purpose of the 5Essentials (5E) Surveys for teachers and students?

Results from the 5E Survey provide a guide to help schools know what they can do to improve or strengthen their school. Research has shown that schools strong on three or more of the 5Es are actually 10 times more likely to improve than schools that are weak on three or more of the 5Es.

Educators in two Marion County districts are pushing lawmakers to let schools count as graduates certain students now labeled as dropouts. But some experts say that move would lower the bar for Indiana students.

Should lawmakers approve the measure, graduation counts in several districts would include students who pass a high school equivalency exam and take steps toward career training...

This study examines trends in CS education in Chicago over the last decade in CPS high schools. The longitudinal look utilizes data from 2008-09 through 2017-18. It looks specifically at the cohorts of students expected to graduate under the new CS graduation requirement in 2020 and 2021. Because our data sample ended in 2018, our analyses and findings do not include information for a full four years of enrollment for the 2020 and 2021 cohorts.

Students’ high school grade point averages are five times stronger than their ACT scores at predicting college graduation, according to a new study published today in Educational Researcher, a peer-reviewed journal of the American Educational Research Association.

Students’ high school grade point averages are five times stronger than their ACT scores at predicting college graduation, according to a study posted on the website of the University of Chicago (UChicago) Consortium on School Research.

The researchers examined 55,084 students who graduated from Chicago Public Schools of varying academic profiles between 2006 and 2009, and who then immediately enrolled in a four-year college. At the time of the study, all Illinois students took the ACT in the spring of 11th grade...