This blog was originally posted onFordham’s Flypaper. We need to take issue with a point in Andy Smarick’s thoughtful review, published in Flypaper, of our new book, A Democratic Constitution for Public Education. As Andy...
To a certain kind of mind, the status quo has no risks and no costs. The “way we do things” is seen as, if not the best of all possible worlds, then at least a...
Everything that schools do, they buy, one way or another. Whether it’s professional development, curricula and tests, or pencils, hamburger, and software, the choice is the same: either spend money on salaries and materials to...
The vitriol that characterizes much of the dialog on school reform is most roiling when the conversation turns, as it invariably does, to teachers unions on one hand, and “corporate reformers” on the other. At...
The education reform debate can be like a spinning top. It changes course abruptly and without warning but it remains largely focused inward. The dizzying debate around education policy is on a collision course with...
When it comes to school accountability, different people see the same events differently. It’s all in the eye of the beholder. When a school district closes a school with persistently low student outcomes, is it...
Today, Paul Hill, Robin Lake, and Michael Petrilli kick off a blog series intended to prompt a productive dialogue around fixing school accountability systems. Join the conversation on Twitter: #TheNewAccountability Read “An Open Letter On...
Children in a city need much better schools, but the local board and union prevent change. Is state takeover the remedy? Perhaps. State action has broken logjams in a lot of cities, but it hasn’t...
State leaders and policymakers are working hard to figure out how to bolster the capacity of state education agencies to meet the unprecedented demands they face to drive improvements in K-12 performance and productivity. In...
Reformers taking over a troubled big-city school system are understandably pessimistic about the educators they inherit. How could there be any good teachers or principals in a district where not even one child in ten...