By Jeanne Allen December 7,1995
In the category of disturbing trends of the 90's comes what can be described as the feel-good analysis of American education. In short, this approach to addressing students' declining academic achievement is one of, simply, insisting that it isn't so, or, at any rate, not nearly as bad as it seems. This all started a few years ago when the education establishment, apparently weary of all the bad news about education and the public's criticism of their performance, turned its energies to proving that the glass of American education was not half-empty but was, in fact, half-full. "Statistics don't reflect the true picture of American education and student achievement because of the vast number of social ills facing the nation." In fact, went the argument, when you consider all that schools are up against -- crime, drugs, violence, etc. -- educators do a pretty good job, thank you!
Enter now into this rousing chorus of "Smile, Darn Ya, Smile" one Robert Huelskamp and his Sandia Report. To make a long story mercifully short, in the late 1980's researchers at the Department of Energy's Sandia, New Mexico, Laboratory "proved" that the government was suppressing information on the actual progress of schools. No, a conspiracy theory on education from the Energy Department's hinterlands doesn't make any sense, and when the report was first shopped around it was dutifully ignored as being, well, nuts. But when the education establishment heard about it, the Sandia Report and Huelskamp became the gospel and savior of the don't-worry-be-happy movement.
Sandia was just what they needed: a report, from an actual federal agency that confirmed their rhetoric and reflected their truth. From there they embraced the "research" of others who were willing to discover the same truth and share in the enthusiasm of an American educational renaissance. (Gerald Bracey and Alex Molner are two other union-sponsored demigods of feel-good education.) And how is such previously unnoticed good news being uncovered? According to statisticians, most of the information being generated by these reports comes from a little trick called "statistical isolation," meaning, basically, that you isolate one group of statistics from another and ignore those that you don't like. For example. Reading scores are down. But, if you remove the scores of disadvantaged children from the mix you discover that reading scores for the rest of the students have remained constant (which isn't entirely true either, but it sells), and viola'! A made-to-order silver lining. You can make a plausible argument that this type of analysis provides a more accurate reading of the "truth" behind statistics. Some students are doing well and some are not and this type of approach shows the progress that is being made. But it is a disturbingly elastic, small-picture approach to separating success from failure. There are any number of football teams with impressive statistics. But if the team isn't winning the coach doesn't say, "We're doing great, if you just ignore the fact that we're losing." And fans don't chant "We're number one...when you adjust the statistics."
Now, to maintain the credibility of their facade of success, or, even worse, because they've actually come to believe their own public relations rhetoric, the establishment has taken to attacking those who don't agree with the feel-good line. If you suggest things aren't as good as they seem you're branded "anti-education." If you point out that test scores are actually lower in many key areas of learning you're a harpy focusing only on the negative. And if you suggest to Department of Education officials that they are painting too rosy a picture of the state of education (as I did during a television appearance with Deputy Secretary Madeleine Kunin) instead of a debate all you get (or, at least what I got) is the smug rejoinder "you just don't get it." There is so much that is disturbing about all of this that it's hard to know where to begin. Do you start with the intellectual dishonesty of the enterprise or the defeatist attitude the ploy represents? Do you offer a defense for those who are attacked as being anti-education or do you discuss the chilling affect all of this is having on the debate over how to improve our nation's schools? And if you do any of those things, how much credibility do you give the establishment by buying-in to their argument?
So to those who think education can be improved through statistical shell games, the power of positive thinking and, heaven help us, conspiracy theories cooked up by Energy Department bureaucrats with way too much time on their hands, I offer only this: stop it. Stop the whole ridiculous game of trying to convince everyone -- including yourselves -- that education is better than it really is. Admit that in some cases it's good and in some cases it's getting better and take pride in that success. But also admit that in other cases it's terrible and getting worse. Admit that reading and history scores are down, and that a lot of efforts to improve student performance and achievement have failed. Find out why. Talk to parents and teachers. See what they think is wrong and what they know is wrong and work with them to bring about change. Take some heat. Accept some blame. Work to fix the problems instead of trying to talk your way out of them. And begin to worry...like the rest of us.
Jeanne Allen is author of THE SCHOOL REFORM HANDBOOK: How to Improve Your Schools, and president of The Center for Education Reform in Washington, DC, a national non-profit advocacy group providing support and guidance to thousands of individuals and communities nationwide who are working to bring fundamental reforms to their schools. For more information, please call (202) 822-9000 or (800) 521-2118, or send e-mail to cer@edreform.com.
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