Anyone
interested in understanding the challenges we face in educational reform, and
political decision making more generally, wants to read this short article in
the May-July 2012 edition of Academe. Knowing the history of the present that the
author provides makes the steady disinvestment in public education less confusing,
if no less disturbing.
While, understanding
the specific ways that the already powerful impact politics and society is
important, this is not the same as concluding that this influence is illegitimate.
It is not, at least not by fiat. If we disagree, we need to
counter-mobilize to increase our influence.
The
reason to read this article is not to suggest that the powerful should be prevented
from mobilizing (if that was even possible), but to ensure that we see the
campaigns and influence and mobilization, learn to recognize the mechanisms and
webs of organizations through which this power operates, so we can know the author
of current policy reforms, appreciate what is at stake, and more effectively weigh in.
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