This weblog entry is part of a continuing paragraph by paragraph critique of Jay Greene’s essay about myths in education.

The introduction is here.

As stated in the introduction of this series, I wrote the critique of “Education Myths” a few years back. I resurrected these articles before moving on to newer material because they cover a lot of educational issues that are still important and relevant today. The original “Education Myths” series ended with this final post (which you can read below), but I had intended on continuing the paragraph by paragraph analysis of Greene’s work this summer. I changed my mine.

I’m going to leave the original post as it was written. The issues Greene speaks of will pop up soon enough as they are hot topics (private schools and vouchers). It is time, I think, to move on to other fodder for my critiques.

Original post:

I am being forced to decide where I can find more time in the day. As a good friend of mine says, “What’s your problem? What are you doing between midnight and 5 AM?” Unfortunately, I confess, lately, I am not always sleeping. According to Greene, I should have lots of time to finish my critique of his pathetically supported statements, but fact is stronger than fiction when you are confronted with the reality of running a classroom. It’s time to cut some of the demands of my time, and this self-appointed attempt at exposing Greene is just one of them.

When I sat down to analyze Greene’s next myth, “The rich school myth,” the first sentence was misleading and typical of his style. “A popular myth says that private schools do better than public schools only because they have more money, recruit high-performing students, and expel low-performing students.” The statement, “private schools do better than public schools,” itself is a myth when like-student comparisons are made. [1] Also, he continues to oversimplify the arguments, and produce misleading information as he continues his crusade against public schools. There is also plenty of evidence which debunks his claims made in the final myth that voucher schools work better than public schools. [2]

Proving the next 2 myths to be just as hollow and unsupported as the previous 4 will take many hours of pouring through legitimate and relevant research to find the strongest arguments against Greene. These are hours I no longer have available. School has started.

Like so many of my colleagues, I find myself having to prioritize and this critique has fallen to the bottom of my list. I just can’t spend any more time knocking over Greene’s strawmen at the expense of more important things. Greene is just not worth it. If I felt he was honorable, or engaging in a sincere attempt at looking at these issues in a balanced way, perhaps it would be worth the time. But, as you have seen in my previous posts, it is hard to believe he is doing anything but creating propaganda for his cause.

I could be accused of the same fault, but if you check my sources and his sources carefully, spending the time to read the arguments, you will find that my evidence outweighs his. So, I leave the next two myths unchallenged. Perhaps, when my life has slowed, I will finish this just for a sense of closure, but probably not. Greene is not convincing the people closest to schools – educators, parents, community volunteers – because his claims just don’t ring true when confronted with reality.

Notes and References:

1. Welner, Kevin and Christopher Lubienski. 2006. “Major flaws found in Harvard analysis of government sponsored public, private school research.” Education Policy Research Unit (EPRU),Education Policy Studies Laboratory, Arizona State University. Note: This article is no longer on the web.
2. You can find useful information here about vouchers. Staff. Fact sheets: The truth about vouchers. People for the American Way, website. Another helpful document: “School Vouchers: Myths and Facts,” Staff, American Federation of Teachers, website, pdf file.

This weblog entry is part of a continuing paragraph by paragraph critique of Jay Greene’s essay about myths in education.

The introduction is here.

Jay Greene’s “Education Myths,” paragraph 42
The certification myth (continued)

Members of the education establishment fiercely resist giving up the old linkage of pay to paper accomplishments. When Michigan adopted new standards emphasizing a teacher’s proven academic ability (as measured in skills tests) rather than their credentials or years of experience, the Detroit News profiled angry teachers. “It’s a slap in my face that I have to go back and take a test,” said one teacher with a master’s degree and 30 years of experience.

Members of the education establishment know that continuing education and experience produce better teachers, and this fact is supported by copious research on the topic (see last post). Greene wants to quantify a teacher’s worth by using test scores. After four or more years of college and dozens of continuing education classes (where, I might add, examinations are often given) it is a slap in the face to ask an experienced educator to sit for a standardized test to judge their worth. That educator has already taken numerous tests through accredited institutions. continue reading…

This weblog entry is part of a continuing paragraph by paragraph critique of Jay Greene’s essay about myths in education.

The introduction is here.

Jay Greene’s “Education Myths,” paragraph 40 & 41
The certification myth (continued)

The current teacher pay system, which connects compensation to education degrees, also harms teacher quality by artificially redirecting time and money toward earning those pieces of paper instead of advanced knowledge in specific subject areas. One NAEP study pointedly concluded that education master’s degrees have “little effect on improving teachers’ abilities,” and therefore the enormous amount of money spent pursuing these degrees “is arguably one of the least efficient expenditures in education.”

Researchers have also investigated the relationship between years of teaching experience and students’ academic achievement. Here, the story is inconclusive. If anything, the evidence indicates that teachers grow a little more effective during their first few years as they get up to speed in the classroom, but that after this initial period, their effectiveness plateaus. This evidence raises doubts about the practice of giving relatively small raises in a teacher’s second and third years, while giving teachers in their 20th and 30th years large annual raises.

I have already discussed the problems with using the NAEP test results as the only benchmark of success. Forgive me if I choose to ignore Greene’s vague siting of one research report based on NAEP scores for a moment and provide other evidence to counter his. Linda Darling-Hammond, of Stanford University, points out: continue reading…

This weblog entry is part of a continuing paragraph by paragraph critique of Jay Greene’s essay about myths in education.

The introduction is here.

I’m going to let Greene get a solid start on his case against certification by letting him present some of his evidence before I discuss it, so we begin with his first three paragraphs on this issue:

Jay Greene’s “Education Myths,” paragraph 37, 38 & 39
The certification myth

Receiving professional certification is generally regarded as a reliable sign of expertise, because in most occupations, credentials are given to those who have proven their worth. Few people would see a doctor who wasn’t licensed, or a lawyer who hadn’t passed the bar. Teacher quality is certainly a crucial factor in students’ academic achievement, but having an extra education degree is not linked to success.

In a review conducted for the Abell Foundation, researchers found that teachers holding a master’s in education did not produce higher student performance, and among new teachers, traditional certification made no difference in student performance. After examining every available study on the impact of teaching credentials on job performance–171 in total–Eric Hanushek found that only nine uncovered any significant positive relationship between credentials and student performance, five found a significant negative relationship between the two, and 157 showed no connection. Looking at Teach For America–a program that lets recent college graduates become teachers without obtaining traditional education credentials–three scholars at Mathematica Policy Research found that students taught by these non-credentialed instructors made significant gains in math in one year, and kept pace in reading. Current policy–which generally centers on teachers having education certificates–therefore appears to be seriously misguided.

Many researchers, politicians, and most Americans assume that more credentialing means better teachers, but the evidence suggests that it doesn’t. One of the strongest and most consistent findings in the entire body of research on teacher quality is that teaching certificates and master’s degrees in education are irrelevant to classroom performance. Yet most school systems reward certification and experience, instead of rewarding more reliable direct indicators of good teaching.

Here’s the real problem: Are the facts guiding the conclusion, or is the conclusion guiding the facts? Both sides of this argument ask this question. To separate the research from the propaganda is difficult. I will come back to the issue of certification in my next post, but I feel this is a good time to address one of the most serious problems in education today. Ideology disguised as legitimate research. continue reading…

This weblog entry is part of a continuing paragraph by paragraph critique of Jay Greene’s essay about myths in education.

The introduction is here.

If you haven’t read the last two posts, you might want to read them first as this continues the discussion on smaller class sizes and refers to some of the information in those posts.

After misrepresenting Project STAR, Greene goes on to criticize California’s Class-Size Reduction (CSR).

Jay Greene’s “Education Myths,” paragraph 34
The class size myth (continued)

In California, the state appropriated $1 billion in 1996 to reduce elementary school class sizes. When California’s test scores rose, advocates of smaller classes held up their program as a model. The reality, however, wasn’t so clear. A RAND Corporation study concluded that California students who attended larger elementary school classes improved at about the same rate as students in smaller classes. Though California’s overall educational performance went up, it did not seem to be due to smaller classes. (The state had also undertaken a number of other major education reforms at the same time it was reducing class sizes.)

Leave it to Greene to select an example that was poorly executed and criticized by small class proponents. Very few will argue that the California mandated Class-Size Reduction (CSR) was not a fiasco. It’s a great example of how not to implement smaller classes. Throwing money at a problem without careful planning is simply stupid, and that’s what happened. continue reading…