On The Death Of Childhood And The Destruction Of Public Schools

No matter what he's called, Gerald Bracey IS public schools' best defender. And in this book, he uses his considerable writing and research skills on their behalf.

The Big Con in Education is the shocking exposé that details how public schools are used as convenient scapegoats for social and economic woes-woes perpetuated not in schoolyards, but in the halls of Congress and in the boardrooms of the Fortune 500. Author Dennis W. Redovich debunks leading business and political interests who blame economic problems on an inadequate workforce, claiming that schools are not educating children with the life skills needed in the twenty-first century. Using the United States government's own statistics, The Big Con in Education uncovers the lies trumpeted in the media about the serious shortage of "skilled workers" and the subsequent economic decline. It also illustrates a lack of credible rationale to claim that all students need to take higher-level courses in academic subjects to prepare to enter the workforce. Redovich contends that supply-side education and training does not produce high-paying jobs any more than does failed supply-side economics. The Big Con in Education documents the hype, propaganda, and hypocrisy big business and political propagandists dish out in a war against public education. Redovich offers his views on the important facts concerning the reality of the job situation that faces the country.

No topic sparks an argument faster among the American public, even with relatively apolitical people, than how their children are taught. In schools across the country, school boards, parents, teachers, and students themselves debate issues ranging from charter schools, to the first amendment rights of students, to the efficacy of the No Child Left Behind Act. School districts in Georgia and Pennsylvania have seen battles over the teaching of evolution; places as diverse as Colorado, Washington, and Kentucky have had debates over how best to protect children while at school. Battleground: Schools provides an in-depth, balanced overview of these controversial topics and enables teachers, students, and their parents to better understand the foundations of these conflicts.

Advancing a three-fold political agenda, this volume: * illuminates how the meanings assigned to a whole vocabulary of words and phrases frequently used to discuss the role and reform of U.S. public schools reflect an essentially economic view of the world; * contends that education or educational reform conducted under an economized worldview will only intensify the effects of the colonial relations of political and economic domination that it breeds at home and abroad; and * offers a set of alternative concepts and meanings for reformulating the role of U.S. public schools and for considering the implications of such a reformulation more generally for the underlying premises of all human relationships and activities. Toward these ends, the authors, in Part I, critically examine many of the most commonly used terms within the rhetoric of educational reform since the early 1980s and before. Part II links today's economized worldview to curricular and instructional issues. These essays are especially important for comprehending how the organization of school curriculum privileges those disciplines deemed most central to market expansion--math and science--and how the political centrality of the economic sphere influences the nature of the knowledge presented in specific content areas. Given that language constrains as well as advances human thought, the twin tasks of de-economizing education and decolonizing society will require a vocabulary that transcends the familiar terminologies addressed in Parts I and II. The entries in Part III cultivate the beginnings of such a vocabulary as the authors elucidate innovative concepts which they view as central to the creation of truly alternative educational visions and practices.

Advancing a three-fold political agenda, this volume: * illuminates how the meanings assigned to a whole vocabulary of words and phrases frequently used to discuss the role and reform of U.S. public schools reflect an essentially economic view of the world; * contends that education or educational reform conducted under an economized worldview will only intensify the effects of the colonial relations of political and economic domination that it breeds at home and abroad; and * offers a set of alternative concepts and meanings for reformulating the role of U.S. public schools and for considering the implications of such a reformulation more generally for the underlying premises of all human relationships and activities. Toward these ends, the authors, in Part I, critically examine many of the most commonly used terms within the rhetoric of educational reform since the early 1980s and before. Part II links today's economized worldview to curricular and instructional issues. These essays are especially important for comprehending how the organization of school curriculum privileges those disciplines deemed most central to market expansion--math and science--and how the political centrality of the economic sphere influences the nature of the knowledge presented in specific content areas. Given that language constrains as well as advances human thought, the twin tasks of de-economizing education and decolonizing society will require a vocabulary that transcends the familiar terminologies addressed in Parts I and II. The entries in Part III cultivate the beginnings of such a vocabulary as the authors elucidate innovative concepts which they view as central to the creation of truly alternative educational visions and practices.

The Unacknowledged Disaster concerns two huge and closely-tied but widely ignored problems that plague the U.S. On the one hand, America tolerates a massive amount of youth poverty, while on the other, youth poverty is the major social factor generating failure in the country’s education. (More than one-fifth of American youths are now impoverished–a poverty rate far worse than those for American adults or the elderly and more than twice the size of youth poverty rates in other advanced nations–and poverty generates most educational failure effects in the U.S. often assigned to such factors as student race, broken homes, and the supposed failures of teachers and school administrators.) These problems have been studied extensively, and the tragedies they create are well known to scholars, but they are often misrepresented, misunderstood, or unacknowledged by far-right advocates, media figures, policy makers, and those concerned with serious problems that now beset the United States. This book reviews evidence concerning these problems and their dire effects, discusses ineffective or tragic outcomes that result when these problems are ignored, assesses why these problems are so often unacknowledged in the United States, and sets forth clear, evidence-based policies that can reduce the disastrous scope of American youth poverty and its destructive effects in education.

The future of public education and democracy is at risk. Powerful forces are eroding commitment to public schools and weakening democratic resolve. Yet even in deeply troubling times, it is possible to broaden social imagination and empower effective advocacy for systemic progressive reform. Re-envisioning Education and Democracy explores challenges and opportunities for restructuring public education to establish and sustain more broadly inclusive, deeply democratic, and effectively transforming approaches to social inquiry and civic participation. Re-envisioning Education and Democracy adopts a non-traditional format to extend social awareness and imagination. Within each chapter, one episode of an evolving strategic narrative traces the life cycle of a systemic reform initiative. This is followed by an exploratory essay that draws from theory, research, criticism, and practice to prompt consideration of focal issues. Woven through each chapter is a poetically framed meditative stream informed by varied historical and cultural conceptions of oracles. A developmental sequence of social learning strategies (exploratory democratic practices), accompanied by thematic bibliographic references, are included to model democratic teaching and learning applicable in classroom and community settings.

As our student population diversifies rapidly, there is a critical need to better understand how national, regional, and/or local policies impact youth in school settings. In many cases, educational policies constructed with the goal of helping youth often have the unintended consequence of inhibiting youth’s potential. This is especially the case when it comes to youth from historically underrepresented groups. Over and over, educational legislation aimed at improving life for youth has had the negative effect of eroding opportunities for our most vulnerable and often times less visible youth. The authors of this book examine the schooling experiences of Hispanic, African American, Indigenous, poor, and LGBT youth groups as a way to spotlight the marginalizing and shortsighted effects of national education language, immigration, and school reform policies. Leading authors from across the country highlight how educational policies impact youth’s development and socialization in school contexts. In most cases, policies are constructed by adults, implemented by adults, but are rarely informed by the needs and opinions of youth. Not only are youth not consulted but also policymakers often neglect what we know about the psychological, emotional, and educational health of youth. Therefore, both the short and long term impact of these policies have but limited effects on improving students’ school performance or personal health issues such as depression or suicide. In highlighting the demographic and cultural shifts of the 21st century, this book provides a compelling case for policymakers and their constituents to become more sensitive to the diverse needs of our changing student population and to advocate for policies that better serve them.