Notes on My Atlantic Profile of David Coleman
Today The Atlantic published my profile of David Coleman, the MicKinsey consultant turned education entrepreneur who is one of the school reform movement's most idealistic believers in the power of the traditional liberals arts as a social justice tool. Coleman is important because his ideas about what students should know (from modernist poetry to Euclid's "Elements") and do (more evidence-based, thesis-driven writing, and less personal narrative) are profoundly reshaping American education. Forty-eight states and territories have agreed to adopt the Common Core curriculum standards, which Coleman and his team helped construct. Now, as the incoming president of the College Board, Coleman hopes to rewrite the SAT to make it more of a test of the actual high school curriculum, moving it further away from the fiction that it measures some sort of innate "aptitude."
Coleman is also a delightful guy with whom I really enjoyed spending time. It isn't your usual cab ride when you
Coleman is also a delightful guy with whom I really enjoyed spending time. It isn't your usual cab ride when you