-
Over 30% of Missouri school districts, mostly in rural parts of the state, have shortened their school weeks to four days as a responsive to chronic teacher shortages. As larger districts like Independence adopt the practice, state lawmakers are considering bills to reign it in.
-
Schools are still struggling to raise attendance rates and student performance to where they were before the COVID-19 pandemic. Plus, school districts are preparing for a new law in Kansas that allows students to transfer to schools outside the district where they live.
-
Missouri's education department has released new performance data finding chronic absenteeism remains a problem for many schools. Attendance rates have dropped in Missouri by 10% since 2019, and they're especially low for Black students.
-
Missouri’s Board of Education changed a rule this week that had prevented many child care providers from accessing the $26 million in grant funding allocated by lawmakers.
-
Karla Eslinger, a Republican state senator from Wasola, will succeed current commissioner Margie Vandeven in the state's top education job in June 2024.
-
Missouri’s state board of education decided to provide schools with optional guidelines on social-emotional learning to help them cope with worsening student behavior. Commissioners are concerned about potential political pushback to the learning standards, which have been criticized by conservatives.
-
Margie Vandeven became the Missouri Commissioner of Education in January 2015, but was briefly ousted by Gov. Eric Greitens before being reinstated. Vandeven led the education department through the COVID-19 pandemic and oversaw a transition to a new standardized testing regime.
-
If approved, Missouri's first funding formula increase since 2020 would cost taxpayers an additional $120 million.
-
Schools in Missouri are still rebounding from the pandemic's impact on student learning. State education leaders say they're also grappling with student mental health issues, chronic absenteeism and teacher shortages.
-
At least 35 school boards have passed resolutions asking the Missouri Board of Education to convene a blue ribbon commission to study the formula for funding public schools, which each year adds up to less and less of their overall budget.
-
Some Missouri school districts have turned to a 2016 state law that empowers them to file charges against teachers who break their employment contracts. The process can lead to the suspension of a teacher’s license. Other school districts have used the law to impose financial penalties as high as $10,000.
-
This is the first time Missouri schools are being rated under a new accountability system. Kansas City Public Schools — which just regained full accreditation last year — sits just above the range for provisional accreditation, while Hickman Mills would remain provisional. However, the state won't use these results to change accreditation status until the 2023-2024 school year.