The Questions Education Reformers Aren’t Asking

[Are_grits_groceries]

Education is moving to domestic policy center stage. The first round of competition for federal “Race to the Top” funds is over, and that competition generated a flurry of school reform activity across the nation. Fifteen states and the District of Columbia were selected and are now preparing for a winnowing round two.
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So far, our discussions and debates about education have been focused on these particulars, frequently sparking more heat than light. But there seems to be little alternative thinking in the approach to school reform itself. And both elite and mainstream media have pretty much fallen in line with the reigning policy talk about the problems with our schools and how to fix them. As well, no one in power is asking the more fundamental questions like:

What is the purpose of education in a democracy, and are our reforms enhancing—or possibly restricting—that purpose?

Mike Rose wrote the following essays over the last year to address some of these broader questions:
Part One: Education ‘Miracles’ Don’t Survive Scrutiny
Despite a childhood of incantations and incense, of holy cards and stories of crutches being tossed, I don’t believe in miracles. So it is with less than wonderment that I watch as a language of miracles—along with a search for academic cure-alls and magic bullets—infuses our educational discourse and policy.

More: http://www.truthdig.com/dig/item/questions_education_reformers_arent_asking_20100318/

The first essay is enlightening. He addresses "cures" such as Teach for America and other ideas.

[rurallib]

1. When I was a young man getting my teaching certificate

some 40 years ago, there were variations of these cure-alls all around. One reason we hear little of them today is that they did not work over the long haul.
As schools continue to battle to educate children with dwindling funds and meddling politicians looking for the limelight it seems like everyone is ready to glom on to the next 'miracle' cure.
As a friend of mine noted, you can predict the school's performance almost right in line with its socio-economic status.

[zipplewrath]

2. Learning takes time

Most of the rest of the industrialized nations get this. Learning takes time. The joke when I was in high school was that if the kids spent half the time on their homework, as they did on the basketball court, we'd have a nation of Rhode Scholars. I suspect the day it'd be the same joke, only about the Gameboy.

I heard a teacher say once that the vast majority of learning came outside of the classroom, and that was the one area that she couldn't control. I suspect there is more truth there than any of the reformers would like to admit.