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Top down
education "reforms": mere alterations with no evidence than
improvements will accrue
By William Phillis
During the past couple decades, politicians and other non-educators
have hurled education reform packages at public school boards,
administrators and teachers with the warning that if they oppose any of
the packages, they will be labeled as obstructionists in support of the
status quo. Generally speaking, the public education community has
attempted to implement the "reforms" foisted upon them.
Sadly, many, if not most, of the recent "reforms" are ill-advised and
punitive. To reform means to alter the form of or to form again. Most
people think that reform and improvement are the same, and therefore do
not want to stand in the way of improvement. But the public education
community has been snookered by many of the so-called politically
motivated "reforms".
Many of the "reforms" handed down from politicians, corporate folks and
other non-educators merely fashion public education in their own image.
The "reforms" such as No Child Left Behind, charter schools, vouchers,
Race to the Top, high stakes testing and parent trigger have NOT
improved education. Many of the "reforms" are designed to shatter the
image of public education. They are designed to label traditional
public schools as failures.
Some of the "reforms" have removed the love of learning and the joy of
teaching from the classroom. They have primarily shunned the wants and
needs of students. They are premised on top-down designed curricula and
multiple high stakes testing to punish those who fail. They ignore and
thus perpetuate inequities inherent in poverty, segregation and racism.
It is time the entire public education community draws a line in the
sand. Children are being hurt. For example, think about the thousands
of Ohio students getting their "education" from the Electronic
Classroom of Tomorrow, Ohio Virtual Academy and other failed charters.
Think about the class time lost in public schools classrooms in the
testing debacle. Think about the lost educational opportunities due to
the state's unconstitutional school funding system.
Think about all the time wasted to secure funding from Race to the Top
and the Ohio Straight A Fund. These funds should be devoted to all
children in the common school system.
The abyss created by the politicians, corporate gurus and other
non-educators started in the 1980s when public education became a
political football. The National Commission on Excellence in
Education's research-void Nation at Risk report was a political
statement. There was no basis for such phrases as "our nation is at
risk", "rising tide of mediocrity", and "committing an act of
unthinking, unilateral educational disarmament."
Those inflammatory phrases resonated with many as the cause of an
economy that was tanking. It was the stuff that supported political
agendas.
Nearly a decade after the Nation at Risk report, the U.S. Secretary of
Energy commissioned the Sandia Laboratories to study public education.
The subsequent report did not corroborate the Nation at Risk report. It
was nearly a polar opposite. But the Sandia report was buried for
political reasons. Political and corporate leaders had a choice agenda.
The goal was to erode public confidence in the public common school.
In 1989 an education summit was convened at the University of Virginia.
Education must have been too important to leave to educators, because
not one educator was included in the summit. The shape of the future of
American education was determined without even one educator being in
the room.
Meanwhile back at the Ohio ranch, the President of the United States
came to Columbus Ohio on November 25, 1991 at the invitation of
Governor George Voinovich to speak about education. The President's
pronouncement: a voucher for every student!
Voinovich, with his pal and campaign contributor David Brennan (who has
extracted one billion dollars from Ohio school districts for his mostly
failing charter schools), started Ohio down the choice road-an effort
that is primarily a "reform" failure. The rest is history.
Some in the public education community are beginning to push back on
these top down "reforms." It is time for an objective debate about the
current "reform" agenda with public school educators being allowed to
participate.
William Phillis
Ohio E & A
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