by David Safier
Diane Ravitch is one of the loudest voices in progressive education, and one of the loudest and most effective voices against the conservative "education reform" movement. Her 2010 book, The Death and Life of the Great American School System (How Testing and Choice are Undermining Education), helped promote a national discussion about the current mis-direction of American education.
Diane Ravitch's blog follows what's happening with education, both good and bad, around the country. So I'm very pleased she featured my 3 posts about Brewer's Performance Funding plan on her blog today. After Ravitch linked to my posts and summarized them, she concluded with some wise advice which, unfortunately, I doubt Brewer, her staff, Craig Barrett, the Goldwater Institute or conservative legislators will pay much attention to.
Really, someone on the governor’s staff should explain to her that there is quite a lot of research showing that bonuses tied to test scores do not produce higher test scores, although they often produce cheating and narrowing of the curriculum.