Evidence-Driven versus Evidence-Influenced Education Policy
Conservative "reformer" Rick Hess demonstrated the best short-term tactic for dealing with amateurs who feel free to editorialize about public schools without having a clue about what they are pontificating about. Yes, the New York Times' Tom Friedman's "man crush" on Arne Duncan is illustrative of way Op Ed writers feel free to pass on educational policy analyses that are the equivalent of cocktail party talk. On the other hand, we must do more than ridicule journalists who are not on the education beat. To help them understand school improvement issues, we must devise a fair definition of the two schools of thought in our educational debate.
The contemporary data-driven school "reform" movement emerged during the Lee Atwater/Dick Morris