This isn't a fully-formed blog post per se, but I would like to draw your attention to an editorial I co-authored in last Sunday's Sacramento Bee; the co-author was the wonderful Esther Wojcicki, Chair of the Learning Matters Board and a successful high school journalism teacher in the northern California area.
The basic premise of the editorial (link is above) is that an expression Ronald Reagan used in relation to the Soviet Union -- "Trust, but verify" -- can be the cornerstone of a plan to save the American education system, which is currently on life support.
A segue: this week over at the Learning Matters website, we organized a discussion on cheating in schools -- how best to prevent it, mostly. This followed up a previous post about the future of charter schools and, of course, a PBS Newshour report we did on cheating in Atlanta.
Thanks for reading some of the above -- next Wednesday (Oct. 5) is World Teachers' Day, and if you come on over to the Learning Matters homepage, we'll be honoring teachers in a variety of ways. (And hey, if you're interested in the value of teachers, as we all should be, check out my latest book.)
Have a great weekend, all.