I was chatting with a reporter the other day who asked me why it seems like we hear a lot less about school reform than we did just a few years ago. It鈥檚 an interesting question and one that I hope to dig into sometime soon. But it also got us onto the interesting tangent of: 鈥淲hat is school reform, anyway?鈥�
The term 鈥渟chool reform鈥� tends to take on a very particular meaning at different points in time. Today, the school reform mantle is less visible than it鈥檚 been for a long time. And the school reformers have a new playbook. Instead of standards or teacher evaluation, 鈥渞eform鈥� circa 2022鈥攁t least according to the advocacy groups, funders, and conference conveners who once fetishized that other stuff鈥攊s now centered on issues like social and emotional learning, teacher retention, and 鈥渁nti-racist鈥� education.
Obviously, it wasn鈥檛 always thus. For much of the 2010s, 鈥渞eformers鈥� were the people who supported things like charter schooling, accountability, test-based teacher evaluation, and the Common Core State Standards.
In earlier eras, other reform orthodoxies have prevailed. A century ago, the list would鈥檝e included 鈥渟cientific management,鈥� regular testing, sorting students by IQ, and depoliticizing school boards. In the 1980s, it would鈥檝e included a more demanding high school curriculum, career ladders for teachers, a longer school year, and tougher teacher-certification tests.
But, at least in my mind, these various recitals of programs and policies don鈥檛 actually equate to 鈥渞eform.鈥� Why not? Well, it鈥檒l make a little more sense if I first say a bit about why I became a 鈥渞eformer鈥� in the first place (spoiler: it had nothing to do with today鈥檚 reform litany nor with those earlier ones). The short version: It鈥檚 mostly because, as a student, a teacher, and a trainer of teachers, I found too many classrooms and schools to be spirit-eroding and mind-numbing. Bells rang, students took their seats, and minutes ticked by.
And it鈥檚 partly because I experienced and saw classrooms that were wholly different鈥攑laces where students felt valued, inspired, and challenged. Most of us picture a particular classroom when we say that. For me, it was Selma Ziff鈥檚 6th grade at Pine Ridge Elementary in Virginia, a room that was a whirlwind of math drills, Shakespearean plays, schemes to colonize Mars, and probability learned by gambling with M&Ms. It was a relentless, joyous race to learn. It was what school should be. Hell, it was what childhood should be.
For me, reform has never been about anything as high-flown as 鈥渟ocial justice.鈥� It鈥檚 been about wanting more classrooms to resemble the ones I loved and frustration that we weren鈥檛 making that happen.
It鈥檚 long seemed clear to me that we could do much better. Better at igniting imagination. At helping students master world languages. At teaching science and history. At instilling a sense of civic responsibility. At ensuring that all students are literate and numerate. At cultivating interest in the arts. At raising kids who are kind and curious. But it鈥檚 seemed equally clear that doing this will require allowing ourselves to reimagine and rethink schooling.
Too often, in their well-meaning focus on achievement gaps, curricular agendas, and equitable staffing models, reformers can seem remarkably unbothered that so many students find school tedious and mind-numbing. I鈥檝e found that tedium and boredom are rarely front and center except when they鈥檙e linked to issues of poverty or race. That鈥檚 nuts. These broad-based frustrations ought to be at the beating heart of reform.
And yet reform is too often a spinning wheel of one reform after another, all of it serving to exhaust 糖心动漫vlog and breed cynicism. Teachers learn to shut their doors while muttering, 鈥淭his too shall pass.鈥� Through the decades, I鈥檝e learned that reform done poorly is often worse than no reform at all and that the real challenge is more often one of execution than of action.
So what is true school reform, the kind that actually helps kids? Sometimes, I think it鈥檚 nothing more than having the courage to resist the groupthink of the moment, embrace first principles, and remember that school improvement is ultimately about the human dynamics of teachers and students.
