Many would argue that the media doesn’t give education the ink or airtime it deserves. But surprisingly, a new publication suggests that—at least at the local, state, and regional levels—K–12 issues receive a fair amount of attention.
In this study, policy strategist Andrew Campanella used the NewsBank database to search for key education terms in headlines and ledes. In total, he compiled stories from more than five thousand news sources and filtered out results about higher education. He found that education coverage was up 7.7 percent in 2014 relative to the twenty-five year trend, and also discovered that local, state, and regional outlets featured K–12 education in about 6.8 percent of stories. That’s a decent proportion of stories when considering the various topics covered by media outlets. In contrast, national media was about three times less likely than local media to feature education.
Perhaps unsurprisingly, it isn’t education policy driving the news coverage in local outlets. Sports were by far the most covered “education” topic, appearing in 13.6 percent of state, local, and regional education stories. Special events like pep rallies and field trips were a distant second at 5.1 percent. When policy was covered, the study found that school funding (5 percent) and school choice (2.3 percent) were most prevalent. School choice coverage has fluctuated greatly in the past twenty-five years, declining from its peak in 2000 but reaching another upward trend in 2011. In addition, stories about school quality were down more than 46 percent in 2014, accounting for a mere 0.08 percent of education stories.
Meanwhile, two policy areas—state standards and safety—were identified as receiving more coverage in recent years. The former is undoubtedly a result of the debate around the Common Core State Standards, and the latter is likely an effect of tragic acts of violence.
Perhaps the biggest takeaway is that the perception of our education system is largely reflected through local reporting, which is typically geared toward the positive—like a football team’s big win or an innovative field trip. This might explain why Americans generally view their own schools in a more positive light than the education system as a whole. (Of course, there are exceptions; a story of malfeasance in a school is apt to make the local news too.) It’s essential for education reformers to use strategies that effectively engage the local media. If they don’t, calls for change will rarely break through.
This study suggests that education coverage increased in 2014, but with the huge expenditures of tax dollars on education each year, more is needed to adequately inform parents and decision makers about the state of our school system and the choices available within it.
SOURCE: Andrew Campanella, “Leading the News: 25 Years in Education Coverage,” Campanella Media and Public Affairs, Inc. (June 2015)
