By Susan Ohanian
Posted: 2003-05-22
Contest: Send in your answers. The most outrageous-and fun--will be posted.
The people below have signed a document, which they call a manifesto.
1) Study the names and then offer three suggestions about what nifty plan for public schools they've come up with:
a)
b)
c)
2) What's their motive?
3) What other nifty project would you suggest they organize?
a)
b)
c)
4) What 3 adjectives best describe this group?
Bonus Question:
5) Operating on the disreputable Six Degress of Separation theory, explain your kinship with any of these signers, i.e., Is William Bennett your step-uncle's cousin twice removed--or did you play the slots next to him?
If you'd rather explain how far you are separated--and why--that's ok too.
Signers as of May 1, 2003
Steven Adamowski, Assistant Professor, Education Leadership and Policy Studies
(former CEO, Cincinnati Public Schools), University of Missouri at St. Louis
Lamar Alexander, United States Senator
Jeanne Allen, President, The Center for Education Reform
Leslye A. Arsht, Chairman and Co-founder, StandardsWork, Inc.
William Bennett, Co-director, Empower America
Alan D. Bersin, Superintendent of Public Education, San Diego City Schools
Stacey Boyd, former President and CEO, Project Achieve
Eli Broad, Founder, Broad Foundation
Sheila Byrd, Education Policy Consultant
Thomas W. Carroll, President, Foundation for Education Reform and Accountability
Michael D. Casserly, Executive Director, Council of the Great City Schools
John Chubb, Chief Education Officer and Vice President, Edison Schools
Judy Codding, Vice-President, National Center on Education and the Economy
Barbara Davidson, Executive Director, HireStandards
Paula Dawning, Broad Fellow Graduate and Superintendent, Benton Harbor Area Schools, Michigan
Candace deRussy, Trustee , State University of New York and Member of Board of Visitors, Air Force Academy
Denis P. Doyle, Co-founder and CAO, SchoolNet, Inc.
Bill Evers, Research Fellow, Hoover Institution, Stanford University
Mike Feinberg, Co-founder, KIPP
Emily Feistritzer, President, National Center for Education Information
Chester E. Finn, Jr., President , Thomas B. Fordham Institute
Mary Lee Fitzgerald, Former Commissioner of Education, New Jersey Department of Education
Howard Fuller, Distinguished Professor of Education, Marquette University
William F. Goodling, Former Chairman, Committee on Education and the Workforce, United States House of Representatives
Jay P. Greene, Senior Fellow, Manhattan Institute
Peter R. Greer, Headmaster, The Montclair Kimberley Academy
Paul R. Gross, University Professor of Life Sciences, emeritus, University of Virginia
Allen Grossman, Professor of Management Practice, Harvard Business School
James W. Guthrie, Director, Peabody Center for Education Policy, Vanderbilt University
Scott Hamilton, President and Co-founder, KIPP
Eric Hanushek, Senior Fellow, Hoover Institution, Stanford University
Frederick Hess, Resident Scholar, American Enterprise Institute
Anne Higdon, CEO and Superintendent, ISUS Trade and Technology Prep
E.D. Hirsch, Chairman, Core Knowledge Foundation
Gary Huggins, Executive Director, Education Leaders Action Council
Dan Katzir, Managing Director, Broad Foundation
Lisa Graham Keegan, CEO, Education Leaders Council
Leo Klagholz, Former Commissioner of Education, New Jersey Department of Education
Martin Kozloff, Watson Distinguished Professor of Education, University of North Carolina at Wilmington
Rita Kramer, Author, Ed School Follies: The Miseducation of America's Teachers
David Levin, Co-founder and Superintendent, KIPP
Tom Loveless, Director, Brown Center on Education Policy, Brookings Institution
Frank J. Macchiarola, President, St. Francis College and former New York City Schools Chancellor
Bruno Manno, Senior Associate for Education, Annie E. Casey Foundation
Don McAdams, President, Center for Reform of School Systems
Deborah M. McGriff, Chief Communications Officer, Edison Schools
Terry M. Moe, Professor, Political Science, Stanford University
William J. Moloney, Commissioner of Education, Colorado Department of Education
Cathy Nehf Lund , Project Director, Walton Family Foundation, Inc.
Ronald L. Ottinger, President, Board of Education, San Diego City Schools
Bill Owens, Governor of Colorado
Michael Podgursky, Professor of Economics, University of Missouri at Columbia
Andrew J. Rotherham, Director of Education Policy, Progressive Policy Institute
David Warren Saxe, Member, Pennsylvania State Board of Education
John Schilling, Chief of Staff, Education Leaders Council
Lewis C. Solmon, Former Dean, Graduate School of Education, UCLA
David Steiner, Chairman, Department of Administration, Training, and Policy Studies; School of Education, Boston University*
Richard A. Stoff, President, Ohio Business Roundtable
Suzanne Tacheny, Member, California Board of Education
Abigail Thernstrom, Senior Fellow, Manhattan Institute, and member of the Massachusetts Board of Education
Marc Tucker, President, National Center on Education and the Economy
Herbert J. Walberg, Fellow, Hoover Institution, Stanford University
John Walton, Walton Family Foundation, Inc.
Bradford Wilson, Executive Director, National Association of Scholars
Charles Zogby, former Secretary of Education, Commonwealth of Pennsylvania
All of the above signed the manifesto titled "Better Leaders for America's Schools," published jointly by the Fordham Institute and The Broad Foundation. This manifesto announces:
American public education faces a "crisis in leadership" that cannot be alleviated from traditional sources of school principals and superintendents. Its signers do not believe this crisis can be fixed by conventional strategies for preparing, certifying and employing education leaders. Instead, they urge that first-rate leaders be sought outside the education field, earn salaries on par with their peers in other professions, and gain new authority over school staffing, operations and budgets.
Translation: Make it easy for retired military and business executives to become school principals and superintendents.
http://www.edexcellence.net/manifesto/profiles.html
The site features out-of-the box school leaders, principals who did not enter the field from conventional means. Oops! One of those featured is Joseph Olchefske, Superintendent, Seattle Public Schools, Seattle, Washington. Make that "former superintendent"; Olchefske just got the axe.
Fordham's take:
"What appears to have happened is that Olchefske's agenda of uniformly high expectations for every child roiled the Seattle Education Association, which bided its time until news of the district's financial problems surfaced, then pounced."
Please send your suggestions for what important agendas this group could take on next. Answers will be posted here.
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