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Standards-based grading offers a different model of assessing student learning in the classroom

  • Written by Jerrid Kruse, Professor of Science Education, Drake University
imageInstead of focusing on student behaviors, standards-based grading assesses if students are actually learning what's being taught.Valerii Apetroaiei/iStock via Getty Images Plus

Some school districts, including ones in Maine, New Mexico, Iowa and Oregon, are shifting to standards-based grading, where students are graded on the skills and concepts...

Read more: Standards-based grading offers a different model of assessing student learning in the classroom

Trump administration’s lawsuits against Harvard and UCLA have roots in a decades-old fight over civil rights law

  • Written by Ryan Creps, Assistant Professor of Educational Leadership, University at Buffalo
imageProtesters gather outside a Boston courthouse in July 2025 to rally against the Trump administration's freezing of contracts and grants to Harvard University. Scott Eisen/Getty Images

The Department of Justice announced in March 2026 that it is suing Harvard University and the University of California, Los Angeles.

The lawsuits allege that both...

Read more: Trump administration’s lawsuits against Harvard and UCLA have roots in a decades-old fight over...

Pope Leo XIV’s Africa journey: How each stop reflects his message of peace

  • Written by Mathew Schmalz, Professor of Religious Studies, College of the Holy Cross
imagePope Leo XIV uses hyssop sprigs to sprinkle holy water during Easter Mass in St. Peter’s Square at the Vatican on April 5, 2026. AP Photo/Andrew Medichini

Pope Leo XIV will begin his journey to four African countries – Algeria, Cameroon, Angola and Equatorial Guinea – on April 13, 2026.

Africa represents the fastest-growing part...

Read more: Pope Leo XIV’s Africa journey: How each stop reflects his message of peace

The good life requires two things, self-knowledge and friends – you can’t have one without the other

  • Written by Ross Channing Reed, Lecturer in Philosophy, Missouri University of Science and Technology
imageFriends can see and know you in ways that you yourself never can.Stephen Simpson/Stone via Getty Images

Friends can help us with all kinds of things in life. How could I forget moving that piano for friends in Chicago? Fortunately, none of us ended up in the ER.

One of the most important things friends do, though, might seem surprising: They help us...

Read more: The good life requires two things, self-knowledge and friends – you can’t have one without the other

Israeli threats to occupy or annex south Lebanon dust off a decades-old playbook

  • Written by Mireille Rebeiz, Chair of Middle East Studies, Dickinson College
imageA man checks his phone on a beach as smoke rises from Israeli artillery fire on Qlaileh village, near the city of Tyre in south Lebanon. AP Photo/Hussein Malla

A chorus of hawkish Israeli politicians is urging the country’s military to intensify its weekslong ground and air campaign against Hezbollah and pave the way for a more permanent...

Read more: Israeli threats to occupy or annex south Lebanon dust off a decades-old playbook

Presidential words can turn the unthinkable into the thinkable − for better or for worse

  • Written by Stephanie A. (Sam) Martin, Frank and Bethine Church Endowed Chair of Public Affairs, Boise State University
imagePresident Donald Trump's rhetoric has grown increasingly violent.wildpixel/iStock via Getty Images Plus

Among the most disorienting things about President Donald Trump’s public language is how easily it can feel numbing and shocking in the same moment. He says something outrageous, the country recoils, and then the recoil itself begins to...

Read more: Presidential words can turn the unthinkable into the thinkable − for better or for worse

Philadelphia’s 40-year history of protecting undocumented immigrants began with churches hiding refugees from El Salvador

  • Written by Menika Dirkson, Associate Professor of History, Morgan State University
imageSupporters visit Javier Flores, right, while he lived in sanctuary at Arch Street United Methodist Church in downtown Philadelphia in 2017.Bastiaan Slabbers/NurPhoto via Getty Images

In the midst of a civil war, married couple Ernesto and Linda Fuentes fled their home country of El Salvador and headed for Philadelphia, via Mexico, in November 1983.

E...

Read more: Philadelphia’s 40-year history of protecting undocumented immigrants began with churches hiding...

Mutual aid and self-sufficiency are key to life near USSR’s contaminated nuclear test zone in Kazakhstan

  • Written by Magdalena Stawkowski, Associate Professor of Anthropology, University of South Carolina
imageFour decades of tests had a total explosive yield of 2,500 Hiroshimas.Magdalena Stawkowski

About a year into my field research in Kazakhstan, I went to the city of Kurchatov, once the secret command center of the Soviet nuclear program, to make some photocopies. On the ground floor of an apartment building I found a store whose owner had a copy...

Read more: Mutual aid and self-sufficiency are key to life near USSR’s contaminated nuclear test zone in...

City animals act in the same brazen ways around the world

  • Written by Daniel T. Blumstein, Professor of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Institute of the Environment and Sustainability, University of California, Los Angeles
imageA monkey swipes a soda in Thailand.Saeed Khan/AFP via Getty Images

The urban monkeys in New Delhi are so bold they’ll steal the lunch right off your plate. If you’ve spent time in New York, you’ve probably seen squirrels try to do the same. Sydney’s white ibises got the nickname “bin chickens” for stealing trash...

Read more: City animals act in the same brazen ways around the world

Water conservation works, but climate change is outpacing it: Phoenix, Denver and Las Vegas offer a glimpse of the future

  • Written by Renee Obringer, Assistant Professor in the Earth and Environmental Systems Institute, Penn State
imageThe Denver suburb of Castle Rock, Colo., limits water use in future developments. Homeowners are embracing water-efficient yards.RJ Sangosti/MediaNews Group/The Denver Post via Getty Images

When a drought turns into an urban water crisis, a city’s first step is often to limit lawn watering and launch a campaign to encourage everyone to...

Read more: Water conservation works, but climate change is outpacing it: Phoenix, Denver and Las Vegas offer...

More Articles ...

  1. From a vaccine mascot to business leadership, lessons for the US from Brazil’s public health system in building public trust and keeping it
  2. Why Americans are buying $22 smoothies despite feeling terrible about the economy
  3. When a president is unfit for office, here’s what the Constitution says can happen
  4. Why the Persian Gulf has more oil and gas than anywhere else on Earth
  5. ¡Ándale! ¡Arriba! Speedy Gonzales set to make his triumphant return to the silver screen
  6. Hosting the NFL draft is less about weekend beer sales and more about long-term brand value
  7. Israel’s death penalty law has little to do with criminal justice and everything to do with ethno-nationalism
  8. 1776’s Declaration of Independence inspired Washington’s troops to fight against the odds – and also helped bring in powerful allies
  9. US refugee policy for white South Africans is part of a century-long effort to keep some English-speaking nations white
  10. AI is reengineering drug discovery by speeding up testing and scanning petabytes of data for connections between diseases
  11. Massive eye drop recall reflects ongoing issues with manufacturing and FDA inspection
  12. We teach at a Florida university that agreed to cooperate with ICE – and we worry that it is making our students feel less safe
  13. How does spider venom damage human cells? Researchers uncover the killer mechanism of recluse spider toxin
  14. Hormuz closure threatens the global food supply – why grocery price hikes are coming
  15. Philadelphia’s founding years were rife with conspiracy fears about ‘godless’ Freemasons and the Illuminati
  16. What is CREC and how does it shape Pete Hegseth’s religious rhetoric?
  17. What I learned from analyzing 789 ‘Shark Tank’ pitches: Narcissists get funding if they’re not arrogant or defensive
  18. About 80% of breast cancer biopsies turn out benign – new imaging tool promises clearer diagnoses and fewer biopsies
  19. Teenagers and younger kids are learning coded predator phrases like ‘MAP’ online, long before their parents have even heard of it
  20. What gig workers and employees who get tips need to know about the new no-tax-on-tips tax break
  21. Lebanon’s political elites are using displacement and humanitarian crisis to delay elections again
  22. US and Iran: A brief history of how decades of mistrust and bad blood led to open warfare
  23. What a US attorney general actually does – a law professor spells it out
  24. Toxic dust from California’s shrinking Salton Sea is harming children’s lung growth – our study tracked the impact in 700 kids
  25. The two lives of Chuck Norris
  26. Supreme Court ruling on Colorado conversion therapy case is not a clear win for conservatives
  27. Why the manosphere has an antisemitism problem
  28. Why Americans give: New research finds 5 distinct profiles for generosity
  29. The costume maker who convinced Hersheypark to embrace candy mascots and ‘chocolatize’ their old-timey theme park
  30. Pam Bondi’s extreme political loyalty to Trump wasn’t enough to save her job
  31. Iran’s president appeals to Americans − but does his office still hold any real power?
  32. The nonprofit status of NCAA athletic departments is starting to raise questions
  33. Kratom poisonings surged 1,200% over the past decade, and regulators are struggling to keep up with the dangers
  34. SpaceX and OpenAI IPOs are unlikely to bring skyrocketing returns that Amazon and Apple did, as companies go public later in life and early investors cash out
  35. For adults with ADHD – or even those with just some symptoms – using smart strategies to start and complete tasks can make all the difference
  36. MLB doubles down on gambling with new Polymarket deal
  37. How Iranian hackers pose a threat to US critical infrastructure
  38. Getting $750 a month didn’t end homelessness – but our study shows it still improved the lives of homeless people
  39. Irresponsible parental gun ownership could become a factor in custody disputes
  40. Better urban design could help save Florida’s threatened Big Cypress fox squirrel
  41. Bypass the Strait of Hormuz with nuclear explosives? The US studied that in Panama and Colombia in the 1960s
  42. AI’s fluency in other languages hides a Western worldview that can mislead users − a scholar of Indonesian society explains
  43. 75 years after she led a student strike that helped end school segregation, Barbara Rose Johns now stands in the US Capitol where Robert E. Lee once did
  44. Trump risks falling in to the ‘asymmetric resolve’ trap in Iran − just as presidents before him did elsewhere
  45. Why Iran targeted Amazon data centers and what that does – and doesn’t – change about warfare
  46. The Department of Justice is suing states for sensitive voter data − an election law scholar explains why federal efforts are facing resistance
  47. Why Michael Jackson’s daughter, Paris, won’t stop ‘til she gets enough from his estate
  48. You’re not going to be alone in national parks this summer – enjoy the company
  49. Winter’s alarmingly low snowpack offers a glimpse of the changing rhythm of water in the western US
  50. Federal election observers once played a key role in securing voting rights for all − but times have changed