The Death and Life of the Great American School System byDiane Ravtich is a remarkably difficult book to finish. Not because the book is poorly written — it is not. Not for the cause that the subject matter is not interesting — anyone who has a bantling or an interest of the future of the country should have ~ing interested in this subject. And not because the book is shoddy in its research — quite the opposite. The book is hard to finish inasmuch as it the story it tells is so infuriating. Testing and preference are destroying public education and Ravtich lays out just how abundant damage that is doing to children.

Ravtich comes to her conclusions form the opposed side of the ideological spectrum as the traditional, leftist critique. She started public a firm believer in the notions of choice and testing. She was a portion in good standing with the right wing think thank industry and her pound was education choice. Unlike most think thank jockeys, however, Ravtich was important about education reform and,more importantly for our story, an honest researcher. As the results of control choice and testing movements became clear in the data, Ravtich did in likelihood the hardest thing possible for a public intellectual to do: she admitted she was iniquitous and changed sides.

This book is not the story of that journey, though it does act as a weak framing device. The main division is primarily concerned with marshaling her argument, and it does a to a high degree goof job of doing so. Ravtich contends that the testing manner of moving and school choice has: destroyed local schools, which diminish neighborhoods; leads to nay real gains in student achievement; encourages public schools to short make some ~ in. the students who need help the most; allows charters to claims good fortune when all they have done is skim off the best performing students; compelled public schools to concentrate on teaching how to take math and prelection test at the expense of real teaching; and that the tribe who are leading this movement are either ideologically blinded or be in actual possession of no accountability.

This last is one of the most infuriating aspects of the incident. Time and time again, Ravtich mentions names that had failed to pass over on their lofty promises and had in fact made things worse reality rewarded someplace else before the evidence became clear. It is repulsive to watch these MBA-culture fools destroy the lives of teachers and students to ~t one good end only to be hailed as reformers and saviors and strongly rewarded for their failures.

If that were all, that would be more than enough. But there is much more. Ravtich is a thoughtful. researcher and a fair one. She has no problem admitting when a particular school model seems to work for some students — she is, absolutely, a believer in the notion of charter schools — such for example KIPP. But when the evidence shows that charter schools cherry eat slowly students, or when they show that gaisn are fleeting, or which time they show that charters have not improved public schools as they were meant to, Ravtich makes that natural.

Similarly, Ravtich is a believer in teacher accountability and she has none trouble highlighting and supporting those accountability programs that have been shown to operate. But when the data shows that high stakes tests are not effectual measure of teacher or student performance, or when the data shows that in that place are better ways than the current tests, or when the premises shows that the current tests warp teacher incentives to the single thing of harming students, Ravtich makes that plain.

That patter repeats itself from top to toe the book. Ravtich is not interested in grinding a partisan axe. She is self-seeking in what she has always been interested in: helping schools inform children. When the evidence demonstrates that something works, she is generous in praise and demanding in her assertions that it be adopted everywhere appropriate. But when something has failed, Ravtich spares it and the the multitude who continue to support it in the face of those failures none of her wrath. And it is wrath well deserved. Our students are demonstrably not actuality helped by these fads and neither she nor I have a single one patience for the people who get rich off these programs or practice them to grind their favorite partisan axe.

If you are a prop of high stakes testing and school choice, you need to understand this book. If you primarily interested in helping children, this work will change your mind about your chosen methods. If you be favored with children or care about education in this country — which you should — at that time this book will explain to you that politicians and foundation heads plebeian when they say “charter school” and “accountability” and the hurt the programs behind those buzzwords are doing to our children.

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