It is election day and in some cases it appears that political offices are contested with a strong emphasis on differences of opinion in how children should be educated. The high profile examples are typically in large cities and are not about those wanting to gain office as a member of the school board, but mayors making a pitch for one or another approach to education. Like many political processes outside money comes to bear in supporting the various candidates and it can be difficult to understand just why this money is being made available. Is it really about educating the children? Why is this an issue in urban areas, but not in most smaller communities where the mayor’s position on educational policy is seldom an issue? If you read Ravitch (and I have), she suggests that contrary to the typical argument that underperforming schools are the result of underperforming faculty, she suggests that the issues are far broader and deal with general issues of poverty and lack of social support. Her message is that blaming the schools is actually a way to provide those unaffected by poor life circumstances even more advantages often rewarding the business sector in the process. The sample news of the day from Boston captures this dispute quite accurately.
Both candidates say their policies are aimed at closing the achievement gap separating white students from blacks and Latinos.
And their fight mirrors, in some respects, a roiling, decades-long national debate over how best to address that gap.
The market-based reform movement has, for years now, had a strong hold on the education establishment. It infused President George W. Bush’s No Child Left Behind law and President Obama’s Race to the Top legislation.
Its patrons include Microsoft billionaire Bill Gates, who has funded reform efforts across the country, and some of the country’s highest profile mayors: New York’s Michael Bloomberg and Chicago’s Rahm Emanuel among them.
But the movement has spawned strong critics, too — none so forceful as New York University professor Diane Ravitch, who served in President George H.W. Bush’s administration and initially embraced standards-based reform.
