Talent & Education
To prosper, Michigan must be a more educated place. Bridge will explore the challenges in education and identify policies and initiatives that address them.
Articles
Muskegon kids struggle to read. Their superintendent had the same problem.
Muskegon Superintendent Justin Jennings read at a third-grade level when he entered college. So he knows the challenges schools face as they prepare for Michigan’s third-grade “read or flunk” law.
Michigan is failing its students, as state test scores keep tanking
M-STEP results show 1-in-3 third-graders are not proficient in reading. The bad news extends across grades and subjects, impacting white, black and Hispanic students. What should state do now?
Database: Check out your Michigan school and district M-STEP scores
See how students in your schools performed in reading language arts, math and other subjects this past school year
Yes, you can pay rural Michigan college grads to come home
Tired of seeing their best and brightest head to college never to return, three Michigan counties offer to pay up to $15,000 of student debt for grads who come back for jobs. Counties in other states are taking notice.
Rural Michigan begs for workers. A few companies are getting creative.
With more than 100,000 unfilled jobs statewide, rural manufacturers often lose out in the scramble for skilled trade workers. Can added lures like company daycare, health clinics or cash bonuses turn the tide?
In Jackson, school choice bring new reality: students as fickle customers
Jackson loses 40 percent of school-age children to other districts and charters. How districts respond illustrates the free-market educational system for Michigan families, and the budgetary challenges districts face.
Where they stand: Michigan candidates for governor on K-12 education
Perhaps no issue is as important to Michigan’s future as improving the state’s schools and increasing the number of post-secondary graduates. Here’s how the candidates answered questions from Bridge.
Where they stand: Michigan governor candidates on college affordability
Some Michigan governor candidates want to make college free, others want to emphasize career tech. Here’s what the candidates facing primary challenges are saying about the rising cost of college.
Why rural Michigan teens are skipping out on college. It's not grades
If Michigan is going to deepen its talent pool, it needs to figure out how to get more rural high school grads onto campuses, and how to keep them there.
To get first-generation students to college: Could the answer be…a bus?
While other universities struggle to get rural and first-generation students to apply, Central Michigan University came up with a surprisingly simple solution: foot the bill to bring busloads for campus visits.
Public outcry delays Michigan social studies standards
Proposed changes in what’s taught as history in classrooms from kindergarten through high school are causing an uproar. The state is extending public hearings through September.
Ignore the sticker price at Michigan universities. Here’s the real cost.
Bridge shows the surprising differences between the published price and the real cost of attending Michigan’s 15 public universities. Students from middle-class and low-income families take note.
Graphic: The cost for your family at 15 Michigan universities
If you know your household income, you can look up the actual cost of attending each of Michigan’s 15 public universities, as of the 2016-17 school year.
Groups join hands to fix Michigan schools. Will it make a difference?
Leaders from education, business, unions and philanthropy announced Wednesday that they will huddle to improve the state’s lagging public schools.
Crowds growing to protest changes to Michigan social studies standards
Public meetings that attracted just a few folks have grown bigger and louder since Bridge revealed conservative changes to Michigan K-12 social studies standards.
Michigan school board Dems: We will block conservative social studies changes
References to gay rights, Roe v. Wade and climate change have been stripped from state K-12 social studies standards. Democrats on the state school board have the votes to block the changes, and vow to do so
Michigan’s top teacher on Betsy DeVos, school shootings and testing
Luke Wilcox isn’t shy about sharing his opinions, with Bridge Magazine or the U.S. Secretary of Education
What Michigan schools can learn from craft beer
To turn around Michigan schools, stop trying to produce Budweiser, and brew more Oberon. That’s the TED Talk message (without the actual alcohol) of Michigan’s Teacher of the Year.
History gets a conservative twist in Michigan social studies standards
Abortion, climate change and gay rights are gone from proposed new social studies standards. State Sen. Patrick Colbeck and conservative groups gained influence on what will taught in Michigan classrooms.