This post is a chapter from my book, How to Succeed in School Without Really Learning. It's a revised version of a paper that was previously published in 1992 as “Power, Knowledge, and the Science of Teaching: A Genealogy of Teacher Professionalization” in Harvard Educational Review. Here's a link to that version. The HER version of … Continue reading Rethinking the Movement to Professionalize Teaching: A Story of Status and Control
This post is a small collection of some of my favorite cartoons about writing. So often writing is a vale of tears, so it's nice to laugh about it once in a while. Enjoy.
I first presented this paper at the conference on “The Century of the School: Continuity and Innovation During the First Half of the 20th Century,” Monte Verità, Ascona, Switzerland, September, 2007. A revised version was published in a book edited by Claudia Crotti and Fritz Osterwalder, Das Jahrhundert der Schulreformen: Internationale und Nationale Perspektiven, 1900-1950, … Continue reading Limits on the Impact of Educational Reform
This post is about an overlooked classic of American literature, which I stumbled upon by accident through an old essay by Tom Cox. It's the debut novel by Evans Connell, Mrs. Bridge, which was published in 1959. It's unlike anything I've ever read. The sheer simplicity of Connell's prose is paralleled by the simplicity of … Continue reading Mrs. Bridge — On the Quiet Desperation of Ordinary Life
This post is a piece I originally published in 1990 in Research in Sociology of Education and Socialization. Here's a link to that version. Later I included a slightly revised version as a chapter in my book, How to Succeed in School Without Really Learning. The text below comes for the latter version. Here's an … Continue reading The Rise of the Community College and the Limits of Educational Opportunity
This post is an essay by Blake Smith that first appeared in Tablet. Here's a link to the original. It's about a phenomenon I started noticing a few years ago in the peculiar process of admissions to elite universities. In this process it's not enough to present yourself to the admissions committee as the ultimate … Continue reading Blake Smith — The Woke Meritocracy
This post is a piece I published in Kappan in November, 2018. Here’s a link to the original. Public schools for private gain: The declining American commitment to serving the public good When schooling comes to be viewed mainly as a source of private benefit, both schools and society suffer grave consequences. By David F. Labaree … Continue reading Public Schools for Private Gain
This post is a reflection on Edward Slingerland's new book Drunk: How We Sipped, Danced, and Stumbled Our Way to Civilization. John Tierney wrote a lovely review of the book in City Journal, which I'm reproducing below. Here's a link to the original. After the review, I provide some of my favorite passages from the … Continue reading Edward Slingerland on How Drinking Is Essential to Civilization
This post is a piece I just wrote, something I've been meaning to write for years. An alternative title is: "School -- Can't Live With It, Can't Live Without It." Here's a link to the Word document. See what you think. School Gave Me the Creeps David Labaree Did you like school? I didn’t. … Continue reading School Gave Me the Creeps
This post is about two key elements in good writing, one of which is to focus on actors and actions. Who's doing what to whom? In academic writing, the actors are often not people but social entities -- bureaucracy, racism, curriculum, schools, universities -- but the principle is the same. Some force or factor or … Continue reading On Writing: It’s All About Actors and Actions and Cutting the Flab
David Labaree on Schooling, History, and Writing 