Charles Barone of the National Parents Union joins Mike Petrilli to debate the Senate’s bipartisan READ Act. Would additional federal funding help states strengthen teacher preparation and expand evidence-based reading instruction, or could a larger federal role politicize the science-of-reading movement and repeat the mistakes of Reading First?

Then, on the Research Minute, Amber Northern reviews a new study examining why tutoring’s impact on student achievement tends to shrink when programs scale up.

Recommended content:

• Is the Senate’s READ Act a Reading First redux? —Michael J. Petrilli, SCHOOLED
• The READ Act: A National Commitment to Literacy —National Parents Union
• From the Teacher’s Desk: A Science of Reading Progress Report —David Griffith and Brian Fitzpatrick, Thomas B. Fordham Institute
• Too Good to Last: The True Story of Reading First —Sol Stern, Thomas B. Fordham Institute
• What Impacts Should We Expect From Tutoring at Scale? Exploring Meta-Analytic Generalizability —Matthew A. Kraft, Beth E. Schuele, and Grace T. Falken, SAGE Journals (2026)

Feedback Welcome: Have ideas for improving our show? We would love to hear them. Send them to thegadfly@fordhaminstitute.org

Mike Petrilli flies solo to discuss the latest Long-Term Trend NAEP results and why the bounce-back among nine-year-olds deserves more attention. While America’s education recovery is far from complete, especially for older students, Mike argues that the rebound in reading and partial recovery in math suggest that federal dollars, tutoring, economic trends, and perhaps science of reading reforms may be helping younger students regain lost ground.

Then, on the Research Minute, Amber Northern examines new evidence from Michigan on which school attendance strategies are associated with better student outcomes.

Recommended content:

• A Surprising Sliver of Hope in New NAEP Scores for the Lowest-Performing Kids Chad Aldeman, The 74
• Declining NAEP Scores Are Flashing Red Lights for the Covid Generation —Michael J. Petrilli, EducationNext
• Anatomy of a ‘Learning Recession’: Academic Losses Began in 2013, Report Finds —Kevin Mahnken, The 74
• Experts say schools could recover pandemic losses by 2028. What then? —Jay Mathews, The Washington Post
• The Learning Legacy of Randi Weingarten —The Editorial Board, The Wall Street Journal
• Imperfect Attendance: Toward a fairer measure of student absenteeism —Jing Liu, Ph.D., Thomas B. Fordham Institute (2022)
• Identifying Effective Attendance Strategies in Michigan —Jeremy Singer, Sarah Winchell Lenhoff, and Angela Lyle, EdWorkingPapers (2026)

Feedback Welcome: Have ideas for improving our show? We would love to hear them. Send them to thegadfly@fordhaminstitute.org

Patrick McAlister, principal of PM Strategies and former director of the Indianapolis Mayor’s Office of Education Innovation, and Shaina Cavazos, the office’s current director, join The Education Gadfly Show to discuss charter growth after the replication era. Drawing on their experience with closures and mergers in Indianapolis, they explain why authorizers and charter boards may need new approaches as enrollment declines and the sector matures.

Then, on the Research Minute, Amber Northern examines new research on content rich reading instruction and finds that while teachers are using strong foundational skills curricula, students often get too few chances to build fluency and vocabulary.

Recommended content:

• Beyond Replication: What Responsible Charter Growth Looks Like Now —Jed Wallace, CharterFolk
• The 10-year test for durable schools —Robert Pondiscio, Thomas B. Fordham Institute
• Do Authorizer Evaluations Predict the Success of New Charter Schools? — Adam Kho, Ph.D., Shelby Leigh Smith, and Douglas Lee Lauen, Ph.D., Thomas B. Fordham Institute
• Bridging the Divide: Connecting Word Recognition and Language Comprehension in Early Literacy —Anna Jennerjohn, Sara Rutherford-Quach, Lauren J. Cassidy, Katrina Woodworth, Sarah Dec, and Dan Reynolds, SRI (2026)

Feedback Welcome: Have ideas for improving our show? We would love to hear them. Send them to thegadfly@fordhaminstitute.org