Tuesday, March 10, 2009

nationalizing banks the curriculum

These days, everybody's talking about nationalizing banks. What many are missing: the nationalization of American education.
I encourage you to go have a look at what people are posting...because I get the impression that this discussion isn't going to subside anytime soon. If anything, we're just at the beginning of this rhetoric...and perhaps not too far from words becoming actions.
I'm not terribly afraid of national standards designed by experts in assessment and instruction. (Call them... teachers.) I am wary though, of national standards dictated by politicians, textbook makers, ed-school "theorists," corporations, lobbyists, and the like.

I disagree with The Science Goddess only slightly: though there's been a recent uptick in national standards rhetoric, this blog predicted its rise over two years ago. It's one of the ironic legacies of the No Child Left Behind Act, which only went partway, allowing states to maintain their own standards, one of the reasons for the act's failure. Now, we're clawing our way out by reaching for a French-made rope.

L'école Américaine normalisée. Bush, père.

1 comment:

Stidmama said...

A reasonable set of national standards... that would be nice. I was a military brat. When moving from one place to another with wildly varying standards it's tough. You either know WAY more than everyone, or WAY less. Sometimes both in different subjects. It makes it difficult to settle in, which makes it hard to learn. It also (as so many have pointed out) makes comparisons of schools, curricula and teachers nearly useless. With our very mobile modern society, setting at least general guidelines makes sense.