Education Curriculum
Blog
America’s 250th Birthday and the Collapse of Civics Knowledge
Civics, according to education writer and longtime Los Angeles teacher Larry Sand, is “the study of what it means to be a citizen, focusing on the rights, duties, and responsibilities of community members,” and also “understanding how government functions, including citizens’ roles in voting, obeying laws, and participating in the ...
Classroom Ideology
Military schools have cracked the code for educating diverse students
America’s military schools are ranked the best in the nation. California should take note. The U.S. Department of Defense, through its Department of Defense Education Activity (DODEA) program, operates 160 K-12 schools in the U.S. and overseas. These schools at American military installations serve around 67,000 very diverse students who ...
Blended Learning
The Double-Edged Sword Of AI In The Classroom
With the new school year started, one of the growing challenges facing students, parents, and teachers is how to address the classroom uses of AI, which has become a double-edged sword in the education process. Read the op-ed here.
Education
Kerry McDonald – Joyful Learning
From FreedomFest 2025 in Palm Springs, Tim talks with Kerry McDonald, senior fellow at the Foundation for Economic Education and State Policy Network education fellow about her new book Joyful Learning, which explores new, low-cost K–12 learning models that favor individualized, learner-centered education. They also talk about the Trump administration’s ...
Commentary
Obscuring the forest for the trees: Most LAUSD students still below standards
Recently, Los Angeles school superintendent Alberto Carvalho held a celebratory press conference to trumpet the incremental increase in the district’s student test scores, but while he was focusing on some bright trees, the dark forest remains—a large majority of Los Angeles students still fail to meet state grade-level standards in ...
Blog
Teacher shortages, layoffs hit big cities and rural areas hardest
Teacher shortages, layoffs hit big cities and rural areas hardest by John Seiler | July 31, 2025 Even $24,764 average spending per student can’t stop the shortage of teachers in California. The number comes from Gov. Gavin Newsom’s budget proposal for fiscal year 2025-26, which began on July 1. For ...
Classroom Ideology
The Disastrous Domino Effect of Social Promotion
Low student scores on national and state reading tests expose the disturbing reality that a lot of children are being promoted from one grade to the next even though they do not have the knowledge and skills necessary to succeed. Reading is the foundational skill that all children need to ...
California
Ben Austin – Can Sacramento Actually Fix California’s Underperforming Public Schools?
Ben Austin, longtime politico who has worked in both Democrat and Republican administrations in California and Washington, DC and now founding director of Education Civil Rights Now – a national non-profit with the mission of establishing a constitutional right to a high-quality public education for all students – joins PRI’s ...
Classroom Ideology
America’s Math Collapse: Harvard Institutes Remedial Math
America’s amazing technological achievements, such as SpaceX’s recent rescue of stranded astronauts, mask the death spiral of math learning in the U.S., which has reached an ignominious low with Harvard’s decision to offer remedial math. On the 2024 National Assessment of Educational Progress math exam, 73 percent of eighth graders ...
Classroom Ideology
The Retreat From Euclid And America’s Great Math Collapse
When average people think about classical education, they tend to think about students reading the great works of Western civilization such as Homer’s Iliad and Odyssey. Those same people probably do not think about mathematics and its classical origins, yet it is the movement away from mathematics’ classical heritage that ...
America’s 250th Birthday and the Collapse of Civics Knowledge
Civics, according to education writer and longtime Los Angeles teacher Larry Sand, is “the study of what it means to be a citizen, focusing on the rights, duties, and responsibilities of community members,” and also “understanding how government functions, including citizens’ roles in voting, obeying laws, and participating in the ...
Military schools have cracked the code for educating diverse students
America’s military schools are ranked the best in the nation. California should take note. The U.S. Department of Defense, through its Department of Defense Education Activity (DODEA) program, operates 160 K-12 schools in the U.S. and overseas. These schools at American military installations serve around 67,000 very diverse students who ...
The Double-Edged Sword Of AI In The Classroom
With the new school year started, one of the growing challenges facing students, parents, and teachers is how to address the classroom uses of AI, which has become a double-edged sword in the education process. Read the op-ed here.
Kerry McDonald – Joyful Learning
From FreedomFest 2025 in Palm Springs, Tim talks with Kerry McDonald, senior fellow at the Foundation for Economic Education and State Policy Network education fellow about her new book Joyful Learning, which explores new, low-cost K–12 learning models that favor individualized, learner-centered education. They also talk about the Trump administration’s ...
Obscuring the forest for the trees: Most LAUSD students still below standards
Recently, Los Angeles school superintendent Alberto Carvalho held a celebratory press conference to trumpet the incremental increase in the district’s student test scores, but while he was focusing on some bright trees, the dark forest remains—a large majority of Los Angeles students still fail to meet state grade-level standards in ...
Teacher shortages, layoffs hit big cities and rural areas hardest
Teacher shortages, layoffs hit big cities and rural areas hardest by John Seiler | July 31, 2025 Even $24,764 average spending per student can’t stop the shortage of teachers in California. The number comes from Gov. Gavin Newsom’s budget proposal for fiscal year 2025-26, which began on July 1. For ...
The Disastrous Domino Effect of Social Promotion
Low student scores on national and state reading tests expose the disturbing reality that a lot of children are being promoted from one grade to the next even though they do not have the knowledge and skills necessary to succeed. Reading is the foundational skill that all children need to ...
Ben Austin – Can Sacramento Actually Fix California’s Underperforming Public Schools?
Ben Austin, longtime politico who has worked in both Democrat and Republican administrations in California and Washington, DC and now founding director of Education Civil Rights Now – a national non-profit with the mission of establishing a constitutional right to a high-quality public education for all students – joins PRI’s ...
America’s Math Collapse: Harvard Institutes Remedial Math
America’s amazing technological achievements, such as SpaceX’s recent rescue of stranded astronauts, mask the death spiral of math learning in the U.S., which has reached an ignominious low with Harvard’s decision to offer remedial math. On the 2024 National Assessment of Educational Progress math exam, 73 percent of eighth graders ...
The Retreat From Euclid And America’s Great Math Collapse
When average people think about classical education, they tend to think about students reading the great works of Western civilization such as Homer’s Iliad and Odyssey. Those same people probably do not think about mathematics and its classical origins, yet it is the movement away from mathematics’ classical heritage that ...