Wars Of Attrition
Diane Ravitch has been having a bit of a battle with the charter school cheerleaders at KIPP (a battle I've happily joined). At issue is not whether KIPP's schools are "successful"; the question is whether KIPP has found the "secret sauce" that makes their teaching methods replicable on a large scale. Paul Thomas, Bruce Baker, andEd Fuller have much more on this.
See, it's much, much easier to teach kids when you only teach the ones who are compatible with your system. As Gerald Coles points out, there's now a great deal of evidence that KIPP does exactly this. No one should be surprised; Matt DiCarlo rightly makes the case that, in a climate of school "choice," it's inevitable that families will choose schools that are the right "fit" for their children. Why would anyone be surprised that many children
See, it's much, much easier to teach kids when you only teach the ones who are compatible with your system. As Gerald Coles points out, there's now a great deal of evidence that KIPP does exactly this. No one should be surprised; Matt DiCarlo rightly makes the case that, in a climate of school "choice," it's inevitable that families will choose schools that are the right "fit" for their children. Why would anyone be surprised that many children