Author: Jerry Leger

A small Midwestern town experiences a certain kind of quiet pride when one of its own accomplishes something noteworthy. It doesn’t make a loud announcement. You can see it in the way a coach stops in the middle of a sentence and smiles to himself, or in the way people at the neighborhood diner lean against the counter and talk a bit longer than usual. When word spread that a seventeen-year-old from their community had won the NFHS Spirit of Sport Award, one of the most significant honors in American high school athletics, that was the sentiment that pervaded this…

Seeing a high school football team practice at ten o’clock at night has a subtle surreal quality. Even in the absence of sunlight, the air remains dense and heavy, with moths circling the beams and field lights humming overhead. Parents wait while using their phones while seated in folding chairs along the sidelines. It doesn’t appear to be practice. It appears to be improvised. since it is. Coaches are rescheduling all over the nation. Late at night, early in the morning, or occasionally both. The reasoning is straightforward and somewhat depressing: it is now medically unsafe to engage in outdoor…

When a child climbs into the backseat of a car and says something that completely alters the drive home, there’s a certain kind of dread. That moment arrived recently for a mother at Lamar Middle School in Flower Mound, Texas; her daughter barely buckled up before telling her that a teacher had taken her picture and she had no idea what had happened to it. Neither did the mother. She still doesn’t, even after several days. A male instructor at Lamar Middle School is presently on administrative leave while Flower Mound police and school administrators look into claims that he…

When something goes wrong in a classroom that no one is allowed to identify, a certain kind of silence descends. A student in the back row is silently aware of something that the teacher in the front of the room might not want her to know as she stares at an essay that has been returned to her with red marks all over it. Anyone who has ever sat through a lecture wondering if the authority figure at the chalkboard had actually done the reading will recognize this tension, which is currently manifesting in schools in a novel and genuinely…

The hallways of nearly every American public school are essentially the same, with lockers, fluorescent lights, and the quiet murmur of students attempting to identify themselves. However, a very different picture appears when you examine the disciplinary records more closely. The longer you sit with it, the more difficult it is to ignore. Black students are punished more frequently, more severely, and at almost every stage of their education, according to a study by UC Berkeley’s Sean Darling-Hammond and statistician Eric Ho that was published in the American Educational Research Association Open. This is something that the education community has…

On May 6th, there was a subtle but noticeable change in North Carolina. Girls flag football was approved as an official varsity sport by the North Carolina High School Athletic Association, making the state the 22nd in the nation to do so. For the players and coaches who had spent years creating this from the ground up, it felt like everything was finally coming together even though there wasn’t much fanfare—no stadium lights, no full auditorium. “Every single county in North Carolina from the coast to the Piedmont to the mountains — we’re all going to be doing it fall…

You might hear something that sounds more like the inside of a sports broadcast than a school hallway if you walk into Calvert Hall College High School in Towson, Maryland on a typical afternoon. Put on your headsets. glowing monitors. squads of three players announcing plays with the accuracy of a football huddle. However, no one is wearing pads. The Cardinals are ranked second out of 111 teams nationwide and are participating in Rocket League drills. Sitting with that number for a while is worthwhile. 111 teams. a nationally recognized team from a Maryland Catholic all-boys prep school. participating in…

The same bulky, worn-out textbook can still be found on the corner of every desk in the majority of Texas public schools. The covers deteriorate. The spines break. And if you know where to look, you’ll discover a version of American history that many historians would find difficult to identify. Many scholars, including the conservative Thomas B. Fordham Institute, have referred to the curriculum standards developed by the Texas State Board of Education over the years as a politicized distortion of the historical record. In an attempt to meet those requirements while selling books to the second-biggest textbook market in…

After a student commits suicide in a small town, there is a certain silence. A grieving counselor, an empty desk, and a school that must continue—no press conference, no national attention. Everyone should be unnerved by the familiarity of that silence in Alaska. The state has the highest suicide rate in the country, and the statistics for young people between the ages of 15 and 24 are not only concerning but also devastating. Therefore, it was not an abstract policy moment when the Alaska Legislature passed Senate Bill 41, which mandated that the state create mental health education guidelines for…

When you first arrive at 3939 Tracy Street, there’s something subtly striking about it. The structure doesn’t resemble the majority of Los Angeles public schools. It simply doesn’t resemble most buildings in Los Angeles. The Collegiate Gothic main building, which has arched windows, stone-cut details, and an architectural weight that suggests permanence, is situated in the Los Feliz neighborhood as though it were transported from a more deliberate and older period of American institution-building. It was designed by George M. Lindsey in 1930, and when it first opened on January 26, 1931, with about 1,200 students strolling through those halls,…