Can America's Schools Be Saved, 1

Other than students, no group of people has been more affected by the failure of American education than teachers. Tens of thousands of dedicated, hard-working, and intelligent teachers walk into their schools every day with the intention of helping children learn. Usually, those intentions are unrealized, and the teachers find themselves blamed for the failure. But why do they fail in the first place? Is the philosophy behind American education the real cause of the failure of the system? Unlike most books critical of American education, Can America's Schools be Saved? was written by a classroom teacher, and takes up the position that the philosophy behind American education is the source of the failure. By unknowingly accepting the basic ideas behind John Dewey's world view, reformers on both ends of American politics miss a fundamental reason that the school system so often fails to deliver on its promises. The solutions found in Can America's Schools be Saved? are based on traditional understandings of human nature and learning. It is time to re-examine the methods that were abandoned in attempt to fix aspects of education that worked well, like punishments that focused on individual wrongdoing, memorization of actual facts, and a focus on the teacher as the transmitter of information. Can America's Schools be Saved? raises questions that the educationists and educrats do not want raised, and proposes solutions that would put educational control back into the hands of parents, local communities, and the teachers who know those problems best.