BURLINGTON, Vt. — Hopeful young entrepreneurs in business schools routinely pitch ideas for startup companies as part of their classroom assignments. But the ones who were doing it at the University of Vermont were still in high school. It was the inaugural Vermont Pitch Challenge, to which nearly 150 teams from 27 states and seven countries had submitted their entrepreneurial brainstorms. The final five had come to the campus to battle it out for the grand prize: a full-tuition scholarship to UVM. Their ideas included a website to help previously incarcerated applicants get jobs, a nonprofit ..read more

You’ve read the national headlines about the student-led protests at Columbia University and graduation ceremonies being canceled because of demonstrations at the University of Southern California.   In both cases, and in similar protests including those at Yale, Rutgers and UCLA, the students are protesting the war in Gaza and demanding that their universities cut financial ties with Israel and call for a ceasefire. No doubt, what’s happening on these high-profile campuses is worth paying attention to.     But protests are happening on campuses all across the country, and some ..read more

To boost enrollment and meet workforce needs, many states are offering free community college programs. It’s a well-intentioned (and bipartisan) idea to help people get the credentials they need, and states build their supply of college-educated workers. But does free really mean free? Do these programs effectively bring students back to college? And does saying something’s free diminish its value? Research shows that free college has had some effect, but not as much as you might think. It doesn’t mean that students still don’t have to pay for food, rent, books, supplies, transportation and o ..read more

BOCA RATON, Fla. – It doesn’t take much searching to spot the fallout from the newest Florida law seeking to erase DEI, or diversity, equity and inclusion, from public campuses. Several weeks ago, for example, staff offices at Florida Atlantic University’s Center for Inclusion, Diversity Education and Advocacy in Boca Raton were vacant, with name plates blank and abandoned desks, plus LGBTQ+ flags, posters and pamphlets left behind. Elsewhere on the palm-tree-framed campus, a sign for the “Women and Gender Equity Resource Center” remained, but a laminated paper on the door offered a new ident ..read more

ASTON, Pa.— In Jodie Murphy’s kindergarten class, math lessons go beyond the basics of counting and recognizing numbers. On a recent morning, the children used plastic red and yellow dots for a counting exercise: One student tossed the coin-sized dots onto a cookie sheet while another hid her eyes. The second student then opened her eyes, counted up the dots and picked the corresponding number from a stack of cards. The dots showed up again a few minutes later in a more complex task. Murphy set a two-minute timer, and students counted as many dot arrays as they could, adding or taking away do ..read more

A record share of children – about 35 percent of 4-year-olds and 7 percent of 3-year-olds – were enrolled in a state-funded preschool program last academic year, according to the 2023 State of Preschool report published last month by the National Institute for Early Education Research at Rutgers University. Notably, though, the actual number of 4-year-olds enrolled in state-funded pre-K is lower than pre-pandemic levels due to declining birth rates. The report also found that overall, states are spending more money on pre-K than ever before: $7,277 per child enrolled, or $11.7 billion total ..read more

The April 18 protests at Columbia University over the war in Gaza and Columbia’s investment in weapons manufacturers and companies doing business in Israel led to more than 100 arrests, and sparked widespread unrest not seen on campuses in decades. Barnard College, which is affiliated with Columbia, suspended at least 53 students and evicted them from their dorms, cut off their meal plans and barred them from campus. We wanted to learn how the suspensions and evictions felt to students on a personal level, and what the experience meant to them. So we interviewed several Barnard students who w ..read more

Every night before going to bed, Antonio would tuck in his three younger siblings. After school, he’d tinker with toy cars, or help his dad, a mechanic, fix things around the house. “He’s quiet, but he’s caring in his own way,” said his mother, Yanelie Marquez. The Hechinger Report is using her son’s middle name to protect his privacy. But four years ago, the then-12-year-old Antonio suddenly lost interest in everything and everyone. It started with school: He complained he couldn’t focus or understand the teacher’s instructions. “I’d open up his notebooks and they were completely empty,” Ma ..read more

I have taught at Columbia University for the better part of 25 years. Last Wednesday, I held office hours, as I do every week. I met with students and we talked about their classes, their essays on Shakespeare and Milton, their progress toward their respective degrees, and their feelings about graduation. We also spoke about their reactions to Columbia President Minouche Shafik’s recent Congressional testimony and her decision to authorize New York City police to break up the “Gaza Solidary Encampment” on campus, along with their views on the protests. In each conversation, I w ..read more

Writing lesson plans has traditionally been a big part of a teacher’s job.  But this doesn’t mean they should be starting from a blank slate. Ideally, teachers are supposed to base their lessons on the textbooks, worksheets and digital materials that school leaders have spent a lot of time reviewing and selecting.  But a recent national survey of more than 1,000 math teachers reveals that many are rejecting the materials they should be using and cobbling together their own. “A surprising number of math teachers, particularly at the high school level, simply said we don’t use the dis ..read more