Join the conversation

Phi Delta Kappa, International has just released the results of the 40^th Annual Phi Delta Kappa/Gallup Poll of the Public's Attitudes Toward the Public Schools.  It makes for fascinating reading.

The Big Headlines

The press will no doubt focus on the following findings:

• Americans believe Barack Obama would do more to improve public schools that John McCain would.
• Americans seem to be warming to the idea of national standards, especially if you call them "common expectations." (Alert Ed in '08).  Wisely, Americans believe that we should not leave creation of such standards up to the feds.
• As in previous years, Americans have a much higher opinion of their local schools than of the nation's schools in general. But they give Asian and European schools much higher marks than American Schools as a whole.

Another finding, which might not capture quite as much media attention, has strong implications for current education reforms.  Americans overwhelmingly believe that the next president should rely on education leaders, rather than political or business leaders, for advice about education.  The current conversation among the education reform cognoscenti turns this preference on its head.  Too many political and business leaders seem to want what Dan Brown has called the "de-Baathification" of education reform. They want to pursue school transformation without input from, or respect for, the educators who must carry it out.

A Rorschach Test

The PDK/Gallup poll also offers an ideological Rorschach test for many of the education experts whose commentaries appear alongside the result.  For example, Marc Tucker sees Americans' continuing support for their local schools as evidence that school transformation is doomed. (He no doubt worries about the fate of his own reform program.)

Checker Finn at the Fordham Foundation, by contrast, is heartened by what he sees as Americans' "receptivity to" or even "eagerness for" some of his own favorite reforms, including charter schools and vouchers.  (Yet the data suggest that the public's appetite for such reforms is not quite as hearty as Finn suggests.  Fewer than half favor vouchers and barely over half support charters.  This represents a substantial decline in charter school support since 2007.) 

John Merrow notes the decline in support for charters but attributes this decline to the public's disappointment that charter schools have become "public schools on steroids, instead of breaking the mold."  (One could just as easily attribute lagging public support to the fact that so many charter schools have had no mold to break. For every inspiring charter school story, Americans have heard about too many fly-by-night operations that operate with little oversight and even less academic capital.)

Respect the Public View

One big takeaway from the poll: Americans can be willing partners in school transformation efforts, as long as we don't dismiss them as unenlightened obstacles to school improvement. The PDK/Gallup poll presents a valuable opportunity for educators and think tank dwellers to engage Americans public in an honest and open conversation about how we can equip public schools and their students for the new century.

Image found at http://hometown.aol.com/arisenshine/images/phone%20call.jpg