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Show What the crisis reports arent tellimus The Good News About Our BY MARGUERITE MICHAELS The North Carolina School of Science and Mathematics in Durham: quality for all. way, but thats the conclusion reached by PARADE after talking with educators across the country. The recent deluge of national studies and reports on the "crisis in education and President Reagans call for more discipline and a better job teaching the basics seem to be at least one or two years out of date Johnnies-come-latel- y to the years-ol- d question of why Johnny cant read or write or add or subtract. I think American education has a cold, says Harold Howe II, a former U. S . education commissioner now teaching at Harvard. "Most people think it has the flu. It certainly doesn't have the pneumonia that the commission suggested. The commission Professor Howe refers to is the National Commission on Excellence in Education, appointed by Secretary of Education Terrel Bell two years ago to assess the quality of education in America. The commission released the most devastating report among n a major reports on education released last year. Our nation is at risk. the report began, and then cited a rising tide of mediocrity and a falling tide of achievement test scores. If an unfriendly foreign power, the report went on , had attempted to impose on America the mediocre educational performance that exists today, we might well have viewed it as an act of war. Are things really that bad? Is nothing right with education in America? We made a deliberate and conscious decision not to try to cover everything , acknowledges the commission chairman , David Gardner, president of the University of California. What we focused on were the areas that needed care and attention. The report doesn't tell you, adds commission member Jay Sommer, a teacher of foreign languages at New Rochelle (N.Y.) High School and National Teacher of the Year in 1981, that there is a great deal of good. Whats the reason for the negative skewing of the commissions report? To get everyones attention. The reception, says Chairman Gardner, has been wonderful. To say that public education in America has no problems is to add 2 and 2 and half-doze- COAER PHOTOGRAPH (OF PATRICK KEHOE ASD CLASSMATES AT OR LAS D PARK SCHOOL IS ORLAND PARK IU i A VD INSIDE PHOTOGRAPHS BY KEVIN HORAN PICTl'RE GROLP MK 4 JANUARY 1, IM4 PMM0C MSAZBS |
