Note: Today we publish the first contribution to this blog by Diane Ravitch, historian of education at NYU and co-chairman of Common Core’s board. As many of you are no doubt aware, Diane is an education advocate of the first degree–author of numerous books (we’ve lost track) and countless articles (we’re not even going to try) on education reform.
April 2008 marks the 25th anniversary of “A Nation at Risk,” the report on the condition of American education that continues to be controversial to this day. Its friends call it a landmark, a clarion call for the improvement of American education, and its critics describe it as the foul sire of No Child Left Behind and the current era of testing, accountability, and choice.
The report (which you can find here: http://www.ed.gov/pubs/NatAtRisk/index.html) was issued by a group called the National Commission on Excellence in Education, convened by Terrell Bell, President Reagan’s Secretary of Education. Bell was somewhat of a subversive in the Reagan cabinet, what some then and now would call a member of the education establishment who had come up through the profession. It cannot have pleased the President that the report did not even mention his own favorite education issues, which were school prayer and abolishing the U.S. Department of Education.
Critics of the report say that it blamed American schools for the woes of the American economy in the early 1980s. They produce lots of statistics to show that the schools have nothing to do with the economy. When the economy got better, they said, “why aren’t the schools getting credit for the upturn?” They missed the point. Of course, schools create human capital. Of course, they are not the immediate cause of good times or bad times. Schools did not cause the Great Depression. But any economist worth his (or her) salt knows that good schools are important for a nation’s future economic, civic, social, and cultural development.
I believe that “Nation at Risk” was a great report and that it has often been mischaracterized. It is not the parent or even the grandparent of NCLB. I realized that one day when I was reading an article by Paul E. Barton of the Education Policy Center at ETS. Barton, one of our wise education thinkers, said that “Nation at Risk” had been hijacked by NCLB. I suddenly realized that he was right.
The proof of the hijacking is the language of the report itself. “Nation at Risk” has only one paragraph recommending standardized achievement tests “at major transition points from one level of schooling to another and particularly from high school to college or work.” It recommends that testing “should include other diagnostic procedures that assist teachers and students to evaluate student progress.” That is all it says about testing. It says nothing at all about accountability and not a word about choice.
Though you would not know it by reading the critics, the main focus of “Nation at Risk” was the weakness of the curriculum and low expectations for students. “Nation at Risk” documented many worrisome trends of the previous decade, in which the largest number of students in high school were enrolled in the general track, which was neither academic nor vocational. It documented the decline of college admission requirements and high school graduation requirements. It documented the prevalence of low expectations and low student performance.
“Nation at Risk” called for 1) a solid core curriculum for all, called “the New Basics,” including four years of English and three years each of science, mathematics, and social studies, as well as two years of foreign language for the college-bound and also “fine and performing arts and vocational education”; 2) higher expectations and more time devoted to schooling; 3) better educated teachers receiving higher pay.
Everyone knows the famous lines about “a rising tide of mediocrity” and “unthinking, unilateral educational disarmament.” Less well known but perhaps more important are these lines (which also answer the critics): “Our concern, however, goes well beyond matters such as industry and commerce. It also includes the intellectual, moral, and spiritual strengths of our people which knit together the very fabric of our society. The people of the United States need to know that individuals in our society who do not posses the levels of skill, literacy, and training essential to this new era will be effectively disenfranchised, not simply from the materials rewards that accompany competent performance, but also from the chance to participate fully in our national life. A high level of shared education is essential to a free, democratic society and to the fostering of a common culture, especially in a country that prides itself on pluralism and individual freedom.”
And even better is the next paragraph, which to my way of thinking, makes this the most important education reform document of the 20th century:
“Part of what is at risk is the promise first made on this continent: All regardless of race or class or economic status, are entitled to a fair chance and to the tools for developing their individual powers of mind and spirit to the utmost. This promise means that all children by virtue of their own efforts, competently guided, can hope to attain the mature and informed judgment needed to secure gainful employment, and to manage their own lives, thereby serving not only their own interests but also the progress of society itself.”
The recommendations of “A Nation at Risk” remain unrealized because the American public and American educators missed the point, but also because the message was hijacked by the testing and accountability posse. The point was to improve the curriculum, to make sure that every student has access to a rich diet of studies, and to ensure that every young American receives a good education. That message remains relevant to this day. It still needs to be said, again and again.
Diane Ravitch
Tags: Uncategorized
I have been waiting for something like this. If you say that the “Posse” of NCLB hijacked this study, then it is clear that those in power use what is necessary to maintain their power and control over society. The use of that small part of the study related to testing. They have uncover a serious wound in American education. How we deal with it is not by testing, but to look at the current frame work of our system and remodel it in hopes of accomodating our students.
I am moved,
Hi, Diane -
I read your post with great interest. Have you heard of the documentary, Two Million Minutes?
Here is a press release we issued today. I think this is a film you’d be interested in!
No longer “A Nation at Risk;” now a nation way behind
Documentary Two Million Minutes addresses the issue of U.S. falling behind other nations
in education and economic opportunity
(Seattle; San Francisco; Boston; Indianapolis – April 28, 2008) The April 1983 government report “A Nation at Risk*” warned us that if we didn’t improve math and science education in the U.S. we would be at risk of falling behind our global competitors. Having reached the twenty-fifth anniversary of the report, a provocative new documentary film, Two Million Minutes, vividly reveals that American students are no longer “at risk” of falling behind — they are now clearly behind even Third World students in India and China, in addition to being in 24th place among developed countries.
“Despite the billions of dollars being spent on ‘education reform’ since 1983, the U.S. has implemented none of the meaningful recommendations of the 1983 report and as a result has seen no real improvements to our math or science education system,” said Robert Compton, creator and executive producer of the documentary Two Million Minutes.
A partner of the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation’s ED in ’08 campaign, the film follows two students in India, China and the U.S. during their senior years of high school. By comparing how these students prioritize their time (approximately four years or “two million minutes” of high school), the film demonstrates that the typical student in the U.S. spends much less time on his/her education and gives less thought to future career opportunities than his/her global peers in India and China. The documentary discusses the implications for the U.S. economy of having its students lose ground in education compared to those students around the globe.
Compton had film crews record high school seniors in the U.S., India and China in 2005 and 2006. “What we saw and what the film portrays is that our culture has a highly developed athletic and extracurricular system but a deteriorating core academic system,” said Compton. “In 25 years, America has gone simply from being ‘A Nation at Risk’ to a nation way behind its largest future economic competitors – India and China.”
“How is your high school student allocating his/her two million minutes?” asked Compton. “That’s a question every parent should ask him or herself. It’s one I even had to ask myself.”
To view a trailer of the film or to purchase a copy of the documentary, visit http://www.2mminutes.com. To join a discussion about the issue, visit Compton’s blog at http://www.2mm.typepad.com/.
The next screenings of the film will take place at Seattle University on May 12, in San Francisco on May 13, and in Boston on May 30. For more information on these screenings or others, please visit our website.
###
About Two Million Minutes
Titled Two Million Minutes, this documentary film takes an in-depth look at how students in the United States allocate their high school years (approximately four years or two million minutes) compared with India and China. It examines the implications this may have on the U.S. position in the global economy during the 21st century. Two Million Minutes is currently screening across the country. For more information, please visit http://www.2mminutes.com.
*“A Nation at Risk” was presented by the National Commission on Excellence in Education to Secretary of Education, the Honorable T. H. Bell. Its purpose was to “help define the problems afflicting American education and to provide solutions.” The results of the report found the U.S. to be a “nation at risk” as “our once unchallenged preeminence in commerce, industry, science and technological innovation is being overtaken by competitors throughout the world… Our society and its educational institutions seem to have lost sight of the basic purposes of schooling and of the high expectations and disciplined effort needed to attain them.”
Diane,
You write that the point of Nation at Risk, and the message that needs to be said ‘again and again’ is to “improve the curriculum, to make sure that every student has access to a rich diet of studies, and to ensure that every young American receives a good education.”
I would argue that this message is flawed, and repeating it over and over, as you suggest, accomplishes nothing but the perpetuation of a faulty paradigm.
Let’s look at it one piece at a time:
“Improve the curriculum.” It’s hard to “improve” on something that is fundamentally broken. The Ivory Tower model of compartmentalizing education into convenient “subjects” has been failing students for decades. “Improving” it usually means only adding more of the same — as Common Core advocates.
“Access to a rich diet of studies.” All students already have this. It’s called the public library. With the internet, that access has multiplied infinitely. The problem isn’t that students don’t have access to knowledge, it’s that they have select bits of it forced upon them, with little regard to whether the material is relevant, interesting, or useful. Another way to put this is that students may have access to a rich diet, but they are forced to eat a thin, unappatizing gruel.
“Receives a good education.” This is perhaps the most dangerous of all the faulty presumptions, for it implies two things: that learning is something that can be packaged, like a product, and that young people should “receive” this product.
“Education” as a thing does not exist. To use it as a noun, as in “a good education” perpetuates this startlingly wrong idea that the process of learning can be pre-packaged. It implies that the mind is something that can simply be programmed with the insertion of the proper software. That is not how the brain works, and it is not how young people should be “educated.”
What young people need — more than ever — are healthy relationships. They need to learn how to be happy, healthy, and loving. They don’t need more of the same Ivory Tower academic model that has little relevance to the real world. If they need to “receive” anything, it’s more love. Yet the message they get in school is that they’re only worthy of love if they memorize and regurgitate the appropriate academics.
While educators obsess over “curriculum” and “standards,” “accountability” and “student performance,” they ignore the things they should most have their eye on. Like the rate of divorce in the country. Or the percentage of Americans in jail. Or the prevalence of mental illness such as depression and anxiety — even among the supposedly “educated” and “successful” adults.
That schools turn a blind eye to the most pressing needs of our society, while criticizing that society for not appreciating them is a cruel irony.
By ignoring the web of social relationships that make up what is commonly called “the real world,” schools have no one but themselves to blame for the shambles they are currently in.
The “risk” in a “Nation at Risk” is not that society ignores its schools, it’s that the schools ignore society.
[...] Diane Ravitch, in her commentary at the Common Core blog has recognized that people, not reports, make policy: “The recommendations of “A [...]
I graduated college this month at the top of my class, and it was sad and appalling for me to see how unprepared my classmates were. I had more than a handful of people in my classes each semester that could not complete basic tasks, but still received their degrees.
Too much “passing the buck” is going on, and parents and teachers should
be working together. Students should be learning to think critically
instead of learning how to answer test questions.
Keep up the good work.
Could not agee with you more..