The Death and Life of the Great American School System: How Testing and Choice Are Undermining Education

Abstract

Diane Ravitch created quite a national stir when The Death and Life of the Great American School System: How Testing and Choice Are Undermining Education came out last year in the United States. Here was a highly respected historian of American education publically recanting her previous advocacy of two main ideas shaping educational reform today: 1) the adoption of free market business practices to make schools more competitive, and 2) the use of standardized testing as the main assessment tool of student learning.