To prosper, Michigan must be a more educated place. Bridge will explore the challenges in education and identify policies and initiatives that address them.
In the latest sign of how bad things could get, Gov. Gretchen Whitmer asks schools to set up emergency child care centers for the children of “essential workers,” from doctors to grocery stockers, needed in the pandemic fight.
State education leaders have asked for a waiver to allow Michigan schools to ditch federally mandated testing this spring, due to disruptions caused by the coronavirus outbreak.
Monday marks the beginning of a three-week school closure in Michigan because of the coronavirus pandemic. The unprecedented crisis has parents searching for nannies, taking kids to work and throwing away rules on screen time.
Yes, free lunches are available from a lot of Michigan schools even during the break. No, your child won’t fall behind in class work if they don’t have access to high-speed Internet at home. Will the school year be extended? There are no plans — yet.
Michigan school districts are profiting from taxpayer-funded online academies that teach home-schoolers electives like ice skating and animal husbandry. The programs are legal, but the state is cracking down, alleging some districts are overcharging taxpayers.
As enrollment declines, Michigan districts are turning to two-year kindergarten programs, placing teachers in private schools and academies for home-schoolers.
Want to solve Michigan’s teacher shortage? A new report skips policymakers and asks the state’s teachers what they would do. More class support and financial incentives to new teachers would help, they say.
From zero tuition to student loan bailouts, Democrats campaigning in Michigan’s March 10 primary are proposing big changes to higher education. Some question the feasibility of the proposals.
Michigan’s governor proposes a big move toward universal pre-K and free training and college for adults in a budget that includes the biggest school aid increase in 20 years. State university funding? Meh.
In what amounts to a mutiny against Michigan’s “read-or-flunk” law, school districts around the state tell Bridge they don’t plan to make students repeat third grade because of poor reading scores.
An estimated 5,000 students could be flagged to repeat third grade because of low reading scores. In her State of the State address, Whitmer will unveil a plan designed to help parents get around the Republican-backed law.
Fewer college students are binge drinking at Michigan’s two Big Ten universities. One possible reason: campaigns to correct students’ “Animal House” perceptions of their school’s drinking culture.
A critical mass of business, political and education leaders pushes for reforms to increase child care access and affordability for low- and middle-income Michiganders.
Several people have made sexual misconduct allegations against Martin Philbert, a longtime fixture in Ann Arbor and former dean of U-M’s School of Public Health.
A strong majority of Michiganders say the state must reduce the number of schools relying on long-term substitutes and find ways to ensure trained teachers are educating students, Bridge Magazine polling shows.
With bipartisan support in Lansing and a push from parents, two-year kindergarten programs are growing across the state, effectively leading the state toward a form of universal preschool.
A wedding planner teaching science. Flunking kindergarten to save on daycare. Protests to keep a high school. Our top 2019 education stories revealed how money and anxiety are quietly reshaping Michigan education.
Business leaders, teacher unions, charter schools and philanthropies are now saying the same thing: We have a plan to improve our schools. In Michigan, that’s news.