BSE News Headlines

PROFESSOR JANELLE T. SCOTT tells The Los Angeles Times that it may be time for schools to re-think what grades measure. "Grading students right now is essentially grading their home resources, which includes not only the physical structure and availability of a space to ‘do’ school, but also adults who can support and supplement remote offerings," she said. Read the full Los Angeles Times story "Ds and Fs Surge, Attendance Slips Among L.A.'s Poorest Students Amid Distance Learning.”

PROFESSOR ZEUS LEONARDO in conversation with The Anti-Racist Project notes that although privilege may be a developmentally appropriate point of entry into discussing race and racism, white people will need to advance beyond confessing their own white privilege; and now is a good time to examine racist structures that are "robust, concrete and can sustain themselves despite critical self-reflection by white educators." Listen to the full interview.

DEAN PRUDENCE L. CARTER remarks on parents paying private tutors as schooling goes online. "We are going to have an exacerbation of massive inequality," she tells The Los Angeles Times. "And many children from economically vulnerable backgrounds who need access to tutors will very likely not get that support." Read the full Los Angeles Times story "Parents Are Paying Up To $100 an Hour for Tutors, Driving Demand and Worsening Inequities.”

PROFESSOR DEREK VAN RHEENEN tells ESPN that as a student, Jaylen Brown wasted no time at Berkeley and delved right in to his educational pursuits. "Jaylen wanted to be thrown to the wolves, intellectually, and to really fight to find his intellectual identity in his first term." Read the full ESPN story "The Celtics' Jaylen Brown is a player for this moment.”

PROFESSOR JANELLE T. SCOTT is interviewed by California magazine about inequities in K-12 distance learning; learning pods; and what parents need to think about to keep learning equitable. "I think any kind of institutional intervention where someone can be thinking about all of the goals people have right now is good. So, equity’s a goal, quality is a goal, safety is a goal. Any kind of hub that can hold all those goals constant, and weigh the costs and benefits in a way that parents can’t, could be really helpful right now. Parents are focused on their kid," she said. Read the full California magazine story "Will Distance Learning Make Education Inequality Worse?"

PROFESSOR FRANK C. WORRELL tells The San Francisco Chronicle that with the pandemic and wildfires in California, the anxiety is real. “As parents and teachers, we have got to be calm and communicate to kids that things are bad right now, but they will work out,” he said. “It sounds corny, but this is a time where you need in some sense to be touchy-feely.” Read the full San Francisco Chronicle story "‘Trauma on top of trauma’: Bay Area students under stress from pandemic face wildfire risks.”

PROFESSOR TRAVIS J. BRISTOL tells Prism that teachers of color are often looked to as the ones who also provide defacto mental health support to students of color. “Teachers are taught in their teacher preparation programs to deliver content, so missing from those schools are services around mental health,” he said. “Those Black teachers are expected to be the teacher and social worker and guidance counselor when they've only been trained around a certain set of skills. Those teachers lack the capacity to handle all of that because that's not how teacher preparation programs were organized.” Read the full Prism story "Black and brown school districts are struggling to retain teachers.”

PROFESSOR FRANK C. WORRELL remarks on a survey by The New York Times that found parents, irrespective of income or employment status, are concerned about their children's academic progress this year. “For many poor families and immigrant families, education really is the way out of poverty. Even parents who didn’t have college degrees are recognizing the importance of college in this economy, and wanting that for their kids,” he said. Read the full New York Times story "‘I’m Only One Human Being’: Parents Brace for a Go-It-Alone School Year.”

DEAN PRUDENCE L. CARTER shares her thoughts with The New York Times about what's happening with parents and learning pods. “There is a natural human tendency to want to blame it on someone else when this is truly a systemic problem. Parents are trying to do the best they can to survive and take care of their own personal situation because we really don’t have a government or leadership right now that’s trying to coordinate this across the nation,” she says. Read the full New York Times story "Why Parents, With ‘No Good Choice’ This School Year, Are Blaming One Another.”

PROFESSOR BRUCE FULLER tells the Los Angeles Times that LAUSD's tentative agreement with teachers is missing a crucial piece. "I see no specificity for how educators will connect with kids in working-class families who fail to log on with teachers,” he says. Read the full Los Angeles Times story "LAUSD, teachers reach tentative deal on remote learning.”

DEAN PRUDENCE L. CARTER tells NPR that learning pods put a spotlight on educational inequities. "I'm thinking a lot about how to minimize the impact of privilege, particularly class privilege, on children's learning," she says. Read the full NPR story "'Pandemic Pods' Raise Concerns About Equity.”

PROFESSOR JANELLE T. SCOTT tells EdSource that learning pods may not be so straightforward. "The idea (of learning pods) is fraught with complications that will be realized as people start to enact these micro-communities. I think the quality of instruction is a big one," she says. Read the full EdSource story "Parents worried about the fall plan 'learning pods' and micro-schools.”

PROFESSOR JANELLE T. SCOTT is a guest on KQED's Forum and shares her thoughts on the challenges and inequities with learning pods. "If parents are committed to forming these (learning) pods, I also think they have to keep a dual eye on how they can support the (school) district's ability to serve all students in equitable ways. I think that's our moral and ethical challenge as citizens," she says. Listen to the recorded Forum broadcast "Parents Turning to Tutors, “Pandemic Pods” to Help with Remote Learning.”

PROFESSOR ZACHARY PARDOS shares distance learning resources with KTVU-2 News. He encourages teachers to build community in online classes by arriving early to class and chatting with students. "I allow students to propose a question of the day and that's how we start the day," he says. Watch the full KTVU-2 News story "Experts look to make distance learning more effective.”

PROFESSOR JANELLE T. SCOTT notes the harsh reality of educational inequities in a story by Salon. "Districts with more resources are likely going to be able to avail themselves of higher quality instruction, and higher-income families are going to be much better positioned to support [remote] learning than less-resourced families who don't have the privilege of staying at home," she said. Read the full Salon story "As school closures continue, students could face long-term learning setback.”

PROFESSOR BRUCE FULLER tells Reuters federal aid for child care will be needed if schools hold in-person instruction. “This cost would be offset by the surge in labor supply and income, as parents flock back to work, helping to jump-start the economy,” he said. Read the full Reuters story "U.S. public schools, focus of debate on reopening, are unsung economic force.”

PROFESSOR TRAVIS J. BRISTOL talks with NPR's All Things Considered about anti-racist education. “I believe that to begin the work of forming a more perfect union requires us to enact anti-racist teaching, but it also requires us to prepare teachers to think about how to design anti-racist teaching. And that is what gives me hope,” he said. Read the full All Things Considered story "Effective Anti-Racist Education Requires More Diverse Teachers, More Training.”

ANNIE JOHNSTON, Coordinator of Public Programs and Principal Investigator of the GSE's College and Career Academy Support Network (CCASN), tells KQED's MindShift that the pandemic gives schools an opportunity for substantive change in how education is designed by including all stakeholders, including students traditionally on the margins. Read the full MindShift story "How Students Benefit from a School Reopening Plan Designed for Those at the Margins.”

PROFESSOR CHUNYAN YANG tells the Daily Californian about her UCOP grant that will help fund research on the mental health needs of Chinese American students during the pandemic. Read the full Daily Californian story "UC system awards $2M to CA COVID-19 researchers.”

PROFESSOR DEREK VAN RHEENEN talks with The Atlantic about Berkeley alumnus and Boston Celtics player Jaylen Brown, the first freshman to take Van Rheenen's course, Theoretical Foundations for the Cultural Studies of Sport and Education. “I think of Jaylen as a public scholar,” Van Rheenan said. “I think both the music and the sports world have dabbled in that notion of public scholars or public intellects who are stepping outside of their normal identity. It’s a responsibility some want to take on and others don’t, and some are better equipped to take it on and others aren’t. Jaylen has both. He has the responsibility, he feels that in his core, and he has the ability to articulate and make use of his platform.” Read the full story in The Atlantic, "‘He’s been about this’: Why Jaylen Brown driving 15 hours to protest is who he is.

PROFESSOR TRAVIS J. BRISTOL talks with EdWeek about the problems of assigning teachers of color only to classes with students of color. Read the full story "Rotating teachers through classes of different ability levels is better for students and prevents educator burnout.”

PROFESSOR TRAVIS J. BRISTOL tells California Schools, a publication of the California School Boards Association (CSBA), that successful retention of teachers of color means school principals and teachers collaborating on improving working conditions. “If principals aren’t creating positive working conditions for teachers, where teachers are getting feedback on their practice, where teachers are being treated like practitioners and experts. If those conditions aren’t present, then you will have teachers leaving,” he said. Read the full CSBA story "The Time is Now: Leaders, researchers advance teacher diversity as an imperative issue.”

PROFESSOR FRANK C. WORRELL tells KTVU-2 News that for school-age kids at home during the COVID-19 public health crisis who aren't used to homeschooling, sticking to a route Monday through Friday is important. Parents and guardians can also have their kids try educational apps, and virtual museum tours. See the KTVU-2 News story "Tips for homeschooling during coronavirus outbreak.”

PROFESSOR BRUCE FULLER'S latest research shows that learning disparities between African Americans and English-learners, compared with white and Asian students, failed to budge in Los Angeles after five years of additional funding. Read more on Berkeley News "New funding lifts L.A. schools, but disadvantaged students still lag.” In a related story, PROFESSOR TRAVIS J. BRISTOL comments on the findings, noting that resources need to focused on specific issues. Read more in the Daily Californian "Progressive funding for schools fails to alleviate racial achievement gap, study says.”

PROFESSOR TOLANI BRITTON tells KPIX5-TV that income sharing agreements as a way to pay for a post-secondary education has many unknowns, it’s not well regulated, and some critics say it's akin to indentured servitude. Read more on the KPIX5-TV news site  "San Francisco-Based Holberton Coding School Facing Fraud Accusations From Former Students.”

PROFESSOR TRAVIS J. BRISTOL tells ABC7 in Los Angeles, "If we're going to lower turnover for teachers of color we have to attend to improving the working conditions in their schools." Read more on the ABC7 Los Angeles news site, "Compton school looking at new ways to help African-American students."

PROFESSOR DEREK VAN RHEENEN says that it’s common for fans to deify professional athletes, so it's not unusual for some fans to be upset when negative aspects of an athlete’s life are reported, such as the 2003 rape allegation against the late NBA player Kobe Bryant. Read more in the Los Angeles Times, "For survivors of sexual assault, Kobe Bryant’s legacy is complicated."

PROFESSOR TRAVIS J. BRISTOL appreciates California Gov. Gavin Newsom's education budget because "it reminds the public that teaching is a profession and in order to become better in the profession, you have to spend time learning the craft of teaching." Read more in the Sacramento Bee, "Teacher bonuses and classroom prep: Inside Newsom’s $900 million plan for California schools."

PROFESSOR TOLANI BRITTON comments on the topic of free college as proposed by Democratic presidential candidate Bernie Sanders. In the short term, "capacity is going to be a big issue," Britton tells the San Francisco Chronicle's political reporter John Wildermuth.  "President Bernie Sanders: Here’s what it would mean for California.”

* Some publications and media outlets may require registration.