Bail Me Out! : Handling Difficult Data and Tough Questions About Public Schools

Rating:
Summary: Recommended reading for parents, students, teachers
Review: Gerald Bracey's Bail Me Out!: Handling Difficult Data And Tough Questions About Public Schools is presented in a question-and-answer format as it surveys nine basic issues stemming from the public education systems of today. Bracey examines the interpretation of educational research data; exploring and understanding tests; SAT facts and fictions; private schools vs. public schools; teacher and administrator accountability. Bail Me Out! is informative and recommended reading for parents, students, teachers, administrators, education reformers, school board members, as well as educational policy makers at the local, state, and federal levels.

Rating:
Summary: How to deny the truth - step by step
Review: Oh, come on. Does Bracey really believe that by attacking the imperfect nature of all statistics he can convince anyone the painfully obvious is not true? There is really a very clear pattern to all these "flawed" statistics. These are not really very subtle problems here.

That he feels it is helpful to the current situation to offer a step by step guide to avoiding the facts is sad. That he believes the kind obfuscation and cheap technical bullying he suggests will actually work shows how far from the real world he has strayed. Read this book and see if you cannot picture having to restrain yourself from laughing in the face of anyone actually putting forward the technical defenses he offers. Here is a possible exchange: "According to the Brookings Institutes study, there are no predominantly minority Public Schools in the NY inner city where 70% of the students are reading at their level, while their are 37 parochial/private schools (16 of which are well above 90%). " Bracey's answer: "How was the variable defined?" I'll tell him how the variable was defined. The children, particularly the most vulnerable, that we have entrusted to our public schools cannot read.

Rating:
Summary: Don't look to be bailed out - be accountable
Review: The title of this book is appropriate. It is designed as a guide for defenders of an indefensiable system who are not looking for solutions but for a way to be bailed out. It is actually filled with shockingly blatant advice on to how to childishly avoid the stark truth by using technical jargon and various tricks to bring any of the dense thicket of negative statistics crying out against the status quo into question. Using the standards he wishes to hold negative statistics to before admitting them is to abandon all statistics as a policy tool. Unfortunately this problem has long passed the point of subtle stastical trends which could be debated. It is clearly visable, and the statistics he wishes to dismiss are not an illusion.

Look at the web sites of any major public policy think tank (Brookings, Hoover, Rand, etc) or read any of the numerous serious studies and books on this subject if you want the scales to drop from your eyes. The consensus on this issue is clear and very specific as to what is wrong and how it got that way - at least among the think tanks. Mr Bracey should be ashamed of himself for creating a guidebook to help those who can make a difference blind themselves to what the world already knows. That we have failed our children, especiually the most vulnerable, and our unions, educators and progressive parties, caught up in political squabbles and vying interests, have resisted any effort to right this terrible wrong.

Fixing problems vs denying problems - hmmm, I wonder which tactic we owe our nations children?