andru volinsky edelblut Education

Santayana Warned Us About Volinsky

A few sentences into his recent piece in InDepthNH (and other places), Andru Volinsky demonstrates that he has no idea how the statewide education tax actually works, let alone how it should work.   First, no one gets excused from paying anything. Every district collects the full SWEPT tax, spends it on adequacy, and applies … Read more

EdOpt Expos were a success!

Education Options held our first two EdOpt Expos at the Richards Free Library in Newport in August. While there are many things for us to learn, we’re off to a good start. The best part was that all the attendees could point to something that they learned there. I know I was part of a … Read more

1st EdOpt Expo in Newport Aug 10 !

The first Education Options (EdOpt) expo is just over a week away, on Saturday Aug 10, from 10:30am to 12:30pm at the Richards Free Library in Newport. There will be a number of tables where you can have one-on-one conversations with experts about different options for educating your children. Statewide resources will include: Regional resources … Read more

NEW DATES! EdOpt Expos in Newport

We are setting up expos to kick off a new effort to provide information, support, and connections to families who are not happy with their current schools, and want to explore the many other education options they may not know about. Our first set of expos will be in Newport NH to serve the Upper … Read more

Announcing Education Options Inc. and Our First Expo!

We are kicking off a new effort to provide information, support, and connections to families who want to explore education options outside of the traditional public school. Our main population is conservative families who are not happy with public schools but who aren’t aware of all their options. Our non-profit organization and website have just … Read more

kaboompics_Math - calculator - geometry - homeschooling - laptop

Homeschooling Survey: They Use Many Different Methods to Learn to Read

Homeschooled students typically score 15 to 25 percentile points above public-school students on standardized academic achievement tests, according to The National Home Education Research Institute.

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A Tale of Two EFAs

It was the best of lies; it was the worst of lies. 

Richburg and Poortown both have K-12 schools with 100 students, and school budgets of $2 million.  

Pat lives in Richburg. He decides to leave the local school to accept an Education Freedom Account (EFA) with $5,255 in it. 

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statehouse

State Rep Accidentally Outs Herself

There is a classic tale in which one man lends money to another. When the time comes to repay the loan, the debtor claims that no loan was ever made. They go to trial, and the lender says that the money was counted out on a large stone, which should be brought to court as a witness. The debtor says, ‘The stone will never be found, because I broke it into many pieces, which I dispersed to many places.’

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Kids - students learning

Homeschool Double Standard

I recently read this Reason article about how homeschooling as increased since the pandemic. Some quotes from people who are apparently against homeschooling blew my mind.  I had the need to share some comments about them.

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How the Shutdown Affected Student Performance: Conclusion (part 8 of 8)

This is the final article in the How the Shutdown Affected Student Performance series. This series was inspired by two recent statements made by Croydon Village School Principal Nicole Lackie to the Croydon School Board. First, she claimed the pandemic shutdowns caused poor student performance. Then, she stated that teachers don’t really know how to … Read more

Studen laptop online learning Photo by Compare Fibre on Unsplash

Shutdown & Student Performance: Grantham (part 7 of 8)

In prior installments of this series, state and national standardized test scores in New Hampshire and Vermont contradict the current narrative that the COVID pandemic shutdown caused children to suffer “learning loss.” Instead, the data reveals that the test scores have been deplorable for more than two decades and that they were in decline well in advance of the pandemic shutdown.

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Social-Emotional Learning Replaces Academics as Focus (Pandemic Shutdown & Reading, part 6 of 8)

Prior installments of this series have demonstrated that state and national standardized test scores in New Hampshire and Vermont were poor and declining before the COVID pandemic school shutdown.

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school room classroom Photo by Jeffrey Hamilton on Unsplash

How the Shutdown Affected Student Performance: Washington NH Elementary (part 5 of 8)

As prior installments of this series have shown, state and national standardized test scores in New Hampshire and Vermont don’t appear to support the current narrative that the COVID pandemic shutdown caused children to suffer “learning loss.” Instead, the data revealed two things: First, that the test scores have been dismal for more than two decades, and second, they were in decline well in advance of the pandemic shutdown.

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Indoctrination cartoon

Why Johnny Shouldn’t Read

Many people who testified at the Sept 14 meeting of the state Board of Education against using the PragerU Cash Course as a Learn Everywhere option argued that it would provide a camel’s nose under the tent to conservative ideas that will indoctrinate students.

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Students teacher classroom

How the Shutdown Affected Student Performance: Killington VT Improved (part 4 of 8)

As presented in earlier installments, student performance in reading all over the United States, including New Hampshire and Vermont, has been poor for decades, with over half of students reading below grade level.

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How the Pandemic Shutdown Affected Student Performance: Vermont (part 3 of 8)

The prevailing narrative is that the pandemic shutdowns affected student performance in public schools. As seen in our prior two articles, data from the Croydon, NH Village School, and statewide data from the New Hampshire Student Assessment System (NHSAS), the National Assessment of Educational Progress test do not support this narrative.

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Girls book reading study education

Did the Pandemic Shutdown Affect Student Performance in NH? Part 2 of 8

The opening article of this series, published in the September 9 edition of the Eagle Times and in Granite Grok, examined test results from the Croydon Village School in light of comments made by its principal, Nicole Lackie, who also shared her belief that schools do not know how to teach reading.

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Did the Pandemic Shutdown Affect Student Performance? Part 1 of 8

At the June 6 meeting of the Croydon School Board, Associate Principal Nicole Lackie presented the results of Croydon Village School’s (CVS) end-of-year diagnostic assessment.

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The Right to Read Film

The Right to Read

There’s a new idea that’s being thrown around these days — the science of reading. I cringe at the phrase because it sounds like just another gimmick to fix things in schools, but the research actually seems to be pretty good.

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parental rights

The Government Is Not the Parent of Children, nor Should It Be.

Dear House Education Committee, I attended the public hearing for SB 272. As you know, people threw around examples of why SB 272 is good and why it’s bad.

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