The Ed Reformers
I thought it might be a good idea to review who's out there and what they have been doing.
Of course, the Big Daddy of ed reform (for elected officials) is none other thanArne Duncan. He seems determined to stay (and stay the course) until the President leaves office. But Duncan is seeing his "my way or the highway" backfire on him as time has gone by. He rolled out Race to the Top to both lure and scare districts only to see that the heavy lift of applying made many districts turn away. I've had yet to hear a news story that has extolled the successes from RttT. As well, the rewriting of NCLB is likely to see the role of Secretary of Education diminish from the dizzying heights that Duncan took it to during his years as Secretary.
The private Big Daddy of ed reform is none other than Bill Gates. Looking at his work list, I think you can see a lot of "I created this group and this group and this data cloud" on and on. But what did he truly accomplish? It's difficult to discern beyond the biggie of Common Core which was built on his financing of it.
A recent NY Times op-ed by Nicholas Kristof tried to imagine the pillow talk of Mr. and Mrs. Gates.
By my conservative back-of-envelope calculations, the world has saved more than 33 million children’s lives since the foundation was established (although obviously the foundation doesn’t get all the credit). And Bill and Melinda Gates foresee the world saving 61 million children’s lives over the next 15 years with the right investments, as child death rates drop more quickly than they ever have in the history of the world.
That’s the amazing news. In contrast, they acknowledge, the foundation’s investments in education here in the United States haven’t paid off as well.
“There’s no dramatic change,” Bill acknowledged. “It’s not like under-5 mortality, where you see this dramatic improvement.”
I would agree with Mr. Gates; giving a child a vaccine is a pretty quick and easy save. Trying to understand what creates better public education is a much larger issue.
Naturally, they have joined the bandwagon of pre-k. Don't get me wrong, I think preschool is vital especially for at-risk students. But it always bringing a smile to my face imagining the memo that either got e-mailed or faxed about a year ago that said, "New talking point - preschool." The Gates say that now Seattle Schools Community Forum: The Ed Reformers:
