Guest Blog: Jane Remer’s CliffNotes on Diane Ravitch’s The Death and Life of the Great American School System

Let’s welcome back Dewey21C’s regular guest blogger, Jane Remer. Fresh off being honored by the New York City Arts Education Roundtable at its Face to Face Conference, she’s got a swell entry on Diane Ravitch new book. As an intro, I want to point out something quite wonderful about Diane and her new book: it is extremely rare for a major league education policy leader to ever mention the arts. Diane points to the arts regularly through her book, and through her daily activities. And, now, so do people like Checker Finn. Let there be more who will acknowledge the arts when talking about education. Thank you Diane!
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Originally Created As a Blurb for Diane Ravitch’s Website; With Diane’s Permission

Jane Remer’s Cliffnotes: Diane Ravitch and The Renewal of the Great American School System

It is not unusual for historians, political figures, Supreme Court justices, party faithfuls and true believers of all stripes to change their minds in the middle of their career. It is rare, however, that a public figure with the stature of Diane Ravitch demonstrates the courage and chronicles the gradual mind-changing (and game-changing) process so that it is visible, “out-loud” and accessible to those within earshot and who follow her Bridging Differences dialogue with Deborah Meier. The Death and Life of the Great American School System is her latest in a long line of distinguished books, and I think it is not only an amazing accomplishment but a very important book. It must be read, widely.

I have worked for close to half a century in and with public schools and districts across the country. I have been a friend and colleague of many others who are deeply concerned with the quality and direction of American public education, e.g., John Goodlad, Seymour Sarason, Robert Stake, Harold “Doc” Howe, Frank Keppel, Howard Gardner, and David Perkins. My first book, Changing Schools Through the Arts, chronicled in great detail the hope, promise and serious obstacles to school change in a network of six urban U.S. school districts. I am reminded on a daily basis as I work in the schools how difficult it is to initiate, implement and most of all sustain change whether in one school or a large number.

What Diane’s book teaches us, or at least reminds us, is the current notion that non-school people such as mayors, generals and lawyers should not be given the power and responsibility to run school systems in a functioning democracy. The research and results are plentiful about the problems, even when (and usually) none of the researchers agree with each other about the causes and results. But schools are complex, old fashioned entities, essentially social communities, and no one district, school or classroom is like another. Schools tend to be latest-fad addicted, always hoping for the holy grail to solve whatever the latest problem may be, and in a bureaucracy like a school system that never has enough patience, resources or field-based and grass roots intelligence to figure out how to move forward, there is rarely enough time dedicated to gathering stakeholders and evidence for support. Even then, school change is really tough, and short cuts, arm-twisting and top down dictates will ultimately not get the job done. What it does, instead, as we witness today, is to force the disintegration of the tenuous structure of the system.

The beauty of Diane’s book is how she does it, disarmingly. Starting with the first chapter, she tells us how and why all this is “true” while she recognizes her earlier mistakes and assumptions and then, through careful analysis of her own and others’ recent research, uncovers, chunk by chunk, what doesn’t work, her opinions why, and the unfinished questions and answers that remain. What is particularly impressive for me is her inside look and take on periods in education history with which I am personally and professionally familiar. The chapters on the Standards Movement, the Transformation of District 2 in New York City, the Lessons from San Diego, all the way through to the brilliant Billionaire Boys’ Club, shine a powerful searchlight on what’s gone dead wrong with American education: Corporate America, in the name of reform and its addiction to power, money and international supremacy now drives fearful schools and the people in them preaching the worship of the new gods of data, metrics, literacy and easily adjustable test scores.

In my view, Diane has always been a staunch humanist, a rigorous historian and an arts as education advocate. As I watched her recently, gradually find her new way carefully through the last several years, I got more and more excited and nowadays, I am continually thrilled by her blunt and beautifully written thoughts that hit the page and the reader between the eyes. She has given those of us who believe public education is about creating individualized and informed citizens for a democracy a series of arguments for tossing out the hollow structural blueprints and returning our schools to a focus on rich and varied content and excellent teaching and learning.

Now, are there magic and final answers to the tremendous challenge of top-notch education in a democracy as young as ours? No, of course not. But the last chapter, Lessons Learned” offers a number of ideas, suggestions that could keep a seminar, let alone a national conversation, on this critical topic going for a long, long time.

Thank you, Diane.

Jane Remer, March 4, 2010

Diane Ravitch from Education Week on Vimeo.

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JANE REMER’S CLIFFNOTES
We are at another rocky precipice in our history that threatens the
survival of the arts in our social fabric and our school systems. The
timing and magnitude of the challenges have prompted me to speak out
about some of the most persistent issues in the arts education field
during the last forty-plus years.
My credo is simple: The arts are a moral imperative. They are
fundamental to the cognitive, affective, physical, and intellectual
development of all our children and youth. They belong on a par with
the 3 R’s, science, and social studies in all of our elementary and
secondary schools. These schools will grow to treasure good quality
instruction that develops curious, informed, resilient young citizens
to participate fully in a democratic society that is in constant flux.
I have chosen the title Cliff Notes for this forum. It serves as
metaphor and double entendre: first, as short takes on long-standing
and complicated issues, and second, as a verbal image of the
perpetually perilous state of the arts as an essential part of general
public education. I plan to focus on possible solutions and hope to
stimulate thoughtful dialogue on-line or locally.

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Jane
Remer has worked nationally for over forty years as an author,
educator, researcher, foundation director and consultant. She was an
Associate Director of the John D. Rockefeller 3rd Fund’s Arts in
Education Program and has taught at Teachers College, Columbia
University and New York University. Ms. Remer works directly in and
with the public schools and cultural organizations, spending
significant time on curriculum, instruction and collaborative action
research with administrators, teachers , students and artists. She
directs the Capezio/Ballet Makers Dance Foundation, and her
publications include Changing Schools Through the Arts and Beyond
Enrichment: Building Arts Partnerships with Schools and Your Community.
She is currently writing Beyond Survival: Reflections On The Challenge
to the Arts As General Education. A graduate of Oberlin College, she
attended Yale Law School and earned a masters in education from Yale
Graduate School.
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