Key flaw in market-based school reform: a misunderstanding of the civil rights struggle:

Key flaw in market-based school reform: a misunderstanding of the civil rights struggle

By Valerie Strauss, Published: August 5 at 4:00 amE-mail the writer

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There is a timely new book out with a succinct title that pretty much says it all: “Public Education Under Siege,” edited by University of Pennsylvania historian Michael B. Katz and UCLA education scholar Mike Rose. The book is divided into three parts: the first about the problems with technocratic educational reform; the second about the intersection of education, race, and poverty; and the third, alternatives of modern school reform. It’s worth your time.

Here is a version of one of the book’s essays, by Janelle Scott, an associate professor in the Graduate School of Education and African American Studies Department at the University of California at Berkeley.

By Janelle Scott

For at least two decades, conservatives have argued that school choice was the last unachieved civil right.  In 2010, some powerful moderate voices echoed their view and invoked the name of Rosa Parks to support it.  At an early screening of the documentary