This examines how Duncan's strong arm tactics in reforming public schools in Chicago will be reflected in his role as education secretary. A well done story; a necessary one.

Informative program about education reform, featuring an interview with Secretary of Education Arne Duncan, a visit to a 'turnaround school' in Chicago which he helped transform. See links to related segments, as well as our full coverage of this topic: http://newstrust.net/topics/education_reform/

The NPR segment is a pretty fair assessment of the appointee's Chicago experience, and explores his view of national reform. Duncan has engaged in grandstanding; firing of all staff of some schools, closing neighborhood schools over parental protest, and been confrontational with teachers. He has had modest success except in the most poverty stricken schools. The strongest arm of his program is the increased hands-on training of recruits, which has produced more effective beginning teachers.

The reporting does some light questioning, but mostly gives a portrait of Arne Duncan's vision and program. Alternative approaches are not given weight. The substitution of corporation control of local schools instead of democratic local school board control is never raised as an issue. The only education goals mentioned are test scores. The headline question is not answered in the episode, and remains a question to be looked at more closely. Free market ideology with hostility to unions sounds very anti-democratic. Close connections with wealthy corporations, expanding segregation, and taking funds from public schools are all problems, not solutions.

An in-depth look at Education Secretary Arne Duncan's controversial and transformational policy of "turnaround schools." The before-and-after look at Chicago's Harvard School was compelling; it included vital details about how this reform works. This interview provided much context which offered a glimpse at how Duncan could approach a national reform. Very interesting to watch.

PBS distributes a great deal of information to the public that I am a frequent consumer of and sometimes use as a resource. Unfortunately, this piece distorts reality by reducing the sample size to 1 and limiting and editing the perspectives shared to those ideologically on board as so many "investigative journalists" do. Many assumptions about effective teaching methods are represented as culturally standard and counterarguments to Arne Duncan's assumptions, of which there are many, have no voice in this journalism. As a teacher and selective consumer of media, I am disappointed that PBS has adopted the reporting style of private news corporations that oversimplifies reality by shaping stories to fit a preconceived argument; ... More »