#tellEWA Member Stories (July 28-August 3)

Barred from car pool lines, school board meetings, parent-teacher conferences and more, an Alabama parent says a school district retaliated against her. Local education leaders filed no-trespass orders against the woman, claiming she made threatening comments about a school employee. But the parent believes her advocacy work put a target on her back, Rebecca Griesbach reports for AL.com.

My pick for #tellEWA from @greezbock @aledlab @Report4America https://t.co/OQiMEJ4oFS

— Trisha Powell Crain (@Trish_Crain) August 2, 2023

To gain access to nonpublic state education data, researchers are required to sign a contract specifying they can’t testify against the California Department of Education. This restriction blocks researchers from giving their expertise during litigation proceedings. Now some researchers are caught in the crossfire, with two parties threatening to sue, John Fensterwald reports for EdSource.

“What are state officials afraid of?” said Michael Jacobs, @MoFoLLP attorney. “That their performance in running the school system during the pandemic in fact aggravated the achievement gap?” #caedu #caleg #capol #tellewahttps://t.co/BjNGpXPXVE

— EdSource (@EdSource) July 28, 2023

Students whose families experienced homelessness during the pandemic struggled with remote learning and fell through the cracks. Many schools didn’t know which students were homeless or about federal-relief funding earmarked for homeless students. Finding out too late means they have less time to spend funding that expires in a year, Cheyanne Mumphrey explains for The Associated Press.

Resharing my latest, published last week, which was the result of attending @EdWriters Diving into Data Workshop. If you are a journalist, consider attending that workshop or applying for that fellowship. I learned some neat skills. #tellEWA https://t.co/WrHLnBgMCi

— Cheyanne Mumphrey (@cheymumph) August 2, 2023

Part of a “private school revolution,” Majestic Grace Christian Academy is one of many that sprang up after the universal expansion of school vouchers in Arizona. These private schools have very little oversight. The Arizona Republic’s Yana Kunichoff takes readers inside of one of these schools while detailing public concerns, such as this one: “Public dollars are going to strip mall private schools.”

ICYMI: As Arizona’s school voucher program has grown, private schools are springing up to access the newly available public dollars

I visited one tiny new private school where every student is getting a voucher #tellEWAhttps://t.co/sieExGeiG1 pic.twitter.com/NjaJXlHZbQ

— Yana Kunichoff (@Yanazure) August 2, 2023

A student accused a respected opioid expert of disparaging the Texas lieutenant governor during a lecture at Texas A&M University. Shortly thereafter, the professor was placed on administrative leave – another example of increasing political involvement from state leaders in how Texas universities are managed, Kate Mcgee and James Barragán report for The Texas Tribune.

#tellEWA https://t.co/PSzGNDYC3c

— Daniel Perez (@DanielPere92537) July 27, 2023

Creating color-coded charts, Julia James of Mississippi Today details her state’s progress in spending pandemic-relief funding. She also helps readers determine how much money their local school districts received via ESSER I, II, and III and how the districts spent that money in nine major categories.

How much of their covid money has your school district spent? what are they spending it on?

I made some charts to help you figure it out:https://t.co/oFIKyQyJCf

— Julia James (@juliaruthjames) July 31, 2023