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kyrstin_p1989's review
challenging
informative
reflective
sad
medium-paced
5.0
While some of this was a review of information I already knew, so much of it was brand new and made me think about certain educational “solutions” in a brand new way. For profit education is not the way to solve inequality in schools. Not through charters. No through virtual school. Not through well-meaning programs like TFA. This book explains why the US is tied up in a battle with segrenomics and what we can do to fix it.
wendysimon's review
4.0
This was a very interesting book about the historical roots and consequences of inadequate education for minority communities and how it is being used as a cash cow for private entities. Going back to the era of Reconstruction after the Civil War throughout the current day and age of unfettered charter school expansion and school "choice," the book investigates the alarming realities in many communities as well as the few success stories. As a teacher in one of the featured communities, I see many of the problems mentioned and while there are common sense solutions to many of these problems, the money is never there but instead is being provided for charter schools. An interesting book book with some common sense solutions!
pyrrhicspondee's review
5.0
I have been locked in for the coronavirus, as all schools (and most businesses) are closed. In this time, I have grown increasingly anxious about online instruction, the gaps between what my students have access to compared to what my own kids have access to, how this whole virus is laying bare the inequities that I see every day--and also how I'm going to teach online and manage my own children's learning at home.
So naturally I picked this book back up and finished it in a day. Helpfully, I picked back up right at the chapter on virtual education, and how it really really doesn't work for our most vulnerable students, even when there isn't a pandemic ramping up fear and anxiety around the globe.
I read this book as part of Clear the Air (https://cleartheaireducation.wordpress.com/), a free online PD program run about social justice and education. The Zoom conversation with Noliwe Rooks was AMAZING. And this book was also amazing. The two together were inspiring and crushing. I can think of no better primer on the history of segregated education in America than this book. The chapter on Brown v. Board of Education should be required reading for everyone in education in this country--so pretty much everyone, given that we all have to move through the education system.
I'll conclude here by saying this book did nothing to make me feel better about working for a charter school.
So naturally I picked this book back up and finished it in a day. Helpfully, I picked back up right at the chapter on virtual education, and how it really really doesn't work for our most vulnerable students, even when there isn't a pandemic ramping up fear and anxiety around the globe.
I read this book as part of Clear the Air (https://cleartheaireducation.wordpress.com/), a free online PD program run about social justice and education. The Zoom conversation with Noliwe Rooks was AMAZING. And this book was also amazing. The two together were inspiring and crushing. I can think of no better primer on the history of segregated education in America than this book. The chapter on Brown v. Board of Education should be required reading for everyone in education in this country--so pretty much everyone, given that we all have to move through the education system.
I'll conclude here by saying this book did nothing to make me feel better about working for a charter school.
jnelly14's review
informative
reflective
medium-paced
4.0
A brief but in-depth explanation of the rise of the educational market. Rooks traces the roots of educational segregation from the Reconstruction Era all the way to the Obama Era. She argues that it can't be solved simply by creating more and more charter schools and alternative solutions that don't reckon with this history.
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