Education policy waxes and wanes as a major policy interest in this country. We latch onto one big policy idea, poiticians make some big speeches and then we throw some legislation at it. Politics, financial contraints, and reality inevitably water down the original idea, until we hit a depression point and realize that nothing has changed. After a few years of nothing new, people start talking again and we begin the cycle of reform with new vigor.
Where are we right now?
No Child Left Behind has left us with a legacy of state standardized tests. These tests give us some rough measurements for showing how miserably we’re failing urban and poor kids, but doesn’t give us any tools for helping them out.
Michelle Rhee is still talking about politics, specifically the unions, as the primary cause of school problems. Nicholas Lemann has an article talking about Rhee and similar reformers who hope to bring about change through performance incentives, choice, and private options. There is still some chatter about school vouchers, but this brand of reform isn’t as hot as it was in the past.
Some people are focusing on the need for early childhood education and parenting reform as an essential first step for reform. The KIPP schools and their ilk are modeled on the premise that poor kids need to be re-programmed to behave like middle class kids. The kids from those programs don’t have a great track record, when removed from the highly structured, military-style schools.
Others are hating on the entire system of public education. Penelope Trunk’s homeschooling blog gives me a little insight in that sector.
The education policy geeks are flitting around with various new ideas, but I’m not seeing a clear winner right now.
I would like to see the model of highly regarded special education programs, like Ian’s program, being appied to urban schools. Special education programs have extremely small class size, ability-based instruction, therapy for weaknesses, and frequent meetings with parents. It’s expensive though, so it would be hard to implement on a large scale. Still, it would interesting to see how effective this model would work with a general population of needy kids.
Apt. 11d 
Frequent meetings with parents implies children with parents (plural) interested in coming to frequent meetings. I think that inner city public schools actually do a pretty good job of educating that kind of child. Certainly lots of Asian shopkeepers’ children in NYC go to inner city public schools and then go on to college and success in life.
LikeLike
It would be interesting to see the special education model applied to those with high needs for other reasons (poverty, trauma, foster care, . . . .). I’m not sure it would help, if the key failure for those kids is a lack of support and care at home. And, how would we measure success? People would agitate to measure success by the productiveness of the students, but presumably the special ed classes aren’t validated on those grounds.
Would a special ed class, even a great one, pass the test of having provided utilitarian benefits as defined in the reform movement (earnings, decrease in anti-social activity, . . . )?
LikeLike
I think that the focus on parents and their role in preparing/supporting students is evolving into the main issue in education reform.
The special ed model has a huge parent involvement component. I can observe Ian’s class once a month, if I choose. I meet with teachers at least four or five times per year. The teacher send home weekly newsletters and frequently send e-mails. There are frequent speakers who give evening talks about parenting and therapy. I have MUCH more contact with Ian’s teachers than Jonah’s teachers.
LikeLike
“I think that the focus on parents and their role in preparing/supporting students is evolving into the main issue in education reform.”
If so, that is likely to exacerbate educational inequality. As limited as schools are in their ability to address comparative deficits with which the students arrive from home, their ability to compel additional parental involvement for the kids who most need it will be even less (not to mention that the kids who need good parental involvement the most are disproportionately likely to not have parents whose involvement would be productive).
Have a nice day,
LikeLike
Flexible proficiency grouping that would allow “ability-based instruction” for all students would be better for ALL kids, and less costly.
I agree that more focus on increased parental involvement would likely exacerbate inequality. In fact, I am in the camp of those who believe it already has. How about assigning homework that doesn’t require a parent to research the internet or help with a poster, for example? I’d like to see that.
LikeLike
I’m not sure how providing more opportunites for parental involvement would increase inequality. There’s already a huge parental involvement gap. Middle class kids come to school with more school readiness skills and increase their abilities during summer breaks, while poor kids are missing out.
There is growing attention to this problem in education policy circles. How do we help parents give their kids certain skills, so that their kids learn more in school?
LikeLike
And providing “more opportunities for parental involvement” will, likely, have massively disproportionate benefits to those who already are on the “right” side of that huge parental involvement gap. The poor kids who are missing out will, disproportionately, not have parents who are able to take productive advantage of “more opportunities” for involvement. The existing parental involvement gap will likely be reinforced.
LikeLike
Some poor parents will continue to opt out, but others might not. Probably it would be the same poor parents who jump at opportunities for charter schools when given the chance.
I’ve focused on the idea of openning up the school to increase parental involvement. Others think we should assume that poor parents won’t be more involved no matter what, so their influence should be neutralized by increasing time away from their parents and spending more time in school from an early age.
LikeLike