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Racially, ethnically, and socioeconomically diverse classrooms are beneficial for young students, yet early childhood programs can be more segregated than elementary and high schools. Research offers five policy strategies to promote diverse early learning settings.
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Student access to high-quality learning should not be predetermined by race, yet racial disparities in education persist. The State Handbook for Advancing Racial Equity offers a framework that state education leaders and policymakers can use to assess and advance racial equity in education through state-level strategies.
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The American education system has made limited progress towards the dream of equity envisioned by Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. more than 60 years ago. Exemplary schools across the country offer a blueprint for building schools in which all students thrive regardless of zip code, family income, or race and ethnicity.
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Across the country, many schools have adopted restorative practices in an effort to improve school climate and student outcomes while reducing exclusionary discipline. Restorative practices improve students’ academic achievement and decreases suspension rates and disparities.
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Fremont High School in Oakland, CA, is among the many schools seeing benefits from adopting restorative practices in place of exclusionary discipline policies such as suspensions and expulsions, which disproportionately impact students of color and students with disabilities. Since implementing these policies, Fremont has reduced suspension rates and increased enrollments.
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Exclusionary discipline (suspension and expulsion) increases risks of student misbehavior, dropout, and incarceration—and Black students are 4 times more likely than White students to experience such discipline. An alternative to exclusionary discipline, restorative practices address root causes of misbehavior and can improve academic, disciplinary, and school climate measures and reduce racial disparities.
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Integrated Schools | Drs. Linda and Kia Darling-Hammond discuss their book, The Civil Rights Road to Deeper Learning: Five Essentials for Equity, which considers key civil rights actions and education policy conditions essential to ensuring access to a meaningful education that prepares all students to thrive in our modern society.
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Magnet schools have been key components of longstanding efforts to desegregate schools; however, many districts have recently retreated from their proactive diversity efforts, resulting in greater school segregation. Through four evidence-based policies, magnet schools can continue to deliver on their original desegregation missions.
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Key civil rights conditions are essential to deeper learning—providing the opportunity to learn the skills and knowledge that students need to succeed. Authors examine the community and school inequities that create persistent obstacles to this goal, the civil rights actions needed to remove them, and highlight exemplary schools that offer deeper learning that engages and empowers students.
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As the pandemic landscape continues to evolve, schools and districts are encountering a range of new challenges. LPI has synthesized 10 of the most important COVID-19-related actions schools and districts can take this fall to support students and staff.