A few years ago, when I began speaking out about the destructive policies that are now called “education reform,” I had the comfort of knowing that no one could punish me. I didn’t want a job, I didn’t want a political appointment, and I didn’t want a foundation grant.
Imagine my surprise, therefore, when I learned on June 5 that I would not be reappointed as a non-resident senior fellow at the Brookings Institution.
Bear with me. This is an unpaid position, so it does not represent a loss of income. But I was sad nonetheless, because I had a long association with Brookings and loved the institution.
I have been affiliated with Brookings since 1993. At that time, Bruce McLaury, then the institution’s president, came to visit me in my office at the U.S. Department of Education to offer me the Brown Chair in Education Policy, a newly created position. I told him I did not want to live permanently in Washington, D.C., and looked forward to returning to my home in Brooklyn after nearly two years as assistant secretary for research in the George H.W. Bush administration. But I was interested in working at Brookings for a time and writing a book there.
So McLaury appointed me as a senior fellow, and I spent two years writing a book on national standards. I returned to New York City in 1995 and retained a close relationship with Brookings. I organized annual research conferences and edited the papers presented there as Brookings Papers on Education Policy.
By 2005, I decided to spend full time writing so I stepped down as conference organizer and editor. For the past seven years, I have held the title of non-resident senior fellow.
Two years ago, when my most recent book The Death and Life of the Great American School System: How Testing and Choice Are Undermining Education was published, I contacted Grover (Russ) Whitehurst to ask if I might present my findings at Brookings. Russ was my counterpart in the George W. Bush administration. I had been the assistant secretary in charge of the Office of Education Research and Improvement, he was the head of the successor agency, called the Institute of Education Sciences. Unlike me, he had accepted the offer to take the Brown Chair at Brookings.
I thought that Brookings was the right place to launch my new book, in view of my long association with the institution. I contacted Russ to make arrangements, but he said that I would have to rent the auditorium and pay a variety of expenses, which would amount to thousands of dollars. I decided not to accept this expensive offer, and I soon received a request from Rick Hess to present my book at the American Enterprise Institute. I agreed, and AEI sponsored an event with an excellent panel of respondents that drew a full house to its auditorium. AEI paid all expenses, including the cost of my travel to D.C. The fact that AEI was sponsoring a discussion challenging some of its own conservative ideas reflected well on its commitment to intellectual freedom.
Over the past two years, I have done what Brookings expects of its senior fellows: I engaged in public policy debates at the highest levels. Although I was one of the most active participants in the education issues of the day, I was never invited to take part in any panels or public events at Brookings.
Then on June 5 came the email from Russ Whitehurst informing me that I would be terminated as a non-resident senior fellow because I was inactive. Understand that it is impossible to be active at Brookings if you are never invited to participate in any of its forums.
My first thought was that Russ might be responding to my blog lacerating Mitt Romney’s education plan in the New York Review of Books. It went online that very morning, about four hours before I got Russ’s email. Russ is an adviser to the Romney campaign on education issues. Would he react that quickly? Then I remembered that I had written two other pieces critical of Romney on my own blog, the first appearing on May 25.
Maybe I was over-reacting.
But then I began wondering whether I was “inactive,” as Russ said. My book—the one he had no interest in discussing at Brookings—had become a national best seller. On the very day that I got his email, it happened to be the #1 book in public policy on amazon.com. It was also the #1 book in social policy on amazon.com. The night before I got his email, I was interviewed on the PBS Newshour. This is the kind of public engagement that Brookings revels in.
There was nothing more to be said or done. I was terminated.
Brookings should be sponsoring debates and panels about the very issues that I raise. It is now clear those debates and panels will never take place. That is sad, far sadder than my termination.
Disappointment ensues. However, Diane, I think you’ve got enough notches on your belt (and enough of the general public) that you don’t need the Brookings Institute. Unlike Whitehurst. Or Romney.
Better to be alone than with the wrong people. You’ve clearly hit a nerve at BI. Their loss. Your stature in the educational debate far exceeds the need to be a part of Brookings or any other organization. Oh, Baby, look at you now! Kudos on your book rankings. Move on.
Amen.
To Jose and Sandy,
Thank you! I can fly on my own. Just stunned to be terminated at point of maximum participation in public issues of great importance to the nation.
Diane
I am so sorry to hear this for many reasons. I look to Ph.D.’s to be pure and unbiased, striving for truth through honest credible research and open to debate. No, I don’t put them on a pedestal, my husband, father and father-in-law are professors and I watch how they strive to eliminate biases in their research, to be honest and look for variables that may skew the data. They are aware of people who to try to influence them for personal gain. They say their reputation depends on credible research to be reviewed by their peers and referenced. They believe in rigor and I love to listen to them ruthlessly debate and challenge each other to be open minded and pure, it is very exciting. Maybe I’m reading into this but I know how research and data can be skewed and influenced. If you ignore opinions that challenge yours or even silence them, you lose credibility and your reputation. As a school counselor I hear students in conflict say “Talk to the hand” and I let them know this is not a good conflict resolution strategy. It makes your peers feel put down and closes the door to the opportunity to find common ground and solve the problem.
There’s a secret value in being “dooced” (although this would be a variation on that concept) for being potentially more viral than the research institute you work for. Find the value in it and create the discourse they’re suggesting they don’t want to hear.
I’m trying, I’m trying!
You’ll figure it out. I have faith in the process of trying.
I’m stunned. I enjoyed your PBS interview although it challenged so of me beliefs.
[…] (typeof(addthis_share) == "undefined"){ addthis_share = [];}Diane Ravitch fired by Brookings — dissenting from Waiting For Superman-style nonsense is bad for your career even if […]
http://blogs.wsj.com/ideas-market/2012/06/11/diane-ravitch-inactive-in-educational-debates/?mod=WSJBlog
Reading the book now … there’s a reason that it’s hit the number 1 spot on so many fronts! Having worked at Brookings last year, I understand the caliber of research they conduct.. so the turn of events you describe are unfortunate indeed..
Brookings may not have appreciated it, but I owe you many thanks for writing The Miseducation of Mitt Romney. It was very informative for me and my friends. I hope this means you have more time for yourself to write and spread the word. Keep writing and keep fighting!
Dear Diane,
Sad though this termination is, it is infinitely more a reflection of what the Brookings Institute has allowed itself to become than a judgment of you. Meanwhile, know that for thousands and thousands of teachers across this crazed land, myself included, you have become an exemplar of intellectual freedom and integrity at an hour in which intellectual freedom and integrity seem to have all but vanished from public life.
It seems that you are living the effects anyone who stands for truth and justice suffers; they are persecuted by small minded people. It is sad that the Brookings Institute has completely lost its way as a place of intellectual integrity and has succumbed to crass political impulse. This means that you are scarring the cockroaches into view. Congratulations and well done.
The cost of your speaking up is great – and we thank you immensely. They say we teachers touch the lives of our students forever… you have certainly touched the lives of many teachers. We thank you.
Brookings’ separation from you diminishes their stature.
You’re a free agent, Professor Ravitch. Thank God you are a free woman! Free to speak the truth. The world is full of b&llsh*tters, buttlickers and backstabbers. So glad to see that you are none of these. Everything that you say and write is meant to help children; not politicians and corporations. Consider it an honor to be fired. You are not like them and you cannot be controlled.
Mere bourgeois trappings. You’re well rid of all such porcine noise machines, Diane.
Maybe NY Review of Books is next shoe to drop?
I’m glad to have seen you speak at Netroots Nation and even to have had a chance to speak with you after. When the education institutions are clearing out debate about education itself, we are worse off than I thought. I always viewed Brookings as truly neutral; so much for that!
Keep the faith. The truth shall set you free ~ and by extension, all of us.
Their loss! I don’t think you’re going to have to worry about parents, students and teachers asking you to leave the public education scene anytime soon. Your incite and your questions for thought or answers are amazing and keep us all going.
Sad to see Brookings be so political. I have not always agreed with Diane Ravich on education policy but that was never an issue for a fair and careful debate on policy. Ms. Ravich always did that. Her insights are important and it is clearly Brookings’ loss.
The people who fund Brookings made the call, and it’s a simple as that.
The wealthy who run this country have zero interest in public education as a way of making a citizen. They want systems administrators and that’s it. The general population is cowed or asleep for the most part.
The future is very obviously bleak and there is very little to suggest things will get better, at least in the U.S.
Hi “purple”, I’m in agreement with the first two paragraphs of your post. I disagree with the third one.
The future is potentially “bleak”. But it’s also potentially bright. It could actually get better. The most immediate thing we need to do is to “stop the bleeding” and work—not hope—work, to call out the specific instances of manipulation, mendacity, distortion, distraction, and all other actions ultimately designed to weaken our schools and start a long-term shift towards corporate control and ownership of what was once—however imperfect—a system of free, universal education for all American children.
So, while I agree that there is “little to suggest that things will get better” there is enough—including the commitment and values shared by many people blogging here today—to also suggest that better days are ahead IF we stick together, support each other, and form an ironclad coalition of parents, teachers, students and others, that will NOT allow our schools to be taken from us.
Keep focused and keep positive. We’ll get there soon enough if we don’t give up.
You continue to provide regular teachers a beacon of hope and light in this time of unprecedented teacher and teachers union bashing. While being fired never feels good, we know that you have truth and integrity on your side. Thank you Diane for being our tireless advocate.
So sorry to hear of your termination Diane. I personally think it’s pretty crass to fire someone in an email message. At least they should have had the courage to call you.
But, as they say, when one door shuts, another one opens. There must be some opportunity coming your way that is far greater than what you were doing for Brookings. That’s pretty exciting Diane.
I know you probably know this, but perhaps we do not tell you enough. I am continually humbled by the tremendous work you are doing to support us public school teachers. You are our voice to those that would take us down. At times, it seems like you are the General of our very small army against Goliath, but you (and us) have America’s children on our side too. Thank you Diane.
Jack, thank you for your kind and supportive comments. I have tried to give teachers hope for the future, especially when I know they are feeling beaten down and out. Bad things don’t last forever, and bad ideas eventually are exposed as bad ideas. In the meanwhile, many schools are closed for no reason other than that they enroll too many low-performing students. So, we need hope, and we must persist in the face of constant battering. I will do what I can to push back and to lend a hand to anyone who needs one.
Diane
I know of what you speak. It is always shocking and unsettling to be fired, more so when it is for speaking out. 17 days after an article ran in the NYTimes ( http://www.nytimes.com/2012/05/07/education/new-procedure-for-teaching-license-draws-protest.html?ref=michaelwinerip) about the student teachers with whom I work refusing to participate in the Pearson field test of the Teacher Performance Assessment (TPA), I received a letter of non-renewal. That is, my contract will be terminated at its end in one year. This comes on the heels of my department chair attempting to scold me in my annual faculty report for not working ‘with her’ on supporting the imposition of the TPA because I offered critiques and concerns (which included my fears of just the kind of corporate incursion we now see with Pearson’s involvement). This comes on the heels of the department chair implying in the NYTimes article and in a meeting with the associate dean that I have undue influence over the students. This from a School of Education that claims a commitment to social justice education—and we all know the canard that social justice educators are brainwashing students when we encourage critical engagement.
In response to your recent blog about galvanic skin responses being used to evaluate teachers, I wrote a parody of the statements we have heard over the years about why we need to accept the destructive ‘reforms’ being forced on us. The parody emerged from a deep frustration that voices of dissent are being silenced everywhere-including the academy. It would take another post to consider why there is a profound national silencing about the TPA. But, it should be noted that those of us who critique corporate education reform are being silenced through implicit and explicit threats and actions from administrators who have chosen complicity and compliance. This silencing from k-12 through higher-education is part and parcel of the surveillance and standards based accountability systems that are ubiquitous. It is high time this silencing is exposed for what it is, and we all reclaim our voices as educators, citizens, students, parents.
You can read more here: http://unitedoptout.com/teacher-performance-assessment-and-pearson-just-opt-out-2/.
I’m so sorry to learn of your terminations, Diane and Barbara.
The long arm of Pearson has reached into my life as well, from wrangling with the powers that be my college over Pearson being the “preferred” textbook publisher, to my own landlord, who works for Pearson –and to whom I owe three months rent. The latter is a result of significantly reduced full time tenure-track opportunities and having to resort to adjunct work, at a school where all faculty are now hired as Independent Contractors, with no labor law protections and slave wages (our pay was reduced twice in four years). I have no resources to help me out of this financial mess and have been teetering on the brink of homelessness for months. So, while I speak out against what’s going on in education today, I feel that I have no choice but to do so anonymously, or risk losing my old job, a new job, and my apartment.
My hope has been that more of those who have job security and a lot less to lose will come forward. That so many faculty in Teacher Ed are silent, complicit and/or collaborating with Pearson and policy-makers is disheartening. However, I still have hope that sizable numbers of higher ed faculty could be rallied.
Thanks so much for all that you have done and continue to do, Diane and Barbara!
It seems in this day and age we live in a world that does not want to hear the dissenting voice. It is sad that we have come to this state of affairs. The beauty of it all is they, whoever they are, cannot silence your voice. For that we can be grateful.
Reblogged this on Southern Perlo.
Thank You for speaking out! I have received my worst evaluation ever this year (I’m thinking I may be pushing the boundaries a bit too much). My heart breaks for my students as I witness the impact it is having on their lives. You give us hope and I want you to know your efforts and quest is appreciated! (I will be secretly hoping for all of us to become independently wealthy until there is no one left to fire except the new minority – the “terminators”…
Brookings = Grover J. “Russ” Whitehurst = Let the Education Dollars Follow the Child = Hoover Institute = Education Next = poor education policy…Hanushek must be beside himself with glee.
Removing your voice from the institute’s official roll is not exactly in the spirit of one of Brooking’s four priorities: Opportunity and Well-being, where Brookings writes, “As they weather the current economic storm, will our governments and societies address the basic needs and aspirations of the least well-off?”
Brooking’s continues to state, “The ability of a society to provide for the health, education, and well-being of citizens—particularly for the most vulnerable—is a cardinal indicator of how well it governs itself. Relevant issues and investments range from the reform of national health and education systems to the design of transportation plans for local communities.”
This decision makes it seem Brookings, or perhaps just “Russ,” is more enamored with the reform element, and its near celebrity status, over the ‘health, education, and well-being of citizens.’
Consider your termination a blessing in disguise, Diane. Taking the high road, even though that meant rerouting your course, gives your voice much more credence than anything “Russ” Whitehurst, or Brookings may espouse.
Keep up the good fight, Diane!
Dr. Ravitch, I have known of you as a paragon of integrity since I first heard about your change of heart (and mind) on so-called education reform. You are unsurpassed in your expertise and candor; you provide the quality of leadership that this country desperately needs at every level—up to and including the White House. I hope you have, or find, a working environment that is as supportive of you and your work as you are of this country’s future!
That is very unfortunate and disappointing on many levels. Keep up the good fight, Diane! It is indeed a good fight, perhaps the best one to fight for children and our nation’s future.
I used to have a fond place in my heart for Brookings. In the 1930s my father was a fellow there. Granted, he was a Republican, but a moderate one (as such used to exist)
It i apparent that too many of the funders of places like Brookings have bought into the false notion that what is being labeled as ‘reform’ is anything more than doubling down on policies that we first saw in A Nation at Risk, then in Goals 2000, followed by NCLB and Race to the Top / Blueprint. Brookings has long since ceased being a center of liberal thought. Like Center for American Progress, it has increasingly been on the wrong side of most educational issues.
I am sorry this happened to you, Diane. You were a fellow at Brookings when we first talked by phone more than a decade ago.
I know you will, as you always have, speak and write as you see things without fear of the impact upon you.
I am honored that you came to Netroots Nation at my request. You made quite an impression there.
Some people are missing the point. It’s not about being terminated from Brookings, however upsetting that may be for Dr. Ravitch. This is about an additional institute/organization silencing another credible person’s voice to further their own conservative agenda. It doesn’t matter to Brookings that Ravitch’s points are valid, or that she has done the research to prove them so. Brookings has no interest in knowing the truth, the best methods used in education, or why evaluating teachers based on test scores doesn’t work. They are only interested in furthering a conservative campaign whose strategy is to undermine teachers and public education in order to privatize it for big business’ interests…and yes, this includes The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. And, sorry to say, if Dr. Ravitch doesn’t go quietly, Brookings will rip her to shreds by attacking her credibility by any means possible and beat the issue to death (like conservatives do) so that whatever they say overshadows and even crushes what she has to say, truth or not. Call it “swift-boating” if you will, or call it just another typical “FOX News” type of story, but it will happen. I’m sorry that Brookings has been “bought” and I still support you, Dr. Ravitch.
Wonderful post, Julie. However, i think that the LAST THING Diane Ravitch, or any of us in similar circumstances, should ever do, is to “go quietly”. That undermines our own cause. No one “going quietly” ever made an important social or economic change.
By posting this information, Diane has made it clear that she isn’t “going quietly”; quite the opposite. She’s engaged all of us with this information, and we’ll engage others.
Brookings needs to be called out on this. Not in an ad hominem manner, but in a direct and professional way. They need to be asked why this happened, what it means, and if anyone funding them requested it.
Diane handled this in her typically gracious and dignified way. She sets an example for all of us. In these debates, call out the actions of those who you believe are wrong, or doing damage to our schools and our society—politely, but directly.
So, if someone from Brookings is reading this…can you tell us the reason for this egregious action against one of this nation’s true scholars in both education and history?
Steve, I agree. I didn’t intend my post to mean that Dr. Ravitch should go quietly, I meant that Brookings will want her to go quietly. I looked back and reread what I wrote and it does read that way, but it wasn’t intentional, rather I was speaking from Brookings’ point of view. (Badly worded on my part and misinterpreted, I realize. Sorry!) So, no, she definitely should NOT go quietly, and you and I and many others will support Dr. Ravitch in our cause.
their loss, you are a shining star for those of us in education!!!
What Romney believes:
The Nephites had to hand over half of their barley to the Lamanites. But that wouldn’t have been a big deal since barley didn’t exist in the New World at the time. Mosiah 7:22
come on, if you were fired by a Romney staffer, its because that reason stuff doesn’t make sense anymore.
I cant wait to see the latest ‘non-fiction’ out of Texas now!
http://www.brookings.edu/experts/ravitchd
I just emailed Brookings and asked why you were terminated. Perhaps others could do the same: http://www.brookings.edu/about, General Inquires, EMAIL.
We will not go quietly-the actions of Brookings mirror the pervasive attempts to silence apparently even the greatest among us like you Dr Ravitch … in K-12, teachers fear speaking out, in Colleges of Education many professors too now feel the pressure to be complicit …or else. But let’s not fool ourselves-remaining quiet or playing by “their rules” to earn brownie points is like currying favor with the executioner to stave off our inevitable terminations and the destruction of public education-so there are those of us who stand with you, Diane, and we WILL MAKE SOME NOISE. WE WILL NOT BE MOVED!!! http://www.unitedoptout.com
Yes! Loud and clear!
It only goes to show how so many fear intellectual freedom and real debate. Those deformers have no real research to back up their ideas. What they have is a religion based on faith. Therefore, they view you as a heretic that has to be silenced. However, they should learn from history that ideas can never be silenced. I thank you so much for trying to save real public education,
Dr. Ravitch, I’ve been recommending yours as a sane voice in the cacophony of self-appointed experts re education ever since I heard a lecture which you gave in downtown Chicago many years ago. As a confirmed liberal with years of experience of teaching in urban public schools at all levels as a substitute–the trial by fire for one’s convictions–I was prejudiced against your conservative position then. Nonetheless, you forced me to reexamine my ideas. Now more than ever, your carefully reasoned comments need to be published and your recommendations to be enacted.
Please continue the fight! Teach us how to fight back! Scary how this happens. Hopefully some can resign or go to American Enterprise Institute. How can one work where intellectual freedom and truth is threatened? This evil will flourish if the good do nada. I will fight for my students!
Diane,
What has neen the response from your colleagues and Universities to Brookings eliminating one of this nation’s most dedicated education and civil rights advocats to come along in about 30 years?
Where is NYU, Standford, and Columbia?
Why aren’t they out there supporing you or did I miss it?
Phoebe, no reason for mass protests. I was an unpaid non-resident senior fellow on a one-year contract. The head of the program decided to terminate me for “inactivity.” As I said in my blogs, my “activity” was not welcome by the head of the program when it was offered, nor was I invited to participate in his programs. Was I silenced? Certainly not. What’s my beef? As I said at the end of the first blog, what is really sad is that one of the great think tanks of our nation will have no debates about high-stakes testing, choice and the other issues now used to do terrible damaged to American public education. That’s what’s really sad.
It’s dangerous! Step 1, identify, 2 take your job, 3 move you to a place you can’t fight. That ‘s what’s happening to educators who believe in freedom.
So is Richard Blum, Dianne Feinstein’s husband, still an active Brookings member? The Blum-Feinsteins, of course, own a billion bucks worth of for-profit colleges that are currently under investigations. Not does Blum make speeches. Brookings has been co-opted by federal fund-grabbing neocons wearing libby cloaks.
OMG, OMG, OMG!!!!
Brookings have been moving rightward for decades. This is merely another example.
Who was it that said “I disagree with everything you say but I will defend to the death your right to say it”? I know it was not Brookings.
Diane, Thanks for sharing this with us, and know how important your voice is in these trying times. You have a national stage, and represent many in public education who continue to fight for our kids in classrooms all over the country. Please stay visible through the election!! Thank you!!!
I am not going away and not giving up.
Diane, The recent death of Fahrenheit 451 author Ray Bradbury should encourage all of us to reread his works. If we continue on the track of watching fake reality shows perhaps we can convince ourselves all is well. Or not.
In the words of Kris Kros
Brookings is wiggidy wack
Diane, even though I disagree with some of your recommendations for schools, your intellect and interest in the school system is very valuable to all of us. Institutions, politicians and political parties that attempt to discourage disagreement reduce our culture’s rate of progress.
thank you.
Stuff Brookings, all they do is walk around patting each other on the back and putting there snout in funds
Top Foundation donor to Brookings Institution: Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation – 14.98 mil.
The scariest part of this educational crisis is that no one will honestly state that many among the Far Right do not want quality public school education. These people want their children and grandchildren to have a leg up by destroying the educational opportunities of the children and grandchildren of median Americans. They don’t believe in equal education for all. They do not want a well-educated electorate that just might see through their tactics!