Education

According to the National Center for Education Statistics, 17.6 million students attended U.S. postsecondary institutions in 2009. Of these, more than a third chose to study part-time or discontinuously. While such nontraditional attendance can make education possible that otherwise wouldn’t be, research has suggested that it is also associated with lower graduation rates, higher education expenses and a reduction in total wages over the course of one’s working life.

Are charter schools better for children? The answer depends on context. And it’s not an unequivocal “yes,” at least based on evidence from test scores: One of the most comprehensive randomized studies to date, published in 2010 by the National Center for Education Evaluation, found that charter schools were no more effective than public ones in raising math and reading outcomes.

Policy decisions concerning education programming and early interventions are increasingly driven by documented results from long-term academic studies. The Chicago Longitudinal Study (CLS) has now tracked the education and post-education experiences of 1,539 families, most of which participated in the Child-Parent Center (CPC) Education Program (the second-oldest federally funded preschool program, behind Head Start).

In this era of economic globalization, the race for innovation and future growth among nations has prompted a profound debate about how the U.S. is preparing its next generation of workers and leaders. While the United States has responded vigorously to global challengers in the past — the Soviet Union in the era of Sputnik, Japan in the 1980s — the potential for a dramatic loss of competitiveness is more acute than ever.