The Heartland Institute

Texas legislators are considering strengthening an education reform that has garnered significant national attention: the Parent Trigger. The legislation, first passed in California, has been considered in approximately 20 other states. A Parent Trigger allows a simple majority of parents at a school to “trigger” one of several ...

The Michigan legislature is considering in its 2014 budget a measure that would prohibit the state department of education from using public funds to implement Common Core, national education standards and tests in math and English that 46 states, including Michigan, have adopted. Another bill is in play that would withdraw ...

A consortium of consultants and science educators has released its final draft of what it plans will become national education standards for K-12 science. They are titled Next Generation Science Standards but are also Common Core science standards because created by the same groups and designed to fit with Common Core math ...

Included in President Barack Obama’s 2014 budget is a proposal to expand federally funded pre-K, to be paid for by raising the federal cigarette tax from $1.01 per pack to $1.95. Research on preschools has shown they have a limited positive effect on the very poorest and neediest children, and research on broader government ...

Maine legislators are considering an education reform that has garnered significant national attention: the Parent Trigger. The legislation, first passed in California, has been considered in approximately 20 other states, and legislators in five states have stated their intention to propose it in early 2013. A Parent Trigger would ...

South Carolina legislators are considering an education reform that has garnered significant national attention: the Parent Trigger. The legislation, first passed in California, has been considered in approximately 20 other states, and legislators in five states have announced their intentions to propose it this year. A Parent Trigger ...

A wave of political rhetoric and action immediately followed the Newtown, Connecticut school shooting that ended 27 lives, in which a mentally ill young man used his mother’s legally acquired guns to kill her, 20 children, and five educators before shooting himself. Many prominent politicians insisted this atrocity showed the ...

Missouri legislators are considering an education reform that has garnered significant national attention: the Parent Trigger. The legislation, first passed in California, has been considered in approximately 20 other states, and state legislators in four states have stated their intentions to propose it in early 2013. A Parent ...

Oklahoma legislators will soon consider an education reform that has garnered significant national attention: the Parent Trigger. The legislation, first passed in California, has been considered in approximately 20 other states, and legislators in four states (including Oklahoma) have stated intentions to propose it in early 2013 ...

Nevada legislators are considering an education reform that has garnered significant national attention: the Parent Trigger. The legislation, first passed in California, has been considered in approximately 20 other states, and legislators in four states have stated their intentions to propose it in early 2013. A Parent Trigger ...

The United States has increased its teaching force 250 percent since 1950, reducing teacher-student ratios from 1:22 to 1:15, but the expansion has not brought higher teacher quality. Teachers tend to have below-average SAT, ACT, LSAT, and GRE scores, and statistics show their college coursework is among the least challenging ...

A Georgia legislator plans to propose an education reform that has garnered significant national attention: the Parent Trigger. The legislation, first passed in California, has been considered in approximately 20 other states, and state legislators in four have stated their intentions to propose it in early 2013. Though the Georgia ...

In the past three years, more than 20 states have passed legislation modifying teacher evaluation systems, and more have committed to do the same in Race to the Top or No Child Left Behind waiver applications. Legislators and administrators have done so because decades of data have shown most evaluation systems rate nearly ...

A new report pinpoints education savings accounts as the next-generation school voucher system for states committed to real education reform. ESAs deposit state per-pupil education spending into an account that parents control, letting them choose how to spend their child’s education dollars among different options such as online ...

Polls consistently show voters generally think public schools need more money – but they estimate school spending is at most half of what it really is. Education spending has become a matter of much debate, particularly with the housing market crash having reduced the property taxes that largely fund public schools and related ...

Parents and voters like the idea of local control in education, but they and politicians have differing definitions of it. This makes the concept a bit of a weasel word—something everyone agrees to but which they shape to fit their own interests and political philosophy. Some liberals oppose local control because they prefer ...

Of the 41 states that allow charter schools, approximately 18 allow viable multiple authorizers to applicants hoping to open the schools, which are fully public but given freedom in matters such as curriculum, budget, and staffing in return for a higher likelihood of closure and tighter oversight. Most states allow local school ...

In the 2011 federal budget deal to raise the nation’s debt ceiling, Congress set up automatic cuts to federal spending that would kick in if they could not agree on how to cut each department specifically. They couldn’t reach a deal, so the automatic cuts, called “sequestration,” are set to kick in on January 2, 2013. The ...

As significant education reforms sweep the country, Arkansas has made few consequential reforms in the past decade. The state offers practically no school choice and severely limits public charter schools. Arkansas has remained in the top five spenders on education as a percentage of the state budget, yet its students score ...

In 2012, the Republican and Democratic parties held their national conventions sandwiched around Labor Day weekend. As is customary, the two released revised party platforms, both including sections on education policy. The Democratic Party platform largely supported and praised President Barack Obama’s education policies, including ...