Testing has become the end-all, be-all of the public education reform movement. The idea seems quite sensible, that holding students (and teachers) to certain objective standards incentivizes both of these stakeholders to work harder and achieve their goals. It also seems reasonable to use the results of those tests as measures of the quality of [...]

Some time ago I wrote a blog post in which I argued, contrary to the current political wisdom (is that an oxymoron?) and education policy that the problem with public education in America is not lousy teachers or failing schools. Rather, failing students are the problem, specifically, students we enter the public school system wholly [...]

I love it when I'm right (a rarity, some would argue), or rather, when there is compelling evidence supporting a controversial position I've taken. This post is one of those moments. I have argued in previous posts that the billions of dollars being spent on public education reform at the school level, if not a [...]

Making sure children have the academic knowledge and skills necessary for educational and career success is a hot topic these days all along the education and child development food chains. At the bottom, reform efforts have included overhauling school curricula, increasing teacher quality, reducing class size, and providing laptop computers to all students. At the [...]

Some recent news out of the bizarro world of public education caused me to have a John McEnroe moment (for those of you who didn't follow his illustrious and animated tennis career, the statement, "You cannot be serious!," is one of his most famous tirades against the injustice of an allegedly bad line call). And [...]

We have been hearing a constant drumbeat from politicians, policy wonks, and pundits that America's public education system is losing the educational "arms race" against other countries around the world. These advocates for reform use the widely reported results of testing of students from dozens of countries showing that U.S. students have gone from world [...]

To his credit, Davis Guggenheim’s new documentary Waiting for Superman has generated real buzz far outside the usual sphere of policy wonks, professional educators, and concerned parents. Unfortunately, to his fault, his film is also a biased, revisionist, and propagandist take on what really ails public education in America, rife with self-serving anecdotes, cherry picking [...]

S.T.E.M. is one of the acronyms du jour in the current public education debate. It stands for Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics, which represent, some argue, the four areas that act as the foundation for America maintaining its preeminent position as world leaders in innovation and technological advancement. Some education reformers  believe that these four [...]

For those of you who follow my education-related posts (here is a primer), you know I'm no fan of testing in public schools as it is currently conceived and used. In my view, the cart is firmly before the horse, where the horse of quality education is being pulled by the cart of testing rather [...]

There's a whole lot of talk and even more money being bandied about these days in the name of public education reform (read public education for the poor). And some of the words that cause educators' hearts to go "THUMP, THUMP" (some with excitement, others with trepidation) are accountability, testing, value-added, and charter schools. Unfortunately, [...]