End the Tyranny of the Self-Contained Classroom
Conventional and unquestioned assumptions about schools, teachers, and classrooms limit educational reform and prevent educational transformation. Bill Gates, one of the leading visionaries of our time, has committed himself and his foundation to improving teaching. Yet, Gates' proposals for change range from suggestions that would result in marginal improvement to recommendations that would actually reinforce the status quo.
His support for identifying outstanding teachers, compensating them well, and assigning a handful of extra students to them is not a bad idea. However, it represents, at best, a marginal improvement for small numbers of students. It does nothing to use the intellectual capital of outstanding teachers to reform, much less transform, schools.
Gates-sponsored research on teacher effectiveness, a topic that suffers from underinvestment, is an excellent idea. Yet, paradoxically, the proposal for value-added teacher evaluation and compensation will work only if schools do not change. Any innovation that requires a departure from the self-contained, teacher-centered classroom, including technology-facilitated learning, makes attributing the learning gains of students to individual teachers even more problematic than it already is. Gates and his foundation have underestimated—as have countless other reformers—a powerful force that is at work preventing change. And it is neither the union nor the school board nor any of...
This article is available to subscribers only.
To keep reading this article and more, subscribe now or purchase this article.
Subscribe to Education Week and Save
Get a full year and save up to 45%!
Viewed
Emailed
Recommended
Commented
- Principal
- Partnership for Los Angeles Schools, Los Angeles, CA
- K-8 Principal
- EdVantages/Performance Academies, Detroit, MI
- 2 Positions -Associate Superintendent and Chief Academic Officer, and Director of Human of Resources
- Washington County Public Schools, Hagerstown, MD
- Superintendent
- The Greendale School District, Greendale, WI
- Principals
- Prince George's County Public Schools, MD
