The Report Card with Nat Malkus

What will last Tuesday’s elections mean for education? Will President Trump actually eliminate the Department of Education? What does the future of school choice look like? Will Democrats and Republicans team up on workforce issues? And who will be the next secretary of education? On this episode of The Report Card, Nat Malkus discusses these questions and more with Derrell Bradford, Preston Cooper, Ginny Gentles, Heather Harding, and Rick Hess.Derrell Bradford is the president of 50CAN: The 50-State Campaign for Achievement Now.Preston Cooper is a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute, where he works on higher education ROI, student loans, and higher education reform.Virginia Gentles is the director of the Education Freedom and Parental Rights Initiative at the Defense of Freedom Institute.Heather Harding is the executive director of the Campaign for Our Shared Future.Frederick M. Hess is the director of Education Policy Studies at the American Enterprise Institute and an affiliate of AEI’s James Q. Wilson Program in K–12 Education Studies, where he works on K–12 and higher education issues. Note: This episode is adapted from an American Enterprise Institute event held on November 6. A video recording of the event can be found here.

On this episode of The Report Card, Nat Malkus speaks with David Figlio about school choice, accountability, and peer effects. Nat and David discuss how school choice programs affect students who remain in traditional public schools; what other choice mechanisms can tell us about universal ESAs; the effects of school accountability on life outcomes; holding students back; the teaching quality of non-tenure-track professors; the importance of cultivating researcher-district relationships; whether peer effects are understudied; and boys named Sue. David Figlio is the Gordon Fyfe Professor of Economics and Education at the University of Rochester. Previously, he was provost at the University of Rochester and dean of the School of Education and Social Policy at Northwestern University.Show Notes:Competitive Effects of Charter SchoolsEffects of Maturing Private School Choice Programs on Public School StudentsSchool Accountability, Long-Run Criminal Activity, and Self-SufficiencyBoys Named Sue: Disruptive Children and their Peers

The College Board is one of the most influential education organizations in America: The SAT plays a large role in determining what college many students attend, and the AP program shapes what many students study both in high school and in college.This is a lot of power for one company to have, and naturally raises some questions. How does the College Board understand its role in the college admissions process, and how does it think about the college admissions landscape? What is the purpose of the AP program, and who determines what gets made into an AP course?On this episode of The Report Card, Nat Malkus discusses these questions, and more, with David Coleman. Nat and David discuss why many colleges are requiring the SAT once again; the effects of test optional policies on boys; how the rise of AI affects the college admissions process; why high school students are so bored; how to make college admissions less cutthroat; whether we should abolish grading and replace it with standardized testing; AP scoring recalibration; whether 6 and 7 should be added to the AP scoring scale; the redesigned SAT; how the AP program balances its goals of promoting access and encouraging excellence; and the extent to which the College Board determines what gets taught in American classrooms.David Coleman is the CEO of the College Board.

On this episode of The Report Card, Nat Malkus speaks with Cass Sunstein about campus free speech. Nat and Cass discuss the legal considerations involved in campus protests, safe spaces, and the removal of sexually explicit books from elementary school libraries; how sectarian colleges should balance religious interests with free speech protections; when it is appropriate for universities to issue statements on world affairs; the difficulty of testifying before Congress; whether governors can intentionally change the ideological character of colleges in their states; designing effective nudges to combat chronic absenteeism; the effects of sludge on academic inquiry; why free speech doesn’t come naturally to people; the complexity of First Amendment law; manipulation; whether we should replace Supreme Court justices with AI; and much more.Cass Sunstein is the Robert Walmsley University Professor at Harvard, the author of many books on law and behavioral economics, and the most cited legal scholar in America. His most recent book, Campus Free Speech: A Pocket Guide, came out in September.Show Notes:Campus Free Speech: A Pocket GuideOnly the First Amendment Can Protect Students, Campuses and Speech

There’s a popular narrative according to which the financial benefits of going to college aren’t what they once were. College is increasingly unaffordable. College doesn’t pay off like it used to. And college is only worth it if you go to the most selective schools.But is this narrative right? Are college costs going up? How do college costs in the US compare with college costs in other countries? What is the return on investment (ROI) like for students at different schools? How does ROI differ by major? And is there a student loan crisis?On this episode of The Report Card, Nat Malkus discusses these questions, and more, with Preston Cooper.Preston Cooper is a Senior Fellow at the American Enterprise Institute, where he studies ROI in higher education, student lending, and higher education reform.Show Notes:ROI in Higher Education (Estimates ROI for 53,000 different degree and certificate programs.)

On this episode of The Report Card, Nat Malkus speaks with Brian Jacob about the ways in which the pandemic changed the grammar of schooling. Nat and Brian discuss the pandemic’s effects on student technology use, parent-teacher communication, and individualized instruction; why pandemic-era changes seem more durable in high schools and middle schools than in elementary schools; whether charter schools changed as much during the pandemic as conventional public schools did; what the pandemic’s effects on schools can teach us about how schools will use AI; whether changes to schooling are driven by students’ needs or by other factors; whether teachers are optimistic about the state of schooling; hybrid education, ESSA, and the juvenile detention system; and more.Brian Jacob is the Walter H. Annenberg Professor of Education Policy and Professor of Economics at the Gerald R. Ford School of Public Policy at the University of Michigan.Show Notes:Did COVID-19 Shift the “Grammar of Schooling”? (coauthored with Cristina Stanojevich)The Lasting Effects of the COVID-19 Pandemic on K-12 Schooling: Evidence from a Nationally Representative Teacher Survey

On this episode of The Report Card, Nat Malkus speaks with Carey Wright about her tenure as State Superintendent of Education in Mississippi and the work ahead of her as State Superintendent of Schools in Maryland. Nat and Carey discuss the Mississippi Miracle; how to get teachers to buy in to major interventions; professional development; the purpose of grade retention policies; math instruction; the importance of the education leadership environment in a state; why some state leaders may care less about student achievement than others; state-district relationships; the importance of education data; teacher coaches; the education press; Maryland’s recent NAEP declines; the Blueprint for Maryland's Future; accountability; the relationship between education spending and student achievement; overcoming learning loss; post-pandemic chronic absenteeism; and more.Carey Wright is State Superintendent of Schools in Maryland. Previously, from 2013 to 2022, she served as State Superintendent of Education in Mississippi.

Note: This episode originally aired in June 2023.What does a good school look like? How does a good school operate? What does a good school do differently? There are probably many correct answers to these questions, but on this episode of The Report Card we want to narrow it down and focus on one particular school, Michaela, that has a very particular set of answers to these questions. Located near London’s Wembley Stadium, Michaela is a free school that opened its doors in 2014 and today has the highest GCSE value-added score in all of England. Michaela is known for its strict behavioral practices, its unique school culture, and its unabashed promotion of small-c conservative values.On this episode of The Report Card, Nat speaks with Katharine Birbalsingh, the founder and head teacher of Michaela Community School. Nat and Katharine discuss school culture, the importance of values in education, school lunches, cell phones in schools, discipline and student behavior, teacher feedback and observation, and more.Show Notes:Michaela: The Power of CultureBattle Hymn of the Tiger Teachers: The Michaela WayBritain's Strictest Headmistress

During the pandemic, the federal government sent $190 billion in ESSER relief funding to America’s schools. Among other things, ESSER was intended to help students catch up from pandemic learning loss—but did it work? Did ESSER help kids catch up? Did it help some students more than others? And should the federal government spend more to address COVID learning loss? On this episode of The Report Card, Nat Malkus discusses these questions, and more, with Dan Goldhaber.Dan Goldhaber is the Director of the Center for Analysis of Longitudinal Data in Education Research (CALDER) at the American Institutes for Research and the Director of the Center for Education Data & Research (CEDR) at the University of Washington. Along with Grace Falken, he is also the co-author of a new paper: ESSER and Student Achievement: Assessing the Impacts of the Largest One-Time Federal Investment in K12 Schools.Show Notes:ESSER and Student Achievement: Assessing the Impacts of the Largest One-Time Federal Investment in K12 Schools Impacts of Academic Recovery Interventions on Student Achievement in 2022-23

Over the past couple years, the education world has seen a renewed push for phonics instruction, often called “the science of reading.” But how science-based is the science of reading movement? Will the current push for phonics last? And what do kids need so that the reading gains they experience from phonics don’t fade away by the time they reach eighth grade?On this episode of The Report Card, Nat Malkus discusses these questions, and more, with Timothy Shanahan. Nat and Tim discuss the differences between balanced literacy and phonics, how much of an improvement balanced literacy is over phonics, previous efforts to promote phonics and why they went by the wayside, whether the current science of reading movement will be durable, textbook reviews, the extent to which practices promoted by science of reading advocates are science-based, the gap between reading instruction research and reading instruction practice, why many students who can decode well nonetheless have poor reading comprehension, grade-level texts and the importance of giving students texts that aren’t too easy, the relationship between love of reading and reading ability, what skills students acquire as they become better readers, disciplinary literacy, the future of reading instruction, the extent to which reading achievement could improve with better instructional practices, and more.Timothy Shanahan is Distinguished Professor Emeritus at the University of Illinois at Chicago, where he was Founding Director of the UIC Center for Literacy. Previously, he was Director of Reading for the Chicago Public Schools and a member of the National Reading Panel and the advisory board of the National Institute for Literacy.Show Notes:What about the Textbook Reviews?How Do You Know If It Really Is the Science of Reading?More on Hanford: Phonics Reform and Literacy LevelsLimiting Children to Books They Can Already ReadWhat Is Disciplinary Literacy and Why Does It Matter?

In the spring, campuses saw a wave of protests erupt over the war in Gaza. These protests, along with the controversial ways in which universities handled them, raised important questions about free expression on campus, the role that university administrations play in maintaining and fostering a culture of free expression, and the role of university presidents.On this episode of The Report Card, Nat Malkus discusses these questions, and more, with John W. Boyer. Nat and John discuss parallels and contrasts between recent campus protests and Vietnam War protests; the challenges university administrations face in dealing with protests; the Chicago Principles and the origins of the University of Chicago’s culture of free expression; what it takes to actually develop a robust culture of free expression on campus; the extent to which university administrations shape campus culture; the role of university presidents; the presidencies of William Rainey Harper, Robert Maynard Hutchins, and Robert Zimmer; why many university presidents today seem to lack a strong vision for what their universities should look like; why so few universities are started today; donor activism; the politicization of the university; the German research university; core curricula and the aims of liberal education; how the University of Chicago increased enrollments in and applications to the College over the last thirty years; balancing institutional history and institutional change; and more. John W. Boyer is Senior Advisor to the President and the Martin A. Ryerson Distinguished Service Professor in the Department of History at the University of Chicago, where he served as Dean of the College from 1992 through 2023. He is also the author of The University of Chicago: A History, the second edition of which comes out in August.Show Notes:The University of Chicago: A History (Note: This is a link to the first edition. A link to the updated second edition will be provided when it becomes available.)John W. Boyer, Dean of the College for 30 Years, in His Own and His Colleagues’ Words

In March of 2023, shortly after Khan Academy launched Khanmigo, its AI tutor and teaching assistant, Sal Khan came on the podcast to discuss Khanmigo and his hopes for AI in education more generally. On this episode of The Report Card, Nat Malkus speaks with Sal Khan again to hear what he has learned since launching Khanmigo and how his thoughts on AI in education have changed over the last year. Sal Khan is the founder and CEO of Khan Academy, a nonprofit educational organization with over 165 million registered users in more than 190 countries, and the author of Brave New Words: How AI Will Revolutionize Education (and Why That's a Good Thing).Show Notes:GPT-4o Math DemoKhanmigo Essay Tool

On this episode of The Report Card, Nat Malkus speaks with Mark Schneider, who recently finished up his six-year tenure as Director of the Institute of Education Sciences (IES). Nat and Mark discuss the past, present, and future of IES; what’s wrong with the What Works Clearinghouse; student privacy protections; NAEP; the state of special education research; why education research isn’t replicated; scalability; whether most education research is useful, usable, and used; why we need a DARPA for education; whether education research should be profitable; the incentive structures in education research; and more. Mark Schneider is Distinguished Professor Emeritus of Political Science at SUNY Stony Brook. He was previously Director of the Institute of Education Sciences, a visiting scholar at AEI, a vice president and Institute Fellow at the American Institutes for Research, and Commissioner of the National Center for Education Statistics.

Are smartphones and social media bad for kids’ mental health? According to a number of recent books, articles, and op-eds, the answer is an emphatic yes: The rise of smartphones and social media corresponded not only to a rise in the incidence of mental health problems but to a decline in academic performance. Indeed, in popular media, there almost seems to be a consensus emerging: It’s the phones, stupid.But is the popular media consensus correct? What does the research say? And what is the state of the research? On this episode of The Report Card, Nat Malkus discusses these questions and more with Pete Etchells.Pete Etchells is Professor of Psychology and Science Communication at Bath Spa University in the UK and is the author of Unlocked: The Real Science of Screen Time (and how to spend it better).Show Notes:Unlocked: The Real Science of Screen Time (and how to spend it better) (Note: Unlocked is not yet available in US stores but can be purchased from UK booksellers and shipped to the US.)Scroll On: Why Your Screen-Time Habits Aren’t as Bad as You Think They AreLost in a Good Game: Why We Play Video Games and What They Can Do for UsSmartphone Bans, Student Outcomes and Mental Health

Over the past couple weeks, as campus protests and crackdowns on campus protests have captured the nation’s attention, it has become increasingly clear that something is wrong with the civic culture at universities. But how do we change course? How do we create a healthier civic culture on campus? And how can we train the next generation of Americans both to respect freedom of speech and be respectful in disagreement?On this episode of The Report Card, Nat Malkus discusses these questions, and more, with Paul Carrese. Nat and Paul discuss the proper content and aims of civic education, why civic education matters, whether civic education is too boring, how individuals benefit from civic education, whether civic education is conservative, why universities have turned away from civic education, whether civic education is indoctrination, Arizona State University's School of Civic and Economic Thought and Leadership, when it is appropriate for state governments to get involved in deciding what courses college students should take, why private universities should create schools of civic thought, and more.Paul Carrese is a professor in the School of Civic and Economic Thought and Leadership at Arizona State University and served as its founding director from 2016–2023.Show Notes:How Civics Can Remedy Higher Education’s DeclineA New Birth of Freedom in Higher Education: Civic Institutes at Public UniversitiesCivic Thought and Leadership: A Higher Civics to Sustain American Constitutional Democracy

During the pandemic, the federal government sent $190 billion in COVID relief funds to America’s schools. These funds, known as ESSER (or the Elementary and Secondary School Emergency Relief Fund), changed school budgets across the country. But this September, ESSER will come to an end, meaning that—on average—schools will have to reduce their budgets by over $1,000 per student.How will schools respond? What will get cut? And what should education leaders know to minimize the impacts of the funding cliff? On this episode of The Report Card, Nat Malkus discusses these questions, and more, with Marguerite Roza. Marguerite Roza is a research professor at Georgetown University and the director of the Edunomics Lab.Show Notes:School Boards Face Their Most Difficult Budget Season Ever. Many Are UnpreparedThe ESSER Fiscal Cliff Will Have Serious Implications for Student EquityNational Education Resource Database on Schools (NERDS)How Within-District Spending Inequities Help Some Schools to Fail

On this episode of The Report Card, Nat Malkus speaks with David Steiner about coherence and fragmentation; why curricula, teacher training programs, and assessments should be aligned (and why they usually aren’t); SEL; where Common Core fell short; E.D. Hirsch and the importance of teaching content; why economics, music, and philosophy should be taken more seriously in secondary education than they usually are; AP exams and CTE; teachers unions, master’s pay premiums, and schools of education; whether school is boring; why American teachers tend to focus more on students and less on subject matter than teachers abroad; the state of the humanities in American education; teaching students Ancient Greek; how not to teach Shakespeare; and more.David Steiner is Executive Director of the Johns Hopkins Institute for Education Policy, Professor of Education at Johns Hopkins University, and the author of A Nation at Thought: Restoring Wisdom in America's Schools. He was previously Dean at the Hunter College School of Education and the Commissioner of Education for New York State.Show Notes:A Nation at Thought: Restoring Wisdom in America's SchoolsArguing Identity: Session ThreeMake Sense of the Research: A Primer for Educational LeadersDon’t Give Up on Curriculum Reform Just Yet

Over the last couple years, a number of states have enacted new universal education savings account (ESA) programs. Republicans have led these efforts with near universal opposition from Democrats, but should more Democrats support ESAs, especially because ESAs would seem to more greatly benefit the urban areas that Democrats tend to represent than the rural areas that Republicans tend to represent?On this episode of The Report Card, four Democrats—Marcus Brandon, Ravi Gupta, Bethany Little, and Graig Meyer—debate whether their fellow Democrats should support ESAs. Nat, Marcus, Ravi, Bethany, and Graig discuss whether ESAs are regressive, whether Democratic voters support ESAs, whether Democrats should focus on private school choice instead of public school choice, and more.Marcus Brandon is the executive director of CarolinaCAN and was previously a state representative in the North Carolina House of Representatives.Ravi Gupta is founder of The Branch and was previously the founder and CEO of RePublic Schools, a network of charter schools in the South. Bethany Little is a principal at EducationCounsel. She has spent twenty years working in government and non-profit organizations, including the White House and the U.S. Department of Education.Graig Meyer is a state senator in North Carolina and previously served in the North Carolina House of Representatives.Note: This episode is adapted from the most recent installment of the American Enterprise Institute’s Education Policy Debate Series, which was held at AEI on February 29. A video recording of the debate can be found here.

On this episode of The Report Card, Nat Malkus speaks with Rick Hess and Mike McShane about their new book, Getting Education Right: A Conservative Vision for Improving Early Childhood, K–12, and College. Nat, Rick, and Mike discuss what principles a conservative vision for education should be grounded in, whether No Child Left Behind was conservative, why family policy should be part of a conservative vision for education, why now is an opportune time for conservatives to take the lead on education, the pandemic’s effects on the politics of schooling, the culture wars, where conservatives have come up short on education in the past, the value of bipartisanship in education, where civics education has gone wrong, the state of education research, parental rights and parental responsibilities, and more.Frederick M. Hess is a senior fellow and the director of education policy studies at AEI.Michael McShane is the Director of National Research at EdChoice. Show Notes:Getting Education Right: A Conservative Vision for Improving Early Childhood, K–12, and CollegeParents’ Rights, Yes. But Parent Responsibilities, TooThe Party of Education in 2024Four States That Are Leading the Charge for Conservative Education

During the pandemic, homeschooling rates spiked, reaching unprecedented levels. And although they have fallen some since then, homeschooling rates remain far higher than anything we saw before the pandemic.On this episode of The Report Card, Nat Malkus speaks with Angela Watson about what is driving this change, what we can expect from homeschooling in the coming years, and what we know about homeschooling more broadly.Angela Watson is a senior research fellow at the Johns Hopkins Institute for Education Policy and an assistant research professor at the Johns Hopkins School of Education. She is also the creator of The Johns Hopkins Institute for Education Policy’s Homeschool Hub and the director of the Homeschool Research Lab.Show Notes:Homeschool HubParent-Created "Schools" in the USInvestigating Declining Trends in Arts Field Trip Attendance