The Age of Educational Romanticism

The New Criterion, May 2008.

Excerpt:

This is the story of educational romanticism in elementary and secondary schools—its rise, its etiology, and, we have reason to hope, its approaching demise.

Educational romanticism consists of the belief that just about all children who are not doing well in school have the potential to do much better. Correlatively, educational romantics believe that the academic achievement of children is determined mainly by the opportunities they receive; that innate intellectual limits (if they exist at all) play a minor role; and that the current K-12 schools have huge room for improvement.

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The New Criterion