CAT Tracks for April 3, 2013 MY LITTLE (GLOBAL) SCHOOL

Ho hum...

PISA

The test taken by a sampling of schools in a multitude of countries...

...has been used this past decade by school reformers to decry United States public schools as failing.

Then, along came a new study that broke down the PISA scores by socio-economic level.

Oops...

United States public schools suddenly performed much better in comparison to their foreign "competition".

As the column below shows, the defenders of school reform are a resilient lot, putting a new spin on things so as to keep the pipeline of educational dollars flowing freely into their burgeoning coffers.

Lest we forget...

I would put money on the FACT that the results of this latest defense of school reform will confirm (admit?) what school reformers have constantly ignored, constantly denied...namely, that there is an achievement gap between the haves and the have nots.

YES!

Poverty does matter!!!

The school reformers will smoothly shift gears and move on (without admitting their error) to another explanation of why U.S. public schools are so bad that they need to be privatized and run for profit.

Well...

...dig deeper!

Bottom line:

It's an apples and oranges thing!

Consider for a moment:

C-U-L-T-U-R-E

Wanna bet?

Folk - rich, middle, and poor - in countries that value education do better on standardized tests than folk in countries that do not.

So...

Advice to the defenders of school reform:

Try, try again.

Look, up in the sky!
It's a bird.
It's a plane.
It's awww sh...shoot, It's a bird!