Class Warfare: Besieged Schools, Bewildered Parents, Betrayed Kids and the Attack on Excellence

by J. Martin Rochester

A firsthand account of the Great American Education War being waged from coast to coast.

Genres: Nonfiction, Teaching

242 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2002

Reviews

[Jo Oehrlein · Rating 1 out of 5]

This is basically a book-length diatribe on the state of education today, with all the blame placed on “progressives” from Dewey forward. Marty Rochester doesn’t like multi-age classrooms, whole language reading instruction, block scheduling, heterogeneous classrooms, accommodations for disabilities, cooperative learning, teachers unions, schools of education, fuzzy math (Everyday Math, Connected Math, and Core Plus are specifically mentioned), or open admissions policies for higher (AP or honors) classes. While I agree with his goal – offering rigorous classes to those most academically capable -- I think he paints with too broad a brush, attributing problems to things that can be GOOD for highly capable learners. For example, I think multi-age classrooms can be good, especially if the highly capable child is one of the youngest. Cooperative learning activities can be good; the problem occurs on bigger cooperative projects where the whole group receives one grade. I’ve even heard good things about Everyday Math and Connected Math, although I’ve heard that it takes a teacher who is strong in math to teach it well. Block scheduling doesn’t HAVE to be an opening for teachers to let kids do homework during class; here it’s one of the things that allows high school students to take college classes. Even when agreeing with him, I didn’t like him. I felt sorry for his local school board and the people who had to deal with his attacks. He’s well spoken and obviously has done a lot of research.