Black Kids Close the Gap in Reading: Still Trail Their Peers

July 14, 2009 – National Public Radio News Blog

Tool shows benefits of education in communities

July 13, 2009 – The Herald Dispatch

South Side Education News & Notes

July 2, 2009 – South Side News Leader

What’s New: From the U.S. Department of Education

May 29, 2009 – Education Innovator

Let them eat cake, educationally speaking

May 27, 2009 – Show Me Progress

Improving state’s future rests with more education

May 19, 2009 – NewsOK

We Can Pay for Education Today – Or Prisons Tomorrow

May 14, 2009 – Huffington Post

Website estimates education’s effect on health, crime, income

May 13, 2009 – USA Today

Common Good Forecaster

Interactive Tool to Map Education Attainment in America

Access the tool here.

United Way and the Measure of America joined forces in 2008 because both organizations focus on the building blocks of a good life – a quality education that starts from birth and ultimately leads to a stable job, enough income to support a family through retirement, good health, and the ability to achieve one’s full potential. Out of this partnership came the Common Good Forecaster™, a tool that shows how vital economic and social issues in your community might change if educational outcomes were better.

This is a forecasting application that uses statistical models drawn from peer-reviewed studies to predict the effect increased levels of educational attainment are likely to have on other important variables. For the vast majority of indicators included, we start from official federal data for particular locations broken out by education level. When adjustments are made in the “mix” of educational attainment, we are assuming that current relationships between education and all other factors in a given geographic area remain the same. Extreme adjustments to the sliders can produce unrealistic results in other factors (ie. unemployment, poverty, and murder rates falling to zero).

A snapshot of the Common Good Forecaster™ tool as applied to Nassau County in New York

For more information: contact@measureofamerica.org

Interview with Co-Author Kristen Lewis

August 15, 2008 – Audio: Bread and Roses, KBOO