Back when Hillary Rodham Clinton was still an education innovator, the Democratic nominee, then the young first lady of Arkansas, brought to her adopted home state an inspired program called HIPPY, which coaches less-affluent parents who want to prepare their preschoolers for first grade. Former President Bill Clinton gave the program a much-deserved mention in...

This article wraps up our in-depth coverage of the Republican and Democratic National Conventions. For more analysis and backstage reports from Cleveland & Philadelphia, see our RNC and DNC archives. We knew from the first primary debates last fall that 2016 wasn’t likely to be the education election. Candidates had other pressing things to talk...

The year was 1993. President Bill Clinton had just beat Republican incumbent George H. Bush and the first family was facing an early political test: Where would they send Chelsea Clinton, their 12-year-old daughter and only child, to school? On the campaign trail, Bill Clinton had portrayed himself as an ardent supporter of public education. He...

By Kaitlin Pennington Yesterday, my Bellwether Education Partners colleague Andy Rotherham wrote on this blog that “as long as the Democrats don’t burn the place down, it’s going to be hard for them to have a worse convention than the GOP just did.” Well, it came close. The Democratic National Convention delegates didn’t seem to get...

As the country’s electoral sweepstakes moves a few hundred miles east from Cleveland to Philadelphia, where Democrats are set to nominate Hillary Clinton, discussions of policy look to become more substantive. Unlike Trump, Clinton has a substantial education record – during the campaign, she released detailed proposals on home visits and the school-to-prison pipeline. She recently addressed...

Two and a half years ago, Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa left his office steering the nation’s second-largest city with a legacy of pushing the kind of changes in the school system that education reformers relish. Trying to make good on a campaign promise to fix the city’s schools, he fought the teachers union in...

With his massive plan to enroll half of all LA Unified’s students into charter schools, billionaire philanthropist Eli Broad is threatening major disruptions at LA Unified, cementing his role as Public Enemy No. 1 to many district and local union leaders. But Broad’s enduring support for public charter schools now appears to be contributing to...