Updated with both a new introduction and a series of interviews, the
second edition of Education and the Crisis of Public Values examines
American society's shift away from democratic public values, the ensuing
move toward a market-driven mode of education, and the last decade's
growing social disinvestment in youth. The book discusses the number of
ways that the ideal of public education as a democratic public sphere
has been under siege, including full-fledged attacks by corporate
interests on public school teachers, schools of education, and teacher
unions. It also reveals how a business culture cloaked in the guise of
generosity and reform has supported a charter school movement that aims
to dismantle public schools in favor of a corporate-friendly privatized
system. The book encourages educators to become public intellectuals,
willing to engage in creating a formative culture of learning that can
nurture the ability to defend public and higher education as a general
good - one crucial to sustaining a critical citizenry and a democratic
society.