How to Rescue Education Reform

[groovedaddy]

THE debate over renewing No Child Left Behind, the education reform act that will be 10 years old in January, has fallen along partisan lines even though school improvement is one of the few examples of bipartisan cooperation over the last decade.

Though the law was initiated and signed by a Republican president, presidential candidates like Mitt Romney and Rick Perry, who once supported it, now talk about getting the federal government out of education, echoing Tea Party members who deem federal involvement a constitutional travesty. Democratic reformers, meanwhile, insist that the federal government has a role in telling states how to identify, punish and fix low-performing schools — despite little evidence that Washington has been good at any of these tasks. To existing mandates, they would add heavy-handed, unproven teacher-evaluation requirements that could stifle innovative teaching and school design.

We sorely need a smarter, more coherent vision of the federal role in K-12 education. Yet both parties find themselves hemmed in. Republicans are stuck debating whether, rather than how, the federal government ought to be involved in education, while Democrats are squeezed between superintendents, school boards and teachers’ unions that want money with no strings, and activists with little patience for concerns about federal overreach.

When it comes to education policy, the two of us represent different schools of thought. One of us, Linda Darling-Hammond, is an education school professor who advised the Obama administration’s transition team; the other, Rick Hess, has been a critic of school districts and schools of education. We disagree on much, including big issues like merit pay for teachers and the best strategies for school choice.

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/12/06/opinion/how-to-rescue-education-reform.html?nl=todaysheadlines&emc=thab1

[dkf]

1. Maybe the point is that some kids will be left behind.

And it's just not fixable unless you fix their parents and their culture and their attitudes towards learning. I used to think teachers could do this for kids, but I've been disabused of that notion by the many teachers in this board.

Maybe that is what affluent parents provide for their kids that many people in poverty can't because they themselves don't possess it.

[groovedaddy]

2. Yep, Those aspects are fundamental and factor in such a critical way. Not addressing them

will only yield more of the same.

[YvonneCa]

3. Teachers can do a LOT. They just can't fix...

...everything and it takes time, commitment and great effort for teachers to have an impact. Problem is, NCLB undermines that...because it targets (as ineffective) the very teachers, usually in Title I schools, who are doing that very challenging work.

Teachers can, and are, making a big difference. But they are now leaving IN DROVES...or rejecting a career in education altogether...because of the punitive nature of NCLB/ESEA. (And it doesn't matter what it's called. )

[sulphurdunn]

4. The notion of "rescuing" education reform

is like telling me I need to rescue the 600lb. grizzly that's shaking me like a rag doll.

[Smarmie Doofus]

5. "Rescue" it? Jesus. n/t