Dr. Jesse Welsh

#CCSDTBT

Most of the families applying for Alabama's new school vouchers have kids in non-public schools More than half of families who applied for Alabama’s new school voucher program have children attending a private school or are home schooling.

Alabama handing out $100M in tax dollars to parents already in private/homeschool. Of those that applied, only 28% are currently in a public school.

@josemonkey.com OK, josemonkey, can you find me? No parking lots in this video!

Exercise of any kind boosts brainpower at any age UniSA research shows that any form of exercise can significantly boost brain function and memory across children, adults, and older adults.

Want to maximize your brainpower- exercise is the key, at any age, with demonstrable gains within 1-3 months:

Maths Says You Should Use The "37 Percent Rule" For Big Life Decisions m/(n-1) times, it works every time.

Interestingness- Mathematical modeling shows that, in order to obtain the best outcome, you generally have to wait until you have reviewed 37% of the possibilities, at which point you optimize you change of picking the best option.

Happy Pi Day! Use this as your excuse to eat a slice (of pie or pizza) today.

Individualized tutoring can combat chronic absenteeism A high impact tutoring initiative in Washington, D.C., showed promise for middle schoolers and those with extreme absenteeism, a new report finds.

Multiple studies now have shown that tutoring is a highly effective strategy to combat chronic absenteeism, particularly in middle school grades.

New NAEP Scores Dash Hope of Post-COVID Learning Recovery Results from the Nation’s Report Card offer few positive signs, with reading performance slumping even since the heart of the pandemic.

NAEP scores (e.g. the US report card in reading and math) show disappointing overall declines in reading in 4th and 8th grade with a slight, 2-point bounceback in 4th grade math.

M-25-13 Temporary Pause to Review Agency Grant Loan and Other Financial Assistance Programs Sections organize your document with a table of contents

Let me be clear. "Pausing" funding for the National School Lunch Program is literally taking food out of hungry children's mouths in schools. This needs to be restored immediately. https://buff.ly/4aEKfYs https://buff.ly/3WDps1t

Private Schools in Nevada — Private School Demographics — ProPublica Private school demographics in Nevada compared to public school demographics

Fantastic reporting by ProPublica on private school enrollment compared to public schools, including a national, state-by-state, dataset. In NV, for example, 29% of public school students are white compared to over 62% for private school students.

Study: Math Scores Matter More for Adult Earnings Than Reading, Health Factors An Urban Institute study underscores the need for better math instruction starting in the early grades.

Mathematics scores are demonstrated to have a greater impact on future earnings, with improvements showing a greater impact even into middle school.

Thousands of Teachers Will Get a Retirement Boost. Here's How It Works School workers in states where districts don't participate in Social Security are poised to see bigger monthly checks.

ICYMI- The passage of the Social Security Fairness Act is BIG NEWS for NV educators. If you paid into Social Security in the past (or do in the future), now your NVPERS pension will not impact your ability to receive SS benefits. This is a big win for 2nd career teachers.

One state tried algebra for all eighth graders. It hasn’t gone well Some places are moving to universal early algebra. Minnesota has required it for years — with less-than-promising results

This is a great example of making poor inferences from data. Just because students that take Algebra I in 8th grade are more successful doesn't mean all students should do so. CCSD tried the same thing in the early 00's with similar, disappointing results.

Mathematically speaking, 2025 is a magical year. It is a perfect square (the last until 2116). 20 + 25 squared equals 2025. If you add the cubes of 1 through 9, it equals 2025. If you add 1 through 9 and square it, you get 2025.

Public Schools by the Numbers: How Enrollment, Funding, and More Changed in 2024 K-12 enrollment is dropping, funding is lagging economic growth, and other takeaways from newly available data.

For those who like the #s and data on education. Of note, 15.1% of NV students live in poverty. With shrinking birth rates, an 11% decrease in HS grads is predicted by 2041 nationwide.

Don’t Want to Close Underenrolled Schools? Here’s How to Make the Math Work Roza: Small schools can be financially viable and get great outcomes for students. But they have to be staffed very differently than large ones

Insightful piece by Marguerite Rosa on how districts can support small and under-enrolled schools by thinking differently about resource allocation to meet students' needs.

Despite funding at #47 in the US, Nevada ranks right around average in teacher starting salary, average teacher salary, and above average in ESP earnings, prioritizing our educators who are the key to positive student outcomes.
https://buff.ly/3OX2kXu

7 Ways Leaders Can Achieve More By Doing Less In 2025 We should embrace minimalism—cutting out noise and unnecessary initiatives—to create sharper focus and greater impact in 2025.

This is a great reminder that, as leaders, sometimes we can add to the organization and increase focus by subtracting and/or simplifying.

The president elect's plan to remove existing protections precluding ICE from enforcement at schools will be detrimental for on attendance and learning for all students. Schools must remain exempt except in severe cases in the interest of public safety. https://buff.ly/3Bquqam

Math scores plummet, progress ‘erased,’ NCES reports Average U.S. math scores on the latest Trends in International Mathematics and Science Study reverted to 1995 levels.

TIMMS international testing shows US math scores dropping significantly, even before the COVID-19 pandemic, putting the US 22 out of 63 in 4th grade and 20 out of 45 in 8th grade.

Nation’s Report Card to debut new poverty measurement The metric for students’ socioeconomic status will include factors such as the number of books in homes and parents’ education levels.

NAEP to include an alternative measure to poverty other than free and reduced lunch, creating a composite score that includes data points such as the number of books in the home:

Schools Want Results When They Spend Big Money. Here's How They're Getting Them Tying spending to outcomes is a goal many district leaders have. A new model for purchase contracts could make it easier.

Outcomes-Based contracts starting to gain traction, where Districts only pay the full contract amount if the product or service helps them achieve certain concrete outcomes, as spelled out in the contract. Great solution to ensure ROI for students.

"Integrity is the only path where you will never get lost."
- Mike Maples

Time for School Assessing the inequality of access to instructional time across the United States

Rich article here on the importance of instruction time in school. Of note, 4-day weeks generally result in 85 fewer instructional Instructional hours annually and are associated with decreases in math and reading scores.

Why the Pioneers of High School Exit Exams Are Rolling Them Back Massachusetts is doing away with a decades-old graduation requirement. What will take its place?

In alignment with national trends, NY and MA move away from high school exit exams, with many other states such as WI, OK, and AK adjusting pass rates to boost proficiency.