Hello, it’s Lily and Erica from Chalkbeat’s national desk. Today’s big story is about books — and just how many high school students are reading for class. Stick around for new research about school cellphone bans, an audit that slams a big district’s data privacy practices, and more.

Also, you won’t want to miss Chalkbeat Philadelphia’s virtual event exploring the impact of the state’s overhauled graduation requirements. Chalkbeat journalists have found evidence that an alternative pathway to graduation has given rise to a troubling new trend: Students are getting low-value credentials to check a box, boosting graduation rates. Chalkbeat reporter Rebecca Redelmeier will moderate this must-see panel.

You can probably recall some of the modern classics you read in high school English class. “To Kill A Mockingbird.” “Rebecca.” “Lord of the Flies.” But do you remember how many novels you read over a school year?

There’s been a fair amount of speculation that the novel is vanishing from classrooms. But new data from RAND shows that while that’s not exactly the case, teachers on average only assign a few books each year.

Based on 2025 survey data from English teachers, RAND researchers also shared some stark findings about who is reading in school and how often. For instance, teachers in schools that serve higher proportions of students from low-income families were more likely to assign fewer books than their wealthier counterparts.

The research mostly focused on middle and high school data, though they did have some tidbits about elementary school reading, too. Notably, researcher Ashley Woo pointed out a U-shaped curve they observed for grades K-2: Nearly 20% reported assigning 0 books, while 50% reported assigning 20 or more (presumably shorter, age-appropriate) books.

Read the full story here.

The first large-scale study of the impact of school cellphone bans was released this week, and the results were decidedly meh.

The change in average student test scores was “close to zero,” though high school math scores did increase a little. Student attendance didn’t improve. Neither did students’ perceptions of online bullying or how much attention they paid in class. 

The study by researchers at Stanford, Duke, the University of Pennsylvania, and the University of Michigan looks at a wide range of outcomes at more than 40,000 schools between 2019 and 2026. Researchers compared schools that adopted Yondr pouches — which block students from using their cellphones during the school day — with demographically similar schools that did not use Yondr pouches. 

The bans were not totally without impacts. Student cellphone use went way down, as measured through teacher surveys and cellphone pings. Teachers reported greater satisfaction. And students reported improvements in their overall well-being in the second year of a strict ban. Researchers attribute worse student well-being in the first year of a ban to withdrawal pangs. 

Nonetheless, the study found less impact on test scores than a smaller study released last year that found modest improvements in one county-level Florida school district. And both studies identified an increase in suspensions in the first year of the ban. 

Thomas Dee, a Stanford education economist and one of the study’s co-authors, told The New York Times that schools shouldn’t abandon cellphone bans just because there wasn’t an immediate improvement in test scores or because implementation was bumpy. He said he considers this new study “encouraging.” 

Still, the study raises questions about just how much impact we should expect from cellphone bans as educators and policymakers try to reverse a long-term decline in student performance that many attribute, at least in part, to the effects of social media and technology. 

At least 37 states and the District of Columbia restrict student cellphone access during the school day, according to a tracker maintained by Education Week, and more states are poised to join the list. Illinois, for example, seems likely to adopt cell phone restrictions after a similar measure failed last year.

Critics of strict cellphone bans say the findings show that schools and lawmakers have rushed ahead of the evidence, with National Parents Union President Keri Rodrigues describing strict bans as “the new abstinence education.” 

That’s how much K-12 and higher education funding the Trump administration’s Office of Management and Budget is sitting on, despite Congress approving the spending. Education Week reports that figure includes $235 million for education research, $220 million for teacher preparation and training, $150 million for community schools initiatives, and $139 million for magnet schools.

All of the affected programs are ones that the Trump administration has tried repeatedly to eliminate. Experts said there’s no need to panic yet, but it is an indication that budget turmoil could be ongoing.

That’s Cecilia Lopez Alvarado, a student at the University of California San Diego, who had to take remedial math in college, which made international headlines after a report about a sharp increase in the number of students who need remedial math.

But Lopez Alvarado said the report, and the criticism that came after, didn’t tell the full story.