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Each spring, at the start of baseball season, fourth-graders at my school connect with Shorty, a character from Ken Mochizuki’s book Baseball Saved Us. Shorty’s a Japanese-American child who plays baseball on a makeshift field in an internment camp during World War II. Mochizuki’s consummate read-aloud story encourages a fired-up discussion in the library. Students talk about the inequities and intolerances foisted on kids and adults alike. It’s the kind of lesson that I thoroughly enjoy teaching, year after year.

Empathy and academics need not be mutually exclusive. In fact, a focus on empathy can increase student achievement. This toolkit for “Empathy for the ‘A’” shows teachers how to build empathy into their practice with a few adjustments to the things they already do.

TT answers your tough questions.

Mention school desegregation, and most people envision the Little Rock Nine—not the Tucson Unified School District (TUSD). But Tucson is exactly where the battle for desegregation is being fought today.

In the wake of the 2016 presidential election, many people—educators chief among them—joined activist Facebook groups. Researchers at the University of Florida studied how these groups influenced educators’ civic engagement. Here’s what they learned.

During this time of political and social turmoil, build networks of trusted adults to help young people understand, contextualize and counter manipulative and harmful information.

Politicians say arming teachers will make schools safer, but educators disagree.

Giving Gen Ed teachers the tools to realize the potential of inclusive classrooms.