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Black and brown people--and especially Black women--regularly face discrimination in schools and the workplace based on the texture and style of their hair. This is yet another form of racial discrimination and yet another way to control and police Black and brown people. Twenty-four states across the country have responded by passing the CROWN ("Creating a Respectful and Open World for Natural Hair") Act, which prohibits hair-based discrimination at work and school. The movement to pass the CROWN Act is gaining momentum in states across the country, as well as at the federal level. The Act is about strengthening worker protections and ensuring dignity and respect for cultural expression. This report discusses: (1) The effects of hair-based discrimination; (2) How the CROWN Act protects against hair-based discrimination; (3) Why is the CROWN Act needed?; (4) State of play: The CROWN Act has bipartisan support; and (5) How the CROWN Act is a critical tool to fight discrimination.

For more than a decade, academics and education policy experts have raised concerns about a widespread shortage of teachers in the United States. The first wave of warnings came in response to the drastic cuts in state and local spending on education following the Great Recession. In this report, the authors use data from a wide range of sources to document the size and scope of the teacher shortage. The data show that the teacher shortage is both widespread and acute across several dimensions, from subject matter specialties to school poverty status. The authors also review data that point to the two most important drivers of the shortage: (1) the declining compensation in the teaching profession relative to other occupations that employ college graduates; and (2) and the increasingly stressful work environment teachers face, a long-standing reality that has been greatly exacerbated by COVID-19. The key finding is that the current shortage is generally "not" the result of an insufficient number of potentially qualified teachers. The shortage is, instead, a shortfall in the number of qualified teachers "willing to work at current wages and under current working conditions." The combination of substandard teacher compensation and highly stressful working conditions has, in recent decades, made teaching a much less attractive profession than alternatives available to workers with college degrees.

Over the last 18 years, Economic Policy Institute has closely tracked trends in teacher pay. Over these nearly two decades, a picture of increasingly alarming trends has emerged. Simply put, teachers are paid less (in weekly wages and total compensation) than their nonteacher college-educated counterparts, and the situation has worsened considerably over time. To analyze teacher pay and compensation through 2020 and 2021 this report uses two sources of data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS): the Current Population Survey Outgoing Rotation Groups (CPS-ORG) and BLS's National Compensation Survey's Employer Costs for Employee Compensation (ECEC). The findings are presented in four sections. First, trends in annual average weekly wages (adjusted for inflation) from 1979 through 2021 for teachers and other college graduates are presented. Next, annual estimates of the national teacher weekly wage penalty using standard regression techniques to control for systematic differences in age, education, state of residence, and other factors known to affect wage rates are reported. Third, regression-adjusted estimates of the teacher pay gap for each state and for the District of Columbia are offered. Finally, nonwage benefits to estimate a total compensation penalty that includes wages and benefits at the national level (which is not possible for each state) are factored in.

Education funding in the United States relies primarily on state and local resources, with just a tiny share of total revenues allotted by the federal government. Most analyses of the primary school finance metrics--equity, adequacy, effort, and sufficiency--raise serious questions about whether the existing system is living up to the ideal of providing a sound education equitably to all children at all times. Districts in high-poverty areas, which serve larger shares of students of color, get less funding per student than districts in low-poverty areas, which predominantly serve white students, highlighting the system's inequity. School districts in general--but especially those in high-poverty areas--are not spending enough to achieve national average test scores, which is an established benchmark for assessing adequacy. Efforts states make to invest in education vary significantly. And the system is ill-prepared to adapt to unexpected emergencies. These challenges are magnified during and after recessions. Following the Great Recession that began in December 2007, per-student education revenues plummeted and did not return to pre-recession levels for about eight years. The recovery in per-student revenues was even slower in high-poverty districts. This report combines new data on funding for states and for districts by school district poverty level, and over time, with evidence documenting the positive impacts of increasing investment in education to make a case for overhauling the school finance system. It calls for reforms that would ensure a larger role for the federal government to establish a robust, stable, and consistent school funding plan that channels sufficient additional resources to less affluent students in good times and bad. Furthermore, spending on public education should be retooled as an economic stabilizer, with increases automatically kicking in during recessions. Such a program would greatly mitigate cuts to public education as budgets are depleted, and also spur aggregate demand to give the economy a needed boost.

Ever since students began returning to classrooms in the late summer and fall of 2021, countless news stories have described intense staffing shortages in primary and secondary schools. The pandemic has wreaked havoc on the country's K-12 educational workforce, with overworked educators retiring or leaving the profession, insufficient substitute teachers to fill in when COVID hits a district, too few paraprofessionals and teaching assistants there to support students who are struggling after more than a year of virtual learning, not enough bus drivers to get students to and from school, and skeleton crews of custodial and food service workers trying to make do. This report presents data on the characteristics and pay of the K-12 education support workforce, showing trends in employment before and during the pandemic, and discusses how COVID is likely affecting workers' decisions to return to schools. It also presents findings from past EPI research that shows that budget cuts, lack of investment in schools, low relative pay, challenging school climates, and inadequate early career supports led to rising teacher turnover and a shrinking pipeline of qualified teachers in the country's schools long before the pandemic began.

The U.S. Supreme Court's 2018 decision in "Janus v. American Federation of State, County, and Municipal Employees" (AFSCME) (referred to as "Janus" hereafter) prohibited state and local government worker unions from negotiating collective bargaining agreements with fair share fee arrangements. In this report, the authors examine state collective bargaining restrictions on public-sector unions and how they impact spending on teacher compensation. Specifically, the authors develop a framework to estimate how spending on teacher compensation was affected by changes in the legal institutions (laws, court decisions, and other administrative mechanisms) governing public-sector unions in five states that experienced these changes early in the previous decade. There are two purposes of this study. First, the framework and the analysis, with the necessary adjustments to scale, contexts, and timelines, could be used in the near future to understand and estimate the impact on public-sector workers of the "Janus" decision (or of laws, court decisions, and other administrative mechanisms of a similar nature). Second, the results also set the stage for other important and broad questions regarding the affected education systems. These institutional changes that influence districts' spending on teacher compensation may also shift the career decisions of individuals who otherwise may have chosen a teaching profession, and they may have implications for student outcomes. Thus, this study can help policymakers better grasp the role of teachers unions in the post-"Janus" era by exploring pre-"Janus" events that affected the educational sector. The authors find that the pre-"Janus" legal changes weakening teachers unions in Idaho, Indiana, Michigan, Tennessee, and Wisconsin effectively reduced spending on total teacher compensation by about 6%, reduced teacher salaries by about 5%, and reduced teacher benefits by 9.7%. Even though it is not possible to use these results to exactly estimate the impact of "Janus" on union and nonunion teachers (nor to assess the impact of any other policy changes in states occurring within different contexts and under different timelines), the evidence from the study serves as an early warning of potentially negative repercussions of "Janus" on similar outcomes.

The teacher shortage in the nation's public schools--particularly in high-poverty schools--is a crisis for the teaching profession and a serious problem for the entire education system. The Economic Policy Institute's (EPI's) teacher shortage policy agenda plots a course to return teaching to a profession in which teachers are compensated on par with their college-educated peers, operate in environments where they can teach effectively, get the training they need early in their careers and the professional development they need throughout their work lives, have their professional judgment incorporated, and have the opportunity to use the expertise they attain to help shape what goes on in their classrooms and their schools. This policy agenda has two components: a set of four foundational recommendations for how to understand the context and approach the problem in a way that will actually solve it, followed by specific policies that, if implemented together, could go a long way toward solving the teacher shortage crisis. This policy agenda builds on an in-depth analysis of the size, scope, and drivers of the teacher shortage, as detailed in the first five reports in the EPI's "Perfect Storm in the Teacher Labor Market" series. The agenda addresses the factors identified in the series as well as other specific or underlying factors such as lack of a properly resourced system, the lack of a diverse teaching workforce, student loan debt payments burdening teachers, and the uneven effectiveness of initiatives for teachers-in-training. The authors review the analysis, present the principles underlying the agenda, and then present the specific agenda items, which fall into two categories: (1) Overarching principles for how to approach the teacher shortage problem; and (2) Specific proposals in the policy agenda to address the teacher shortage.

The teacher shortage in the United States is an increasingly recognized but still poorly understood crisis. Much attention has focused on the size of the shortage (about 110,000 teachers in the 2017-2018 school year, by one estimate), its monetary costs, and the negative effects of the shortage on students, teachers, and the public education system at large. But the multiple complex and interdependent causes have received less scrutiny. In 2019, we authored a series of five EPI reports examining the full magnitude of the teacher shortage and the working conditions and other factors that contribute to the shortage. A sixth report on policy recommendations, "A Policy Agenda to Address the Teacher Shortage in U.S. Public Schools," [see ED611178] is being released simultaneously with this summary report. This summary report presents key findings from the first five studies in the series and outlines the policy agenda presented in the sixth report. At the end of this summary report are the infographic fact sheets that were released with the reports. [For the first five reports, see ED598211, ED598209, ED598208, ED598207, and ED598210, respectively.]

More than a decade and a half of work on the topic has shown there has been a long-trending erosion of teacher wages and compensation relative to other college graduates. Simply put, teachers are paid less (in wages and compensation) than other college-educated workers with similar experience and other characteristics, and this financial penalty discourages college students from entering the teaching profession and makes it difficult for school districts to keep current teachers in the classroom. Teacher compensation is not just an issue of staffing: effective teachers are the most important school-based determinant of student educational performance. To promote children's success in school, schools must retain credentialed teachers and ensure that teaching remains an attractive career option for college-bound students. This report provides an update on teacher wage and compensation penalty as the U.S. continues to struggle with the COVID-19 pandemic and the economic consequences. While the data in this paper are through 2019 and thus predate the pandemic, the analysis may provide useful insights as schools struggle to reopen. The U.S. has yet to make the necessary investments, and pass the needed policies and procedures (e.g., universal mask requirements and testing, tracing, and isolating protocols) that would allow some semblance of normalcy. Teachers and other school staff will continue the business of educating students in these trying times. They and their unions will play a critical role in moving forward in an effective and safe environment. [This report was produced in collaboration with the Center on Wage and Employment Dynamics (CWED).]

The COVID-19 pandemic is overwhelming the functioning and outcomes of education systems--some of which were already stressed in many respects. The shutdown of schools, compounded by the associated public health and economic crises, poses major challenges to students and their teachers. The public education system was not built, nor prepared, to cope with a situation like this--there is a lack of structure to sustain effective teaching and learning during a shutdown and to provide the safety net supports that many children receive in school. If students are to not see their temporary interruptions become sustained and are to regain lost ground, if teachers are to do their jobs effectively during and after the pandemic, and if the education system is to deliver on its excellence and equity goals during the next phases of this pandemic, it will be critical to identify which students are struggling most and how much learning and development they have lost out on, which factors are impeding their learning, what problems are preventing teachers from teaching these children, and, very critically, which investments must be made to address these challenges. For each child, this diagnostic assessment will deliver a unique answer, and the system will have to meet the child where he or she is. A strengthened system based on meeting children where they are and providing them with what they need will be key to lifting up children. This report briefly reviews the relevant literature on educational settings that have features in common with how education is occurring during the crisis and emerging evidence on opportunity gaps during the COVID-19 pandemic in order to propose a three-pronged plan. The plan covers the three Rs: (immediate) relief for schools, (short-term) recovery, and (long-term) rebuilding for schools and the education system as a whole.

The chronic underfunding of early care and education (ECE) is compromising the well-being of educators and the children they teach and threatening the economic security of millions of families in the United States. The current ECE system demands large contributions from the parents of young children, both through payments for ECE services and through forgone income when parents drop out of or reduce their participation in paid labor markets to provide care on their own. Investments from federal, state, and local governments have provided some relief for parents, but those investments have generally been far too small. And while the cost to parents for ECE is high, the current market rates for services are inefficiently low because ECE teachers are underpaid. Nationally, the median hourly wage for ECE teachers is $12.12 (EPI 2019b). A greater public investment is required to create a comprehensive and high-quality system that works for parents, children, and teachers alike. Gould et al. (2020) estimate the costs of a transformed ECE system--in which teachers are appropriately compensated and programs are of high quality and available to all families--for all 50 states and the District of Columbia, using a variety of data sources. All together, the enhanced system--fully phased-in and comprehensive--would require an annual investment in the range of $337 to $495 billion, serving between 11.5 and 16.0 million children. This report provides some context for the investment needed for an ECE overhaul by providing a rough count of the money already in the ECE system from direct contributions. The authors also account for income forgone by families when parents participate in fewer hours of paid work to care for their children. [This report was produced in collaboration with Lea J. E. Austin and Marcy Whitebook.]

California's child early care and education (ECE) system is underfunded, and California policymakers have not been willing to acknowledge the true cost of creating a comprehensive ECE system. Proposals for ECE reform have focused primarily on improving access and affordability for families but have ignored the elephant in the room: Early care and education is substantially "funded" through low teacher pay and inadequate supports for ECE teachers. In addition to being a serious injustice, lack of adequate financial and professional supports for ECE teachers compromises the consistency and quality of care children receive. In this report, the authors develop an estimate of what it would cost to provide high-quality and comprehensive early care and education for California's families that doesn't overburden them financially or come at the expense of ECE teachers. This paper makes the case for aligning the costs of the ECE system with what is required to create a strong and sustainable system. Herein, the authors model a system to meet the needs of all families in California and solve the myriad problems the current system fails to address.

This report is the fifth in a series examining the magnitude of the teacher shortage and the working conditions and other factors that contribute to the shortage. The series finds that the teacher shortage is real, large and growing. When indicators of teacher quality (certification, relevant training, experience, etc.) are taken into account, the shortage is even more acute than currently estimated, with high-poverty schools suffering the most from the shortage of credentialed teachers. This report examines the early career supports available to novice teachers in the first year of their careers, as well as the continued learning opportunities available to teachers throughout their careers. It also explores the extent to which certain aspects of the working environment--the presence or absence of supportive and collaborative relationships; cooperation among teachers, colleagues, and principals; and teachers' influence over policy and day-to-day classroom decisions--establish a culture of learning in which teachers' knowledge and professionalism are recognized and cultivated.

The members of the high school Class of 2019 who enter the labor market right after graduating have better job prospects than young people who graduated from high school into the aftermath of the recession, a result of the steady (if slow) progression of the economic recovery. This study analyzes data on recent young high school graduates (ages 18-21) to learn about the Class of 2019's economic prospects as they start their careers. The report begins by providing a snapshot of the educational attainment of all young adults in this age group (not just graduates) side by side with the educational attainment of all adults over age 21, to provide context and get a sense of these graduates' likely future educational prospects. In the second section, the authors look specifically at those in this age group who have graduated from high school to learn what shares of these young adults are now enrolled in further schooling, employed, both, or neither. Third, the authors narrow the focus to only those graduates who are not enrolled in further schooling to find out how they are faring in the labor market--specifically, looking at their unemployment and underemployment rates. In the fourth section, the authors analyze the wages of those who are employed (and not enrolled in further schooling), making comparisons with wages in earlier periods as well as looking at important differences by gender and race/ethnicity. In the fifth and final section, they discuss the challenges facing those students who wish to pursue a college degree: stagnating family incomes, the rising price of college and resulting student loan debt, uncertain future wage prospects, and the complicating role of for-profit colleges. This report focuses exclusively on those graduating from high school.

This report is the fourth in a series examining the magnitude of the teacher shortage and the working conditions and other factors that contribute to the shortage. The series finds that the teacher shortage is real, large and growing. When indicators of teacher quality (certification, relevant training, experience, etc.) are taken into account, the shortage is even more acute than currently estimated, with high-poverty schools suffering the most from the shortage of credentialed teachers. Like the other reports in this series, this report explores a probable factor behind the exodus of teachers from the profession and the shrinking supply of future teachers: the working environment for teachers, broadly referred to here as the "school climate. The report shows that school climate affects teacher satisfaction, morale, and expectations about staying in the profession. It also shows that school climate is challenging for a number of reasons: Teachers confront widespread barriers to teaching and learning, face threats to their emotional and physical safety, lack influence over school policy and what and how they teach in their classrooms, and suffer from dissatisfaction and low motivation. The report further demonstrates that there is a significant relationship between these indicators of difficult working conditions and teachers leaving the profession. And finally, as in previous reports, the authors provide evidence that working conditions are more challenging in high-poverty schools than in low-poverty schools, which compounds the problems already identified in this series.

Fallout from the Great Recession did a lot of damage to the employment prospects of young adults just entering the workforce after graduating from high school or college--and that damage persisted well into the recovery. In this study, the authors analyze data on recent young college graduates (ages 21-24) to learn about the Class of 2019's economic prospects as they start their careers. This report focuses exclusively on those graduating from college. It begins by providing a demographic snapshot of this population of young college graduates. In the second section, the authors discuss what shares of these young graduates are now enrolled in further schooling, employed, both, or neither. Third, they narrow the focus to only those graduates who are not enrolled in further schooling to find out how they are faring in the labor market--specifically, looking at their unemployment and underemployment rates. The authors also draw on literature that highlights the likelihood that many young college graduates will end up working at jobs that do not require a college degree. In the fourth section, the authors analyze the wages of those who are employed (and not enrolled in further schooling), making comparisons with earlier periods as well as looking at important differences by gender and race/ethnicity.

This report is the third in a series examining the magnitude of the teacher shortage and the working conditions and other factors that contribute to the shortage. The series finds that the teacher shortage is real, large and growing. When indicators of teacher quality (certification, relevant training, experience, etc.) are taken into account, the shortage is even more acute than currently estimated, with high-poverty schools suffering the most from the shortage of credentialed teachers. This third report focuses on a likely factor behind why teachers are leaving the profession and fewer people are becoming teachers: teacher pay. Specifically it looks at how teacher compensation compares with compensation in nonteaching occupations. It also delves into an aspect that has received increasing attention recently, which is whether teachers work multiple jobs, and what share of teachers supplement their earnings by moonlighting. Teachers who end up quitting their jobs received, on average, lower salaries, they participated less in the kinds of paid extracurricular activities that complement their professional development (activities like coaching students or mentoring teachers), and they participated more in working options outside the school system than did teachers who stayed at their schools. In high-poverty schools, teachers face compounded challenges. Relative to teachers in low-poverty schools, teachers in high-poverty schools are paid less, receive a smaller amount from moonlighting, and the moonlighting that they do is less likely to involve paid extracurricular or additional activities for the school system that generate extra pay but also help them grow professionally as teachers. The report discusses the likely influence of the large and rapidly growing "teacher pay gap"--how much less teachers earn than their comparably educated peers in other professions--on the weakening attractiveness of public education as a profession, and on the rising rate of teacher attrition.

Since the Coleman Report's release in 1966, education policymakers have grappled with the fact that, on average, African American children's academic and behavioral outcomes are depressed relative to those of white children (Coleman et al. 1966). Because African American children disproportionately come from low-income families, it is generally understood that the disadvantaged social and economic conditions from which many of these children come to school predict these depressed outcomes. "Stress" is a commonplace term for hormonal changes that occur in response to frightening or threatening events or conditions. When severe, these changes are termed "toxic" stress and can impede children's behavior, cognitive capacity, and emotional and physical health. Frightening or threatening situations are more sustained and are experienced more frequently by African American and socially and economically disadvantaged children, who also have less access to protective resources that can mitigate their stress to tolerable levels. Seeking to improve outcomes for these children, education reform efforts have focused mostly on how higher-quality teaching can overcome the force of social and economic challenges; however, these efforts have failed to make a meaningful dent in the black-white achievement gap. This report describes the relative frequency of toxic stress by race and social class, and shows how it depresses children's outcomes and contributes to the "achievement gap." It concludes by suggesting policy and practice recommendations that can reduce the cognitive, behavioral, and health harm that toxic stress provokes. [This report was produced in collaboration with the Opportunity Institute.]

This report is the second in a series examining the magnitude of the teacher shortage and the working conditions and other factors that contribute to the shortage. The series finds that the teacher shortage is real, large and growing. When indicators of teacher quality (certification, relevant training, experience, etc.) are taken into account, the shortage is even more acute than currently estimated, with high-poverty schools suffering the most from the shortage of credentialed teachers. This report shows that schools' staffing efforts are challenged by teachers leaving the profession at high rates and by the reduced pipeline of new teachers as fewer people have entered teaching preparedness pathways in recent years. It also presents data suggesting that teachers entering the profession don't have the same qualifications their peers in years past had, due to the proliferation of nontraditional teacher preparation programs and changes in the requirements for obtaining an initial teaching certificate. Additionally, it shows that staffing trends are affecting the qualifications held by the teaching workforce overall: A lot of teachers quit teaching and some of the teachers who quit are as credentialed or more credentialed than the teachers who stay, and the share of all teachers who are inexperienced has increased over time.

This report is the first in a series examining the magnitude of the teacher shortage and the working conditions and other factors that contribute to the shortage. It finds that the teacher shortage is real, large and growing. When indicators of teacher quality (certification, relevant training, experience, etc.) are taken into account, the shortage is even more acute than currently estimated, with high-poverty schools suffering the most from the shortage of credentialed teachers. This is significant because shortage of teachers harms students, teachers, and the public education system as a whole. Lack of sufficient, qualified teachers and staff instability threaten students' ability to learn and reduce teachers' effectiveness, and high teacher turnover consumes economic resources that could be better deployed elsewhere. The teacher shortage makes it more difficult to build a solid reputation for teaching and to professionalize it, which further contributes to perpetuating the shortage. In addition, the fact that the shortage is distributed so unevenly among students of different socioeconomic backgrounds challenges the U.S. education system's goal of providing a sound education equitably to all children. To address this problem, working conditions and other factors that are prompting teachers to quit and dissuading people from entering the profession need to be tackled. Additionally, extra supports and funding to high-poverty schools, where teacher shortages are even more of a problem, need to be provided to all schools.

A broader understanding of the importance of student behaviors and school climate as drivers of academic performance and the wider acceptance that schools have a role in nurturing the "whole child" have increased attention to indicators that go beyond traditional metrics focused on proficiency in math and reading. The 2015 passage of the Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA), which requires states to report a nontraditional measure of student progress, has codified this understanding. The vast majority of U.S. states have chosen to comply with ESSA by using measures associated with student absenteeism--and particularly, chronic absenteeism. This report uses data on student absenteeism to answer several questions: How much school are students missing? Which groups of students are most likely to miss school? Have these patterns changed over time? And how much does missing school affect performance? In this report, the authors aim to fill some of the gaps in the analysis of data surrounding absenteeism. They first summarize existing evidence on who misses school and how absenteeism matters for performance. The authors then analyze the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) data from 2003 (the first assessment with information available for every state) and 2015 (the most recent available microdata). They use this information to describe how much school children are missing, on average; which groups of children miss school most often; and whether there have been any changes in these patterns between 2003 and 2015. The authors also present evidence that higher levels of absenteeism are associated with lower levels of student performance. Major findings include: (1) One in five eighth-graders was chronically absent; (2) absenteeism varied substantially among the groups analyzed; (3) absenteeism varied by state; and (4) prior research linking chronic absenteeism with lowered academic performance was confirmed by the results.

Teacher strikes in West Virginia, Oklahoma, Arizona, North Carolina, Kentucky, and Colorado have raised the profile of deteriorating teacher pay as a critical public policy issue. Teachers and parents are protesting cutbacks in education spending and a squeeze on teacher pay that persist well into the economic recovery from the Great Recession. This paper underscores the crisis in teacher pay by updating the data series on the teacher pay penalty--the percent by which public school teachers are paid less than comparable workers. Providing teachers with a decent middle-class living commensurate with other professionals with similar education is not simply a matter of fairness. Effective teachers are the most important school-based determinant of student educational performance. To address teacher shortages, it is necessary to focus on both recruiting and retaining high-quality teachers. Many policies are needed to accomplish this goal, and providing appropriate compensation is a necessary, major tool in addressing shortages. The examination of the teacher compensation penalty (combining wage and benefit data) begins in 1994, the earliest year for which teacher benefit data are available. With this update, the authors continue to sound the alarm regarding the long-run growth in the pay penalty. The authors also provide estimates of teacher wage penalties by state. Following are key highlights of the report: (1) the mid-1990s marks the start of a period of sharply eroding teacher pay and an escalating teacher pay penalty; (2) wage penalties have grown significantly for both male and female teachers; (3) improvements in benefits relative to professionals have not been enough to offset the growing teacher wage penalty; (4) teacher wage and compensation penalties grew from 2015 to 2017; and (5) the Great Recession can't be blamed for the erosion in teacher pay. ["The Teacher Pay Penalty Has Hit a New High: Trends in the Teacher Wage and Compensation Gaps through 2017" was also produced by the Center on Wage and Employment Dynamics (CWED).]

Hispanics now represent 18.1 percent of the U.S. population, making their labor market outcomes an important economic policy issue. A central question for researchers and policymakers is whether the labor market conditions of Hispanics have improved, stayed the same, or deteriorated in recent decades. To help answer this question, this report looks at changes in a number of key indicators of labor market health. First the authors track changes in the unemployment and labor force participation rates for the Hispanic population overall and then by gender and by Hispanic national origin (specifically Mexican American, Puerto Rican, and Cuban American), comparing these rates with overall U.S. unemployment and labor force participation rates by gender to see if there are significant gaps in these labor market measures. They also measure gaps in educational attainment. Then, in the bulk of the report, they look at earnings gaps (specifically, hourly wage gaps) between Hispanic workers and non-Hispanic white men ("white men"). They track these gaps by gender overall, by the subpopulations cited above, and by education level, immigrant status (U.S.-born vs. foreign-born), and immigrant generation (first-, second-, or third-generation and beyond). The examination generally begins in 1979 because that marks the start of the ongoing trend of growing wage inequality and ends in 2016 or 2017 (the last data year available). However, to accommodate data availability and generate large enough sample sizes, some discussions begin in 1980, 1988, or 1994.

This study analyzes data on recent young high school graduates (ages 18-21) to learn about the Class of 2018's economic prospects as they start their careers. The report begins by providing a snapshot of the educational attainment of all young adults in this age group (not just graduates) and of all working-age adults (ages 18-64) to provide context and get a sense of these graduates' likely future educational prospects. The second section looks specifically at those in this age group who have graduated from high school to learn what shares of these young adults are now enrolled in further schooling, employed, both, or neither. The third section narrows the focus to only those graduates who are not enrolled in further schooling to find out how they are faring in the labor market--specifically, looking at their unemployment and underemployment rates. The fourth section analyzes the wages of those who are employed (and not enrolled in further schooling), making comparisons with wages in earlier periods as well as looking at important differences by gender and race/ethnicity. The fifth, and final section discusses the challenges facing those students who wish to pursue a college degree: stagnating family incomes, the rising price of college and resulting student loan debt, uncertain future wage prospects, and the complicating role of for-profit colleges. Key findings detailed in this report include: (1) While 44.1 percent of all 18- to 21-year-olds have some college education, the vast majority (68.2 percent) of the overall working-age population (ages 18-64) do not have a four-year college degree; (2) The share of young high school graduates who are employed only (not enrolled in further schooling) has declined significantly since 1990, while the share who are enrolled only (and not employed) has increased; (3) Roughly one in eight young high school graduates not enrolled in further schooling are unemployed; (4) The underemployment rate for high school graduates in this age group currently sits at 25.0 percent, slightly above where it was in 2007; (5) From 1990 to 2018, average wages for young high school graduates grew only 9.7 percent in total; and (6) As incomes stagnate and the price of college increases, students must increasingly rely on loans to finance their education, further complicating the decision to enroll in college. While there may be many reasons someone might choose to enter the labor force after high school rather than attend college, college should at least be a viable option; a person's economic resources should not be the determining factor in whether they get to go to college. But, as things stand, the prospect of staggering debt may discourage students from less wealthy families from enrolling in further education or prevent them from completing a degree. Additional policies that will improve young high school graduates'--and all workers'--job quality include raising the minimum wage; protecting workers from wage theft; providing undocumented workers with a path to citizenship (which will give these workers, as well as authorized workers in similar fields, more leverage to command higher pay); and ending discriminatory practices that contribute to race and gender inequities.

Sustained improvements in economic conditions in recent years have brightened young graduates' prospects for employment and wage growth. This report focuses exclusively on those graduating from college. This study analyzes data on recent young college graduates (ages 21-24) to learn about the Class of 2018's economic prospects as they start their careers. The report begins by providing a demographic snapshot of this population of young college graduates. The second section discusses what shares of these young graduates are now enrolled in further schooling, employed, both, or neither. The third section narrows focus to only those graduates who are not enrolled in further schooling to find out how they are faring in the labor market--specifically, looking at their unemployment and underemployment rates. The report also draws on literature that highlights the likelihood that many young college graduates will end up working at jobs that do not require a college degree. The fourth, and final section analyzes the wages of those who are employed (and not enrolled in further schooling), making comparisons with earlier periods as well as looking at important differences by gender and race/ethnicity. Because of the progression of the economic recovery and substantial declines in the unemployment rate, members of the college Class of 2018 currently have better job prospects than the classes of 2009-2017 did. However, compared with those who graduated into the 2000 labor market, the Class of 2018 still faces real economic challenges, as demonstrated by elevated levels of underemployment as well as worsened wage gaps, particularly for women and black workers.

In light of the Pennsylvania's most recent pension cuts and the challenges the state faces in attracting and retaining qualified teachers, this report asks two primary questions in this study: (1) How does teacher pay compare with the pay of other comparable workers in Pennsylvania--that is, are Pennsylvania public school teachers underpaid (which could help explain the teacher shortage) or overpaid (which might justify the pension cuts); and (2) How will teacher compensation change under Act 5 beginning in 2019? The report further breaks down the compensation data to answer these two questions as well: (1) How does the teacher pay penalty vary by gender; and (2) how does gender and racial/ethnic pay equity among teachers compare with pay equity among other workers? The report also examines whether union membership and collective bargaining has any effect on teacher compensation. This study follows standard practice by focusing on full-time, full-year employees who work at least 35 hours per week and at least 39 weeks per year, a group that represents 80 percent of Pennsylvania's wage earners, according to the American Community Survey. This study makes it clear that Pennsylvania public school teachers face a significant pay penalty. These results are consistent with other research on teacher pay. When researchers looked at overall compensation among Pennsylvania public school teachers, it is apparent that better health and pension benefits only partly compensate for lower salaries. This increase in the teacher compensation penalty is likely to accelerate shortages that are currently being experienced in certain communities and subject areas, disproportionately affecting certain demographic groups. School districts need to address these compensation penalties as they confront shortages of qualified and motivated personnel.

The nation's oldest labor laws give employees the fundamental rights to organize and join a union. An increasing number of graduate student workers across the country are seeking to exercise these rights at the private universities where they work while they pursue their education. During the 2011-2012 school year, 12.1 percent of all graduate students and 57.9 percent of non-education Ph.D. students worked as graduate student assistants, a category that includes research assistants and teaching assistants. Over the last several decades, universities have increasingly shifted teaching duties away from tenured or tenure-track faculty and onto graduate students and adjunct or other non-tenure-track instructors. Likewise, graduate research assistants take on a large portion of the research work that earns these universities prestige and grant-based financial support. In the decade between Fall 2005 and Fall 2015, the number of graduate assistants employed by universities rose by 16.7 percent while tenured and tenure-track faculty increased by just 4.8 percent 2--less than overall employment growth of 5.9 percent over this same period. In this context, momentum is growing among graduate students to organize and join unions so that they can bargain collectively to negotiate for better wages and working conditions. In August 2016, a ruling by the National Labor Relations Board found that "student teaching assistants" and "student research assistants" are employees at private universities and therefore have the right to unionize under the National Labor Relations Act. Since that ruling, graduate teaching and research assistants at some of the nation's most elite private institutions of higher learning--such as Columbia, Harvard, and Yale--have sought to be represented by a union. This report concludes that graduate students who work for private universities should have the same rights as other U.S. employees under our nation's labor law, including the right to bargain for better pay and working conditions. The 2016 Columbia decision, and the recent increase in organizing efforts among these students (despite opposition from their school administrations), are positive signs that the benefits of union membership may eventually be experienced more broadly among graduate student workers throughout the United States.

Several studies have argued that teacher pensions are a raw deal for most teachers and should be replaced with account-style plans. This report examines research that most teachers working today are building a secure retirement. According to the author, the myth that most teachers get a raw deal while a lucky few receive generous pensions is based on flawed studies that give equal weight to career teachers and to those who leave after a year or two. A shift to account-style plans would not benefit most teachers and would increase teacher turnover to the detriment of students. While the existing pension system can and should be tweaked to meet changing needs, it successfully serves the goals of attracting and retaining teachers, promoting orderly retirement, and providing retirement security.

Extensive research has conclusively demonstrated that children's social class is one of the most significant predictors--if not the single most significant predictor--of their educational success. This three-part study combines a statistical analysis of early skills gaps among a recent cohort of children and changes in them over time with a qualitative study of multifaceted, school-district-level strategies to narrow them. Using data from the National Center for Education Statistics (NCES): the Early Childhood Longitudinal Study of the Kindergarten Classes of 1998-1999 and 2010-2011, this study examines the relationship between children's socioeconomic status (SES) and their cognitive and noncognitive skills when starting school. Findings reveal that large performance gaps exist between children in the lowest and highest SES quintiles and that these gaps have persisted from the 1998 cohort to the 2010 cohort. The positive news is that the gaps have not grown, even as economic inequalities between these two groups of students have grown. The negative news is that the gaps have not narrowed, despite the fact that low-SES parents have substantially increased their engagement in their children's early education. This report also reviews a set of 12 case studies of communities that have employed comprehensive educational strategies and wraparound supports to provide more children (especially low-income children) with strong early academic foundations, and to sustain and build on early gains throughout their K-12 school years. Based on examples from these diverse communities, the authors discuss implications: strategies that districts can employ and district and state policy changes to make those strategies easier to adopt and more sustainable. The report ends with conclusions and recommendations for further research, practice, and policy. [For the companion report, "Reducing and Averting Achievement Gaps: Key Findings from the Report 'Education Inequalities at the School Starting Gate' and Comprehensive Strategies to Mitigate Early Skills Gaps," see ED587806.]

Persistently large achievement gaps between high-social-class and low-social-class children in America, and the disparities in opportunity that drive these achievement gaps, threaten the very notion of the American Dream. The lack of true equality of opportunity calls for much more comprehensive interventions to tackle those gaps. This report focuses on interventions at the school and community levels, including support for parents. However, the need for those interventions would be substantially reduced and students' odds of success greatly enhanced if the broader structural forces that drive poverty and inequality that hold back a growing number of children were also addressed. This brief describes the type and size of early achievement gaps--and trends in them over time--and points to effective and comprehensive educational policies to avert and narrow them. It is based on key findings from "Education Inequalities at the School Starting Gate: Gaps, Trends, and Strategies to Address Them," a study combining statistical analyses of performance gaps and qualitative analyses of school districts that are piloting promising strategies for closing these achievement gaps. The quantitative analyses (on the persistence of gaps over time and their sensitivity to individual and family characteristics and to educational experiences) are based on data from two representative national samples of children who started kindergarten in 1998 and in 2010. (Kindergarten classes separated by 12 years constitute an "academic generation" because the eldest cohort is in its graduation year when the youngest cohort is beginning kindergarten.) Researchers compare children of low socioeconomic status (SES), as determined by parents' educational attainment and job status as well as household income, with their SES peers. In an effort to identify more effective policy solutions, researchers also look at how and why performance gaps and children's circumstances have changed over time. Specifically this brief argues the following: (1) Interventions to close performance gaps must start early in children's lives because skill and performance gaps take root before children enter kindergarten and do not go away; (2) Interventions that are already being provided must be reassessed because performance gaps did not narrow over an academic cohort (1998-2010); and (3) Comprehensive, community-level education strategies that begin addressing children's needs before kindergarten show promise in narrowing these gaps. Such strategies should be further explored and adapted in more districts, and proven interventions should be widely scaled up. This brief explores the interplay between educational outcomes, socioeconomic status, and social mobility. As the analyses show, there is a close connection between one's economic birthright and educational achievement.

The Great Recession and its aftermath have had long-lasting effects on the employment prospects of young people entering the workforce after graduating from high school or college. Despite officially ending in June 2009, the recession has left millions of people unemployed for extended spells, with recent workforce entrants such as young graduates particularly vulnerable to unemployment. The slow pace of the recovery has meant that, since 2007, students have graduated into an acutely weak labor market and have had to compete with more-experienced workers for a limited number of job opportunities. But after a long and sluggish recovery, young graduates' economic prospects have finally begun to look up. Sustained improvements in economic conditions in recent years have brightened young graduates' job prospects for employment and wage growth, particularly for those graduating from college. Young workers are taking notice of the stronger labor market: Among 18- to 30-year-olds surveyed in 2015, 61 percent were optimistic about their employment opportunities--up from 45 percent in 2013. This paper focuses on recent high school graduates (age 17-20) and college graduates (age 21-24) who are not enrolled in further schooling. Their employment, enrollment, and wage trends were analyzed in order to glean the class of 2017's economic prospects as they begin their careers. Key findings include: (1) The labor market for young graduates remains weaker today than it was in 2000 or 2007; (2) High school graduates matter; (3) Unemployment among young graduates is close to where it was in 2007 but still far higher than in 2000; (4) Underemployment rates among young graduates have improved but remain higher than before the recession began; (5) The share of young graduates who are "idled" by the economy--neither enrolled in further schooling nor employed--remains elevated in the wake of the Great Recession; (6) The overall unemployment rates and idling rates of young graduates mask substantial racial and ethnic disparities in these measures; (7) Wages have stagnated--or fallen--for most young graduates since 2000; (8) The wage gap between male and female young high school graduates has narrowed since 2000, while the wage gap between male and female young college graduates has widened; and (9) Young graduates are burdened by substantial student loan balances. Young high school graduates were hit especially hard by the Great Recession. While there is still a long road to a healthy economy, unemployment rates have dropped significantly since the aftermath of the recession. Although the economy is slowly improving, many graduates of the Class of 2017 will face a difficult job market.

Betsy DeVos, the new U.S. secretary of education, is a strong proponent of allowing public education dollars to go to private schools through vouchers, which enable parents to use public school money to enroll their children in private schools, including religious ones. Vouchers are advanced under the rubric of "school choice"--the theory that giving parents more choices regarding where to educate their children creates competition and thus improves low-performing schools. (Charter schools, though technically funded and regulated similarly to public schools, are another key private school component of the choice argument and another top policy priority for DeVos.) DeVos's nomination and confirmation have heightened the debate over using privatization, versus other school improvement strategies, to enhance educational outcomes for students and their schools. This report seeks to inform that debate by summarizing the evidence base on vouchers. Studies of voucher programs in several U.S. cities, the states of Florida, Indiana, Louisiana, and in Chile and India, find limited improvements at best in student achievement and school district performance from even large-scale programs. In the few cases in which test scores increased, other factors, namely increased public accountability, not private school competition, seem to be more likely drivers. The report suggests that giving every parent and student a great "choice" of educational offerings is better accomplished by supporting and strengthening neighborhood public schools with a menu of proven policies, from early childhood education to after-school and summer programs to improved teacher pre-service training to improved student health and nutrition programs. All of these yield much higher returns than the minor, if any, gains that have been estimated for voucher students.

This report describes the results of research into New Jersey public school teacher compensation. The research was initiated in response to New Jersey Governor Chris Christie's attacks on New Jersey teachers' unions and his allegations that New Jersey public school teachers are overpaid. This analysis seeks to answer three questions about teacher compensation in New Jersey: (1) Are New Jersey public school teachers overcompensated? (2) How do public school teachers compare with other New Jersey employees in terms of pay equity across gender, racial, and ethnic categories? and (3) Does participation in unions increase public school teacher compensation? The report findings detailed in the report include: (1) New Jersey public school teachers are in fact undercompensated, not overcompensated; (2) Female, black, and Hispanic public school teachers enjoy greater pay equity compared with the rest of the labor market in New Jersey, in part because of the transparency afforded by collective bargaining agreements; and (3) Teachers' union membership in the United States produces measurable earnings improvements for union members, acting as an important counterbalance to the teacher pay penalty.

A founding ideal of American democracy is that merit, not accident of birth, should determine individuals' income and social status. Schools have assumed a major role in judging key elements of merit among young people--namely, academic skills, hard work, self-discipline, and cooperative behavior. Schools do so mainly by evaluating students in a variety of subjects deemed important for success later in life. No one expects outcomes at the end of the schooling process to be the same for every student, since initial ability varies, and some young people are more disciplined and willing to work harder in school than others. Yet, when students' inherent characteristics--such as race, gender, or parents' economic and social capital--rather than their innate ability, hard work, and discipline systematically affect their school outcomes, this threatens democratic ideals. Analysts have studied persistent gaps in U.S. student achievement--particularly between blacks and whites, Hispanics and whites, and different social-class groups--for many decades. They have also examined achievement gaps between boys and girls. Considerable evidence exists that race continues to be an important factor in explaining achievement differences, however, social-class differences account for much of the black-white and Hispanic-white achievement gap. Disadvantaged minority children, such as African-Americans and Hispanics, are much more likely to be poor than are white children. Furthermore, there are new questions about whether race and social class interact with gender, resulting in a particularly deleterious effect on the academic performance of disadvantaged minority boys, and whether school conditions have a greater effect on boys or girls. The good news in the literature is that achievement differences between blacks and whites and between Hispanics and whites have apparently declined over time. The bad news is that until recently the achievement gap between higher and lower-social class groups appeared to be increasing, particularly between the children in the highest-income group and everyone else. This paper advances the discussion of these issues by analyzing trends in how race/ethnicity, social class, and gender relate to academic performance in U.S. schools. The focus is on different grades and different subjects (mathematics and reading) over the past 10 years and on mathematics since the mid-1990s. Changing achievement gaps between students of different race/ethnic identification, gender, social class, and English language-ability designation in the fourth and eighth grades over the past decade and a half, and how sensitive these gaps are to school composition in terms of the proportion of poor or minority peers were analyzed. Many of those achievement gaps develop well before entry into school and, on average, continue--or get larger as students progress in school (because those who start out behind academically are more likely to attend schools with fewer resources, which may compound, instead of compensate for, initial disadvantages). Lower-income families are also less able and less likely to invest in academically enriching activities for their children outside of school. Student micro data from the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) were used to estimate the math and reading performance of students in fourth and eighth grade from 2003 to 2013, as well as students' performance in eighth-grade mathematics only from 1996 to 2013. This report makes the argument that changes of patterns of change, or lack of change in patterns have important implications for what is happening in U.S. schools and American society.

Some communities look at claims of miraculous proficiency rates or heed reports of long waiting lists for charter schools and conclude that chartering is the way to go. But if the broad, long-term policy objective is to move toward the provision of a "system of great schools" that produces an equitable distribution of excellent (or at the very least adequate) educational opportunities for all children, chartering must pass a much more thoughtful examination. Other reports have shown how high test scores and popularity of charter schools could be the byproducts of using data from cherry-picked charter schools that serve cherry-picked or culled populations. This report adds further insights for the debate on how expanding charter schools as a policy alternative achieves the broader goal. Specifically, it shows that charter expansion may increase inequity, introduce inefficiencies and redundancies, compromise financial stability, and introduce other objectionable distortions to the system that impede delivery of an equitable distribution of excellent or at least adequate education to all children. By shedding light on the risks of charter expansion, it provides elements for a decision-making process that weighs the costs against expected benefits. The report concludes with a checklist of items decision-makers must consider when evaluating charter expansion in their communities.

The importance of so-called noncognitive skills--which include abilities and traits such as critical thinking skills, problem solving skills, social skills, persistence, creativity, and self-control--manifests itself in multiple ways throughout life. This policy brief, which focuses on a set of skills that can and should be taught in schools, is based on a body of scholarly literature that tends to use the term "noncognitive skills" over others. Various fields and experts call them social and emotional skills, behavioral skills, inter- and intra-personal skills, and life skills, among other terms, but this brief does not aim to settle this issue. This brief explains why it is so important to incorporate these skills into the goals and components of public education, and lays out the steps necessary to make that happen.

Nearly 7 years into the recovery from the Great Recession, two glaring problems remain in the U.S. economy. One is a significant slowdown in the growth of productivity (the amount of output and income generated in an average hour of work). The other is the destructive rise in income inequality in recent decades due largely to big corporations and the wealthy rewriting the rules of the economy to stack the deck in their favor. Ameliorating these two problems should be policymakers' core focus. One way to address both issues--one that would spur myriad other benefits to American families--is investing ambitiously in the country's children. This report reviews the evidence on why a major investment in America's children is such a promising economic strategy that can provide substantial social benefits--and that would more than pay for itself over time. It highlights four particular tranches of benefits: (1) Benefits that stem from having more resources invested in the care and education of children in their early years; (2) Benefits that stem from providing resources directly to families with young children to help them afford early child care and pre-kindergarten; (3) Benefits that stem from increasing labor force participation by parents (mostly mothers) of young children; and (4) Benefits that stem from the professionalization of the child care workforce. This report demonstrates that such a national investment could pay off in a number of ways.

Recent developments in employment practices have increased the prevalence of non-standard work schedules--non-daytime shifts in which most hours do not fall between 8 a.m. and 4 p.m., when shifts rotate, or when schedules vary weekly or otherwise. For example, computer software now enables retail, restaurant, service, and other firms to predict hourly customer demand and delivery schedules with precision, encouraging employers to create "just-in-time" schedules in which workers are called in or sent home on short notice. By preventing many parents from adequately caring for their children, such practices adversely affect child and adolescent development. This issue brief examines evidence on the prevalence of unpredictable and non-standard work schedules, and on how such schedules impair children's development. It concludes by proposing policy solutions. Key findings include: (1) Non-standard schedules are more common among black workers and less-educated workers, and also among mothers who are low-income, younger, and have spent more years as single parents; (2) Young children and adolescents of parents working unpredictable schedules or outside standard daytime working hours are more likely to have inferior cognitive and behavioral outcomes; and (3) Policy changes should create disincentives to schedule work in ways that impede employees' ability to care for their children. A list of endnotes and references is included.

Inequalities in education outcomes such as test scores or degree attainment have been at the center of education policy debates for decades. Indeed, the first seminal national report on the state of U.S. education--the 1966 Coleman Report--examined some of these inequalities 50 years ago. Since then, researchers have examined performance gaps by income level and race or ethnicity in depth, as well as inequalities in educational attainment (degrees earned, etc.), employment opportunities, earnings, and even health status and overall well-being--all of which can be seen, partly, as long-lasting consequences of earlier education gaps (Altonji and Blank 1999; Cutler and Lleras-Muney 2010; Duncan and Murnane 2011a; Jencks and Phillips 1998; Magnuson and Waldfogel 2008; Morsy and Rothstein 2015; Rothstein 2004; Schultz 1980). This study seeks to broaden the debate by examining the education gaps that exist even before children enter formal schooling in kindergarten, and showing that the gaps extend to noncognitive skills, which are also critical for adulthood outcomes (Heckman 2008; Heckman & Kautz 2012). Regarding the analysis of early education gaps, this paper is modeled on Lee and Burkam's 2002 monograph "Inequality at the Starting Gate: Social Background Differences in Achievement as Children Begin School," which found that cognitive gaps between children of different socioeconomic backgrounds and races and ethnicities were both sizeable and statistically significant at school entry in kindergarten. Using recent data from a younger cohort of kindergarten students--the National Center for Education Statistics' Early Childhood Longitudinal Study, Kindergarten class of 2010-2011 (hereafter, ECLS-K 2010-2011 NCES), this paper delineates an updated picture of education inequalities among the nation's youngest children in school. It provides a comprehensive analysis of gaps in both cognitive and noncognitive skills among this cohort of children and concludes with a discussion of the research and policy implications of these findings. Appended are: Race and socioeconomic gaps: specifications; Data issues: Definition of variables, missing data, use of sample weights, and distribution of dependent variables; Outcome variables; Control variables (child and family characteristics or "education inputs"); Survey weights; and Distribution of outcomes. [For the summary of this report, see ED560364.]

Understanding disparities in school readiness among America's children when they begin kindergarten is critically important, now more than ever. In today's 21st century global economy, it is expected that the great majority of children will complete high school ready to enter college or begin a career, and assume their civic responsibilities. This requires strong math, reading, science, and other cognitive skills, as well as the abilities to work well and communicate eeffectively with others, solve problems creatively, and see tasks to completion. Unfortunately, the weak early starts that many children are getting make it hard to attain these societal goals. Knowing which groups of children tend to start school behind, how far behind they are, and what factors contribute to their lag, can help in developing policies to avert the early gaps that become long-term problems. "Inequalities at the Starting Gate: Cognitive and Noncognitive Skills Gaps between 2010-2011 Kindergarten Classmates" explores gaps by social class and race/ethnicity in both cognitive skills--math, reading, and executive function--and noncognitive skills such as self-control, approaches to learning, and interactions with teachers and peers. The authors refer to these skills gaps as gaps in school readiness. [For the full report, see ED560407.]

That students' social and economic characteristics shape their cognitive and behavioral outcomes is well established, yet policymakers typically resist accepting that non-school disadvantages necessarily depress outcomes. Rather, they look to better schools and teachers to close achievement gaps, and consistently come up short. This report describes how social class characteristics plausibly depress achievement and suggests policies to address them. It focuses on five characteristics for purposes of illustration: (1) parenting practices that impede children's intellectual and behavioral development; (2) single parenthood; (3) parents' irregular work schedules; (4) inadequate access to primary and preventive health care; and (5) exposure to and absorption of lead in the blood. Parental unemployment and low wages, housing instability, concentration of disadvantage in segregated neighborhoods, stress, malnutrition, and health problems like asthma are among other harmful characteristics. This analysis suggests that policies other than school improvement should be given strong consideration, as should the possibility that at least some of these policies may be more powerful levers for raising the achievement of disadvantaged children than the school improvement strategies that policymakers conventionally consider and advocate. A list of combined endnotes and references is provided.

Multiple traits compose a broad definition of what it means to be an educated person. Indisputably, being an educated person is associated with having a certain command of a curriculum, and knowledge of theories and facts from various disciplines. This paper contends that noncognitive skills should be an explicit pillar of education policy. It contributes to the growing interest in these skills by reviewing what is known about noncognitive skills, including what they are, why they matter, and how they enter into the education process. The author then extends the discussion by providing a tentative list of skills that are both important for and can be nurtured by schools. Contrasting what is known about noncognitive skills with how policy currently treats them, the author contends that noncognitive skills deserve more attention in the education policy arena. Toward this end, she proposes some guidelines for how to design education policies that better nurture them, and describe the kinds of research needed to inform policy and practice. This paper is composed of two main sections. The first defines noncognitive skills and explores the evidence-based findings on their role in education and adulthood outcomes, and on how they are nurtured. The second section examines how education policy could help schools better nurture noncognitive skills. It includes some suggestions for researchers on how their work can provide new evidence geared toward policymakers, and a discussion of the goals of public education, education reform, and accountability.

Closing achievement gaps--disparities in academic achievement between minority and white students, and between low-income and higher-income students--has long been an unrealized goal of U.S. education policy. It has now been 60 years since the Supreme Court declared "separate but equal" schools unconstitutional in "Brown v. Board of Education." With income inequality at record levels, the interactions between poverty and race remain strong and troubling and continue to impede educational progress for many students. One result of such interactions is ongoing segregation at both the neighborhood and school levels. In this paper Garcia and Weiss use data from a recent representative cohort of U.S. students entering kindergarten to describe how segregated schools are by both race and income. Next, the authors compare the racial and socioeconomic status composition of those kindergarten classes with what they would look like if they represented the characteristics of the U.S. student body overall. Garcia and Weiss explore the differences in students' other characteristics based on the racial makeup of their own classes. Finally, Garcia and Weiss analyze how the students' academic performance changes over that first year, measured by their place on the score distribution in math, reading, and approaches to learning at entry in the fall and again in the spring, and by level of segregation in the school.

The Great Recession officially ended in June 2009. However, the labor market has made agonizingly slow progress toward a full recovery, and the slack that remains continues to be devastating for workers of all ages. The weak labor market has been, and continues to be, very tough on young workers. Though the labor market is headed in the right direction, it is improving very slowly, and the job prospects for young high school and college graduates remain dim. A key finding of this paper is that there is little evidence that young adults have been able to "shelter in school" from the labor market effects of the Great Recession. This briefing paper examines the labor market that confronts young graduates who are not enrolled in further schooling--specifically, high school graduates age 17-20 and college graduates age 21-24--in an attempt to focus as closely as possible on the labor market outcomes of those who are starting their careers. Key findings include: (1) Unemployment of young graduates is extremely high today because young workers "always" experience disproportionate increases in unemployment during periods of labor market weakness--and the Great Recession and its aftermath is the longest, most severe period of economic weakness in more than seven decades; (2) In today's labor market, there are nearly 1 million "missing" young workers; (3) Unemployment and underemployment rates among young graduates are improving but remain substantially higher than before the recession began; (4) Overall unemployment rates of young graduates mask substantial disparities in unemployment by race and ethnicity; (5) The large increases since 2007 in the unemployment and underemployment rates of young college graduates, and in the share of employed young college graduates working in jobs that do not require a college degree, underscore that the current unemployment crisis among young workers did not arise because today's young adults lack the right education or skills; (6) The long-run wage trends for young graduates are bleak, with wages substantially lower today than in 2000; (7) The erosion of job quality for young graduates is also evident in their declining likelihood of receiving employer-provided health insurance or pensions; (8) Graduating in a bad economy has long-lasting economic consequences; (9) The cost of higher education has grown far more rapidly than median family income, leaving students with little choice but to take out loans; and (10) Because the scarcity of job opportunities for the Class of 2014 is a symptom of weak demand for workers more broadly, what will bring down young workers' unemployment rates most quickly and effectively are policies that will generate strong job growth overall. Tables and figures are appended.

During the past year, Wisconsin state legislators debated a series of bills aimed at closing low-performing public schools and replacing them with privately run charter schools. These proposals were particularly targeted at Milwaukee, the state's largest and poorest school district. Ultimately, the only legislation enacted was a bill that modestly increases school reporting requirements, without stipulating consequences for low performance. Nevertheless, the more ambitious proposals will likely remain at the core of Wisconsin's debates over education policy, and legislative leaders have made clear their desire to revisit them in next year's session. To help inform these deliberations, this report addresses the most comprehensive set of reforms put forward in the 2013-2014 legislative session. Backers of these reforms are particularly enamored of a new type of charter school represented by the Rocketship chain of schools--a low-budget operation that relies on young and inexperienced teachers rather than more veteran and expensive faculty, that reduces the curriculum to a near-exclusive focus on reading and math, and that replaces teachers with online learning and digital applications for a significant portion of the day. Rocketship proposes that its model--dubbed "blended learning" for its combination of in-person and computerized instruction--can cut costs while raising low-income students' test scores (Rocketship Education 2011). The call for public schools to be replaced by such tech-heavy, teacher-light operations comes from some of the most powerful actors in local and national politics: the major corporate lobbies, including Wisconsin Manufacturers and Commerce, Americans for Prosperity, and the Metropolitan Milwaukee Association of Commerce (MMAC). It is these groups, rather than parents or community organizations, that provided the impetus for legislators to consider proposals for mass school closure and privatization in Milwaukee. This report evaluates the "blended learning" model of education exemplified by Rocketship and seeks to understand how the "school accountability" legislation debated during the most recent legislative session would likely affect Milwaukee schools. This briefing paper also explains how such proposals might fit within the broader economic agenda of both local and national corporate lobbies. Above all, the report questions why an educational model deemed substandard for more privileged suburban children is being so vigorously promoted--perhaps even forced--on poor children in Milwaukee.

May 17 is the 60th anniversary of "Brown v. Board of Education," the U.S. Supreme Court's 1954 decision that prohibited Southern states from segregating schools by race. The "Brown" decision annihilated the "separate but equal" rule, previously sanctioned by the Supreme Court in 1896, that permitted states and school districts to designate some schools "whites-only" and others "Negroes-only." More important, by focusing the nation's attention on subjugation of blacks, it helped fuel a wave of freedom rides, sit-ins, voter registration efforts, and other actions leading ultimately to civil rights legislation in the late 1950s and 1960s. But "Brown" was unsuccessful in its purported mission--to undo the school segregation that persists as a central feature of American public education today. This issue brief highlights key elements of the American education system that have evolved in the wake of "Brown." Among these key elements are: (1) Although "Brown" stimulated a civil rights movement that desegregated many facets of American society, it was least successful in integrating education, the decision's aim; (2) Initial school integration gains following "Brown" stalled and black children are more racially and socioeconomically isolated today than at any time since data have been available (1970); (3) Academic achievement of African Americans has improved dramatically in recent decades, but whites' has as well, so racial achievement gaps remain huge; and (4) Schools for black children had enormous resource shortages in 1954. Inequalities still exist in some places, although they are much smaller. But resource equality itself is insufficient; disadvantaged students require much greater resources than middle-class white students to prepare for success in school.

School reform alone cannot substantially improve the performance of the poorest African American students. This performance problem must be addressed primarily by improving the social and economic conditions that bring too many children to school unprepared to take advantage of what schools have to offer. Integrating disadvantaged black students into schools where more privileged students predominate can narrow the black-white achievement gap, but the conventional wisdom of contemporary education policy notwithstanding, segregated schools with poorly performing students cannot be "turned around" while remaining racially isolated. The racial isolation of schools cannot be remedied without undoing the racial isolation of the neighborhoods in which they are located. This paper discusses the importance of remembering the history of racial segregation, which is a step towards confronting the problems that segregation has created and will continue to create throughout generations. Remembering and learning racial history is the foundation for an understanding that aggressive policies to desegregate metropolitan areas are not only desirable, but a constitutional obligation. [This work was presented at the Atlantic Live Conference, "Reinventing the War on Poverty," March 6, 2014, in Washington, D.C.]