Rejecting False Claims about Education: A Primer for Journalists
One thing (but not the only thing) I have learned about doing public work as an academic is that I am often positioned as the responder, and thus criticizing someone else’s claim. The result is that many are quick to refute my criticism as just that—so much griping—and those voices often demand that I offer some alternative, a valid response. Although I must note that in the mainstream media, I am often given only about 750 words and one shot at the topic.
Here, in the confines of my blog, however, I can take more time and come back to topics as often as I see fit. My recent examination of the dysfunctional relationship between journalists covering education and the field of education (see here, here, here, and here) cannot be complete, then, without offering both the central false claims that dominate how the media characterizes public schools and credible education reform along with evidence-based alternatives to those claims.
Below, let me outline some prominent myths and the more complicated realities about the historical and current state of public education in the U.S. and the need for a different vision of education reform in the context of long-ignored social reform.
Myth: Education is the great equalizer.
Lets start with semantics—how we make claims. As most people use “education is the great equalizer,” the claim suggests we have already accomplished this; however, in reality, educational attainment does not equalize in the context of race, social class, and gender.
A tremendous amount of evidence shows that greater educational attainment will give a person advantages within race, class, or gender, but not among race, class, and gender. As just a couple of graphic examples (see research linked above):
Instead of “education is the great equalizer,” we must begin to argue “education should be Rejecting False Claims about Education: A Primer for Journalists – the becoming radical:
