Beyond bans: Schools’ role in a hard reset on the ‘phone-based childhood’

As I say each week… From the neo-liberal, educational privatizers masquerading as an academic body – so the term research here is used VERY loosely (as none of this actually represents methodologically sound, reliable, valid, or empirical research in any real way).

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When will transforming a school succeed, and when will it fail?

As I say each week… From the neo-liberal, educational privatizers masquerading as an academic body – so the term research here is used VERY loosely (as none of this actually represents methodologically sound, reliable, valid, or empirical research in any real way).

Check out this week’s highlights from the Christensen Institute.

Copyright © 2024 Christensen Institute, All rights reserved. You are receiving this email because you are a friend of the Institute. Our mailing address is: Christensen Institute 49 Winter Street Natick, MA 01760

How can both teachers and families get the power they deserve?

As I say each week… From the neo-liberal, educational privatizers masquerading as an academic body – so the term research here is used VERY loosely (as none of this actually represents methodologically sound, reliable, valid, or empirical research in any real way).

Check out this week’s highlights from the Christensen Institute.

Copyright © 2024 Christensen Institute, All rights reserved. You are receiving this email because you are a friend of the Institute. Our mailing address is: Christensen Institute 49 Winter Street Natick, MA 01760

In Exchange For Right To Strike In Mass., Offer Educational Choices

An item from a neo-liberal…  This one is an item from a business professor with little direct experience in education, but who believes free market economic principles are the answer to education’s (and pretty much all other society’s social) problems.

This entry is a good illustration of this point!  Unions are designed to ensure that workers have the ability to bargain as a group to even the playing field between employers and employees.  It is worth reminding readers that in the United States unions are responsible for achieved higher wages, more reasonable hours, safer working conditions, health benefits, aid when retired or injured, ending the practice of child labor, and a host of other things.  Unions have also been demonized by neo-liberals and those on the right because being forced to do things like provide a living wage to their employees eats into the profit of businesses and corporations.

In good neo-liberal fashion, Michael’s proposed solution is to trade a fundamental right that should be available to unions in order to achieve all of the things describe above, in exchange for essentially greater privatization of a public system funded by taxpayers.  I mean what good are rights if we can’t leverage them to maximize profits for the wealthy!

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MICHAEL B. HORN MAR 6 ∙ PREVIEW

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On the heels of the illegal Newton teachers strike canceling 11 days of school, a debate has continued in the Commonwealth. Should public school teachers be allowed to strike?

While both sides have aired the rationales for and against, what’s missing is a compromise to allow both teachers and families the power they seek. If public school teachers are to get the right to strike, families should get publicly funded educational choices in the form of education savings accounts (ESAs).

Since 1973, public employees have not been allowed to strike. The arguments for including teachers in this provision include that public schools are essentially a monopoly. Many families can’t afford alternatives. And even when they can, canceling school hurts all families.

 

© 2024 Michael Horn

Disruptive Innovation’s Inherent Inclusivity

An item from a neo-liberal…  This one is an item from a business professor with little direct experience in education, but who believes free market economic principles are the answer to education’s (and pretty much all other society’s social) problems.

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MICHAEL B. HORN MAR 1

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The Future of the Ph.D.

On our latest episode of Future U., Jeff Selingo and I delved into the future of graduate education, specifically around the Ph.D. As our guest, Len Cassuto, a professor at Fordham University and author of the new book The New PhD: How to Build a Better Graduate Education, shared, “graduate school… is in the ICU… needful of attention.”

This is a topic that matters.

As Len shared:

“Ph.D. education in particular… is the straw that stirs the drink. It’s the oldest and most prestigious degree. What happens on the Ph.D. level trickles down through the entire higher ed system and through there down to K-12. And so when we’re talking about changing the Ph.D., we are talking about high-impact change. And so even though Ph.D.s are not numerous compared to the numbers of other students in the system, if you’re changing doctoral education, you are making notable change to the whole system.”

It’s badly broken and in need of repair. Among the many stats we share in the podcast was this one from Jeff: “about 50% of PhD students will not complete the PhD, and among those who finish, about 50% will not get academic jobs. “

Len didn’t just offer diagnosis. Far from it. He offered several solutions, which Jeff and I then debated in the back half of the episode.

I played the role of skeptic. Although I like the thrust of Len’s solutions, I was skeptical that they could be easily implemented. Or that the value of the Ph.D. outside of academia could be as high in the humanities as it is in the STEM fields. Jeff pushed back in thoughtful ways.

The result of all that is a delightfully fun conversation you can listen to here.

Western Governors University Sage Advice Podcast

Finally, I appeared on the WGU Sage Advice podcast with Chris Bonnell, which you can listen to here at “The Future of Learning Through Disruptive Innovation with Michael Horn.”

Longtime subscribers know of my fondness for WGU. In this episode we talked about:

• my own educational and career journey
• the new book I’m working on
• what disruptive innovation actually means in education and how WGU is a great example of it
• disruptive innovation’s inherent inclusivity
• and AI and how it can help personalize learning.

Thanks as always for reading, writing, and listening.

 

© 2024 Michael Horn