Phyllis W. Jordan is FutureEd's associate director, writing about education policy and editing the work of our fellows and others. Jordan has written extensively for FutureEd about student absenteeism and Covid relief spending. An experienced writer and editor, Jordan served in senior editing positions at the Los Angeles Times and the Washington Post, where she managed a team of 40 reporters and her responsibilities included editing the newspaper's education coverage. Jordan also served as the communications director at Attendance Works, a San Francisco-based national nonprofit focused on improving the policy, research and practice around school attendance, and as a vice-president of the Hatcher Group, a communications firm that works exclusively with foundations and nonprofit organizations. At Hatcher, Jordan worked on a range of education initiatives, across print, digital, and social media platforms, including the crafting of a communications strategy for the Campaign for Grade-Level Reading to improve early literacy. Jordan holds a master's degree in journalism from the University of Missouri and is a Phi Beta Kappa graduate from Sweet Briar College.
Work by Phyllis W. Jordan

What Congressional Funding Means for K-12 Schools
Phyllis W. Jordan May 18, 2022(Updated 5/18) School districts and charter school organizations could have an extra 18 months to…

How Medicaid Can Help Schools Sustain Support for Students’ Mental Health
Phyllis W. Jordan Anne Dwyer Bella DiMarco Margaux Johnson-Green May 17, 2022Among the Covid-19 pandemic’s most pernicious aftershocks is its impact on student…

How to Read a Covid-Relief Plan
Phyllis W. Jordan May 16, 2022With billions in federal Covid-relief aid flowing to schools, the question on everyone’s mind is…

School Districts’ Post-Covid Strategies for Summer Learning
Bella DiMarco Phyllis W. Jordan May 02, 2022Summer has traditionally been a time when students lose some of the skills they gained…

Financial Trends in Local Schools’ Covid-Aid Spending
Bella DiMarco Phyllis W. Jordan Apr 14, 2022(Updated with April 5 data) Nearly a year after Congress approved $122 billion in Covid-relief…

An Analysis of Local School Districts’ Ambitious Post-Covid Tutoring Plans
Phyllis W. Jordan Bella DiMarco Thomas Toch Apr 05, 2022In his State of the Union address, President Joe Biden called on local educators…

How District Poverty Levels Influence Covid-Relief Spending
Phyllis W. Jordan Bella DiMarco Apr 05, 2022(Updated April 4, 2022) For decades, many school districts with the largest share of students…

National, Regional Trends in Educators’ Covid-Relief Spending
Phyllis W. Jordan Bella DiMarco Mar 01, 2022(Updated with March 1 data) With billions to spend in Covid-relief money, school districts and…

Covid-Aid Spending Trends by City, Suburban, Rural School Districts
Bella DiMarco Phyllis W. Jordan Mar 01, 2022(Updated with March 1 data) The Covid pandemic can look different in a small rural…

Using Covid Relief Funds to Advance Student and Staff Health
Phyllis W. Jordan Alex Mays Feb 14, 2022For all the talk about the pandemic’s impact on academic achievement, the coronavirus crisis remains…

New Data: School Spending in the Time of Covid
Phyllis W. Jordan Oct 05, 2021Public school spending increased during fiscal year 2020 even as the coronavirus pandemic kept many schools closed,…

Covid Relief Playbook: Smart Strategies for Investing Federal Funding
Phyllis W. Jordan Brooke LePage Catherine Dragone Jun 28, 2021Disrupted for more than a year by the coronavirus pandemic, U.S. public education…

Designing Summer Programs That Students Want to Attend
Brooke LePage Phyllis W. Jordan Jun 14, 2021As school districts and states scramble to use federal Covid relief aid to help students…

Present Danger: Solving the Deepening Student Absenteeism Crisis
Phyllis W. Jordan May 24, 2021States and school districts nationwide have reported higher student absenteeism during the pandemic, with schools…

Why Investing in Ventilation Could Pay Dividends for Learning
Phyllis W. Jordan May 04, 2021Once relegated to those dry, dull school board discussions about facilities, ventilation is having a…

The Striking Racial and Gender Bias in Classrooms and How to Address It
Phyllis W. Jordan Mar 18, 2021This commentary was published in The 74. Education research is replete with studies that…

Education in the 2021 State of the State Addresses
Phyllis W. Jordan Brooke LePage Mar 10, 2021When governors delivered their State of the State addresses this winter — often via…

Kamala Harris’s Surprising Evolution on Truancy
Phyllis W. Jordan Jan 13, 2021Much has been written about Kamala Harris’s decision as San Francisco district attorney to threaten…

With an Influx of Covid Relief Funds, States Spend on Schools
Phyllis W. Jordan Brooke LePage Jan 03, 2021This piece and interactive maps were published in The 74. Asked by the U.S. Education…

How Schools and Colleges Are Innovating During the Pandemic
Alina Tugend Phyllis W. Jordan Mark A. Stein Dec 09, 2020FutureEd partnered with The New York Times for this story that appeared in the Oct.

The Challenge of Taking Attendance in Remote Learning
Phyllis W. Jordan Hedy N. Chang Dec 03, 2020This piece ran as a commentary in The 74. In suburban Detroit, a teenage girl was…

This Year, States and Districts Can’t Count on Enrollment Counts
Phyllis W. Jordan Sep 30, 2020It’s the time of year when schools traditionally take their “enrollment snapshots” to determine the…

How Governors Are Using Their CARES Act Education Dollars
Phyllis W. Jordan Javaid Siddiqi Sep 09, 2020Back in March, when the coronavirus crisis first shuttered schools and universities, Congress dedicated some…

The Discarded International Students Rule and Trump’s Agenda
Phyllis W. Jordan Brooke LePage Jul 15, 2020An earlier version of this commentary piece appeared in The Hill. Forget for a moment…

Attendance Playbook: Smart Solutions for Reducing Chronic Absenteeism in the Covid Era
Phyllis W. Jordan Jun 11, 2020Amid the economic and health consequences of the coronavirus crisis and heightened anger over racism…

Bringing College Courses to Disadvantaged High Schools
Phyllis W. Jordan Jun 10, 2020This piece was published in The 74. Leaders at selective colleges and universities often…

Fighting Coronavirus with National Service
Brooke LePage Phyllis W. Jordan Jun 02, 2020This piece appeared as a commentary in The Hill. This May, more than…

Chronic Absenteeism in the Time of Coronavirus
Phyllis W. Jordan Apr 21, 2020The spread of coronavirus, the need for “social distancing,” and the shuttering of schools in…

From Teacher Pay to Free College, What Governors Want
Phyllis W. Jordan Brooke LePage Mar 17, 2020Governors’ annual State of the State addresses are windows into what’s likely to be at…

Can School Climate Surveys Measure School Quality?
Phyllis W. Jordan Mar 16, 2020This commentary was originally published in The 74. School climate and student engagement…