The Report Card with Nat Malkus

Many schools today offer mental health programming, but according to Carolyn Gorman, a lot of school mental health programming is not only wasteful and ineffective but also directionally misguided: School mental health programming often targets students who don’t need help, pathologizes ordinary emotions, and fails to adequately help students with the most severe mental health problems.On this episode of The Report Card, Nat Malkus speaks with Carolyn Gorman about school-based mental health. Nat and Carolyn discuss whether and why student mental health has gotten worse, what we do and don’t know about school-based mental health programming, what K–12 schools should do when it comes to mental health, whether the mental health landscape in higher education is similar to the mental health landscape in K–12 schools, and how schools can promote student mental health through ordinary routines and orderly school environments.Carolyn D. Gorman is a fellow at the Manhattan Institute, where her research examines how policy changes in the U.S. impact individuals with mental illness.This episode was produced by Elli Lucas.Show Notes:School-Based Mental Health Initiatives Challenges and Considerations for PolicymakersThe Tradition and Limits of Campus Mental HealthCongress Is Treating Schools like Mental-Health ClinicsIt’s Time For Schools To Get Out Of The Mental Health Business

On this episode of The Report Card, Nat Malkus speaks with John White about state education leadership, how the education landscape has changed over the last few decades, innovation in education and where it tends to go wrong, the importance of school choice, the Southern Surge, why coherent systems matter, what we know about curriculum, and more.John White is the CEO of Great Minds. Previously, he was the Louisiana State Superintendent of Education, Superintendent of the Louisiana Recovery School District, Deputy Chancellor of the New York City Department of Education, and a Teach For America corps member.This episode was produced by Elli Lucas.

In classrooms across the nation, students and teachers are using AI—but should they be?AI’s advocates argue that it can be used to individualize instruction and provide personalized feedback, but its critics contend that the adoption of AI in the classroom will get in the way of students acquiring critical thinking skills.Who is right here? Can AI reverse a decade of falling test scores, or will it only exacerbate this trend? And even if AI in the classroom is the future, does that mean schools should adopt AI in the classroom today?On this episode of The Report Card, Nat Malkus and four experts discuss and debate whether maximizing school improvement by 2035 means integrating AI into classrooms today.Note: This episode is adapted from the most recent installment of the American Enterprise Institute’s Education Policy Debate Series, which was held at AEI on December 8. A video recording of the debate can be found here.Shanika Hope is the director of Americas & Knowledge, Skills, and Learning at Google.Alex Kotran is the CEO of the AI Education Project.Dan Meyer is the vice president of User Growth at Amplify.Jake Tawney is the chief academic officer at Great Hearts Academies.

On this episode of The Report Card, Nat Malkus, Rick Hess, and Andy Rotherham discuss what recent elections in Virginia, New Jersey, and New York City mean for education, the Trump administration’s Compact for Academic Excellence in Higher Education, the latest in the Jim Ryan saga, and more. (Note: This episode was recorded on Monday, before the Trump administration announced further plans to dismantle the Department of Education.)Andrew J. Rotherham is a co-founder and senior partner at Bellwether and the author of the Eduwonk blog.Frederick M. Hess is a senior fellow and the director of education policy studies at AEI.Show Notes:Jim Ryan LetterThe Impoundment Wars, Begun They Have. Plus, Wait, What Just Happened at UVA?"Patriotic Education" Isn't. Plus, The Vagueness of "No Kings."What's The Forecast In Virginia? Plus Literacy, Des Moines, Cell Phone Bans, More...And Fish Pics.VCU Changed Scholarship for Descendants of the Enslaved to Align with Anti-DEI PoliciesFinding Common Ground on Trump’s College CompactCampus Leaders Conveniently Find the Spines They Lost Years AgoHow Zohran Mamdani Could Kill New York’s SchoolsTexas A&M Tightens Rules on Talking About Race and Gender in ClassesHow to Really Know a Thing, Directed by Quentin Tarantino

In August 2023, right after he took over as superintendent of Houston ISD, Mike Miles came on The Report Card to talk about his plans for Texas’s largest school district. From changing teacher pay to overhauling curriculum, Miles’s plans for Houston were ambitious—and controversial—but would they work?Two years later, Mike Miles comes back on The Report Card to speak with Nat Malkus about the progress Houston has made and whether Houston’s bold reform agenda has gone according to plan.F. Mike Miles is the superintendent of Houston Independent School District. Previously, he was the founder and CEO of Third Future Schools, superintendent of Dallas Independent School District, and superintendent of the Harrison School District in Colorado Springs.Show Notes:Mike Miles on Houston ISDThe Last Hurrah

Earlier this month, 2024 NAEP scores came out for 8th grade science and 12th grade reading and math, and the results were not good, with students losing ground in each subject. But these declines are not new and they are not only the result of the pandemic: Across a number of tests and subjects, scores have been declining for over a decade, especially for low-performing students. Indeed, while achievement for the top 10 percent of students has remained roughly flat, achievement for the bottom 10 percent of students has fallen precipitously—on many assessments, by well over a year.What might be causing these declines? Is it the rise of phones? The fall of No Child Left Behind? The aftereffects of the Great Recession? A change in the culture of schooling? On this episode of The Report Card, Nat Malkus explores these questions and more with James Wyckoff and Chad Aldeman.James Wyckoff is the Memorial Professor of Education and Professor of Public Policy Emeritus at the University of Virginia.Chad Aldeman is the founder of Read Not Guess, the author of Aldeman on Education, and a regular columnist for The 74.Show Notes:Testing Theories of Why: Four Keys to Interpreting US Student Achievement TrendsPuzzling Over Declining Academic AchievementInteractive: See How Student Achievement Gaps Are Growing in Your StateDon't Blame the SubgroupsStudent Achievement Is Down Overall—But Kids at the Bottom Are Sinking Faster