On the Death of Childhood and the Destruction of Public Schools
Subtitle: The Folly of Today's Education Policies and Practices
Publisher: Heinemann
Published: September 16, 2003
Language: eng
Format: Paperback
Number of pages: 208
ISBN-13: 9780325006024
Subjects: Educational administration; Educational Policy & Reform; Education / Educational Reform; Education / Teaching; Education and state; Evaluation; Public schools; United States; Education
Description: The author delivers the statistics and skillful analysis needed to win the numbers game that plays out daily in the popular press. Drawing on data from a variety of reputable sources, he proves that public schools are doing much better than critics claim, some indicators even showing record highs. He takes on the testing movement in numerous chapters offers data that provide different perspectives than usually seen, and reviews the history of public schools, showing how they have included more and more students while raising achievement levels, too. He questions the so-called failing schools, discusses the phenomenon of "summer loss," provides international comparisons, and presents data to argue that investing in universal quality preschool pays off in the long run. He even attempts to enter the mind of the father of American public education, Horace Mann, to see what he might think about the "nuttiness of today's policies."