The Difference between a $10,000 Education and a $10 Education
Amanda Ripley recently picked on Diane Ravitch over the issue of how much poverty matters in educational achievement, accusing Ravitch of distorting the reality. By playing with the PISA data, Ripley tries to prove that poverty should not be considered a big problem or excuse for the poor quality of American education. That was what I thought at first, then upon reading more of her writings, I realized that she was trying to prove a bigger point: American education sucks and other countries are great. Not exactly an earth-shattering or groundbreaking observation from new data or fresh insights. ...