🛝 What If We're Measuring the Wrong Things?

Welcome to Playground Post, a bi-weekly newsletter that keeps education innovators ahead of what's next.

This week's reality check: Teens may support cellphone bans more than educators assume, but the racial divide in that support deserves attention. Meanwhile, new research suggests schools are waiting too long to flag attendance problems, and the rapid expansion of universal school choice is outpacing researchers' ability to study it.

💎 Data Gem

25% of teachers report being worse off financially than their parents, compared to 17% of similar working adults, according to a new RAND study.

Teens May Support Cellphone Bans More Than You Think

Most educators support school cellphone restrictions. But what about students?

Newly released data from Pew Research Center show that smartphone bans may have more backing from teens than educators assume.

41% of teens ages 13 to 17 support banning smartphones during class time. 

51% oppose them, and 9% are unsure.

When it comes to banning cellphones for the entire school day, support drops significantly. Only 17% of teens support bell-to-bell policies, and nearly three quarters oppose them.

By comparison, 74% of adults support classroom bans, and 44% support all-day bans.

Since 2023, at least 33 states have passed laws requiring schools to ban or restrict cellphone use. 23 states now require bell-to-bell bans.

Early research is promising - a project by Stanford economists found that bell-to-bell policies and rules requiring students to lock phones away were linked to improved attention in class.

But there's a catch.

A working paper from the National Bureau of Economic Research found that while Florida's ban improved achievement and attendance overall, suspension rates went up in the first year, especially for Black students. They dropped back down in the second year.

The Pew survey provides context for that finding: 46% of white teens support classroom bans, compared with 33% of Black students and 36% of Hispanic students.

George LaComb, a senior in Orlando and Florida representative for the National Student Council, sees value in limited restrictions but says the bell-to-bell ban goes too far. He gets stuck waiting for rides when practice cancellations go unseen until the end of the day.

"It chisels away at the relationship that the administration used to have with the kids," George said. "My friends say it feels like school has become more and more prison-like."

For innovators, the gap between classroom bans (41% teen support) and bell-to-bell bans (17% support) suggests demand for solutions that restrict phones during instruction while allowing access during breaks. 

The racial disparities in both support and suspension rates point to a need for implementation tools that don't disproportionately punish certain student populations. And the logistical complaints about missed notifications suggest opportunity for school communication systems that work around phone restrictions.

10% Chronic Absenteeism Threshold May Be Too High

While most schools flag students as chronically absent after they miss 10% of school days, poor attendance may affect academics well before that threshold.

Absence rates of 3% to 7% already signal risk of scoring below grade level on state tests, according to a new study analyzing 9,000 Boston public school students tracked from prekindergarten through 8th grade.

"We rarely stop to determine if we are measuring chronic absenteeism in a useful way," said Tiffany Wu, the report's lead author and doctoral student at the University of Michigan. "There has been relatively little empirical evidence to justify that cutoff."

States are holding districts accountable for reducing chronic absenteeism - nationwide, 28% of students were chronically absent at the 2021-22 peak. That number has declined but no state has returned to pre-pandemic levels.

The study used signal detection theory to determine when absences predict academic risk. Wu compared it to programming a smoke detector sensitive enough to catch a fire early without triggering constant false alarms.

Some key findings:

• Unexcused absences are a stronger predictor of achievement in 3rd grade and beyond than in early elementary school. 

• The correlation between absences and below-grade-level performance grows stronger as students age.

• In math, total absences were most predictive of later test performance. Because math lessons build sequentially, even an engaged student who missed school for illness may struggle to catch up.

• In English language arts, unexcused absences were more predictive than total absences, perhaps because unexcused absences signal disengagement.

The study concluded that "no single absence cutoff is likely to serve as a strong standalone predictor of academic risk," underscoring the need to integrate attendance with other measures in early warning systems.

For innovators, the finding that different absence types predict different outcomes in different subjects suggests demand for more sophisticated early warning systems. Current tools often treat all absences the same. 

Products that distinguish between excused and unexcused absences, weight them by grade level and subject, and integrate attendance data with other indicators could help schools intervene before students hit the 10% threshold.

School Choice Is Going Universal. Research Can't Keep Up.

The number of students using public funds for private school or homeschool expenses is growing rapidly. 

Researchers are scrambling to study the effects.

To date, 19 states have programs making virtually all students eligible for state funding to use on private education. Every one of those states made their programs universal within the past four years.

EdChoice estimates 1.5 million students are using private school choice programs this year, up from about 1 million 18 months ago and fewer than 500,000 five years before that. In Arizona and Florida, more than 10% of students now use choice programs.

Texas opens applications next month for a new $1 billion program awarding families up to $10,500 per student for private education and up to $30,000 for students with disabilities.

The academic impact is largely unknown. 

Of the first eight states to launch universal programs, only Indiana and Iowa require participating students to take the same state tests as public school students. Four others let schools choose from approved national tests, destroying comparability.

"They want the schools to have as much autonomy as possible," said Douglas Harris, a Tulane economist. Another reason states didn't require state tests, he suspects, is that "they're trying to avoid the bad news."

Studies of earlier, more limited choice programs showed "neutral to negative" effects on test scores. Graduation and college-going rates were a brighter spot.

A new working paper found private school enrollment rose only 3-4% more in choice states than in non-choice states, and tuition increased 5-10% due to vouchers. 

But the researchers expect these effects to grow over time as programs become established.

In Arizona, which removed all eligibility limits in 2022, state spending on the program reached $886 million in 2024-25, about 10% of the state's education budget. That contributed to a state budget shortfall in 2024.

States are spending billions without clear evidence of academic impact because they're not requiring comparable assessments.

There may be demand for independent evaluation tools that can measure outcomes across different testing regimes. And as public school enrollment continues its gradual decline, districts need planning tools that help them manage unpredictable funding tied to fluctuating headcounts.

⚡️More Quick Hits

This week in education:

• Senators discuss school tech limits amid mental health crisis — Congressional hearing examines connection between technology use and student wellbeing

• 4 education legal and policy trends to watch in 2026 — K-12 Dive outlines the major issues likely to shape schools this year

• K-12 facilities need $90 billion to close maintenance gap — Capital investment shortfall continues to grow across aging school buildings

• Hawaiian language schools grow as DOE shrinks — Enrollment rises in immersion programs but teacher pipeline remains a challenge

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