Helping teachers with the workload
K-12 leaders and experts weigh in on whether AI tools have the potential to make teachers’ jobs more manageable and if that can ease staffing challenges.
Teachers are swamped.
They’re working longer hours compared to other professionals, and their job-related stress often comes from managing student behavior, earning low salaries, and performing administrative work that isn’t tied to instruction, according to an educator survey by Rand Corp. released in June.
Furthermore, an April study by Pew Research Center also found that 8 in 10 teachers don’t have enough time in the day to complete all of their work. And 81% of those teachers said a major reason for that is they “just have too much work.”
Academic Gains after the Pandemic
Some Bright Spots in Students’ Learning Recovery, But Still a Long Way to Go
There are “small signs” of improvement in students’ academic recovery, but still a long way to go to return to pre-pandemic levels of achievement, concludes a report from Curriculum Associates, a company that provides curriculum and classroom-based testing programs.
Based on an analysis of more than 10 million students in reading and 12 million in math who took the organization’s i-Ready Diagonistic, the proportions of students now performing at grade level are very similar from spring 2023 to spring 2024 across grades and subjects.
Mental Health Improving
Depression and suicidal activity have decreased slightly for teens since 2021, but simultaneously there have been alarming increases in violence, bullying and school avoidance, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
Advanced Placement Exams show Improvement
Here’s Why More Students Have Passed AP Exams in Recent Years
Some Advanced Placement teachers might have noticed that a higher percentage of their students received passing scores on the program’s year-end exams in the last few years.
This year, 72 percent of students who took the AP U.S. History exam earned scores of 3, 4, or 5—scores that often allow exam takers to claim college credit—up from 48.3 percent in 2022. On the AP Macroeconomics exam, 62 percent of students this year earned passing grades, up from 51.8 percent two years earlier, according to College Board data.
School Closures need to happen
Prompted by declining enrollment and the impending loss of federal pandemic relief funding, school districts nationwide are wrestling with whether to close schools — and, if so, how many. Seattle is weighing a plan to close a quarter of its elementary schools. Rochester, New York, voted last fall to shut 11 of its 45 schools. San Antonio recently closed 13, with two more slated to shut their doors soon.
School closures are hardly new, but two factors make the current wave different. First, shifts to homeschooling and private schools during the pandemic exacerbated the trend of declining urban enrollment. Second, the loss of pandemic relief funds (the so-called fiscal cliff) finally forced districts to find ways to save money.
FAFSA Updates
The Free Application for Federal Student Aid for the 2025-26 academic year will be fully available by Dec. 1 — two months later than the form’s usual debut, according to an announcement Wednesday from the U.S. Department of Education.
Starting Oct. 1, the Education Department will test the new form with a limited number of students and institutions. This phased approach is aimed at ensuring complete functionality when the form fully launches, officials said in a news release.
Are students choosing college?
Why some high school graduates chose not to pursue a bachelor’s degree
College has long been the most popular choice for graduating high school seniors, but these days, a growing number of recent graduates are choosing alternative pathways instead.
Enrollments in undergraduate certificate programs—which are designed for students who want to develop technical skills in lieu of traditional higher education—increased by almost 10 percent from fall 2022 to fall 2023, according to the National Student Clearinghouse Research Center’s 2023 higher education enrollment update. Meanwhile, enrollment in bachelor’s programs increased by 0.9 percent in the same time period.
FAFSA update
The change could increase colleges’ administrative burden and leave some students without financial aid this fall, one industry association said.
The Education Department released an updated version of the FAFSA in late December, almost three months later than usual. Following publication, the form’s rollout has faced heavy criticism over ongoing delays and limited functionality.
Despite the rapidly approaching start to the fall semester, Tuesday’s announcement shows some FAFSA processing issues will continue to go unresolved.
The Profile of a Current Student
Nearly three years after most kids returned to in-person classes, new federal data reveals troublesome student behavior – from threatening other students in class and online to lack of attentiveness – continues to make learning recovery challenging.
Top challenges in more than half of the country’s schools were students being unprepared or disruptive in the classroom, according to the Department of Education’s research arm in its 2023-24 School Pulse data release.
