Walt Gardner's Reality Check
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By June 4, 2010 at 8:37 AM

The release of new academic standards on June 2 marks the beginning of a new era in public education in this country. Critics contend that the detailed blueprint means the end of local control of schools, but it is a price worth paying. For one thing, the standards do not tell teachers exactly what to teach nor how to teach. Instead, they help teachers organize their lessons by providing clearer guidelines than existed in the past. Because the standards are written in more concrete language than before, teachers should welcome them as an aid in designing their lessons. For another, ...

By June 2, 2010 at 8:27 AM

Educational research is replete with different conclusions by prominent professors on the same controversial issue. The lack of agreement is healthy in academe, but it leaves taxpayers confused at a time when their understanding is vital for developing support for public policies. I was reminded of this by an essay in the Wall Street Journal on May 29 ("A Tale of Two Students"). The writer puts into human terms the importance of inspired teachers in changing the lives of disadvantaged students by focusing on two Hispanic students in Oklahoma City. One attended Santa Fe South High School, a charter school, ...

By May 31, 2010 at 7:22 AM

The successful lawsuit filed by black firefighters against New York City claiming that two entrance exams used in 1999 and 2002 intentionally discriminated against them surfaced once again on May 26 when a federal judge accused the city of obstructionism in redesigning the tainted exams ("Racial Bias in Fire Exams Can Lurk in the Details," July 24, 2009). There is a lesson to be learned from the controversy that applies to standardized test construction in general and to teacher certification in particular. The lesson boils down to the importance of collecting varied kinds of validity evidence in order to determine ...

By May 28, 2010 at 7:53 AM

Sooner or later, a new report by an entity with an impressive title will be released finding students in the U.S. once again coming up short against their counterparts in other countries around the globe. Predictably, the results will be seized on by critics as further evidence of the crisis afflicting schools here. But rankings don't tell the whole story by a long shot. Anyone who doubts this view needs to read Balancing Change and Tradition in Global Education Reform, edited by Iris C. Rotberg (Rowman & Littlefield, 2010). This second edition looks at education in 16 countries, including the ...

By May 26, 2010 at 7:54 AM

The long awaited trial of teacher unions in the court of public opinion has finally arrived. In the view of many, the day of reckoning is long overdue. They see teacher unions as self-serving entities that need to be found guilty for the damage they have done to the education of the young, and be punished accordingly. At the heart of the indictment is the proclamation that the U.S. spends more per student than any other country but gets little back commensurate with its investment. The alleged cause are teacher unions, which aid and abet mediocrity by protecting ineffective ...

By May 24, 2010 at 7:46 AM

Once eagerly awaited as a time of relaxation, summer this year for as many as 150,000 teachers nationwide will be a season of angst. That's because the recession has forced districts to issue pink slips even to teachers in once hard-to-fill subjects such as special education, chemistry, physics and math. The desperation is seen in the lopsided ratio of applicants to openings. This imbalance applies to traditional public schools as well as to charter schools. Recognizing the implications, the U.S. Senate has a pending bill aptly titled Keep Our Educators Working Act. The best estimate is that it ...

By May 21, 2010 at 7:47 AM

If there's one issue that has continued to frustrate educational reformers beyond all others over the decades, it's the existence of the academic achievement gap. More precisely, it's the difference in average performance between various social classes. Despite proclamations at the highest levels to eliminate the gap, the best that can be done is to narrow it. It's not that some students from disadvantaged backgrounds can't match the performance of their advantaged counterparts by hard work, parental support and stellar instruction. But high-blown rhetoric serves only to create unrealistic expectations for the overwhelming majority of public schools. The latest example ...

By May 19, 2010 at 7:46 AM

The U.S. is one of the few countries in the world that places virtually all the burden for learning on the shoulders of teachers. This notion is alien to teachers in most countries that are our competitors in the new global economy. Yet it gets scant attention from reformers. I was reminded of this by a front-page story in the New York Times on May 9 ("Guest-Teaching Chinese, and Learning America"). The reporter focused on the experience of a young Chinese teacher who is teaching her native language to students in Lawton, Oklahoma. The woman is one of about ...

By May 17, 2010 at 5:36 AM

This is the season for thousands of graduates of schools of higher learning to march down the aisle to receive their degrees. Whether the time, effort and money involved were worthwhile expenditures depend on what expectations graduates had when they made their decision to apply for admission. If the primary reason was to land a well-paying job right off the bat in today's economy, they are going to be in for a rude awakening. But contrary to popular opinion, this disappointment is new only in terms of severity. Education was never intended to be preparation exclusively for employment. The author ...

By May 14, 2010 at 6:16 AM

The recent news from Washington D.C. and New York City serves as a strong rebuttal to the charge that teacher unions are obstacles to school reform. In both districts, the respective unions agreed to change the rules on how teachers are evaluated. The implications for other districts, large and small, should not be underestimated. Under the new system, standardized test scores will constitute a significant portion of the basis for determining teacher effectiveness. The weight given to progress made on these tests varies from district to district, but the fact that teacher unions took a more flexible stance after ...

The opinions expressed in Walt Gardner's Reality Check are strictly those of the author(s) and do not reflect the opinions or endorsement of Editorial Projects in Education, or any of its publications.

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