Acts 9:18... kinda

Teaching in the 408 writes:

I have, in the past, been critical of Teach For America, for promoting service over professionalism, for a borderline unethical disregard of further teaching, and most relevantly, for pursuing a two-sided approach to "the movement," that wildly over-estimates the achievement gap-closing potential two years of poor-to-mediocre teaching will have on the pursuit of an alum's law/ policy/ business career.

At the risk of belaboring, it is this last issue that is the most unfortunate. Oft-repeated and oft-cited, the duh-invoking notion that the entirety of the achievement gap cannot be closed solely from within the school site has germinated into a nice talking point, an easily applied defense of a variety of policy mistakes. Folks in my neck of the TFA woods are growing a lot more direct in voicing this two-parts-to-the-movement ideology, pushing the notion that they've hit on something special and unique.
Read more