North Carolina

Today there is nothing short of a state of emergency in the delivery of education to our nation’s communities of color. As our communities quickly grow on pace to become a numerical majority, it is clear that confronting the issues we face is not just our challenge alone but all of America’s challenge. As a nation, we are failing to provide the highquality educational opportunities that are critical for all students to succeed, thereby jeopardizing our nation’s ability to continue to be a world leader.

There is an economic -- as well as ideological -- importance to providing all students with an equal opportunity for rigorous education. In this report, the Alliance for Excellent Education makes the economic case, analyzing state-level economic data to determine the monetary benefits that states could see by improving the graduation rates of students of color and Native students.

This report, by the Georgetown University Center on Education and the Workforce, finds that the U.S. has been underproducing college-going workers since 1980. As a result, the country is losing its edge as an economic world leader. We must add 20 million postsecondary-educated workers to the workforce to make this income inequality decline. We can do it if we make a concerted effort to improve levels of educational attainment.

The Pew Center's Pre-K Now project released a new paper making the case for "Pre-K as a School Turnaround Strategy." The paper urges members of Congress to look at state and local turnaround initiatives that use limited funds for proven early education programs as a way to improve student achievement. According to the report, "The evidence is clear and compelling: pre-K multiplies the impact of other reforms. Early investment is the best investment."

A recent report by the Center on Education Policy finds that more school districts are predicting budget cuts compared to this time last year and say that the cuts will come at the expense of teachers and other core services. The report is based on a nationally representative survey. 

With high school dropout rates on the rise — disproportionately so among poor and minority students — this report calls on federal policymakers to draw on lessons learned from the New York City Department of Education's Multiple Pathways to Graduation (MPG) initiative. Using MPG as a case study, the report highlights the initiative's success in helping off-track students succeed and reach the same high standards by catering to their varying educational needs.

To transform struggling schools into successful environments for teaching and learning, more emphasis needs to be placed on seeking partnerships among groups at the federal and local level. This brief examines the federal policy for intervening in low-achieving schools and suggests a different approach for "turning around" struggling schools.

A new analysis by the National Center for Education Statistics of scores on the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) reviews the achievement gaps between Hispanic and White public school students at the state and national levels. While reading and mathematics scores for both Hispanics and Whites increased between 1990 and 2009, the achievement gaps remained stable at 21 points for fourth-grade mathematics and 26 points for fourth-grade reading. A previous report analyzes the NAEP achievement gap between Black and White students. 

Summer learning programs can help children improve their academics, especially students from low-income families who may not have access to educational resources in the summer, and low-achieving students who need additional time to master academic materials. This report, conducted by RAND Education and sponsored by The Wallace Foundation, finds evidence of the effectiveness of summer learning programs and offers specific recommendations on how school districts can overcome barriers to establishing them so that all children have access to enrichment opportunities.

Each year, more than 1 million students drop of high school while still thousands more – the majority of whom are students of color and low-income students – graduate without the high-quality education they need to succeed in college, the workplace and in life. In a compelling new report, “The Plan for Success,” the Campaign for High School Equity has outlined the crisis and defined solutions that will require changes in policy and practice to help transform our high schools to ensure every student, regardless of race, ethnicity, ZIP code or socioeconomic status, has an opportunity to learn in a high-quality public school.