John Thompson: Diane Ravitch and the Long View of School Reform
Guest post by John Thompson.
Near the end of David Denby's New Yorker profile of Diane Ravitch (Public Defender), Denby quotes Ravitch saying, "If the testing vampire is slain, the whole facade of faux reform collapses. No test scores, no merit pay, no closing of schools by test scores."
Shouldn't people who cannot agree with Ravitch on anything else join her in repudiating high-stakes testing, and then see if her other positions prove correct?
Like Ravitch, I oppose merit pay, but I would not dig in my heels on it. If a younger generation of educators want performance pay, I'd push for another metric for estimating "performance" but I would not oppose it.
I will wait for Ravitch's new book before deciding how much I agree or disagree with her on charter schools, and whether they are driving privatization. If we are just debating charters as they currently exist, and not charter management organizations, I would not offend charter advocates by using the p-word. But, if we were just discussing the educational benefits of charters, would there be any evidence-based rationale for dramatically expanding them? And that is why I am anxious to read Ravitch's upcoming book. I am worried that she will
Near the end of David Denby's New Yorker profile of Diane Ravitch (Public Defender), Denby quotes Ravitch saying, "If the testing vampire is slain, the whole facade of faux reform collapses. No test scores, no merit pay, no closing of schools by test scores."
Shouldn't people who cannot agree with Ravitch on anything else join her in repudiating high-stakes testing, and then see if her other positions prove correct?
Like Ravitch, I oppose merit pay, but I would not dig in my heels on it. If a younger generation of educators want performance pay, I'd push for another metric for estimating "performance" but I would not oppose it.
I will wait for Ravitch's new book before deciding how much I agree or disagree with her on charter schools, and whether they are driving privatization. If we are just debating charters as they currently exist, and not charter management organizations, I would not offend charter advocates by using the p-word. But, if we were just discussing the educational benefits of charters, would there be any evidence-based rationale for dramatically expanding them? And that is why I am anxious to read Ravitch's upcoming book. I am worried that she will