Category: Education

Another Big Ten president is on the move.

Less than two weeks after Michigan State University offered President Kevin Guskiewicz a $1 million raise, doubling his compensation to $2 million a year, to fend off headhunters, he is leaving to take the top job at Clemson University.

When MSU trustees proposed the raise, they said that Guskiewicz was being aggressively recruited by other institutions and noted his frustrations with the board. While trustees did not specify the nature of those frustrations, Michigan State’s board has been mired in drama in recent years, accused of retaliating against faculty members and micromanaging prior presidents.

Now, after just two years, Guskiewicz is heading to Clemson. In making the jump he will take a pay cut, reportedly earning an annual base salary of $1.2 million on a five-year deal. (Additional incentives, such as deferred compensation and bonuses, will push that number higher.) Guskiewicz will take the helm of a major research university for the third time, following stops at MSU and four years as the chancellor of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

“I’ve known for many years how special Clemson University is, and I’m honored by the opportunity to build on the extraordinary tradition of excellence and to help lead the University into the future,” Guskiewicz said in the hiring announcement. “I look forward to engaging with students, faculty, staff, alumni and the many South Carolinians whose passion and support have shaped Clemson into one of the nation’s leading global public research universities.”

On his way out, Guskiewicz also noted serious governance concerns at Michigan State, though he did not elaborate on specific incidents.

In a statement to the MSU community, he wrote that “effective university leadership requires a shared commitment to collaboration, trust and a forward-looking vision,” but that some board members spent too much energy “revisiting past conflicts and internal disagreements.”

He also accused MSU board members of pursuing personal agendas.

“While I firmly believe we are all better when there is a diversity of viewpoints informing decisions, our ability to make meaningful progress is hampered when disagreements move from offering alternative perspectives into publicly undermining decisions and putting personal interests above the best interests of the university and our faculty, staff and students,” Guskiewicz wrote in his statement. “What is perhaps most troubling is the actions of some to abuse their access to privileged and confidential information to mispresent [sic] facts, manipulate situations and selectively use and leak that information to promote personal agendas.”

Despite the board dysfunction, Guskiewicz praised the five members who voted earlier this month to approve a new code of ethics, which he said was in alignment with best practices but has been rejected by some trustees as a gag order. (Two trustees—Mike Balow and Rema Vassar—have already faced sanctions from the university for refusing to sign the agreement.)

Michigan governor Gretchen Whitmer, a Democrat, also chastised the board.

“This is disappointing, but also nobody should be surprised by this outcome given some of the antics we’ve seen from a handful of board members,” Whitmer said at an event covered by The Detroit News. She added that “the way we’ve selected board members needs to change” and nodded to a current proposal in the State Legislature to appoint trustees, which, she said, “would help ensure institutions have the leadership and expertise to get things back on track.”

Under the current system, trustees are elected to staggered eight-year terms.

In response to emailed questions from Inside Higher Ed about trustee behavior and leadership turnover, a Michigan State spokesperson shared a statement from board chair Brianna Scott.

“We greatly value these past two-plus years under President Guskiewicz,” Scott wrote in the statement. “His leadership has set the university on a positive trajectory and one that we can continue during this transition. Michigan State University has demonstrated resilience throughout its history, and the institution’s strength has never depended on any one individual. The university’s mission, talent and momentum continue just as they have for nearly 175 years.”

Trustee Tensions

Guskiewicz’s departure underscores leadership instability at both Big Ten institutions and MSU. More than half the leaders of Big Ten member institutions have left their roles since early 2025.

Leadership turnover at Michigan State has also been high since long-serving president Lou Anna K. Simon resigned amid a sexual abuse scandal in 2018. Since then, MSU has had a revolving door of interim leaders, with two permanent presidents lasting a combined five years.

Outside observers noted that Guskiewicz’s departure amounts to more than just another presidential transition; it signals deeper issues with governance at Michigan State.

Robert Kelchen, a professor of education at the University of Tennessee at Knoxville, told Inside Higher Ed that Guskiewicz’s early exit “shows that Michigan State is one of the toughest leadership jobs in the country.” Beyond the challenges of running a major research enterprise with big-time athletics, he said, presidents must navigate an elected yet divided board.

With Clemson—led by a board largely appointed by state officials in a state long dominated by Republicans—Kelchen argued that Guskiewicz is getting a greater sense of certainty. He added that while Clemson is a step down “from a prestige standpoint,” it provides more day-to-day stability.

Kelchen noted, too, that Guskiewicz’s parting message was “extraordinarily rare” for a president in underscoring his strained relationship with the board as the impetus for his exit.

Now, as Michigan State begins its next presidential search, it will do so with a reputation for persistent board dysfunction that will likely complicate the search and drive up salary demands.

“They’re going to have to pay the next president a lot of money,” Kelchen said.

Sen. Elizabeth Warren requested the head of the U.S. Government Accountability Office to investigate whether staff cuts at the U.S. Department of Education have hampered the agency’s ability to combat fraud and abuse carried out by colleges. 

As part of the Education Department’s mass layoffs last year, the Office of Federal Student Aid lost about 46% of its employees, according to a recent GAO report.

“Alarmingly, this included workers who were responsible for overseeing colleges to combat fraud, waste, and abuse of the federal financial aid funds that millions of students rely upon,” Warren said in her letter last week. 

Before the cuts, the Massachusetts Democrat said, the Education Department monitored colleges that receive federal student aid to ensure they were complying with federal requirements. That included reviewing independent compliance audits to ensure colleges weren’t misusing student aid and investigating institutions suspected of wrongdoing, such as misleading students about their costs or programs.

The Education Department did not immediately respond to a request for comment Tuesday. 

Warren raised particular concerns with for-profit colleges, which bore the brunt of FSA’s enforcement actions during the Biden administration, according to her letter. 

“The prospect of a reduction in FSA’s enforcement activity is especially concerning in light of recent Trump administration policies that are poised to boost the growth of for-profit colleges,” Warren said, listing the upcoming expansion of Pell Grant eligibility to short-term programs as an example. 

Warren asked Orice Williams Brown, the GAO’s acting comptroller, to estimate the financial costs the government would incur from lessened oversight of colleges. She also asked for other information, such as whether the cuts have impacted how many investigations and enforcement actions that department pursues.

The Trump administration has made dismantling the Education Department a policy priority, though fully eliminating the agency would require congressional approval. Along with the workforce reductions, the Education Department has also struck 10 agreements with other federal agencies to offload some of its duties — moves that some Democratic lawmakers have called illegal.

Key points:

Every June, once the last bus leaves and the halls go quiet, I get the strong desire to take a deep breath and to allow the pressure of the previous school year to subside and let the slower pace of summer settle in. 

But after years of working in a district such as Van Dyke Public Schools, I’ve come to understand that the reason I never truly settle into that slower pace is because summer isn’t a break. For the families school districts most need to engage with, summer is the time to act. And if we aren’t purposeful in using the “down time” of the summer, we will spend all of the following year trying to catch up. 

This is because chronic absenteeism is an issue that doesn’t disappear when the school year ends. In the U.S., 23 percent of all students (nearly one-fourth) miss enough school to fall significantly behind. These aren’t just abstract statistics to me. These are children in my community whose future depends on whether the adults in their lives showed up to provide support prior to the first bell ringing in the fall.

Van Dyke Public Schools, where I have had the honor of serving as Superintendent for nine years, has experience in working alongside families experiencing real hardships including housing instability, health issues, and transportation obstacles. Some of our students have been put in situations where they must assume caregiver roles for younger siblings due to family circumstances. These are explanations for absenteeism, not justifications. They are also problems that a robo-call or form letter will never be able to resolve. 

What I do know is that building relationships with students and families helps address chronic absenteeism. And relationships have a season. 

That season is summer. 

Consider what happens when school is not in session. Attendance notices cease. Disciplinary discussions go quiet. The pressures of the school year diminish a bit and families who have endured months of feeling judged or pursued by institutional systems they don’t trust enough to allow them to enter their homes become more receptive to engaging in a meaningful dialogue. 

I’ve seen this firsthand. When my team connects with families during the summer break, not with a warning, not with a consequence, but with a sincere individual inquiring about their child’s needs, the response is different. The defensiveness that develops throughout a school year is lessened. We aren’t contacting them because something went wrong. We are contacting them because we care about what lies ahead. 

This difference means more than I can express. 

The research supports this finding. Root-cause analysis of chronic absenteeism consistently demonstrates that families who disengage from school do so not because they are indifferent to their child’s education, but because they are overwhelmed and exhausted. These families have frequently had negative experiences that have led them to believe they cannot rely upon institutional systems for support. Establishing institutional trust does not occur during a quick hallway discussion on back-to-school night. Institutional trust must be established before that.

The positive outcomes resulting from our efforts support this conclusion: Our efforts to reconnect with families and restore trust contributed to chronic absenteeism declining at Lincoln High School (from 64% in 2023-2024 to 58% in 2024-2025) and Lincoln Middle School (from 59% in 2023-2024 to 50% in 2024-2025). 

I am proud that Van Dyke has decided to commit resources toward engaging students and families during summer months as a central component of our attendance strategy. Supported by our partners at  Concentric Educational Solutions, our efforts to conduct outreach to chronically absent students and their families during summer months, serves as an example of a human-centered approach necessary for achieving success in this area. 

When our team conducts outreach to chronically absent students and their families over summer months by visiting residences, making phone calls that appear more personable than administrative, and listening before speaking, we are not merely attempting to improve cold statistics. Rather, we are communicating to every family we contact: You are an important part of our community and we want you to return to school.

I say to you from experience that that message lands differently in July than it does in October. 

I encourage other educational leaders across Michigan and the United States to examine their summer calendars and to critically assess how they are utilizing this time as an opportunity for action.  For students who are disengaging from school and disconnecting from opportunity, summer is either a pathway back to school or a longer pathway away from school. For their families, it can mean a pathway of reconnecting with their community resources and school should be the most important of those.

I know which pathway I want it to be. 

The effort required to maintain student connection to school is extensive, continuous, and inherently human-centered. However, summer gives us an opportunity we seldom receive during the school year: the chance to prevent problems from arising rather than chasing after problems once they arise. 

That opportunity is too valuable to squander.

As one fourth grader peers over the top of a 300-foot-tall wind turbine, a classmate stands next to surgeons operating in an emergency room. Nearby, another fourth grader shuffles through an autobody shop.

They are not visiting high-risk job sites, at least not in real life.

These experiences are the result of a series of investments into virtual reality in North Dakota.

The state hopes that putting VR headsets with career-focused software in classrooms will eventually boost local employment. While many schools across the country are looking to limit screen time, North Dakota is pushing for increasingly younger students to use these digital tools.

Because North Dakota is largely rural, students’ face significant travel hurdles to visit job sites that could be several hours away, says Mackenzie Tadych, director of Northern Cass School’s college career and readiness program.

The VR investment “was an attempt to engage students at an earlier age and develop an awareness of [the careers] the state has to offer,” says Wayde Sick, state director for the Department of Career and Technical Education. “This is the first glance to show what is out there without throwing a bunch of students on a bus where you drive two hours for a field trip and two hours back.”

Tech to Supplement Lower Resourced Areas

In North Dakota, the virtual reality program works directly with employers in the state in an effort to bring awareness to careers and fields students may be unfamiliar with or have misconceptions about, such as manufacturing.

The statewide program first started in 2023, after the North Dakota state legislature passed a bill that allotted a half-million dollars to the state’s Department of Career and Technical Education to purchase virtual reality headsets that would be used by middle and high schools. Late last year, that was expanded to all elementary schools in the state.

While more traditional career exploration modes – like career aptitude tests – are still used, VR is a way for more children to literally visualize potential new careers. The initiative, which is an expansion on the RUReady ND career exploration program, offers 118 different modules for students through Fargo-based CareerViewXR.

Ann Pollert, a career exploration coach, has a mobile van that visits schools at every level throughout six counties in the northeastern part of the state. Her bus is outfitted with seven headsets and she works on average with five students at a time, helping find their interests and guiding them through the modules.

“I would go into classroom after classroom and give a 50-minute spiel, but they had no visual,” Pollert, a former diesel technician recruiter, says. “With this, I could take it to the school and show those kids what it means to replace an excavator. It helps me identify the students I need to further encourage.”

She says the headsets as a whole are not meant to replace guidance or career counselors, particularly in high schools. As those counselors find themselves with increasingly higher workloads and less time, this is seen as a supplement.

“We still need career counselors, work-based learning counselors and great teachers that notice something about a student, saying, ‘You would be good at this,’” Pollert says, adding that some smaller schools do not have the resources for those counselors. “It’s everything together to make it work. It’s not the van that’s solving the problem.”

So, is it working?

Future Tech — And Potential

Sick, the state director, says it’s too early to measure the impact of these programs, including whether it’s increased the number of students staying in the state to work post-graduation.

Most of the efforts are focused on students who have yet to graduate high school, he points out. But he does believe this program serves as a starting place for younger students to explore their interests at an early age.

“In my eyes, this content is most important for elementary and middle school-aged kids, so the high school students have seen those experiences, have an idea of what they want to pursue and can do so in a series of courses based on what they have seen in virtual reality as a fifth or sixth grader,” he says.

Sometimes in VR, the students find what they dislike.

Tadych, of Northern Cass School, recalls a student vehemently reacting to a virtual reality module that placed them in a high-stress operating room.

“It’s just as beneficial being able to find what you don’t want to do,” she says, adding that the district also requires students to job shadow before graduation, following around professionals as they go through their work day.

And as the VR experiences get more lifelike, students will get more useful information about possible careers.

For example, Sick believes the technology could evolve down the road to include augmented reality, where students would be able to more fully interact with their environment. He believes the interactions will not only alert children of more local career opportunities, but keep them in the state upon graduating.

“We’re a rural state, and my goal is to make sure every student has the best experience they [can] have, to find what they should become, and try to help them figure it out sooner,” he says. He adds that the only way to do that is to provide a rich variety of experiences that start at the elementary level.

As one fourth grader peers over the top of a 300-foot-tall wind turbine, a classmate stands next to surgeons operating in an emergency room. Nearby, another fourth grader shuffles through an autobody shop.

They are not visiting high-risk job sites, at least not in real life.

These experiences are the result of a series of investments into virtual reality in North Dakota.

The state hopes that putting VR headsets with career-focused software in classrooms will eventually boost local employment. While many schools across the country are looking to limit screen time, North Dakota is pushing for increasingly younger students to use these digital tools.

Because North Dakota is largely rural, students’ face significant travel hurdles to visit job sites that could be several hours away, says Mackenzie Tadych, director of Northern Cass School’s college career and readiness program.

The VR investment “was an attempt to engage students at an earlier age and develop an awareness of [the careers] the state has to offer,” says Wayde Sick, state director for the Department of Career and Technical Education. “This is the first glance to show what is out there without throwing a bunch of students on a bus where you drive two hours for a field trip and two hours back.”

Tech to Supplement Lower Resourced Areas

In North Dakota, the virtual reality program works directly with employers in the state in an effort to bring awareness to careers and fields students may be unfamiliar with or have misconceptions about, such as manufacturing.

The statewide program first started in 2023, after the North Dakota state legislature passed a bill that allotted a half-million dollars to the state’s Department of Career and Technical Education to purchase virtual reality headsets that would be used by middle and high schools. Late last year, that was expanded to all elementary schools in the state.

While more traditional career exploration modes – like career aptitude tests – are still used, VR is a way for more children to literally visualize potential new careers. The initiative, which is an expansion on the RUReady ND career exploration program, offers 118 different modules for students through Fargo-based CareerViewXR.

Ann Pollert, a career exploration coach, has a mobile van that visits schools at every level throughout six counties in the northeastern part of the state. Her bus is outfitted with seven headsets and she works on average with five students at a time, helping find their interests and guiding them through the modules.

“I would go into classroom after classroom and give a 50-minute spiel, but they had no visual,” Pollert, a former diesel technician recruiter, says. “With this, I could take it to the school and show those kids what it means to replace an excavator. It helps me identify the students I need to further encourage.”

She says the headsets as a whole are not meant to replace guidance or career counselors, particularly in high schools. As those counselors find themselves with increasingly higher workloads and less time, this is seen as a supplement.

“We still need career counselors, work-based learning counselors and great teachers that notice something about a student, saying, ‘You would be good at this,’” Pollert says, adding that some smaller schools do not have the resources for those counselors. “It’s everything together to make it work. It’s not the van that’s solving the problem.”

So, is it working?

Future Tech — And Potential

Sick, the state director, says it’s too early to measure the impact of these programs, including whether it’s increased the number of students staying in the state to work post-graduation.

Most of the efforts are focused on students who have yet to graduate high school, he points out. But he does believe this program serves as a starting place for younger students to explore their interests at an early age.

“In my eyes, this content is most important for elementary and middle school-aged kids, so the high school students have seen those experiences, have an idea of what they want to pursue and can do so in a series of courses based on what they have seen in virtual reality as a fifth or sixth grader,” he says.

Sometimes in VR, the students find what they dislike.

Tadych, of Northern Cass School, recalls a student vehemently reacting to a virtual reality module that placed them in a high-stress operating room.

“It’s just as beneficial being able to find what you don’t want to do,” she says, adding that the district also requires students to job shadow before graduation, following around professionals as they go through their work day.

And as the VR experiences get more lifelike, students will get more useful information about possible careers.

For example, Sick believes the technology could evolve down the road to include augmented reality, where students would be able to more fully interact with their environment. He believes the interactions will not only alert children of more local career opportunities, but keep them in the state upon graduating.

“We’re a rural state, and my goal is to make sure every student has the best experience they [can] have, to find what they should become, and try to help them figure it out sooner,” he says. He adds that the only way to do that is to provide a rich variety of experiences that start at the elementary level.

Longtime readers have been privy to periodic updates about The Girl. One of my first posts ever, back in 2004, announced her birth. This one announces her college graduation.

Like all Gaul, her graduation is divided into three parts. On Monday, the English Department hosted a ceremony giving departmental awards. That ceremony was indoors, brief, well-thought-out and lovely. Apparently it was the first time they did it; my kudos to the department for doing it right. She picked up a pair of awards, including one for her thesis. That was where she got her honors cord to wear with her regalia.

On Tuesday, the Arts and Humanities College hosted its graduation in the basketball arena. I’m told that this was the first year for that, too. It went smoothly—again, indoors—with a particularly terrific speech from the YA writer Jason Reynolds. The grads were in full regalia, so we made sure to get plenty of photos. Naturally, there were rumors of skulduggery: The video montage of student speakers in lieu of live student speakers was—we were told—intended to prevent any sort of political statements. I was struck by the repeated warnings that any “expressive activities” were only to be engaged in outdoors, far from where anyone would see them. Whether the rumors are correct as to intention, I don’t know, but they were certainly correct in impact.

The entire university graduation was scheduled for Wednesday evening in the football stadium, but it got postponed due to a misplaced forecast of nasty weather. That threw our travel plans into a bit of chaos, but so it goes. I’ll admit being annoyed that the full graduation was outdoors at all; this time of year, Maryland is either hotter than the surface of the sun, or soaked. Neither is especially conducive to graduation. Yet here we are.

At the Arts and Humanities ceremony, TG was resplendent in her gown and honors cord. We took plenty of pictures, even capturing (distant) video of the moment her name was called and she walked across the stage. Afterward she was a good sport about posing for pics with everyone, which I know isn’t her favorite activity.

She’s our youngest, so this is the end of an era for us. We won’t miss the out-of-state tuition payments, and we’re proud that we were able to get both kids through four years of college without them having student loans to pay back. That takes some doing.

I couldn’t help but feel bad for TG, though. I remember the feeling at my doctoral graduation as the arena emptied out and I stood there wondering what was next. I didn’t have a job lined up, or even a discernible prospect of one. After (cough) years of education, scrimping and saving and living like a church mouse, graduating into a void felt awful. It felt vertiginous, like the moment right before falling off a cliff.

She’s facing something similar now. She has sent out literally hundreds of applications but hasn’t had a single interview. And that’s with multiple internships, a series of part-time jobs and a GPA over 3.9. She worked hard and played by the rules, and she’s standing where I stood back on that June day in 1997. It’s a tough spot. Technology now being what it is, she actually received a rejection email during the ceremony, which I thought was a bit on the nose.

I found something a few months after graduation, parlaying an adjunct gig into a full-time teaching position and a subsequent turn to administration. It was the ’90s, so such a thing was still possible. I don’t know what her break will be or when it will happen, but I have to believe it will come soon. She’s too darn smart and talented for someone not to notice.

In the meantime, though, there’s achievement to celebrate and a milestone to note. Congrats, TG! It’s an honor and a thrill to see you grow into yourself.

By Emmy Martin

The question isn’t which majors AI will spare. It’s which parts of any job still require a human.

Dive Brief:

• The U.S. Department of Education is under pressure from college and K-12 groups, as well as a bipartisan group of U.S. senators to release nearly $300 million in funding for education research.
• The two separate coalitions sent letters to the U.S. Education Secretary Linda McMahon this month, calling for the Education Department to disperse unallocated money for the agency’s Institute of Education Sciences from fiscal years 2025 and 2026. The FY25 funds will expire after Sept. 30 if not allocated, the letters said.
• The Education Department, under the Trump administration, has been downsizing the agency and providing states with more spending discretion. Still, a department spokesperson told K-12 Dive on Thursday that it is “committed to using appropriated funds to meet our statutory obligations while supporting high-quality research.”

Dive Insight:

IES, the Education Department’s research arm, collects and analyzes college and K-12 data and distributes grants for research programs to help improve learning. One major activity under this office includes collecting, analyzing and maintaining education assessment data for the National Assessment of Educational Progress, known as the Nation’s Report Card. 

In a May 11 letter, a bipartisan group of 19 U.S. senators, including Sen. Jeff Merkley, D-Ore., Sen. Thom Tillis, R-N.C., and Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., said the Education Department received $793 million in FY25 and $789.6 million in FY26 for IES activities and there was a remaining balance of about $290 million that would lapse Sept. 30. IES allocations can be used over a two-year period, the senators’ letter said.

A lack of spending at IES has led to “the sharp decline of special education research and data gathering,” according to a statement from Merkley. 

The senators criticized what they said are the closeouts of hundreds of unreviewed IES FY25 grant proposals within the National Center for Education Research and the National Center for Special Education Research. “This resulted in no new awards being made over the past year, and these awards are crucial to addressing urgent educational challenges facing students,” the letter said.

Findings from NCER-funded research have led to the development of literacy programs and practices in schools nationwide that states are scaling up to improve reading achievement. NCSER research has supported educational programs that have “decreased high levels of anxiety in youth with autism, taught reading to individuals with Down Syndrome, and assisted students with learning disabilities in the mastery of mathematical word problems,” the senators wrote.

In a May 18 letter to McMahon and Russell Vought, director of the White House’s Office of Management and Budget, the 97 K-12 and college advocacy organizations stressed the urgency to release the remaining IES funds. The coalition letter’s signees also included the Knowledge Alliance, the American Educational Research Association and the National Association of Secondary School Principals.

“These are not abstract losses, but real gaps in knowledge, support, and progress for students, teachers, and schools in every state,” the letter said. “Put simply, if funding lapses, students and families will pay the price.” 

In their letters, both the senators and the coalition of organizations asked the Education Department and OMB to work together to release the FY25 monies. 

The senators also said they were concerned about downsizing in the IES office. The institute’s workforce was reduced from 187 employees to 30 between January 2025 and February of this year, the letter said. At IES’ National Center for Education Statistics, the staffing level dropped from about 100 to 11.

“These reductions in staff have directly contributed to significantly fewer research, data, and evidence-use products being published by IES,” the senators said. 

A lawsuit filed last year by the American Educational Research Association and the Society for Research on Educational Effectiveness challenging the funding and staffing cuts at IES is ongoing. 

In February, an internal Education Department document made recommendations to reform IES, including “a thorough review” of data collections and the consideration of discontinuing data collections “as warranted.” 

The Education Department did not provide a status update on potential changes at IES when asked on Thursday.

For FY27, the Trump administration is recommending funding for IES at $261.3 million, or about $531.8 million less than the FY25 level. The proposal also asks for 75 staff for IES program administration, down from 111 in FY25.

Key points:

Summer is full of learning opportunities that many children miss. When back-to-school season begins, some kids are already starting behind. That’s all due to a lack of access to high-quality programs and resources. Throughout our years working with schools and families, we’ve seen firsthand how the summer months can either widen or close opportunity gaps for children.

At the National Summer Learning Association (NSLA), we always say: “Summer isn’t just a season. It’s a strategy.” NSLA works to ensure that all of America’s students, regardless of background, income, or zip code, can access and benefit from high-quality summer learning experiences each and every year. The research shows that the opportunity gap grows most dramatically during the summer, when school is out. By fifth grade, low-income students fall two and a half to three years behind their middle-class peers. At NSLA, we work to find ways to stop that deficit.

Learning support that families and schools really want

Genuine summer engagement begins with understanding what families and school leaders actually value. It also involves recognizing where those priorities sometimes diverge. The key is making summer learning fun and engaging.

Recent Gallup data from NSLA reveals that 91 percent of superintendents view summer programs as key to reaching district goals, with most prioritizing academic recovery and skill maintenance in reading, math, and STEM. In 2026, despite the expiration of the American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA) funding and other federal funding, 63 percent of superintendents said their in-school programs were over or at capacity. That is a powerful reminder that summer really matters to families and communities.

But access is uneven.

Through the American Camp Association, we found that about 30 million young people (55 percent of America’s 54 million kids) participated in organized summer opportunities in summer 2024. Only about 11 million of the 25 million low-income students, or about 38 percent, have access to programs, compared with 50 percent of middle-class kids and 67 percent of high and upper-income children. Participation overall is strong, but the opportunity is not equal. Cost is another barrier: Forty-eight percent of parents surveyed wish their children could have participated in a program, but couldn’t because of cost or scheduling conflicts with work or other obligations.

In addition to logistics, we need to understand what parents value. Parents overwhelmingly say they want summer to be fun. They are looking for enrichment programs that focus on the whole child–social skills, confidence, friendships, and new experiences. This matters because when programs are designed purely for remediation, families are not as motivated to enroll. Conversely, when programs only offer enrichment without a learning intention, districts don’t see the outcomes they need. That misalignment shows us that the strongest summer programs combine joy and engagement with learning and skill building. Understanding this balance leads to the ultimate success for families and schools alike.

The three Rs

Once we understand what families look for in summer learning, we can design summer learning experiences around three foundational principles: relationships, routines, and realistic support. These principles offer the enrichment desired from families while maintaining learning and skill development during the summer months.

Relationships

Relationships are the single most important ingredient in summer learning. Kids don’t remember worksheets; they remember the camp counselor who taught them about constellations, or the librarian who helped them discover their new favorite book series. When children feel known, they take risks; when they feel valued, they participate; when they feel safe, they learn.

Summer programs can be where the struggling reader begins to be seen as a kid who loves graphic novels, or where the child with an attention issue becomes the animal expert in the class. Learning doesn’t have to be separate from fun; it can be literacy in a makerspace, science in nature, or math in cooking. All of these activity models align with what parents value and what superintendents prioritize.

When we focus our efforts on building relationships extensively, families see the impact of strong connections with educators, and schools benefit immensely.

Routines

Routines provide structure that helps children stay engaged without adopting the rigidity of the school day. It is about creating a structure where students can find comfort in the familiar, allowing them to build their skill set. Routines benefit parents as much as they benefit kids.

And when we say routines in summer, we don’t mean recreating the school day. It can be as simple as a school calendar that families can access on the school’s website, featuring summer activities and community events. Another idea is a take-home pack of games and prompts that helps families create small, daily learning moments. Simple, repeatable routines can anchor a child’s day while naturally building and maintaining their learning muscles. These bite-sized moments not only support learning but also create meaningful time for families to spend together.

Realistic support

Realistic support means meeting families where they are, not adding more complications or pressure to their daily lives. We do this by connecting families to existing community resources, like libraries and parks, and offering simple, practical ideas that are helpful without feeling like homework.

We also understand that most summer participation happens outside of school districts, so strategic partnerships are an essential part of NSLA’s approach and our families’ success. That could look like starting a summer resources page on your school website or sending home family-friendly materials to maintain easy learning opportunities throughout the summer months.

The goal is not to add to families’ mental load. Families need simple, enriching ways to have learning opportunities and relationship-building activities with their kids–reading books together, asking thought-provoking questions, encouraging scientific curiosity on a nature walk, and playing simple math games are all fun and easy ways to promote learning at home.

Building community partnerships and celebrating summer learning

Summer engagement thrives when schools embrace partnerships and recognize that they don’t have to, and shouldn’t, do this work alone. Creating a partnership map is one of the most practical steps schools can take to see successful engagement with their students. Identify existing groups and learn about their mission and goals for helping families.

Begin locally: libraries, faith-based organizations, YMCAs, Boys and Girls Clubs, community centers, and local nonprofits. These institutions are already serving the same students and provide trusted relationships with robust summer programming that would benefit school partnerships. Creating new programs isn’t necessarily the solution; it’s coordination with community partners that creates the synergy needed for successful summer engagement.

Communication is equally critical. Share summer opportunities before the school year ends using multiple channels: texts, social media, family nights, and report card pickup events. Some schools host community fairs where partners can join together, making it easy for families to connect with summer resources all in one place.

Furthermore, it is essential to celebrate summer learning at the start of the school year. Children are motivated by recognition. When we celebrate their summer learning–whether through sock hops, special t-shirt days, bulletin boards, or sparkly pencils–we send the powerful message to students that their summer learning counts, and we’ve noticed.

Summer is the launchpad for students

Summer learning succeeds when we reframe it as an extension of learning rather than an interruption, design programs that combine joy with intention, and build partnerships that expand access for every child. Families want summer programs, and superintendents value summer learning; the goal now is to align those priorities and provide deeper, more equitable access.

When programs are affordable, intentionally designed, and grounded in relationships, summer becomes a launchpad for students.

The U.S. Surgeon General’s office issued a warning yesterday about the harms of extended uses of screens on children, raising concerns about its impact on academic performance, physical health and mental well-being.

The advisory follows a contentious debate over screen time that has been fraught in recent years as schools that implemented 1-to-1 device ratios amid the pandemic now struggle with student attention, behavioral and mental health issues that took root around the same time.

The latest advisory urges kids to pursue — and for the adults in their lives to encourage — a “broader world, beyond the confines of screens,” Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. said in an opening letter. The role of U.S. surgeon general has been vacant since January 2025, but the advisory was issued by a committee led by Kennedy Jr.

The report encapsulates what researchers and education experts have been long saying: Excessive time in front of devices like smartphones and tablets can worsen mental health and academic outcomes for students.

The American Academy of Pediatrics took a more nuanced approach to a similar report it released, Whitney Raglin Bignall, associate clinical director of The Kids Mental Health Foundation, tells EdSurge. Researchers rolled back their specific limits on screen time in favor of “family media plans” that set boundaries for media consumption.

The Surgeon General’s advisory calls on schools to implement plans that many districts are already adopting or considering: bell-to-bell cellphone bans, or bans that do not allow the use of phones during the entirety of the school day, including passing periods and lunchtime. It also proposes screen time limits. The advisory specifies that screen time limit exceptions should be made for students who have individualized education programs or other needs for assistive devices — something about which disability advocates have expressed worry.

It also urges schools to teach digital citizenship and digital literacy along with offering students social and physical activities that don’t involve screens.

The report hits back against tech companies, like those that recently lost a California civil case over social media addiction. They were called by the advisory to eschew designing their apps for engagement in favor of user well-being by incorporating warnings about harmful screen use every time a user opens the app. The advisory also calls for tech companies to encourage children to socialize with friends and play outside, and get rid of features like recommendation algorithms and notifications.

Correlation, Not Causation

Raglin Bignall, associate clinical director of The Kids Mental Health Foundation, cautions that while research has found a correlation between screen time and poor mental health, there’s not yet cause-and-effect evidence.

“There might be kids who need less [screen time], or those who are doing lots of different types of things with that content that’s interactive that is not harmful,” Raglin Bignall says. “Nevertheless, it should be monitored. By doing that, we make sure that we’re not doing too much [with screens], and that whatever we are doing is beneficial.”

Teachers might notice students being distracted, not listening, being irritable or having a hard time being away from screens, Raglin Bignall says. Fatigue or lack of sleep among students may also be signs of too much screen time. She adds that screen time should especially be monitored for children who have attention or hyperactivity disorders.

Not all screen time or content is equal, Raglin Bignall says. Teachers don’t need to rush to boot quality, evidence-based education apps from their lesson plans.

The warning calls attention to harmful online behaviors like bullying and gambling. The content children encounter on these platforms can encourage risky behaviors like self-harm and substance use, the advisory claims, or put them in the path of exploitative strangers.

In general, good content is educational, slow-paced and isn’t trying to market any products, Raglin Bignall says. Adults should pay special attention to what teens and tweens are seeing online, as those who struggle with confidence could be particularly vulnerable to harmful content like accounts that promote eating disorders.

“I wouldn’t want to make it seem that all screen time is bad,” Raglin Bignall says. “I often recommend co-watching with adults during those younger ages. As kids get older, it’s still important for adults to monitor the level of content and what is being offered to them.”