We Must Take Charge! - Softcover

Finn, Jr. Chester E.

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0029102766 ISBN 13: 9780029102763

Publisher: Free Press, 1993

Synopsis

According to leading education analyst Chester Finn, a paradox lies at the heart of our educational trouble. While Americans commonly acknowledge that public schools in general are a disaster, polls consistently show that most parents, teachers, and administrators think their local schools and their own children are doing just fine. The implications of this self-congratulation are profound. For if people believe their own schools and children are succeeding, why should they feel compelled to change things? Yet, if we don't, we will continue to watch the destruction of a system that already lacks accountability and quality control, and is beset by a teaching profession compromised by bad ideas, fads, buck-passing, dubious theories, and stodgy practices.

Fin proposes radical changes which he insists must be championed by all Americans if this atrophy is to be reversed. First and most importantly, he calls on us to reorganize education in relation to the results we want from it. This means establishing a clearcut standard of intellectual achievement that we will oblige all of our schools to enforce and our children to meet. To define this standard, we will need to rebuild instruction around, a national curriculum of core subjects - history, science, geography, math, literature and writing. And we must demand a more detailed flow of useful information, including reliable testing, about how our children are performing in relation to this standard.

Finn calls on us to give our children as much time, as many options, and as broad an array of resources as possible. As he points out, learning can take place as easily in July as it does in march, as easily in a museum as it does in a classroom. And if parents have choices in deciding which schools and programs best fit the needs of students, they will have an added incentive in helping their children succeed. He urges us to revitalize the means of delivering education from the bottom up, by vesting as much authority as possible with educators in each individual school and holding them accountable for their performance.

For Finn, the implementation of these radical measures is essential to produce not only a knowledgeable twenty-first century work force that will keep our nation competitive, but an informed and reasoning citizenry capable of participating fully in a democracy. Challenging and candid, this book will point the way for all those insisting on the best that our schools can offer.

About this title

From Kirkus Reviews:

A call to arms to fundamentally revolutionize the catastrophically afflicted public education system in the US. Finn (Education & Public Policy/Vanderbilt) relies heavily on statistical research conducted by various educational, governmental, and business institutions to demonstrate the pressing need for major reform. While the important trends in education during the past two decades have been towards access and equality, Finn states, assessment and accountability have been largely lacking. Increased budgetary input does not lead to better results, and while longer school terms might have been educationally successful, they were a failure politically. The author likens the US education system to the USSR economic system, indicating the extent and gravity of its failure. Finn presents himself as an almost lone crusader for such unpopular causes as national standards and a national curriculum. He wants concrete nationwide goal statements with results that can be objectively indicated and with educators directly accountable for the quality of their schools. He reiterates to the point of redundancy that we need to overhaul the power structure and its ingrained practices. Cognitive learning and knowledge must be stressed, he argues, and civilian control of the system is the only way of ultimately effecting the necessary changes. A sincere, if too heroic, plea worth reading by educators and concerned parents. -- Copyright ©1991, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.

From Library Journal:

Finn, noted educator and director, Educational Excellence Network, expounds his sometimes unpopular stance on the state of education in the United States. He characterizes "the excellence movement of the 1980's . . . as the education system playing at reforming itself . . . designed to restructure without fundamentally altering the system of power relations." Finn believes that true educational reform begins with the consumers and not the lawmakers. He contends that reform must be approached on four fronts: 1) school organization, 2) belief that a good education is a vital cultural value, 3) higher education and employers' standards for students and employees, and 4) families supporting positive attitudes toward school. The author's previous ties with the new Secretary of Education, Lamar Alexander, may induce knowledgeable educators to ask for this provocative and challenging book.
- Annelle R. Huggins, Memphis State Univ. Libs., Tenn.
Copyright 1991 Reed Business Information, Inc.

About this edition

• Publisher: Free Press
• Publication date: 1993
• ISBN 10: 0029102766
• ISBN 13: 9780029102763
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 384