Teaching, Leading, and Social Justice

NAACP sues U.S. Education Department over DEI school funding cuts

Jonathan Stempel, Reuters

The NAACP sued the U.S. Department of Education on Tuesday to stop its alleged illegal effort to cut off funding to schools that use diversity, equity and inclusion programs, and prevent Black students from receiving equal education opportunities. In a complaint filed in Washington, D.C., the largest U.S. civil rights group faulted the Trump administration for targeting programs that offer “truthful, inclusive curricula,” policies to give Black Americans equal access to selective education opportunities, and efforts to foster a sense of belonging and address racism. It also said the policies “advance a misinterpretation” of federal civil rights laws and Supreme Court precedent that undermine NAACP members’ equal protection rights and protections from viewpoint discrimination under the U.S. Constitution.

Harvard professor gives perspective on the Trump administration clash with university [Audio]

Michel Martin and Nikolas Bowie, NPR

What does the clash between Harvard and the Trump administration look like from the perspective of its faculty? NPR’s Michel Martin asks Harvard Law School professor Nikolas Bowie.

This Chicago teacher supports immigrant students, even teaching them calculus on Saturday

Becky Vevea, Chalkbeat

Math teacher Victor Hurtado knows what it’s like to enter high school as a recently arrived immigrant. After growing up in Durango, Mexico, he moved to Chicago as a teenager and enrolled in Schurz High School, which had an English-Spanish bilingual program at that time.

Now, Hurtado serves as the math department chair teaching advanced algebra and AP Calculus at Schurz, which is now one of three dual-language high schools in Chicago Public Schools. “I’m very passionate about my bilingual background,” Hurtado said. “I love my newcomers, and it’s a blessing to serve them.”

Language, Culture, and Power

L.A.’s Schools Chief Knows What It’s Like to Be Undocumented

Jesus Jiménez, New York Times

When federal agents arrived at two Los Angeles elementary schools last week to conduct welfare checks on students who the agents said were undocumented, fear and outrage spread among parents, teachers and administrators. For the superintendent of the Los Angeles Unified School District, the visit by federal agents was something more. It was personal. Alberto Carvalho, the leader of the second-largest public school system in the country, was once undocumented, too.

“Their journey is no different than my own,” Mr. Carvalho said in an interview, referring to the estimated one in four migrant students who are believed to be undocumented in his district. “Maybe the country of origin is different, but in many, many instances, the journey is exactly the same.”

Immigration FAQ

Daniel Costa, Josh Bivens, and Ben Zipperer, Economic Policy Institute

Immigration is among the most important economic and political issues and a main topic of discourse and debate among policymakers and the public. But misperceptions persist about many fundamental aspects of this crucial topic. This FAQ addresses essential background and facts, as well as frequently asked questions, with short answers that include relevant data and extensive citations to key sources.

ICE can now enter K-12 schools − here’s what educators should know about student rights and privacy

Brian Boggs, The Conversation

United States federal agents tried to enter two Los Angeles elementary schools on April 7, 2025, and were denied entry, according to the Los Angeles Times. The agents were apparently seeking contact with five students who had allegedly entered the country without authorization. The Trump administration has been targeting foreign-born college students and professors for deportation since February 2025. This was the first known attempt to target younger students since the U.S. Department of Homeland Security in January rescinded a 2011 policy that had limited immigration enforcement actions in locations deemed sensitive by the government such as hospitals, churches and schools.

Whole Children and Strong Communities

Stressed, tired, and yearning for support

Denise Clark Pope, Sarah Miles, Megan Pacheco, and Caitlin Ciannella, Phi Delta Kappan

Denise Pope, Sarah Miles, Megan Pacheco, and Caitlin Ciannella explore three major concerns affecting high school students’ well-being: stress, sleep deprivation, and lack of belonging. Drawing from research by Challenge Success involving over 270,000 high school students across more than 10 years, they highlight how academic pressure, family expectations, and modern societal challenges contribute to unhealthy stress levels. Their research reveals that students are chronically sleep-deprived, averaging only 6.6 hours of sleep per night. Additionally, many students, particularly those from marginalized groups, report feeling isolated and unsupported at school. They offer practical suggestions for families, educators, and schools to address these issues.

An Interview With A Fired USAID Education Officer

Sabrina Imbler, Defector

When Joel Runnels graduated from college, he followed the age-old tradition of young people who don’t quite know what they want to do with their lives, which is to say he applied to the Peace Corps. Runnels had studied American Sign Language in college and, as someone who grew up with a speech impediment, he also had a lifelong affinity for working with people with disabilities. The Peace Corps, under the mistaken impression that there’s one universal sign language, invited him to pioneer their Deaf Education Program in Kenya. Runnels only knew ASL, so he had to learn Swahili and Kenyan Sign Language as well. In Kenya, Runnels’s students kept asking him if he’d heard of an African-American educator and missionary named Andrew Foster, who is often called the father of Deaf education in Africa. Runnels hadn’t, and back in the U.S. he found no books about Foster’s life or legacy. “I thought, if I want to read the book, I have to write it,” he said.

Make climate literacy a gen ed requirement across higher ed — before it’s too late

Lelia Hawkins, Ed Source

Earlier this year, students across the country watched as wildfires devastated large parts of Southern California. Yet even as they watched — and, in some cases, lived through — a real example of what climate change can look like, many students don’t understand why events like these are happening more frequently and with greater intensity. Without that foundational knowledge, they are ill-equipped to help mitigate the significant problem affecting their generation. Lack of climate literacy is a crisis that higher education has a responsibility to address. Acknowledging the problem is no longer enough. Although 72% of U.S. adults recognize that our climate is changing, only 58% acknowledge that it is human-caused, and even fewer understand the scientific consensus — that over 97% of climate scientists affirm our role in the ever-warming planet. We need a climate-literate electorate if we want to drive effective climate action, because the solutions we choose to support are based on our individual understanding of the problem. To do this, we must make climate education part of general education. And we must move quickly.

Access, Assessment, Advancement

This Is How Universities Can Escape Trump’s Trap, if They Dare

M. Gessen, The New York Times

Almost three months into the Trump administration’s war on universities, and a year and a half into the Republican Party’s organized campaign against the presidents of top colleges, it is clear that antisemitism and D.E.I. are mere pretexts for these attacks. Like much of what this administration does, the war on higher education is driven by anti-intellectualism and greed. Trump is building a mafia state, in which the don distributes both money and power. Universities are independent centers of intellectual and, to some extent, political power. He is trying to destroy that independence.

Another Palestinian Columbia student is arrested for activism [Audio]

David Myers and Madeleine Brand, KCRW’s Press Play

Mohsen Mahdawi’s detention exposes the rising risks faced by pro-Palestinian students during the Trump administration’s crackdown on campuses.

More high schoolers are taking college classes — but no surprise which students benefit most

Delilah Brumer, CalMatters

Students tap on their keyboards as a professor lectures at the front of the room. It looks like any other college course, except that it’s taking place at a high school. This year, more than 150,000 California teens are earning college credit in dual enrollment courses. Dual enrollment offers high schoolers the chance to attend community college, typically for free, often without having to leave their campuses. By helping students tackle the college academic experience, the programs increase the likelihood that students attend college after graduating high school.  About 80% of California’s dual enrolled high school students go on to a community college or university, compared to 66% of California 12th grade students in general, the Public Policy Institute of California found. More than a third of California’s dual enrolled students go on to attend the same community college they attended while in high school after they graduate, according to the Community College Research Center.

Inequality, Poverty, Segregation

San Jose lawmaker introduces bill to address funding inequality in schools [Video]

Len Ramirez, CBS News Bay Area

Push for equality in our schools.  A South Bay state senator is behind a bill that aims to level the playing field when it comes to school funding. For most of California’s history, property taxes have been the primary source of income for public schools.  That means schools in more affluent areas get way more money.  Then in 2013, the state began sending more money to schools with high needs students, like low-income, English Learners, or foster youth.  Nearly everyone agrees it has helped.  But a funding gulf remains.  Len Ramirez dives into the new efforts to close it. 

Families say school civil rights investigations have stalled after federal cuts

Dylan Peers McCoy, NPR

There are a lot of things 12-year-old G likes about school. She likes gym class; she likes to help other students; she likes to craft with her teacher. But when you ask what she doesn’t like, G doesn’t hesitate. “The blue room,” she says, sitting in her home outside Fort Wayne, Ind. That’s a padded room G’s family says school staff sometimes lock her in. “It feels like close spaces, and it’s like — it’s, like, scary in there.” Her mother, Amy Cupp, says G has disabilities, and because of them, she sometimes has tantrums at school — lying on the floor; refusing to follow instructions; and trying to leave the room. Sometimes when this happens, school staff seclude her.

The Ghost of Jim Crow Haunts Trump’s War on Public Education

Karida Brown, Ms. Magazine

On March 20, 2025, President Donald Trump gutted the Department of Education with the stroke of a pen, signing an executive order that marked the beginning of the end for federal public education as we know it. The American school system, a public good, will soon become private.

If you want to know what privatizing essential rights looks like, look at the U.S. healthcare system.  In America, quality care is reserved for those who can afford it, while everyone else faces instability, uncertainty and debt. Now, this same market-driven logic is about to be applied to our education system. After a wave of chaotic executive orders from Trump, and sweeping federal closures, freezes and layoffs by Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), the Department of Education is now on the chopping block. They package it as a return to “states’ rights” and an expansion of parental “school choice.” But every parent, educator and student in America should be asking: “States’ rights to do what? And to whom?” We have seen this before.

 

Democracy and the Public Interest

ACLU sues Defense Department school system over banning race- and gender-related books

Olivia Diaz, AP news

The American Civil Liberties Union has sued the Department of Defense’s school system for children of military families, asserting that the removal of race- and gender-related books and curricula violated students’ First Amendment protections against government censorship. The suit filed Tuesday in U.S. District Court in northeast Virginia said the Department of Defense Education Activity nixed educational materials in line with an executive order issued by President Donald Trump in January. Trump’s order forbids the school system from “promoting, advancing, or otherwise inculcating … un-American, divisive, discriminatory, radical, extremist, and irrational theories” connected to race and gender.

Racial Knowledge and the Tenets of Critical Race Theory: Is Opposition to CRT Due to Ignorance?

Scott Eidelman, Mejdy Jabr, and Austin Eubanks, Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin

Is racial ignorance a cause of lay opposition to critical race theory (CRT)? In Study 1, undergraduates completed a test of racial knowledge and indicated support for CRT tenets (e.g., that racism is common and structural; that race is socially constructed and intersectional). Accurate racial knowledge, determined by signal detection analysis, predicted tenet support, even when controlling for racial prejudice, social dominance, and political conservatism. In three experiments, White undergraduates learned critical knowledge about race vs. poverty or transportation (Studies 2 and 3, respectively) or structural racism vs. pig intelligence (Study 4). In each, critical racial knowledge increased CRT tenet support. In Study 1, racial knowledge predicted blind patriotism negatively but constructive patriotism positively. Acquiring critical racial knowledge in Studies 2–4 did not lead participants to distance from America, despite claims of cultural critics. Teaching critical knowledge about race may be an effective means to promote racial understanding.

School vouchers will divert public funds, disproportionately harm special education students

Stephanie Tsapakis, San Antonio Report

In one of the most polarized political times of our nation’s history, the Texas Legislature has also seen its fair share of hot topics. One of the most publicly known issues has been Senate Bill 2, relating to the establishment of an education savings account (ESA) program, popularly known as school vouchers. San Antonio has seen a shift in school enrollment trends over the past years, with charter networks in the metro areas serving nearly 48,800 students, or about 11% of the total school-aged population. These statistics point to the effectiveness of large marketing and branding budgets when it comes to competing for enrollment and parents’ desire for specialized programs when considering the best educational environment for their children. Neighborhood public schools have also implemented unique and innovative ideas to bring these specialized programs to their districts.

Other News of Note

How to educate for social action [Audio]

Aaliyah El-Amin and Scott Seider, Harvard EdCast

To succeed in school, in life, and as contributors to a more equitable society, students must be able to recognize, analyze, and challenge systemic injustices, say Harvard Lecturer Aaliyah El-Amin and Boston College Professor Scott Seider. Through their research, they are examining what it truly means to pursue education for justice in K–12 schools. “The kids who are in classrooms right now are our country’s next generation of leaders,” says El-Amin. “They’re the people who are going to help determine whether we continue on our current path of deep injustice and human suffering, or whether we chart a new course toward a more just society — one where people across differences have equal access to well-being and thriving.” El-Amin and Seider argue that equipping young people with the tools to understand and respond to injustice is not only critical to building a more just society but also key to supporting youth development—academically, emotionally, and civically.