We're rolling out our "Celebrating Latinx Economists" poster series - a bit late for Hispanic Heritage Month, but it's always timely to celebrate excellence! So far, we've got our own Greg Phelan plus Ricardo Caballero, @Marietmora, and @CarycruzBueno - and many more on the way! pic.twitter.com/CV84TRXUKS

— Williams Economics (@WilliamsEcon) December 3, 2019

Today, a research team from the University of Virginia, Brown University, and Stanford University make public results from two new studies based on data from recent years (2013-2017). In the first study, Thomas Dee, professor at Stanford University, Jessalynn James, a post-doctoral fellow at Brown University, and Jim Wyckoff, professor at the University of Virginia, find that the incentives created by IMPACT continue to encourage some low-performing teachers to voluntarily exit and to instigate improvement among those who remain. In a second paper, James and Wyckoff find that what might first appear to be relatively high turnover among DCPS teachers is largely driven by the turnover of low-performing teachers, whose exit improves student achievement.

"Nearly three decades into the charter school movement, what has research told us about charter schools?" is a working paper from four researchers published on a website hosted by Brown University's Annenberg Institute. Reviewing a host of recent research published in peer-reviewed journals, the paper says that on issues such as racial segregation, serving students with disabilities, and traditional public school finances, charter supporters and critics both have evidence and questions they should consider that don't match their chosen narratives.

164 Angell St., Providence Building owner and tenant: Brown University Architect: Architecture Research Office LET THERE BE LIGHT: The Angell Street building had parts of its façade replaced with full-length windows, allowing natural light to enter some of the offices on the building’s upper floors. Developer/General contractor: Shawmut Design and Construction…

As part of the Home Learning Environment Round, the EEF has partnered with the Department for Education and Leeds-based education charity SHINE to test projects that support parents to help improve their children’s cognitive skills at home before they start school. Tips by Text will be funded through this round, as it is based on promising evidence from the READY4K! programme in the US.

It was great evening on #TeacherDiversityRI. Thank you all attendees and special thanks to the great panel, @equityinst, @LPIRWU, and @DomingoMorel. pic.twitter.com/XaER42jOfI

— Annenberg Institute at Brown (@AnnenbergInst) November 14, 2019

Standards-based reforms in science and mathematics often require significant teacher learning, particularly of subject matter content and new instructional practices. Thus, since the first calls for standards-based reforms, circa 1990, reformers have explored several avenues for supporting teachers’ growth.  New curriculum materials, such as those produced to align to the Framework for Science Education and the Next Generation Science Standards, aim to provide concrete support for disciplinary practices, core ideas, and cross-cutting content.

Now that the NAEP scores are out, we can turn our attention from the prediction to interpretation, a place of much surer footing for me. While headlines are emphasizing the lack of progress in average scores – ‘No Progress’ Seen in Reading or Math on Nation’s Report Card,” EdWeek or, “A ‘Disturbing’ Assessment: Sagging Reading Scores, Particularly for Eighth Graders, Headline 2019’s Disappointing NAEP Results,” The74 – the story to me is the continued fall in achievement of our lowest-performing students.

High school seniors who receive texted reminders—or "nudges"—from their school counselors are 17 percent more likely to complete the college financial aid application process and 8 percent more likely to enroll in college directly after graduating than their peers who are not nudged, according to a new study published today in Educational Evaluation and Policy Analysis, a peer-reviewed journal of the American Educational Research Association.

While the idea of making any prediction gives me the shivers (who likes to be wrong?), making predictions about NAEP results seems like a relatively safe endeavor. The best prediction about the NEAP results would perennially be, “yeah, so it’s going to look a lot like last year,” because, inevitably it does. Sure, some states or subgroups rise a bit and some fall, but overall, the country is not making the types of rapid increases in student learning that anyone would find satisfying.

That said, if I take off my glasses and squint hard at these tea leaves, I’m willing to make two small predictions.