NEPC Press Releases

Missouri Report Documents Staffing Growth But Not Its Causes

National Education Policy Center — Thu, 05 Nov 2026 21:09:05 -0600

BOULDER, CO (November 5, 2026) — A new Show-Me Institute report contends that Missouri public school districts and charter schools have added teachers and administrators faster than student enrollment since 2000, and attributes this “Personnel Boom” to shifting perceptions of student needs and expanded regulatory responsibilities. The report suggests that teacher salaries could be more than $10,000 higher had staffing remained at year-2000 levels. However, the report’s evidence for why staffing increased is less convincing than its evidence that it did.

Christopher Redding of the University of Florida reviewed Missouri’s 21st Century Public School Personnel Boom. He found that the report’s analyses provide a descriptive picture of trends in teacher and administrator staffing and salary levels in Missouri, and that it makes a valid point that educators continue to be underpaid. However, the indicators used in the report to assess student need provide only a partial picture of the challenges schools face, and its calculation assumes that all savings from reduced staffing would have gone towards higher teacher salaries, which is unlikely. For these reasons, he concludes, the report is not useful as a guide for determining whether Missouri schools currently employ too many teachers and administrators.

Find the review, written by Christopher Redding, at:
https://nepc.colorado.edu/review/personnel

Find Missouri’s 21st Century Public School Personnel Boom, written by Avery Frank and Cory Koedel and published by the Show-Me Institute, at: https://showmeinstitute.org/publication/education/missouris-21st-century-public-school-personnel-boom/

NEPC Talks Education: The Human Impact of Anti-Trans Ballot Initiatives in Colorado and Beyond

National Education Policy Center — Tue, 27 Oct 2026 18:31:04 -0500

BOULDER, CO (October 27, 2026) — In this month’s episode of NEPC Talks Education, hosts Bethy Leonardi and Zander Nowell are joined by a Colorado mother of a 12-year-old transgender girl and by Scott Skinner-Thompson, a professor in University of Colorado Boulder’s School of Law. Together, they examine two citizen-initiated Colorado ballot measures targeting transgender youth.

Proposition 134 defines male and female strictly by biological reproductive systems, requiring schools and athletic associations to designate sports teams by sex. If passed, it would effectively ban transgender girls from participating on girls' teams. Proposition 135 prohibits healthcare professionals from performing surgeries for gender-affirming treatment on minors and bans the use of state, federal, Medicaid, or insurance funds for these procedures.

Nowell explains that these measures are part of a wider national trend. Since 2020, 29 states have restricted sports participation based on gender, and 27 states have banned gender-affirming surgeries for minors. He notes that this election cycle marks the first time these policies are being pursued via direct ballot measures rather than state legislatures.

In her anonymous interview, the Colorado mother shares how her fear that her daughter would lose access to specialist care was realized when federal funding restrictions forced clinics to close. Reflecting on the potential impact of Proposition 134, she shares a poignant conversation with her 12-year-old daughter, who transitioned when she was six years old. "I talked to her about how it would feel if she wasn't allowed to play on a girls' team," the mother says. "And she said, 'Well, I probably wouldn't play then.' It’s kind of that simple and so sad."

Professor Skinner-Thompson, an expert in constitutional law and LGBTQ+ civil rights, warns that laws like these on the Colorado ballot do not operate in isolation. "They work together and are operating to push trans people from public life altogether," Skinner-Thompson states, drawing a structural parallel to Jim Crow-era laws designed to exclude marginalized groups from the public sphere.

Skinner-Thompson also addresses the broader threat to democracy when the majority is permitted to vote on the civil rights of a vulnerable minority—especially youth who cannot vote. Colorado’s historical precedent, 1992’s Amendment Two, would have banned anti-discrimination protections for LGB individuals. The U.S. Supreme Court ultimately struck it down, because laws motivated by pure animus are unconstitutional under the Equal Protection Clause.

Furthermore, he notes that Proposition 134 opens the door to invasive policing of all children's gender expressions, while Proposition 135 represents a "massive invasion of individual medical authority" and “a solution in search of a problem,” given that surgical interventions on minors are already exceedingly rare and carefully managed by medical professionals.

To close the episode, Professor Leonardi offers reflective questions to help listeners reflect on how they can foster equitable communities.

A new NEPC Talks Education podcast episode, hosted by Bethy Leonardi and Zander Nowell, will be released each month from September through May.

Don’t worry if you miss a month. All episodes are archived on the NEPC website and can be found here.

NEPC podcast episodes are also available on Apple Podcasts under the title NEPC Talks Education. Subscribe and follow!

New Brief Reviews Evidence on School Smart-Device Use and Restrictions

National Education Policy Center — Wed, 21 Oct 2026 03:03:27 -0500

BOULDER, CO (October 20, 2026) — Students spend significant amounts of time during the school day engaging with social media and entertainment platforms on their personal smart devices, such as smartphones and smartwatches, as well as on their school-issued laptops and tablets. A new review of research concludes that this behavior is harmful and that lawmakers should double down on policies to address the problem.

The policy landscape with respect to such non-academic device use in schools has shifted dramatically in a short time. As recently as 2018, restrictions on phones and other personal devices in U.S. schools were largely left to individual teachers’ discretion. By late 2025, 35 states and the District of Columbia had enacted laws or policies addressing phone use in K-12 schools, 22 of them during 2025 alone.

A new policy brief, Cell Phone Policies in Schools: A Science and Policy Update on the Effects of Students’ Non-Academic Screen Use, reviews what is known about the effects of non-academic screen use in schools and the emerging evidence on policies that restrict it. Authors Mitch Prinstein and Corbin Evans examine research in developmental neuroscience, adolescent mental health, classroom behavior, and academic performance. They also review initial evaluations of smartphone-restriction policies in the United States and abroad.

Dr. Prinstein is the John Van Seters Distinguished Professor of Psychology and Neuroscience and Co-Director of the Winston Center on Technology and Brain Development at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill as well as the Senior Science Advisor of the American Psychological Association. Dr. Evans is Deputy Chief of Operations & Strategy and Senior Advisor to the Deputy CEO at the American Psychological Association.

Prinstein and Evans consider the research on smartphones as well as the non-academic use of school-issued computers and tablets, and they draw several conclusions from that research. Importantly, non-academic screen use during class, on personal or school-issued devices, is associated with lower academic performance, not only for the students using the devices but also for nearby classmates. This “secondhand” effect has classroom-level implications. Adolescents’ heightened social sensitivity and still-developing impulse control likely make it especially difficult for them to disengage voluntarily.

Preliminary evidence also links heavy screen use to disrupted sleep and differences in adolescent brain structure and function, although these findings require replication and long-term follow-up.

Evidence on smartphone restrictions themselves is still preliminary. Most policies were enacted within the last two to three years, few studies use rigorous designs, and no published study has evaluated a personal smart-device restriction alongside systematic limits on non-academic content on school-issued devices.

Even so, the available evidence suggests small but meaningful improvements in academic performance following restrictions, often appearing one to two years after implementation. These gains have been concentrated in schools that previously had the least restrictive policies. Disciplinary incidents tend to spike in the short term as enforcement begins, subsiding thereafter.

Research does not yet speak to the comparative effectiveness of different policy designs, such as bell-to-bell versus instructional-time-only restrictions, different storage methods, or phone-only versus all-device bans. The effects of restrictions on students’ social and psychological functioning are also largely unstudied.

The brief concludes that non-academic phone use in school is associated with a range of academic, cognitive, and psychological impacts. The authors offer recommendations for state legislators, education agencies, and district and school leaders—who should act now, even while research continues. Where evidence of impact is substantial and the cost of inaction is borne by students, policymakers can reasonably act on the best available evidence while building the record needed to evaluate their choices.

Find Cell Phone Policies in Schools: A Science and Policy Update on the Effects of Students’ Non-Academic Screen Use, by Mitch Prinstein and Corbin Evans, at:
https://nepc.colorado.edu/publication/cell-phones

NEPC Talks Education: The Relentless Pushback Against DEI and Who It Harms

National Education Policy Center — Thu, 01 Oct 2026 22:39:27 -0500

BOULDER, CO (October 1, 2026) — In this month’s episode of NEPC Talks Education, Drs. Michele Moses and Amy Farley join hosts Bethy Leonardi and Zander Nowell in the first of a series of episodes examining how the politics of today directly impact education policy and the daily lives of teachers, researchers, principals, students, and families across K12 and university settings.

Michele Moses is Professor of Educational Foundations, Policy and Practice at the University of Colorado Boulder. Her research focuses on issues of ethics, democracy, and policy disagreements that involve racial, ethnic, and gender diversity and equity. Amy Farley is Associate Professor of Educational Leadership and Policy Studies at University of Cincinnati. Her research pays particular attention to school and university reform, high-stakes policies, and the disparate impact of policies on minoritized student and teacher populations.

In this episode, they discuss the national pushback against Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) initiatives, particularly Arizona Proposition 142, a measure on the upcoming 2026 ballot designed to tighten constitutional restrictions on affirmative action, diversity programs, admissions, and public employment hiring practices within the state.

Drawing on their extensive academic research on direct democracy, citizen-initiated ballot initiatives, and race-conscious education policies, Drs. Moses and Farley explain how measures like Prop. 142 function in reality to “chill conversation,” “weaponize voter confusion,” and create an “administrative stranglehold” on educational institutions. The chilling effect stems from the broad, sweeping language of the proposition. Criminalizing certain topics creates a culture of fear that silences teachers, researchers, school, university and district leaders, and prevents students from having honest classroom conversations about history, race, and identity. Voter confusion stems from a combination of marketing and legislative language intentionally designed to confuse the public. While measures like Prop. 142 are frequently sold to voters as "ending discrimination," their actual mechanism outlaws the programs designed to ensure equal treatment. The proposed ban on public funding for diversity offices, staff training, and inclusive curriculum creates an administrative stranglehold by forcing public universities and K-12 schools to prioritize legal concerns over student success and belonging and fair hiring. This creates an environment in which the threat of litigation paralyzes educational institutions and prevents them from focusing on supporting their communities.

A new NEPC Talks Education podcast episode will be released each month from September through May. Listeners can look forward to a season dedicated to exploring education policy through a human lens, with episodes bringing top researchers into conversation with the people on the front lines of education, including school counselors, youth, and families.

Don’t worry if you miss a month. All episodes are archived on the NEPC website and can be found here.

NEPC podcast episodes are also available on Apple Podcasts under the title NEPC Talks Education. Subscribe and follow!

Heritage Report Calls for Ending Head Start, but Its Evidence Is Anemic

National Education Policy Center — Tue, 15 Sep 2026 21:06:33 -0500

BOULDER, CO (September 15, 2026) — Head Start is a federal-to-local program intended to enhance the school readiness and success of children in poverty. The program, housed in the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), is currently being targeted by the Trump administration for a major overhaul. In August, HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. announced a proposed rule that would remove federal standards around background checks, class size, and staff-to-child ratios, among other things—characterized as providing states with “flexibility.”

This proposed rule was a major step along the way to a key goal of the Heritage Foundation, the organization behind Project 2025. As explained in a recent Heritage report, this sort of deregulation is advisable, while the administration also works to end the program. However, a review of the new Heritage report finds the sheer volume of relevant research overlooked by the proposal to be “stunning.”

W. Steven Barnett and Morgan Healy of the National Institute for Early Education Research (NIEER) at Rutgers University reviewed From Washington, DC, to the States: Rethinking Head Start. They found the report’s conclusions and recommendations to be unsupported by evidence.

The Heritage report concludes that Head Start does not improve school readiness or produce lasting benefits, spends more per child than alternatives, fails to protect children adequately, and is burdened by regulations that serve no purpose. It therefore recommends eliminating Head Start, block granting its funds to states, and replacing federal program standards with less stringent state childcare regulations. The last of these three recommendations overlaps with the new proposed HHS rule.

Barnett and Healy concur that Head Start is long overdue for Congressional reauthorization and that there is room to reduce paperwork and overly detailed regulations. Moreover, major demographic, economic, and policy changes over the past quarter century have altered the population Head Start serves and the context in which it operates. These changes provide a strong rationale for rethinking Head Start, and the report should be credited for raising questions about how Head Start should adapt to changing conditions.

However, Barnett and Healy conclude that the report’s use of evidence is so limited and misleading that neither its conclusions about Head Start’s performance and benefits nor its policy recommendations should be used to inform policy decisions. In fact, the full body of research indicates Head Start has immediate benefits for children and likely improves adult outcomes, while the report’s recommended relaxed class size and ratio requirements would likely reduce benefits. Adopting the report’s recommendations could do more harm than good for children and taxpayers, since stronger not weaker standards are warranted to improve outcomes.

Find the review, written by W. Steven Barnett and Morgan Healy, at: https://nepc.colorado.edu/review/head-start

Find From Washington, DC, to the States: Rethinking Head Start, written by Madison Marino Doan and Jonathan Butcher, and published by the Heritage Foundation, at: https://www.heritage.org/education/report/washington-dc-the-states-rethinking-head-start

Report on Reading Instruction Falls Far Short of the Standards It Promotes

National Education Policy Center — Wed, 12 Aug 2026 01:07:06 -0500

BOULDER, CO (August 11, 2026) — A recent report from the National Council on Teacher Quality (NCTQ) evaluates how well university-based teacher education programs prepare candidates to teach reading, but the report itself fails to meet the scientific research standards it ostensibly expects of those programs.

Elena Aydarova of the University of Wisconsin-Madison reviewed Decoding Progress in Reading Preparation, and she concludes that its claims don’t withstand scrutiny. She found unsubstantiated assertions about how reading should be taught and what policymakers should do in response, while failing to incorporate current research evidence and relying on flawed methodology.

Professor Aydarova also identifies apparent conflicts of interest, noting that NCTQ repeatedly directs readers to products and services offered by members of its own technical and advisory panels.

According to Professor Aydarova, the report narrows conceptions of reading instruction, promotes the de-professionalization of teacher educators, and undermines academic freedom in higher education. Rather than providing a rigorous, evidence-based assessment of reading teacher preparation, she concludes, the report functions more as an ideological critique of university-based teacher education programs.

Professor Aydarova urges policymakers, journalists, and education leaders to approach the report’s findings and recommendations with significant caution.

Find the review, written by Elena Aydarova, at:
https://nepc.colorado.edu/review/reading-prep

Find Decoding Progress in Reading Preparation, written by Christie Ellis, Ron Noble, Graham Drake, and Heather Peske, and published by the National Council on Teacher Quality, at: https://teacherquality.nctq.org/review/standard/Reading-Foundations/2026

“Math Wars” Report Focuses on Current Debates but Falls Short on Attention to Practice

National Education Policy Center — Tue, 28 Jul 2026 19:53:06 -0500

BOULDER, CO (July 28, 2026) — The Center on Reinventing Public Education (CRPE) recently published a report analyzing contemporary disputes about effective math instruction. A review released today explains that the report provides a helpful review of current debates yet fails to provide useful guidance for education and policy leaders.

Deborah Loewenberg Ball of the University of Michigan reviewed Navigating the Math Wars: A Practical Guide to the Divides and Debates Influencing Math Instruction, examining its analysis of what it describes as five key areas of disagreement over effective mathematics instruction.

The report frames the disputes as (a) conceptual understanding or procedural fluency, (b) inquiry-based or direct instruction, (c) productive struggle or scaffolded support, (d) standard algorithms or invented strategies, and (e) the link between timed practice and math anxiety. Although the report concludes that these disagreements are less polarized than public discourse suggests, Professor Loewenberg Ball contends that its framing nevertheless reinforces the notion of enduring "math wars."

The report's use of broad labels such as “inquiry-based” and “explicit” instruction obscures important similarities and differences in how mathematics is actually taught in classrooms. Professor Loewenberg Ball also points out that the analysis would have been strengthened by a stronger historical and critical analysis of recurring debates in mathematics education, including how the current context differs from the past.

Although, as noted, the report does provide a useful overview of current public and professional debates about mathematics instruction, it ultimately falls short of providing the nuanced discussions of instructional practice that would support students’ mathematical understanding, fluency, reasoning, and engagement.

Find the review, written by Deborah Loewenberg Ball, at:
https://nepc.colorado.edu/review/math-wars

Find Navigating the Math Wars: A Practical Guide to the Divides and Debates Influencing Math Instruction, published by the Center on Reinventing Public Education, at: https://crpe.org/wp-content/uploads/Navigating-the-Math-Wars-2026.pdf

Sifting Through the Mississippi Evidence

National Education Policy Center — Tue, 14 Jul 2026 19:52:25 -0500

BOULDER, CO (July 14, 2026) — The Progressive Policy Institute (PPI) recently published a report offering an insider account of how Mississippi's K–3 education system has evolved over roughly two decades.

In his review of Inside the Mississippi Marathon, Gregory Camilli, professor emeritus at Rutgers University, focuses on just a slice of the report: its description of the state’s performance in fourth-grade reading on the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP). The state’s improvement on that exam has been called the “Mississippi Miracle.” The PPI report rejects that characterization, opting instead to use a “marathon” metaphor.

While confirming the state’s improved performance on the fourth-grade NAEP (mathematics, as well as reading), Camilli finds that the report overstates the role of the state’s literacy reforms. He explains that insufficient attention has been given to other factors that may have contributed to rising scores. In particular, he explores how extensive third-grade test preparation may have influenced NAEP results.

Camilli concludes that the PPI report may understate the effect on NAEP performance of the state’s “substantial increase in the frequency of both formative and high-stakes assessment in reading and mathematics as well as increasing the alignment of the state assessment to NAEP.”

Find the review, written by Gregory Camilli, at:
https://nepc.colorado.edu/review/mississippi

Find Inside the Mississippi Marathon, written by Rachel Canter and published by the Progressive Policy Institute, at: https://www.progressivepolicy.org/inside-the-mississippi-marathon/

States Face Charter-School Crossroads as Supreme Court Poised to Protect Faith-Based Discrimination

National Education Policy Center — Fri, 29 May 2026 01:24:02 -0500

BOULDER, CO (May 28, 2026) — Forty-two states plus the District of Columbia may soon confront sweeping changes to their charter-school systems, as the U.S. Supreme Court appears likely to greenlight religious charter schools and to then shield those religious schools from anti-discrimination and other good-governance laws that apply to public schools.

In a new policy brief, Avoiding the Supreme Court’s Religious Charter-School Trap: Governance Change for the New Legal Era, authors Kevin G. Welner (University of Colorado Boulder), Carol C. Burris (Network for Public Education), and Preston C. Green III (University of Connecticut) warn that, without proactive legislative action, this radical transformation of states’ charter sectors could be fully imposed within two years.

The brief describes an upcoming “one-two punch” from the Supreme Court. First, the Court will hear a case next term that is likely to find a free-exercise right for taxpayer-funded private religious schools to engage in faith-based discrimination. Arguments for faith-based exemptions from accountability and transparency rules will follow. Second, the Court is likely to hear a case in the following term, resulting in a decision that prohibits states from excluding religious charter schools—again grounded in the First Amendment’s Free Exercise Clause.

This charter-school trap, however, is set only for states that structure their laws to place private, independent organizations in the charter-governance role. As the brief explains, if governmental entities retain that governance role, the Court’s free-exercise reasoning does not apply. Instead, the applicable law is the long-standing Establishment Clause bar on religious public schools.

Forty-six states and the District of Columbia permit charter schools. Of these, 42 allow or require independently governed charter schools—the type that the Supreme Court’s ruling might drastically transform. However, nine of those 42 states also allow charter schools to be governed by local school districts, and four states—Alaska, Kansas, Maryland, and Virginia—place all their charters under the governance of publicly elected school boards. This brief argues that these four are already protected from the Supreme Court’s likely decisions.

“State legislators can head off the Court’s radical change by strengthening the fundamental publicness of their charter schools,” Welner explains. “Legislators can protect the charter-school sectors against the imposed transformation by changing how they are governed.”

According to Green, the solution is straightforward: “All charter schools should be created, staffed, and governed by public entities such as local school districts, ensuring they remain fully subject to constitutional and civil rights protections.”

The authors include key provisions for a state statute to guide this shift, offering a clear path for preserving accountability, transparency, and civil rights in an evolving legal landscape.

Bringing charter schools into this legal safe harbor will, according to Burris, have other advantages as well:

District-governed charters also offer practical advantages, including stronger financial oversight and reduced risk of mismanagement and fraud. Communities, via their elected school boards, will have a voice in whether and how to build charter schools that serve the community’s best interests.

Find Avoiding the Supreme Court’s Religious Charter-School Trap: Governance Change for the New Legal Era, by Kevin G. Welner, Carol C. Burris, and Preston C. Green III, at:
https://nepc.colorado.edu/publication/religious-charters

Dubious Claims About Colorado Benefits From Federal Tax-Credit Voucher Program

National Education Policy Center — Thu, 21 May 2026 23:17:47 -0500

BOULDER, CO (May 21, 2026) — The Common Sense Institute recently published a report declaring large potential benefits of the federal education tax-credit voucher program created through President Trump’s One Big Beautiful Bill. However, the report’s claims about the improvements the program would create for Colorado are unlikely to materialize.

Joydeep Roy of Teachers College, Columbia University explains why in his review of The Economic Impact from Colorado’s Choice to Participate in the “Education Freedom Tax Credit” Provision in the One Big Beautiful Bill Act.

As part of the legislation passed in July 2025, the federal government established a nationwide tax credit for contributions to so-called scholarship-granting organizations (SGOs) that can fund some K-12 educational expenses. Taxpayers can receive a credit of $1,700 each year for these donations. Although key rules are still being drafted by the Trump administration, eligible families given a voucher by a private SGO will likely be able to use these funds on a range of educational expenses, including private school tuition, tutoring, transportation, instructional materials, and courses offered at either private or public educational institutions.

The Common Sense Institute report claims significant benefits will emerge for Colorado when—pursuant to the intentions of Gov. Polis—it opts into the program starting in 2027. The report predicts that the tax credits will boost incomes, create jobs, generate additional revenue for public schools, and increase private school enrollment.

However, many of these hypothesized benefits are unlikely. The methods used in the report’s economic impact model leave important questions unanswered, and it relies on speculative assumptions about participation and economic effects. For instance, participation rates in similar scholarship programs have historically been much lower than the report predicts for Colorado, raising doubts about the report’s assumptions and conclusions. (Neither the report nor the review addresses the program’s long-term impact on the health of the state’s public education system.)

Ultimately, Professor Roy concludes, the report provides little value in fostering an informed, evidence-based policy debate about the likely economic effects of the federal education tax credit program in Colorado.

Find the review, written by Joydeep Roy, at:
https://nepc.colorado.edu/review/co-tax-credit

Find The Economic Impact from Colorado’s Choice to Participate in the “Education Freedom Tax Credit” Provision in the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, written by Thomas Young and Jimena Sanchez and published by the Common Sense Institute, at: https://www.commonsenseinstituteus.org/colorado/research/education/the-economic-impact-from-colorados-choice-to-participate-in-the-education-freedom-tax-credit-provision-in-the-one-big-beautiful-bill-act