One of the things that I have valued most about my graduate education has been the level of attention my programs and instructors have brought to my own teaching. At both my MA institution and at the doctoral level, I’ve been part of programs and departments that take graduate teaching of undergraduates very seriously, and […]

Adam Ozimek dings me, fairly, for being insufficiently rigorous in how I talk about cultural respect for teachers. So: I will cop to speaking too loosely about respect and satisfaction when it comes to this topic. Adam is right to get on me about this stuff, and I resolve to do better in the future. […]

School reformers have scored, in their view, a major victory in their efforts by winning a key court battle against teacher tenure. (Through the financial power of a Silicon Valley oligarch, naturally.) Unfortunately for the reformers, getting rid of tenure can’t fix schools– especially by their own logic. Let’s walk through this step by step […]

Last fall, I worked as a research assistant for the late Linda Bergmann. Linda was a brilliant academic and a great mentor; her particular area of of expertise was writing centers, where students of all levels come to work on their writing with expert tutors. I’ve long felt that writing centers are a symbol of […]

The Dish has been considering the topic of college assessments and government rankings of universities. It happens that I am right now writing my dissertation on the Collegiate Learning Assessment and its successor, the Collegiate Learning Assessment+, one of the major competitors in the effort to establish a common test of college student learning. It also […]

Reihan Salam is a very popular guy with other professional political writers, so I am risking opprobrium in criticizing a piece he wrote about education. But it needs to be said: this is an awful  piece that marries broad ignorance about its subject matter to the condescending Slate house style. Salam: Say you were given […]

In his latest gem-encrusted masterpiece, Tom Friedman takes aim at a basic mathematical concept when he declares  that”average is over.” He then proceeds to demonstrate that he doesn’t understand how averages work.  I’ve been arguing for a while now that “average is over.” It has to be when every boss has cheaper, easier, faster access […]

So there’s a new piece in the New York Times magazine about college graduation rates, and how they are associated with student socioeconomic factors. The writer, Paul Tough, argues that these differences in graduation rates are largely attributable to economic differences. I wouldn’t contest the point; in fact I’m very glad to see him making it. But […]