Through focused early literacy efforts, the West Ottawa School District is taking children with little to no English-language skills and preparing them to compete with white, more affluent peers.
Talent & Education
To prosper, Michigan must be a more educated place. Bridge will explore the challenges in education and identify policies and initiatives that address them.
Posted inTalent & Education
Rich school, poor school, and the challenges that separate them
Waukazoo Elementary draws students from affluent lake homes. Pine Creek kids come from Holland’s poorest neighborhoods. In ways large and small, Waukazoo kids benefit from their families’ extra income.
Posted inTalent & Education
Kalamazoo Promise scholarship program ‘significantly’ increases college grad rates, study finds
Ten years after the launch of the nationally lauded program, researchers can say for the first time that the money was well spent, with many more Kalamazoo students earning college degrees than would have without the scholarship.
Posted inTalent & Education
Does Kalamazoo Promise success build case for more state scholarship funding?
Make college cheap enough, and more people graduate. Who knew?
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Study offers financial, policy road map for Michigan education reform
A blunt new report lists ways to fix Michigan schools. Will anyone listen?
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One Dearborn school soars. Another stumbles. Why?
A test result is a snapshot, and in Dearborn, one elementary school came out with a surprisingly better portrait than another in the critical milestone of third-grade reading. Why? Nobody seems to know.
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Grand Rapids cites the limits of state rankings to explain school gaps
Why do some low-income elementary schools in Grand Rapids perform better than others? Educators in Grand Rapids say that ranking formulas often do not reflect critical differences between seemingly similar schools.
Posted inTalent & Education
One teacher, 25 kids and the enormous challenge of turning around Detroit schools (Chapter 1)
The state is in the midst of yet another fix for Detroit’s troubled schools. So this spring, Bridge spent time in William Weir’s social studies classroom to get a sense for what works, and what doesn’t, for one Detroit teacher.
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One teacher, 25 kids: For struggling students, a push to 'dream bigger' (Chapter 2)
For third- and fourth-graders with limited reading skills, a teacher must take creative measures to make lessons stick.
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One teacher, 25 kids: ‘Can I sleep at night?’ (Chapter 3)
Budget deficits in Detroit mean even larger class sizes come this fall. Will Mr. Weir meet the challenge for his young students?