On Monday, November 14th, join DL21C’s Education Committee for a discussion with Steven Brill on his controversial book CLASS WARFARE: Inside the Fight to Fix America’s Schools.
This is a book that has ignited both praise and criticism on all sides of the education reform debate, and is a discussion not to be missed. Doors open at 6:30pm - see you there!
About the book:
CLASS WARFARE (Simon & Schuster; August 16, 2011) is Brill‘s compelling and contentious narrative of the push for education reform that has accelerated rapidly in town halls, in state capitals, and on Capitol Hill in recent years following President Obama‘s Race to the Top contest. Brill tackles hotly debated questions about how to measure teacher competency and set salaries, the role of teachers‘ unions, the struggle within the Democratic Party between reformers and old-school union loyalists, and policies like last in, first out that require that teachers get laid off based purely on seniority rather than performance. With revealing stories populated by a large and highly vocal cast of characters, from the famous to the unknown, Brill explains why so many of our children are failing, who is standing in their way, who is trying to help, and what needs to happen to put the American dream back in America‘s schools.
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*CLASS WARFARE: Inside the Fight to Fix America’s Schools will be available for purchase on-site*
Free for Annual Members and anyone purchasing a copy of CLASS WARFARE; $5 for everyone else
DL21C Annual Membership is only $50 and gets you in to all DL21C events for a full year - to sign up, go to www.dl21c.org/membership.
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About Steven Brill
Steven Brill is the CEO of Press+, which has created a new business model for journalism to flourish online. He has written feature articles for The New Yorker (where he wrote about the ―Rubber Rooms‖ that housed teachers accused of incompetence), The New York Times Magazine, and TIME. He teaches journalism at Yale and founded the Yale Journalism Initiative. Brill founded and ran The American Lawyer magazine, Court TV, and Brill’s Content magazine. He is the author of After: How America Confronted the September 12 Era, and The Teamsters.
About Geoffrey Decker
Geoffrey Decker is a GothamSchools staff writer. He joined GothamSchools in 2011 from the CUNY Graduate School of Journalism, where he covered Brooklyn schools for NYTimes.com‘s The Local blog and contributed to the New York Times. As a regular contributor to Brooklyn’s Patch.com sites, Geoffrey covered school closures and other co-location battles throughout central Brooklyn. He has also covered crime, politics, and government for NBC New York and high school basketball for Bed-Stuy Patch. Geoffrey studied journalism at Marist College.
Commentary about CLASS WARFARE: Inside the Fight to Fix America’s Schools
“Steven Brill‘s Class Warfare is hard-hitting, illuminating, and as fast-paced and gripping as a thriller. His vivid accounts of great teachers at work—and his play-by-play of the battle to remove the obstacles put in front of them by their own union—opened my eyes and changed my outlook about the possibilities for American education. A must-read call to action for all thinking Americans, especially parents.”
-- Amy Chua, Yale Law Professor and author of Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother
"The financiers of public school reform described [in Brill's book] live in a world of spectacular wealth. They believe in measurable outcomes; their faith in test scores is greater than that of most educators, who understand that standardized tests are not scientific instruments and that scores on the tests represent only a small part of what schools are expected to accomplish. The Wall Street men have found a cause that is both “exciting and fun” and... “because so many of us got interested in this at the same time, you get to work with people who are your friends.” It is unlikely that any of them have close personal connections to public education, yet they have made it their mission to change national education policy. " - Diane Ravitch
“Education in America is THE national imperative of the 21st century and Steven Brill has done a brilliant job of taking us through the complexities, trials and triumphs, failures and food fights that define the struggle to get it right. We all have a stake in the outcome and owe it to succeeding generations to get involved. Class Warfare is the road map to what that means.”
-- Tom Brokaw, journalist and author of A Long Way from Home and The Greatest Generation
Reviews of CLASS WARFARE: Inside the Fight to Fix America’s Schools
NY Times: http://www.nytimes.com/2011/08/21/books/review/class-warfare-by-steven-brill-book-review.html?pagewanted=all
New York Review of Books: http://www.nybooks.com/articles/archives/2011/sep/29/school-reform-failing-grade/?page=1
The New Republic: http://www.tnr.com/book/review/class-warfare-steven-brill
Gotham Schools: http://gothamschools.org/2011/08/31/we-read-steven-brill%E2%80%99s-%E2%80%9Cclass-warfare%E2%80%9D-so-you-don%E2%80%99t-have-to/