The decreased costs of filing college applications due to things like the internet and the Common Application has increased the average number of college applications that high school seniors submit. This, in turn, has increased the competition between high school seniors to get into any given (mainly selective) institution. A recent NY times article "Greater Competition for College Places Means Higher Anxiety, Too" reports how this is causing more anxiety among college applicants.
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Do students actually learn more in courses where they give teachers higher course evaluations? A study in "Meta-analysis of faculty's teaching effectiveness: Student evaluation of teaching ratings and student learning are not related" by Utll, White, and Gonzalez that was published in the just publi

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The decreased costs of filing college applications due to things like the internet and the Common Application has increased the average number of college applications that high school seniors submit.

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The Wall Street journal blog article How Education Drives Inequality among the 99% reports on research by David Autor who looks at changes in inequality among those below the top 1% in income and the important role that education plays in explaining changes over time in inequality among those who ar

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Interesting article in NY Times Getting Out of Discount Game, Small Colleges Lower the Pricethat said some colleges are getting out of the tuition discounting game. For example, instead of having a list price tuition of $35,000 and average aid of $13,000 a college would charge everyone $22,000.

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The New York times article "U.S. Reading and Math Scores Show Slight Gains reports results from the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) exam which showed small gains in reading and math but differences by race and income groups still persist.

The recent OECD report "Education at a Glance" shows that the unemployment rates of college graduates (tertiary type A) in OECD countries are lower than those without a high school degree (lower secondary).

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The NY times article "Faltering Economy in China Dims Job Prospects for Graduates" reports that with 7 million new college graduates and a weakening economy its tough for a new college graduate to get a job.

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Education Week came out with its 2013 rankings of states based on six categories of education policy and performance. Maryland ranked first (87.5) followed by Massachusetts (84.1) and New York (83.1). The national average was 76.9 or a grade of C+.

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The recent article in the Huffington Post, "Education Funding Drops In More Than Half Of States" that summarizes the findings from a report by the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities reports that per-student/ inflation adjusted education spending has dropped since 2008 in more than half the state

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If you had $102,000 where would be the best place to invest-- Stocks, bonds or a college degree.

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The National Math and Science Initiative pays students $100 for scoring 3 or higher on the AP exam as well as rewarding teachers according to the number of students in their class who pass the exam.

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Here is a nice video on U-Tube, that highlights last June's National History Day. Thanks to Alison Armentrout for providing the link.

Many college graduates are unable to find jobs that are the beginning of a career path. With the poor economy their careers are on hold as they are unable to find jobs related to their desired career.

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Over 200 poorly performing teachers were laid of in the D.C. public schools last week. This was the result of the IMPACT program that was put into place by the former superintendent of schools Michelle Rhee. As reported in the Washington Post article, "206 D.C.

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Given that standardized tests are now ubiquitous after No Child Left Behind and value added approaches based on tests scores are used to gauge performance, many teachers feel intense pressure to "teach to the test", especially as the time for standardized testing draws near.

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Over the last decade the price of college has soared while incomes for the middle class have remained flat. Since the middle class does not typically qualify for federal support such as Pell grants the question arises of whether or not college is affordable for the middle class.

The U.S. Department of Education recently released the report "Public School Graduates and Dropouts from the Common Core of Data 2008-09." Wisconsin had the highest high school graduation rate (AFGR) at 90.7% while Mississippi had the lowest at 62.0%.

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Many high school seniors who plan to attend college next fall have had to recently decide what university they will attend among those institutions that they have been admitted to.

The LA times article "California community colleges to slash enrollment, classes" reports that the California's community college system faces an $800 million shortfall and may have to cut enrollment by 400,000 students and eliminate thousands of classes.

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In the past two years unions have organized 12 of the 85 charters in Chicago and they hope to organize all of them reports the NY times article "Unions Move In at Chicago Charter Schools, and Resistance Is Swift." The impact of such unions on teachers and students will ultimately depend on the type

Governor Jerry Brown has proposed cutting the University of California System's budget by $500m million dollars. As reported in "UC regents hear grim predictions about the system's future" some Chancellors predict that quality at the campuses may be compromised and course offering will be cut.

Education officials in New York have released a report showing that the majority of students who leave high school in the state are not college ready according to their scores on the state's Regent Exams.

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The Higher Education Research Institute's "The American Freshman" report presents findings from the CIRP Freshman survey showing that freshman in 2010 are more stressed out than in previous years.

Officials in Missouri have suggested that by raising tuition at the University of Missouri, the school's prestige may increase.

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To help counteract the childhood obesity problem in the US, the Federal government is proposing changes in the nutrition content of school meals.

Early indications are that applications to universities will rise in Britain this year despite the increase in tuition. The BBC News article "University applications continue to rise" reports that applications are expected to increase by 2.5% this year despite the rise in tuition to £9000.

As unemployed workers seek to retrain at community colleges, state budget cuts are limiting the number of students that can enroll.

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The ACLU brought suit against several public school districts for allegedly charging fees to students for textbooks etc.

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While considerable progress has been made in narrowing the black-white gap in reading and achievement math achievement since 2007, recent results show that the gap actually increased slightly between 2009 and 2010. The Washington Post article "Progress slows in closing achievement gaps in D.C.

With pay now being linked to test performance in many school districts and adequate yearly progress for NCLB being harder to achieve with the raising of the bar in many states, the incentives for teachers to tamper with tests has increased.

Here are the articles in the August 2010 issue of Economics of Education Review

1. Low-income students and highly selective private colleges: Geography, searching, and recruiting

by Catharine B. Hill and Gordon C. Winston.

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A new report released by the Department of Education found that 25% of high school students fail to graduate on time. For African Americans and Hispanics the percentage is about 40%.

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The Washington DC's teacher union ratified a contract that bases pay on performance not seniority yesterday. As reported in the Washington Post article "D.C.

The New York state legislature voted to increase the cap on the number of charter schools in the state from 200 to 460.

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In recent years the California State university system has be cut beyond the bone. In 1984 the university system's share of the state budget was 11% while last year it had shrunk to 5.7%. The budget was cut 21% last year alone.

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