July 12, 2023
Rethinking the Impact of the Lockdowns
We are only beginning to make sense of the COVID-19 pandemic and the implications of the lockdowns that forced people to stay home. It is an endeavor that will take years to flesh out. Eszter Hargittai’s Connected in Isolation is one of the first large-scale attempts to do just that and looks at how the United States…
July 8, 2023
Why the End of Affirmative Action Is Good for Black Science Students
“Corporate diversity in the crosshairs.” That was a typical headline after last week’s Supreme Court decision declaring the use of racial preferences in college admissions unconstitutional. Panic has set in among the chattering classes about what will happen to “workplace diversity” as a result of the ruling. Not only do observers fear that the court — whose majority…
July 6, 2023
The End of Affirmative Action Calls for a Renewed Conservatism of Opportunity
Only about 40 percent of adults in their late 20s have a bachelor’s degree, and that’s true of only 25 to 30 percent of blacks and Latinos in that age range. Just 20 to 25 percent of black and Latino men ages 25 to 29 have a bachelor’s degree. Most college graduates attend schools that are minimally selective. All…
June 30, 2023
The U.S. Could Learn a Lot from This School in the U.K.
Last month, I took advantage of a trip to the U.K. to spend a day observing at London’s legendary Michaela School, which serves about 800 students ages eleven to 18, a short distance from Wembley Stadium. Katharine Birbalsingh, who has gained fame in her country (some say infamy) as “Britain’s strictest headmistress,” invited me for an entire day…
June 30, 2023
It’s Time to End Legacy Admissions
The Supreme Court’s decision in the UNC and Harvard cases was received, as most news is these days, in two quite different ways on the two sides of our political aisle. But one theme seemed to resonate with both supporters and opponents of affirmative action: that in the spirit of ending unfair admissions practices, elite…
June 28, 2023
Yes, College Is Still a Good Investment
A four-year degree still pays dividends—but now’s a great time for young people to snap up some on-the-job experience, too. Another graduation season is in the books. Some students have finished high school and are thinking about their next steps while others have just finished college and are wondering if it was worth it. They…
June 26, 2023
Why There Are So Few Black Kids at Stuyvesant: Private Schools and Charter Schools Pull Top Students Out of the System
Once more there is hand-wringing as only a handful of Black students are in the 2023 entering Stuyvesant class; and very limited numbers at Bronx Science and Brooklyn Tech: the three flagship New York City high schools. These numbers are virtually the same as the previous year. As usual, most liberals again demand that the…
June 15, 2023
AI and the Future of Schooling
Over the past year, eerily human artificial intelligence has crossed from the province of science fiction into daily reality. Displaying an astonishing ability to write poetry, code programs, summarize research, and ace the SAT, AI has profound implications for education. The early response has tended to take one of two forms: sky-is-falling panic or an…
June 14, 2023
The Best Argument for School Choice
A new study from the Texas Public Policy Foundation is a reminder that the most persuasive argument in favor of school choice is not the promise of higher test scores, the beneficial effects of competition, or even an escape hatch from failing public schools—it’s the power of choice to make a more satisfying range of school cultures…
June 13, 2023
The Great School Rethink
In The Great School Rethink, education policy sentinel Frederick M. Hess offers a pithy and perceptive appraisal of American schooling and finds, in the uncertain period following pandemic disruption, an ideal moment to reimagine US education. Now is the time, he asserts, to ask hard questions about how schools use time and talent, how they work…