CAP’s Education Department aims to change America’s approach to early childhood, K-12 education, higher education, and lifelong learning by ensuring equitable access to resources, developing community-centered policies, and promoting the ability to participate fully in an inclusive economy built on a strong democracy.
Students walk to their classrooms at a public middle school in Los Angeles, California, September 10, 2021. (Getty/Robyn Beck/AFP)
CAP has identified a series of proposals, including a grant program that would increase recruitment and retention of highly qualified educators in schools with the highest teacher turnover, helping ensure equitable access to great teaching in school districts across the country.
Provide access to quality, affordable child care
CAP has helped shape key child care and preschool policy proposals, many of which are included in the Biden administration’s Build Back Better agenda, and furthered the understanding of child care research, including cost of care, child care deserts, family spending, and workforce participation.
CAP’s Comment on the Borrower Defense and Closed School Discharge Regulations
Madison Weiss and Loren Welles submitted a comment letter to the U.S. Department of Education on the borrower defense and closed school discharge regulations.
Meeting the urgency of the college affordability and student debt crisis will require bold action to restore the promise of opportunity for all Americans.
New, comprehensive data on child care workers in center-based programs—analyzing their demographics, education, experience, and wages—reveal widening pay gaps and inequality.
A Strong Start in Life: How Public Health Policies Affect the Well-Being of Pregnancies and Families
Understanding how the key social determinants of health—including housing, employment, and education—affect perinatal health is critical to ensuring that federal policies support healthy babies and families.
Why K-12 Teachers and Their Students Need Investments in Child Care
To meet the caregiving needs of the K-12 educator workforce and the developmental needs of the youngest students, the United States needs sustained, significant federal investments in the accessibility and affordability of high-quality child care.
The Alternative Teacher Certification Sector Outside Higher Education
Enrollment continues to grow in alternative teacher certification programs operated outside of colleges, but the number of students completing these programs is declining.
3 Ways Federal Investments Can Address Child Care Deserts in America
Comprehensive, sustained investments in child care can create historic opportunities to transform the system by building supply, expanding affordability, and supporting the workforce.
Congress must act now to resolve the nation’s infant and specialty formula crisis by addressing supplies, cost, and accessibility and then take steps to prevent future shortages.
The nursing profession is critical to the health of the country and the economic security of millions of workers. This video shows how the nation can support its nurses.
4 Reasons the U.S. Economy Needs Comprehensive Child Care
Building the infrastructure for a robust child care system would have wide positive reverberations for the nation’s businesses and broader economic recovery and growth.
The COVID-19 pandemic worsened a national shortage of registered nurses, making it increasingly urgent that policymakers invest in higher education, coordinate strategies to alleviate the pressures on the nursing workforce, and make the entire health care system more equitable and stable.
Major investments of federal funding and sustained coordination are needed to mitigate the impact of nursing shortages and improve the nation’s ability to improve the health care system.
Prioritizing Racial Equity in Student Mental Health Spending
States and school districts have rightly prioritized student mental health as they start to spend pandemic recovery dollars, but they must do more to ensure that funding also promotes racial equity.
Proposed Priorities for the School Pulse Panel Data Collection
In these comments, the Alliance for Excellent Education and partners provide recommendations to the School Pulse Panel Data Collection to advance shared educational equity priorities through federal, state, and local policy and advocacy.
Proposed Changes to the Mandatory Civil Rights Data Collection
In these comments, the Center for American Progress suggests revisions to the Civil Rights Data Collection to get the data necessary to address equity gaps in education.
How Colleges and Universities Can Bring Pell Grant-Funded Programs Back to Prisons
A new process from the U.S. Department of Education outlines how higher education institutions can receive approval to offer Pell Grant-funded programs to incarcerated students.
5 Strategies for Equitable Implementation of Public Investments in Child Care
States received an influx of funding from the American Rescue Plan Act to stabilize their child care industries. Key policy strategies that center equity ensure that these funds reach the people who need them most.
The American Rescue Plan Shored Up Child Care, But a Long-Term Solution Is Necessary
The American Rescue Plan provided much-needed funding to protect the child care sector from collapse, but long-term investments are critical to achieve lasting infrastructural change.
The United States Must Support HBCUs and Opportunity for Black College Students
The recent rash of bomb threats against historically Black colleges and universities is just one of the numerous signs that America is at risk of winding the clock backward when it comes to opportunities for Black students in higher education.
Major child care investments pay for themselves through a range of benefits, including improved child and family health, bolstered educational outcomes, and economic recovery.
The National Advisory Committee on Institutional Quality and Integrity: Overview and Resources
This page contains facts and resources about the role the National Advisory Committee on Institutional Quality and Integrity plays within the accreditation system.
These 6 Priorities Show the Need for a Robust Domestic Discretionary Budget
Funding for government agencies expires on March 11; rather than pass another stopgap bill, Congress must pass full-year appropriations that adequately support the nation’s priorities and needs.
Holding Higher Education Accountable in Federal-State Partnerships
Colorado’s experiment with performance contracts in the College Opportunity Fund offers insights into how performance contracts could be used for accountability in federal-state partnership proposals for higher education.
Q&A With CAP’s New Senior Vice President for Education, Jesse O’Connell
Jesse O'Connell, the new senior vice president for Education at the Center for American Progress, talks about the opportunities this moment offers to improve early childhood, K-12, and higher education in the United States.
Education Policies Need To Address the Unique Needs of Asian American and Pacific Islander Communities
The Center for American Progress is conducting new research that uplifts the lived experiences in public education of Asian American and Pacific Islander communities. This research will advance CAP’s ongoing work to apply an explicit racial equity lens to K-12 education policymaking.
Co-Sponsoring Legislation To Advance Safe, Healthy, and Inclusive School Climates
Led by the Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights, this letter urges members of Congress to co-sponsor the Counseling Not Criminalization in Schools Act, the Keeping All Students Safe Act, the Protecting our Students in Schools Act, the Safe Schools Improvement Act, and the Ending PUSHOUT Act.
The Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights, partners
Retaining and Fostering Diverse Schools Program in the FY 2022 Budget
Led by the National Coalition on School Diversity, this letter advocates for the inclusion of the Fostering Diverse Schools program in the fiscal year 22 budget.
The National Coalition on School Diversity, partners
Understanding the Opportunities and Challenges of Charter Management Contracts for Public Schools
A review of the common failures of contracts between management companies and the charter schools they oversee suggests some changes could help protect both students and taxpayer money.
These state fact sheets provide data on access to affordable child care for families, compensation for child care providers, and economic benefits of increased public investment in early learning.
The Build Back Better Act Substantially Expands Child Care Assistance
The Build Back Better Act ensures child care assistance for 16 times as many young children as under current law, and in some states, it would help state child care agencies reach more than 25 times as many children and their families.
How Educators, Students, and Families Would Spend Additional K-12 Education Funding
Educators, students, and family members discuss the important investments they would make to improve the educational experience if they had additional education funding.
