Matt Barnum

Meet the billionaire pushing taxpayer-funded school vouchers How one of the richest people on the planet presses his pet issue: school choice

NEW: Our look at one of the most important players in the school choice debate: Jeff Yass, the billionaire funding campaigns across the country and in his home state of PA. Got a chance to talk with him at length and he had lots of provocative things to say 1/x
www.washingtonpost.com/politics/202...

LA Parents say school-issued iPads are causing chaos with their kids A growing contingent of public school parents say school-mandated iPads, particularly in elementary and middle schools, are leading to behavior problems.

Great piece by @tktk.bsky.social on the growing backlash to school-issued screens in L.A.

www.nbcnews.com/tech/tech-ne...

Great, nuanced @mattbarnum.bsky.social piece

My take: Studies demonstrating larger impacts on low-stakes tests & LT outcomes use a no accountability counterfactual that no longer exists. That was the right research q then. But the current policy q is what happens when we mix stronger acc back in.

The rise of accommodations is a legit issue to explore, but this graf conflates two different things. *504 plans* are generally for accommodations. IEPs are for needed educational services and *do not* disproportionately go to advantaged students.

www.theatlantic.com/magazine/202...

we agree. I just think this is a very different than the selection bias one.

Mississippi rising? A partial explanation for its NAEP improvement is that it holds students back Author’s Update, August 5, 2022: Analysis of NAEP demographic data shows that retaining students was in fact not a major contributor to Mississippi’s improved fourth grade NAEP results in the last few...

Yes, that's the treatment, not selection bias! Also not clear if this even matters much anyway fordhaminstitute.org/national/com...

Lots of words here but very little new: the retention as selection bias explanation does not make sense for explaining Mississippi's long-run gains because retained students must eventually move forward.

statmodeling.stat.columbia.edu/2025/12/01/h...

Did scaling back school accountability and testing pressure hurt students? Critics say ending No Child Left Behind and moving to the Every Student Succeeds Act can help explain declining test scores. Here’s what the research shows.

There's a new nostalgia for No Child Left Behind gripping parts of the education world .

I took a deep dive into the research to see whether it's really true that NCLB-style school accountability drove learning gains. Answer: yes—with several asterisks

cbnewsletters.chalkbeat.org/p/would-more...

State rankings critiqued, more on the Southern surge, and education research for dummies A Chalkbeat Ideas round up

New: I look at the surprisingly difficult question of how to rank different states' schools (inspired by @jerseyjazzman.bsky.social).

I also take a look at a new project summarizing education research on various topics.

And more in this Ideas roundup

cbnewsletters.chalkbeat.org/p/chalkbeat-...

Trump wants to ‘return education to the states.’ Is that what he’s doing? Education Secretary Linda McMahon says the Trump administration is “returning education to the states.” But closing the Education Department is not the same thing.

Nice piece by @laurameckler.bsky.social wondering how moving Education Department functions to different federal agencies would "return education to the states." www.washingtonpost.com/education/20...

Excited to share that I'm writing a book: a history of the debates over funding public schools from the 1960's to now.
(Yes the working title is tongue in cheek.)

Now I just need to finish writing—stay tuned!

And if you want to follow my work, you can do so here: www.chalkbeat.org/newsletters/...

Which party really has an edge on education? Voters still tend to trust Democrats more than Republicans, according to most polls.

"In surveys conducted this year by eight different organizations, all but one showed Democrats with an edge on education. Voters again now tend to trust Democrats on the issue of education," writes @mattbarnum.bsky.social. www.chalkbeat.org/2025/11/18/w...

Trump is dismantling the Education Department. Here’s what it means. The impact on schools will probably be small, but it represents something big.

New–

I look at why outsourcing the Education Department is and is not a big deal.

It sets up major legal and political fights. But it won't matter for the typical school. Federal influence comes from funding, not the name of the administrative agency.

cbnewsletters.chalkbeat.org/p/why-trump-...

Which party really has an edge on education? Voters still tend to trust Democrats more than Republicans, according to most polls.

This is, as always, an excellent and comprehensive take from @mattbarnum.bsky.social www.chalkbeat.org/2025/11/18/w...

I thought this might be a Trump phenomenon but actually polling from '24 also seems to show Dems with an advantage on education (after losing it briefly in '22).

Voters still tend to trust Democrats more on education Yet the party faces challenges on the issue, including greater learning loss in blue states.

New—

There's been a lot of discussion about Democrats losing their historic advantage with voters on education.

In fact, this oft-repeated narrative no longer seems to be true. Nearly every poll from this year shows Dems with a clear edge on education.

cbnewsletters.chalkbeat.org/p/voters-sti...

We’re still fighting about pandemic-era school closures — but do they still matter? We’ve got answers to that and other questions from a new tranche of state testing data.

variation in closure times does predict some of the differences in learning loss, though it doesn't explain most of the learning gaps (especially now) cbnewsletters.chalkbeat.org/p/we-re-stil...

we need some alliteration to compare to the Southern surge. "The M-state misery"?

1) thank you 2) I did write the headline so I can't escape accountability for it 3) we = people on the internet!

New: Pandemic-era school closures still occupy a significant part of the American political discourse, but do they still matter for student test scores?

Answer: yes, but only a bit.

cbnewsletters.chalkbeat.org/p/we-re-stil...

Michigan has also lost ground! I had resist adding them in as well

Meanwhile, preliminary new data suggests another uptick in college enrollment this year. nscresearchcenter.org/enrollment-i...

It’s Too Early to Write Off College Degrees Companies are favoring multitool graduates with broad skill sets.

Already getting some Discourse wins here. (I take full credit.) www.wsj.com/lifestyle/ca...

Christian law firm sought Colorado test case for religious public schools, emails suggest Alliance Defending Freedom approached a Colorado lawyer about starting a school in Colorado to spark a legal test of publicly funded religious education, according to an email authored by the lawyer.

This is big news: Alliance Defending Freedom, a conservative legal group, has helped to seed a test case in Colorado over whether public schools can provide Christian education

www.chalkbeat.org/colorado/202...

Is college enrollment plummeting? Reports of the death of the bachelor’s degree have been greatly exaggerated.

There’s a big gap between the narrative about higher ed and the data, explains @mattbarnum.bsky.social for @chalkbeat.org. Tuition is actually more affordable, and both the value of a bachelor’s degree and four-year college enrollment remain “near historic highs.” www.chalkbeat.org/2025/11/11/i...

I get into that briefly in the very last section. yes, the "enrollment slope" (not really a cliff) will be a challenge for less-selective colleges

just grants and scholarships, not loans

thanks—it's good to be back!

Is college enrollment really plummeting? Reports of the death of the bachelor’s degree have been greatly exaggerated.

Reports of the death of the bachelor’s degree have been greatly exaggerated. Enrollment is near pre-pandemic levels, real tuition is flat or down, and the college wage premium remains high.

I explore how the narrative became disconnected from the data.

cbnewsletters.chalkbeat.org/p/is-college...

ICE arrests could hurt student test scores, study says — and not just for immigrants A study of a large Florida school district found that the effects of immigration enforcement on students’ academic performance was concentrated in high-poverty schools. The test score declines also occurred for U.S. citizen students.

A study of a large Florida school district found that the effects of immigration enforcement on students’ academic performance was concentrated in high-poverty schools. The test score declines also occurred for U.S. citizen students.