Late in 2018, the Trump administration moved to roll back Obama-era regulations designed to improve air quality and limit pollution. No one thought of it as an education story.

But new research suggests it is, at least in part. While the health risks of air pollution have long been documented, two recent studies are among the first to directly connect two different forms of pollution to lower test scores and higher absence rates among exposed schoolchildren.

Schools across the country — particularly those serving more low-income students of color — are often located near hotbeds of pollution, like highways.

“The results are pretty damning,” said Claudia Persico, a professor at American University and one of the researchers behind both of the studies. “These papers suggest that pollution might play a much bigger role in inequality in outcomes between rich and poor kids and between black and white kids than we previously realized.”

The two studies both examine Florida in the 1990s and 2000s.

Read the full article about air pollution and education by Matt Barnum at Chalkbeat.