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Articles by Richard Whitmire

Richard Whitmire is the author of several books, most recently “The B.A. Breakthrough: How Ending Diploma Disparities Can Change the Face of America.” Whitmire is a member of the Journalism Advisory Board of The 74.

Q&A: Rocketship Schools Co-Founder Reflects on 15 Years of Empowering Parents

Richard Whitmire

New KIPP Scholarship Will Help College Grads At Risk of Being ‘Underemployed’

Richard Whitmire

Whitmire: Elementary School Holds Answers to Male Education Crisis

Richard Whitmire

Steep College Persistence Drop Latest Sign of COVID’s Severe Impact

Richard Whitmire

College Enrollment Continues to Plunge

Richard Whitmire

Spring College Enrollment Numbers Fail to Rebound

Richard Whitmire

Whitmire: Why Miguel Cardona Could Help End the School Culture Wars and Reverse College Enrollment Plunge for Low-Income Kids

Richard Whitmire

New Data: College Enrollment for Low-Income High School Grads Plunged by 29% During the Pandemic

Richard Whitmire

New Data: Sharp Declines in Community College Enrollment Are Being Driven By Disappearing Male Students

Richard Whitmire

KIPP Launches First-Of-Its-Kind Alumni Network to Help Its 30K Graduates With Careers, Mental Health and Finances

Richard Whitmire

All States Now Required to Track Students’ College and Career Readiness, but Few Do It Well and Some Not at All

Richard Whitmire

How the Common App, the College Advising Corps and an AI Chatbot Are Saving the College Dreams of Low-Income Students During the Pandemic

Richard Whitmire

‘That’s Not a Gap Year. That’s Just Not Going to College’: COVID-19 Erodes Equity Gains of First-Generation College-Goers

Richard Whitmire

Whitmire: Nonprofit, Smart College Advising Groups Quickly Moved Online During COVID-19 — a Very Good Thing for Low-Income, First-Generation Students

Richard Whitmire

Whitmire: The Wave of Higher Ed Shutdowns Threatens American’s Progress in Getting Low-Income, First-Generation Students to and Through College

Richard Whitmire

A High-Poverty High School in Tennessee Is Using National Student Clearinghouse Data to Fuel a Revolution in Smart College Counseling

Richard Whitmire

74 Interview: National Student Clearinghouse’s Michele Gralak on Helping Schools and Districts Put Data to Work for Their Kids

Richard Whitmire

Whitmire: With DACA in Danger at the Supreme Court, The Against-All-Odds Success of These Undocumented College Grads Deserves Its Own Hearing

Richard Whitmire

A Program That Successfully Propels Low-Income Students to (and Through) College Starts Its Work Years Before High School

Richard Whitmire

New Research Shows Some 1 Million College Dropouts Returned to School in the Past Five Years and Earned Degrees

Richard Whitmire

Whitmire: Both Fans and Critics of Success Academy’s Remarkable Results Will Find Something to Like in Pondiscio’s New Book. But Don’t Use It to Judge All Charter Schools

Richard Whitmire

Charters and District Schools Share Strategies on Getting Low-Income Students Through College, Putting Uneasiness Aside

Richard Whitmire

IDEA Understands That College Is the New High School — For the Texas Charter Network That Means Making It Attainable for Everyone

Richard Whitmire

The Magic Moment: College Signing Days Make Rock Stars out of College-Bound Seniors, Inspiring Those Waiting in the Wings

Richard Whitmire

Whitmire: As School Districts Collaborate With Top Charters and Foundations, We’re on the Cusp of a Breakthrough in Guiding Low-Income & Minority Students to a College Diploma

Richard Whitmire

Change Agent: From Georgetown to Franklin & Marshall to Aspen, How Dan Porterfield Is Leading a Revolution to Get First-Generation Students Through College With a Degree

Richard Whitmire

The Pride of 2009 From Rural North Carolina Reflect on How Their Lives Were Changed by the Chance to Go to College

Richard Whitmire

Whitmire: New Pell Institute Study Finds ‘Critical’ Gap in College Success Between Low- & High-Income Students. Here Are 3 Reasons for Hope

Richard Whitmire

Uncommon Schools’ New President Julie Jackson Talks Community Circles, Transition Points, College Completion & Loving Our Students

Richard Whitmire

With High School Counselors Badly Outnumbered, Innovative Nonprofit Steps In to Offer Smart College Advising to Low-Income Students Across the Country

Richard Whitmire

Whitmire: Responses to My Media Column Show We Do Have an Issue With Education Journalists and Charter Schools — a Sensitive One That Requires Reflection (and Lots of Data)

Richard Whitmire

How a Houston Experiment in College Counseling Is Succeeding in Sending Low-Income, First-Generation Students to the Country’s Top Universities

Richard Whitmire

Analysis: Why the Media’s Pendulum Swing Against Charter Schools Has Consequences — and Why Journalists Must Keep Their Spotlight on the Trajectory of Students

Richard Whitmire

A ‘Bot’ That’s Changing the Game for College Selection: Meet the Midwest Software Whiz Whose Program Is Now Helping Students Find Better Fits — and Earn More Degrees

Richard Whitmire

The 74 Interview: Priscilla Chan on Supporting Whole-Child Education, Nurturing Diverse Scientists and Measuring Success Beyond Math and Reading

Richard Whitmire

Expanding the Community College-to-University Pipeline: Why More Elite Schools Are Embracing Transfers and the 15,000 Annual Community Graduates With 3.7 GPAs

Richard Whitmire

When It Comes to Predicting Which College Students Will Actually Go On to Attain a Bachelor’s Degree, High School GPA Is King

Richard Whitmire

Alarming Statistics Tell the Story Behind America’s College Completion Crisis: Nearly a Third of All College Students Still Don’t Have a Degree Six Years Later

Richard Whitmire

How Opening a High School on a Rural Peanut Field Altered the Arc of a NC Town — and Doubled the College Degrees in 5 Years

Richard Whitmire

Whitmire: New Study of Suburban Charter Middle Schools Misses Point — Again — About Low-Income, Minority Charter Grads and College Success

Richard Whitmire

New Numbers Show Low-Income Students at Most of America’s Largest Charter School Networks Graduating College at Two to Four Times the National Average

Richard Whitmire

Whitmire: Elite Colleges Empower First-Generation Students to Succeed Just By Letting Them Enroll. They Must Admit More of Them

Richard Whitmire

Analysis: How Bloomberg’s $1.8 Billion Gift to Johns Hopkins Will Elevate the National Conversation About Helping First-Generation Students Complete Their College Degrees

Richard Whitmire

Whitmire: As Success Academy Graduates Its First Class of 16 College-Bound Seniors, Don’t Bet Against It Someday Being Thousands

Richard Whitmire

Exclusive: Data Show Charter School Students Graduating From College at Three to Five Times National Average

Richard Whitmire

Are High Schools Adequately Preparing Teens for College? No One Really Knows. That’s Why Today’s GreatSchools Analysis Is One of the Most Important Education Reports in Years

Richard Whitmire

Whitmire: Decrying ‘One Size Fits All,’ Hickenlooper Lays Bare Democratic Party’s Deep Divide Over School Choice

Richard Whitmire

Whitmire: Why Boston’s Most Racially Diverse School Could Also Be the Country’s Most Interesting School Integration Story

Richard Whitmire

Whitmire: Want to Serve Student Interests in District-Charter Partnerships? New Study Advises Tackling the Adult Politics First

Richard Whitmire

Analysis: Why Are All the Stories About Boys Falling Behind Girls at School Ignoring the Forces Keeping Them There?

Richard Whitmire

Whitmire: 7 Ways Charter Schools & Districts Are Remaking Education in Texas

Richard Whitmire

Whitmire: Finding Brave New World of District/Charter Collaboration in Rebirth of Newark Elementary School

Richard Whitmire

Top Charter Networks Worth the Disruption, Set High Accountability Bar for All Public Schools

Richard Whitmire

The Georgetown Scholarship Program: Getting First-Generation Students Acquainted With College Early On

Richard Whitmire

KIPP Alumni Leadership Accelerator: Realizing the Belief That Its Graduates ‘Are Going to Be the Change Agents of the Future’

Richard Whitmire

They Are Some of America’s Best and Brightest Students. They’re Hoping Congress Will Let Them Stay Under DACA

Richard Whitmire

Green Dot Public Schools: Not Just About Getting Students Into College, but Getting Them Into the Right Ones and Keeping Them There

Richard Whitmire

KIPP NYC College Prep: Tracking Students Through Graduation — and Then Through College — Like No One Else in America

Richard Whitmire

YES Prep: At the Birthplace of College Signing Day, ‘Pumping Out Kids Prepared and Ready to Roll’

Richard Whitmire

Alliance College-Ready Public Schools: AMPing Up Its Alumni Network to Track & Guide Students Through College

Richard Whitmire

Noble Network of Charter Schools: It’s Not Just About Going to College, but About Global Perspective & Leaving Chicago

Richard Whitmire

Whitmire: In the State That Created High-Performing Charter Networks, College Success Is Lagging Behind Others

Richard Whitmire

IDEA Public Schools Proving the Impossible Is Possible in Guiding Texas Alumni Through College Graduation

Richard Whitmire

Achievement First’s Ambitious Alumni Goal: 75% College Success Rate

Richard Whitmire

How Uncommon Schools Is Guiding Alumni Through College Graduation: GPA, SAT Scores & a ‘Dirty Little Secret’

Richard Whitmire

Exclusive: Data Show Charter School Students Graduating From College at Three to Five Times National Average

Richard Whitmire

Whitmire: Money, Hustle & Good Candidates Won LA Vote for Ed Reformers, but Tougher Fights Lie Ahead

Richard Whitmire

Whitmire: In Bridging Charter-District Divide, Educators Collaborate to Make the Impossible Happen

Richard Whitmire

Whitmire: Is DeVos Still Planning a School Tour With Weingarten? Here’s the First Place They Should Go

Richard Whitmire

Whitmire: Charter Leaders Saw Too Much Damage to Students (and Their Own Future) to Embrace Trump’s Budget

Richard Whitmire

Whitmire: Why the Charter Cap Fight in Massachusetts May Have Sparked a Tidal Wave of New Parent Applications

Richard Whitmire

Whitmire: Dear Secretary DeVos, If You Want to Grow Great Charter Schools, Do This, Not That

Richard Whitmire

Schooling, Reimagined: How Dacia Toll Shaped the Greenfield School By Borrowing From the Best

Richard Whitmire

Whitmire: Welcome to the Trump Presidency — and the Hazy New Battle Lines of the Education Debate

Richard Whitmire

Building the 3.0 High School: How Summit Basecamp Schools Pairs Teaching With Technology

Richard Whitmire

Inside the 2004 Denver Summit That Changed the Course of America’s Public Charter Schools

Richard Whitmire

Whitmire: Partnering With Charters, AppleTree Plants Seeds for New Approach to Early Childhood Ed

Richard Whitmire

A ‘Founders’ Excerpt: How 4 Visionary Entrepreneurs Joined Forces to Launch Uncommon Schools

Richard Whitmire

A ‘Founders’ Excerpt: How Joel Klein Found His Disruptive Force — and Reshaped NYC Education

Richard Whitmire

Whitmire: Donald Trump, the Best (or Worst) Thing to Happen to School Choice?

Richard Whitmire

Whitmire—Why Question 2 Lost in Massachusetts: The Better the Charter, the Bigger the Threat

Richard Whitmire

Whitmire: Rocky Mountain Ties—In Denver, Charters Excel Working With District

Richard Whitmire

Whitmire: MA Labor Leaders Challenge Parents on Charter Schools

Richard Whitmire

A ‘Founders’ Excerpt: USC Hybrid High, a Los Angeles Breakthrough, Graduates Its Very First Class

Richard Whitmire

‘It’s Heartbreaking’: Boston Parents Ask Why Their Wealthy Neighbors Are Fighting Charter Schools

Richard Whitmire

A ‘Founders’ Excerpt: IDEA Charters in Texas – A Lone Star Charter Success Story

Richard Whitmire

A ‘Founders’ Excerpt: The Noble Network of Schools Thrives in Chicago — Against All Odds

Richard Whitmire

A D.C. Charter Wins $10M to Invent Virtual Reality Programs That Will Change High School — All of Them

Richard Whitmire

74 Interview: RePublic Schools’ Ravi Gupta on the Next Frontier of the Education Reform Wars

Richard Whitmire

All Over the Cap: The Fight for the Future of Massachusetts’ Charter Schools

Richard Whitmire

The Accidental Activist: One Mom’s Unlikely Crusade to Bring Better Schools to Northern California

Richard Whitmire

Whitmire: America’s Best Charter School Doesn’t Look Anything Like Other Top Charters. Is that Bad?

Richard Whitmire

Whitmire: Why Do Many Big Donors Prefer Charter Schools? (Hint: It’s Not Because They Hate Unions)

Richard Whitmire

Michael Bloomberg, the Education Candidate?

Richard Whitmire & Andrew J. Rotherham

Whitmire: The Secret to Building the Next Gen High School? Forget All Your Middle School Successes

Richard Whitmire

Impressive New Scores for Newark Charters Raise an Awkward Question: Did City Pick the Wrong Strategy?

Richard Whitmire

Whitmire: New Report Shows Surging Charter Enrollment, But Could Breakthroughs Be the Prelude to a Backlash?

Richard Whitmire

NYC’s Haven Academy, a Bronx Breakthrough Serving Kids in Foster Care That Carmen Farina Has Yet to Visit

Richard Whitmire

Whitmire: L.A.’s $490 Million Charter Push and Crunching the Costs of Improving a City’s School System

Richard Whitmire

Why Washington’s ‘Common School’ Ruling Runs Counter to the Common Good of Students

Richard Whitmire & Richard Whitmire

Whitmire: 5 Ways to Stop Bad Charters from Derailing Education Reform

Richard Whitmire

Whitmire: Reformers Must Move Faster to Close Failing Charters, or Risk Backlash Bigger Than ‘Opt-Out’

Richard Whitmire

Coast Guard to the Classroom: What One Heroic Pilot Learned When He Applied to TFA

Richard Whitmire

Media Ignores New Orleans Success Because It’s Good News on Charters

Richard Whitmire

Meet The Grandmother of America’s Best Charter Schools

Richard Whitmire

All Charters Are Not Equal: Time to Shut the Worst and Learn from the Best

Richard Whitmire