One reason No Child Left Behind is all but a failed initiative, is that one of its main metrics, Adequate Yearly Progress (AYP), is a horrendous measure of educational progress. With AYP, each state sets its own goals and assesses progress with its own metric. If one state meets AYP and another one does not,…
Simple, inexpensive measures to cut emissions of two common pollutants will slow global warming, save millions of lives and boost crop production around the world, an international team of scientists. The climate-change debate has centered on carbon dioxide, a gas that wafts in the atmosphere for decades, trapping heat. But in recent years, scienti have…
President Barack Obama’s proposal to eliminate the Commerce Department promises to reignite sharp debates about the best home for its sizable but patchwork research and technology portfolio. The Commerce Department now includes the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST), the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office, and the…
The Environmental Protection Agency for the first time is making available detailed information on sources of greenhouse gas emissions, from the Mount Sinai Hospital heating plant in Manhattan to the nation’s largest coal-burning power plant in Georgia. The agency unveiled a searchable computerized map that allows users to identify the nation’s major stationary sources of…
Of all the domestic policy differences between the Bush and Obama administrations, just about the sharpest and most telling may be their opposite responses to the drive by Republican-dominated states to require voters to present photo identification at the polls. The Bush administration thought photo ID was a dandy idea. The Obama administration recognizes it…
The Science and Security Board of the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists announced that the metaphorical doomsday clock is now at five minutes to midnight, putting humanity one figurative minute closer to catastrophic destruction than it was just two years ago. The Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists was founded in the 1940s by members of…
While no scientifically proven criteria exists for what makes a politician look like a Republican, plenty of people seem to think they can spot a party affiliation on a candidate’s face. Maybe it’s something in the eyebrows, or the cheekbones, or the cast of a jaw line (or insert your humorous observation here). Whatever it…
Researchers found that voters were more likely to cast their ballots for candidates with lower-pitched voices, and tended to rate them as more dominant and more trustworthy.
A new survey from the Pew Research Center finds wide gaps in how different generations view politics. Older voters are more conservative, more angry at the government, and less hopeful about the future of the country. Younger voters lean left, wish the government played a greater role in their lives, and believe the nation’s best…
New research shows that anyone can be corrupted at the drop of a hat. Indeed, when looked at in evolutionary terms, clinging to the moral high ground could be seen as an irrational position. If everyone else is cheating, then playing by the rules will leave you with the smallest haul—where the haul, whatever it…