The Council on Postsecondary Education’s 2020 Stronger By Degrees Progress Report offers progress worth celebrating in overall educational attainment, KCTCS graduation rates, and STEM+H degrees, along with slower progress on bachelor graduation rates and a concerning decline in recent high school graduates enrolling in higher education. Here comes a closer look at those developments.

The Council on Postsecondary Education set tuition policy for the next academic year, as well as released the 2020 annual progress report for Kentucky’s public colleges and universities at today’s quarterly meeting. Unsurprisingly, the impact of the COVID-19 public health crisis on Kentucky students and our postsecondary institutions colored much of the discussion. As Kentucky institutions have shifted to on-line learning for the remainder of the spring term, uncertainty remains as to how students and campuses will respond through the summer and into the next academic year. This uncertainty will impact Kentucky’s ability to maintain progress toward educational attainment goals and the types of innovative strategies that will be necessary to ensure student success.

APRIL 2020 \ SCHOOL SUPPORT STAFF For more than 100 high school students in Graves County, thinking about the effects of coronavirus arrived months before prevention measures transformed students’ lives and left school staffs and communities scrambling to meet the needs of suddenly isolated students and families. Kentucky’s aggressive response to limiting the virus’s spread upended student and family life. In addition to new modes of teaching and learning, the crisis has also jolted adults who support schools into new directions and prompted community responses to supplement student learning and promote families’ welfare.

Yesterday, the Senate Education Committee approved a committee substitute version of Senate Bill 158, and sent it forward for consideration on the Senate floor. We’ve revised our two-page overview of how the bill compares to Kentucky’s current law and practice.  The following are my thoughts on the bill as amended.