1 of 2 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars
Doesn't Show What Subtitle Promises, November 28, 2009
For those who care about education, Larry Cuban's books are always a treat. Like many of his other books (Tinkering Toward Utopia, Hugging the Middle), Cuban's focus here is on the history of educational reforms: nemely, he takes a look at the history of education's collusion with business. Cuban examines two time periods where this collusion was particularly strong: the early 1900's and the late 1900's.
As Cuban shows, the collusion between public ed and business begins in the same way: a recession or some other economic catastrophe convinces policy makers to lay blame on the ineffectiveness of education in preparing our youth. (Remember A Nation At Risk?) From here, policy makers and business leaders start to argue in tandem that education needs to do better at preparing our youth for the workforce and that current methods are inefficient. Therefore, we need to bring in business-like strategies into education.
Through careful analysis (and the crystaline prose he is known for), Cuban shows that the various attempts to "beef up" education by bringing in business-like solutions (more quantitative testing, bringing in technology, charter schools) have been either ineffective or less effective than was hoped. Cuban's thesis is that (as the book's subtitle indicates) education and business strive toward two different things and that the methods of the latter are inefficient for the former (and vice versa). Education's results may not be measurable until years later where business results are often seen immediately, it is more difficult to define who the 'customer' is in education than in business, public ed cannot reject customers as could businesses, etc.
My biggest problem with this book is that Cuban makes part of his case well and the other part not at all. He certainly convinces us that many of the business-like "solutions" to our educational woes have not produced gains. All the overly-standardized testing, standards-based education and infusing technology into schools (which Cuban spends an inordinate amount of time on) have all produced very lackluster results.
But Cuban does not really do much to make the further case that the reason for these lackluster gains is that education cannot adopt a business model, or even that education has ever tried. The most Cuban shows here is that business-like aspects have been tried on the administrative side of the equation, but also offers persuasive reasons why even these fell way short of a true business model (since when are businesses micromanaged in the way schools are by district, state, and federal boards of ed? Since when have companies given employees tenure after several years?) Cuban may convince us that certain nostrums proposed or funded by business leaders have proved ineffective, but does not really address the issue of how truly business-like many of those interventions were.
Another weak spot in Cuban's case is that he often confuses 'making public education more vocational' with 'adopting a business model.' Actually, any research on present private schools will tell you that private schools are often the LEAST vocational and most focused on teaching a strong liberal arts education. While Cuban makes a good case that businesses have been clamoring for public ed to put more emphasis on educating future workers, he ASSSUMES that this means that for-profit education would do this on an even larger scale. But this is an assumption for which that Cuban nowhere argues. And he would have a hard time doing so, seeing as the 'vocationalization' of high schools was largely a 'progressive' trend (coming genererally from those on the political left) and the history of private schools, which have often been amongst the least vocationally focused. (Anyone wanting to read a good case as to why schools would function better under a market system might read
Education and Capitalism: How Overcoming Our Fear of Markets and Economics Can Improve America's Schools (Hoover Institution Press Publication).
So, there we have it: three stars. As a history, Cuban does a fine job detailing many of the failed changes made to public education in response to economic panics. He does a good job showing that, and why, these nostrums did not work. But Cuban, unfortunately, falls short on his main case - the one stated as the subtitle of the book: he never really shows "why schools can't be businesses." (Maybe he should change the subtitle to "Why business-inspired changes to public schooling haven't worked." That is a case he does make, but it is far from the one he wanted to make.)
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6 of 14 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
A must--timely, lively!, August 31, 2005
This review is from: The Blackboard and the Bottom Line: Why Schools Can't Be Businesses (Hardcover)
Larry Cuban is always timely, but amidst today's hype this is a well-informed, careful and much needed antidote to a lot of what gets said about schooling. It speaks to a wide audience--I hope teachers and school folks read it, and parents, and also the people who write the news we all read.
Deborah Meier
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