How My Thinking about School Reform Has Changed Over Decades (Part 1)

These reflections on school reform began with a request from a colleague I admired, Richard Elmore. He asked me to write a piece about how my ideas have changed over the years. Daily experiences in schools as a teacher, administrator, and researcher (and my writings about those experiences) had, indeed, altered key ideas I had about the nature of reform and how reform worked its way into districts, schools, and classrooms. Elmore included my piece in a book he edited called I Used to Think… And Now I Think (Harvard Education Press, 2011). I have divided the piece I wrote for him into two parts. Here is Part 1. ************************************************************************* I used to think that public schools were vehicles for reforming society. And now I think that while good teachers and schools can promote positive intellectual, behavioral, and social change in individual children and youth, schools are (and have been) ineffectual in altering social inequalities. I began…