April, 2008

Reply to Strong

by Sol Stern
The Conversation
April 24th, 2008

It’s sad that Michael Strong has to end what has been a useful debate by egregiously distorting my position on the best strategies for school reform. He starts his critique by claiming that I believe that “the possibility of significantly better education [is] utopian.” In fact, throughout this exchange, [...]

Read: Reply to Strong

Understanding How Educational Freedom Improves Education

by Michael Strong
The Conversation
April 23rd, 2008

Richard Rothstein is concerned that
If we deregulate the teacher market, we will undoubtedly attract some very high quality teachers who might not have made it through the certification hoops. We will also attract some incompetents, who will do serious harm to our children. How many of the latter are we willing to tolerate in [...]

Read: Understanding How Educational Freedom Improves Education

Why Not Use What We Already Know?

by Sol Stern
The Conversation
April 23rd, 2008

Since Richard Rothstein has nothing to say about the criticisms I made in my last post, I see nothing useful in raising those points again. I would only note that he now takes his determinist view about the possibility of in-school reforms raising the achievement of disadvantaged children to new heights (or should I say [...]

Read: Why Not Use What We Already Know?

Deregulating Smart

by Frederick Hess
The Conversation
April 23rd, 2008

I find myself in accord with Mr. Rothstein on several counts. We agree that it is naïve to imagine that underlying social conditions will not influence student performance, that it would be a mistake to debate the merits of any proposed domestic policy agenda primarily in terms of the educational consequences, and that it is [...]

Read: Deregulating Smart

If “The Poor Will Always Be with Us,” So Too Will Low Test Scores

by Richard Rothstein
The Conversation
April 22nd, 2008

Frederick Hess’ latest contribution misunderstands my position in one respect: I would never suggest, and have never suggested, that the social and economic reforms I mentioned should be supported primarily because they would raise student achievement. There are many reasons, for example, to want to ensure that children have adequate health care besides the fact [...]

Read: If “The Poor Will Always Be with Us,” So Too Will Low Test Scores

The Danger of Grand “Fixes”

by Frederick Hess
The Conversation
April 21st, 2008

I found Mr. Rothstein’s discussion of the various critiques somewhat less convincing than his initial essay primarily on two counts. Allowances should be made in light of the fact that he was asked to address three discordant responses and, given that Mr. Strong and Mr. Stern have already weighed in, I will try to fashion [...]

Read: The Danger of Grand “Fixes”

Against Education Utopias

by Sol Stern
The Conversation
April 19th, 2008

Michael Strong and Richard Rothstein have more in common than they are ever likely to acknowledge. Each of them seems to have largely given up on the prospect of significant achievement gains for disadvantaged children within the nation’s existing education system. Instead of offering a practical answer to the forum’s question — “Can the Schools [...]

Read: Against Education Utopias

Teens in Crisis

by Michael Strong
The Conversation
April 18th, 2008

I am delighted that Richard Rothstein acknowledges the ways in which cultural influences undermine teen learning and that “it is reasonable to speculate that our high school organization is flawed.” Analyses of American education that fail to acknowledge that we have an especially severe problem at the secondary level strike me as surreal. For some [...]

Read: Teens in Crisis

Response to the Responses

by Richard Rothstein
The Conversation
April 17th, 2008

First, thank you to the editors of Cato Unbound for inviting me to comment on the 25th anniversary of A Nation at Risk, and then inviting me further to respond to reactions by Sol Stern, Michael Strong, and Frederick Hess.
My initial comment asserted that the analysis of A Nation at Risk was flawed in three [...]

Read: Response to the Responses

Where Do We Go Now?

by Frederick Hess
Reaction Essay
April 14th, 2008

Frederick Hess, the Director of Education Policy Studies at the American Enterprise Institute, concedes the premises of Richard Rothstein’s argument but contests their implications for the future of education. According to Hess, the key failing of A Nation at Risk was its too-easy acceptance of “the familiar institutions and practices of K-12 schooling.” As a consequence, the nature of teaching and teacher education has barely changed, despite deep changes in the broader labor market. And even the school choice movement has fallen victim to “the dangers of trying to paste preferred policies atop existing arrangements.” Hess concludes that “we must reject both excuse-mongering and overwrought hyperbole in favor of a steely willingness to revisit the shopworn assumptions and tired verities that have so long characterized school reform on the left and the right.”

Read: Where Do We Go Now?

A Tale of Two Rothsteins

by Sol Stern
Reaction Essay
April 11th, 2008

The Manhattan Institute’s Sol Stern detects “two Richard Rothsteins.” The first praises the public schools for improving student performance and for narrowing inequalities in student achievement. The second argues that nothing further can be done by the schools; for added progress we need other forms of social and political reform. “Either schools are able to significantly overcome family and neighborhood deficits that children bring to the classroom (and therefore ought to be judged by that standard) or they cannot be expected to overcome the social and economic deficits,” Stern writes. “But [Rothstein] perversely insists on having it both ways.” In stark contrast, Stern argues that test scores have become worse, that schools bear the responsibility, but that they can improve through a regime of standards.

Read: A Tale of Two Rothsteins

The Freedom to Innovate and the Future of Education

by Michael Strong
Reaction Essay
April 9th, 2008

In his reply, education entrepreneur Michael Strong challenges Rothstein’s key claims about the success of public schools and their relative unimportance for the further economic advance of the poor. He argues that the attachment to the status quo system of public education is “irrational.” Drawing on his experience as the principal of a successful charter school, Strong emphasizes the importance of the freedom to innovate. “The first nation that creates an educational system that allows educational entrepreneurs significant freedom to innovate will, over time, develop a significant advantage in the global marketplace. I’d prefer that the U.S. lead this movement rather than follow it.”

Read: The Freedom to Innovate and the Future of Education

“A Nation at Risk” Twenty-Five Years Later

by Richard Rothstein
Lead Essay
April 7th, 2008

Twenty-five years ago this month, a Reagan-appointed blue-ribbon committee published a blockbuster study, A Nation at Risk, about the sorry state of American education. In this month’s lead essay, the Economic Policy Institute’s Richard Rothstein gives his critical assessment. “In 1983, A Nation at Risk misidentified what is wrong with our public schools and, consequently, set the nation on a school reform crusade that has done more harm than good,” Rothstein writes. “The diagnosis … was flawed in three respects: First, it wrongly concluded that student achievement was declining. Second, it placed the blame on schools for national economic problems over which schools have relatively little influence. Third, it ignored the responsibility of the nation’s other social and economic institutions for learning.”

Read: “A Nation at Risk” Twenty-Five Years Later