Shenandoah County Public Schools’ Post

Welcome to the Information session about our Master's Program!

📆 Save the Date! 📆 Mark your calendars for the 2024 MCHEP Convening taking place Sept. 25-26 in Raymond, Mississippi. This annual convening gathers leaders from across the field to engage in solution-focused discussions about best practices, policy updates, and #Pell implementation. Designed to support colleges, universities, and prison education partners, the event aims to enhance the delivery of meaningful instruction that leads to degree completion. 🔗 Learn more: https://hubs.la/Q02KGHhG0 #HigherEdInPrison #PrisonEducation #NormalizingOpportunity #JusticeImpacted

Here's another way we're teaching Texas State University students about the justice system: #CollegeInCourt gives them a front-row view of the process and great access and opportunity to ask questions in the moment. #ExperientialLearning #HaysCounty #CallToDuty

Data for Missouri schools suggests about 42% of Missouri third-graders are proficient readers, with the rate dropping to 21% for Black third-graders. In the St. Louis Public Schools, about 14% of Black third-graders are proficient readers, compared to 61% of White students. “There is a literary crisis in our country, and being able to read is a civil right.”

This is one of the best discussions of the impact of declining enrollment on schools I've seen lately, and it does a good job of balancing the pros for student experience when schools are smaller with the fiscal realities of an enrollment-based funding system. But one factor often goes ignored in these discussions: as enrollment declines, we have more English learners and students with disabilities. Weighted student formulas should offset this, but does the math really math when you need a certain number of set positions to have a functioning school? Particularly when you need social workers, hard-to-staff teachers, and occupational therapists?

Maybe America has too many of the "wrong" types of schools. Instead of indoctrinating students, maybe more schools should go back to focusing on delivering tangible vocational skills that can lead to a certificate in a trade and immediately gain employment afterwards. The shift from vocational education to a college based one was short-sighted and a huge mistake. Yes, manufacturing went overseas in the 80s; however, there was still a need for many vocations. Instead, the shift to promoting a 4 year degree for everyone resulted in administrative bloat at colleges. Administrator employment greatly outpaced faculty growth and student enrollment. As always, it was all about the money. The good news is that more young people are seeing through the charade and are choosing to save money and learn a trade. This new shift should have a ripple effect and bring back the vocational education platform that is sorely needed. This, in turn, will help urban youth gain skills, meaningful employment, and solid compensation. #education #trades #vocationalschool #schools

I think it’s inaccurate to surmise that urban schools are empty because of low birth rates, which in turn is the reason for parents to move elsewhere. It’s simply not the case. Parents do not move because of not having children. They move in search of better job opportunities. After the pandemic, inperson jobs fell precipitously. Remote jobs began to gain traction, and parents without the requisite skills began to feel the pain. They have been left with no alternative but to move, move along with their children. There is your problem — the absence of jobs! Lawmakers can stabilize this population by creating jobs, and by offering opportunities to retrain low skilled urban parents for the new digital economy. That’s what would keep them in their school districts, and their children in their schools. This is one way to curb the outflow of kids from urban school districts.

I've been warning about this for years. As of 2024, the fertility rate in the United States is 1.64. The fertility rate is a somewhat difficult number to measure, but can roughly be thought of as the number of children an average woman will give birth to over the course of their lifetime. For a population to remain stable, you need 2.1 children per woman. The population of the US is still increasing, primarily on the basis of the Millennials, which followed a pattern similar to but more muted than the Baby Boomers. The growth rate is the first derivative of the population and is still (barely positive), but the growth acceleration rate, the second derivative, shifted negative about fifteen years ago. Not counting immigration, the US population will peak in about 2040, about 15 years ahead of what was predicted at the turn of the century. Immigration is likely to continue for some time after that, but by 2050 or thereabouts, the same phenomenon will be hitting immigration rates, and it is likely that we'll see signs of that by as soon as 2037 or so. What's worth noting, however, is that immigration for the most part is concentrated in a few key areas - around the southern border with Mexico and northwards to about Colorado, along Florida and the Gulf Coast, and various population groups that are facing wars or similar actions (the number of Ukranians emigrating to the US, mostly the elderly and children) has spiked, not surprisingly). In general, recent immigrants don't immediately impact schools, though the next generation generally is schooled. In many parts of the country, where immigration is usually not an immediate factor, the birth rate differential of -0.46 births is already being felt, with it predicted to exceed -0.5 births within the next decade. This rate of decline would be faster except that woman are having children later in life as in vitro fertilization becomes more widely used, but because this is such a slowly changing number, there is still an open question about how significant the latter effect is. Regardless, the upshot of all of this is that we are looking at a demographic shift that is due to several factors all pointing to a long term (multigenerational) stabilization (and ultimately decline) in population that is already affecting our schools, our workplaces and ultimately our senior years. As with other crises, the effects have occurred slowly at first, but are now becoming noticeable. We probably can't change anything in any meaningful way as far as stopping this (nor, to be honest, would this decline necessarily be a bad thing for humanity) but it does mean that we need to start adapting our institutions to recognize that the status is going to be increasingly non-quo, and that if we expect things to remain the same, we will be guaranteed nothing but disappointment.

This book is important,