Video footage from the panel discussion of Fordham’s recent report, High-Achieving Students in the Era of No Child Left Behind, is now online for your viewing pleasure:

High-Achieving Students in the Era of NCLB from Education Gadfly on Vimeo.

5:30 - Tom Loveless, Brookings Institution
19:05 - Steve Farkas, Farkas Duffett Research Group
33:25 - Josh Wyner, Jack Kent Cooke Foundation
41:15 - Ross Wiener, Education Trust
48:30 - Question & Answer

Download:
Tom Loveless’s slideshow
Steve Farkas’s slideshow

Speaker bios

Mike and Christina discuss Fordham’s new report on how high-achievers have fared as educators have turned their focus toward closing the achievement gap.

Mike and Christina discuss a recent rash of education reform proposals.

Mike and Liam discuss Mike’s controversial Gadfly article on the burdensome health care costs associated with teacher obesity.

Amber and Christina discuss the good and bad of the Reading First interim evaluation report:

Mike and Christina discuss what kind of ed talk to expect from the presumptive nominees as we near the general election.

Mike and Christina discuss Secretary of Education Margaret Spellings’s latest round of changes to No Child Left Behind.

Marvin’s and Mike’s mothers coordinated on the phone last night before laying out their sons’ outfits. (Click the photo for a bigger version.)

We at the Thomas B. Fordham Institute fight to improve K-12 schooling in America, but that doesn’t mean we’re ignoring the environment:

Mike and Christina discuss Pope Benedict XVI’s visit to the United States and what he had to say about Catholic schools.

Mike and Christina discuss Fordham’s latest report, Who Will Save America’s Urban Catholic Schools?

This is what $60 million gets you.

(The original Ed in 08 video is here.)

U.S. Secretary of Education Margaret Spellings has announced a pilot plan to let some states “differentiate” between really bad schools and mediocre ones—i.e., those that fail just one or two of their subgroups instead of all of them. In exchange for a pressure valve on the so-so schools, states must agree to crack the whip on the most egregious offenders. Is this a well-calculated adjustment or a ham-fisted over-correction? Fordham’s own Michael Petrilli tells Fordham’s own Christina Hentges what he thinks about it in this week’s Fordham Factor.

On March 10, the Thomas B. Fordham Institute demanded an inquiry into scandalous efforts by the executive and legislative branches to sabotage the Reading First program.