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☆ Opinion | The ‘Impossible Life’ of Equal Devotion to Art and Mothering
▼ + stars: | 2024-05-01 | by ( Jessica Grose | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

“Too much life enters this house,” Tillie Olsen, the writer, labor activist and mother of four daughters, wrote in a letter to the poet Anne Sexton. Olsen and Sexton were among the early recipients of a paid fellowship from the Radcliffe Institute for Independent Study. In some ways, remarkable progress has been made for American women since then — at the time, for example, it was perfectly legal to fire a woman for getting pregnant. (In other ways, we have returned to the 19th century.) The book made me ponder whether some of the conflicts that parents feel between their family responsibilities and other parts of their lives can be fully resolved.

Persons: ” Tillie Olsen, Anne Sexton, “, lunchpacking —, Olsen, Sexton, Maggie Doherty’s, Radcliffe’s, Mary Ingraham Bunting, Maxine Kumin, Barbara Swan, Marianna Pineda Organizations: Radcliffe Institute for Independent, Art Locations: midcentury America, Doherty’s

☆ Opinion | Every Tech Tool in the Classroom Should Be Ruthlessly Evaluated
▼ + stars: | 2024-04-24 | by ( Jessica Grose | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

Educational technology in schools is sometimes described as a wicked problem — a term coined by a design and planning professor, Horst Rittel, in the 1960s, meaning a problem for which even defining the scope of the dilemma is a struggle, because it has so many interconnected parts that never stop moving. When you have a wicked problem, solutions have to be holistic, flexible and developmentally appropriate. Which is to say that appropriate tech use for elementary schoolers in rural Oklahoma isn’t going to be the same as appropriate tech use in a Chicago high school. I spent the past few weeks speaking with parents, teachers, public school administrators and academics who study educational technology. We need a complete rethink of the ways that we’re evaluating and using tech in classrooms; the overall change that I want to see is that tech use in schools — devices and apps — should be driven by educators, not tech companies.

Persons: Horst Rittel, Julia Freeland Fisher, Jonathan Haidt, ”, Fisher Organizations: Christensen Institute Locations: Oklahoma, Chicago

☆ Opinion | Most Teachers Know They’re Playing With Fire When They Use Tech in the Classroom
▼ + stars: | 2024-04-17 | by ( Jessica Grose | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +2 min

Unconstrained skills are more complex ones that develop over a lifetime of learning and can deepen over the years. (It’s worth noting that many popular educational apps are not high-quality.) And I think those are the questions that researchers, policymakers, school leaders, teachers and principals should be asking,” he said. “What are the best use cases for this digital technology in the classroom?”In last week’s newsletter, I came in pretty hot about the pitfalls of educational technology in American classrooms. But that doesn’t mean there are no benefits to any use of educational technology.

Persons: Josh Gilbert, Gilbert, ”, I’m, haven’t Organizations: Boston College, Harvard

☆ Opinion | Get Tech Out of the Classroom Before It’s Too Late
▼ + stars: | 2024-04-10 | by ( Jessica Grose | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +2 min

Jaime Lewis noticed that her eighth-grade son’s grades were slipping several months ago. She suspected it was because he was watching YouTube during class on his school-issued laptop, and her suspicions were validated. In fact, he opted out of retaking a math test he’d failed, just so he could watch YouTube,” she said. A few weeks ago, they had a meeting with the district superintendent and several other administrators, including the tech director. To bolster their case, Lewis and her allies put together a video compilation of clips that elementary and middle school children had gotten past the district’s content filters.

Persons: Jaime Lewis, “, ”, Lewis Organizations: YouTube, San Luis Coastal Unified School District Locations: San Luis, San Luis Obispo, Calif

☆ Opinion | Screens Are Everywhere in Schools. Do They Actually Help Kids Learn?
▼ + stars: | 2024-03-27 | by ( Jessica Grose | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +2 min

A few weeks ago, a parent who lives in Texas asked me how much my kids were using screens to do schoolwork in their classrooms. (Smartwatches and smartphones are banned in my children’s schools during the school day, which I’m very happy about; I find any argument for allowing these devices in the classroom to be risible.) No, this parent was talking about screens that are school sanctioned, like iPads and Chromebooks issued to children individually for educational activities. I’m embarrassed to say that I couldn’t answer her question because I had never asked or even thought about asking. I rarely heard details about what these screens are adding to our children’s literacy, math, science or history skills.

Persons: Chromebooks, I’m, Natasha Singer, “ Organizations: ”, Progress Locations: Texas, New York State

☆ Opinion | Does Everyone Want to Be on the ‘Mommy Track’?
▼ + stars: | 2024-03-16 | by ( Jessica Grose | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +2 min

I think I had five jobs because they just weren’t working for what was going on in my personal life,” Koelsch told me. Now, she works four days from home, one day in the office, and her life is manageable. Remote work, and Washington State’s paid family and medical leave program, will make having another kid possible for her. One was the negative effect of the increased volatility and outrageous expense of child care (which I wrote about on Wednesday). I’ve seen a fair number of headlines over the past few years like this one, “WFH Goes From New Path to Dead End for Working Mothers,” and this one, “‘You Are Mommy Tracked to the Billionth Degree,’” suggesting that for ambitious moms, working from home is a mistake.

Persons: Liz Koelsch, Jessica Bennett, she’s, ” Koelsch, Washington State’s, I’ve Organizations: Covid, Washington, Reading Locations: “

☆ Opinion | How to Fix the Crisis of Trust in Higher Education
▼ + stars: | 2024-03-06 | by ( Jessica Grose | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +2 min

Since the beginning of the year, I’ve been keeping track of every report I see about major budget shortfalls at universities. Here’s a sampling:“SUNY Warns of Future $1B Deficit Without Higher Tuition or More Aid” — The Times Union, Jan. 2. “Penn State Plans Nearly $100M in Cuts for FY26 Budget” — Higher Ed Dive, Jan. 24. “As U. of Arizona Confronts Budget Cuts, Workers and Students Brace for the Worst” — The New York Times, Feb. 21. The other is the decline in Americans’ confidence in higher education.

Persons: I’ve, Brace, Sharon Otterman, Josh Moody, Ed Organizations: The Times Union, UConn, Connecticut, “ Penn, Workers, New York Times, Gallup Locations: Arizona, New York

☆ Opinion | A.I. Is Making the Sexual Exploitation of Girls Even Worse
▼ + stars: | 2024-03-02 | by ( Jessica Grose | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +2 min

The superintendent told NBC News the photos included students’ faces superimposed onto nude bodies.”I had heard about this kind of thing happening to high school girls, which is horrible enough. I’m not a technophobe and have, in the past, been somewhat skeptical about the outsize negative impact of social media on teen girls. The possibilities are especially frightening when the technology is used by teens and tweens, groups with notoriously iffy judgment about the permanence of their actions. I have to admit that my gut reaction to the Beverly Hills story was rage — I wanted the book thrown at the kids who made those fakes. But I wanted to hear from someone with more experience talking to teens and thinking deeply about the adolescent relationship with privacy and technology.

Persons: Kat Tenbarge, Liz Kreutz, ”, — Organizations: NBC News, “, Beverly Vista Middle, NBC, Beverly Locations: Beverly Hills, Calif

☆ Opinion | Could Swifties or Trekkies Decide the Election?
▼ + stars: | 2024-02-28 | by ( Jessica Grose | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +2 min

Tolkien via social media for political action. But despite the good-natured skepticism, Sundberg said she understands and respects what the Working Families Party is trying to do. Social media is where many young voters live — about a third of adults under 30 regularly get news from TikTok, according to Pew Research. And turning out young voters who are otherwise not particularly politically engaged will be key to winning elections up and down the ballot in November. As Marcela Valdes explained this week for The New York Times Magazine, young voters tend to have low turnout rates.

Persons: Emily Sundberg, ”, Tolkien, What’s, Biden, Sundberg, Marcela Valdes Organizations: Working, Party, Pew Research, House, The New York Times Magazine, Center for Information, Research, Civic, Tufts University Locations: TikTok, Gen

But — astead herndon You don’t really talk — you don’t really talk about that on the first date? I don’t know how to — I don’t know if that’s the best way to phrase it. I just — they’re not for me if they’re really, really intense about it. And it is really, really important to some people and less important to others. speaker 8 I’m — I’m — I’m more pro-choice, to be honest.

Persons: ashley I’m Ashley, radia I’m Radia, ashley, astead herndon, ashley Yes, radia, we’re, we’ve, hasn’t, Donald Trump, it’s Donald Trump, Joe Biden, ashley Um, BELL, herndon, Elisa Gutierrez, Ashley, Radia, King of Prussia, elisa gutierrez, elisa gutierrez Oh, elisa gutierrez We’re, Don’t, I’m Astead Herndon, Trump, there’s, you’re, — astead herndon, Biden, It’s, that’s, I’m, COVID, didn’t —, aren’t, I’m John, astead, wasn’t, karen, Karen, karen Um, don’t, they’re, — astead, —, Pew, jess grose, Jess Grose, ” astead herndon, anna martin I’m Anna Martin, Elisa, anna martin, Jess, you’ve, astead herndon We’re, Anna, Taylor Swift, anna martin That’s, anna martin You’re, I’ve, anna martin Totally, jess grose Homophily, astead herndon Homophily, astead herndon I’m, — jess grose That’s, it’s, you’ll, anna martin Absolutely, jess grose Yes, anna martin Oh, Wariness, astead herndon Anna, anna martin Good, jess grose Oh, Jessica Grose, Anna Martin, Tom Suozzi, Republican Mazi Pilip, astead herndon He’ll, George Santos, astead herndon Donald Trump, Lara Trump, Sean Hannity, lara, Donald J, Ronna McDaniel, biden, Jason Kelce, Travis Kelce, Mama Kelce Organizations: The New York Times, Biden, Trump, Pew, “ Times, Democratic, Republican Party, Republican, The Boston Globe, Nassau, Nassau County Republican, Republican National Committee, RNC, South, GOP Locations: King, Philadelphia, herndon, astead herndon, It’s, United States, —, Boston, New, Nassau County, Israel

☆ Opinion | When It Comes to Dating, Ambition Might Matter More Than Politics
▼ + stars: | 2024-02-07 | by ( Jessica Grose | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +2 min

I read through all 274 responses to a questionnaire I put out about how politics affects the dating lives of Americans under 30, and I took note of the fact that quite a few respondents used economic terminology when describing their romantic experiences. The term “scarcity,” in particular, came up more than once as a factor in dating experiences. If you live in a smaller or more politically mixed environment, you can’t afford to be so choosy without severely restricting your dating pool. In Brooklyn, for example, registered Democrats outnumber registered Republicans about eight to one. So for daters in my own liberal bubble, it doesn’t matter nearly as much that in the country overall, men are more likely to be conservative — a New Yorker is unlikely to be dating someone who currently lives in Alabama or Wyoming.

Persons: doesn’t, “ It’s, ” Organizations: Democrat Locations: New York, Denver, Brooklyn, New, Alabama, Wyoming

☆ Opinion | Are These Recipes Good, or Is the TikTok Chef Just Good-Looking?
▼ + stars: | 2024-02-03 | by ( Jessica Grose | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

I follow a lot of cooking accounts on TikTok and Instagram, which means that I get served ever more cooking content, and over the past few years, I’ve noticed a stylistic change. But lately, more and more of the cooking video creators appear as their full selves, and most of them are blandly attractive. I don’t know about you, but I don’t need a chef to tell me that a ham and cheese sandwich tastes good. It’s reached the point where I can’t tell: Are these recipes good, or are the people leading me through them just good-looking in a way that’s rewarded by social media algorithms? But it made me wonder whether the “beauty premium” — something that economists have observed over many years — is greater now that individuals with all different levels of expertise can get a career boost from having a robust social media presence.

Persons: I’ve, BuzzFeed’s, speck, burrata, It’s, ”, Vox’s Rebecca Jennings, “

☆ Opinion | Good Marriages Are Good. Bad Marriages Are, Well, Bad.
▼ + stars: | 2024-01-31 | by ( Jessica Grose | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +3 min

There’s an idea that’s been floating around for a few years that when it comes to marriage, wealthy elites hold luxury beliefs. And she said: “I’ll probably end up getting married, having a husband and have that kind of conventional family life. He said that this kind of elite belief expressed by his classmate had a trickle-down negative cultural influence. Bowling Green State University’s National Center for Family and Marriage Research has tracked high school seniors’ attitudes toward marriage since the 1970s. Considering how cynical Gen Z is about most major societal institutions, it’s remarkable how pro-marriage they are.

Persons: Rob Henderson —, Yascha Mounk, Henderson, she’s, “, ” Henderson Organizations: Yale, Bowling Green State University’s National, for Family, Research

☆ Opinion | In a Post-Roe World, Are Differing Views on Abortion a Dating Deal-breaker?
▼ + stars: | 2024-01-24 | by ( Jessica Grose | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

A few weeks ago, when I asked Times readers under 30 how politics influences their dating lives, I expected that the subject of reproductive choice would come up pretty frequently. Among the more than 200 people who sent email responses to my questionnaire, I got a lot of answers like this one from a 25-year-old New Yorker named Nicole, who described herself as very liberal: “Anti-abortion is my biggest political deal-breaker. I also talked to Nathan Miller, 23, of Dayton, Ohio, who described himself as very conservative. He told me that abortion is a deeply personal issue for him, because he’s Catholic. If they were using dating apps, they said, they would often filter for political beliefs so people from the opposing party wouldn’t even show up in their feeds.

Persons: Roe, Wade, Nicole, Nathan Miller, Nathan Locations: Dayton , Ohio

☆ Opinion | Debating the Value of Standardized Tests
▼ + stars: | 2024-01-23 | by ( ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

To the Editor:Re “Don’t Ditch Standardized Tests. It takes about five minutes in a school building to know if it needs more resources. And yet, regardless of the ever-changing policy on standardized tests, the same schools across our nation suffer from underfunding year after year. To the Editor:Jessica Grose doesn’t mention a standardized testing organization that many school districts around the nation use. NWEA, Northwest Evaluation Association, is a nonprofit organization that provides standardized tests in reading, math, language usage and science.

Persons: Jessica Grose, Grose, I’ve, Jeremy Glazer Glassboro, Jessica Grose doesn’t Organizations: Rowan University, Evaluation Association Locations: N.J, NWEA

☆ Opinion | Don’t Ditch Standardized Tests. Fix Them.
▼ + stars: | 2024-01-17 | by ( Jessica Grose | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

According to The New York Post’s analysis of New York State Education Department data, “Nearly 200,000 students — or one out of five — refused to sit for the state’s standardized reading and math exams for grades 3-8 administered in the spring” of 2023. That number surprised me. There’s certainly some precedent for it, but I thought that the educational havoc wreaked by the Covid pandemic might have dampened the popularity of the opt-out movement — the tide of parents who’ve chosen to exempt their kids from state standardized testing. Apparently not. I also thought that damning revelations in recent years about “balanced literacy” — a method focused on “developing a love of books and ensuring students understand the meaning of stories,” as the Times education reporter Sarah Mervosh described it — which was shown to be less effective than phonics (“systematic, sound-it-out instruction”), would make parents realize that standardized testing is an important part of developing the best curriculum possible.

Persons: There’s, who’ve, Sarah Mervosh Organizations: The, New York State Education Department Locations: The New York

☆ Opinion | Snowplow Parents Are Ruining Online Grading
▼ + stars: | 2023-11-29 | by ( Jessica Grose | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +2 min

During the 2011-12 school year, Roxanne Greitz Miller was a professor-in-residence at a California middle school that had just implemented an online grade book that allowed parents and students to see students’ grades as soon as they were posted to an app. I recently spoke to Miller, who is now the dean of the College of Educational Studies at Chapman University, and she said it was clear to her almost immediately that this technology was “game changing” for parents, teachers and students — and not in a good way. Mitch Foss, who was a classroom teacher in Colorado for 19 years, told me that when he posted grades, he would hear from kids almost instantly via email or text. Sometimes they’d be waiting outside his classroom door to talk about their scores. “You might get emails from parents questioning the grade, wanting an explanation, and that’s for every single thing,” even assignments that had little bearing on students’ overall marks, “which can be overwhelming.”

Persons: Roxanne Greitz Miller, Miller, —, “ I’ll, ‘, it’s, ”, I’ve, Mitch Foss, they’d, “ Organizations: College of Educational, Chapman University Locations: California, Colorado

☆ Opinion | Americans Under 30 Don’t Trust Religion — or Anything Else
▼ + stars: | 2023-11-25 | by ( Jessica Grose | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +2 min

Whereas with many young Americans, Burge said, “they look at all the religion options and say, ‘I really don’t want to pick a side.’ And that’s what nothing in particular is. So it makes a certain kind of sense that they don’t want to associate too closely with any defined group. What’s more, some religious institutions have had high-profile ethical failures around cases of sexual abuse — concealing rather than confronting allegations of wrongdoing among their leadership. “Instead of trying to redress these really incredibly painful problems, they made things worse in many instances,” Cox said. “So I think that’s a really different environment to come of age and to learn about how these institutions operate and who they operate for.”

Persons: Burge, It’s, it’s, we’ve, —, Clinton, Trump, Daniel Cox, ” That’s, ” Cox, ” Organizations: Survey Center, American Enterprise Institute

☆ Opinion | Congress Isn’t a Schoolyard. Time to Deal With Toxic Immaturity.
▼ + stars: | 2023-11-18 | by ( Jessica Grose | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +2 min

The set-to between Mullin and O’Brien wasn’t the only incident of its kind in Congress this week. And though it may go without saying, what’s good for the basest kind of political entertainment isn’t necessarily good for Congress, the country as a whole or young men. I don’t have boys, but I know that by several measures, they are floundering compared to American girls. I don’t mean that in a “Won’t somebody please think of the children” kind of way. I just don’t think we can be a functional society if this becomes the new norm.

Persons: Joseph Bernstein, Mark Zuckerberg, Elon Musk, it’s “, Mullin, O’Brien, Robert Jimison, Donald Trump, Gen, ” Sanders, Let’s, It’s, “ Organizations: Pew Research, Congress Locations: ”, United States

☆ Opinion | Are We Finally Ready for a Male Contraceptive?
▼ + stars: | 2023-11-08 | by ( Jessica Grose | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +3 min

So the method the foundation is working on with a biotech company is a pill that needs to be taken only monthly. It contains the same types of hormones that are in a daily pill, so the same set of side effects would apply. Another hot spot for innovation is in injectables, like the Depo-Provera shot, Vogelsong said. ”Injectables aren’t very popular in the U.S., but they are the No. 1 method used in many countries in sub-Saharan Africa for a variety of reasons,” she noted.

Persons: Ed Cara, ”, Wang, Kirsten Vogelsong, Melinda Gates, Vogelsong, I’ve Organizations: Melinda Gates Foundation Locations: injectables, U.S, Saharan Africa

☆ Opinion | The Despair at the Heart of Britney Spears’s Memoir
▼ + stars: | 2023-11-04 | by ( Jessica Grose | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

The first chapter of Britney Spears’s new memoir, “The Woman in Me,” includes the story of her paternal grandmother, Emma Jean Spears, called Jean; everybody says Britney Spears looks like her, but that’s not the only thing they have in common. “Tragedy runs in my family,” the passage about Jean Spears begins. “Jean wasn’t the only wife June sent to the mental hospital in Mandeville,” Britney Spears writes. “He sent his second wife there, too.”That’s the environment that her father, Jamie Spears, was raised in, Britney Spears writes. By now, most people have heard about her conservatorship (the subject of a Times documentary, “Framing Britney Spears”), which started in 2008, after her father petitioned for control over his daughter’s life and finances, citing concerns about her mental health.

Persons: Britney Spears’s, Emma Jean Spears, Jean, Britney Spears, that’s, Jean Spears, June Spears, “ Jean wasn’t, “, ”, Jamie Spears, Justin Timberlake Organizations: Louisiana Hospital Locations: Mandeville

☆ Opinion | Why We Need to Talk More Openly About Birth Control Side Effects
▼ + stars: | 2023-11-01 | by ( Jessica Grose | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +3 min

Part of the reason that some non-hormonal birth control methods seem to have gained such traction on social media is that there is a tendency among some medical professionals to downplay the side effects of hormonal birth control methods that many women experience. Most women who use birth control are completely or somewhat satisfied with their methods of choice, but a minority of them experience reactions unpleasant enough to seriously impede their daily lives. Over the years, I have heard anecdotally about — and experienced — various side effects to different types of contraception: heavy breakthrough bleeding and abdominal pain with IUDs, mood disturbances with different types of pills, and sexual side effects with everything. Discussion of these issues, often confined to intimate chats among women, was aired out in a great extended bit from the comedian Beth Stelling’s new Netflix special, in which she recounts the various kinds of birth control she’s “experimented recreationally” with over the years. But some physicians say without data that point to the prevalence of some side effects, they find it difficult to respond.

Persons: Beth Stelling’s, she’s “, ”, “, Sara Cravatts, Cravatts, —, Kat Tenbarge, Kate White, they’re Organizations: Netflix, “, Stat, NBC News, Boston Medical Center

She comes on Halloween night after they fall asleep, switch it out for either healthier candy or a toy. But I think it’s all part of a larger trend where we don’t let kids have time or space to let their imaginations run wild. And so this lack of unconstructed free time is making kids feel that they don’t have power in their own lives. Maybe a little, but I’m not —[LAUGHS]I don’t want — like, I don’t do it just to be a hater. And where can I find ways that we can do things that give our kids more freedom and pleasure that we’re not stage managing?

Persons: I’m Jessica Grose, I’m, You’re Organizations: The New York Times, Pediatrics

☆ Opinion | Stop Micromanaging Halloween — Let Your Kids Be Free
▼ + stars: | 2023-10-25 | by ( Jessica Grose | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +3 min

Yes, there’s international variation on these themes, which I’ve written about, and the authors of the commentary cite Finland, in particular, as a place where children still have a lot of autonomy. They theorize that a lack of independent activities negatively affects a child’s internal locus of control. When children aren’t allowed to do things on their own, they may have a weaker internal LOC, and that is “highly predictive” of certain levels of anxiety and depression. Which is that you’re taking away the opportunity for kids to have control over what they’re doing, “Because you are always controlling them. But one reason parents are overcontrolling is that they are worried about things like crime, bullying, inappropriate internet content and so on, and these things have their own negative effect on kids.

Persons: —, aren’t, ”, Peter Gray, They’re, ” Laurence Steinberg, “ Organizations: Boston College, Temple University Locations: Finland, United States

☆ Opinion | Lenient Grading Won’t Help Struggling Students. Addressing Chronic Absenteeism Will.
▼ + stars: | 2023-10-18 | by ( Jessica Grose | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +3 min

Once put in place, though, these types of changes are difficult to roll back, said Paul Hill, the founder of the Center on Reinventing Public Education. Schools don’t work like businesses — beta testing a particular practice, looking at the results and moving forward based on the outcome. Instead, these types of realignments can become the status quo, regardless of what the data says, according to Hill. After my previous story, I did hear from some educators who’ve had positive experiences applying the 50 percent floor. But that doesn’t change the reality that strong evidence is lacking that such a practice is academically effective on a large scale.

Persons: Paul Hill, hadn’t, Brian Conrad, who’ve, you’ve, that’s, ” Organizations: Reinventing Public Education, Schools, San Francisco Unified School District, Stanford, University of Pennsylvania, University of Texas, North Locations: Hill, That’s, California, San Antonio, North Carolina

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