The pandemic has been devastating for students and families on so many levels. It also produced insights that constitute urgent news for schools, both as they contend with the next wave of coronavirus and in the longer-term future. Today, a quarter of elementary school students in the U.S. use the Zearn platform and they have...

Over the past school year, the the Center on Reinventing Public Education has tracked how pandemic learning pods evolved from emergency responses to, in some cases, small, innovative, and personalized learning communities. This summer, as COVID-19 vaccinations increased, it seemed like the major impetus for these efforts was fading from view. We turned to our existing...

Every year, as much as one-third of college-bound high school graduates never show up to their first day of class. It’s all too easy for students to miss important deadlines, forget about necessary paperwork or get lost in the byzantine financial aid process. Known as summer melt, this phenomenon has long plagued high schools and...

I remember my shock the first time I was working with one of my fourth-grade students who spent most days working asynchronously — on his own — at home during the pandemic. He had completed all the online lessons assigned to him and came to school to take a multiplication test in person. Of the...

When Nevada’s school buildings closed in March 2020, the state’s 17 districts had varying abilities to support distance learning. A couple were well on their way, with quality instructional materials, access to devices and connectivity for students. But an overwhelming number of districts, including the largest one, Clark County School District, just didn’t have the...

Shortly after the COVID-19 pandemic closed Los Angeles County schools, Elena, a Promotora (community educator) who has been with Planned Parenthood Los Angeles (PPLA) for more than 15 years, reached out to a mother who had taken parent education classes at a LAUSD high school. Elena called to find out if the mother had followed...