Potential Grizzlies

Kevin G. Welner, University of Colorado Boulder

• Foreword by David Berliner.Acknowledgements.Introduction.Chapter 1. The Use of Research (or Not) By Policymakers.Chapter 2. Reforminess.Chapter 3. School Choice.Chapter 4. Reading Wars.Chapter 5. Billionaires and Their Buddies.Chapter 6. Those Dreadful Teachers.Chapter 7. Deregulation, Crisis, and Closure.Chapter 8. Parent Trigger.Chapter 9. Budget Reduction.Chapter 10. Class Size.Chapter 11. Stratified Opportunity.Chapter 12. Growth Mindset.Chapter 13. Screen Time.Chapter 14. MOOCs.Chapter 15. Higher Ed Grade Inflation.Chapter 16. Guns.Chapter 17. Childhood Obesity and Marketing.Chapter 18. COVID-19.

Kevin Welner deftly skewers every phony reform fad of the past twenty years with a sharp blade, neatly removing head from body without leaving a trace. He says in a few cleverly chosen anecdotes what many of us have tried to prove in laborious tomes. The so-called ""reform"" movement is a hoax. Read it and laugh!"" — Diane Ravitch, Research Professor of Education at New York University, and author of Slaying Goliath: The Passionate Resistance to Privatization and the Fight to Save America's Public Schools“During these days of grim headlines, Potential Grizzlies provides welcome relief. With clever twists about “reformers” and their projects, Welner captures the tragic hilarity of what friends of public schools have lived through for the past decades. Every time I thought I read the most hilarious ""tweak"" of ed reform, I would find a new favorite a few pages later. A must-read for those who have waged the fight against NCLB, Race to the Top, privatization, and of course Betsy DeVos.” — Carol Burris, Executive Director of the Network for Public Education, and author of On the Same Track: How Schools Can Join the Twenty-First-Century Struggle against Resegregation""Welner expertly jumbles satire, research and education reform into this must-read book, which simultaneously covers where we’ve come from, why, and where we are going with education reform. Honestly I’m angry that my blog is not as funny as this. Read it, unless you don’t have a funny bone."" —Julian Vasquez Heilig, Dean and Professor, University of Kentucky College of Education