And, Gates' small schools experiment? While Gates himself declared the experiment a failure, Marshak explains that Gates' small school experiment actually exposes Gates' own inability to understand the education dynamics he claims to reform. But ample evidence reveals both that Gates is inexpert and remains unsuccessful as an education reformer. See here, here and here -- including his failure to understand statistics and the charts he enjoys using to make his points here.
Rhee's DC success? Possibly the best example of too-good-to-be-true. While the truth about Rhee has been mounting for some time -- both her incompetence and her lack of success (here, here and here.) While those of us in education have known this all along, some are starting to see that Rhee is no miracle worker, but she does fulfill a script, as Lyons notes in a piece titled "Michelle Rhee: Education Reform Huckster" -- "Presumably because Rhee's tale fits so conveniently with Jeffersonian idealism that sees potential genius everywhere, it was treated as gospel throughout the national media."
Canada's Harlem miracle? Only in the press, although the press seems convinced that Canada is an expert in education -- and he's is not -- and the source of education miracles -- again, he is not.
But this is not anything new; we can also backtrack. Bush and Paige's Texas miracle? Another mirage, as Ravicth explains and as careful consideration of the data reveals.
Accountability appears to be something those driving the reform are using to mask the lack of expertise or accomplishment among the reformers themselves. And the media is playing right along, unwilling and possibly unable to hold the reformers themselves accountable -- unwilling and possibly unable as well to discern that the education reform debate is being misrepresented as badly as education is itself.
There is no support for the status quo, and there is a credible but often silenced recognition that the new education reformers lack the exact experiences and expertise needed to drive true education reform.
As Anthony Cody has explained, "The 'reformers' have used the power of the media and government, and billions of dollars in philanthropic money to push anyone who questions their strategies off the stage up to this point." Despite having little to no expertise and only claims of success where no success exists, the new reformers have built false statues for their own benefit.
If accountability is truly what must drive education reform (and I doubt this is true), then we must start at the top, or we are left only with the crumbling bravado of self-appointed experts at the expense of children, education, and the promise of a free society.(Note: You can view every article as one long page if you sign up as an Advocate Member, or higher).
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