“During the 1980s, widespread dissatisfaction with America’s schools gave rise to a powerful movement for educational change, and the nation’s political institutions responded with aggressive reforms. Chubb and Moe argue that these reforms are destined to fail because they do not get to the root of the problem. The fundamental causes of poor academic performance, they claim, are not to be found in the schools, but rather in the institutions of direct democratic control by which the schools have traditionally been governed. Reformers fail to solve the problem-when the institutions ARE the problem. The authors recommend a new system of public education, built around parent-student choice and school competition, that would promote school autonomy—thus providing a firm foundation for genuine school improvement and superior student achievement.”

—  Terry M. Moe

John E. Chubb, and Terry M. Moe (1990). Politics, markets, and America's schools. Brookings Institution Press; Book abstract

Adopted from Wikiquote. Last update June 3, 2021. History

Help us to complete the source, original and additional information

Do you have more details about the quote "During the 1980s, widespread dissatisfaction with America’s schools gave rise to a powerful movement for educational ch…" by Terry M. Moe?
Terry M. Moe photo
Terry M. Moe 3
American political scientist 1949

Related quotes

Seymour Papert photo
Ivan Illich photo

“Universal education through schooling is not feasible. It would be no more feasible if it were attempted by means of alternative institutions built on the style of present schools.”

Introduction (November 1970).
Deschooling Society (1971)
Context: Universal education through schooling is not feasible. It would be no more feasible if it were attempted by means of alternative institutions built on the style of present schools. Neither new attitudes of teachers toward their pupils nor the proliferation of educational hardware or software (in classroom or bedroom), nor finally the attempt to expand the pedagogue's responsibility until it engulfs his pupils' lifetimes will deliver universal education. The current search for new educational funnels must be reversed into the search for their institutional inverse: educational webs which heighten the opportunity for each one to transform each moment of his living into one of learning, sharing, and caring. We hope to contribute concepts needed by those who conduct such counterfoil research on education — and also to those who seek alternatives to other established service industries.

Michel Foucault photo
Benjamin Zephaniah photo
David Guterson photo

“We should recognize that schools will never solve the bedrock problems of education because the problems are problems of families, of cultural pressures that the schools reflect and thus cannot really remedy.”

David Guterson (1956) Novelist, short story writer, poet, journalist, and essayist

"When Schools Fail Children: An English Teacher Educates His Kids at Home", Harper's Magazine (November 1990)

Peter Medawar photo
Francesc Ferrer i Guàrdia photo
George W. Bush photo

Related topics