Students Are Not Lazy. They Are Cognitively Exhausted

By the middle of the school day, I can usually tell when a class has hit its limit.

It is not always loud. It is not always disruptive. Sometimes it is the opposite. Students sit quietly, stare at their screens, reread the same direction three times, click between tabs without purpose, or look at me with the kind of expression that says they heard the words but did not have enough mental energy left to process them.

As a secondary science teacher and adjunct professor, I have seen this pattern often enough that I no longer dismiss it as laziness. Some students are distracted. Some avoid work. Some make poor choices. Teachers know that reality better than anyone.

Read more: https://theeducatorsroom.com/students-are-not-lazy-they.../

Most Agreed Topic: Ban Grade Minimums

In South Carolina, students will no longer get minimum grades.

Gov. Henry McMaster has signed a new law eliminating so-called “grade floors” in South Carolina schools, a practice that allowed teachers to assign students a minimum grade higher than what they actually earned. The change takes effect next school year, and districts that continue the practice risk losing 10% of their state funding.

Read more: https://bit.ly/3QfkDeJ

Curriculum Associates, the education technology company behind the widely used I-Ready learning platform, is facing a civil lawsuit over its handling of student data — a legal challenge the company is firmly pushing back against.

The lawsuit is one of several similar actions filed against education technology providers in recent months. Curriculum Associates maintains that the claims against it are without legal merit.

“We do not sell student data to third parties, use student data for advertising, or build commercial profiles on students,” the company said in a statement, adding that all student data use is for educational purposes and carried out with the consent of the schools and districts that own the data.

Read more: https://theeducatorsroom.com/i-ready/

We Could See This Coming: I-Ready

Dr. Kimi Waite’s journey in education is a story of courage, creativity, and commitment to equity. As an award-winning Asian American scholar-activist, author, and innovation leader, Waite has dedicated her career to ensuring that classrooms are spaces of inclusion, inspiration, and global awareness. As a Top 50 Educator, her work is particularly focused on climate change and environmental justice education, connecting K-12 students, teachers, and communities to the pressing issues of our time.

Education Legislation You Need to Know

Read more: Be in the know. What bills are happening in your state?

Read more about these bills: https://theeducatorsroom.com/house-republicans-advance.../

Who Are We Interviewing: Dr. Kimi Waite

Dr. Kimi Waite’s journey in education is a story of courage, creativity, and commitment to equity. As an award-winning Asian American scholar-activist, author, and innovation leader, Waite has dedicated her career to ensuring that classrooms are spaces of inclusion, inspiration, and global awareness. As a Top 50 Educator, her work is particularly focused on climate change and environmental justice education, connecting K-12 students, teachers, and communities to the pressing issues of our time.

Read more: https://theeducatorsroom.com/kimi-waite-pioneering.../

Do You Need Summer Professional Learning? Join Our Secondary Reading Course

Grade floors have typically allowed students who score very low, for example, a 40%, to receive a minimum of 50% or 60% on an assignment or test. Critics say the approach masks academic struggles and gives families a misleading picture of how their children are doing.

“Right now, because of the use of grade floor practices in multiple school districts across the state, students and parents are often receiving an inflated sense of what their students are capable of doing,” said Patrick Kelly of the Palmetto State Teachers Association.

Read more: https://bit.ly/3QfkDeJ

That means if a student can’t spell, there’s a very good chance they’re also struggling to read — and vice versa. They’re not two separate problems. They’re the same problem.

This is one of 8 research-backed topics we’re covering in our summer course. Doors open next week. Sign up for a sneak peek

.

House Republicans advance two bills to restrict LGBTQ+ content and civil rights history in schools

House Republicans advanced two pieces of legislation this week that critics say would dramatically restrict what students can learn in federally funded schools, targeting references to transgender people, discussions of structural racism, and the use of chosen names and pronouns for trans students.Be in the know. What bills are happening in your state?

Read more about these bills: https://theeducatorsroom.com/house-republicans-advance-two-bills-to-restrict-lgbtq-content-and-civil-rights-history-in-schools/

https://theeducatorsroom.com/house-republicans-advance-two-bills-to-restrict-lgbtq-content-and-civil-rights-history-in-schools

Gratitude Tour: Rob Murphy

It was Rob Murphy’s daughter I met first. She was a student at Free Union School, where I was filling in for the final three months of the 1997/1998 school year. Without knowing who I was other than this guy who had suddenly begun appearing each day on campus in March, she’d greet me every morning with a big smile and wave. I learned her name was Colleen, one of three Murphy daughters. I’d eventually meet her mom Jennifer who spoke of an all-boys boarding school about twenty minutes north of Free Union in Greene County, VA. Her husband Rob was a fundraiser for the school. They lived on campus as did many of the faculty and staff.

Read more: https://theeducatorsroom.com/gratitude-tour-rob-murphy/

Psychological Safety Is School Safety

Walk into a school that takes safety seriously, and you’ll notice the visible measures right away: secured entrances, cameras, locked doors, and practiced drills. These ingredients all signal a school invested in preparation and care.

But there is another safety measure more difficult to point to upon immediate entry: Do people feel safe speaking up here?

Read more: https://theeducatorsroom.com/psychological-safety-is-school-safety/

Curriculum Associates, Maker of I-Ready, Responds to Lawsuit

Curriculum Associates, the education technology company behind the widely used I-Ready learning platform, is facing a civil lawsuit over its handling of student data — a legal challenge the company is firmly pushing back against.

The lawsuit is one of several similar actions filed against education technology providers in recent months. Curriculum Associates maintains that the claims against it are without legal merit.

"We do not sell student data to third parties, use student data for advertising, or build commercial profiles on students," the company said in a statement, adding that all student data use is for educational purposes and carried out with the consent of the schools and districts that own the data.

Read more: https://theeducatorsroom.com/i-ready/

Anne: The Hardest Child to Love

Anne was small for her age, with tangled brunette hair and clothes that always looked slept in. A sour smell followed her everywhere she went. The other children noticed. Fifth graders always notice. She stomped into my room that first morning with hard eyes and crossed arms, daring anyone to care.

She would not look at me.

Would not open a book.

Would not participate.

Every direction I gave her felt like a battle.

Read more: https://bit.ly/4nSm8vR

When immigration agents pounded on his family’s apartment door in 2019, 15-year-old Jair Solis stood between them and his father, refusing to let agents inside without the proper warrant.

Read more: https://theeducatorsroom.com/he-once-considered-leaving-school-after-his-fathers-detention-this-spring-he-graduated-from-college/

Jahque Bryan-Gooden: Redefining Education Through Justice, Culture, and Joy

Jahque Bryan-Gooden’s journey in education is as vivid and layered as the classrooms she envisions, a space where every child’s humanity is honored, their culture celebrated, and their potential nurtured. From her earliest memories at age nine, she recalls walking through the ruby-red doors of a school in Harlem, greeted by a rooftop garden, a cooking club that reinforced math skills, and field trips where students engaged with the indigenous Algonquin practice of maple sugaring. Surrounded by classmates from Bengali, Peruvian, Trinadian, African-American, and White American backgrounds, Gooden experienced what her mentor Carmen Perez called a “salad”: a harmonious mix of identities left intact, rather than assimilated.

Read more: https://theeducatorsroom.com/jahque-bryan-gooden-redefining-education-through-justice-culture-and-joy/

ICE Raids Caused Enrollment to Drop. Now Districts Are Paying the Price

Community members packed a high school auditorium in Chelsea, Massachusetts, last month to oppose the school board’s plan to cut 70 positions, including reading coaches, special education staff and counselors.


“These support systems are what students really rely on,” one girl told the board. “As someone who struggles a lot with being overwhelmed and anxious, sometimes I just need someone to talk to.”

The layoffs will help reduce an $8.6 million budget deficit, due in part to the loss of 350 students.

Sarah Neville, a board member in the Boston-area district, knows one reason enrollment is down. Under federal law, districts can’t ask whether students are U.S. citizens, but almost 90% of the 5,700-students are Latino and 47% are English learners. The state education agency estimates that the population of English learners in Massachusetts schools has dropped by 7,000 since 2024. Officials from Chelsea and other metro-area districts say absenteeism increased as Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents conducted raids in Boston last fall.

“We’re low hanging fruit for ICE because so many of our folks are undocumented,” Neville said. “When they say, ‘We’re going to go target Boston,’ you find the vans actually hanging out in Chelsea.”

Read more: https://theeducatorsroom.com/ice-raids-caused-enrollment-to-drop-now-districts-are-paying-the-price/

Read more: https://theeducatorsroom.com/when-numbers-tell-stories-connecting-math-and-english-in-the-classroom/

Like most of my fellow human beings, I have made mistakes. I lied about eating a second cookie when I was ten years old. I did not signal my intent to turn and accidentally cut off a minivan full of children on their way to soccer practice. I even forgot to wear a hat during a particularly windy…

Read more

Read more

A new report from PEN America found that thousands of books were removed from U.S. public schools during the 2024–2025 school year, disproportionately featuring people of color, LGBTQ+ characters, and nonfiction subject matter, reflecting what the organization describes…

Read more

Read more

Charlotte Cravins’ son, Landry, turned 2 in January. He’s a smiley little boy who loves singing “Itsy Bitsy Spider” and recently got his first pair of glasses.

Landry was born with Down syndrome and has impaired vision. He receives publicly funded therapies that have helped h…

Read more

The viral TikTok has taken the internet by storm. What's caused the debate? A simple sentence:

"She wore a silhouette of clothes that were extraordinary but somewhat gauche."

Read more: https://theeducatorsroom.com/viral-tiktok-has-students-struggling-to-read-basic-sentence

Read more

Recently, I took an informal survey of fellow instructors regarding their most memorable moments as a “student” in education. This would have been long before many considered a career in teaching. Responses included memories of elementary school, junior high, high school, and even college. While expecting …

Read more

I am, unapologetically, a nerdy educator. I enjoy exploring research from other disciplines and examining its potential value in the classroom. I do so with skepticism. What holds up in a carefully controlled, research-driven lab environment does not always survive the unpredictability of a clas…

Read more

As a full first-term teacher assistant, I was living the dream. I had built a class family that followed the rules, settled nicely, and spread love amongst each other so much so that we had become the envy of the other classes. I juggled many responsibilities and still found a way to show up in the clas…

Read more

At my children’s elementary school, an answer…

Read more

Read more

When I was young in my career, I once apologized to a parent because her 16-year-old daughter was walking into walls.

Mad Mom entered my classroom after school, fuming. Her eyes were wide, an almost predatory look on her face as she locked eyes with me and advanced.

“Do you have any idea how much harm you are causing my child?…

Read more

When schools see a spike in referrals, the instinct is often to look for more intervention.

More pull-out support. More behavior plans. More counseling referrals. More Tier 2 and Tier 3 responses.

But in many cases, the real problem starts earlier.

Read more: https://theeducatorsroom.com/tier-1-is…

Read more

A comment from a middle school has ended with one Arkansas teacher arrested for aggravated assault in West Memphis, Arkansas.

Tracy Matthews, 56, a teacher at Wonder Junior High School, faces a felony charge for reportedly putting his hands on a student on April 15.

West Memphis Police…

Read more