Saturday, February 25, 2012

School Tech Connect: Arne Duncan's Genie

School Tech Connect: Arne Duncan's Genie:

Arne Duncan's Genie

This is the thing he let out of the bottle with Race to the Top. It's the bureaucratic expression of America's worst impulses. And, as has been pointed out over and over, you'll notice that none of the private schools where the elites send their kids are doing anything like this, including the elite private school where Rahm Emanuel sends his own children.

It's not the teaching. I've spent a third of my career in private schools: the teaching runs the same range as it does everywhere else. There are experienced people and new people. There are naturally gifted teachers and those who work at it. As with lawyers and physicians, some are better than others.


It's the decisions made by policy-makers that are destroying public education. What we need is regularly