Pennsylvania

In an inspiring display of cross-sector collaboration, the New York City School-Justice Partnership Task Force has released an action plan for NYC officials to reduce the use of suspensions, summonses, and arrests by building common cause between different agencies and communities and implementing positive discipline strategies.

Proponents of charter schools and charter expansion consistently overlook serious issues with how these schools can selectively shape their student enrollment. A report from the National Education Policy Center describes 12 practices that charter schools use to push out or discourage enrollment of students with special needs, those with low test scores, English learners, or students in poverty.

May 17th is the 59th anniversary of the historic Brown v. Board of Education Supreme Court decision. Decades later, students, parents, teacher and advocates are still fighting against education policies that leave students of color and low-income students deprived of the resources and opportunities they need to succeed. But a grassroots revolution is brewing, what blogger Jeff Bryant has been calling an "education spring," and this past week has seen headline-grabbing victories and inspiring actions.

Thousands of students in Philadelphia are staging a massive, city-wide walkout today to protest the under-resourcing of their schools and school closures. A number of OTL allies are participating in the event, including the Philadelphia Student Union and Youth United for Change, two of the largest student organizing groups in the city. Follow #walkout215 on Twitter for for live updates!

Standards-based reform creates an inherent system of winners and losers by raising the bar and assessing who makes the cut. Supports-based reforms provide and strategically align the needed resources so each student has the opportunity to reach that bar—and surpass it.

The National Center for Education Policy (NEPC), an OTL ally, has a new, must-read book about the change our nation needs to make from thinking about the achievement gap to trying to fix the opportunity gap that underlies it.

Like most states, Pennsylvania's Constitution requires the state to provide students with access to a basic public education. And, like most states, there's a gap between what resources students need to get that promised basic education and what the state is actually funding. In a letter to Gov. Tom Corbett, education advocates from across the state, including several OTL allies, wrote that "the basic educational needs of Pennsylvania's children are not being met."