The aftermath of the earthquake in Haiti has left a fragile nation teetering on the brink of collapse. In the coming weeks and months, donor countries, aid agencies, and NGOs will continue their tireless efforts to bring help and hope to Haiti’s roughly 10 million survivors. And yet, while urgent needs lurk on every street corner, nothing will determine the country’s long-term fate more than the trajectory of its education system.

School districts and their employees are occasionally sued after a student commits suicide, but courts are reluctant to hold them liable for these tragic events. Thus, an educator’s responsibility to prevent a student from committing suicide is primarily a professional and ethical obligation and not a legal duty.

The re-authorization of ESEA presents the Obama administration with the opportunity to address the flaws in the No Child Behind law and chart a new direction in federal policy. This is an opportunity that should not be wasted. NCLB needs more than minor tinkering or adjustments. A major overhaul is needed if greater improvements in our nation's schools are to be realized in the next few years.

This commentary critically appraises Camilli, Vargas, Ryan and Barnett’s (2010) meta-analysis of the cognitive effects of early education interventions. It also presents a related synthesis of recent randomized controlled trials.

A new report authored by Tom Loveless and published by the Fordham Institute misleads in an attempt to convince policymakers to maintain tracking policies. The report combines weak data with questionable analyses to manufacture a flawed argument against detracking.

Teacher and writer Nancie Atwell responds to critics of reading workshop—an approach in which students choose the books they read—by identifying and dissecting five myths about independent reading.

Recent efforts to combat low school enrollment in the developing world -- such as President Obama's pledge to establish a $2-billion Global Fund for Education and the 2002 creation of the World Bank's Fast Track Initiative -- represent a promising model for a synchronized, global effort on education that should be erected upon. Yet, to effectively supply the funding, guidance, and logistical support to achieve education for everyone, policymakers must focus their efforts more intensely on tapping the unrealized potential of females and rural inhabitants.

Based on her book How Professors Think: Inside the Curious World of Academic Judgment, sociologist Michèle Lamont discusses the role of emotions, interactions, and identities in influencing academic evaluation, including for tenure. She argues that subjectivity is essential for evaluation and that we need to be more aware of its impact – not try to eliminate it. She also argues that we should shift our focus away from bias toward gaining a better understanding of evaluative cultures and evaluative practices and of how they differ across disciplines, universities, and national contexts.

This commentary argues that researchers, educators, and policymakers need to better understand low-income youth's perspectives about the opportunities and barriers preventing them from accessing, persisting, and completing postsecondary education.

Should public schools adopt the business model of Google? Is selling advertising space inside the schoolhouse gate an answer to our chronically underfunded public schools?

A professor and her teaching assistant present a cultural perspective on the teaching of sexual identity development in a graduate higher education course. They raise questions about the challenges associated with engaging graduate students in discussions of sexual identification issues.

In June 2008, the Post-9/11 GI Bill signed into law with overwhelming support of both houses of Congress. This bill enables eligible Post-9/11 veterans to attend any in-state public college free of charge. How college administrators respond will have enormous impact on those military students who enroll. Our research looks at the degree to which college campuses are ready to take on the task of serving these non-traditional students.

Do parents have a constitutional right to be physically present at school with their children? A federal court in Texas says no.

This commentary outlines a fresh approach to recruiting and training good teachers.

This commentary surveys how Higher Education has historically enabled the rapid rise of Intercollegiate Athletics as a commercial business while compromising its ability to protect academic standards. However, the myth behind the economic value of investing in the intercollegiate sports arms race is being exposed under the new economic climate, empowering faculty and university presidents to redistribute academic resources so that all students have access to both an education and athletic participation. But are academics too powerless to seize the opportunity?

Educational achievement gaps impose on the United States the economic equivalent of a permanent national recession, but there is reason for hope: race and poverty are not destiny.

This commentary argues that teacher training programs should incorporate a more robust instruction on school law.

Skepticism is warranted when considering Uncle Sam’s ability to directly address teacher distribution. Ill-conceived policies may encourage districts to move teachers from schools and classrooms where they are effective to situations in which they are less effective. Heavy-handed efforts to reallocate teachers may drive good teachers from the profession. And we are far less able to identify “effective” teachers in any cookie-cutter fashion than many who call for federal action might wish. For all these reasons, humility is in order.

This commentary details the remarkable relationship between what Rachel Carson evidenced in her revolutionary book Silent Spring and how public officials in our field continue to use control measures, namely high-stakes tests, to monitor and regulate what is happening in America’s public schools.

Given the simultaneous ticking of biological and tenure clocks, research topics related to work and family for faculty have captured the attention of faculty and administrators in higher education. A primary emphasis of this research is early career faculty. The goal of this commentary is to broaden the conversation by including the perspectives of mid career faculty based on longitudinal data.

Corporal punishment is abusive, ineffective, and violates international human rights law: it should be immediately abolished in the US. Corporal punishment violates children's right to freedom from cruel, inhuman, or degrading treatment, and contributes to a hostile school environment in which students struggle to learn and succeed. Corporal punishment is abusive for all children, but it has particularly severe effects for students with disabilities. Not only is it ineffective in teaching them appropriate behaviors, it can cause lasting mental and physical injury, and it can make students aggressive and unable to learn. For students with disabilities, corporal punishment can be followed directly by a decline in their medical conditions. These discriminatory, abusive, and ineffective practices should be abolished in US schools. There are better methods of providing effective school discipline, including positive behavioral support systems that enable educators to respond to children's individual needs.

School districts received a welcome message from a recent decision by the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals. In Palmer v. Waxahachie Independent School District, the court ruled that a Texas school district has the authority to a adopt student dress code that bans all messages on students' clothing so long as the district offers students other means of expression during the school day.

Research testing a social-psychological intervention designed to improve minority student performance and reduce the racial achievement gap is summarized. Key to the intervention is the notion that the risk of confirming a negative stereotype aimed at one's group, stereotype threat, can elevate stress to a level that can inhibit academic performance in minority students. Self-affirmation, a process known to bolster individuals facing identity threat, was administered in the form of a brief in-class values-affirmation writing exercise to lessen such stress and mitigate its impact. Several double-blind field experimental trials at a suburban Northeastern middle school with a student body nearly equally divided between African Americans and European Americans, found significant improvement in African American students’ grades as well as on their statewide achievement test scores. How a seemingly small intervention can lead to significant reduction in the racial achievement gap is discussed in concluding remarks.

Why do some social and behavioral science IRBs require researchers at other institutions to obtain local IRB approval for low-risk data collected in person, but not for low-risk data collected over the internet?

This commentary reviews the evidence regarding the impact of interracial roommates on friendship diversity in colleges. It argues that policies designed to maximize interracial roommate assignment may foster better interracial relations on their campuses and perhaps throughout their students’ lifetimes.