The daily stroll last week took us down Claremont Avenue where large picture window affords a passing glimpse into a college classroom at Barnard. A young teacher was talking while on the large screen was a slide headed “Principles of Democracy”. Only the top bullet had been revealed – “Inclusion”. Perhaps I jumped to a wrong conclusion but that gave…
There’s a useful and on-point critique of the Maker movement in The Atlantic magazine: Why I am not a Maker by Debbie Chachra. And maker devotees and promoters would do well to read it as they out there talking up the maker culture as a panacea to all the ills of education. But – what is a maker? Just someone…
…and we’ll make winners out of them” There’s a good article in the latest edition of Independent School magazine that challenges some cherished notions of excellence and the hypocrisy of so many claims about diversity, equity and justice. It is starts with a question and a well-aimed slice at the euphemisms of so many school mission statements. What does it…
When I’m in the car I listen to WAMC, and yesterday I heard Roland Fryer’s Dowmel lecture. His specialty is race-based economic issues, and his research projects seek to answer the question of why African-Americans are harder hit by poverty than other demographic groups in America The focus was education and the data dismal. Fryer is a brilliant economist, an…
A decade or so ago the focus was all on girls and how schools were failing to give them the attention and support they need to compete in school and to get a fair shake in the classroom. In recent years the focus has turned to boys and, if the media are to be believed, there is a crisis of…