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Keeping children safe on social media: What parents should know to protect their kids

A realistic way to protect kids from social media? Find a middle ground

Heartbreak, anger and many questions follow University of the Arts’ abrupt decision to close

Pro-Palestinian demonstrators arrested at Stanford University after occupying president’s office

Greece is buoyed by a Turkish official’s comments about Parthenon sculptures taken by Britain

The pandemic’s missing students.

These kids never returned to school after the pandemic – because of paperwork and a broken phone

More education news, missouri appeals court sides with transgender student in bathroom, locker room discrimination case.

Life as a teen without social media isn’t easy. These families are navigating adolescence offline

In their own words: What young people wish they’d known about social media

Washington parental rights law criticized as a ‘forced outing’ measure is allowed to take effect

Columbia University and a Jewish student agree on a settlement that imposes more safety measures

After publishing an article critical of Israel, Columbia Law Review’s website is shut down by board

Ohio’s attorney general seeks to block seminary college from selling its rare books.

Conservative University of Wisconsin regent resigns after initially refusing to step down

Milwaukee schools superintendent resigns amid potential loss of millions in funding.

University of Michigan regent’s law office vandalized with pro-Palestinian graffiti

New Orleans valedictorian lived in a homeless shelter as he rose to the top of his class

Ncaa division i softball world series glance.

Most US students are recovering from pandemic-era setbacks, but millions are making up little ground

Birmingham-Southern keeps inspiring, magical season alive with walk-off win at D-3 World Series

Disruptions at University of Chicago graduation as school withholds 4 diplomas over protests

University of the Arts abruptly announces June 7 closure, vows to help students transfer

Massachusetts teacher on leave after holding mock slave auction and using racial slur, official says.

UVA to pay $9 million related to shooting that killed 3 football players, wounded 2 students

Oldest living National Spelling Bee champion reflects on his win 70 years later

Birmingham-southern loses d-iii world series opener 7-5 on same day the liberal arts college closes.

Police arrest 80 at Israel-Hamas war protest at UC Santa Cruz, school says

Federal rule on Title IX is a ruse to require trans sports participation, GOP states say

Bruhat Soma wins the National Spelling Bee after a slow night concludes with a sudden tiebreaker

NCAA, states reach agreement in lawsuit to permanently allow multiple-transfer athletes to compete

8 Northern California middle school students arrested for assault on 2 peers

The special Tony Award for educators goes to Baltimore community artist CJay Philip

Pro-Palestinian camp at Wayne State dismantled while MIT students walk out of commencement

A fifth grader’s fundraiser cleared his school of meal debt. It named an award for him

On spelling’s saddest day, hyped National Spelling Bee competitors see their hopes dashed

Yale University names Maurie McInnis as its 24th president

Education Department vows 'full-scale review' of financial aid office after FAFSA debacle

Spelling champ Bruhat Soma rides an unbeaten streak to the Scripps National Bee title, winning tiebreaker

Yale University names Maurie McInnis as its first female president

This college is shutting down, but its baseball team will live on at the College World Series

Israel-Hamas war

From seinfeld to butker, commencement speaker appearances invite controversy.

'A Different World' cast reunites as HBCUs see a new peak in admissions

Hundreds walk out of Harvard College graduation; UCLA contends with new protest

Education videos.

New program tackles literacy challenges in classrooms

Virginia school addresses 'segregation game' targeting Asian American student

Satanic Temple fighting for representation in schools

New book looks at political tension in school districts like Southlake, Texas

College commencements face pro-Palestinian disruptions

Duke students walk out of graduation as protests continue nationwide

Protests and arrests continue on college campuses as graduation season begins

Virginia school board votes to return names of Confederate figures to schools

Virginia school board approves a proposal to restore names of Confederate leaders

New campus crackdowns on pro-Palestinian protesters

Education Department calls on Texas school district to address claims of civil rights violations

Texas superintendent dismissed after transgender controversy

California superintendent fired after allegedly bullying students

New protests and arrests at colleges nationwide

New pro-Palestinian protests on campuses across the country

Campus protests spread around the country

Dozens arrested in pro-Palestinian protests at Columbia University

Columbia University president testifies on antisemitism on campus

House passes bill to rename federal courthouse after Latino family who helped desegregate schools

Biden cancels $7.7 billion in federal student debt for 160K borrowers

Transgender Kids

Transgender teen booed after winning girls' track race at state championship.

College students who protested and those who didn't share in disappointment at response from schools

California district to pay $360K to teacher fired for not following transgender policies

Maryland parents can't opt kids out of LGBTQ book curriculum, court rules

UC Berkeley encampment comes down after school agrees to review investments

Chicago teen who started college at 10 earns doctorate degree at 17

UNC-Chapel Hill board slashes diversity funding to divert money to public safety resources

Over 20 GOP-led states sue Biden administration over Title IX rules for LGBTQ students

House Republicans look at K-12 schools in latest antisemitism probe

Once champions of free speech, colleges crack down on pro-palestinian protests, columbia seniors, parents say canceling commencement is a 'demoralizing' end.

Columbia is rethinking its commencement ceremony in the wake of campus protests

UT Austin students get civil rights group's help for Latinx Graduation canceled by DEI cuts

UC Berkeley opens civil rights investigation into backyard confrontation between a law professor and a student

Palestinian students' complaint against Columbia sparks DOE civil rights investigation

Texas superintendent resigns after trans student’s removal from ‘Oklahoma!’

Campus calls to divest from Israel hinge on a tough question: Where's the money exactly?

Rollout of transgender bathroom law sows confusion among Utah public school families

House passes antisemitism bill with broad bipartisan support amid campus arrests

College decision day passes many students by as financial aid delays linger

Columbia's near-total lockdown over protests called extreme and divisive by students and staff

Pro-Palestinian student groups say an autonomous group has occupied Columbia University's Hamilton Hall

White House

Biden officials will have a minimal presence at college graduations as campuses erupt in protests.

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Janelle Monáe gives a commencement speech at Loyola Marymount University's 2024 Graduate ceremony. JC Olivera/Getty Images hide caption

All Songs Considered

Advice for graduates: listeners share songs, lessons from high school.

June 4, 2024 • Listeners share songs that take them back to the final days of high school, and the lessons they impart.

LA Johnson/NPR hide caption

Pandemic aid for schools is ending soon. Many after-school programs may go with it

June 1, 2024 • Once the federal money expires, one Tulsa organization estimates its after-school program offerings will shrink from 450 to just 75. That's unless they can find outside funding.

Bruhat Soma, 12, of Tampa, Fla., stands on stage with his family after winning the Scripps National Spelling Bee, in Oxon Hill, Md., on Thursday night. Mariam Zuhaib/AP hide caption

A 12-year-old from Florida has won this year's Scripps National Spelling Bee

May 31, 2024 • Bruhat Soma spelled 29 out of 30 words correctly in Scripps’ second-ever spell-off, in which competitors have 90 seconds to spell as many words given to them as possible.

NPR Student Podcast Challenge

Starting Your Podcast: A Guide For Students

New to podcasting? Don't panic.

Florida A&M University announced a "transformative" donation earlier this month — but the school said it ceased contact with the donor after questions arose about the funds. Jeffrey Greenberg/Universal Images Group via Getty Images hide caption

A mega-gift for an HBCU college fell through. Here's what happened — and what's next

May 24, 2024 • To people who watch high-level philanthropy, Florida A&M's embarrassing incident wasn't only a shocking reversal. It was something they've seen before. The school is now investigating what went wrong.

Due to the success of the State Department's J-1 Visa program, the Kuspuk School District and other rural districts in Alaska are looking at ways to utilize other visa programs to keep foreign teachers in classrooms for longer. Emily Schwing for NPR/Emily Schwing hide caption

Visa program draws foreign teachers to a rural Alaska school district facing a staffing crisis

Kyuk service.

May 24, 2024 • Teacher retention and recruitment is difficult and some schools make use of J-1 Visas to recruit teachers from outside the U.S. In one rural school district in Alaska, foreign teachers make up over half the staff.

Robert Hale gives an envelope with cash to a graduating UMass Dartmouth student at last week's commencement. Each of the 1,200 graduates received $1,000 onstage, half to keep and half to donate. Karl Christoff Dominey/University of Massachusetts Dartmouth hide caption

A billionaire surprised graduates onstage with cash, but it's not all theirs to keep

May 23, 2024 • Billionaire philanthropist Rob Hale gave UMass Dartmouth graduates $1,000 each, and instructed them to donate half. He tells NPR the best cause students can support is one that matters to them.

U-Mass Dartmouth graduates got a surprise gift from a billionaire at graduation

From left: Alexis Jones (Cornell University), Mei Lamison (New York University), Anaka Srinivas (Northwestern University). Alexis Jones; Mei Lamison; Anaka Srinivas hide caption

Consider This from NPR

A concentrated dose of history: the class of 2024 looks back.

May 22, 2024 • Everyone says you live through history, but "I don't think anyone prepared us for this much history," say the students in the Class of 2024.

Student Podcast Challenge

May 22, 2024 • Student Podcast Challenge invites students from around the country to create a podcast and compete for a chance to have your work featured on NPR.

Pedestrians pass through The Ohio State University's student union. John Minchillo/AP hide caption

Ohio reviewing race-based scholarships after Supreme Court affirmative action ruling

May 18, 2024 • Higher education officials in Ohio are reviewing race-based scholarships after last year's Supreme Court ruling on affirmative action.

Michelle Perez for NPR hide caption

These teens were missing too much school. Here's what it took to get them back

May 18, 2024 • Since the pandemic, chronic absenteeism in the nation's K-12 schools has skyrocketed. These teens are working to get their attendance back on track.

Perspective

Code switch, in a debate over a school name, it's not just parents who are attached to the past.

May 18, 2024 • At the height of the racial reckoning, a school district in Virginia voted to rename two schools that had been previously named for Confederate generals. This month, that decision was reversed.

Basil Rodriguez was arrested linking arms outside Hamilton Hall, but said the arrest had strengthened their resolve to continue protesting. The trespassing charge Rodriguez faced was dismissed this week. Keren Carrión/NPR hide caption

Campus protests over the Gaza war

Arrested. injured. suspended. six nyc university students say they'll keep protesting.

May 18, 2024 • Students arrested at Columbia University and the City College of New York spoke with NPR about their choice to risk legal and academic consequences.

Des Moines Superintendent Ian Roberts races students on an Iowa track. Phil Roeder/Des Moines Public Schools hide caption

Iowa superintendent and former Olympian bested in footrace by 5th-grader

May 18, 2024 • Ian Roberts has competed in some of the most high-profile races in the world. But his biggest competition to date was a determined fifth-grader in jean shorts and Nike tennis shoes.

Earlier this month, President Biden spoke about protests that have roiled many U.S. college campuses. Among their demands is for the Israeli military to leave Gaza. Biden said students have a right to protest but not to be disruptive. He is set to speak at Morehouse College in Atlanta on Sunday. Drew Angerer/AFP via Getty Images hide caption

Biden is set for the Morehouse graduation. Students are divided

May 17, 2024 • Ahead of Biden's address at Morehouse, students share their frustrations

Applicants to Georgia State University received a welcome email for the 2024-25 school year. However, the email was sent in error to 1,500 applicants by the school's admissions office. Here, the campus celebrates its fall commencement exercises on Dec. 17, 2014, in Atlanta. Meg Buscema/Georgia State University hide caption

1,500 college applicants thought they were accepted. They soon learned it was an error

May 16, 2024 • Georgia State University says the students were not sent an official acceptance letter but "communication" from a department welcoming those who intend to major in a specific academic area.

Kansas City Chiefs player Harrison Butker, pictured at a press conference in February, is in hot water for his recent commencement speech at Benedictine College in Kansas. Chris Unger/Getty Images hide caption

The NFL responds after a player urges female college graduates to become homemakers

May 16, 2024 • Harrison Butker of the Kansas City Chiefs urged female graduates to embrace the title of "homemaker" in a controversial commencement speech. The NFL says he was speaking "in his personal capacity."

Announcing the 2023 College Podcast Challenge Honorable Mentions

May 15, 2024 • Here are the honorable mentions from the 2023 College Podcast Challenge. Congrats!

Fahmida Azim for NPR hide caption

Why children with disabilities are missing school and losing skills

May 15, 2024 • A special education staffing crisis is raging through many U.S. school districts. It's taking a toll on students and families.

Illustration of a rally where "peaceful protesters" march alongside "violent looters." LA Johnson/NPR hide caption

Why the trope of the 'outside agitator' persists

May 15, 2024 • As protests continue to rock the campuses of colleges and universities, a familiar set of questions is being raised: Are these protests really being led by students? Or are the real drivers of the civil disobedience outsiders , seizing on an opportunity to wreak chaos and stir up trouble?

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May 14, 2024 • There's a special education staffing crisis in a northern California school district. It means some of the district's most vulnerable students have missed weeks and even months of school.

Public Health student Hanna Stutzman helps establish new native plantings at The College of New Jersey. Nathaniel Johnson/The College of New Jersey hide caption

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Dr. Thorsten Siess shows the Impella. Annegret Hilse/Reuters hide caption

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May 13, 2024 • Entries for our sixth annual contest for middle and high school students (and our first-ever fourth grade competition) are now due Friday, May 31 at midnight E.T.

Graduate students and demonstrators at the University of Texas at Austin protest the war in Gaza after walking out of commencement at the DKR-Texas Memorial Stadium on May 11, 2024 in Austin. Brandon Bell/Getty Images hide caption

Student protests caused mostly minor disruptions at several graduation ceremonies

May 12, 2024 • From California to North Carolina, students staged chants and walkouts over the weekend in protest of Israel's ongoing military offensive in Gaza.

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How covid taught america about inequity in education.

Harvard Correspondent

Remote learning turned spotlight on gaps in resources, funding, and tech — but also offered hints on reform

“Unequal” is a multipart series highlighting the work of Harvard faculty, staff, students, alumni, and researchers on issues of race and inequality across the U.S. This part looks at how the pandemic called attention to issues surrounding the racial achievement gap in America.

The pandemic has disrupted education nationwide, turning a spotlight on existing racial and economic disparities, and creating the potential for a lost generation. Even before the outbreak, students in vulnerable communities — particularly predominately Black, Indigenous, and other majority-minority areas — were already facing inequality in everything from resources (ranging from books to counselors) to student-teacher ratios and extracurriculars.

The additional stressors of systemic racism and the trauma induced by poverty and violence, both cited as aggravating health and wellness as at a Weatherhead Institute panel , pose serious obstacles to learning as well. “Before the pandemic, children and families who are marginalized were living under such challenging conditions that it made it difficult for them to get a high-quality education,” said Paul Reville, founder and director of the Education Redesign Lab at the Harvard Graduate School of Education (GSE).

Educators hope that the may triggers a broader conversation about reform and renewed efforts to narrow the longstanding racial achievement gap. They say that research shows virtually all of the nation’s schoolchildren have fallen behind, with students of color having lost the most ground, particularly in math. They also note that the full-time reopening of schools presents opportunities to introduce changes and that some of the lessons from remote learning, particularly in the area of technology, can be put to use to help students catch up from the pandemic as well as to begin to level the playing field.

The disparities laid bare by the COVID-19 outbreak became apparent from the first shutdowns. “The good news, of course, is that many schools were very fast in finding all kinds of ways to try to reach kids,” said Fernando M. Reimers , Ford Foundation Professor of the Practice in International Education and director of GSE’s Global Education Innovation Initiative and International Education Policy Program. He cautioned, however, that “those arrangements don’t begin to compare with what we’re able to do when kids could come to school, and they are particularly deficient at reaching the most vulnerable kids.” In addition, it turned out that many students simply lacked access.

“We’re beginning to understand that technology is a basic right. You cannot participate in society in the 21st century without access to it,” says Fernando Reimers of the Graduate School of Education.

Stephanie Mitchell/Harvard file photo

The rate of limited digital access for households was at 42 percent during last spring’s shutdowns, before drifting down to about 31 percent this fall, suggesting that school districts improved their adaptation to remote learning, according to an analysis by the UCLA Center for Neighborhood Knowledge of U.S. Census data. (Indeed, Education Week and other sources reported that school districts around the nation rushed to hand out millions of laptops, tablets, and Chromebooks in the months after going remote.)

The report also makes clear the degree of racial and economic digital inequality. Black and Hispanic households with school-aged children were 1.3 to 1.4 times as likely as white ones to face limited access to computers and the internet, and more than two in five low-income households had only limited access. It’s a problem that could have far-reaching consequences given that young students of color are much more likely to live in remote-only districts.

“We’re beginning to understand that technology is a basic right,” said Reimers. “You cannot participate in society in the 21st century without access to it.” Too many students, he said, “have no connectivity. They have no devices, or they have no home circumstances that provide them support.”

The issues extend beyond the technology. “There is something wonderful in being in contact with other humans, having a human who tells you, ‘It’s great to see you. How are things going at home?’” Reimers said. “I’ve done 35 case studies of innovative practices around the world. They all prioritize social, emotional well-being. Checking in with the kids. Making sure there is a touchpoint every day between a teacher and a student.”

The difference, said Reville, is apparent when comparing students from different economic circumstances. Students whose parents “could afford to hire a tutor … can compensate,” he said. “Those kids are going to do pretty well at keeping up. Whereas, if you’re in a single-parent family and mom is working two or three jobs to put food on the table, she can’t be home. It’s impossible for her to keep up and keep her kids connected.

“If you lose the connection, you lose the kid.”

“COVID just revealed how serious those inequities are,” said GSE Dean Bridget Long , the Saris Professor of Education and Economics. “It has disproportionately hurt low-income students, students with special needs, and school systems that are under-resourced.”

This disruption carries throughout the education process, from elementary school students (some of whom have simply stopped logging on to their online classes) through declining participation in higher education. Community colleges, for example, have “traditionally been a gateway for low-income students” into the professional classes, said Long, whose research focuses on issues of affordability and access. “COVID has just made all of those issues 10 times worse,” she said. “That’s where enrollment has fallen the most.”

In addition to highlighting such disparities, these losses underline a structural issue in public education. Many schools are under-resourced, and the major reason involves sources of school funding. A 2019 study found that predominantly white districts got $23 billion more than their non-white counterparts serving about the same number of students. The discrepancy is because property taxes are the primary source of funding for schools, and white districts tend to be wealthier than those of color.

The problem of resources extends beyond teachers, aides, equipment, and supplies, as schools have been tasked with an increasing number of responsibilities, from the basics of education to feeding and caring for the mental health of both students and their families.

“You think about schools and academics, but what COVID really made clear was that schools do so much more than that,” said Long. A child’s school, she stressed “is social, emotional support. It’s safety. It’s the food system. It is health care.”

“You think about schools and academics” … but a child’s school “is social, emotional support. It’s safety. It’s the food system. It is health care,” stressed GSE Dean Bridget Long.

Rose Lincoln/Harvard file photo

This safety net has been shredded just as more students need it. “We have 400,000 deaths and those are disproportionately affecting communities of color,” said Long. “So you can imagine the kids that are in those households. Are they able to come to school and learn when they’re dealing with this trauma?”

The damage is felt by the whole families. In an upcoming paper, focusing on parents of children ages 5 to 7, Cindy H. Liu, director of Harvard Medical School’s Developmental Risk and Cultural Disparities Laboratory , looks at the effects of COVID-related stress on parent’ mental health. This stress — from both health risks and grief — “likely has ramifications for those groups who are disadvantaged, particularly in getting support, as it exacerbates existing disparities in obtaining resources,” she said via email. “The unfortunate reality is that the pandemic is limiting the tangible supports [like childcare] that parents might actually need.”

Educators are overwhelmed as well. “Teachers are doing a phenomenal job connecting with students,” Long said about their performance online. “But they’ve lost the whole system — access to counselors, access to additional staff members and support. They’ve lost access to information. One clue is that the reporting of child abuse going down. It’s not that we think that child abuse is actually going down, but because you don’t have a set of adults watching and being with kids, it’s not being reported.”

The repercussions are chilling. “As we resume in-person education on a normal basis, we’re dealing with enormous gaps,” said Reville. “Some kids will come back with such educational deficits that unless their schools have a very well thought-out and effective program to help them catch up, they will never catch up. They may actually drop out of school. The immediate consequences of learning loss and disengagement are going to be a generation of people who will be less educated.”

There is hope, however. Just as the lockdown forced teachers to improvise, accelerating forms of online learning, so too may the recovery offer options for educational reform.

The solutions, say Reville, “are going to come from our community. This is a civic problem.” He applauded one example, the Somerville, Mass., public library program of outdoor Wi-Fi “pop ups,” which allow 24/7 access either through their own or library Chromebooks. “That’s the kind of imagination we need,” he said.

On a national level, he points to the creation of so-called “Children’s Cabinets.” Already in place in 30 states, these nonpartisan groups bring together leaders at the city, town, and state levels to address children’s needs through schools, libraries, and health centers. A July 2019 “ Children’s Cabinet Toolkit ” on the Education Redesign Lab site offers guidance for communities looking to form their own, with sample mission statements from Denver, Minneapolis, and Fairfax, Va.

Already the Education Redesign Lab is working on even more wide-reaching approaches. In Tennessee, for example, the Metro Nashville Public Schools has launched an innovative program, designed to provide each student with a personalized education plan. By pairing these students with school “navigators” — including teachers, librarians, and instructional coaches — the program aims to address each student’s particular needs.

“This is a chance to change the system,” said Reville. “By and large, our school systems are organized around a factory model, a one-size-fits-all approach. That wasn’t working very well before, and it’s working less well now.”

“Students have different needs,” agreed Long. “We just have to get a better understanding of what we need to prioritize and where students are” in all aspects of their home and school lives.

“By and large, our school systems are organized around a factory model, a one-size-fits-all approach. That wasn’t working very well before, and it’s working less well now,” says Paul Reville of the GSE.

Already, educators are discussing possible responses. Long and GSE helped create The Principals’ Network as one forum for sharing ideas, for example. With about 1,000 members, and multiple subgroups to address shared community issues, some viable answers have begun to emerge.

“We are going to need to expand learning time,” said Long. Some school systems, notably Texas’, already have begun discussing extending the school year, she said. In addition, Long, an internationally recognized economist who is a member of the  National Academy of Education and the  MDRC board, noted that educators are exploring innovative ways to utilize new tools like Zoom, even when classrooms reopen.

“This is an area where technology can help supplement what students are learning, giving them extra time — learning time, even tutoring time,” Long said.

Reimers, who serves on the UNESCO Commission on the Future of Education, has been brainstorming solutions that can be applied both here and abroad. These include urging wealthier countries to forgive loans, so that poorer countries do not have to cut back on basics such as education, and urging all countries to keep education a priority. The commission and its members are also helping to identify good practices and share them — globally.

Innovative uses of existing technology can also reach beyond traditional schooling. Reimers cites the work of a few former students who, working with Harvard Global Education Innovation Initiative,   HundrED , the  OECD Directorate for Education and Skills , and the  World Bank Group Education Global Practice, focused on podcasts to reach poor students in Colombia.

They began airing their math and Spanish lessons via the WhatsApp app, which was widely accessible. “They were so humorous that within a week, everyone was listening,” said Reimers. Soon, radio stations and other platforms began airing the 10-minute lessons, reaching not only children who were not in school, but also their adult relatives.

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A Bipartisan Bill Aims to Boost AI Education for K-12 Teachers

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More than half of educators believe that students will need some knowledge of artificial intelligence to succeed in the workplace of the future, according to an EdWeek Research Center survey conducted late last year.

It appears that at least some lawmakers in Congress have come to the same conclusion.

U.S. Sens. Maria Cantwell, D-Wash., and Jerry Moran, R-Kan., this month introduced the bipartisan NSF AI Education Act of 2024 . The bill seeks to expand scholarship aid and professional development opportunities for K-12 educators interested in artificial intelligence and quantum computing, with support from the National Science Foundation or NSF.

Quantum computing , like AI, is a rapidly developing field related to computer science, which seeks to harness technology to quickly solve problems.

The legislation would create a grant program at the NSF to promote research on teaching AI at K-12 schools, with a focus on schools that serve low-income, rural, and tribal students. The bill leaves the size of the grant program up to NSF.

This bill also calls on NSF to award undergraduate and graduate scholarships for future educators, as well as students interested in farming and advanced manufacturing, to study AI. The grants would be given directly to post-secondary institutions to cover students’ tuition and fees and to provide them with a stipend.

The bill directs NSF to develop publicly available “playbooks” for introducing AI in P-12 classrooms nationwide. The playbooks would include a special focus on schools in rural or economically struggling communities.

This guidance would be in addition to AI resources that the Biden administration has directed the U.S. Education Department to release this year , including a forthcoming AI policy toolkit.

The bill calls on NSF to conduct an outreach campaign on its AI and quantum education opportunities at K-12 schools and post-secondary institutions.

“The emerging tech jobs of tomorrow are here today,” Cantwell said in a statement. “Demand for AI expertise is already high and will continue to grow. This bill will open doors to AI for students at all levels, and upskill our workforce.”

“Artificial intelligence has tremendous potential, but it will require a skilled and capable workforce to unlock its capabilities,” Moran said in a statement. “If we want to fully understand AI and remain globally competitive, we must invest in the future workforce today.”

‘There’s a real dearth of practical resources’

At least one advocate for AI education is heartened that some in Congress have begun to focus on this issue—and particularly pleased by the legislation’s focus on research on AI in education.

Educators are asking, “when are we going to understand the potential positive impact of generative AI on schools but also the potential harms that we need to mitigate?” said Amanda Bickerstaff, the CEO of AI for Education, a business that works with educators the responsible adoption of AI in schools.

She’s glad that the bill may allow NSF to start creating materials for AI in education.

“There’s a dearth of really practical resources, and there’s a real need for educators to get their hands around what to actually start doing within their classrooms to support student learning,” as well as how to use the tools in a smart way to develop lesson plans, assignments, and complete other tasks, Bickerstaff said.

This is at least the second piece of bipartisan legislation introduced in this Congress to promote AI literacy. In December, Reps. Lisa Blunt Rochester, D-Del., and Larry Bucshon, R-Ind., introduced the “Artificial Intelligence Literacy Act.”

That measure would shine a spotlight on the importance of teaching AI literacy. It would make it clear that K-12 schools, colleges, nonprofits, and libraries can use grants available under an existing program—the $1.25 billion Digital Equity Competitive Grant program —to support AI literacy. It defines AI literacy as understanding the basic principles of AI, its applications and limitations, as well as ethical considerations.

Importantly, neither bill would set aside new money for teaching AI, though a spokeswoman for the Democrats on the Senate commerce committee, which Cantwell chairs and on which Moran serves as a senior member, said Cantwell will work to ensure NSF has the funds it needs to implement these programs.

The agency currently receives $9.05 billion, for fiscal year 2024 but Cantwell and other leaders are pushing for $15.6 billion for fiscal year 2025 the amount specified in a recent bipartisan law aimed in part at advancing economic competitiveness through STEM education, the spokeswoman said.

While the lack of dedicated new funds might disappoint educators hoping for additional resources, it also may boost the measures’ chance of passing, as Congress is operating under a bipartisan deal with significant spending constraints.

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Public education is facing a crisis of epic proportions

How politics and the pandemic put schools in the line of fire

A previous version of this story incorrectly said that 39 percent of American children were on track in math. That is the percentage performing below grade level.

Test scores are down, and violence is up . Parents are screaming at school boards , and children are crying on the couches of social workers. Anger is rising. Patience is falling.

For public schools, the numbers are all going in the wrong direction. Enrollment is down. Absenteeism is up. There aren’t enough teachers, substitutes or bus drivers. Each phase of the pandemic brings new logistics to manage, and Republicans are planning political campaigns this year aimed squarely at failings of public schools.

Public education is facing a crisis unlike anything in decades, and it reaches into almost everything that educators do: from teaching math, to counseling anxious children, to managing the building.

Political battles are now a central feature of education, leaving school boards, educators and students in the crosshairs of culture warriors. Schools are on the defensive about their pandemic decision-making, their curriculums, their policies regarding race and racial equity and even the contents of their libraries. Republicans — who see education as a winning political issue — are pressing their case for more “parental control,” or the right to second-guess educators’ choices. Meanwhile, an energized school choice movement has capitalized on the pandemic to promote alternatives to traditional public schools.

“The temperature is way up to a boiling point,” said Nat Malkus, senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute, a conservative-leaning think tank. “If it isn’t a crisis now, you never get to crisis.”

Experts reach for comparisons. The best they can find is the earthquake following Brown v. Board of Education , when the Supreme Court ordered districts to desegregate and White parents fled from their cities’ schools. That was decades ago.

Today, the cascading problems are felt acutely by the administrators, teachers and students who walk the hallways of public schools across the country. Many say they feel unprecedented levels of stress in their daily lives.

Remote learning, the toll of illness and death, and disruptions to a dependable routine have left students academically behind — particularly students of color and those from poor families. Behavior problems ranging from inability to focus in class all the way to deadly gun violence have gripped campuses. Many students and teachers say they are emotionally drained, and experts predict schools will be struggling with the fallout for years to come.

Teresa Rennie, an eighth-grade math and science teacher in Philadelphia, said in 11 years of teaching, she has never referred this many children to counseling.

“So many students are needy. They have deficits academically. They have deficits socially,” she said. Rennie said that she’s drained, too. “I get 45 minutes of a prep most days, and a lot of times during that time I’m helping a student with an assignment, or a child is crying and I need to comfort them and get them the help they need. Or there’s a problem between two students that I need to work with. There’s just not enough time.”

Many wonder: How deep is the damage?

Learning lost

At the start of the pandemic, experts predicted that students forced into remote school would pay an academic price. They were right.

“The learning losses have been significant thus far and frankly I’m worried that we haven’t stopped sinking,” said Dan Goldhaber, an education researcher at the American Institutes for Research.

Some of the best data come from the nationally administered assessment called i-Ready, which tests students three times a year in reading and math, allowing researchers to compare performance of millions of students against what would be expected absent the pandemic. It found significant declines, especially among the youngest students and particularly in math.

The low point was fall 2020, when all students were coming off a spring of chaotic, universal remote classes. By fall 2021 there were some improvements, but even then, academic performance remained below historic norms.

Take third grade, a pivotal year for learning and one that predicts success going forward. In fall 2021, 38 percent of third-graders were below grade level in reading, compared with 31 percent historically. In math, 39 percent of students were below grade level, vs. 29 percent historically.

Damage was most severe for students from the lowest-income families, who were already performing at lower levels.

A McKinsey & Co. study found schools with majority-Black populations were five months behind pre-pandemic levels, compared with majority-White schools, which were two months behind. Emma Dorn, a researcher at McKinsey, describes a “K-shaped” recovery, where kids from wealthier families are rebounding and those in low-income homes continue to decline.

“Some students are recovering and doing just fine. Other people are not,” she said. “I’m particularly worried there may be a whole cohort of students who are disengaged altogether from the education system.”

A hunt for teachers, and bus drivers

Schools, short-staffed on a good day, had little margin for error as the omicron variant of the coronavirus swept over the country this winter and sidelined many teachers. With a severe shortage of substitutes, teachers had to cover other classes during their planning periods, pushing prep work to the evenings. San Francisco schools were so strapped that the superintendent returned to the classroom on four days this school year to cover middle school math and science classes. Classes were sometimes left unmonitored or combined with others into large groups of unglorified study halls.

“The pandemic made an already dire reality even more devastating,” said Becky Pringle, president of the National Education Association, referring to the shortages.

In 2016, there were 1.06 people hired for every job listing. That figure has steadily dropped, reaching 0.59 hires for each opening last year, Bureau of Labor Statistics data show. In 2013, there were 557,320 substitute teachers, the BLS reported. In 2020, the number had fallen to 415,510. Virtually every district cites a need for more subs.

It’s led to burnout as teachers try to fill in the gaps.

“The overall feelings of teachers right now are ones of just being exhausted, beaten down and defeated, and just out of gas. Expectations have been piled on educators, even before the pandemic, but nothing is ever removed,” said Jennifer Schlicht, a high school teacher in Olathe, Kan., outside Kansas City.

Research shows the gaps in the number of available educators are most acute in areas including special education and educators who teach English language learners, as well as substitutes. And all school year, districts have been short on bus drivers , who have been doubling up routes, and forcing late school starts and sometimes cancellations for lack of transportation.

Many educators predict that fed-up teachers will probably quit, exacerbating the problem. And they say political attacks add to the burnout. Teachers are under scrutiny over lesson plans, and critics have gone after teachers unions, which for much of the pandemic demanded remote learning.

“It’s just created an environment that people don’t want to be part of anymore,” said Daniel A. Domenech, executive director of AASA, The School Superintendents Association. “People want to take care of kids, not to be accused and punished and criticized.”

Falling enrollment

Traditional public schools educate the vast majority of American children, but enrollment has fallen, a worrisome trend that could have lasting repercussions. Enrollment in traditional public schools fell to less than 49.4 million students in fall 2020 , a 2.7 percent drop from a year earlier .

National data for the current school year is not yet available. But if the trend continues, that will mean less money for public schools as federal and state funding are both contingent on the number of students enrolled. For now, schools have an infusion of federal rescue money that must be spent by 2024.

Some students have shifted to private or charter schools. A rising number , especially Black families , opted for home schooling. And many young children who should have been enrolling in kindergarten delayed school altogether. The question has been: will these students come back?

Some may not. Preliminary data for 19 states compiled by Nat Malkus, of the American Enterprise Institute, found seven states where enrollment dropped in fall 2020 and then dropped even further in 2021. His data show 12 states that saw declines in 2020 but some rebounding in 2021 — though not one of them was back to 2019 enrollment levels.

Joshua Goodman, associate professor of education and economics at Boston University, studied enrollment in Michigan schools and found high-income, White families moved to private schools to get in-person school. Far more common, though, were lower-income Black families shifting to home schooling or other remote options because they were uncomfortable with the health risks of in person.

“Schools were damned if they did, and damned if they didn’t,” Goodman said.

At the same time, charter schools, which are privately run but publicly funded, saw enrollment increase by 7 percent, or nearly 240,000 students, according to the National Alliance for Public Charter Schools. There’s also been a surge in home schooling. Private schools saw enrollment drop slightly in 2020-21 but then rebound this academic year, for a net growth of 1.7 percent over two years, according to the National Association of Independent Schools, which represents 1,600 U.S. schools.

Absenteeism on the rise

Even if students are enrolled, they won’t get much schooling if they don’t show up.

Last school year, the number of students who were chronically absent — meaning they have missed more than 10 percent of school days — nearly doubled from before the pandemic, according to data from a variety of states and districts studied by EveryDay Labs, a company that works with districts to improve attendance.

This school year, the numbers got even worse.

In Connecticut, for instance, the number of chronically absent students soared from 12 percent in 2019-20 to 20 percent the next year to 24 percent this year, said Emily Bailard, chief executive of the company. In Oakland, Calif., they went from 17.3 percent pre-pandemic to 19.8 percent last school year to 43 percent this year. In Pittsburgh, chronic absences stayed where they were last school year at about 25 percent, then shot up to 45 percent this year.

“We all expected that this year would look much better,” Bailard said. One explanation for the rise may be that schools did not keep careful track of remote attendance last year and the numbers understated the absences then, she said.

The numbers were the worst for the most vulnerable students. This school year in Connecticut, for instance, 24 percent of all students were chronically absent, but the figure topped 30 percent for English-learners, students with disabilities and those poor enough to qualify for free lunch. Among students experiencing homelessness, 56 percent were chronically absent.

Fights and guns

Schools are open for in-person learning almost everywhere, but students returned emotionally unsettled and unable to conform to normally accepted behavior. At its most benign, teachers are seeing kids who cannot focus in class, can’t stop looking at their phones, and can’t figure out how to interact with other students in all the normal ways. Many teachers say they seem younger than normal.

Amy Johnson, a veteran teacher in rural Randolph, Vt., said her fifth-graders had so much trouble being together that the school brought in a behavioral specialist to work with them three hours each week.

“My students are not acclimated to being in the same room together,” she said. “They don’t listen to each other. They cannot interact with each other in productive ways. When I’m teaching I might have three or five kids yelling at me all at the same time.”

That loss of interpersonal skills has also led to more fighting in hallways and after school. Teachers and principals say many incidents escalate from small disputes because students lack the habit of remaining calm. Many say the social isolation wrought during remote school left them with lower capacity to manage human conflict.

Just last week, a high-schooler in Los Angeles was accused of stabbing another student in a school hallway, police on the big island of Hawaii arrested seven students after an argument escalated into a fight, and a Baltimore County, Md., school resource officer was injured after intervening in a fight during the transition between classes.

There’s also been a steep rise in gun violence. In 2021, there were at least 42 acts of gun violence on K-12 campuses during regular hours, the most during any year since at least 1999, according to a Washington Post database . The most striking of 2021 incidents was the shooting in Oxford, Mich., that killed four. There have been already at least three shootings in 2022.

Back to school has brought guns, fighting and acting out

The Center for Homeland Defense and Security, which maintains its own database of K-12 school shootings using a different methodology, totaled nine active shooter incidents in schools in 2021, in addition to 240 other incidents of gunfire on school grounds. So far in 2022, it has recorded 12 incidents. The previous high, in 2019, was 119 total incidents.

David Riedman, lead researcher on the K-12 School Shooting Database, points to four shootings on Jan. 19 alone, including at Anacostia High School in D.C., where gunshots struck the front door of the school as a teen sprinted onto the campus, fleeing a gunman.

Seeing opportunity

Fueling the pressure on public schools is an ascendant school-choice movement that promotes taxpayer subsidies for students to attend private and religious schools, as well as publicly funded charter schools, which are privately run. Advocates of these programs have seen the public system’s woes as an excellent opportunity to push their priorities.

EdChoice, a group that promotes these programs, tallies seven states that created new school choice programs last year. Some are voucher-type programs where students take some of their tax dollars with them to private schools. Others offer tax credits for donating to nonprofit organizations, which give scholarships for school expenses. Another 15 states expanded existing programs, EdChoice says.

The troubles traditional schools have had managing the pandemic has been key to the lobbying, said Michael McShane, director of national research for EdChoice. “That is absolutely an argument that school choice advocates make, for sure.”

If those new programs wind up moving more students from public to private systems, that could further weaken traditional schools, even as they continue to educate the vast majority of students.

Kevin G. Welner, director of the National Education Policy Center at the University of Colorado, who opposes school choice programs, sees the surge of interest as the culmination of years of work to undermine public education. He is both impressed by the organization and horrified by the results.

“I wish that organizations supporting public education had the level of funding and coordination that I’ve seen in these groups dedicated to its privatization,” he said.

A final complication: Politics

Rarely has education been such a polarizing political topic.

Republicans, fresh off Glenn Youngkin’s victory in the Virginia governor’s race, have concluded that key to victory is a push for parental control and “parents rights.” That’s a nod to two separate topics.

First, they are capitalizing on parent frustrations over pandemic policies, including school closures and mandatory mask policies. The mask debate, which raged at the start of the school year, got new life this month after Youngkin ordered Virginia schools to allow students to attend without face coverings.

The notion of parental control also extends to race, and objections over how American history is taught. Many Republicans also object to school districts’ work aimed at racial equity in their systems, a basket of policies they have dubbed critical race theory. Critics have balked at changes in admissions to elite school in the name of racial diversity, as was done in Fairfax, Va. , and San Francisco ; discussion of White privilege in class ; and use of the New York Times’s “1619 Project,” which suggests slavery and racism are at the core of American history.

“Everything has been politicized,” said Domenech, of AASA. “You’re beside yourself saying, ‘How did we ever get to this point?’”

Part of the challenge going forward is that the pandemic is not over. Each time it seems to be easing, it returns with a variant vengeance, forcing schools to make politically and educationally sensitive decisions about the balance between safety and normalcy all over again.

At the same time, many of the problems facing public schools feed on one another. Students who are absent will probably fall behind in learning, and those who fall behind are likely to act out.

A similar backlash exists regarding race. For years, schools have been under pressure to address racism in their systems and to teach it in their curriculums, pressure that intensified after the murder of George Floyd in 2020. Many districts responded, and that opened them up to countervailing pressures from those who find schools overly focused on race.

Some high-profile boosters of public education are optimistic that schools can move past this moment. Education Secretary Miguel Cardona last week promised, “It will get better.” Randi Weingarten, president of the American Federation of Teachers, said, “If we can rebuild community-education relations, if we can rebuild trust, public education will not only survive but has a real chance to thrive.”

But the path back is steep, and if history is a guide, the wealthiest schools will come through reasonably well, while those serving low-income communities will struggle. Steve Matthews, superintendent of the 6,900-student Novi Community School District in Michigan, just northwest of Detroit, said his district will probably face a tougher road back than wealthier nearby districts that are, for instance, able to pay teachers more.

“Resource issues. Trust issues. De-professionalization of teaching is making it harder to recruit teachers,” he said. “A big part of me believes schools are in a long-term crisis.”

Valerie Strauss contributed to this report.

The pandemic’s impact on education

The latest: Updated coronavirus booster shots are now available for children as young as 5 . To date, more than 10.5 million children have lost one or both parents or caregivers during the coronavirus pandemic.

In the classroom: Amid a teacher shortage, states desperate to fill teaching jobs have relaxed job requirements as staffing crises rise in many schools . American students’ test scores have even plummeted to levels unseen for decades. One D.C. school is using COVID relief funds to target students on the verge of failure .

Higher education: College and university enrollment is nowhere near pandemic level, experts worry. ACT and SAT testing have rebounded modestly since the massive disruptions early in the coronavirus pandemic, and many colleges are also easing mask rules .

DMV news: Most of Prince George’s students are scoring below grade level on district tests. D.C. Public School’s new reading curriculum is designed to help improve literacy among the city’s youngest readers.

June 4, 2024

VCU professor Jan Rychtar wins national teaching award from the Mathematical Association of America

He is the first VCU instructor to receive the Haimo Award for classroom excellence; colleague Dewey Taylor also honored by a regional MAA section.

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By Sian Wilkerson

Virginia Commonwealth University professor  Jan Rychtar  has received prestigious recognition by the  Mathematical Association of America for excellence in teaching at the university level.

Rychtar, Ph.D., who joined VCU’s Department of Mathematics and Applied Mathematics  in the  College of Humanities and Sciences  in 2019 , is a 2024 recipient of the MAA’s  Deborah and Franklin Tepper Haimo Award . It honors college or university professors whose teaching effectiveness has had far-reaching influence.

The MAA was established in 1915 to advance the understanding and impact of mathematics, and it instituted the Haimo Award in 1991. Up to three are given each year, and Rychtar is the first VCU instructor to win the award.

“I am honored and grateful to be one of the award recipients,” he said, thanking the MAA and its members for their work to advance math students and teachers. “The MAA’s core values – community, inclusivity, communication, and teaching and learning – provide endless inspiration. Incorporating these values into my classroom and beyond has had a tremendous impact on my teaching.”

Rychtar, who dedicated the award to his family, also thanked his former and current students as well as his mentors, who “have my deep gratitude for all the lessons they taught me. I can only aspire to be as good as them.”

Rychtar has been honored for his service and teaching excellence throughout his career. At the University of North Carolina Greensboro, where he taught from 2004 to 2019, he received the College of Arts and Sciences Teaching Excellence Award, the Department of Mathematics and Statistics Award for Distinguished Service and the Thomas Undergraduate Research Mentor Award.

Separately, VCU math professor  Dewey Taylor , Ph.D., was honored for teaching excellence by the MAA’s Maryland-D.C.-Virginia section, receiving the 2024 John M. Smith Award for Distinguished College or University Teaching. Each year, every MAA section is invited to honor an educator with a section award, and those recipients become nominees for the national Haimo Award. Rychtár won the Smith Award in 2022.

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TS Inter Recounting, Re-verification results 2024 declared at tgbie.cgg.gov.in

Ts inter results 2024: this year, the overall pass percentage of ts inter 1st year students was recorded at 60.01 per cent, and the pass percentage of 2nd year stood at 64.14 per cent..

TS Inter Re-verification Results 2024: The Telangana Board of Intermediate Education (TGBIE) has released the TS intermediate Class 12 re-verification and recounting results 2024 today (June 6). Students who applied for re-verification have to enter their hall ticket number to check the revised results. The TS Class 12 recounting result link 2024 is hosted on the official website — tgbie.cgg.gov.in .

Over 4.5 lakh students appeared for the first-year exams this year and over five lakh students appeared TS inter 2nd year exams. Last year, the overall pass percentage in TS inter-first-year general stream was 62.85 per cent, while in the second year, it was 67.27 per cent.

TS Class 12 Recounting, Re-verification Results 2024: How to check

Step 1: Visit the official website — tgbie.cgg.gov.in  

Step 2: Click on the re-verification or recounting result link

Step 3: Enter the hall ticket number and required login credentials

Step 4: Submit the login credentials entered

Step 5: The results will be displayed on the screen.

Step 6: Check the details and download for future reference.

The TS Inter supplementary exams 2024 for students who failed the final board exams were conducted between May 24 to June 3.

In the first year, female candidates outperformed male candidates . Girls achieved a pass percentage of 68.35 per cent, while boys attained 51.50 per cent. This year, the overall pass percentage for vocational stood at 63.86 per cent, with females securing 79.28 per cent, and boys securing 47.72 per cent. 

The Telangana State Board of Intermediate Education exams were between February 28 and March 19, 2024, in a pen-paper mode for a total of 9,80,978 students . As many as 4,78,718 students appeared for the TS IPE first-year exams this year and in the IPE second year TS inter exams, 5,02,260 students appeared. The Telangana board intermediate 2024 results will be announced for the general and vocational streams.

• TS Inter Results

According to comedian Sunil Pal, SRK would visit late at night for special occasions. Sunil also shared his experiences of meeting SRK during a tour in Singapore, where the star showed humility and respect towards other artists.

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Iraq Detains at Least 12 After Latest Attack on Baghdad KFC

BAGHDAD (Reuters) - Iraqi security forces cracked down on rioters in Baghdad who were attacking a KFC on Monday, wounding three with live fire and detaining at least 12, security and medical sources told Reuters.

The attack on a KFC on the city's Palestine Street is at least the third in just over a week and was reported just as a senior official in the Iran-backed Iraqi armed group Kataib Hezbollah released a statement calling on Iraqis to "boycott and expel" U.S. brands.

The attack caused significant damage but no injuries to staff or customers, the sources said.

The store was opened by Americana Group, the Middle East and North Africa franchisee of fast-food restaurants KFC and Pizza Hut. Americana did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Iraqi security forces did not immediately comment on Monday night's attacks.

The KFC brand, previously known as Kentucky Fried Chicken, is owned by U.S.-based Yum! Brands.

Iraq has been trying to encourage foreign businesses to set up shop in the country amid a period of relative stability that has at times been shaken by security incidents, including months of tit-for-tat attacks between Iran-backed armed groups and U.S. forces.

Western brands in many parts of the world have been facing boycotts and other protests during the Israel-Hamas war, reflecting public anger over Israel's military operation that has killed more than 36,000 people in Gaza, according to health authorities there, and caused a humanitarian crisis.

The war began when Hamas militants attacked Israel on Oct. 7, killing 1,200 people and abducting some 250 others, of whom some 120 remain in Gaza, according to Israeli tallies.

(Reporting by Timour Azhari; Editing by Rod Nickel)

Copyright 2024 Thomson Reuters .

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A Climate Scientist Is Voted President of an Oil Country. Now What?

Claudia Sheinbaum, Mexico’s next leader, is an academic and a politician. Here’s what her track record reveals.

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By Somini Sengupta

Mexico is the world’s 11th-largest oil producer. It has been gripped by a deadly heat wave. Now, it’s elected as its president a woman with a rare pedigree: a left-of-center climate scientist with a doctorate in energy engineering named Claudia Sheinbaum.

Ms. Sheinbaum is no stranger to politics nor to environmental crises. She was mayor of Mexico City, a vibrant metropolitan area of 23 million that faces a dire water crisis. She helped write the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change reports, the sweeping United Nations documents that have warned the world about the hazards of burning fossil fuels.

Ms. Sheinbaum will have to balance numerous, sometimes contradictory, tests as she takes office. Federal budgets are tight. Energy demands are rising. Mexico’s national oil company is heavily indebted. She’ll face the challenges of poverty, migration, organized crime and relations with the next president of the United States.

It would be folly to predict what she will do, but it’s worth looking at what she has said and done on energy and environmental issues so far in her career.

First, her record.

As mayor of Mexico City, she began electrifying the city’s public bus fleet. She set up a huge rooftop solar array on the city’s main wholesale market. She expanded bike lanes, making permanent several kilometers of pandemic-era pop-up paths.

She has been criticized by environmentalists for backing one of the country’s most controversial infrastructure projects, the 1,500-kilometer so-called Maya Train corridor, which cuts across forests and archaeological sites to connect tourist sites like Cancún to rural areas on the Yucatán Peninsula.

As for Mexico’s energy sector, Ms. Sheinbaum said on the campaign trail she wanted to expand renewable energy infrastructure, unlike her predecessor, Andrés Manuel López Obrador. But she also said she would continue to support the Mexican state-owned oil company, Petróleos Mexicanos, or Pemex, and keep it under state control.

Pemex produces just under 2 million barrels of oil a day. Ms. Sheinbaum has said she would maintain those levels, while also expanding the company’s mission to include lithium production. Lithium is a key component in electric batteries and pivotal to the global transition to cleaner energy.

Mr. López Obrador has limited private investments in renewable energy projects, including from the United States, and if Ms. Sheinbaum were to continue that policy, that could significantly slow down the country’s clean energy transition.

“Claudia is an environmental scientist and unlike her mentor, AMLO, believes in decarbonization and in boosting renewables,” said Shannon O’Neil, a Mexico specialist at the Council on Foreign Relations, referring to Mr. López Obrador by his initials. “But she is also a statist, wanting Mexico’s energy transition to be led and controlled by cash-strapped, state-owned enterprises.”

Pemex is heavily indebted, and whether the government can continue to prop it up remains unclear. “The next president will need to find a solution to ‘fix’ the company’s problems as its condition today is unsustainable,” S&P Global, a commodities research firm, said in an analysis this year.

Ms. Sheinbaum will also have to weigh what role Mexico wants to play to further the ambitions of the United States to be the world’s leading supplier of liquefied gas. U.S. gas companies are angling to build export terminals along the Mexican coast to ship gas to Asia. If they are all built, as planned, that would hugely expand the emissions of planet-heating greenhouse gases and, according to environmental campaigners, threaten sensitive ecosystems.

Among Ms. Sheinbaum’s many published scholarly works are papers that examine how Mexico can make the energy transition from one that’s based almost exclusively on fossil fuels to renewables like wind, solar and geothermal.

Her academic work also explores the social consequences. A 2015 paper , for instance, looked at the conflicts that erupted in the relatively poor and heavily Indigenous state of Oaxaca after a wind project came in. It recommended establishing national policy based on the feedback of local communities.

“ Wind energy development in Mexico has been complex and contentious; the large increase of wind energy in Oaxaca has created social conflicts in Oaxaca, which even might stop further wind project development in the region,” the paper said, adding that the case shows “the need for a national and regional policy.”

Her work as president will have to consider similar trade-offs. Except they will not be academic.

An earlier version of this article stated incorrectly the field of Ms. Sheinbaum’s doctorate. She holds a Ph.D. in energy engineering, not environmental engineering.

How we handle corrections

Somini Sengupta is the international climate reporter on the Times climate team. More about Somini Sengupta