The School Improvement Grant (SIG) program will expire as ESSA is implemented, but the challenges of low-performing schools have not. SIG provided some promising examples, as well as caveats that can challenge and inform those of us who believe our nation’s most disadvantaged students deserve better. In our latest blog ...
Contributing and working alongside Native Nations, AIR has a deep commitment to engaging communities, fostering shared vision and values, building capacity, and developing strategic alliances to achieve sustainable systems change in Indian Country.
For more than 15 years, AIR has led the National Reporting System for Adult Education for the Office of Vocational and Adult Education (OVAE). AIR developed the adult education accountability system—the NRS—and from its inception developed a parallel line of technical assistance activities to ensure its effective implementation and use. ...
Knowing that the current context is dramatically different than previous school years because of the COVID-19 pandemic, and that students’ access to learning from home varies, how should schools grade student performance? This brief from the California Collaborative on District Reform explores some of the policy options California districts and ...
Amidst numerous issues plaguing the San José Unified School District, the San José superintendent and the San José Teachers Association president came together to find common ground and chart a new path. This report shares the lessons learned over 24 years of collaboration between the district and the union, and ...
California’s Local Control Funding Formula (LCFF) has introduced changes that alter the conditions under which educators, administrators, and community leaders approach their roles in the K-12 education system. Consequently, leaders at all levels may need to build the capacity—both the knowledge and skills and the resources—that they need to fulfill ...
For the Bay Area Youth Participatory Evaluation Project, AIR collaborated with Youth Participatory Evaluation (YPE) experts from Alliance for Girls, who guided a group of three young people affected by the justice system to support research on diversion programming. The goal was to find ways to further humanize young people's ...
Achieving Common Core-aligned mathematics instruction is not easy. AIR has teamed up with the Center for Education Policy at Harvard University to offer high-quality professional development to help teachers, schools, and districts improve their mathematics instruction.
An early warning system can be a powerful strategy to provide data to inform educators’ practices and help students get back on track. An EWS is implemented as a continuous improvement process, improving practices through review and refinement of practice. Through analysis of process, practice, and data, our clients receive ...
Our nation’s lowest performing schools have traditionally struggled to offer students the instruction and supports they deeply need. The first phase of the federal School Improvement Grant Program targeted the goal of turning around these schools and improving learning for students. This report examines the first year of SIG implementation ...