May 17, 2026

Jacob Stead for NPR

Happy Sunday, fellow education nerds! It’s Cory this week, bringing you one of my favorite kinds of stories: the kind that forces you to question everything you thought you knew about a thing.

In this week’s story, the “thing” is the idea — long accepted by many as fact — that steep losses in students’ math and reading scores are the result of pandemic-era school disruptions and student struggles with everything that came with those disruptions.

Well, not so fast. Last week, researchers at Harvard, Stanford and Dartmouth released the fourth-annual Education Scorecard, which relies on state-specific test scores and offers a finer-grain look at student performance than the better-known Nation’s Report Card.

And one of the headlines from this year’s Scorecard is that the pandemic wasn’t actually what sent student scores plummeting.

Wait, what?

The researchers found that scores in both math and reading started falling not in 2020 or 2021 but back in 2013. And in reading, the declines were so steady before, during and after the pandemic that, from a bird’s-eye view, it’s hard to see any pandemic-specific effect at all.

In short, the researchers say, the U.S. has been in a “learning recession” for more than a decade. This is a big deal because the fight over how to improve student learning — and yes, things need to change — too often devolves into partisan finger-pointing about schools’ pandemic response. To be clear, the pandemic didn’t help things, but it’s not the original sin.

So, what was happening around 2013 that could have kicked off such a long, brutal “learning recession”? Two things: That year marked the beginning of the end of the intense annual testing and school ratings of the No Child Left Behind era and a rise in … a specific kind of screen time.

You’ll find a lot more in my story. Don’t miss the audio piece at the top of the page. I love spending time with children in the classroom, and for this story, we’ll take you to an awesome kindergarten class.

— Cory Turner, Correspondent, NPR Ed

Speaking of reading scores: A candidate who dresses as a pencil is running for governor in Oregon to draw attention to how one measure found that the state’s fourth graders rank dead last in reading.

Reporting that has an impact: Oregon Sen. Jeff Merkley, a Democrat, cited reporting by NPR and that of our partners at The Hechinger Report in a recent letter questioning unspent federal dollars set aside for education research. Read our story.

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In other news...

Selective colleges try harder to get rural students to attend. More than 90,000 rural students applied to institutions that are part of a network of selective colleges trying to boost rural enrollment. That’s up 15% over the year before. Now the work has turned to getting these students to actually show up on campus in the fall and graduate four years later.

— Jon Marcus, The Hechinger Report

Native kids with disabilities were held in wooden boxes. Sweeping reforms are coming. An investigation by New York’s education department, obtained by NPR, found at least five elementary-age students with disabilities were confined in a "wooden box for a timeout" at the end of 2025. "They were subjected to seclusion when they were placed in 'stations' with the door held shut," according to the report, which concludes parents of children held in the boxes weren't notified, violating state regulations.

— Brian Mann, correspondent, NPR

Some researchers say restored federal funding is too little, too late. Some of the billions of dollars previously frozen or withheld from research institutions and agencies have been restored, but it's too late to save some researchers’ work.

— Katia Riddle, correspondent, NPR Science desk

Acclaimed author Sara Novic chats about her new memoir, 'Mother Tongue.' Author Sara Novic is obsessed with language — its power, how it connects us and also how it can isolate us. Her latest book, a memoir, is called Mother Tongue. In it, she chronicles losing her hearing at age 12, learning American Sign Language and finding a deaf community.

— Elissa Nadworny, correspondent, NPR

Linda McMahon defends dismantling the Education Department, shifting its work. Lawmakers and the education secretary tussled over education issues that will affect the lives of millions of Americans, including whether new Republican caps on federal student loans will lower the cost of college, what role the government should play in trying to improve abysmal literacy rates among U.S. students — and whether the Department of Education should even exist.

— Cory Turner, correspondent, NPR

The MAHA movement is coming to school cafeterias. Here's what that means for kids. School districts are waiting to see if it will become more expensive to prepare meals because of new federal dietary guidelines, which will affect what can be served in school cafeterias.

— Joe Hernandez, correspondent, NPR

About 7 million kids live in a home with a loaded and unlocked gun, a study finds. That's according to a new study published in JAMA Network Open.

— Rhitu Chatterjee, health correspondent, NPR

They graduate to six figure salaries, and grueling work. Industry groups say there are roughly 8,000 open positions across the U.S. maritime sector. More than 5,000 are with the Military Sealift Command, the federal agency responsible for keeping Navy ships stocked with fuel, food and ammunition in waters around the world. SUNY Maritime College and the other state-run maritime academies are trying to fill that gap.

— Steve Kastenbaum, for NPR

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And here's something to make you smile...

In Fairbanks, Alaska, spring happens almost overnight

In many places, spring happens gradually. But in far-north Fairbanks, Alaska, birch and aspen trees often put their leaves out over a span of just 24-48 hours, a dramatic event known as "greenup."

When botanist Jan Dawe moved up to Fairbanks in 1975, the first greenup she saw felt like magic. “To be able to watch the same tree at 8 o'clock in the morning, noon, 6 o'clock at night, and you could see that they were growing,” she says. “The forest turns from the dull gray of winter into this fresh green burst.”

Further south, Dawe says, trees may have seven months to soak up the sun through their leaves and make it into food. But in Fairbanks, it's more like four.

“And if you're going to be a successful plant, you have to get your leaves out there,” Dawe says.

Hannah Hill lives in Fairbanks and calls greenup a seasonal holiday.