The 2016 presidential election was the first since the passage of the 1965 Voting Rights Act in which full voting protections were not in place for historically marginalized voters. This shift was largely due to a 5-4 decision in "Shelby v. Holder" (2013) in which the Supreme Court ruled that states with a history of voter discrimination…

A major feature of the school finance landscape over the last two decades has been the reform of state school finance systems. Using the case of Maryland's Bridge to Excellence in Public Schools Act, this paper extends the current literature by developing a conceptual framework for residential bidding and sorting and using it to estimate housing…

Background: The purpose of this study was to determine the impact of the coverage of state legislation and the expansiveness ratings of state model policies on the state-level prevalence of bullying in schools. Methods: The state-level prevalence of bullying in schools was based on cross-sectional data from the 2013 High School Youth Risk Behavior…

In 2013, the state of Colorado passed the ASSET (Advancing Students for a Stronger Economy Tomorrow) bill, which allowed eligible undocumented/DACA (Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals) students residing in Colorado the ability to qualify for in-state tuition at public institutions. Using qualitative methods, we examine how undocumented/DACA…

High-achieving African American students in California are not attending University of California (UC) campuses. Due to hyper-implementations of Proposition 209, which limited UC campuses' ability to use race as a significant admission criteria, the UC system and individual UC campus policies have scaled back their efforts to recruit…

Recent advocacy and legislation across states calls for stricter accountability measures and closure of low-performing charter schools. As charter schools try to meet the multiple accountability standards they face from federal, state, local authorities, and their own associations, it is important to understand how these numerous frameworks…

As part of the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act enacted last year, federal lawmakers gave parents more flexibility with their own savings for their children's education. Now, families that save money for college using what are commonly known as 529 college savings plans (named after Section 529 of the Internal Revenue Code) can apply some of those savings to…

In this policy update, author Amelia Vance explores data protections for school directory information. She argues students do not have the right to attend school anonymously, but they do have a right to have their information protected and used responsibly by local and state education agencies. State boards can lead on this issue by striking the…

Each year, California provides millions of state funding to counties to serve youth within their communities and reduce justice involvement through two major grant programs. First, the Juvenile Justice Crime Prevention Act (JJCPA), which was enacted by the Schiff-Cardenas Crime Prevention Act and given its current name through a California Senate…

The purpose of this study was to examine the impact of gender and sexual orientation on students' perceptions of campus safety and carrying concealed handguns. A comparative research study was used to evaluate the statistical differences on the perceptions of fear of crime and campus carry by gender and sexual orientation. For this study, a total…

"Paving the Path to College Aid: Expanding Access to the Cal Grant Program" looks at promising practices for increasing Cal Grant application rates, including the initial implementation of AB 2160, a new law introduced by Assembly member Phil Ting and sponsored by Ed Trust-West, to streamline the Cal Grant application process by…

Since 2014, 42 states have adopted charter school legislation. Research has been conducted on charter school effectiveness and legislative adoption. However, limitations in the research exist regarding school choice in that studies address inequalities and outcomes at the school level, with limited attention to the state-level policy environment.…

This article details the efforts that the Texas Success Initiative (TSI) office at a large research university made toward piloting, refining, and scaling corequisite courses for students who require developmental education. House Bill 2223, passed by the Texas Legislature in June of 2017, requires public institutions to increase the percentage of…

This report is a requirement of "The Career Preparation Expansion Act." The act directs the Maryland Longitudinal Data System Center and the Governor's Workforce Development Board to produce a report on the workforce outcomes of high school graduates five years after graduation. Specifically, the report must include their wages earned,…

Last spring's sudden shift to remote learning in response to the COVID-19 pandemic disrupted K-12 education in an unprecedented way. Upon Education Secretary Betsy DeVos's waiver of federally mandated state testing for spring 2020, it also triggered the first nationwide break in state testing in half a century. With students returning to school…