[.uk] Education Myths: What Special Interest Groups Want You ... (ISBN 074254978X)

Thank you Mr. Greene:
Jay P. Greene has an agenda: the beginning of a modern system of public education. Wake up America, we need change in Public Education and Greene is right on point. Some of his points can be offensive (to teachers), but sometimes the truth hurts. Everyone agrees there exists a problem, and when Greene asks the reader to look at the facts that lead to the roots in order to get to the solution, I am inspired that there is hope. We all have agendas in life that govern the decisions we make from the time we wake to the time we sleep. Some of the agendas we choose in life are selfish and regressive for our great country. We can only hope that more are interested in progress. Greene is a true American who has put the progress of his country at the front of his agenda. "Education Myths" is clearly written from the hearts and minds of men who care and I look forward to reading more from Greene and others from his school of thought.

its about freedom stupid:
I don't need lengthy intellectual arguments to understand that it is better to have parents decide where their children go to school, what they are taught, and how resources are distributed. This country was founded upon the concept of individual liberty and the "public" schools(they are government schools, not public schools) have taken this portion of our liberty away.

Excellent Discussion of Why the Conventional Wisdom on Education is Wrong:
"Education Myths" is one of those "love it or hate it" books. Liberals who have bought into these myths will despise the "reality checks" Greene gives while conservatives will applaud his meticulous debunking of them. Are schools underfunded? Are teachers underpaid? Do smaller class sizes raise student achievement? Does teacher credentialing result in better performance? Do vouchers work? Greene reviews the research on these and other "hot button" issues to demonstrate that the conventional wisdom is very often wrong.

Watch out for what Jay P. Greene wants you to believe!:
Greene's book is a right-wing piece of propaganda made to look like solid science by the inclusion of numbers and statistics. It is a perfect example of what Stephen Colbert calls "truthiness." Has Greene ever visited a school? Has he observed large classes and small classes? The question, really, is irrelevant. Don't think for a minute that Greene is actually interested in fixing schools; he's likely far more interested in dismantling public education. Greene argues that so-called special interest groups like teacher unions have agendas to promote; so does he, only his is hidden. His arguments are full of holes and he perpetuates myths of his own. A careful reading of just one chapter makes this obvious. In the chapter on "The Teacher Pay Myth," Greene claims he debunks the myth that teachers are underpaid. Yet he also promotes the myth that teaching is easy work. He says, "The average teacher in a departmentalized setting...taught almost 4.5 hours per day in 1982 and fewer than 3.9 hours per day in 2000....This leaves plenty of time for grading and planning during the day" (76). What an easy job! Teach for a few hours, dash off a lesson plan, skim those 130 five-page essays, and still time to kick back with a cup of coffee in the staff room? But what is "plenty" of time? Is three hours a day really enough time to plan and grade? Not if it takes 30 minutes to grade each one of those 130 essays. Not only does Greene perpetuate a myth, he uses faulty logic. Just before the statement cited above, he argues that we shouldn't accept vague assertions as research findings. He ought to take his own advice. Greene also claims that the lack of incentive pay "leaves (teachers) with little incentive to do great amounts of overtime work" (77). Greene has obviously never met many teachers or spent much time in a classroom. Granted, there are poor teachers (and poor writers, researchers, doctors, accountants), but for most teachers, the incentive to work overtime is the fact that we care about our students. Plus, has Greene ever headed up a meeting? If so, he knows how much work it takes to prepare. He should try leading a meeting all day, every day; then he would know that entering a classroom unprepared is a miserable experience. There's more incentive. The fact is: most teachers don't need salary as incentive, which is not to suggest, of course, that teachers shouldn't be paid for the important work they do. But wait - is that work really so important? Let's ask Dr. Greene. He argues that, "it is simply wrong to imply that teachers should make as much money as workers in more demanding fields that require extraordinary talent and training" (77). Here's a statement that needs debunking! So teaching is not demanding? Teaching doesn't require extraordinary talent? If teaching is so easy, then any idiot should be able to do it. Why, then, is Greene concerned that schools don't attract the "best and brightest" among college graduates? How, he asks, can we "explain the generally low quality of the graduates attracted to teaching?" (83). There are two problems with his question. The first, obviously, is this: What does Greene mean by "low quality"? My best guess is that he is associating academic performance with teaching potential. Yet this is ridiculous. Why should we assume that a "good student" would necessarily be a "good teacher"? Many of the best teachers I know are good teachers precisely because they weren't good students and, as a result, can identify with low-motivated kids. The second problem with Greene's assumption that those who go into teaching are graduates of low quality is that is doesn't provide any evidence that those graduates who go into teaching are actually of low quality. He simply puts forth an unsupported assumption: that low-quality graduates are attracted to teaching because of the short work year. Huh? Here's his reasoning: "It seems likely that high-performing graduates are precisely the kind of ambitious people who would prefer to work more hours and make a higher total salary rather than work fewer hours and make a higher hourly rate but a lower total salary" (83). Wait a minute. Didn't Greene just spent a lot of time debunking the low teacher pay "myth" by arguing that teachers' hourly rates are actually higher than most other professions, thus proving that teachers are actually paid quite well? Turns out, I guess, according to his logic, that annual salary does matter! I think a Harvard-educated professor should know better than to base a conclusion on what "seems likely."

Repulsive:
I have never read such a misuse of statistics to piece together arguments that are flimsy at best. I thought the idea of the book sounded good, only to be horrified from the first paragraph on. If you believe ideas such as "bigger classrooms MAY actually be better because then schools could hire FEWER teachers so there'd be more money to pay them and it would attract higher QUALITY teachers!" Huh? The logic is so ridiculous. So where exactly would all the low quality teachers go? And exactly who wants their kids in the schools while this change comes about to see if this counter-intuitive idea actually works? I'm sure this book will appeal to people of a certain mindset, but if you are looking for a book with objective, fact-based ideas for improving education, this ain't it.