Education Resources

If you can only allocate the time to read one book on education, this is the one. As the director of the Progressive Policy Institute’s project on Reinventing America’s Schools, David Osborne provides a rigorous, experienced base survey of some of the best practices in education in America today. While this might sound dry and academic, it is far from it, as Osborne concentrates on the lessons learned from the miraculous turnaround of the school districts of New Orleans, Washington, DC, and Denver. From those experiences, he provides a compelling summary of the conditions necessary to reinvent America’s schools. While in our Education Research, we endeavored to remain neutral in the charter debate, it is hard to do so after reading Osborne’s book. While he is no ideologue with respect to charters or teachers’ unions, the conclusions are inescapable. The path to better schools challenges the traditional centralized system. In his words, “The new formula—school autonomy, accountability for performance, diversity of school designs, parental choice, and competition between schools—is simply more effective than the centralized, bureaucratic approach we inherited from the 20th century. Separating steering from rowing makes all the difference. School boards and superintendents get to focus their energy on steering: on setting policy and direction and ensuring that schools deliver the results desired. Meanwhile, those doing the rowing—operating schools—have the freedom from bureaucratic constraints they need to maximize school performance.”