Banding Together - Union City’s Teachers and Administrators Work Together to Improve Student Achievement

Oct 15, 2026

Uploaded by Pentious

The article examines U.S. education reform proposals following a 2012 blue-ribbon commission’s warning that educational failure threatens national security and public safety. It critiques the promise of charter schools, vouchers, and strict “perform-or-die” accountability, noting limited gains on NAEP and persistent achievement gaps. It then highlights Union City, New Jersey, describing sustained improvements in test scores and graduation outcomes, suggesting a more usable strategy rooted in coordinated local practice.

LanguageEnglish

CategoryResearch & Report

FormatPDF

Pages9

Reading Time23 min

AccessFree to download

Banding Together

U.S. Education Reform and National Security

Limits of Choice and Strict Accountability

Union City’s Local Strategy and Results

Banding Together Union City’s Teachers and Administrators Work Together to Improve Student Achievement ILLUSTRAT IONS BY MICHAEL GLENWOOD By David L. Kirp The report of a blue-ribbon commission chaired by Joel Klein, former chancellor of New York City’s public schools, and Condoleezza Rice, secretary of state in the administration of President George W. Bush, came as a shocker. U.S. Education Reform and National Security, published in the spring of 2012 and carrying the imprimatur of the prestigious Council on Foreign Relations, ominously concludes that themiseducation of America’s students poses an imminent threat to our country’s capacity to defend ourselves.“Educational failure puts the United States’ future economic prosperity, global position, and physical safety”—physical safety!—“at risk.”1 What can be done to avert this catastrophe? Klein and Rice plump forgiving parents more choice about what school their children attend, arguing that charter schools and vouchers will generate needed innovation. 􀀞e old-line public schools cannot merely David L. Kirp is the James D. Marver Professor of Public Policy atthe University of California at Berkeley and the author of numerous books, including Kids First: Five Big Ideas for Transforming Children’s Lives and America’s Future. 􀀝is article is reprinted from Improbable Scholars: 􀀞e Rebirth of a Great American School System and a Strategy for America’s Schools by David L. Kirp with permission from Oxford University Press USA. Copyright © 2103 by David L. Kirp. be reformed, the report contends: if these institutions are going todo a decent job of educating our kids, a discipline-and-punish regimen of strict accountability is needed. Schools whose students aren’t improving at a su􀀉ciently rapid pace should be shuttered. Teachers’ livelihoods should depend on how their students fare on high-stakes reading and mathematics tests, with pay raises handed to some and pink slips to others. Teachers should be recruited from among the top colleges, as Teach for America does, rather than being drawn mainly from run-of-the-mill education schools.* For years, critics have lambasted the public schools as fossilized bureaucracies run by paper-pushers and 􀀛lled with timeserving teachers preoccupied with their job security, not the lives of their students. Washington has been delivering a similar, if less bombastic, salvo ever since the No Child Left Behind Act became law in 2002. 􀀞e Obama administration’s $4.35 billion Race to the Top initiative, the crown jewel of its education reform agenda, morphed into NCLB on steroids, as the U.S. Department of Education deployed the carrot of new money to prod the states into expanding charter schools and closing low-performing public schools.2 Look dispassionately atthe evidence, and you’ll 􀀛nd little justification for the proposition that imposing perform-or-die *Wendy Kopp, the founder of Teach for America, served on the commission. 14 AMERICAN EDUCATOR | WINTER 2013–2014 accountability on teachers or expanding choice for students will cure what ails public education. NCLB, with its hyperemphasis on the three Rsand its command to close or remake “failing” public schools, was supposed to end what President George W. Bush called “the soft bigotry of low expectations.” But a decade later, scoreson the National Assessment of Educational Progress, or NAEP, the nation’s report card, have improved only slightly; and poor, black, and Latino students haven’t been able to close the achievement gap. What’s more, despite the hosannas for charters, the bulk of the research shows that, overall, they don’t do a better job than traditional public schools.3 In short, there are no quick 􀀛xes, no miracle cures. But if superstars and clean sweeps can’t deliver that, how can the typical school district, 􀀛lled with ordinary teachers, most of whom grew up nearby, do it? Enter Union City, New Jersey. Amid the hoopla over choice and charter

FAQs

What reform approach does the article question most strongly?

It questions relying on charter/voucher choice and strict discipline-and-punish accountability to fix public education, citing weak evidence and ongoing gaps.

What is the role of NAEP in the article’s argument?

NAEP results are used to show that achievement improvements after major reforms have been only slight and that disadvantaged students have not closed gaps.

What makes Union City, New Jersey, stand out in the article?

Union City’s students achieve state-level outcomes comparable to NJ averages over time, with high graduation rates and strong postsecondary enrollment.

Oct 15, 2026

Uploaded by Pentious