Alex Cohen is the Director of Learning and Evaluation for the Richard M. Fairbanks Foundation. High-performing school leaders have a substantial impact on student achievement. Studies that aim to isolate the impact of leaders on student test scores find that moving from a low- to a high-quality principal can mean several additional months of learning. And the impacts are larger for low-income students. But can schools do anything to boost the quality of their school leaders? Or are the traits that lead to better leaders too difficult to predict or develop and the best leaders too hard to retain? To help answer these questions, the Wallace Foundation funded and provided […]

Claire Fiddian-Green is the President & CEO of the Richard M. Fairbanks Foundation. One in three Hoosier adults is obese, and more than two in three are overweight or obese, costing Indiana an estimated $8.5 billion in 2017– most of which is borne by households and the private sector. A report released today by the Richard M. Fairbanks Foundation underscores these findings, showing that obesity has increased dramatically in Marion County and Indiana, becoming one of the most significant preventable causes of morbidity and mortality. The report shows that in Indiana, obesity rose from 20 percent in 1995 to 34 percent in 2017 – a rate that is the 12th highest […]