Our Schools and Our Future ... Are We Still at Risk?

Abstract

Our Schools and Our Future ...Are We Still at Risk?, edited by Paul E. Peterson. Stanford, CA: Hoover Institution Press, 2003. 378 pp. $15.00, paperback; $25.00, hardback. In 2004 we are acknowledging the anniversary of two major civil rights and education milestones; one being the 50th anniversary of the Brown v. Board of Education ruling and the other is the 40th anniversary of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. In light of these recognitions, we continue to ask ourselves how much has education and opportunity changed for those previously considered to be disenfranchised? In the midst of the strong federal presence of accountability, we also ask what measures need to be taken to increase student achievement and thus destroy disenfranchisement (combining the simultaneous quest for and equity in education)? Similar questions and issues are addressed in Our Schools and Our Future... as the contributing authors acknowledge and review the effects of the report Nation at Risk, released two decades ago. The Koret Foundation established a task force of 11 scholars on K-12 education. The members of this academic community of educators were invited to give their scope on the state of education since the release of the infamous report 20 years ago. The authors that comprise this task force argue that the National Commission did a better job of diagnosis than prescription when they released Nation at Risk in 1983. In this book, an insightful distinction was made between the noncompliance of the form and spirit of recommendations put forth by Nation at Risk. Nation at Risk alarmed many citizens, particularly administrators, teachers, politicians, and the press. It stimulated an attentive ear of a receptive audience and launched what came to be known as the excellence movement. After the release of Nation at Risk, researchers and educators alike began to reconsider the organization and governance of schools, curriculum standards, teacher training, and the like. In this context, Our Schools and Our Future discuss how these changes may not have been the most astute, but achieved a well deserved refocus on the status of American education. The book is organized into three major sections that provide readers with an overview of past, present, and future phenomena as it relates to educational policy. Section one, A Nation at Risk: Then and Now, offers a historical look at the document while examining the changes in reform trends or lack thereof. This section also gives attention to the achievement of minority children at risk. The authors admit that Nation at Risk had a deleterious effect on minority students, particularly in urban areas. …