How Education Funding Matters: Lessons From NAEP, the Pandemic, and Recovery Efforts | Recent NAEP data reveal widening achievement gaps, especially for the lowest-performing students. What’s the path forward? Research makes it clear: well-targeted investments boost outcomes, narrow disparities, and support long-term success ..read more

Standards to Classroom: Transforming the Opportunity to Learn in California Schools | California has made significant progress in aligning K–12 education policies, but successful implementation of new standards, particularly in math and English language arts, requires sustained and comprehensive teacher professional development. To build instructional capacity at scale, investments in ongoing teacher training, digital tools, and embedded professional learning are needed ..read more

Looking Back, Moving Forward: A Vision for Instructional Capacity in California | In his sixth decade of education policy, Michael W. Kirst looks to the past and future, reflecting on policy reforms enacted during his four terms as California State Board of Education President and elevating lessons that can inform a new roadmap to build instructional capacity in all California classrooms ..read more

Redesigning High Schools With the Learner at the Center | The science of learning and development reveals how to design high schools so that learners can thrive in environments that support individualized development; where they have strong, supportive relationships; and where their social, emotional, physical, and cognitive needs are met ..read more

Layoffs, Shortages, and the ESSER Cliff: Making Sense of a Paradoxical Labor Market | Teacher shortages are widespread, yet layoffs occur annually. This paradox stems from converging factors such as state and local funding decisions, fluctuations in public school enrollment, and the impending expiration of federal ESSER funds ..read more

Layoffs, Shortages, and the ESSER Cliff: Making Sense of a Paradoxical Labor Market ..read more

When Teachers Leave: Understanding the Financial Impacts on Schools | Each year, approximately one in six public school teachers across the United States leaves their school or leaves the profession altogether, contributing to teacher shortages and costing districts considerable time, energy, and resources to find and train new teachers. The Learning Policy Institute’s updated calculator can help educational leaders to estimate the cost of teacher turnover ..read more

Bringing Students Back: How Community Schools Are Addressing Chronic Absenteeism | In 2022, nearly 13.8 million students were chronically absent—missing 18 days of school or more. Students miss school for a wide range of reasons, and frequent absences can cause students to fall behind. Community schools are a research-based strategy that schools can adopt to address the issues underlying chronic absenteeism ..read more

New AmeriCorps Rules: Unlocking Another Resource to Prepare a Stronger Teacher Workforce | Teacher shortages continue to impact schools and districts in all 50 states and Washington, DC, driven in part by financial barriers that prevent candidates from accessing comprehensive preparation. New AmeriCorps rules will potentially unlock a meaningful source of funding for comprehensive preparation programs and the candidates they prepare ..read more

Where Do Teachers Want To Teach? And Why? | Teacher shortages continue to be a huge issue in many states. Yet states differ in their education policies and in the ways that teachers are prepared, compensated, and supported. These differences can result in dramatically different levels of student access to a diverse, stable, and well-qualified educator workforce ..read more