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Commentary
2.13.2002

Education in Singapore: Part II

Chester E. Finn, Jr.

In last week's Gadfly, I described a bit about modern Singapore and how its world-beating education system is structured. Today I offer ten observations based on what struck me most during a brief visit. First, ethnicity is indeed powerful, but a country's education culture and standards can trump ethnic differences.

Commentary
2.13.2002

Surge in career-changers entering teaching

A front-page story in The New York Times this week described a big increase in the number of people seeking jobs as teachers nationwide, prompted by the sinking economy and a wave of soul-searching after the Sept. 11 attacks.

Commentary
2.13.2002

Good news: Teachers College prexy endorses canon

Diane Ravitch

Until now, most of us believed that ed school professors were in principle opposed to the concept of a "canon" of great books. It turns out that this is not so, at least not if we consider the recent statements of Arthur Levine, president of Teachers College, Columbia University.

Commentary
2.6.2002

Will No Child Truly Be Left Behind? reports ask

Seven provocative new papers examining key challenges of implementing the new federal education law-particularly its testing and accountability provisions-and strategies for meeting them will be available tomorrow on the Fordham Foundation website (www.edexcellence.net).

Commentary
2.6.2002

Using whole school reform to turn around struggling schools

Is installing a "whole school" reform model the best way to turn around a struggling school? Since 1997, Uncle Sam has given U.S. public schools over $480 million to put school-wide reform designs in place through the Comprehensive School Reform Demonstration Program (also known as Obey-Porter).

Commentary
2.6.2002

Tomorrow's Teachers

Chester E. Finn, Jr.

edited by Herbert J. Walberg and Margaret C. Lang2001

Commentary
2.6.2002

Education in Singapore: Part I

Chester E. Finn, Jr.

At the risk of falling into the trap of instant expertise, let me offer some impressions-brought home from a recent trip-about why Singapore keeps coming in at the top on international tests of student achievement, at least in science and math. This week, I sketch the basic structure of that small but vibrant country's education system.

Commentary
2.6.2002

Effective principals show bad teachers the door

Principals are under increasing pressure to raise student test scores. The vast majority of their teachers are committed and competent, principals say, but an unknown number stifle learning. Given the extreme difficulty of terminating a tenured teacher, what's a principal to do once she has tried without success to help the teacher improve? According to Dr.

Commentary
2.6.2002

Florida union urges power outage to punish donation to scholarship fund

After learning of a $5 million donation made by Florida Power to a private school scholarship program under the Sunshine State's new education tax credit law, the teachers union in Pinellas County, Florida has urged the local school board to shut off all power in county schools for a day as payback for the utility company.

Report
2.1.2002
Accountability & Testing

No Child Left Behind: What Will it Take?

Mark D. Reckase, Billie J. Orr, Matthew Gandal, Lisa Graham Keegan

Just one month after President Bush signed the politics-governance Act into law, a provocative set of expert papers commissioned by the Thomas B. Fordham Foundation explores the legislation's key features: it's testing and accountability provisions. The papers identify the questions left unresolved by Congress and the many hurdles facing the U.S. Education Department and states, districts, and schools as they try to make this ambitious law a reality. The papers also offer suggestions for clearing those hurdles.

Commentary
1.29.2002

Who Says It's a Good School?

Chester E. Finn, Jr.

Important education insights sometimes arise from developments in other fields. This happened to me twice in recent weeks. Both episodes bear on results-based accountability, how it works, what can go awry-and what's wrong with the usual substitutes.First, a new study of hospital accreditation looked into whether it makes any difference for the quality of patient care.

Commentary
1.29.2002

Preschool as the next frontier for Bush and Kennedy

As they flew back to Washington earlier this month after celebrating their joint education bill, the No Child Left Behind Act, President Bush and Senator Edward M. Kennedy held an extended conversation about the need to boost early childhood education, and that conversation may soon lead to legislation, according to reporter Anne Kornblut of The Boston Globe.

Commentary
1.29.2002

Is the GED equivalent to a high school diploma?

In an earlier report and Gadfly editorial-available at http://www.edexcellence.net/gadfly/issue.cfm?issue=75#1062-the Manhattan Institute's Jay Greene explained that official high school graduation rates published by the federal government understate the problem of dropouts because they treat the General Education Developm

Commentary
1.29.2002

2001 Education Freedom Index

Chester E. Finn, Jr.

Jay P. Greene, Center for Civic Innovation at the Manhattan InstituteJanuary 2002

Commentary
1.23.2002

The New York Times debates reading methods

Diane Ravitch

A careful reader of The New York Times would by now be very confused about the state of reading research. In the past few weeks, three different writers in the newspaper have offered differing interpretations of the issue.

Commentary
1.23.2002

Milwaukee public schools respond to competition

"Years of vouchers and competition-based reforms mean it's no longer a novelty to see MPS [Milwaukee Public Schools] promoting schools the way Procter & Gamble sells Tide," writes Sam Schulhofer-Wohl in the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, but "the public school system's promotional efforts are reaching newly feverish heights this winter" with free chili dinners at MPS open houses, radio