The drops in enrollment mean resources for schools have been stretched thin. If SPS were to consolidate, staffers argue, students might get better access to specialized programs, social workers, specialists, school counselors and nurses — resources that students have continuously requested in the last school year.
Only one in five teachers disagreed with the statement "I am happy in my current position," according to a SchoolCEO survey of about 1,000 educators in 300 districts.
Learning loss and staff recruitment and retention continue to be the two most expensive categories according to Burbio, which collected data from 6,000 school districts on how they plan to allocate their ESSER III funds.
In an interview with Time magazine, Mira Murati — chief technology officer at OpenAI, the company behind the buzzy AI chatbot ChatGPT — said schools shouldn't rush to ban the technology on their campuses due to concerns over cheating. Instead, Murati said ChatGPT "has the potential to really revolutionize the way we learn," particularly in settings where not everyone has the same learning preferences or abilities.
The Institute of Education Sciences (IES), the Department of Education's statistics, research and evaluation arm, received $40 million in new money for research and development, a portion of which must be used to "support a new funding opportunity for quick-turnaround, high-reward scalable solutions."
With six new members, mostly conservatives, the State Board of Education walked back its opposition to school vouchers or similar programs that would use public money for private education.
"Even before my junior year, I already knew that I wanted to be a teacher … I was just unsure about the grade level," one student said. "I want to be a special needs teacher, but I didn't know a lot of the background about teaching."
Better pay, community support and empathy from district leadership are among the main changes teachers say they require in order to stay in the profession.
The most drastic proposal, from Texas, would prevent public officials from earning more than the state's governor. Another bill links the salaries of superintendents to first-year teachers.
Researchers call for an increased focus on well-designed and well-resourced policy initiatives from district leaders and legislators to combat the ongoing issue.
