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Richard Ingersoll said that admission standards for elementary teaching programs are already low, certainly compared to other professions such as medicine and law. The solution presented to address shortages in the national teacher workforce has been to “widen the gate and lower the bar,” but lowering academic standards “any further doesn’t make much sense,” Ingersoll said.

GSE students are making a difference with their work around the world.

Ameena Ghaffar Kucher interviewed Pakistani American students in New York and observed that they transformed “the negative experience of being ostracized into a positive experience of solidarity and group membership with other Muslims, both in their immediate community and globally.”

Yasmin Kafai and professors across several departments at Utah State University have partnered to create an imaginary virus, allowing students to virtually explore many aspects of living in a pandemic. Children can play in this risk-free environment with more control than they often have in the real world.

Parents can help their kids prepare to go back to school in person. Focus on sleep. Talk about fears. And maybe get a new outfit.

Writing in Diabetes Daily, Penn GSE alum Tara Bryant-Gray encourages parents to embrace the flux of pandemic parenting a child with type 1 diabetes.

Jonathan Zimmerman discusses a trend across higher education, where we’re relying on draconian penalties — especially suspensions — to discipline our students instead of working with them to help them get better.

Penn GSE Reading, Writing, and Literacy doctoral student Maritza Moulite discusses her newest book and her journey to academia

Jonathan Zimmerman told The 74 that the sometimes vituperative arguments about American ideals and history held a vital place in K-12 classrooms.

Writing in University World News, Emily Moore and Kelsey Ullom explore some of the challenges and opportunities for colleges.

Deans Pam Grossman and Erika James argue that to be prepared leaders need to consider the necessary crisis leadership practices that should occur before, during, and after a crisis happens.

Penn GSE Assistant Professor Brooks Bowden now leads the center.

Whether tutoring your child yourself or hiring someone to help, Anne Pomerantz explains what makes tutoring effective.

Sigal Ben-Porath, an expert in civic education, says teachers need to be prepared for these important conversations.

Ameena Ghaffar-Kucher says to start by listening and use clear language.

Sigal Ben-Porath describes, “It was a very disturbing and significant moment in American history, so most students will be needing a place to consider it outside their families, and they don't have peer groups right now for the most part because of the pandemic.”

Penn GSE faculty feature prominently in this year’s list.

COVID-19 dominated the year but didn’t define it. Here are some ways members of Penn GSE’s community made a difference in 2020.

Setting goals for learning a language can help you determine which tools will be most useful to you, says Dr. Anne Pomerantz, an expert in the teaching and learning of new languages at Penn GSE.

The award recognizes Wagner’s work to improve educational opportunities around the globe.

Sigal Ben-Porath joins host Jay Shapiro to explore what protections universities owe their students.

There is no universal answer. But Penn GSE’s Karen Weaver says the colleges facing the toughest choices might not be the ones you’d think.

Richard Ingersoll said cultural misunderstandings about what it takes to be a good teacher have contributed to low wages for educators. “There was this idea that you don’t have to be that smart. It’s not as complex,” he said. “Or as difficult as being an accountant, working with numbers. Or being a dentist, working with teeth.”

Michael Gottfried said it’s difficult to quantify how school is going for students amid the pandemic. “We’re sort of building the plane as we fly it,” he said. “Everything’s up in the air now. Everything’s been disrupted just from the measurement side.”

Writing in Harvard Business Review, Kandi Wiens says it’s important to watch out for self-sabotage traps

Amid a global pandemic and perhaps the largest civil rights movement in U.S. history, Penn GSE is embracing the shift to virtual education, providing resources to educators and leaders in the field at large, and addressing issues of race, equity, and access throughout the School’s work.

CodeQuilt Philadelphia, part of CS4Philly Week, gives students a voice in saying who codes and why they do it.

In a hard year, these stories offered a hopeful vision of a more inclusive and just world.

Jonathan Zimmerman writes about the declining availability of tenure-track positions and a movement toward preparing doctoral students for jobs outside the academy, but suspects the change will come from outside of the academy, not from within it.

Penn GSE’s Homecoming @ Home honored five outstanding graduates and featured Laura Bilodeau Overdeck, WG’95, founder and president of Bedtime Math, a nonprofit that works to help kids love math.

Peter Eckel and Aida Sagintayeva virtually brought together higher ed leaders from across 15 time zones to talk about a way forward.

In a virtual forum moderated by Penn GSE Dean Pam Grossman, Dr. Jonathan Zimmerman, Penn Law Professor Jacques deLisle, and Associate Vice Provost for Global Initiatives at Penn Global Amy Gadsden discussed the challenges of ensuring free speech in digital learning spaces.

New research from the Consortium for Policy Research in Education (CPRE) points to critical lessons principals have learned during the pandemic that can be used in planning for future emergencies.

Jonathan Supovitz explains, “The principals are doing all these amazing things, which are serving urgent needs of kids and families. That’s not taken into account in what we think of as a good school. There is an imbalance between our metrics for assessing quality and the actual role of schools in society.” The Consortium for Policy Research in Education, housed at Penn GSE, has published five briefs about how U.S. school districts and principals have dealt with the pandemic.

In this interview, Jenny Zapf highlights the importance of innovative and long-term, sustainable ideas that have impact.

Jalil Mustaffa Bishop, Vice-Provost Postdoctoral Scholar and Penn GSE Lecturer, recently co-authored an NAACP report examining the ongoing effect of student debt on Black students and families.

Jonathan Zimmerman’s The Amateur Hour: A History of College Teaching in America is a richly researched, eye-opening history of college teaching in the United States over a span of more than a century and a half, mining personal papers and institutional records and reports from over 50 archives.

Penn GSE’s Bob Zemsky detailed how many colleges were close to the financial brink just before the pandemic hit. Here’s what he says colleges face in the next year and beyond.

Sharon Wolf and an Imperial College London colleague co-authored an article about the effects of food shortages on early childhood development. “We found that children from households that were food insecure even only once during the three-year study period had lower literacy and numeracy abilities and short-term memory performance later on,” they wrote.

Peter Eckel, an expert in higher education administration, argues that the challenges of the pandemic may offer boards an opportunity to evolve in ways that will be beneficial in the long term.

Jennifer Stimpson, a chemist, teacher, and recent alumna of the Graduate School of Education’s mid-career program, was named an IF/THEN ambassador. The initiative aims to empower women in STEM to inspire the next generation of learners.