Despite its promise, traditional PBL often collapses into superficial showcases: glorified slide decks and videos passed off as deep learning. Kids have been making presentations since kindergarten; by high school, it’s more ritual than rigor. It鈥檚 an astonishingly inefficient use of time, talent, and opportunity.

I know this because I鈥檝e lived it. I helped design and launch several of Los Angeles鈥� most successful project-based charter schools, including Larchmont Charter and Valley Charter,  between 2004 and 2014. I鈥檝e taught mathematics, earned a master鈥檚 in curriculum construction from Stanford University and worked alongside brilliant educators committed to making learning meaningful. And I believe it鈥檚 time to evolve PBL 鈥� not discard it, but bring it fully into the world our students actually live in.

That world is complex, unpredictable and increasingly polarized. It requires collaboration, communication, creativity and adaptability. So our learning models must meet that challenge. We can do this by fusing the best of PBL with the best of community service 鈥攁nd then modernizing both.

Too often, 鈥渃ommunity service鈥� in schools becomes a checkbox. Students log hours doing well-intentioned but disconnected tasks. They pack food boxes or clean park trails. These efforts are not without value, but they鈥檙e rarely linked to any larger purpose, and they rarely push students to think, lead, or grow.

What if, instead of logging hours, students designed and implemented 鈥渃ommunity impact projects?鈥�

Imagine a model where students start by exploring who they are: what drives them, what skills they bring, what kind of work energizes them. Some are motivated by a specific cause. Others want to develop a skill or explore a career path. Some are simply determined to make a visible difference. These internal motivations matter. They shape what a student is willing to commit to over time.

From there, students look outward. They conduct interviews, collect data, read local news and observe their neighborhoods. What are the real needs? Where are the gaps? Who鈥檚 being left behind?

This isn鈥檛 abstract. It鈥檚 concrete inquiry, grounded in the real world. Students may notice that elderly neighbors feel isolated. Or that a local creek is filling with trash. Or that a group of small businesses lack digital tools to compete. The key is that students are asking questions and listening before deciding what to do.

Once they鈥檝e identified a need, they study the landscape. Who is already working in this space? Which nonprofits, businesses, agencies or coalitions are active? What partnerships could help 鈥� or complicate 鈥� what they want to accomplish?

This step is critical. It builds awareness and respect. Students begin to understand that community work doesn鈥檛 happen in a vacuum. There are always stakeholders, histories and existing efforts to consider.

Then comes the real design work. Students craft a solution: something tangible, time-bound and achievable. They seek feedback, revise and prepare to launch. The process is collaborative and iterative, grounded in real-world constraints. It鈥檚 not a simulation. It鈥檚 not a game. It matters.

Planning follows. Students map out a schedule, align tasks to calendar dates, set milestones and build in moments for reflection. They鈥檙e expected to track progress and share it 鈥� publicly 鈥� with their peers, their partners and their communities.

And finally, they implement. They call adults. They troubleshoot. They adapt. They reflect. They finish.

This is project-based learning, but deeper. It鈥檚 community service, but smarter. It鈥檚 a model that merges the two and layers in best practices from entrepreneurship, civic action and systems thinking.

Students leave with real skills. They know how to write a persuasive email. How to manage a timeline. How to deal with silence, rejection, ambiguity and failure. They gain confidence 鈥� not the kind that comes from praise, but the kind that comes from doing something real.

Schools benefit too. This model doesn鈥檛 require new tech or expensive consultants. It requires a shift in mindset. 

I鈥檝e implemented this with student cohorts 鈥� it鈥檚 not theoretical. Designed to require fewer than 20 classroom hours, most of the heavy lifting happens outside class, driven by the students themselves. An English teacher can guide email writing and pitches, a history or social science teacher can support research, and science teachers can consult as needed. But really, any educator can take part through occasional advisory check-ins. Grouping students with similar project structures allows them to act as peer support teams 鈥� just like start-up founders or social entrepreneurs do when backed by shared venture networks.

With smart scaffolding, schools can support this work without overburdening staff.

Communities gain, too. They get young people who show up, listen and contribute鈥攏ot for a few required hours but with purpose and persistence.

And something else happens. 

In a time of institutional distrust, social division and adult disillusionment, these projects create connection. When a 16-year-old calls a local business, works with a senior center or builds something useful for a community group, they aren鈥檛 just 鈥渓earning鈥� 鈥� they鈥檙e building trust.

This is what schools should be doing: helping students feel capable, connected and purposeful. Helping them become the kind of citizens we all hope to live among.

Let鈥檚 not waste this moment.

Because when students learn they can make a difference, they don鈥檛 just thrive in school. They start to believe in themselves 鈥� and in each other.

鈥淧lease use this sidewalk chalk to draw a picture of how you are feeling after the storm.鈥� These were the instructions given to a small group of children who had gathered while their parents stood in line at a food distribution site in Swannanoa, North Carolina, one of the hardest-hit towns from Hurricane Helene. The person giving these instructions was creating a safe and welcoming activity for young children who might have otherwise been bored and restless as their families waited in line for a hot meal.

What if we told you that the person leading this activity wasn鈥檛 a child care professional or therapist, but a local student who had come with her mother to Swannanoa that day to help distribute food with ? Finding more than enough volunteers already handing out meals, this resourceful teenager took the initiative to retrieve materials from her car, brightening the day for young children 鈥� and their parents 鈥� in the process.

Get stories like this delivered straight to your inbox. Sign up for 麻豆精品 Newsletter

This is only one of many stories from Western North Carolina after Hurricane Helene, highlighting students who identified a need and took action to support their communities and families. And while simply finding and sharing these stories is inspiring in itself, what if we could do even more? What if these examples of student leadership and community impact could spark broader, long-term positive change in Western North Carolina as these communities and schools work to rebuild and become more resilient?

Hurricane Helene brought immense challenges, but it also offered students opportunities to apply their knowledge and skills in meaningful ways, demonstrating real-world leadership and learning, as seen in the story above. By stepping up to help with causes they cared about, students developed critical skills in adaptability, problem-solving, empathy, and likely others we鈥檒l continue to uncover in the coming months. Much like during the COVID-19 pandemic, however, there is a risk that these experiences may go unrecognized amidst urgent recovery needs and the pressure to make up for missed school days.

Acknowledging both the profound disruption to instructional time and the valuable life lessons gained, how might we ensure that this real-world learning 鈥� supporting families, contributing to community recovery 鈥� is honored and even recognized as a vital form of education? Rather than viewing these times solely as ‘lost,’ what if we recognized them as essential pieces of a more holistic picture of student growth 鈥� one that values both academic progress and meaningful community contributions? By exploring answers to these questions, we allow these stories of impact to become more than moments of inspiration; they can be catalysts for reimagining what authentic experiential learning and innovative credentialing might look like for all students.

We believe this shift isn鈥檛 just possible; it鈥檚 imperative. That鈥檚 why , , , and a coalition of other North Carolina-based nonprofits are collaborating with teachers and school leaders across Western North Carolina to co-design an initiative that not only highlights stories of student learning and community impact like this one, but leverages these experiences to foster a culture of authentic learning and innovation in schools throughout the region.

Consider this: a global environmental response team, known for their work in disaster areas and underserved communities without filtered water, recently visited Canton Middle School (CMS). They demonstrated to three local principals, including Casey Kruk from CMS, how to use portable water testing kits for real-time citizen science and water quality analysis. This knowledge, which directly addressed the aftermath of Helene鈥檚 flooding, provided valuable insights into local water safety and environmental health.

Following this tutorial, Dr. Kruk met with the school鈥檚 science teachers to discuss how this hands-on learning could be integrated into their classrooms, making the study of water quality standards suddenly relevant to students impacted by the flood. Inspired by the environmental team鈥檚 guidance, teachers began developing lesson plans that would allow students to engage in real-world learning, using samples from the same river affected by the flood and doing so in a way that is directly aligned to North Carolina鈥檚 science standards.

But the impact doesn鈥檛 stop there.

With support from external experts, CMS educators gained firsthand knowledge and resources to develop more engaging, relevant lessons that offer a deeper learning experience for their students. These prototype lessons are now available for adoption and adaptation by other schools and districts affected by Helene鈥檚 flooding across the region. This kind of collaboration is a powerful example of what this initiative is all about.

Through this initiative, we aim to create a collaborative space for educators, students, community members, and other stakeholders to co-design similar learner-centered, experiential projects focused on recovery and resilience. These open-source resources would be freely available for adaptation across the region and beyond.

The first phase of this work will begin on November 22 with a one-day design sprint at (WRESA) offices in Asheville. This empathy-driven process (which is for WNC educators) will allow participants to explore and draw inspiration from stories like those shared here, using them as 鈥渋mages of possibility鈥� to then create an initial set of prototype lessons, projects, and activities that are all grounded in Helene recovery and rebuilding efforts. These resources will then be immediately accessible to classroom teachers and school leaders throughout Western North Carolina.

Building on the prototypes developed in November, a second, more comprehensive design sprint will follow in January (date and location TBD). This two-day event will serve as the initiative鈥檚 official launchpad, bringing together additional educators and stakeholders to design a wider variety of learner-centered projects, lessons, and strategies that recognize and credential students鈥� real-world contributions. These resources will align with , high-tech pathways, and core academic standards across all curricular areas and grade levels.

The final phase of this initiative will broaden collaboration among regional educators, students, business and community stakeholders, and nonprofits. The prototypes developed earlier will act as catalysts for expanding experiential learning strategies, such as place-based, project-based, and phenomenon-based learning, across schools in the region. With a focus on topics like power generation, water access, communication networks, mental health, and disaster logistics, we aim to empower students to actively apply their learning to local rebuilding and resiliency efforts. Moreover, by leveraging emerging fields like cybersecurity, data analytics, and technology-driven problem-solving, students can explore high-tech solutions to real-world problems, further enriching their contributions to community resilience, while also developing skills needed in today鈥檚 innovation economy.

This phase will also further develop credentialing prototypes, such as digital portfolios, micro-credentials, and mastery-based assessments, aligned with . Our goal is to pave the way for wider adoption of CBE strategies across the region鈥檚 schools. Throughout all phases, inclusivity remains paramount; we will ensure a diversity of community voices and stories are represented, particularly from underrepresented groups.

The saying ‘Never let a crisis go to waste,’ often misattributed to Winston Churchill, captures the spirit of this initiative: to enable schools across the region to transform recovery efforts into a foundation for student-led problem-solving, using the challenges of Helene as a catalyst for meaningful change. The initiative will ensure relevant resources are accessible that teachers and school leaders can adapt and share in their classrooms, extending the reach of deep, real-world learning experiences as students contribute to the long-term recovery and rebuilding efforts they 鈥� and ideally their communities 鈥� will lead for years to come.

We invite educators, community leaders, and potential funders to join us in refining this initiative to make a true difference in this cherished part of North Carolina. Your support will help create lasting, meaningful change for students and communities across Western North Carolina. to get involved. In the meantime, find some sidewalk chalk and draw a picture to show a student how you are feeling today. They will understand.

This first appeared on and is republished here under a Creative Commons license.

From to 麻豆精品, it鈥檚 now an annual tradition to share a journalism 鈥淛ealousy List鈥� 鈥� a tribute to the most memorable and impactful coverage published by other outlets. 

In short, it鈥檚 a list of stories we wish we鈥檇 covered.

At Early Learning Nation, we want to celebrate and honor the powerful stories that have shaped important conversations around our nation’s youngest children and the families, caregivers and early educators who support them.

Some of these pieces focus on the early care and education workforce, covering key issues like low wages, the challenges of subsidies, and barriers to accessing funding and benefits. Others address topics central to families, like the affordability and quality of care, the high stakes of screen time and why it鈥檚 so tough to find child care options.

Below, in no particular order, are nine stories about early care and education that we can鈥檛 stop thinking about from 2024. Kudos to the journalists who wrote them, the sources who boldly shared their experiences and ideas, and the researchers who released studies and data that informed them. 

By sharing these stories, we aim to surface (or resurface) some of the most creative storytelling, impactful practices and important research in the field. We hope you鈥檒l read 鈥� and share 鈥� them.

Sarah Carr, The Hechinger Report

Family, friend and neighbor (FFN) care is the most prevalent form of non-parental child care in the U.S. but this critical group of child care providers often goes unnoticed and many are underpaid. 

There are efforts across the country to provide more , but obstacles arise. In many states, for example, FFN caregivers often face barriers to accessing funds they qualify for, such as subsidies for children from low-income families.

From language barriers, to government mistrust to enrollment difficulties and more, Sarah Carr looks at the challenges facing this vast group of providers and why so many of them struggle to obtain the funding they are eligible to receive. And even when they can access the funds, Carr raises important issues like low reimbursement rates and processing delays that extend and complicate the series of hurdles for these caregivers.

Six women get candid on dwindling enrollment, priced-out parents, and crying kids. 

Anya Kamenetz, The Cut

When it comes to early care and education, many of the stories that resonate most are about the significant cost of providing high-quality, developmentally appropriate, reliable child care 鈥� and the tough reality that while the price is often high for families, child care programs typically operate on thin margins with providers working for very low wages. That rings true in New York City, where the that half of the city鈥檚 households can鈥檛 afford basic needs, funding for pre-K and 3-K programs is unpredictable, and child care subsidies often fall short. Six child care workers in various settings across the boroughs shared their day-to-day experiences with Anya Kamenetz, who writes about education and parenting. Their experiences, as told to Kamenetz, shine a light on the complexities of the profession as well as their passion for the young children they serve.

Moriah Balingit and Sharon Lurye, The Associated Press and Daniel Beekman, The Seattle Times

For many parents, especially mothers, the decision about whether to work has a number of factors, but often comes down to a simple question: Is the cost of child care greater than my take-home pay? 

Nicole Slemp found herself asking this question. She expected to return to her job, which she loved, after having her son. But once she crunched the numbers, she learned that most of her salary would go to child care and found that she and her husband made too much to qualify for support from the government. She felt she had no choice but to quit. 

In the U.S., where the cost of care can be prohibitive, government assistance is sparse and child care slots are limited, this story isn鈥檛 uncommon, . But while women鈥檚 participation in the workforce has increased overall, there鈥檚 a noticeable employment gap between mothers with and without a four-year degree. Moriah Balingit, Sharon Lurye and Daniel Beekman unpack that employment gap, the data behind it and the lived experiences of some of the women finding themselves faced with difficult decisions. 

Teachers this year saw the effects of the pandemic鈥檚 stress and isolation on young students: Some can barely speak, sit still or even hold a pencil.

Claire Cain Miller and Sarah Mervosh, New York Times, The Upshot

There鈥檚 been a good deal of reporting on the effects of the pandemic on older children. Less covered is the impact on the nation鈥檚 youngest children 鈥� those who were babies, toddlers and preschoolers during the height of the pandemic and are now school-aged.

Claire Cain Miller and Sarah Mervosh share findings from interviews with teachers, pediatricians and early childhood experts. The bottom line: Many of these younger children are showing signs of academic and developmental delays. There are also concerns related to a variety of areas like speech and language development, emotional regulation, social interactions, behavior, attention span, core strength and fine motor skills. Researchers suggested that a number of factors affected young children during the pandemic, including parental stress, less exposure to people, more time on screens and lower preschool attendance.

Despite these trends, some experts said recovery is possible, pointing to tools and resources that can help as well as evidence that the early years of brain development in young children positions them well to 鈥渃atch up.鈥�

Emily Tate Sullivan, EdSurge

At a time when people can make dinner reservations on an app and buy a car online, it may come as a surprise that finding child care options isn鈥檛 that easy, but that鈥檚 the reality for many families.

In most states, there鈥檚 a website with information about providers, such as operating hours and quality ratings, but enrollment data is often outdated or not listed at all. Without reliable information on vacancies, a parent might spend time calling programs that are at capacity. 

Some states 鈥� including Iowa, Maryland and Arizona 鈥� have teamed up with technology firms to develop solutions that help families find child care, reports Emily Tate Sullivan. 

By using 鈥渘ear real-time鈥� vacancy data, these efforts are saving families time and helping state leaders understand their child care systems, giving them a better sense of capacity by surfacing open slots as well as shortages. This approach, which provides more accurate data, can help state leaders, lawmakers and communities plan more intentionally, make informed decisions and direct attention where it鈥檚 needed.

Chabeli Carrazana, The 19th

鈥淔or years, American women soccer players have been at the forefront of advocating for pay equity in a sport they dominate at a global level. But child care has long been an issue they鈥檝e also contended with鈥� writes Chabeli Carrazana, adding that 鈥淪ome have argued that their pay and benefits simply were not enough to cover child care costs.鈥�

Carrazana digs into a dispute between the Angel City Football Club 鈥� an American professional women鈥檚 soccer team 鈥� and the National Women鈥檚 Soccer League (NWSL). 

After conducting an investigation into a salary cap violation by Angel City FC, and determining that the team had surpassed the cap through a number of agreements that were made with players directly and not disclosed to the NWSL, the league that it was docking three points from the team鈥檚 standings and fining the team.

While child care payments were only part of the reason the team exceeded the cap, the situation brought child care benefits for parent athletes into the spotlight, and in particular, raised a question about whether any child care payments should count against the salary cap.

Jenny Gold, Los Angeles Times

are making headlines, and the U.S. surgeon general has warning families that usage of the apps could be detrimental to the mental health of adolescents. Pediatricians have raised concerns around health and development, like behavioral challenges, issues with sleep, language delays and more.

For families with young children, a major question is: How much screen time is OK? There are for children under 5 years old, but the guidance can feel overwhelming. From time limits to quality assessment to the importance of 鈥渃o-viewing鈥� digital media with young children, there鈥檚 a lot for parents to consider, and the reality is that many families aren鈥檛 meeting these guidelines. 

Jenny Gold dives into the high stakes of screen time, whether limiting it is realistic given the world parents are raising children in today, and what families can do to make the most of their children鈥檚 screen time.

Carly Flandro, Idaho Education News and Valeria Olivares, The Dallas Morning News Education Lab

Stress. Anxiety. Financial pressure. The is weighing on parents, especially the ones who work. Teachers aren鈥檛 immune. Many parenting teachers are faced with difficult decisions about their work lives, and child care is a major factor. 

A number of schools in some states, particularly those with limited funding for early care and education, are offering high-quality, affordable child care for their teachers. This solution addresses educator retention, while aiming to help early learners become better prepared to enter kindergarten. Programs vary, but some offer care from infancy so teachers don鈥檛 have to between parenting and their career. 

Carly Flandro and Valeria Olivares dive into two of these initiatives. One is an elementary school in Nampa, Idaho that offers on-site child care, which a dozen of the school鈥檚 30 teachers take advantage of. The other is a Texas district that鈥檚 offering subsidized child care and that has two 鈥渃hild learning academies鈥� for infants and toddlers from 6-weeks-old through age 3, that serve 120 children. 

Flandro and Olivares reported that these services made a difference for teachers, whether easing the cost, helping them feel reassured their children were receiving high-quality care, or even keeping them in the classroom. 

New study reveals the extent of harms of an 鈥榦utdated, uneven鈥� Head Start funding system.

Jackie Mader, The Hechinger Report

鈥淲hen Head Start was established in 1965, it was meant to boost outcomes for children from low-income families by offering high-quality early learning and wraparound services,鈥� writes Jackie Mader. Today, she adds, the program has seen increased funding, but the way that federal funding is distributed is based in part on a formula from 1974. 

So what does that mean for children and families? Mader takes a look at the funding model and analyzes findings from a report by the Southern Education Foundation, which suggests that the formula should be updated to reflect changes in the definition of poverty, and to account for the number of eligible children and where they live.

Researchers say the best fix is to give Head Start a one-time increase to be spread across a few years, which could be used to even out the funding and then to adjust the formula. With a new federal rule to provide a raise to most Head Start teachers, Mader writes, researchers expressed a sense of urgency to adjust the formula. Paying staff more is key. So, too, is increasing access to serve more children.

put forth a list of close to 500 strained schools as a 鈥渨ake up call鈥� for districts to plan interventions such as family engagement, high dosage tutoring and address specific community concerns before they 鈥渇ind themselves pushed against a wall鈥� and forced to close schools, said author Sofoklis Goulas, a fellow with the Brookings Institution who built on his prior enrollment research in this latest study with Fordham. 

The study cautioned districts against using the list as a strict guide or framing it as a 鈥渂ad schools list,鈥� rather, as a starting point for interventions and discussions.

School closures are often and can lead to distrust in the system, particularly when plans target campuses, most often elementary schools, with predominantly Black and brown children.

The study is the first to correlate school performance with enrollment declines, revealing the drops are far from random: Among schools identified as chronically underperforming by their states, those in high-poverty, urban areas, and charter schools lost the highest proportions of students, those 鈥済rappling with systemic challenges and resource constraints,鈥� the report stated. 

Goulas鈥檚 latest findings suggest family dissatisfaction with schools is outpacing other known drivers such as . 

鈥淔amilies are essentially rejecting schools that are not serving them well,鈥� Goulas told 麻豆精品, adding solutions won鈥檛 look the same across all districts 鈥� some will be forced to close schools while others may not. He urged leaders to address, 鈥渢he core problem, which is the disengagement, the sentiment of dissatisfaction from traditional public schools.鈥�

California and New York, hosting the nation鈥檚 largest school systems by population, both have about 40 schools on the list of 500. Overall, roughly 5,100 of the nation鈥檚 98,000 schools, or one in 12, lost substantial numbers of students. 

Five are underperforming Los Angeles Unified schools which have lost between 22 and 55% of their enrollment as of 2022-23. Pio Pico Middle School, for instance, lost 261 students since 2019, more than the 212 who remain enrolled.聽

Alongside Illinois and New York, California experienced one of the largest heading into 2023. Los Angeles Unified, the second largest district in the country, has established a new office to better support schools鈥� recruitment and retention. 

But, as spokesperson for LAUSD told 麻豆精品 by email, 鈥渢here are stark realities confronting Los Angeles Unified that transcend what a school system can address such as cost of living, job prospects and statewide economic challenges that are forcing families to leave the city and state.鈥� 

鈥淥ur students represent some of the most fragile in the city and are particularly impacted by financial pressures鈥� School closures or consolidations are a measure of last resort which have little to do with finances and more with the type of offerings schools are able to provide.鈥�

In Washington, a multimillion dollar has been credited with bringing back 2,000 kids. Given the financial strain the declines are already placing on districts across the country, some like and have already announced or enacted closure plans. 

Researchers relied on a federal guideline to determine which schools are low performing, using states鈥� required Comprehensive Support and Improvement schools lists, those with the lowest performance and graduation rates. They caution this metric is not completely reliable, given the variation from state to state, with some updating every year while others only every three years. The CSI lists don鈥檛 often account for year-to-year academic growth either, which may be strong and indicate a thriving school community. 

Researchers also did not determine whether students attending these schools have nearby high-quality alternatives in the event their schools close. 

鈥淭his is an exposition of the situation鈥� There’s no horizontal solution across the board that we need,鈥� said Goulas. 鈥淒istrict superintendents need to find the solution that meets the needs of their community,鈥� he said, adding student demographics, year-to-year growth, transportation and strength of alternatives are some measures that cannot get lost in closure conversations. 

, children whose schools close .  At the same time, when students are moved into larger schools, it means more financial resources, and with them, more extracurriculars or specialty course offerings. 

The best of the worst case scenario is to be honest with families about consolidations or closures and provide 5- and 10-year plans, former Chicago schools chief told 麻豆精品 earlier this year.

鈥淚 hope that the research that people like me provide can help the districts plan ahead,鈥� Goulas said, 鈥渂ecause the less runway you have to make a plan and be prepared, the harsher the decisions you end up making.鈥�

Four of 10 seats on a new finance advisory committee will be filled by community members, starting in a few weeks 鈥� the first time the public has been given a formal role in fiscal oversight. In an effort to recruit new voices, priority will be given to people who have not previously volunteered with district governance but have ties to schools and some knowledge of finance. Three school board members and three district executives, including Superintendent Joe Gothard, will round out the committee. 

Over the summer, as the school board considered the current $1 billion budget, community opposition to some cuts convinced district leaders that as public as had been, even more outside participation was needed. 

St. Paul Public Schools is one of the most diverse in Minnesota, serving one-fourth of the state鈥檚 English learners, with concentrations of Southeast Asian and East African students. Less familiar populations, including Karen, Burmese and Bhutanese families, are also expected to grow. When the district first started planning to address the pandemic鈥檚 learning losses, leaders knew that the demographics meant schools would need numerous strategies. To identify them, they tapped dozens of community organizations.

When the federal aid started flowing, trying to both incorporate feedback from so many groups and speed up the hidebound bureaucracy that keeps money moving seemed impossibly daunting, says Stacey Gray Akyea, the district鈥檚 executive chief of equity, strategy and innovation.

But finding time for community input is already yielding dividends in making the system more nimble and assuring that limited funds are spent on students鈥� most pressing issues. Instead of waiting for multi-year evaluations, looking at early evidence can help leaders decide whether to put more energy or money into an initiative.  

鈥淲e’ve got to continue to coalesce around student learning needs,鈥� Akyea says. 鈥淓verything else really needs to be able to shift according to what we need to be able to do to do what is best for our students.鈥�

To this end, a year ago district leaders created a series of dashboards tracking, in real time, key information about each of the dozens of strategies initially adopted. As they began using the data to make decisions much more quickly than usual, they shared them publicly. They hoped to help the public understand, by sharing evidence of where change is needed, why some programs got boosts while others were cut. 

The effort drew national and local attention from the U.S. Department of Education, which invited district leaders to present their work at a webinar for other districts; from the Council of Great City Schools; and, most recently, from the Minnesota Association of School Administrators, in naming Gothard the newest superintendent of the year.

Whatever ultimately ends up in the budget to be approved next June, school board members will have to justify their choices to the public. Better, say district leaders, to start those conversations now. 

Case in point: The relief aid allowed the district to test new strategies for closing longstanding racial and socioeconomic academic gaps. Funding those that turned out to be seems like an obvious priority. Yet new concerns have surfaced in the years since in-person schools were shuttered. 

Chronic absenteeism and student safety are much bigger community concerns now, for example, than they were in 2020. After schools reopened for in-person instruction, it became clear that giving older students passes for public transit, now plagued by rising crime, wasn鈥檛 as likely to get them to school as it had been. So St. Paul used some of the aid to raise driver pay so it could reinstitute school bus routes.

鈥淲e did some student surveys last spring after a lot of tragic incidents in and around our schools,鈥� says Innovation Office Director Leah Corey, one of the district leaders who created the dashboards tracking how well pandemic interventions have worked. 鈥淵ellow buses came up a lot as something that students and parents missed. They thought they would be safer and be more on time and more accountable to get to and from school if they had a yellow bus.鈥�

Khulia Pringle, the National Parents Union鈥檚 Minnesota state director, has applied to join the committee. If she is chosen, she says, she will also raise safety issues. The parents she works with want more orderly schools, she says, but believe that would better be accomplished by increasing the number of community groups with a presence in schools than by reviving contracts with local police.

As painful as these choices sound, St. Paul may hit fewer speedbumps navigating them than other large school systems.

Right now, administrators everywhere are taking their first painful steps toward creating budgets for the 2024-25 academic year. For many, this means finally confronting the so-called fiscal cliff, a precipice that education finance experts warned of three years ago when Congress approved $190 billion in recovery aid. Now, with federal funds , these districts are figuring out who to manage with dramatically reduced funding. 

Lawmakers and finance experts had hoped much of the aid would be used to from pandemic learning losses, but many school systems instead used it to plug pre-existing budget gaps. Frequently, the mounting deficits were caused by years of falling enrollment driven by declining birth rates. 

Compounding the crisis, a record number of families moved their children out of district schools during COVID, accelerating the need for painful structural changes. Instead of helping their remaining students rebound, lots of districts spent relief funds staving off unpopular decisions such as closing schools and laying off staff.

Between the start of the 2019-20 and 2021-22 school years, St. Paul Public Schools lost 10% of its students, accelerating a trend decades in the making and projected to continue. Operating a large number of drastically underenrolled schools, in fall 2021 the board decided to close several and consolidate others.

The move allowed the district to spend most of its $319 million share of the Elementary and Secondary School Emergency Relief Fund on strategies tied directly to meeting students鈥� needs. With an aim of pushing the system to respond more nimbly to internal data showing what鈥檚 working and what isn鈥檛, district leaders created a public dashboard for each expenditure outlining its goal and tracking progress. 

That information should help the new committee be strategic in considering what recommendations to prioritize in 2024-25.

For example, the panel will likely be asked to consider continuing a program that put 105 literacy specialists in elementary and middle schools to work with small groups of struggling students. In addition to allowing the district to retain highly effective educators even as it closed buildings, the effort 鈥� known as What I Need Now 鈥� quickly started to boost reading rates. 

Test data show that the more than 4,000 kids in the program are learning to read more quickly than their peers. The district is nowhere near catching everyone up, however. After an initial dip at the start of the pandemic, reading proficiency rates on annual state exams have stabilized 鈥� around 35%.

District leaders are working to extend the program, which will cost an estimated $12 million during the current school year, from elementary to middle grades. They have also instituted a parallel effort in math, training teachers to use data and higher quality instruction in schools where students are struggling.

The district has also had success addressing labor shortages. St. Paul spent $4.6 million in pandemic money creating a team to recruit and retain teachers, administrators and paraprofessionals of color and in areas where job openings are particularly hard to fill. Among many strategies, the new staff has traveled to Historically Black Colleges and Universities, made on-the-spot offers at job fairs and 鈥� a rarity in Minnesota 鈥� used hiring bonuses to help fill vacancies. 

The investment appears to be paying off. Over the summer, as neighboring districts struggled to retain educators of students with disabilities, St. Paul offered $10,000 signing bonuses to special education teachers, filling 70 vacancies in short order. Of the nearly 750 staff hired during that time, half were teachers.

The new finance committee is expected to meet four to six times a year.

Social capital is a critical predictor of educational attainment, academic achievement, health, happiness and economic success, regardless of a student鈥檚 socioeconomic background.

Adding to students’ disengagement: Schools often focus on the skills and knowledge needed to navigate a chosen path, but rarely on who. Who do you want to be when you grow up, and who can help you along that path?

To address these questions, the nonprofit launched an online platform that taps the wisdom, skills and experiences of community members nationwide in collaboration with students and educators through real-world learning experiences. Through these opportunities, students become more engaged in school and their neighborhood, develop awareness of career pathways and expand their access to caring adults who share their backgrounds and encourage their interests.

, a local nonprofit makerspace that supports learning by sharing tools and resources, started partnering with CommunityShare in 2019 to cultivate these connections. Through this collaboration, Las Cruces entrepreneurs, scientists, engineers and artists built bridges between communities and classrooms, and expanded the types of projects that students could accomplish.

Cruces Creatives used CommunityShare鈥檚 platform 鈥� sort of a human library 鈥� to post online profiles reflecting the skills and life experiences that its diverse network of makers, academics, parents and business professionals could share with students. Teachers posted project requests, and the platform matched them with partners to serve as mentors, guest speakers, project collaborators and content advisers. With funding from many generous foundations, Cruces Creatives and CommunityShare Las Cruces were able to support classroom projects with mini-grants of up to $500.

In one example, a Sierra Middle School social studies teacher turned her curriculum into a multi-faceted, engaging, real-world cultural experience by connecting to food truck owner Liz Corrales. Through a mini-grant, Corrales brought her food truck to the school. Students created business models, put together a menu and then ate birria tacos while Corrales, a Latina and part-time stay-at-home mom, described how her business literally feeds her community.

Through a vermicomposting project, a sixth-grader at Lynn Middle School learned that his love for worms can lead to careers. His gardening class had collaborated since 2021 with Dr. Emily Creegan, an environmental restoration specialist at Johns Hopkins University, to test composting systems and identify the best option for their school. Supported by Creegan and a program mini-grant, students researched how reducing, reusing and recycling can help the environment, while directly putting their hands on the project, smelling nutrient-rich compost and laughing as they handled wriggly worms deemed either 鈥渃ute鈥� or 鈥渄isgusting.鈥� Students built sorting systems, delegated responsibilities, calculated measurements for compost bins, mastered hand tools and played in the soil and sun, all for a project that ultimately launched a schoolwide composting system.

As of spring 2023, CommunityShare projects have brought these and similar projects to over 5,000 students in the Las Cruces Public Schools, supported by 240 teachers and 160 community partners. Consistent with showing the positive correlation between classroom and community engagement, teachers reported through platform-generated evaluations that students are more engaged when they participate in a CommunityShare project. They also reported that the projects help students practice critical thinking, problem solving and teamwork 95% of the time; build social-emotional skills 95% of the time; and better understand real-world applications of academic skills 93% of the time.
All communities are full of amazing people with unique gifts and wisdom to share, and everyone has something to offer: the parent who started a food truck and mentors students in entrepreneurship; the grandmother sharing her lived history of her local neighborhood; the virologist teaching how math can save lives; the glass blower artist demonstrating the artistic interplay of physics, chemistry and creativity; the grad student sharing the realities of navigating college. We invite communities to connect with the and start reimagining communities as classrooms, to ensure all students have the resources and caring humans in their lives to help them realize their full potential.

In a school system that has and recently regained local control from a state takeover, educators are piloting a new leadership model hoping to mend teachers鈥�, staff and students鈥� strained relationships to St. Louis schools and lure families back.

Coached by retired superintendents and principals from the area, two elementary schools are replacing  top-down work structures with leadership teams as part of the Transformational Leadership Initiative co-run by Washington University in St. Louis. 

Hoping to stem the tide of families leaving the district, both middle class and lower income families, leadership teams of teachers and staff puts those closest to students at the center of finding solutions. 

From food banks to more place-based lessons, the teams are reshaping everything from schedules to curriculum, adding more St. Louis-specific lessons that make academics relevant to the real world and counter negative perceptions of their hometown. 

鈥淚 think that’s a priority of the district 鈥� how do we recapture some of the families that have moved and understand why they have,鈥� said Jay Hartman, executive director of the Consortium Partnership Network with St. Louis Public Schools. 鈥淗ow do we provide a better system that will serve all families that won’t push them to move out of the city?鈥�

Because current school structures tend to overwhelm both teachers and admin, the leadership shake up and resulting school-specific changes are a welcome change, said St. Louis educators involved in the pilot.  

鈥淥ne principal cannot be the superhero. That is not a model that works,鈥� said Victoria May, executive director of Washington University鈥檚 Institute for School Partnership, which co-leads the Initiative.

Teachers in the partnership are encouraged to design programs to address systemic challenges facing students, like gun violence, which impacts over in the state. At one St. Louis Public School, that looked like adding a non-academic block at the start of the school day. 

鈥淭hey wanted a class meeting for 15 minutes every morning where they just are building community and getting their kids ready for the day and processing something, [like] a shooting that might have happened the day before,鈥� said May. 

Building an environment where staff feel they can bring such new ideas to fruition and help students develop a positive relationship to their hometown is also key to the 鈥溾�� transformation. 

鈥淓ncourage the kids to look at where they are and who they are,鈥� Linda Henke, co-creator of the model and a coach with the Initiative, told 麻豆精品. 鈥淵ou still are getting the rich content of science and social studies, but it’s grounded in the place where the kids really are.鈥� 

For instance, as fourth graders learn about vocal cords and sound waves, they now also explore local music, playing kazoos and learning the history of how jugs are used in roots and blues. The unit culminates with a visit to the National Blues Museum downtown.

For educators, the inclusive leadership structure provides a sense of purpose that was overshadowed by pandemic stressors. 

鈥淚t has been empowering as a teacher,鈥� said Erika Ellis, kindergarten teacher at Meramec Elementary, one of the pilot schools. 鈥淏ecause in the profession, in some places you’re just a technician. And you read a curriculum, you comply. And then you go home. I’m not wired that way.鈥�

Eager to replicate the model鈥檚 success, advocates and philanthropists in Missouri backed the approach crafted by Henke, former superintendent of the nearby Maplewood-Richmond Heights district, which was on the verge of losing accreditation and had 30% turnover rates. Through Henke鈥檚 12 year tenure, the district earned a top score on , and saw 15% growth in rates. 

Andrew Eason, fifth and sixth grade teacher at Ashland Elementary, now in its third year of the pilot, has taught about food insecurity and local food deserts. The lessons address health curricula standards while, 鈥渦sing science to be able to change their communities and change their neighborhoods,鈥� he said. 

鈥淚 wanted to open my students up to looking at their community and seeing what resources they don’t have,鈥� Eason said. 鈥溾�極kay, well, why do we have so much fast food in our neighborhood? And why is it that there’s a lot of unhealthy things, you know, down to the fact that there are far less trees in our parks, things that promote healthy breathing and those types of things.鈥�

Washington University鈥檚 Institute for School Partnership hopes to scale up the initiative at additional聽district聽schools in coming years.