In this week’s newsletter:
📌 The surprise success of progressive New York City mayoral candidate Zohran Mamdani.
📌 A revealing interview with the actor who plays the ‘cool’ teacher from a hit Broadway play about high school kids in Georgia.
📌 Homeschooling families and private school vouchers!?
📌 A YouTube education talk show dances to its own beat.
The newsletter will be off next Friday!
THE MAMDANI SURPRISE
The big education story of the week
The big education story of the week is the surprise victory of progressive Zohran Mamdani in the NYC Democratic mayoral primary on Tuesday.
Why’s it an education story? Education is the biggest line item in the city’s budget. And Mamdani, a former tutor, is an avowed progressive who opposes mayoral control of schools and appears to want to scrutinize popular but controversial NYC DOE programs like specialized high schools and gifted education (Chalkbeat, NY1, New York Times, USA Today, Reason).
His primary victory throws into question the widespread sentiment that Democrats need to tack to the political center to regain public support (NYT, BBC, NPR).
It also raises important questions about media coverage.
“No pollster was able to fully capture Zohran Mamdani’s energy,” noted Politico’s Andrew Howard, who went out and asked them why they’d failed so miserably.
“Mamdani’s win is a reminder, in case one was needed, that ‘outsider’ perspectives need to be represented, too,” noted CNN’s Brian Stelter.
Other big stories of the week include Ohio vouchers ruled unconstitutional, today’s big parent opt-out decision, and the 260 districts with rising early reading scores. Follow @thegrade_ for daily education news.
HOMESCHOOLERS, GUN VIOLENCE, & EARLY CHILDHOOD
The best education journalism of the week
Unexpected, innovative, and well-reported, here are the best education stories of the week:
🏆 Why most Texas vouchers could go to homeschoolers, not private schools Houston Chronicle
🏆 Graduation brings hope, fear at a Bronx school touched by immigration politics Chalkbeat NY
🏆 ‘It’s our reality’: How school shootings and gun violence are reshaping Wisconsin’s youth Journal Sentinel
🏆 As Trump administration punishes Ivy League, universities in the heartland stand to benefit Boston Globe
🏆 SC suspends students with disabilities at a higher rate than any other state SC Post & Courier
🏆 Somerset ISD students recovered from COVID. Here’s how. San Antonio Report
What’d we miss?
‘THE CRUCIBLE’ & THE COOL TEACHER
Our latest columns and commentary
Focused on a honors English class in a rural Georgia high school, the hit Broadway play ‘John Proctor Is the Villain’ tells the story of what happens when kids start questioning the play they’re being taught, the classes they’re being offered, and even their teachers.
At its center is the cool teacher, Mr. Smith, played by Tony Award-winning actor Gabriel Ebert, who’s trying to teach his students Arthur Miller’s ‘The Crucible.’
In this new video interview, Ebert talks with The Grade about his own experiences as a high school student, what it’s like playing the cool teacher in the show, and the powerful reactions audiences have to his character.
This is actually the second in our series on actors playing fictional teachers on the stage or on TV. Check out Defending Mr. Malik, an interview with Faraz Ayub, the actor who plays the indifferent probationary teacher in Netflix’s hit limited series, ‘Adolescence.’
Who else should we be tapping next?
PEOPLE, JOBS, & EVENTS
Who’s going where and what’s happening?
Above: What a treat to be at the retirement celebration for my j-school advisor Sam Freedman last weekend, along with Audrey Watters (pictured) and many other education journalists. Here’s a recent writeup of his legendary book writing class he taught. Just the right mix of critical and kind, Freedman pushed me and many others to write a book I might otherwise have given up on. “If you’re in,” he likes to say, “I’m in.”
📰 People: Get to know the Gazette’s K-12 education reporter Grace King and recently-appointed Chicago Tribune education reporter Kate Armanini. Education technology critic Audrey Watters is back on the trail, taking a hard look at AI and schools. Inside Higher Ed’s Liam Knox is moving to Bloomberg. Former WAMU education reporter JennyAbamu is back to full-time reporting there (as a Maryland reporter covering politics and policy). Some of you will remember her amazing 2019 exit interview.📰 Job openings: EdSource is looking for an executive editor. Inside Higher Ed is looking for a faculty reporter.
📰 Innovations, alternatives, and non-traditional education information sources: This week’s roundup includes Etacude, a YouTube channel that features segments like High Schoolers Can’t Read, which has generated 6K likes/comments. Check out The Rules to Engagement, a YouTube and Instagram talk show that discusses education issues and is hosted by four Atlanta-area educators. (One of the hosts, a dance instructor, even dances with a guest.) News outlets that serve the needs of low-income communities particularly well include Outlier Media and Deep South Today, according to the American Journalism Project’s Dorrine Mendoza. Last but not least, Rainy Day Recess is the successor podcast to Seattle Hall Pass, the nontraditional podcast we profiled last year.
📰 New information: In total, public schools have lost 1.28 million students since the start of COVID-19. A survey of 1,500 kids suggests that phone bans have important but limited effects. There are lots of states where a majority of people say that they support Christian prayer in schools. Nearly 2 million student loan borrowers are at risk of having wages garnished this summer — and roughly 6 million federal borrowers are already more than 90 days past due. A majority of states or territories did not meet federal special education targets, according to the U.S. Education Department. In total, only about 15% of urban U.S. neighborhoods have gentrified over the past 50 years.
📰 Quotable
“To find journalists willing to acknowledge the magnitude of what is taking place in Houston, one has to look all the way to Dallas.”
“You should understand the communities you’re serving in order to do the best job. It’s kind of simple.”
“I spoke to a bunch of kids at a Bronx charter high school that uses Yondr pouches to lock up phones. The teens say their grades have gotten better and they socialize more. (But they still hate it.)”
“No strong organized group in the US reliably gives a damn whether our young people achieve & learn much. That is very, very scary.”
“I don’t dispute the number of book deals here is staggering, but there’s no real discussion here about privilege, connections at Ivy institutions, or how many NYT reporters attended Columbia.”
“Did not expect to see FERPA, a federal student privacy law, to be invoked to challenge student debt, but here we are. To be clear, it does not work this way.”
THE KICKER
We saved the best for last!
“WHAT,” says WUWM’s Kati Kokal.
Happy first week of Summer!
