There Wasn’t Just One Reason That Led to Parkland

“You can’t handle the truth.” I’m beginning to think there was great wisdom in these five words uttered by Colonel Jessup, the character played by…

Let’s Stop With the Handcuffs and Train Teachers to Deal With Special Needs

I couldn’t watch the video of the Florida child being handcuffed in the principal’s office. As a writer and a policy wonk, I am not supposed…

Stop Pushing Girls Out of the Classroom and Just ‘Let Her Learn’

Every day girls are being pushed out of the classroom. Some of them are unseen. Many of them are unheard. And too often they are…

School Reformers Cannot Ignore the Life and Death Issues Black People in America Face

In recent months, notable people within school reform circles have locked horns over a trifling question: Does the inclusion of social justice activists, people derided…

The New Civil Rights Data Is Depressing. We Must Do Better.

The Civil Rights Data Collection recently released data collected from nearly 100,000 public schools and it’s troubling. Black and Latino students are more likely to…

Cynthia Tucker Haynes writes at The Seventy Four about how schools have been turning to law enforcement for minor infractions, leading to criminal records for what most would consider typical teenage defiance. The result: A school to prison to pipeline that is major cause for alarm. That criminalization of children’s misconduct helps to explain such episodes as the handcuffing of a four-year-old pre-kindergarten student at a Virginia school…