What Do We Want from Education?

The choices have been clear for a long time. One side, though, seemed to have won within the last decade. As Elaine Weiss, writing for the Huffington Post, says, there has been “a philosophical shift from education as a critical tool to advance democracy to a consumer-oriented system of individual choice, achievement, and even profit.”…

Reign of Error: the important new book by Diane Ravitch

This is crossposted from Daily Kos at the request of Aaron Barlow: The testing, accountability, and choice strategies offer the illusion of change while changing nothing. They mask the inequity and injustice that are now so apparent in our social order. They do nothing to alter the status quo. They preserve the status quo. They…

What Will the Student-Loan Crisis Mean for Colleges?

Paul Solman of PBS, says “Student loan debt is actually a crushing burden for many, especially in the current jobless maybe-it-is/maybe-it-isn’t recovery.” Students now starting college–or a year or two away–are absolutely aware of that burden. Their choices are going to be determined by how much of it they are willing to take on. Their…