Systemic changes to curriculum are an inevitable part of education; however, understanding how teachers and administrators perceive their responsibilities in implementing district-mandated changes to curriculum is unclear. The purpose of this qualitative case study was to determine teachers' and administrators' perceptions related to their…

States and school districts endeavoring to improve learning outcomes for young children typically focus on literacy, not math. Math is often overlooked in improvement initiatives, and it gets far less instructional time than literacy in preschool and the early grades. While literacy skills are unquestionably critical, so are math skills. Math…

For decades, education policy has prioritized the need to improve reading and math achievement while science teaching and learning have received far less emphasis. In 2013, schools across the United States began implementing Next Generation Science Standards (or similarly structured, state-adopted science standards). These new science standards…

In recent years, the use of external proficiency-based tests to measure learners' language ability has increased significantly, in part thanks to the Seal of Biliteracy movement. However, there exists very limited research investigating the influence of such tests and their subsequent outcomes data on teachers' practices. As such, this study…

The Boston Public Schools (BPS) district is the first large school system in the United States to design and implement a curriculum and professional model--called "Focus on Early Learning"--to align instruction across its well-known, high-quality public school pre-K program and early elementary school grades. Schools opt in and can…

Teacher attrition and burnout have been researched in school districts all over the country for several decades. Characterised by physical and psychological exhaustion, cynicism (as an interpersonal and emotional indication of built-up aggression), and a sense of helplessness and low self-efficacy, burnout can lead to anxiety, depression,…

The purpose of this paper is to report themes identified in questions K-12 mainstream teachers in one U.S. school district posed about differentiating instruction for English language learners (ELLs) in order to hear directly from teachers about topics they would like to learn more about. Teachers in the district completed a selected-response and…

Traditionally, in U.S. K-12 schools, inclusive education has been used in the context of students with disabilities participating in the general content area or the mainstream classroom together with their peers. We redefine inclusive education (and subsequently inclusive teacher education) to refer to teaching all students, including multilingual…

The purpose of the qualitative narrative inquiry was to re-story the lived experiences of emergency preparedness of public elementary schoolteachers during the COVID-19 pandemic to drive change within the field of education to increase elementary schoolteachers' preparedness for implementing emergency plans. The problem is the unexpected and…

Ordinary citizens and elected officials struggle with the unsettled nature of history and America's problematic racial past in particular. Textbooks--the most common curricular resource in the discipline--contribute by emphasizing singular names (e.g., Martin Luther King Jr.), curious objects (e.g., Rosa Parks's bus seat), and ahistorical notions…

Deciding how to spend the nation's education dollars is a tremendous responsibility. It's easy to forget that this responsibility falls primarily to district leaders (sometimes with input from principals). Sometimes those decisions go well and schools beat the odds on student outcomes. Other times, they do not, and student outcomes lag. Sometimes…

National and state-based assessments have been a common practice for the past several decades. These assessments often come with high-stake consequences for students and schools, which tends towards the creation of a test-centric environment where educators prioritize test-based instruction to prepare students to be successful on those…

The push toward digital curricula has quickened with the COVID-19 pandemic leading to concerns about how digital curricula programs are selected. Research indicates selection of curricula plays a primary role in student achievement. State curriculum leaders were surveyed about how they are involved in selecting PK-8 mathematics digital curricula.…

Transgender and nonbinary (collectively referred to here as "trans") students are ill-served by most school environments. They experience challenges trying to navigate institutions that, at best, are poorly designed to support them and that often work against them. Although some districts and states have developed laws and policies to…

Early career teachers (ECTs) face unprecedented pressure to fulfill expectations of 'highly effective' teachers within their first few years of teaching. Lesson planning is an important precursor to effective instruction, yet little is known about how the social and institutional contexts where ECTs work influences their planning. In this paper,…