The Heartland Institute

A bill offering South Carolina parents education tax credits and allowing tax-credit scholarships passed the House March 29—a first for any such measure since school choice became key to the Republican agenda in 2004. With a 62-38 vote, the bill now awaits discussion by the Senate’s Finance Committee. It likely faces an uphill ...

There is strong evidence that instructional materials play a pivotal role in student learning and, compared to more popular reforms like merit pay and school turnarounds, changing them for the better is easy, inexpensive, and quick, conclude Matthew Chingos and Grover Whitehurst in a report for the Brookings Institution. At the ...

Idaho Gov. C.L. Otter signed a bill to lift the state’s cap on the number of new charter schools allowed to open each year. “Idaho does not rank very high among states with charter schools and corresponding charter school laws,” noted state Rep. Bob Nonini (R-Coeur d'Alene), the bill sponsor. The new law overrides two charter ...

On the first day of class last fall, I asked my college students to spend ten minutes writing a brief essay explaining their definition of the American Dream and what they expected the federal government to do to help them achieve it. The first part of all their essays was pretty standard stuff. They wanted to have a ...

A new survey finds huge majorities of teachers are satisfied with their jobs and embrace limiting tenure, more rigorous evaluations that include student achievement growth as a measure, and ending last in, first out hiring and firing practices. Primary Sources 2012: America’s Teachers on the Teaching Profession is the second ...

Many high schools do not offer sufficiently rigorous curricula to graduate college- or career-ready students, a new report by Center for Public Education concludes. The report notes 3,000 high schools offer no classes in Algebra II, a subject tested on the SAT and important for college preparation. This is approximately one ...

The South Carolina legislature voted to merge two versions of a bill that could increase the number of public charter schools in the state. Key to H.B. 3241 are measures that would diversify the types of sponsoring organizations, launch a loan program, and allow greater flexibility in charter school course and extracurricular ...

Louisiana legislators have proposed an education reform that is garnering significant national attention: the Parent Trigger. The legislation, first passed in California, is currently being drafted in a dozen other states. The Louisiana Parent Trigger would allow a simple majority of parents at a school to “trigger” its conversion ...

In February, in a controversy known as "Fakegate ," a scientist impersonated a Heartland Institute board member to obtain internal documents and released them to climate bloggers. One of the findings within the documents was a note Heartland planned to spend $200,000 creating "educational material suitable for K-12 students on ...

School choice programs don’t threaten public school budgets, according to a new study by the Friedman Foundation for Educational Choice. A popular argument against school choice programs is allowing children to leave public schools leaves the school with fewer resources to pay fixed costs, notes study author Benjamin Scafidi ...

A pair of school choice initiatives backed by Maine’s governor has received a cold legislative reception, including the demise of a proposal to open the state’s publicly funded tuition program to religious schools. Two of four education bills supported this year by Gov. Paul LePage (R) would expand Maine parents’ power to select ...

While education reformers focus on big schemes like Common Core standards and teacher evaluations, little over the several past decades has seemed to change about American education. Author Beverlee Jobrack, a long-time textbook editor for SRA-McGraw Hill, explains in Tyranny of the Textbook that some of the reason why is that ...

This section of Reason Foundation's Annual Privatization Report 2011 provides a comprehensive overview of the latest on school choice, charter schools, voucher and tax credit programs, and other news from the education sector. Topics include: In 2011 15 states offered a total of 26 school voucher and tax credit programs with ...

Ballooning costs in recent years indicate that there is significant room for increased efficiencies in Texas schools that would free up funds to improve educational instruction without the tax increases sought in the recent lawsuits filed by school districts against the state, writes James Golsan in a policy brief for the Texas ...

Public schools’ tradition of social promotion—promoting children to the next grade despite their lack of academic knowledge and skills—degrades U.S. school quality. Whether judged by the state departments’ of education proficiency standards or by the well-regarded National Assessment for Educational Progress (NAEP), large numbers of ...

The New Hampshire Senate on March 21 passed a bill that would create a statewide education tax-credit scholarship program. Senate Bill 372 would allow nonprofit organizations to collect corporate donations for scholarships worth up to $2,500 so students from low- and middle-income families could attend the public or private school ...

Top young soccer players around the nation will now have to choose between playing a ten-month season with top teams and a shorter season with their public school home team. The United States Soccer Federation recently announced it would extend its Development Academy season to nearly year-round to match international competition ...

Legislation under consideration in New Jersey would require annual evaluations and evidence of student achievement growth for a teacher to earn tenure and would make it easier to fire ineffective teachers. Senate Bill 1455 resembles reforms proposed by Republican Gov. Chris Christie, including requiring student achievement constitute ...

Michigan Gov. Rick Snyder signed a bill to prevent public schools from automatically deducting union dues from employee paychecks. The new law, formerly House Bill 4929, removes the state from its position as middleman between unions and their members, he said. "This legislation furthers the goal of good government by promoting ...

High-profile writers and publications have recently written the Parent Trigger needs to change drastically, or that parents can't be trusted with its power. RiShawn Biddle, editor of Dropout Nation and a contributor to the American Spectator, explains why these ideas are foolish, demeaning, and antithetical to school choice. See ...