Daniel Tanner

Improving the Curriculum— Guidelines for Principals

To be effective, the principal must be committed to sound educa tional principles, says this writer, who offers some research and practice-based guidelines for improving the curriculum.

Knowledge divided against itself

Humanistic intellectuals have tended to regard science as an alien realm of merely technical knowledge. This situation not only deprives our educational system and society of a great mode of inquiry but also cuts off advances in knowledge from pervasive social problems.

The Lost Sources of a Science of Education

Abstract The author explores the mystery of how and why John Deweys The Sources of a Science of Education came to be lost or forgotten, and why that work is still so important today.

Margaret Thatcher: Iron Lady of Charter Schools.

Abstract Documentary history reveals that charter schools are a vestige of the socially divided school system of 19th-century England. The current charter school movement in the United States raises the danger to American democracy of splitting up the U.S. school structure and creating a separate system of schools for other peoples children.

Sorry, President Obama, but High-Stakes Tests Can't Cure Cancer

Abstract Successive nationalizing programs for school reform in the United States have centered on external high-stakes testing and charter schools aimed at closing the widening achievement gap between children of socioeconomically disadvantaged and advantaged families. But the chief cause of the achievement gap is poverty, and poverty cannot be cured by high-stakes tests. Charter schools raise a clear and present danger of splitting up the inclusive unitary school structure—a uniquely American invention.

Regaining Excellence in Education. By Mario D. Fantini. Columbus, Ohio: Merrill Publishing Co., 1986

Surely a powerful case can be made for the great accomplishments of American public education. The U.S. today continues to lead all nations in the proportion of the age groups completing high school and going on to higher education. The U.S. leads all other nations in authorship in the world’s leading scientific and technical journals, scientific patents, and international scientific awards.