Excellence for All: How a New Breed of Reformers Is Transforming America's Public Schools

Conclusion

135 conclUSion In 1991, education writer Thomas Toch observed that public schools had reached a pivotal point in their history. They were, as he wrote, “poised to take the American experiment in free universal education to a new level, one where all students have not only an equal right to walk through the schoolhouse door but also equal intellectual opportunities.”1 Rather than aiming to provide a different kind of educational experience for the underserved, as had often been the practice in American schooling, reformers in the last decades of the twentieth century began to pursue a new goal—providing all children with the sort of education that would enable them to succeed in college and beyond. This vision, insofar as it aimed to serve all children equally, was the product of wider agitation among progressive camps for equity, access, and social justice. In the wake of the civil rights movement and the Great Society , excellence for all reformers recognized that addressing the needs of the underserved was both a moral imperative and a political necessity. Insofar as excellence for all reformers were also concerned with returns to the nation-state—to say nothing of the free-market philosophies inherent in their efforts—the movement was equally shaped by attitudes traditionally associated with social and economic conservatism. But beyond merely reconciling traditionally opposing aims, the vision of excellence for all promised to rescue the nation from the multiple threats produced by a changing economy increasingly more dependent on knowledge than labor. “Today’s fears,” wrote James Fallows in the Atlantic, “combine relative decline—what will happen when China has all the jobs? and all the money?—with domestic concerns about a polarized society of haves and have-nots that has lost its connective core.”2 Whatever the opportunities for bridging ideological divides, consensus came neither easily nor immediately. The fractures that characterized the 136 ExcEllEncE for All policy-making context of the second half of the twentieth century were significant . Those seeking to preserve their relative advantage, those fighting for access, those adamantly opposed to what they viewed as an overzealous central government, and those split over the question of race, to name just a few, did not see eye to eye. But openings to create common ground for policy making continued to emerge and savvy reformers continued to seize those opportunities. As they did, they created a movement with a king-sized appeal—an appeal powerful enough to generate momentum behind highly ambitious efforts to solve big national problems by transforming the public schools. Not all reform efforts, of course, matched the grand rhetoric of excellence for all. Yet the core vision was coherent and inclusive and exerted a broad influence across the world of education. Eventually, it emerged as a battle cry among reformers in foundations, think tanks, nonprofit organizations , the federal government, state departments of education, and school districts themselves. Anything short of excellence for all, they began to argue, would contradict either the American pursuit of international preeminence or the realization of its democratic ideals. Union leaders and entrepreneurs, bureaucrats and billionaires, liberals and conservatives, the privileged and the underserved could all support the aim of excellence for all and the reform efforts that were initiated in its pursuit. The vision did not, of course, emerge into the world fully formed. It grew by fits and starts, and was marked by disagreements and setbacks. But what evolved, and what maintained consistent support, was the dream of finding the right levers to transform struggling public schools into topnotch urban academies and taking those models to scale. In one sense, the results were remarkable. The pursuit of educational excellence for all generated billions of dollars in financial support and the political will to push through major efforts across the nation, particularly in the urban high schools that so captivated reformers. But despite the redesign of hundreds of high schools, there was one significant problem: they did not succeed in bringing top-flight education to the traditionally underserved. By the early twenty-first century, tens of thousands of students from low-income and minority communities attended small schools, were enrolled in Advanced Placement courses, and were taught by teachers with degrees from top colleges and universities. Other reforms, reflecting the vision of excellence for all with various degrees of clarity, made their mark as well. And yet, urban public schools and their students continued to lag conclUSion...