Education

The incoming administration of President-elect Joe Biden will invest billions of dollars in public education to close achievement gaps, modernize school buildings and support schools with high concentrations of low-income students, campaign policy director Stef Feldman told the Education Writers Association in an interview last week.

The push to reopen schools in Massachusetts mirrors a national trend in which governors and mayors are pushing for a return to schools at the same time COVID rates are spiking around the country.

As progressive Asian American activists, we support the suspension of the entrance exam as a criteria for selection to attend the exam schools in favor of standards that will lead to increased diversity and improved access, particularly for Black and Latinx communities.

Like many schools and extracurricular programs reorienting during the pandemic, the ACE Mentor Program of Greater Boston is grappling with the big question: How do you create an engaging online learning program?

Roxbury Latin is a democratically gathered community, a school where individuals from a great diversity of backgrounds are brought together by shared goals and common ideals.

Now that we’ve been at Park for several years, we have found it is providing an exceptional educational foundation for our children, Sarah-Alysee in Grade 5, Rodney in Grade 1, and Micah in PreK. (Our youngest, Elaina, isn’t quite old enough for Park yet!)

We are still facing uncertainty from coronavirus, but the values that guide us are unchanged. Our plans for the upcoming school year put health, safety and the needs of our most vulnerable students at the center of our plans.

In a virtual meeting with the Massachusetts Education Justice Alliance on Sept. 3, several parents, students and teachers discussed what would make them feel safe enough to return to school buildings in the fall.

Schools in predominantly Black and Latino neighborhoods in Massachusetts are becoming more intensely segregated, even as the state’s population is becoming more diverse, according to a new study released in August.

Tensions between Boston Public Schools Superintendent Brenda Cassellius and the Boston Teachers Union continue to simmer as the district pushes forward with plans to reopen schools over the objections of schoolteachers and staff who say they want to see more safety measures put in place.

Benjamin Franklin Institute of Technology has named Marvin Loiseau to serve as the school’s dean of academics.