Children and families with Minneapolis Families for Public Schools calling for ICE out of schools and Minnesota in January 2026. School should be a sanctuary for growth; but today, the looming fear of immigration enforcement seeps into these spaces, threatening countless students’ ability to learn. The Protected Areas Policy, enacted during the Biden Administration, once barred Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and Customs and Border Protection (CBP) from conducting

A public school teacher gives students a lesson—an example of the instruction that Nebraska parents say compels students to accept government viewpoints. A group of parents is suing state and local officials in a Nebraska court, arguing that the state’s compulsory education law effectively forces them to accept government messaging by enrolling their children in public schools or pay steep private school tuition to escape it. This financial pressure to opt in to public educa

A smartphone displaying ChatGPT rests on a textbook, raising questions about AI’s place in the classroom and its impact on student learning. New York City responded to AI in a way that few governments have before: it led with a pause instead of a rollout. On September 2, 2026, the City enacted the broadest student-facing AI ban in the country. Starting this school year, nearly 600,000 students from 2-K through 8th grade will go a full year without generative AI, as the city d

New York State Senator James Skoufis speaks with Kyra’s mother, Jacqueline Franchetti. Skoufis is sponsoring Kyra's Law in the Senate. Francesca Wehner '29, Analyst in the Center for Education Policy, and Kiran Chaudhry-Bishop '29, Assistant Director of the Center for Education Policy, co-wrote this op-ed. Autumn Coleman was a three-year-old girl growing up in Queens, New York, with curly braids, a sharp sense of humor, and dreams of being a “princess-doctor.” In March 2019,

New York State Senator James Skoufis speaks with Kyra’s mother, Jacqueline Franchetti. Skoufis is sponsoring Kyra's Law in the Senate. Francesca Wehner '29, Analyst in the Center for Education Policy, and Kiran Chaudhry-Bishop '29, Assistant Director of the Center for Education Policy, co-wrote this op-ed. Autumn Coleman was a three-year-old girl growing up in Queens, New York, with curly braids, a sharp sense of humor, and dreams of being a "princess-doctor." In March 2019,

Young students in a classroom excitedly learn to read—a positive sign in early childhood development. In the US today, 44% of public school students are behind a grade level in at least one subject. In 1996, about 9% of students in grades one through twelve attended summer school. By 2024, that number had jumped up to 13%. Here in the Ithaca City School District, the New York State Education Department flagged nearly half of the schools for failing to meet state standard