The Education Wars Provides A Guide For Supporters Of Public Education
From Forbes.com
In their 2020 book, A Wolf at the Schoolhouse Door, Jack Schneider and Jennifer Berkshire sounded the alarm:
The threat to public education...is grave. A radical vision for unmaking the very idea of public schools has moved from the realm of ideological pipe dream to legitimate policy.
In their new book The Education Wars (out this week), Schneider and Berkshire update us on how that radical vision, now fueled by the culture wars, is faring.
The culture wars—roaring debates over what schools are for, what they should teach, who should decide— are not new. But the writers note that “this time it’s different.” This time, the questions under debate include the question of whether public schools should exist at all.
With that question on the table, the culture wars take on extra weight.
Culture war isn’t merely an outlet for grievance, though it is that. It is also a mechanism for alienating people...a way of prying allegiance away from the public schools that Americans of all stripes have long supported, and which are at the heart of so many communities.
Or as Christopher Rufo, the man who has promoted several waves of culture panic put it
To get universal school choice, you really need to operate from a place of universal public school distrust.
Berkshire and Schneider’s book is subtitled A Citizen’s Guide and Defense Manual, and it serves well as that, providing a brisk view of the journey that brought us to our present situation, a clear explanation of what that situation is, and some thoughtful ideas for how to defend public education.
A Wolf at the Schoolhouse Door has been on my To Read list for a while. Your post motivates me to read it before The Education Wars is available at my local library. Thanks!