‘It’s Being Done’
One of the big questions facing American education is, “Can it be done?” Is it possible for schools to help all children—even those considered “difficult to teach”—learn to read, write, compute, and generally become educated citizens?
By now it has become almost a truism that high-poverty, high-minority schools are low-achieving, and that even in diverse schools most poor children and children of color are doomed to low achievement. An entire industry has grown up to reassure teachers and administrators that the dismal results they get are the only results that could be expected, and that only the misguided would demand anything different.
But that isn’t the end of the story. About two years ago, I spoke to a very accomplished principal, Mary Russo, of the K-8 Richard T. Murphy School in Boston, and we discussed the fact that many people say it is impossible for schools to help the kinds of students who attend her school to achieve. I said, “They say...
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