Kamenetz, Anya

An NPR education reporter shows how the last true social safety net; the public school system; was decimated by the pandemic, and how years of short-sighted political decisions have failed to put our children first. School has long meant much more than an education in America. 30 million children depend on free school meals. Schools are, statistically, the safest physical places for children to be. They are the best chance many children have at finding basics like eye exams, safe housing, mental health counseling, or simply a caring adult. Flawed, inequitable, underfunded, and segregated, they remain the most important engine of social mobility and the crucible of our democracy.

A teacher's guide to teaching students in the standardized testing system.

"In many public schools, students are spending up to 28 percent of instructional time on testing and test prep. Starting this year, the introduction of the Common Core State Standards Initiative in 45 states will bring an unprecedented level of new, more difficult, and longer mandatory tests to nearly every classroom in the nation up to five times a year--forcing our national testing obsession to a crisis point. Taxpayers are spending extravagant money on these tests--up to $1.4 billion per year--and excessive tests are stunting children's spirits, adding stress to family life, and slowly killing our country's future competitiveness. Yet even so, we still want our kids to score off the charts on every test they take, in elementary school and beyond. And there will be a lot of them. This book is an exploration of that dilemma, and a strategy for how to solve it"--.

Examines the crisis of increasing college tuition that impacts first-generation, low-income, and minority students who primarily dominate the coming generation. Proposes radically changing traditional higher education and replacing it with personal learning networks and paths that blend experiential and digital methods of learning and free and open models. Provides a reference guide, websites, chapter notes, and an index.

Presents an examination of the economic problems facing young people aged 18-35, providing the author's view that young Americans are hampered by low wages, high taxes, student loans, and other factors.