Events

As states, districts, and schools are expanding instruction to include the competencies associated with college, career, and civic readiness, they are also developing ways to measure mastery of higher-order thinking skills. These measures include performance assessments that show what students know and can do through demonstrations of their thinking, writing, research, and products. During this briefing, speakers shared information on how performance assessments can inform teaching and learning, advance educational equity, and be used to inform the postsecondary admission, placement, and advisement process in ways that increase access.

On March 21, LPI, the National Conference of State Legislatures, Learning Forward, and the National Association of State Boards of Education launched State Efforts for Building an Effective, Diverse Teacher Workforce, a series of webinars on how states can help develop and support a diverse workforce of teachers who develop greater mastery and leadership. The first webinar addressed opportunities under ESSA for effective professional learning systems, professional development to help teachers provide instruction that supports deeper learning, and how state departments of education can work with state boards of education to develop state-funded strategies.

On March 20, LPI held the second webinar in a series that explores why deeper learning is crucial for students in today’s innovation economy and how we can achieve greater equity in access to deeper learning. This webinar explored how performance assessments are providing all students, including those who are farthest from opportunity, a vehicle to show what they know in a way that matters.

Fifty years ago this March, the Kerner Commission issued a seminal report on racial division and disparities in the United States. On February 28, the findings regarding education from the 50-year update to the commission report were released and discussed at a Washington, D.C. At the event, some of the nation's leading policymakers, journalists, researchers, civil rights activists, and educators discussed the state of public education in the United States, and what policy levers are needed to eradicate racial inequities that have persisted in historically marginalized communities and that can improve educational opportunities for all students.

Fifty years ago this March, the Kerner Commission issued a seminal report on racial division and disparities in the United States. On February 27, LPI, the Eisenhower Foundation, and the Economic Policy Institute co-hosted a full-day forum in Washington, D.C., to release and discuss the findings from the 50-year update to the commission report. At the forum some of our nation's leading policymakers, journalists, researchers, civil rights activists, and educators discussed the status of civil rights today.

On February 15, LPI held the first webinar in a series that explores why deeper learning is crucial for students in today’s innovation economy and how we can achieve greater equity in access to deeper learning. This webinar addressed ways schools and school districts can improve academic achievement—particularly among students who are farthest from opportunity—through engaging students in learning that focuses on meaningful mastery of subjects, critical thinking, problem-solving, collaboration and other skills necessary for college, career, and civic participation in the 21st Century.

The Learning Policy Institute released Building an Early Learning System that Works: Next Steps for California at this forum. This new report complements LPI’s earlier report on early care and education (ECE), Understanding California’s Early Care and Education System, which provides a comprehensive overview of the state’s ECE system. The earlier report found that California’s ECE system is complex and fragmented, and fails to provide hundreds of thousands of children with the quality early learning experiences they need.

The Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA) provides funding to meet the educational needs of low-achieving schoolchildren. A new landmark study finds that community schools are effective at improving educational outcomes for children in high poverty communities. Teachers College and Children's Aid hosted leading scholars, policy makers, and practitioners who discussed the future of community schools in New York City and New York State.

This briefing highlighted community schools as an evidence-based approach for school improvement for education stakeholders to consider under ESSA. The Learning Policy Institute shared its findings and recommendations on community schools as a means to school improvement, based on a study it recently conducted with the National Education Policy Center.

Education experts and school leaders from across California convened for a day of thought-provoking panel discussions and workshop sessions that explored how California schools can best serve students who are most at risk in the current climate, including immigrant students, LGBTQ and other groups.