Two Education Crises: Which is Fake, Which Real?
Last week there were two important studies released. One tells us that the international test data used to declare our schools broken and uncompetitive is bogus. The other tells us we have a very different crisis we should be concerned about: the percent of students who are engaged and excited about school drops dramatically between elementary and high school. The policies being pursued to fight the first, phony crisis are likely to be making our real problem of declining student engagement worse.
When "no excuses" reformers like Michelle Rhee or Bill Gates want to justify their demands for policy shifts in our schools, the first card they play is the one that says our schools are failing in comparison to those of our international rivals. Michelle Rhee's StudentsFirst ran TV ads last summer that depicted our students as an out of shape athlete bumbling around on a gym mat. Bill Gates on Oprah a few years ago asserted that if we could get rid of all the nation's "bad teachers," our scores would rise to the top of the world rankings.
But researchers have long been skeptical about these rankings, and careful investigation by Martin Carnoy and Richard Rothstein have confirmed that our standings are quite respectable. Our international standings are
When "no excuses" reformers like Michelle Rhee or Bill Gates want to justify their demands for policy shifts in our schools, the first card they play is the one that says our schools are failing in comparison to those of our international rivals. Michelle Rhee's StudentsFirst ran TV ads last summer that depicted our students as an out of shape athlete bumbling around on a gym mat. Bill Gates on Oprah a few years ago asserted that if we could get rid of all the nation's "bad teachers," our scores would rise to the top of the world rankings.
But researchers have long been skeptical about these rankings, and careful investigation by Martin Carnoy and Richard Rothstein have confirmed that our standings are quite respectable. Our international standings are
