The document discusses educational historian and professor Diane Ravitch and her criticisms of recent education reforms in the United States. Ravitch opposes high-stakes standardized testing policies like No Child Left Behind and Race to the Top. She argues that poverty and inequality, not teachers, are the true problems affecting student achievement. Ravitch believes schools should provide students a strong curriculum focused on critical thinking rather than punishing teachers for test scores. Overall, the document examines Ravitch's perspective that current education reform efforts in the U.S. are misguided.

2. YOU CAN READ MORE ABOUT HER HERE:
http://dianeravitch.com/about-diane/
- She is an educational historian who has worked for the Federal
government.
- She is currently a professor at NYU
- She has written many books about school reform, especially criticizing
the many failed attempts to make over our schools

3. RECENT EDUCATIONAL REFORMS
- What is NCLB?
- In case you want some background, here is the Department of Education’s
summary of the NCLB Act:
http://www2.ed.gov/nclb/overview/intro/execsumm.html
- The idea is to hold teachers and schools accountable for their students’
success
- If teachers are invested in their students’ education, then we will have
fewer poor teachers and we can reward those who are successful
- We can determine teacher effectiveness by using standardized tests.
- Do you think this is possible? Should we punish schools whose students
do not meet standards? Should we reward schools whose students excel?

4. RAVITCH DOES NOT SUPPORT NCLB
You can check out this interview on The Daily Show to get an overview:
http://www.thedailyshow.com/watch/thu-march-3-2011/diane-ravitch
- Why does Ravitch oppose NCLB?
- It is punitive to teachers
- Testing takes the front seat, but subjects that aren’t being tested are not
being prioritized, and are even being cut.
- Another interview in which Ravitch states that NCLB has been a disaster:
http://www.davisenterprise.com/local-news/schools-news/ravitch-no-child-
left-behind-has-been-a-disaster/
- How do we determine a school’s success? Should it be measured
empirically?

5. RACE TO THE TOP
- What is it?
- You can read about it here, to get a better idea:
http://www.whitehouse.gov/the-press-office/fact-sheet-race-top
- Basically, the government provides funds to those states and schools that
show the greatest dedication to educational reform, by using assessments
and collecting data, reforming teacher preparation, and improving the
quality of low-performing schools.
- It also promotes the creation of charter schools, attempting to use these
schools to replace failing public schools
- Is privatization the answer? If a school can not meet the standards the
government has set, then should that school be turned over to someone
else?

6. WHAT DOES RAVITCH HAVE TO SAY?
- She addressed this point on her blog: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/diane-
ravitch/obamas-race-to-the-top-wi_b_666598.html
- Essentially: testing students more is not the answer. If we hold teachers
and principals accountable for student test scores, we will end up
punishing a lot of people and closing a lot of schools.
- If students, schools, and teachers are products of their community, can we
fix schools by improving the community?
Here is Ravitch specifically discussing the problems with charter schools:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A_HwI6S92Eo
What do you think about charter schools? Are they the solution? Or just
another problem with school reform?

7. HOW ABOUT THE COMMON CORE
CURRICULUM?
- This is a useful resource, since New York is moving in this direction
already:
- http://www.corestandards.org
- The Common Core is designed with the idea that students across the
country need some kind of common education, and that this education
should be held up to high standards.
- What do you think of the standards?
- Interestingly, in the summer of 2012, Ravitch describes herself as neither for
nor against the Common Core – but only says that we can’t know if it is good
until it is tried.
- http://truthinamericaneducation.com/common-core-state-standards/diane-
ravitch-common-core-state-standards-rolled-out-in-45-states-without-a-
field-test-anywhere/

8. AND 21ST CENTURY LEARNING STANDARDS?
- Ravitch says that 21st Century learning standards are more of the same
old- same old: more “if onlies” as she describes reform in Forgetting
the Questions: The Problem of Educational Reform
- The 21st Century Learning Standards were designed to provide students
with the skills they need to be successful in today’s changing work
force.
- What skills do you think students need? Do you think the standards will
really prepare students?
- More recently, Ravitch had this to say: http://commoncore.org/pressrelease-
05.php

9. WHY HAVEN’T THESE REFORMS WORKED?
- We shouldn’t be focused on ferreting out the bad teachers
- Teachers are not the only things that affect test scores, so why are we
using them to punish our teachers?
- In Forgetting the Questions: The Problem of Educational Reform,
Ravitch says that it’s not necessarily the schools that are the problem –
our society has much greater problems that are being put upon the
schools to fix.
- Poverty and inequality are the true evils, not bad teachers.
- Schools can not be expected to somehow rise above the current society and
“mold a new kind of person”- they are institutions created by people, and will
therefore be a reflection of their human creators, i.e. imperfect.
- What do you think? Can schools be centers for social change? Can we hold
them accountable for making changes in our society?

10. SO WHAT SHOULD WE DO?
- Diane Ravitch speaks at the Save Our Schools March:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wzvZ1Uc2MiY
- From Forgetting the Questions: The Problem of Educational Reform:
- it’s more important to provide students with the optimal environment for
learning than it is to punish teachers
- Schools should be a place where intelligence and important skills are fostered
and learned – we can not expect them to necessarily be the place where other
goals are achieved.
- Schools should have a strong curriculum, where students are taught to think
critically and make their own judgments, as well as learning to enjoy literature,
and learn science, history, and math. Schools should not be offering students
too many choices that allow them to “serve time” in school without learning
something of value.
- “Until we teach our teachers and our students to love knowledge and to love
learning, we cannot expect them to use their minds well.”

11. REFERENCES
About Diane « Diane Ravitch. (n.d.). Diane Ravitch. Retrieved September 29, 2012, from
http://dianeravitch.com/about-diane/
Common Core State Standards Initiative | Home. (n.d.). Common Core State Standards Initiative |
Home. Retrieved September 29, 2012, from http://www.corestandards.org
Diane Ravitch. (n.d.). Facebook. Retrieved September 29, 2012, from
https://www.facebook.com/DianeRavitch?fref=ts
Diane Ravitch - The Daily Show with Jon Stewart - 03/03/11 - Video Clip | Comedy Central. (n.d.). The
Daily Show with Jon Stewart - Political Comedy - Fake News | Comedy Central. Retrieved
September 30, 2012, from http://www.thedailyshow.com/watch/thu-march-3-2011/diane-ravitch
Fact Sheet: The Race to the Top | The White House. (n.d.). The White House. Retrieved September
29, 2012, from http://www.whitehouse.gov/the-press-office/fact-sheet-race-top
Hudson, J. (n.d.). Ravitch: "No Child Left Behind has been a disaster" | Davis Enterprise. Davis
Enterprise | Yolo County's Breaking News Source. Retrieved September 29, 2012, from
http://www.davisenterprise.com/local-news/schools-news/ravitch-no-child-left-behind-has-been-
a-disaster/
Ravitch, D. (n.d.). Common Core - News | 21st Century Skills: An Old Familiar Song. Common Core -
CCSS-Based Curriculum Maps. Retrieved September 30, 2012, from
http://commoncore.org/pressrelease-05.php
Ravitch, D. (n.d.). Diane Ravitch: Obama's Race to the Top Will Not Improve Education. Breaking
News and Opinion on The Huffington Post. Retrieved September 29, 2012, from
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/diane-ravitch/obamas-race-to-the-top-wi_b_666598.html
Ravitch, D. (1985). Forgetting the Questions: The Problem of Educational Reform. The schools we
deserve: reflections on the educational crises of our times (pp. 97-105). New York: Basic Books.
Hart, S. V. (n.d.). Diane Ravitch: Common Core State Standards Rolled Out in 45 States Without A
Field Test Anywhere | Truth in American Education. Truth in American Education. Retrieved
September 29, 2012, from http://truthinamericaneducation.com/common-core-state-
standards/diane-ravitch-common-core-state-standards-rolled-out-in-45-states-without-a-field-
test-anywhere/
Executive Summary of the No Child Left Behind Act of 2001. (n.d.). Archived: Executive Summary of
the No Child Left Behind Act of 2001. U.S. Department of Education. Retrieved September 29,
2012, from http://www2.ed.gov/nclb/overview/intro/execsumm.html