About 600 school districts are expected to start using the nonprofit Sandy Hook Promise's mobile app that allows for anonymous reporting of school threats. The app, currently in use in 150 districts, is available to schools for free.

The US Education Department will forgive about $150 million in student debt for some 15,000 borrowers who attended colleges that shut down or that they claim defrauded them. The move comes two months after a federal judge ordered the department to implement the Obama-era Borrower Defense to Repayment rule.

Law enforcement officials in a Connecticut district are investigating a racist video posted on social media by an unidentified high-school student. The video uses racial slurs and references race-related violence.

Culture plays an important role in how people learn, according to findings included in the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering and Medicine's update to its report "How People Learn II." In this interview, the study's director, Sujeeta Bhatt, shares other findings, including the importance of motivation in learning.

Linnette Attai, a privacy expert, writes that 2019 could be a perfect storm of activity related to protecting privacy. In this opinion piece, Attai shares five privacy-related events to watch for in the coming year, including federal and state legislation, plus a focus on the privacy of young people.

The Sarasota County school district in Florida soon may stop filtering comments that appear on its schools' Facebook pages under a potential policy being considered by the school board. Currently, the district hides the majority of comments, but board members in favor of the change would like more open communication with parents through Facebook.

Offering students equal access to technology in the classroom is key to addressing achievement gaps, writes Kevin Ghost, director of technology and network administrator for the Connellsville Area School District in Pennsylvania. In this commentary, he shares steps his district took to promote tech equity, including looking for financing and working with teachers.

The US Department of Education will release a plan to help teachers who have been hit with large debts because of problems with the TEACH Grant program. The move comes after it was discovered that some teachers who complied with the requirements of the program had their grants wrongly converted to loans because of paperwork mishaps.

Children ages 9 and 10 who spent at least seven hours on screens per day had thinning of the part of the brain that controls sensory processing, and those who had more than two hours of daily screen time had lower language and thinking test scores, according to an ongoing study from the National Institutes of Health. The study will follow over 11,000 children for 10 years to see how prolonged screen time affects the brain.

A survey of Generation Z high-school and college students in 17 countries shows 80% want to work with cutting-edge technology as part of their careers, and 57% say their education has prepared them for a job. The data also show 98% have used technology during their education and 52% are confident in their tech skills.