Wednesday, February 26, 2014

2-26-14 @ The Chalk Face

@ THE CHALK FACE:






Thanks to @MelissaGuion and @AOBFound for their visit.
If you’re in the DC area and you care at all about books, especially children’s books, I’m sure you’ve been to Politics and Prose. Right? One of the last, great independent bookstores. I’ve been going there for years. When I walk into the children’s section, they always seem to be reading my mind and I […]


New Orleans Recovery School District *Choice*
The state-run Recovery School District (RSD) in New Orleans is about appearance, not truth. It is about control, not choice. I have written extensively on the “RSD success” illusion. It is an illusion that has come to the New Orleans community at great cost. Below is a firsthand account of life in the RSD written by […]


The Middle School Mess and How Reform Made It Worse
The Washington Post’s Emma Brown recently explained something that has been lost on reformers in Washington D.C. and elsewhere. Teaching in high-poverty middle schools has always been challenging. But, the extreme proliferation of choice has created intense concentrations of children from generational poverty who have endured extreme trauma. Now that less than a quarter of […]

Crisis In Education!
I hate to be the voice of bad news, but the U.S. must face a CRISIS IN EDUCATION! When students in the U.S. are compared to students in other countries, they simply do not measure up. U.S. teachers are central to student achievement, but “a discouraging number of them are incompetents.” The top students in […]


“Hunting Scapegoats”: WWII Literacy Crisis and Current Education Reform

“Hunting Scapegoats”: WWII Literacy Crisis and Current Education Reform. via “Hunting Scapegoats”: WWII Literacy Crisis and Current Education Reform.
2-25-14 @ The Chalk Face
@ THE CHALK FACE: A Liberal and a Conservative Reach Remarkable Agreement on Edu-PhilanthropyRichard Kahlenberg moderated a discussion between Joanne Barkan and Rick Hess at the Shanker Institute.  As it turned out, no moderator was needed. By the end of the conversation, there was a remarkable consensus about the overreach of foundations.    Barkan kicked the discussion off with a historical anal