Explore commentary and stories from Chad Aldeman, K-12 policy and school finance expert, on the evolving landscape of educational recovery and progress.
When I first heard about Louisiana’s effort to streamline state and federal funding programs, it immediately made sense to me. Why have districts submit separate budgets and plans for multiple different programs, each with their own priorities, timelines, and reporting requirements?
Welcome to Fall, the season of football, pumpkin spice lattes, and finally seeing your child’s results from state tests they took last Spring.
As part of its redesigned school performance and support framework, last month Virginia adopted a new math acceleration indicator which will nudge schools to enroll more middle school student in advanced math courses.
I thought I understood the chronic absenteeism problem. Kids were disengaged during the pandemic and lost the habit of going to school regularly. Plus, the virus and flu were still circulating, which forced kids to stay home. That story is a generic one. The virus and flu should affect all kids equally, right?
Humans are lazy. I don’t mean that in a negative sense. But we all take shortcuts, we use rules of thumb, and we generally try to make things as easy as possible on ourselves.
Math performance among New Mexico’s 8th graders has fallen 15 points in the last decade, grounding scores to a two-decade low. Yet, despite the alarming state of learning, New Mexico leaders appear to be walking back an accountability system that was originally touted by a panel of independent, national experts as one of the best in the country.
From an education policy perspective, there’s not much to say about last night’s presidential debate.
Algebra is a gateway toward more advanced mathematics courses, and passing the course in 8th grade is a strong predictor of future college success.
In a report for FutureEd last month, Lynn Olson and Tom Toch advocate for a “matrix sampling” approach to federally required achievement tests. Basically, instead of testing all kids in grades 3-8, states could test just a sample of students and still get high-level accountability results.
About 25 million kids will sit down to take a state test this spring. When can parents reasonably expect to see their child’s results?
So the key question is not whether these types of digital programs “work,” but, “how many students actually stick with them?” And the reality is not that many.
So the key question is not whether these types of digital programs “work,” but, “how many students actually stick with them?” And the reality is not that many.
Chad Aldeman is a nationally recognized expert on education policy, including school finance; teacher preparation, evaluation, and compensation; and state standards, assessment, and accountability. Chad has worked at the Edunomics Lab at Georgetown University, Bellwether Education, and the U.S. Department of Education during the Obama Administration.
He has published reports on K-12 and higher education accountability systems; school choice; student enrollment; and teacher preparation, evaluations, and compensation. His work has been featured on CNN and NPR and published in the Washington Post, New York Times, and Wall Street Journal. Chad holds a bachelor’s degree from the University of Iowa and a master’s of public policy from the College of William and Mary. Chad is also the founder of ReadNotGuess.com, a program to help parents support their child’s early reading skills.
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