StickWithANose

It doesn’t take a genius to discover that, despite the rhetoric of reformers, the driving impetus behind current trajectories in education reform is a simplistic narrative of neo-liberal market ideology. At the core of the reforms being pushed by Team Obama is an un-critical belief in the power of market competition and external accountability systems [...]

I’m not well-versed enough in the particulars to offer any keen insights into the likelihood of success or failure, but the emergence of a teacher-led school in the on-going disaster that is the Detroit Public School System is certainly an encouraging sign. As I’ve noted previously, one of the key features of Finland’s successful education [...]

As the Obama administration began to coalesce in 2009, I knew that there was trouble ahead. In methodical fashion Obama jettisoned many of the prominent experts advising him throughout the campaign for the same old goons that have driven the republic into the ditch, for example ditching Paul Volcker for Rubinites like Larry Summers and [...]

…even though their students spend less time on instruction than other OECD nations. As I’ve noted previously[1][2][3], there is much to be learned from Finland, however all of the methods being used in Finnish schools aren’t really all that new. These ideas have been around for over 100 years. From BBC America: [h/t Public Policy [...]

As a reformed libertarian, I am sympathetic to those who believe that the spirit of competition in the marketplace is the primary engine of innovation, however libertarianism is a belief system that is not well rooted in empirical reality.  From the canals of the early 19th century to the satellites making possible all of this [...]

I was going to dedicate today’s post to this blatant attempt by Tennessee House Replicants to open the door to the state’s university system to an even greater level of cronyism and corruption than we currently enjoy [please do call your representatives on this one], but then I came across this really good idea being [...]

Thorstein Veblen offers us a reasoned argument for taxing the shit out of the small number of individuals making more than $1 million a year.
Greg Mankiw links a former student courageously trying to protect the rights of Millionares not to pay more taxes here.
Here’s the thing — there are no reputable studies on the [...]

In response to Lykins laying down the smack, I’ve started a weekly segment called What Works. This second installment begins to pull back the layers of the Finnish model I discussed last week by examining Finland’s commitment to basic education.
Prior to the 2000’s, Finland’s education system had been considered average by Western, post-industrial standards. In [...]

Lykins set me straight in comments yesterday by asking the simplest of questions:
Is there another education model that is out there now that we can advocate or is this going to take an enormous redirection of the national discussion into places unknown?
Since my dissertation took up this question, it is only appropriate that I begin [...]