Reign Of Error

Reign Of Error

Sometimes in the course of human events you get a book that
exposes an evil so completely and pursuasively it can't be ignored.
Think Uncle Tom's Cabin and slavery. Think Silent Spring and
pesticides. Hopefully Diane Ravitch's Reign of Error: The Hoax of
the Privatization Movement and the Danger to America's Public Schools
can do a similar consciousness raising for education under the tyranny
of standardized tests and the peril of for profit charters.
We're hearing a lot of gloom and doom when it comes to American
public education. Our kids are being outscored by most of the world
on international tests. Despite our pouring gazillions of dollars
into them, our schools are performing abysmally. Because of this our
way of life is in jeopardy. We must waste no time in finding and
rewarding teachers and schools that can boost those all important test
scores and winnowing out those who can't.
Ravitch debunks these fears. When numbers are looked at
correctly we're doing just fine in relation to the rest of the world.
In fact some countries who boast ultra high scores send their kids
whose parents can afford it to America so they can learn by creative
techniques rather than rote memorization. Yes, there are some schools
and districts that are lagging behind the rest. By some strange
coincidence those are the ones with the largest concentrations of poor
and minority children.
Ravitch exposes the strange double speak of the bureaucratic
Chicken Littles (remember the sky is falling down) among us.
Educational "reformers" are in favor of privatization, rather than
improvement of education. Oops, people don't like the word
privatization. So let's call it "choice". "Merit pay" rewards
teachers who bring test scores up the most. Only that achievement
seems to have a lot to do with having students who are't poor,
minority, or disabled. Even different cohorts of students can make
one year's outstanding teacher the next year's in need of
improvement. Tenure for teachers is claimed to make it impossible to
get rid of the bad ones. In preK to 12 world it merely is a guarantee
of due process. I could go forever. You're lucky. I won't.
Basically a lot of people are putting too much time and money
into convincing us that our public schools are in such bad shape they
need to be drastically altered or euthanized and replaced. Ravitch
shows that the danger (other than that posed by poverty, something
that education's saviors refuse to tackle) comes instead from those
who want to "reform" it. No Child Left Behind and Race To The Top set
increasingly unrealistic test score standards, setting up all schools
for failure. Recall how this is the year all students, regardless of
disability, poverty, or level of familiarity with English, are
supposed to score as proficient. (In what state is this going to
happen? Certainly not in Maine.). It sets the stage for shifting
students and funding to largely unregulated for profit schools,
eventually crippling if not destroying the most egalitarian schooling
we're capable of.
Fortunately Ravitch does not think it's too late to fight back.
She tells us what kids need to become happy and productive citizens.
She ends the book with this charge to all who truly care about
children and education.
"Despite its faults, the American system of democratically
controlled schools has been the mainstay of our communities and the
foundation for our nation's success. We must work together to improve
our public schools. We must extend the promise of equal educational
opportunity to all the children of our nation. Protecting our public
schools against privatization and saving them for future generations
of American children is the civil rights issue of our time."
On a personal note, I'm really excited. An op ed piece I wrote about
the dangers of basing education on international competition and the
need to shift to international cooperation will be in the Bangor Daily
News any day now. I feel like a little kid waiting for Santa to arrive.
A great big shout out goes out to all who strive valiently to protect
our schools from the all too wide spread Reign of Error.
Julia Emily Hathaway



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