♦ Life Happens: A ChoiceWords series ♦ The state needs to add additional enrollment periods for the Wisconsin Parental Choice Program. The state should also end the program’s grade-level entry points, which can prevent families from accessing the program for years. This is the first in a periodic ChoiceWords series. Do you know in April what you’ll be doing in September? Do you have all the paperwork filed for those plans? Maybe. But we all know life happens and you don’t know what your situation may be six months from now. The reality that “life happens” bedevils parents in the…

As the school year starts, top of mind for many schools in Wisconsin is the current teacher shortage. The problem has garnered lots of nationwide coverage. Staff shortages plague both public and private schools in the state. In mid-July, School Choice Wisconsin did a survey on this topic. The 133 choice schools that responded reported 355 open positions at the K­–12 level. This is a much higher than usual rate, according to longtime education administrators at School Choice Wisconsin. Forty providers offer teacher preparation programs in the state. To become a licensed teacher, one must follow one of four pathways. The road can…

First-ever drop in math, biggest drop in reading in 30 years Fallout from the COVID-19 pandemic and pandemic policies continues to manifest across the nation. The latest: Reading and math scores of 9-year-old students nationwide dropped between 2020 and 2022, according to results released today from the National Center for Education Statistics (NCES). A Wall Street Journal story on the scores cites experts who say it could take decades for the worst performers to rebound. “These are some of the largest declines we have observed in a single assessment cycle in 50 years of the NAEP program,” said Acting NCES…