Uncovering Lasting Lessons from Decades of Education Reform
By John Thompson.
Learning from the Federal Market-based Reforms: Lessons for the Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA), edited by William Mathis and Tina Trujillo, details the numerous “opportunity costs” that resulted from a generation of test-driven, competition-driven reform. The money and energy devoted to the test, sort, reward, and punish approach to school improvement precluded a serious commitment to holistic and humane science-based efforts. The market-driven reform movement ignored decades of social science research. Often it has devolved into “magical thinking.”
Mike Rose begins the anthology by considering “how this economic focus, blended with the technology of large-scale assessment, can restrict our sense of what school ought to be about: the full sweep of growth and development, for both individuals and for a pluralistic democracy.” Rose notes that “this narrowing of discourse, this pinching of what we talk about when we talk about school,” has defined down what we discuss in the broader public sphere. He challenges us to, “Think of what we don’t read and hear.” He calls for:
Public talk that links education to a more decent, thoughtful, open society. Talk that raises in us as a people the appreciation for deliberation and reflection, or for taking intellectual risks and thinking widely—for the sheer power and pleasure of using our minds, alone or in concert with others. We need a discourse that inspires young people to think gracefully.
As Gary Orfield explains in “A New Civil Rights Agenda for American Education,” we must first Do No Additional Harm. We must reject the judging and punishing of teachers using metrics that are invalid and encourage teach-to-the-test. “We should fund no more intentionally segregating charter schools,” writes Uncovering Lasting Lessons from Decades of Education Reform - Living in Dialogue:
