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History and Educational Reform

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  24 February 2017

Extract

The history of school reform has continuously fascinated historians of education, but their study of the subject has acquired a new urgency in the last quarter of a century as national political discussions have given an increasingly important place to educational policy. The recent publication of Tinkering toward Utopia: A Century of Public School Reform (Harvard University Press, 1995), by David Tyack and Larry Cuban, offers the latest comprehensive study of the subject. We have invited four distinguished scholars to comment on the book. They are Robert L. Hampel of the University of Delaware, William R. Johnson of the University of Maryland, Baltimore County, David N. Plank of Michigan State University, and Diane Ravitch of the Brookings Institute. Professors Tyack and Cuban have, in turn, agreed to respond to the comments.

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Forum
Copyright
Copyright © 1996 by the History of Education Society 

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References

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2 In Michigan, for example, the goals behind sweeping changes in the educational system over the past four years have been to reduce taxes, to weaken the power of unions, and to placate parents and other constituencies alienated from the public schools. “Helping students learn better” may or may not be a by-product of these reforms, but it was distinctly not their main objective.Google Scholar

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