Author: Reporter

by Ben Wildavsky, The Hechinger Report April 14, 2026 MYSORE, India — Employers around the world share a familiar complaint: Universities often don’t prepare students for fast-changing job demands. Too many new graduates need extra preparation before they’re workforce-ready.  In India, rather than waiting for higher education to catch up, major employers are designing their own education programs for new hires. It’s a model that offers a glimpse of where some American firms may be heading. Rishi Agrawal knows the college-to-career disconnect firsthand — along with one influential company’s solution. He grew up in a small village in central India.…

Get stories like this delivered straight to your inbox. Sign up for The 74 Newsletter There are more than 12 million elementary and middle school students from low-income families who are below grade level in reading or math, our analysis shows. Yet school districts across the country are cutting their tutoring programs — not because they doubt the evidence, but because they can’t afford the tutors.  Traditional high-impact tutoring can cost upward of $2,000 per student a year, and staffing is the single biggest constraint. At the same time, shortages of qualified teachers persist, with districts struggling to recruit and…

Get stories like this delivered straight to your inbox. Sign up for The 74 Newsletter Three well-known but very different names in nonprofit education say they’re coming together Tuesday to launch an improbable enterprise: a new, AI-focused college, designed for a world in which artificial intelligence is reshaping what employers want. It promises a bachelor’s degree in applied AI, delivered almost entirely online in as little as two years — for less than the price of a used Toyota Corolla.  Applications are expected to open in 2027 for the Khan TED Institute, a joint project of Khan Academy, TED —…

I only play a historian on television, so I thought it would be useful to include some of my lively chats with real-life historians in this column. Recently, I spoke with Eddie R. Cole, scholar of American higher education at the University of California, Los Angeles. Cole has written two award-winning books on U.S. higher education in the 20th century, one focused on the role of presidents in aiding or challenging the Civil Rights Movement and another on the history of Omega Psi Phi Fraternity, Inc. We discussed how he thinks about academic freedom, the role of historically Black colleges…

Richard Souvenir, professor and vice provost for strategic initiatives at Temple University, is chairing the search for the university’s vice provost for online and digital learning. As this role fits perfectly into my Featured Gig series—positions at the intersection of learning, technology and organizational change—I am grateful to Richard for agreeing to answer my questions about the opportunity. Q: What is the university’s mandate behind this role? How does it help align with and advance the university’s strategic priorities? A: Temple is creating the vice provost for online and digital learning [role] to lead a universitywide transformation in how we…

Competency-Based Training For Associations In Action Competency-based training is a simple idea with profound impact: focus learning on the specific skills and abilities people need to demonstrate, not just the hours they sit in a course. In an association context, this approach is gold. Members aren’t interested in theoretical knowledge for its own sake – they want to master competencies that advance their careers or fulfill certification requirements. Microlearning fits perfectly here, offering quick hits of training tightly aligned to those competencies. In this article, we’ll define competency-based training and see why it matters for associations. You’ll discover examples of…

Listen to the article 4 min This audio is auto-generated. Please let us know if you have feedback. Dive Brief: Staff hiring freezes and layoff notices have risen quickly in districts nationwide in recent months as school boards grapple with declining enrollment and budget shortfalls. For example, Boston Public Schools proposed cutting 678 full-time roles in its fiscal year 2027 budget, Virginia’s Richmond Public Schools plans to eliminate 46 full-time positions in its central office, and School District of Philadelphia Superintendent Tony Watlington has called for cutting 130 vacant central office positions.  This trend comes as annual school district budgets…

Dive Brief: The U.S. Department of Education is continuing to push for artificial intelligence use in classrooms through newly finalized priorities and definitions for districts and colleges applying for any of the agency’s discretionary grant programs.  The department’s final rule, issued Monday, said it will prioritize applications for projects that aim to expand the understanding of AI or the appropriate and ethical use of AI in education.  Within those parameters, proposals that call for integrating AI literacy skills into teaching and learning practices that improve student outcomes will be given more weight, according to the rule.  Dive Insight: Under the…

?si=sPXB5teJO7wsm71F The Pacif­ic Pal­isades fire of Jan­u­ary 25 destroyed much of that coastal Los Ange­les neigh­bor­hood, but it some­how spared the Charles and Ray Eames house. Any­one who’s paid it a vis­it, or at least pored over the many pho­tos of it in exis­tence, knows that it’s more than a pre­served work of Cal­i­for­nia mod­ernism once inhab­it­ed by a famed pair of hus­band-and-wife design­ers. In truth, it’s more like a world, or at least a world­view, made domes­tic. From the out­side, one first notices the clean, vague­ly Japan­ese lines, the sharp angles, and the planes of Mon­dri­an col­or. Once inside,…

Key points: Schools have seen rising problems with student behavior since the pandemic. For too many K-12 districts, these student behavior challenges are leading to violence against teachers. According to a survey from the National Education Association (NEA) and the American Psychological Association (APA), 80 percent of teachers experienced at least one incident of verbal or threatening violence from students during the 2021 to 2022 school year and 56 percent experienced incidents of physical violence from students.  Violence against teachers in the workplace contributes to issues like burnout and some educators leaving the profession altogether. To support teachers in doing…