Arne Duncan Gets an F

July 10, 2015 7:58 AM

"It will take years to recover from the damage that Arne Duncan’s policies have inflicted on public education." Diane Ravitch says Obama's Secretary of Education has earned an F. In other news, Duncan will be sending his kids to the University of Chicago's lab school.
posted by goatdog (5 comments total)

For those who may not know her, Diane Ravitch is "a historian of education and Research Professor of Education at New York University," per her blog. She has also served as a U.S. Assistant Secretary of Education. More background, from Wikipedia. She was a supporter of No Child Left Behind, and has since done a 180 on education policy; her blog is a daily compendium of essays/critiques/letters about what's going wrong in American schools.
posted by MonkeyToes at 8:10 AM on July 10, 2015

The United States spends more than other developed nations on its students' education each year, ... Despite the spending, U.S. students still trail their rivals on international tests.

Either your education system spends money badly or your schools students are uniquely hard to educate, though of course the big caveat is that international comparisons are really hard to make. Probably a bit of both?
posted by alasdair at 8:12 AM on July 10, 2015

In other words, he's a neoliberal and member of the economic elite that rigged the systems under his control to benefit the private sector while insulating himself and his family from the consequences. The Obama administration is thick with them.

The next president and the next Secretary of Education will have an enormous job to do to restore our nation’s public education system from the damage done by Race to the Top.

Under Clinton or Rubio / Walker / Bush / Christie? Get ready for a doubling down. The class war is over, average Americans, and we have lost decisively.
posted by ryanshepard at 8:13 AM on July 10, 2015 [5 favorites]

Unless the aim here is to go one sided politics filter on mefi, a diversity of analysis would be helpful for more background and discussion for a front page post.
posted by Karaage at 8:22 AM on July 10, 2015 [1 favorite]

Feel free to provide it.
posted by Etrigan at 8:23 AM on July 10, 2015 [5 favorites]