Amid 'Turnaround Agenda,' Teachers, Communities Overshadowed by Corporate Reforms

[mike_c]

1. I came up through that "broken" and "failed" education system...

...during which I failed nearly every grade multiple times, dropped out of high school (twice), never earned a regular diploma, and was for all intents and purposes a statistic of failure. Yet today I have a research doctorate, am a tenured full professor of zoology, and look back on a successful and stimulating academic career.

Just how broken does an education system have to be to turn someone like me into a successful scientist and teacher?

There are LOTS of reasons that students either succeed or fail, most of them completely outside the control of teachers or school administrators. But consider that our educational system has consistently produced more Nobel Prize winners than any other country, and provides opportunities for people with ABYSMAL academic achievement records-- like mine-- to regroup and ultimately excel. That system was fundamentally intact, if somewhat constrained by shrinking public support, so when it began to appear "broken" the real causes were likely elsewhere. The system that produced me and my colleagues needs no reform, as far as I'm concerned. It worked beautifully, just as it has for much of the last hundred years. Sure, we can ALWAYS improve, but the reformers today aren't seeking to improve an already great educational system-- they're seeking to destroy and reconstruct it in very different form.