In 1983 the report A Nation at Risk claimed that the poor performance of the schools was a threat to our economic and political well being. Since that report, there have been ongoing and wide-ranging debates about public education, and there have been numerous programs and experiments aimed at reforming the schools. In January 1997, President Clinton's inaugural address made education one of the key items on the agenda for next four years. Thus the process of reforming the schools is ongoing, and we can expect the debates and initiatives to continue in the years to come.
"A Citizen's Guide to Education Reform" is the ongoing class project for Government 375, Ideology and Politics in Education Reform, at Hamilton College in Clinton, New York. For the past two years, students in the course divided into teams to examine different problems confronting public education. This site is the result of their efforts.
Our goals for the site are to provide visitors with a clear statement of one or more problems confronting the schools, a summary and analysis of the current debate concerning these issues, and relevant web and library resources. More simply put, we wish to provide a resource for our fellow citizens to better understand some of the problems confronting public education. The site is divided into sections indicated in the frame on the left. Some of these sections are further subdivided with teams examining different problems under these headings.
Certainly this site is not comprehensive in its treatment of the reform movement or even in the various topics it addresses. However, it is our hope that future versions of this course will update and expand this site. Perhaps students in similar courses at other schools or practicing scholars or ordinary citizens will also contribute to its development. We welcome any and all comments and suggestions. They should be directed to the instructor of this course, David C. Paris.
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