The best book on what has gone wrong in US education

Diane Ravitch is a historian of education and I highly recommend her book of 2010, “The Death and Life of the Great American School System” (Amazon link) to get an overview of all the main issues. She is not an optimist about where we are headed and the sub-title is revealing: “How Testing and Choice are Undermining Education.” Exactly.

The book is a great read. She begins with her realization some years ago that “most of the reform strategies that school districts, state officials, the Congress and federal officials are pursuing, that mega-rich foundations are supporting, and that editorial boards are applauding are mistaken.” She then goes on to examine “how the Standards Movement Turned into the Testing Movement,” case studies of what happened in New York and San Diego where “business models” were applied disastrously, No Child Left Behind, the “Choice” movement with its charter schools, and the invasion of corporations like Broad, Gates and the like.

Ravitch is revered among educators because she tells it the way they see it. What is surprising to me is the way so many parents and journalists do NOT see it this way. Why do they embrace every new fad as a way to “save” education? Why do they think they know more about what makes for good teaching, or how teachers should be evaluated, than teachers themselves? As one friend put it, it is about catharsis – relief from the frustrations everyone feels about education, about life, about raising kids, as though blowing up the system is somehow going to improve things. It never does. You may have noticed?

Teachers are individualists and independent spirits. If we value them for that and treat them with respect they will respond positively. Treat them like clients or employees and watch them retreat into cynicism and passive resistance as the system continues its slide to disaster.