America 2000, President Bush's program for revitalizing our education system asks many of the right questions, and that's important. For instance, one major focus of attention is how we can change our schools so that American students will do at least as well as kids in other industrialized countries. (If we didn't know it already, the recent National Report Card shows that our kids are miles behind.) But will the strategies that are being proposed do the job?
In order to create "break-the-mold" schools, America 2000 has set up the American Schools Development Corporation, a nonprofit organization funded by business contributions. It will award contracts to groups of "experts" -- "R & D think tanks, school innovators, management consultants and others" -- who will come up with innovative ideas for totally new kinds of schools.
Now, I agree that nothing is needed more than a new model for our schools to replace the factory model that's been around for 100 years. We need schools that will reflect the fact that children learn at different rates and in different ways, schools that allow for differentiated staffing and make use of the new technology that could revolutionize both teaching and learning. But what makes us think this is the way to do it? Perhaps efforts to break the mold haven't worked. The education history of the past 20 or 30 years is filled with examples of revolutionary new schools, funded by private or foundation or government money and designed to solve education's most serious problems, that have disappeared without a trace into education's equivalent of the Bermuda Triangle.
A recent story from Education Week (September 25, 1991) about the Annie E. Foundation's "New Futures" project may be a case in point. The foundation planned to spend $50 million over five years to reform inner-city schools in five American cities and make sure that troubles young people had the services they needed to improve their school performance. But three years later, apparently many of the leaders of the project are discouraged by what they've accomplished: Reading scores are about what they were when the project started; math scores rose slightly but then fell back to their original low point; black students continue to fail at a far higher rate than white students; and average daily attendance has not improved. What's wrong? The Casey people had lots of good ideas, enthusiasm and money. The project may still live up to original expectations - after all, it's only been going for three years. But so far it seems to be a disappointment.
I'm not saying that trying new ideas is not worthwhile, but innovation alone is not a solid basis for dealing with our problems. The first thing innovators need to do is to spend time analyzing past failures. They could fail anyway, but if they've done their homework and know where the excellent ideas of the past have gone wrong, they are less likely to do so. This is important advice for America 2000.
For example, it's not enough t have a good strategy; you have to be able to pay for it. And in the past, plenty of good ideas have failed for lack of funding. Will the money for America 2000's break-the-mold schools be there over time or will the corporate funding run out in a couple of years? What guarantee is there that even successful programs won't end up in the trash can because there's no money to continue them?
Another thing to consider is that many past efforts -- including some of the state school reform strategies of the 1980s -- failed because they were top down. Some smart people got together, figured out how they thought education should change and turned their ideas into a master plan for people in the schools to carry out. Will America 2000's plans be more of the same -- except that they'll be adopted by the school board and superintendent (and perhaps the union leader) instead of the state? No scheme ever works unless the people responsible for carrying it our want to make it work. You have to get their whole-hearted support, and if you don't, the plan is likely to be the victim of unintentional sabotage, no matter how brilliant it is.
Overpromising is another problem. Americans are optimistic people, and they also want results in a hurry. So education reformers have often claimed far too much for a new idea. Doctors don't do this. When they come out with a new drug, they are careful to say, "Here's what tests show us this drug will do, but we still are not sure about long-term results and possible side effects. We need to do more testing." As a result, people do not expect too much too soon. Secretary of Education Lamar Alexander understands the dangers of overpromising. As he goes around the country selling America 2000, he admits that maybe some of the ideas we try won't work. Unfortunately, some of the Administration's written material about America 2000 is full of hype, and this could backfire.
We need a new kind of school. If we keep working at it, we'll get there, but we need to be smart enough to take advantage of the mistakes we've made in the past as well as the bright ideas we have today.